Entertainment Weekly's Hollywood Insider blog is out-scooping everyone today.
Last week, we learned that Amanda Seyfried was forced to drop out of Zack Snyder's "Babes Behind Bars" fantasy flick SUCKER PUNCH when HBO wouldn't budge on her shooting schedule for BIG LOVE. Being a fan of Seyfried's for a variety of reasons, this disappointed me. But HBO's stubbornness has, according to EW, created an opportunity for Emily Browning (recently in THE UNINVITED, but probably best known as Violet in LEMONY SNICKET) to take on the lead role of Baby Doll, a badass, asylum-bound chick who fantasizes of busting out of the joint with her fellow inmates (who'll possibly be played by Evan Rachel Wood, Abbie Cornish, Emma Stone and Vanessa Hudgens).
When Snyder was doing the press rounds prior to the release of WATCHMEN, he was talking up SUCKER PUNCH as a deliriously violent R-rated prison flick set in the 1960s. This was before WATCHMEN did whatever you want to say it did at the box office. I suppose he might catch some flack from Warner Bros. regarding SUCKER PUNCH's rating, but as long as he keeps the budget under control (and remember, he brought 300 in at a very reasonable $65 million), I've a feeling they'll let him go nuts with the bloodletting and bone-snapping.
As for anything else that might snag him an R... I've a feeling you'll have to make do with the classics of the genre: e.g. Jonathan Demme's CAGED HEAT or Jack Hill's bawdy duo of THE BIG DOLL HOUSE and THE BIG BIRD CAGE.
