#422. Movie Buzz
1. To strip and die outside L.A.
Antonio Banderas will head out on the trail of a missing stripper in The Big Bang and find nasty Russians and a potentially world-changing conspiracy.According to Variety, Banderas' character will be a hardboiled Los Angeles private eye who is hired to find a missing stripper and follows her trail into the New Mexico desert, where he tangles with a nasty Russian boxer, the LAPD and a billionaire who is trying to recreate the Big Bang.Filming begins in Spokane, Washington, in September under director Tony Krantz, who among other credits was executive producer for three seasons on 24.
2. Go West, young Mechanic
Simon West (Con Air) has been signed to direct the remake of the old Charles Bronson thriller The Mechanic, Variety reports.Jason Statham has been cast in the Bronson role, as a veteran hitman who takes a young protege under his wing. The catch: the kid is the child of one of his victims!Jan-Michael Vincent played the understudy in the original but no one has been signed for the role in the remake as yet. Hey, why not make it a gal?
3. Hyde and go freak
Keanu Reeves is in talks to play the world's most famous (or at least most frequently filmed) dual personality, in a retelling of Robert Louis Stevenson's The Strange Case of Dr Jekyll and Mr Hyde.Universal Pictures is developing the movie, which would bring the tale forward into a modernday setting, The Hollywood Reporter says.
4. Rosario Dawson goes behind bars for Percy
Seven Pounds star Rosario Dawson will step into prison for Percy Jackson and the Lightning Thief for Fox 2000, but it's no ordinary jail for her. Dawson will play Persephone, the imprisoned wife of Hades, Greek god of the underworld, says The Hollwood Reporter.Appearing as her spouse will be Steve Coogan (Tropic Thunder), in this tale of Zeus' half-human son Percy Jackson who is on a quest to save the world - and possibly Olympus as well.Already cast are Catherine Keener, Pierce Brosnan, Uma Thurman, Sean Bean, Kevin McKidd and Melina Kanakaredes.The movie, directed by Chris Columbus (Home Alone), is based on Robert Riordan's series of fantasy-adventure books.
5. Meat Train's Cooper to play Green Lantern?
Bradley Cooper, star of the gruesome horror flick Midnight Meat Train and one-time best bud of Sydney Bristow on Alias, is apparently a front-runner for the role of The Green Lantern.The DC superhero is scheduled to hit the big screen under director Martin Campbell (Casino Royale) and early reports had tipped Star Trek's new Captain Kirk, Chris Pine, for the role.However, HitFix.com reports that Cooper is now in the running and said to be pretty close to nailing the part.The Green Lantern, a.k.a. courageous test pilot Hal Jordan, becomes a member of an intergalactic peacekeeping corps when he is chosen by the dying Green Lantern guarding Earth's side of the galaxy to be his successor.
6. No Dwayne for 20,000 Leagues
Despite earlier reports that Dwayne Johnson (formerly The Rock of WWE fame) has been cast in 20,000 Leagues Under the Sea: Captain Nemo, director McG says otherwise.
He told Production Weekly that the role is still being offered to Will Smith, and that he has never even spoken to Johnson about the role.The movie is being made for Disney, where Johnson had his last two starring roles, Race to Witch Mountain and The Game Plan.In McG's reimagined Nemo, the captain of the futuristic (for its time) submarine Nautilus teams up with a mystery woman and a fugitive whaler to find a lost city with vast stores of forgotten knowledge - and a doomsday weapon.
7. Quinto thanks journo for Spock role
Zachary Quinto has credited a journalist from his hometown for helping him land the role of Spock in JJ Abrams' new Star Trek movie.According to a report on IMDB.com, Quinto had just landed his role as Sylar on TV's Heroes and was interviewed by a journalist from a small paper in Pittsburgh, who asked if there was any other role he'd like to play.Quinto, who had just heard about Abrams' next project, said he would like to play Spock. The interview was syndicated and picked up by other journalists, who then started asking him if it was true his dream since childhood was to play Spock.Quinto admitted that he gladly played along, and eventually the repeated exposure helped him land the part.
8. Huston, we have splashdown
Danny Huston, currently putting mutants in their "place" as the conniving villain Stryker in X-Men Origins: Wolverine, has signed on for a role in the Clash of the Titans remake.The Hollywood Reporter says Huston will play Poseidon, god of the sea. The main Greek deities will be played by Liam Neeson (Zeus) and Ralph Fiennes (Hades).Huston was previously seen as the leader of the ferocious vamps in 30 Days of Night.
9. Jackman kicks out dead people
Hugh Jackman will star in and produce Ghostopolis, an adaptation of a graphic novel by Doug TenNapel.The Hollywood Reporter says Jackman will play a guy who works for the Supernatural Immigration Task Force, whose role is to send ghosts that have escaped into our world back to the dead realm of Ghostopolis.When a young boy is accidentally sent over to Ghostopolis, Jackman's character must team up with the ghost of an old flame to bring him back to the land of the living.No director or screenwriter has been attached to the project yet.
10. Scarlett's directing debut goes to DVD
Scarlett Johansson has directed a movie - well, part of a movie. And the thing is, that part won't be seen in the movie, but only in the DVD release.Zap2It.com reports that the actress' segment for New York, I Love You was removed, with producer Emmanuel Benbihy describing it as a "compelling, albeit unconventional, narrative" that did not fit in with the rest of the film because it did not feature an interpersonal relationship.(Other directors on the project include Brett Ratner, Jiang Wen, Shekhar Kapoor, Natalie Portman and Mira Nair. The film is an anthology of love stories.)The New York Post, however, reports another possible reason for the removal of Johansson's shot-in-black-and-white segment featuring Kevin Bacon, describing it as unwatchable.
