A new look at Carrie and tha Gals!

Already high on the news that Harry Potter and the Deathly Hallows will be split into two movies, HP fans now have a new picture from upcoming Half-Blood Prince to salivate over!

(Click on the pic for the image in high resolution!)

NBCU and cable network FX have penned a deal worth $100 million for first viewing rights to 15 titles from Universal’s 2008 line-up.  This is NBCU’s first deal of its kind with a basic cable network!

Included in the deal: Judd Appatow’s Forgetting Sarah Marshall, Angelina Jolie’s Wanted, and George Clooney’s Leatherheads. Also part of the agreement are upcoming films The Mummy: Tomb of the Dragon Emperor, with Brendan Fraser and Maria Bello; Hellboy II: The Golden Army, starring Ron Perlman and Selma Blair; Death Race, featuring Jason Statham and Joan Allen; Dennis Quaid starrer The Express; Clint Eastwood’s Changeling; Baby Mama, starring Tina Fey and Amy Poehler; and The Strangers, with Liv Tyler and Scott Speedman. The pact also includes the recently released films Definitely, Maybe and Doomsday.

The movies will be available for showing on the network sometime in 2010, about 28-30 months after the theatrical releases.

Amulet

Written by: Kazu Kibuishi (author)
Sold to: Warner Bros. Pictures
A brother and sister move into their late great-grandfather’s home after their father dies. They must use his amulet to rescue their widowed mother from a beast who lures her into an underground world. Graphic novel published by Scholastic. This will be a five novel series. Willow Smith and Jaden Smith will star.

Lush Life

Written by: Richard Price
Sold to: Miramax Films
A restaurant manager and his bartender set out to walk a drunken friend home on New York’s Lower East Side. One of the men winds up on the wrong end of a bullet, and a murder investigation reveals much about the city and the characters involved in a mugging gone wrong.

Untitled Fogelman Pitch

Written by: Dan Fogelman
Sold to: CBS Films
Four semi-retired baby boomers embark on a getaway to Las Vegas. Pitch, part of a bidding war. Sold for $1 million.

Untitled Antin Project

Written by: Steven Antin
Sold to: Walt Disney Pictures
Musical. Set in a high school.

Dune

Written by: Frank Herbert (author)
Sold to: Paramount Pictures
Set on the remote desert planet of Arrakis, the one planet that produces the interstellar’s sole source of the spice Melange, a empirewide power struggle begins over the control of the spice.

Cyclops

Written by: Alexis Nolent (author)
Sold to: Warner Bros. Pictures
Mercenary forces have their soldiers wear Cyclops-like cameras in their helmets and broadcast in real time to both central command and living rooms. One mercenary chosen to lead an elite squad begins to realize he isn’t fighting for freedom and justice as much as for commerce.

Rocket Ship

Written by: Tiffany Paulsen
Sold to: Kopelson Entertainment
A father and son move to New Mexico and discover a large, shiny object buried in the desert behind their home. The discovery triggers events beyond their wildest imaginations.

Gran Torino

Written by: No writer yet attached.
Sold to: Warner Bros. Pictures
Being kept under wraps.

Rigged

Written by: Ben Mezrich (author)
Sold to: Summit Entertainment
John D’Agostino, an Italian kid from Brooklyn, studies at Harvard and lands on the Merc Exhange. After establishing himself, he hooks up with another young trader and a mysterious Middle Easterner to engage in a dangerous scheme to revolutionize the oil trading industry. Book, full title “Rigged: The True Story of an Ivy League Kid Who Changed the World of Oil, From Wall Street to Dubai”. True story.

Vanity

Written by: Adam Simon
Sold to: Hero Pictures International
Teens and young adults across continents deal with major issues in their lives.

Untitled Monahan Project

Written by: William Monahan
Sold to: Paramount Pictures
A drug dealer is traded a prison sentence to go undercover at a maximum security hospital for the criminally insane, where he tried to get a serial killer to divulge the whereabouts of his victims. To be based on an article that will appear in “Playboy” magazine later this year.

The Witness

Written by: Sandra Brown (author)
Sold to: Broken Road Productions
An idealistic public defender discovers a dark secret in the forest near her small South Carolina town. It leads her to turn state’s witness against her white supremacist ex-husband and father-in-law as she struggles to discover whom she can trust.

The Low Dweller

Written by: Brad Ingelsby
Sold to: Relativity Media, Scott Free Productions and Appian Way
Set in Indiana in the mid-1980s, a man is released after serving years in prison for murder, and wants only to follow through on his promise to marry his long-suffering girlfriend. That is, until he discovers that his loser brother has been murdered after getting involved in a seedy midwestern gambling racket. While the man did time for a murder he couldn’t avoid, he decides he can’t skip out on his obligation to avenge his brother’s murder. Spec script. Ridley Scott, Leonardo DiCaprio, Brooklyn Weaver and Relativity Media will produce. Ridley Scott will possibly direct.

Ronin

Written by: Joby Harold
Sold to: Warner Bros. Pictures
A masterless samurai is reincarnated in a dystopic near-future New York populated by squatters, factions and mutants. The ronin must try to destroy a demon with a mystic sword, which also is found in New York.

Minimum Wage

Written by: Tegan West
Sold to: Tapestry Films, Inc.
A thieving corporate executive is sentenced to live on minimum wage in the town his company bankrupted.

Bloom

Written by: Joby Harold
Sold to: Universal Pictures
An 11-year-old and his two friends acquire possession of a physics book that enables them to alter the physical properties of the world, including gravity.

Beat Kip

Written by: Todd Waldman & Rob Kerkovich
Sold to: Comedy Central
Three struggling college graduates find a purpose in life: to travel across the country to fight an Ivy League student who stole one of their girlfriends.

Source: Done Deal Professional

Anyone recognize this strapping young lad? His name is Anton Yelchin, and he is in negotiations to play a young Kyle Reese in the new Terminator movie. Anton has been in a number of films, most recently Charlie Bartlett and Alpha Dog (with Justin Timberlake), the Showtime series “Huff”, and has a cool starring role in the upcoming feature by director/producer J.J. Abrams, a little flick called Star Trek.

Apparently, the Reese in this movie is going to befriend a character named Marcus (played by Sam Worthington), who is an early version of the Terminator played by Arnold in the first three films.

There seems to be an underlying tone in the film and TV versions of the whole Terminator series, that machines can learn to love. We see this with The Terminator and John Connor in T2 and T3, and I think it’s being hinted at in “Terminator: The Sarah Connor Chronicles”. Maybe we’ll see a side of the Terminators that think for themselves, out of love and a conscience, rather than them just being on a mission.

I have come to love the new Terminator TV series, and I think they should totally bring Summer Glau into the film versions as well. She may be small, but she’s mighty!

On a side note: it is also being said that Paul Haggis, Academy Award-winning scribe of Crash, Million Dollar Baby, and Casino Royale (as well as the upcoming Quantum of Solace) is in talks to script the sequel to Terminator Salvation. I LOVE Paul Haggis, and I can’t think of anyone better to take on the project. His versatility in writing (as shown with the movies listed above) ensure an action packed flick with lots of depth. Hope this happens!

Dreamworks’ newest addition to their line of successful animation pictures is an adaptation of the children’s book series How to Train Your Dragon by Cressida Cowell.  The story centers on the timid son of a Viking chief who must capture and train a dragon in order to be initiated into his tribe.

Joining the cast are Jay Baruchel (Knocked Up, Million Dollar Baby), Gerard Butler (300), America Ferrera (ABC’s Ugly Betty, The Sisterhood of the Traveling Pants), Jonah Hill (Knocked Up, Superbad) and Christopher Mintz-Plasse (Superbad).  Baruchel will voice the boy, named Hiccup Horrendous Haddock the Third, who is saddled with an undersized and uncooperative dragon. Butler is the father and chief of the tribe, Stoick the Vast, while Ferrera voices Astrid, who partners with Hiccup for the initiation. Hill will play Snotlout, a bully who thinks he should be the next chief, and Mintz-Plasse portrays Fishlegs, a Viking big in size but small in brains.

This will be Dreamworks’ second film that will be made in Ultimate 3D.  It is scheduled for release on March 26, 2010.

Sounds kind of interesting.  We’ll see.

For all of you sci-fi lovers out there, prepare yourselves for the orgasm you’re about to have.

Frank Herbert’s 1965 masterpiece “Dune” is set for a remake!  Actor-cum-director Peter Berg (The Kingdom, Friday Night Lights, and this summer’s upcoming Will Smith anti-hero blockbuster Hancock) will direct the movie for Paramount Pictures.

The film, it is being reported, is currently out to writers, and producers are looking for a faithful adaptation of the book.  Paramount is looking to make this a tentpole project, hoping to spur a successful franchise out of the subsequent books.

I absolutely loved this book when I read it, and was more than slightly disheartened by the original movie (it was released a year before I was born and I saw it in the 2000s, people, it was bad).  This definitely requires some serious dedication to the source material if it’s going to be successful…  Too many adaptations are failing these days because film-makers insist on changing too much of the plot (can anyone say Eragon?).  PLEASE DO A GOOD JOB, FOR GOD SAKES!

Two-time Academy Award-nominated director Stephen Frears (The Queen) is set to helm a 1920s period piece based on the book “Cheri” by French author Collette.  Michelle Pfeiffer had already signed on to do the project, but it has been announced that Kathy Bates and Rupert Friend (Pride & Prejudice) will now be joining her.

Friend will play the title character, and Bates is in final negotiations to play his mother, Madame Peloux, a famed courtesan in 1920s France. Peloux sends the spoiled Cheri to her courtesan pal Lea de Lonval (Pfeiffer) for an adult education, but their six-year affair comes to a painful end when he’s forced to marry a wealthy young woman.

Cheri will begin filming later next month and is slated for release sometime in 2009 (exact date not yet specified).

These are some incredibly talented actors and, from what I hear, Frears is a great director (you don’t get two Oscar nods if you aren’t!)… so I’m interested to see what they do with this!

Bone

Written by: Jeff Smith (creator)
Sold to: Warner Bros. Pictures
Three cousins from the Bone family, who are small, white and bald humanlike creatures with big noses, run out of their hometown and find themselves in a mysterious valley where they are separated and hunted by other creatures. They are taken in by a girl named Thorn and her grandmother, and find out that the valley is threatened by an evil force called the Lord of the Locusts.

Snaked

Written by: Clifford Meth
Sold to: Independent producer(s)
Centers on the personal and political exploits of a government employee with supernatural, snake-like abilities.

Imaginary Larry

Written by: David R. Goodman
Sold to: Odd Lot Entertainment
After a young boy grows up, he no longer needs his 30-year-old imaginary friend Larry. When the man kisses a girl for the first time, the action permanently banishes Larry to Imaginary World. Larry vows to make himself real and exact revenge on the girl who stole his best friend.

Untitled O’Keefe & Staples Project

Written by: Sean O’Keefe & Will Staples
Sold to: Universal Pictured
An elite team secretly journeys to a foreign country to take down an international criminal. When the mission is compromised, the team suddenly finds itself on the run, desperate to uncover the truth behind a major conspiracy.

Untitled Apatow Comedy

Written by: Judd Apatow
Sold to: Universal Pictures & Sony Pictures Entertainment
Being kept under wraps. Judd Apatow will also produce and direct. Adam Sandler, Seth Rogen and Leslie Mann will star.

The Blade Itself

Written by: Aaron Stockard
Sold to: Miramax Films
Two childhood friends from Chicago make their reputation committing petty crimes as kids before choosing different paths in life. When they are reunited years later, one is forced to decide how far he will go to protect the secrets of his past.

Harbinger

Written by: Jim Shooter (creator)
Sold to: Paramount Pictures
Harbingers are humans with powers that can be unlocked by “omega” harbingers. Teenager Pete Stanchek finds himself on a collision course with an older “omega” who used his gifts to become an evil industrialist.

Untitled Kutzera & Mickel Project

Written by: Dale Kutzera & David Mickel
Sold to: Twentieth Century Fox
Animal-themed story.

Attack of the Killer Tomatoes!

Written by: Kent Nichols & Douglas Sarine
Sold to: Emmett/Furla Films
A group of scientists must work together in order to save the world from mutated, killer tomatoes. Remake of the 1978 cult film.

Shell Game

Written by: Len Wiseman & Chris Morgan
Sold to: Columbia Pictures
Set in the future, a detective is faced with a moral dilemma as he investigates the dangerous black-market business of immortality.

Sacrilege

Written by: Neil Marshall
Sold to: Rogue Pictures
Set in the Old West during the Gold Rush.

Rosemary’s Baby

Written by: No writer yet hired
Sold to: Paramount Pictures
A young couple move into a gothic New York apartment, where they are befriended by their elderly neighbors. After the woman becomes mysteriously pregnant, she discovers that the neighbors actually are part of a coven of witches and that her husband has allowed her to be impregnated by the devil in exchange for a successful career. Remake of the 1968 classic.

Monster Zoo

Written by: Douglas TenNapel (author)
Sold to: Paramount Pictures – for low-six against seven figures!
At a zoo, an ancient idol awakens and starts to mutate the caged animals, and a group of teenagers must band together to try to stop the idol and the evil from destroying the world.

Uprising

Written by: Charles Leavitt
Sold to: Columbia Pictures
After Earth becomes occupied by a powerful alien race, an uprising by a group of Earth’s citizens occurs. Wolfgang Petersen will direct.

Untitled Muppet Movie

Written by: Jason Segel & Nick Stoller
Sold to: Walt Disney Pictures
No details given.

The Wishbones

Written by: Tom Perrotta
Sold to: Warner Independent Pictures
A 30-year-old failed musician, living with his parents in New Jersey, is about to marry his longtime girlfriend when he begins an affair with a bohemian poet from Manhattan who makes him question his life and future.

1906

Written by: Brad Bird
Sold to: Warner Bros. Pictures & Walt Disney Pictures
A college student begins to investigate the murder of his father, uncovering a web of deceit that has left the city vulnerable to the sort of fire that breaks out when the Great Earthquake of 1906 hits San Francisco.

Lil Homiez

Written by: Robert Townsend & Dallas Jackson
Sold to: Overture Films
Five multiethnic kids try to save their neighborhood from being taken over by an evil land developer.

Heavy Metal

Written by: No writer yet attached
Sold to: Paramount Pictures
Centers on eight or nine erotic & violent stories. Inspired by the 1970’s magazine Heavy Metal.

Source: Done Deal Professional

Disney is dipping into its classics vault yet again for a remake of the 1975 classic Escape to Witch Mountain, (un)cleverly redubbed “Race to Witch Mountain”.

Alexander Ludwig (The Seeker: The Dark is Rising) and AnnaSophia Robb (The Reaping, Charlie and the Chocolate Factory) will be taking over the roles of two psychic siblings who are in a race to get to witch mountain (which I guess is the inspiration behind the uninspiring name change) so that they can help save the world (that’s new to me! Didn’t they just want to escape the gold-digging rich guy in the first one?).

What do you think?

-or-

Joining them on their perilous journey is Dwayne “The Rock” Johnson as the Las Vegas cab driver with the heart of gold, trying to help the kids in any way he can, and Carla Gugino (Night at the Museum) as a discredited astrophysicist and UFO expert.

The movie is supposed to start filming this month and is slated for a March 2009 release.