According to Deadline Universal has hired Tony Gilroy to write the script for Bourne 4. Gilroy has worked on all the past Bourne scripts and has been called “the key screenwriter” behind the Bourne franchise, so it looks like it is in good hands.

Frank Marshall and Pat Crowley are back to produce and Universal are aiming to release the film sometime in 2012. No word yet on whether Matt Damon or Paul Greengrass will be back, however.

Greengrass announced in December that he would not be returning to direct the fourth film, with speculation that it was due to a rift between Universal and himself over the hiring of writer Josh Zetumer. Matt Damon said he wouldn’t do it without Greengrass, and in February the actor said “there’ll probably be a prequel of some kind with another actor and another director before we do another one.”

I’m guessing Universal would prefer to get Greengrass and Damon back, although they may end up hiring another actor/director combo if the duo decides against returning. Greengrass has nothing lined up at the moment (so far as we know) having recently decided against directing a remake of the 1966 sci-fi movie Fantastic Voyage for James Cameron.

Do you want to see Greengrass/Damon return for Bourne 4, or would you be more interested in a prequel/reboot?

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Good news Avatar fans (fans of the cartoon that is), The Last Airbender director M. Night Shyamalan is in it for the long run! I guess we can decided whether this is actually ‘good news’ after we see the film this summer, but I’ve been quite impressed with all the trailers that have been released up until now, so hopefully M. Night doesn’t disappoint.

In an interview with UGO the director spoke about the film and it’s sequels. He mentioned he wants to make a small film before making the follow-up, and he sees the trilogy as one big arc, comparing it to The Lord of the Rings.

- The Last Airbender is very much the first in a planned trilogy. Night compares it to Lord of the Rings in that it is all one story not, “more adventures” with your favorite characters. The three films will mirror the three seasons of the series, with some tweaks.

- Night plans to direct all three, but before the second one he wants to bang out a smaller-budgeted thriller.

- The thriller is *not* Unbreakable 2, though he still hopes one day to get to that. And he knows Bruce Willis feels the same way.

-Night hopes the CG in The Last Airbender will be unique in that there isn’t as much quick-cutting as in commonly seen in CG-heavy films. Go back and look at his other films and you will see a lot of long takes. This means the CG is going to have to be really top notch, because it can’t be hidden away with cutting.

Last year we heard that M. Night Shyamalan was already working on the script for the second movie, so if the first film is a success it shouldn’t take too long before the second can begin production. Producer Frank Marshall said they are aiming for the trilogy to take place over 6 years, which means the films should be released around 2-3 years apart.

We can expect another trailer for The Last Airbender to be released alongside Iron Man 2 in May.

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Producer Frank Marshall tweeted that the next trailer for M. Night Shyamalan’s The Last Airbender will be attached to Iron Man 2 which is due for release on May 7th in the US. The trailer will also be making it’s way online around that date too.

Click here to watch the second official trailer that was released a month ago, and here to watch a very cool TV spot that debuted during the Winter Olympics.

The Last Airbender will be released on July 2nd 2010.

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Centurion is set in AD 117 and centers on the 9th Legion fighting for their lives behind enemy lines after a devastating guerrilla attack. It’s like 300, only with a winter backdrop and the warriors actually wear armour for protection, not just to look cool in slo-mo shots. The film stars Michael Fassbender (300), Dominic West (300), Olga Kurylenko (Quantum of Solace) and is directed by Niel Marshall, the man behind The Decent and Doomsday.

Today IGN released the first trailer for the film, and from the opening titles it appears Warner Bros. will be releasing the film; however that may only be in the UK. No US release date has been released as of yet (the cast is full of non-Americans, so if it is released in the US it may only be a limited one).

Centurion will be released in the UK on April 23rd. I’ll post the US release date once (and if) it gets one.

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Earlier this year The Last Airbender producer Frank Marshall said that we can expect a second trailer for the movie by Christmas, however he has now tweeted that fans will have to wait as not enough effects shots by Industrial Light & Magic are completed:

Not enough ILM shots finished, so LAST AIRBENDER trailer will not debut until Feb…

ILM’s effects are always amazing, so it will probably be worth the wait. In the meantime, here’s the teaser:

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The Last Airbender producer Frank Marshall recently updated his Twitter page with the following:

For those of you wondering about LAST AIRBENDER, all is well in post and we r working on a trailer for Xmas…

…and that’s the news. Here’s The Last Airbender teaser trailer to fill up space:

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M. Night Shyamalan is mostly known for his twist endings and supernatural plots, however with The Last Airbender he has to get a bit more technical and delve deeper into the world of special effects and green screen. VFX World had the chance to visit The Last Airbender set and they spoke to the director about the effects process. He also mentions the recently released teaser trailer which he says they “worked forever on”.

Although The Last Airbender represents his first major CG film, he suggested that he is quickly adapting to the use of high-tech in his process.

“I’m not the most techie guy in the world, so if I can keep coming from character, I can keep it grounded,” Shyamalan chuckled. “When we saw the cartoon, the mythology was so well thought out and had Buddhism, martial arts and CGI, but the kind that is character-based and that’s coming from emotions. So I could tell ILM…and speak in terms of character point of view and be effective in that way.”

Shyamalan admitted that he’s already into the cut of the film so he can provide ILM plates to start their daunting work. “I usually don’t touch editing until I am done shooting. But with a movie of this scale with the level of CGI, they need nine months to do a particular shot of waterbending. So I’m already editing to hand over the shots.”

The first glimpse of what is to come with those vfx debuted with The Last Airbender teaser trailer on June 23rd. Showing an epic water scene with warships blasting flaming missiles at Aang’s cliffside monastery, the director said that’s just a taste of what audiences can expect. “The teaser we worked on forever. I shot it and it was my idea. We did it all ourselves as first unit and it was our big effort to come out and make a big splash.”

They also spoke to producer Frank Marshall who said that The Last Airbender would be like their Star Wars as it is is the first time he has worked on a movie that has a totally made up world. Click here to read the whole article!

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We are only just starting to get marketing material from M. Night Shyamalan’s The Last Airbender which is still a year away, however producer Frank Marshall has revealed that Shyamalan is already working on the second movie, and that they plan on shooting the trilogy over the span of 6 years.

From Starlog:

Unlike Peter Jackson’s THE LORD OF THE RINGS, this trio of films won’t lense back-to-back-to-back. “We’re shooting them one at a time, because they’re being written one at a time,” says veteran producer (and STARLOG favorite) Frank Marshall. “Night is now working on the script for the second movie, but he hasn’t had time to write the second or third ones. He’s looking at the arc of all three. One of the things we’ll be doing is using the sets, ships and elements for each different nation in this film and incorporating them into movies two and three. We’re not waiting. There just isn’t enough time. Night will finish this movie, then the script and then we’ll prepare for the next one. I think it’ll probably happen over six years.”

Whenever young actors are involved, especially when they are the main character, the film makers have to be quick off the mark when making sequels due to mother natures gift of ‘ageing’. In 6 years Noah Ringer who plays Aang will be 20, and no longer a kid.

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Frank Marshall, who is currently working on The Last Airbender, spoke to ComingSoon.net about a few films that are currently in the pipeline. Marshall produced the entire Bourne trilogy and he gave a small update on the status of Bourne 4, which was announced last October.

“We’d like to shoot next year,” he told us. “It’s trying to get everybody’s schedules in the right place and getting the script right. We’ve done pretty well with these scripts that are pretty loosely put together, but I’d like the script to be really solid this time before we go forward. We’re spending a lot of time on this story.”

He was also asked about Jurassic Park 4, which has been on and off for years. In the past we have heard rumours of it revolving around the extinction and another about dinosaurs with guns attached to them, however it seems those ideas have been scrapped.

“We just have to see if they can come up with a story. We don’t have a story.”

I don’t think we will get to see Jurassic Park 4 for a while, if ever, which is a shame as we haven’t had a good dinosaur movie in years.

Lastly, he spoke about The NeverEnding Story which Warner Bros. announced they would be rebooting in February.

“We love the book and we’ve always thought there was an opportunity (because) there were a lot of elements in the book that weren’t in the movie. It’s another one where we’re still working on the rights and it’s a huge thing to get it. Once we get it, we’ll bring on a writer, but that’s kind of off in the distance. But it’s a great story.”

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Frank Marshall, producer of the Bourne trilogy, updated his Twitter profile with the following messages:

Bourne4 is in the works for Summer 2011…

George Nolfi is the writer of Bourne4, should have a draft by June.

If they keep on target this would mean Bourne 4 should start filming sometime next year. Matt Damon and director Paul Greengrass have already signed up to return, and George Nolfi wrote The Bourne Ultimatum so we can expect a film as good as the previous ones.

With producers, directors and actors revealing information on Twitter we can expect more of these mini updates.

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