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It's the Mid-'90s All Over Again

In 1994 I devoured Richard Preston's nonfiction best-seller The Hot Zone and then didn't get a wink of sleep for approximately two weeks afterward. (Stephen King called it "one of the most horrifying things I've ever read," so I was in good company.)  The book was about the real-life events that led to the deadly Ebola and Marburg virus outbreaks in Africa and their possible spread to a CDC facility in the US, and so I freaked out when anyone sneezed or coughed near me and gave anyone who so much as sniffled in my presence the stink-eye.  The following year, the film Outbreak was released (which was not directly based on The Hot Zone... the film adaptation of the THZ never got off the ground), and that riled me up all over again.

But humankind somehow managed to avoid being wiped out so far, and I'd forgotten all about the possibility of scary airborne viruses until the whole SARS thing in 2003, and more recently the swine flu/H1N1 pandemic last year. But now that I've just read the news that director Steven Soderbergh is going to fast-track Contagion, a Traffic-like multi-story film about the outbreak of a deadly virus, I'm preparing myself for more insomnia.  The Informant!'s screenwriter, Scott Z. Burns, has apparently turned in such an awesome script that Soderbergh is putting his plans for the Liberace biopic on hold and gearing up to shoot Contagion this fall. Word is he's already gotten his main man Matt Damon to sign on, along with Jude Law, Marion Cotillard (love her) and Kate Winslet (love her, too!). What's more, those who have read the screenplay deemed it "terrifying."  Great. Just great.  (I'm still morbidly excited for this one, though. But I'll probably don one of those goofy face masks in the movie theater while watching it -- you never can be too careful...)

Still Enchanting?

It's been established that a lot of redblog readers are huge Disney fans, so if you count yourself among them, I'm curious for your take on this bit of news: A sequel to the 2007 hit Enchanted is officially in the works. BUT no one from the original creative team will be involved -- we've got ourselves a different director and screenwriter.

Overseeing Giselle's ongoing adventures in the real world will be Anne Fletcher, who used to be a choreographer (which will come in handy for the requisite musical numbers, wouldn't you say?) and then moved behind the camera to direct Step Up, 27 Dresses, and last summer's big hit The Proposal. Jessie Nelson (I Am Sam) will be penning the script.  None of the cast members have signed on yet, though it is expected they will (I'd say that's absolutely critical... helloooo!).  Since I truly loved Enchanted, I'm going to remain cautiously optimistic on this one, though it always puts a little dent in my expectations when a franchise gets passed over to a new team. 

If they screw this up then not only are they going to have some very disappointed fans, but also a lot of rowdy and unhappy singing and dancing pigeons, rats and cockroaches to deal with.  That's never a good combination.

Hi-Ho, Everyone! The New Muppet Movie Gets a Conchord Director!

Two years ago, as Forgetting Sarah Marshall was moving Jason Segel from the TV to the big-screen, it was clear actor-writer Segel loved the Muppets. ("Dracula musical! Dracula musical!" I'm still chaffed that "Dracula's Lament" didn't get nominated for Best Song.)

In fact, soon after Sarah Marshall, Segel and his Marshall director and co-writer Nicholas Stoller began working on a Muppet movie script (sometimes known as The Cheapest Muppet Movie Ever Made) that would effectively relaunch the Muppet film franchise for a new generation.

For a while this winter it seemed Phil Lord and Chris Miller, the directors of Cloudy With a Chance of Meatballs, might be signing on to direct the new Muppet film (they would have been perfect), but instead they're off to do a big-screen remake of 21 Jump Street that will star Jonah Hill.

According to The Hollywood Reporter, the Muppet directing gig has now gone to James Bobin, the behind-the-scenes co-creator, co-writer, and sometimes director of the much-beloved HBO series Flight of the Conchords. Before seeing Jermaine Clement and Bret MacKenzie perform as the Conchords and working with them to create the HBO series, Bobin had worked as a writer and director on Sacha Baron-Cohen's Da Ali G Show. And Bobin's musical-comedy experience with the Conchords could certainly be a plus for a Muppets movie.

If you're worried all this sounds like they might be turning the grand tradition of the Muppets into some sort of hipster-ironic in-joke, don't worry. Segel has often professed his sincere admiration for Jim Henson's genius creations and this promises to be a true labor of love for him--something Muppet-focused that harkens back to the magical, hope-and-dreams purity of the original Muppet Movie, as opposed to just another Muppet classics adaptation or genre spoof. Besides, the appeal of the Muppets, The Muppet Show, and the Muppet movies has always been that they're a little more sly and knowing, quicker with a wry inside show-business joke than the original Sesame Street Muppets were.

This will be the first big-screen Muppet film since 1999's Muppets from Space (there have been a couple TV movies). Since Jim Henson's death in 1990 (20 years ago! Yipes!), his son Brian has taken over voicing Kermit the Frog and co-running the Jim Henson Company with his sister Lisa. In 2004 the Muppets were purchased by Disney, so this also marks the Mouse's first major film project with the property.

And now, since it's Saturday, how 'bout joining me over the jump for some music videos!

Poltergeist Actress Zelda Rubenstein and Catcher in the Rye Author J.D. Salinger Die

Yes, I know it's weird to headline character actress Zelda Rubenstein's passing over that of J.D. Salinger, but of course redblog is a film blog first and foremost, and Salinger famously didn't make a lot of movies.

Four-foot, three-inch Rubenstein was in her late 40s when she rose to pop culture prominence in 1982's Poltergeist, as the medium Tangina. She also appeared Poltergeist II and III. Oddly, my favorite memory of Rubenstein was from Sixteen Candles as the organist at the sister's wedding. I just love when Sam's mother says of heavily "muscle-relaxed" sister Ginny, "She's a little out of it," and Rubenstein responds, "Just a little." Always cracks me up.

Rubenstein was also a very early public AIDs-awareness activist in the mid-'80s, and worked throughout her life on behalf of rights and respect for little people. The 76-year-old had been gravely ill since late December, when her family and companion had taken her off life-support due to kidney and lung failure.

Then there's good old Jerome David, who died today at the age of 91, having lived in semi-seclusion in Cornish, New Hampshire, out of the public eye since the mid-'50s. Though he was said to have been a film lover, Salinger was infamously unwilling to let his written works, including The Catcher in the Rye, be adapted into movies. Many speculate this was due to feeling his story "Uncle Wiggily in Connecticut" was mishandled when being adapted into the 1949 film My Foolish Heart with Dana Andrews and Susan Hayward. Since then, Salinger aggressively pursued copy-right lawsuits against anyone attempting to adapt his work.

Each new generation has had several directors and actors who've wanted to take a run at portraying Holden Caulfield on screen, and all failed to convince Salinger to give them the film rights. At one point in the '50s Salinger himself wanted to play Holden on stage, saying that if he couldn't play his character no one could. Jerry Lewis, Billy Wilder, Brando, and Nicholson all made attempts to launch film versions. In the past decade Tobey Maguire, Leonardo DiCaprio, Spielberg, Harvey Weinstein, Terrance Malick, and John Cusack have also expressed their desire to make a Catcher film.

An experimental art film entitled The Catcher in the Rye was created in 2008 by artist Nigel Tomm. It's just 75 minutes of blue screen, underscoring the point that both Salinger and Holden would hate the idea of a film capturing the story, and that it's best to just read the book. 

Does Salinger's death increase the possibility of a Catcher in the Rye film someday? Probably not anytime soon. He's survived by his wife Colleen O’Neill, his estranged daughter Margaret, and his son Matthew--whether or not they would now have the final decision on any adaptations would depend on the nature of Salinger's estate and his wishes. As I understand it, under US copyright law, The Catcher in the Rye would not enter the public domain until 70 years after its author's death. Other sources suggest that based on its copyright renewal, it could be available after 2044. (If we have an copyright legal experts out there, feel free to chime in!) Either way, don't expect any movie versions in the near future unless it's with the permission of the Salinger estate.

UPDATE: The Hollywood Reporter sheds a little more light on the film-rights situation: "In 2008, the rights to his works were placed in the J.D. Salinger Literary Trust, of which the author was sole trustee. Phyllis Westberg, who was Salinger's agent at Harold Ober Associates in New York, declined Thursday to say who the trustees are now that the author is dead -- but she was clear that nothing has changed in terms of licensing movie, TV or stage rights."

I Am Number Four Gets a Director

Remember James Frey?  He was the author Oprah infamously give a smack-down to on her show three years ago after he admitted to fabricating parts of his "memoir," A Million Little Pieces.  The controversy didn't seem to hurt him too much, though... by that time the follow-up to AMLP, My Friend Leonard, had also hit the best-seller list, and then in 2008 his first foray into fiction, Bright Shiny Morning, did extremely well to boot.  He's currently working on Illumination, a novel he's described as "the third book of the Bible," which will depict what Jesus would be up to were he living in modern-day New York City.  If you read some of the things he has planned for the main character (meaning Jesus) here, I'm sure you'll agree that there won't be ANY controversy around this book.  Uh-uh. No way.  It'll be smooth sailing for him.  Absolutely no one will protest. 

In the midst of all of the scandal he's endured over the past four years, Frey somehow found the time to partner with Joby Hughes (an author I couldn't find much information about -- has anyone else out there heard of him?) to create what will be a six-volume sci-fi young-adult series.  Hmm, sounds like someone's got Harry Potter or Twilight envy.

The first of the books, I Am Number Four, is due out this fall, but without even knowing if it'll be successful, DreamWorks bought the movie rights last June, got Michael Bay to produce, secured Al Gough and Miles Millar (both for the TV series Smallville) to write the screenplay, and has just announced that D.J. Caruso (Disturbia, Eagle Eye) will direct. Here's a snippet from its plot description: A group of nine aliens escaped their home planet just before it was annihilated by a rival species. Hiding out on Earth, the title character disguises himself as a human high schooler, only to discover he is being hunted still by his planet's enemy.

I think the premise sounds cool -- it's just that I have mixed feelings about Caruso.  Loved Disturbia... hated Eagle Eye.  So I'll be on the look-out for any casting news for I Am Number Four, and cannot wait to see a trailer. It may be a while, though; Caruso might choose to shoot The Art of Making Money, a true story about counterfeiter Art Williams, first.

What's Up (and Who's in and Out) in Asgard?

Filming Starts This Week on Thor--But Not Without a Hiccup

Another day, another bit of super-hero movie news!

I'd been meaning to post some Thor casting updates all fall long, and well... never got around to it. Now director Kenneth Branagh's big-screen adaptation of Marvel's God of Thunder super-hero is actually underway filming in L.A in anticipation of its May 2011 release. (A release date that no longer has to contend with fellow Marvel hero Spider-Man.)

Hopefully in the best show-biz tradition, the Thor production got its bit of bad luck out of the way early. Actor Stuart Townsend--fiance of Charlize Theron, star of Queen of the Damned (as Lestat), and a supporting actor in The League of Extraordinary Gentlemen--had been cast as the Errol-Flynn-esque Fandral, one of Thor's Warrior's Three from the comics.

The Warriors are a fan-favorite band of Asgardians--stalwart allies of Thor sometimes presented as noble, bickering, almost Three-Stooges-like comic relief. Ray Stevenson (Rome, Punisher: War Journal) will don a fat suit to play the jolly, Falstaff-like Volstagg, and Japanese actor Tadanobu Asano is the more serious, Charles Bronson-like Hogun.

However, all was not "stalwart" in pre-production. Townsend reportedly had "creative differences," showed up six hours late to a rehearsal reading last week, and was fired over the weekend. He is being replaced with rookie actor Joshua Dallas, who's had bit parts in a few films and has a larger role in the 2011 film Red Tails, producer George Lucas's look at the Tuskegee Airmen of WWII that just finished filming. (One of my favorite up-and-coming young actors, Dominic Cooper of The History Boys, The Escapist, and An Education, was talked about last fall for Fandral, but alas twas not to be.)

Now we all know you don't get fired just for missing one table read. Clearly there were other "issues" with Townsend that led to Branagh, Marvel, and Paramount pulling the plug right before filming started. And of course, movie geeks know that this is not the first time Townsend "parted ways" with a major fantasy-action film production at the last minute: He was cast in 2000 as Aragorn in Peter Jackson's Lord of the Rings but let go early in the filming when Jackson felt Townsend just didn't have the battle-weary gravitas the part required. Instead, Viggo Mortensen jumped on a plane to New Zealand and rushed into the role with only a few days notice. And that seemed to work out okay.

As for the rest of Thor's cast, join me over the jump, where I'll rundown those actors still with the production. 

Green Lantern Gets Its Villain, and Its Gossip Girl

Back in July, Ryan Reynolds beat out the likes of Justin Timberlake and It Guy Bradley Cooper for the role of Hal Jordan/Green Lantern in Warner Brothers' adaptation of the Green Lantern comic. I know Locke is a fan of Reynolds, and he's certainly grown on me over the past year -- I thought he was the best thing about X-Men Origins: Wolverine -- but the jury's still out on whether or not he can carry not one, but two superhero flicks that are both scheduled for release in the summer of 2011 (his X-Men character, Deadpool, is getting his own spin-off, too).

Now we know who's going to be helping him shoulder the burden of turning the long-delayed Green Lantern project into a blockbuster franchise: Peter Sarsgaard and Blake Lively.  Now, if you're not a teenage girl (or a thirtysomething woman who watches shows/movies meant for teenage girls... cough, cough - ME), you might not have even heard of Lively before.  She's best known for playing rich Upper East Sider Serena van der Woodsen on The CW's Gossip Girl. She's also starred in the two Sisterhood of the Traveling Pants films, was recently in the indie The Private Lives of Pippa Lee, and will appear opposite Ben Affleck in this fall's The Town.  In her Green Lantern auditions, she triumphed over Jennifer Garner and Keri Russell to land the part of the female lead, Carol Ferris, an aerospace engineer and Hal's love interest. Those who are familiar with the comics know that Ferris might undergo somewhat of a transformation over the course of the story (trying to be vague so as not to spoil anything for those who want to be surprised), but it's unclear how, if at all, this subplot will turn up in the film.

While Green Lantern fans seem to be divided into "She sucks, can't act and is going to ruin this franchise!" and "So what, you freakin' nerds, she's HOT!" camps, everyone's on the same page (a happy one) about the addition of Sarsgaard as the film's main villain. However, there is a bit of head-scratching about the fact that the An Education star isn't playing Sinestro, the main baddie everyone assumed would be in the movie. Instead, he's on board as Dr. Hector Hammond, the son of a senator who starts rockin' some psychic powers after he discovers a meteor.

Filming is set to commence in New Orleans in March, so I'm sure we'll get more details about the script, and maybe even some pictures from the set, in the next few months.  In the meantime, what do any Green Lantern fans out there think about this latest casting news? 

Snip! Sony Cuts Spider-Man 4's Web!

Script Disagreements Leave Director Sam Raimi and Star Tobey Maguire Out
--Billion-Dollar Franchise Will Be Rebooted as High School Tale in 2012

Okay, as Sam the Man says in Jurassic Park,  hold on to your butts...

Sony Pictures has decided to scrap plans for a Spider-Man 4 May 2011 release date and end the current Spidey film franchise as created by Sam Raimi and starring Tobey Maguire. Instead, the studio will move ahead with plans that were already in the pipeline to reboot the amazingly lucrative movie series, recasting with a younger actor as Peter Parker and setting it in high school.

Over the holidays there were increasingly loud rumblings that all was not well in Spidey-land. Back in the summer, Sony hired James Vanderbilt (the brilliant Zodiac screenwriter) to write Spidey 4, a direct sequel to Spider-Man 1 through 3. Raimi reportedly didn't like Vanderbilt's script and its tone, so Raimi brought in Alvin Sargent, who'd worked on Spidey 2 and 3. When Raimi and Sony still couldn't see eye to eye on the scripts last week, the scheduled production start on Spidey 4 was delayed a week, spurring speculation the intended blockbuster would have trouble making its May 6, 2011 release date.

Meanwhile, Sony had kept Vanderbilt writing, charging him to come up with scripts for both Spidey 5 and 6, and to set them back in high school in preparation for eventually rebooting the franchise with a new (and therefore cheaper) director and younger star. Then yesterday, "eventually" came a lot faster than expected. Sony ended the current franchise and is now on to Plan B: Vanderbilt's scripts for Spider-Man 4 and 5 will now become Spider-Man 2.1 and 2.2.

Many online bloggers and entertainment reporters are currently circling the crash site, sifting the debris to offer up their take on "what it all means." Clearly this is not an ideal situation for Sony--it leaves the studio without a big tent-pole franchise for summer of 2011, and pulling the plug at the last minute is never good for publicity or the financial bottom line.

And finding a good director to jump in and take over the reboot and rush into production for a 2012 date is going to be a challenge. Superhero movie fans are all too familiar with how these games of directorial "musical chairs" often go. (See: the Superman mess of the late '90s and early '00s involving Tim Burton, McG, Michael Bay, and eventually Bryan Singer.)

But on the other hand, there are a lot of possible upsides to all this. Despite both having grown up on Spider-Man comics and my great love for Raimi's non-Spidey movies, I was never fully thrilled by Raimi and Maguire's somewhat bright, cartoony take on Spider-Man. The first film was fine, the second was even better, but like many filmgoers I felt the third film was just another big, bloated, lumbering, nonsensical summer franchise monster. (And like many, I was never a fan of Kirstin Dunst's MJ or the Goblin armor.) Sure it made a lot of money,  but there's every possibility that Spidey 4 could have brought very diminishing returns, both creatively and financially--as both Sony and Raimi knew, hence the desperate holiday tension.

Nor do I think Raimi's heart was still in the franchise. He'd made it repeatedly clear that he didn't want to come back for 3 or 4,  but Sony kept backing up the money trucks, feeling that Sam's perfect mix of fanboy and girl cred and box-office batting record was worth begging to keep around. But really it's best to end the marriage--now Raimi can move on to projects he's more creatively passionate about (perhaps the World of Warcraft film adaptation, maybe more fun little bits of Evily Deadish nastiness like Drag Me to Hell, or--I hope--another serious drama-thriller like my beloved A Simple Plan or The Gift.)

He's Your Huckleberry

Paramount Buys Script for The Further Adventures of Doc Holliday

Hoping to launch a light-hearted, historical action-adventure franchise along the lines of Pirates of the Caribbean, Paramount has bought writer Chad St. John's script The Further Adventures of Doc Holliday. (It's St. John's first major sale, but he's a hot name in Hollywood right now on the basis of several un-produced scripts and development deals.) According to a Variety article, it appears the idea is not to create a historically accurate depiction of dentist-turned-gunfighter John Holliday, but rather to put Jack Sparrow in the Old West. And give him consumption.

Doc Holliday is a fantastic character, and for most of us under 60 he'll always be thought of as some mix of Val Kilmer's terrific performance in Tombstone and maybe Dennis Quaid's in Wyatt Earp. Kilmer is great and forever quotable, no doubt, but I've also really like Quaid's version. It's not as flashy--Wyatt Earp is a much slower, more ponderous film than Tombstone--but Quaid has some fine moments and lines as Doc in the film and comes off sadder, not as smirky. Other famous screen Hollidays include Kirk Douglas in 1957's Gunfight at the  O.K. Corral and of course Victor Mature as possibly the most hale and hearty lunger ever in John Ford's 1946 classic My Darling Clementine.

So part of me gets a little excited at the idea of more Doc on screen, but there are some big concerns here. For starters, the project is being produced by Lorenzo di Bonaventura. A lot of what you may have found distasteful or moronic in films like Transformers and G.I. Joe is in part thanks to di Bonaventura. On the other hand, he also produced the delightful fantasy Stardust and the sharp horror adaptation of Stephen King's 1408. So we'll give him a tenuous benefit of the doubt for the time being.

But more worrisome is the idea of turning Doc Holliday into a gruff-but-lovable action-comedy hero like Jack Sparrow. The whole appeal of Holliday's mystique was his dark, sardonic gallows-humor approach to life, or rather to death. It's hard to imagine a portrayal of Holliday that isn't somewhat fatalistic and cynical: historically there is no care-free, happy-go-lucky version of the Georgian man. He had tuberculosis all of his adult life, from age 21 when he opened his ill-fated dentistry business in 1873 (the financial success of which was doomed by the fact no one really wanted to have dental work done by a man constantly wracked by the tell-tale cough of consumption) until he died 14 years later. And much of who Holliday was and how he lived life and faced danger in that short time was a morbid reflection of his knowing that he--like his mother--was sentenced to die young of the disease.

Bryan Singer to Direct Every Single New Film ...Including the X-Men Prequel

Director Bryan Singer surprised many fan boys last week when he announced that he will be returning to the X-Men franchise he helped launch in order to take the reins on X-Men First Class. The prequel, scripted by Gossip Girl creator Josh Schwartz, will tell the story of the early days of Charles Xavier's School for Mutants.

The new film will mesh in with the recent X-Men Origins: Wolverine movie and the planned X-Men Origins: Magneto project. In Wolverine we got a glimpse a "young" Xavier (Patrick Stewart overlaid with weird CG anti-aging effects) gathering up young mutants like Scott "Cyclops" Summers and Emma Frost. X-Men First Class will, like the Star Trek reboot, following younger versions of Cyclops and Jean Grey as they learn the super-mutant ropes at Xavier's school alongside new mutant characters. The film will also examine how Xavier and Erik "Magneto" Lensheer (played by Ian McKellan in the current films) went from ideological compatriots to mortal enemies. And all those roles from the X-Men films will be recast with younger actors.

In the original comic books from the '60s, the "first class" of Xavier's mutants included Cyclops, Jean Grey, Hank "The Beast" McCoy, Iceman, and Angel. But Iceman and Angel had different origins in the film series, so it seems unlikely they'll be in the First Class film. However, producer Lauren Shuler Donner has said that a young McCoy, played by Kelsey Grammer in X-3, will be on hand.

Missing in mutant action will be Wolverine. After all, the point of Wolverine's mythos is that he is a loner, an outsider who reluctantly joins up with Xavier's merry mutants in X-Men I. And while--as in the comics--Hugh Jackman's Wolverine became the clear star of the X-Men films, chances are Fox feels that they can go Logan-less in the prequel and develop other cool mutant characters for it while moving ahead with a separate sequel to the movie Wolverine. (As well as the Deadpool film with Ryan Reynolds.)

While Singer has been reportedly sniffing around X-Men First Class since the summer, all this is a strange twist of fate. After directing X-Men and X-Men 2--and almost singlehandedly showing Hollywood and fan boys how superhero movies could be done right (that is, smart and respectful of the subject and characters while still being exciting and fun)--Singer famously jumped ship from X-Men and 20th Century Fox in order to relaunch the Superman franchise for Warner Brothers.

That did not... go so well. Singer's Superman Returns was a reverent, polished, lovely ode to Richard Donner's original Superman I & II, but it was also mostly inert--respectful to the point of glowing paralysis. It did okay at the box office, but not vigorously enough to fill Warner Brothers with great faith. Singer had hoped to make a second Superman film--one he described as his Wrath of Khan (that is, more rollicking and entertaining than its stuffy predecessor), but Warner's reluctance to work with Singer again, combined with an ongoing legal battle with the estates of Superman's comic-book creators, eventually made it clear that the Superman franchise will most likely be rebooted yet again in the future with a new creative team.

While waiting for the Superman mess to shake out, Singer directed the very solid WWII thriller Valkyrie with Tom Cruise. Meanwhile over in X-Land, the X-Men franchise stumbled in Singer's absence, with Brett Ratner ending up directing X-Men: The Last Stand (aka X3) right into the ground creatively--as with Joel Schumacher's wretched Batman & Robin, the feeling was that the series had been so artistically befouled that the best approach was to start over fresh. Clearly both Fox and Singer decided that despite their past very public break up, they both need each other.

For those trying to keep track of Singer's recent flurry of project announcements, you can add X-Men First Class to his planned big-screen remakes of Excalibur and Battlestar Galactica. However none of these films is likely to be the next Singer movie to reach theaters. That will probably be his fairy-tale adventure Jack the Giant Killer, a Terry Gilliam-esque imagining of the classic beanstalk fable that Singer is developing for New Line.

So, how do you feel about an X-Men prequel now that Singer is back? What mutants (from the films or the comics) would you like to see in attendance? And which of  Singer's four current film projects are you most excited for (or afraid of)? X-Men? Excalibur? Galactica? Jack the Giant Killer?