Father Geek here a Geek Headquarters in Austin posting up Elston's WEEKLY RECAP once again, this column is a valuable resource to all you readers that don't have the time to surf the web for ALL the info as it happens each day so I hope you let Elston know how much you appreciate his weekly efforts by E-mailing him at his address that he includes at the end of each of his columns. Now on to the week that was...
Hello,
I was glad to see AICN's positive response to Paramount re-releasing
WONDER BOYS. It's a great film. I was more glad to see you champion
Dylan's "Things Have Changed" which is a great great song. (The moniker
Elston Gunn comes from Dylan, by the way). I hope the song is at least
nominated for an Oscar...I'd LOVE to see Dylan perform at that awards show.
*sigh* Let's cross our fingers. Here's the recap...
TAKEN FROM VARIETY AND THE HOLLYWOOD REPORTER
CASTING
TAKEN FROM VARIETY AND THE HOLLYWOOD REPORTER
CASTING
* David Cronenberg stars in JASON X for director James Isaac and New Line Cinema. He'll play a professor who takes his students on a field trip to Earth in 2455 where they discover Jason's frozen body.
* Katie Holmes is in talks to star as Rene Russo's daughter in Disney's BIG TROUBLE for director Barry Sonnenfeld about a nuclear device in a suitcase set to go off in a Miami airport. Tom Sizemore and Tim Allen also star.
* Jorge Rivero (RIO LOBO) joins THE PEARL with Lukas Haas and Richard Harris.
* Jon Huertas ("Sabrina, the Teenage Witch") will star and co-produce the indie pic GREEN DIGGITY DOG.
* Gabriel Macht ("The Others") will play Frank James in JESSE JAMES for Morgan Creek and director Les Mayfield (BLUE STREAK). Will McCormack ("The Sopranos") joins as well, playing Bob Younger.
* Peter Stormare (FARGO) joins CHOCOLAT. Lasse Hallstrom directs.
* Lesley Ann Warren and Jennifer Jason Leigh will star in the indie flick THE QUICKIE with Sergei Bodrov (EAST-WEST) directing.
* Al Pacino is in talks to star in what's now referred to as the Hollywood Project, written by Andrew Niccol (THE TRUMAN SHOW) and to be produced by New Line Cinema and Jersey Films. Pacino would play a down-and-out movie producer.
* Darius McCrary ("Family Matters") joins KINGDOM COME.
* James Marshall ("Twin Peaks") will star in DOWN with Annabeth Gish and Dean Cain.
* Ronnie Marmo joins Matt Dillon and Fairuza Balk in DEUCES WILD.
* Ryan Gosling (REMEMBER THE TITANS) will star in THE BELIEVER for director Henry Bean (INTERNAL AFFAIRS writer).
* Will Ferrell ("SNL") will join Mike Myers in DIETER for Universal/Imagine. He'll play the German TV host's American cousin. Ferrell will then star in AUGUST BLOWOUT which he co-wrote with Adam McKay about a car salesman desperate to make his quota.
* Portia de Rossi ("Ally McBeal") will play the female lead in CLETIS TOUT opposite Tim Allen, Christian Slater, and Richard Dreyfuss.
* Musician Vitamin C will star in Dimension's WES CRAVEN PRESENTS: DRACULA 2000 for director Patrick Lucier. Jennifer Esposito, Jonny Lee Miller and Christopher Plummer also star. Shooting begins this summer.
* Cuba Gooding Jr., James Caan, Matthew Modine and Joey Lauren Adams will star in the indie thriller IN THE SHADOWS for writer/director Ric Roman Waugh. Shooting begins this week in Miami. The story is about a hit man sent to kill a stunt man, but falls in love with his daughter and becomes a stunt man himself. The daughter, meanwhile, is smuggling illegal medicine with the help of an FBI agent.
* Alice Hirson ("Ellen"), Michael O'Keefe (GHOSTS OF MISSISSIPPI) join Trevor Morgan (THE SIXTH SENSE) join THE GLASS HOUSE with Leelee Sobieski and Rita Wilson.
* Diane Baker will play Sen. Ruth Martin in HANNIBAL. She'll also star in HARRISON'S FLOWERS with Andie MacDowell. Boyd Kestner (G.I. JANE) joins HANNIBAL as well.
* Alexa Vega will star in SPY KIDS while her sister Makenzie Vega has a role in Jon Favreau's MADE.
* Marisa Coughlan ("Wasteland") grabbed a role in Jersey Films' comedy SUPER TROOPERS.
* Dom DeLuise joins Casper Van Dien and Catherine Oxenberg in the indie flick ALWAYS GREENER.
* Estella Warren (upcoming CONSPIRACY OF WEEDS aka TANGLED) will star opposite Sylvester Stallone in the racing pic CHAMPS for director Renny Harlin.
* Bruce Willis is in talks to join George Clooney in OCEAN'S 11 for director Steven Soderbergh.
* Matt Damon is in talks to star in Universal's adaptation of the Robert Ludlum book THE BOURNE IDENTITY with Doug Liman (GO) directing.
* Martin Lawrence is in talks to star in 20th Century Fox's THE BLACK KNIGHT about a restaurant worker transported back to the Middle Ages. Darryl Quarles (BIG MOMMA'S HOUSE) scripted.
* Pam Grier and Danny Glover will star in the drama TH3 A.M. for writer/director Lee Davis and producer Spike Lee. The movie follows the lives of 3 cab drivers. Grier will also star in PLUTO NASH as Eddie Murphy's mom.
* Melissa DeSousa (THE BEST MAN) joins MISS CONGENIALITY.
* Seann William Scott (AMERICAN PIE, ROAD TRIP) will join Ashton Kutcher ("That 70s Show") in DUDE, WHERE'S MY CAR? for 20th Century Fox.
DIRECTOR/WRITER ATTACHMENTS
* Music video director Mark Romanek is in talks to direct his urban thriller script ONE HOUR PHOTO for Fox Searchlight about an employee at a one-hour photo lab who becomes obsessed with a suburban family.
* Actor Don Murray (BUS STOP) will direct and co-star in ELVIS IS ALIVE based on the novel by Mickey Maughon. Boston Celtics legend Bob Cousy will play himself in the pic.
* Universal picked up Stuart Blumberg's (KEEPING THE FAITH) script EBONY AND IVORY for Imagine to produce. The script tells the story of a black rapper and his white attorney who switch bodies in the middle of the rapper's trial.
* Harold Becker (CITY HALL) is in talks to direct John Travolta in the thriller DOMESTIC DISTURBANCE for Paramount about a father who sets out to rescue his son from a life-threatening situation involving the boy's stepdad. Lewis Colick (OCTOBER SKY) scripted. Travolta will do this film after he wraps SWORDFISH which starts shooting in July.
* Caroline Thompson (THE NIGHTMARE BEFORE CHRISTMAS) and Larry Wilson (BEETLEJUICE, both did THE ADDAMS FAMILY) will write LENORE, an animated film based on the cult comic about a 10-year old girl who returns from the dead because she feels her family needs her.
* Rod Lurie will rewrite and direct CLINK INC. for DreamWorks and ImageMovers about a female Wall St. banker in prison who uses what she knows to help life in prison run more efficently.
* Jay Garrett has written the high-concept thriller script KIDS FEARS, picked up by Lakeshore Ent., about a serial killer who kidnaps a D.A.'s daughter.
* Jay Russell (MY DOG SKIP) will direct a remake of the 1956 film THE BRAVE ONE for Disney about a Mexican peasant and a bull that is born to die in the ring.
* Garry Marshall will direct THE PRINCESS DIARIES for Disney. Whitney Houston will produce through her Brownhouse Prods. The film is based on the Meg Cabot novel about a 16-year old New Yorker who finds out she's the princess of a small European country. Shooting begins in September.
* Renny Harlin is in talks to direct Jackie Chan NOSEBLEED for New Line about a window washer who gets involved with a couple who fear the World Trade Center is going to be bombed again.
* Ben Stiller is in negotiations to direct and star in the comedy ZOOLANDER for Paramount/Mandalay about the misadventures of a male supermodel named Derek Zoolander (a character which Stiller created for a VH-1 Fashion Awards show).
* Actor Joe Pantoliano (THE MATRIX) will direct JUST LIKE MONA for Regent Entertainment. It's set in the 60s and 70s (through flashbacks) about a boy and his foul-mouthed mother, who is having an affair with her third cousin. Pantoliano scripted with Travis Malloy. Diane Lane, Jason Schwartzman, Chazz Palminteri, Camryn Manheim, Marcia Gay Harden and Andy Garcia are committed to star. Shooting begins in October in New Jersey.
* Darryl Quarles (BIG MOMMA'S HOUSE) has written STRAY DAWGZ for New Line to produce, Ice Cube to star and music video director Gregory Dark to helm. Cube and Dark will also executive produce. The script follows a parolee who finds out he comes from a long line of werewolf hunters. He must save his sister, and San Francisco, from a new breed of werewolves.
* Warner Bros. picked up COMPLETELY PATHETIC by Greg Grabianski about a group of all-boys Catholic school losers who have been selected to be a part of a play put on by an all-girl's school.
MISCELLANEOUS PRODUCTION TIDBITS
* High Times magazine is co-producing and co-sponsoring (a la National Lampoon) the indie comedy HIGH TIMES MAGAZINE'S POTLUCK about a mob soldier who smokes his first joint at 60 and questions his life.
* Paramount will re-release WONDER BOYS in October putting emphasis on the cast and the film's reviews.
* Producer Scott Rudin grabbed the rights to "The Cop and the Stalker," a New York Magazine article written by Craig Horowitz about the true story of a cop whose life falls apart due to his obsession with a man who stalked him and his wife, but later became a government informant.
* Nickelodeon and Good Machine picked up the rights to David Weisner's animated/no-text children's book SECTOR 7 about a boy who is swept away into outer space and ends up in a city of clouds. It's being developed as a directing vehicle for Darren Aronofsky ("Pi").
* Miramax bought the remake rights to the 1957 British film THE COLDITZ STORY about Allied prisoners of war who try to escape a German castle. Rafael Yglesias (FROM HELL) will script. Miramax also got the rights to the John Patrick Reid books: THE COLDITZ STORY, COLDITZ: THE LATTER DAYS and COLDITZ: THE FULL STORY.
GUNN SHOTS (not from the trades)
* Heath McKnight is finishing up his movie SKYE FALLING. Visit the flick's site at www.skyefalling.com.
* Ben Trebilcook has written GOD AND THE DEVIL which may be the basis for the next DIE HARD film (with two previous producers back on board). Fox has been informed that a review of this script will appear at www.popcorn.co.uk in the near future.
The cast for BIG TROUBLE is coming together nicely and THE GLASS HOUSE doesn't seem to cease its casting. IN THE SHADOWS and SECTOR 7 could be very cool, but I really want to know more about the Al Pacino/Andrew Niccol project. If you know something, do tell. What do you think about the Renny Harlin/Jackie Chan mix? Should be a lot of action. And has Ben Stiller finally decided on ZOOLANDER as his next directorial effort? We shall see. I'm quite anxious to see Mark Romanek's film, his videos are wild. And the news of Paramount rereleasing WONDER BOYS is welcome. I hope more people give it a chance in the fall.
