Maguire Signs For Spidey
t's official: Columbia Pictures announced that Tobey Maguire (The Cider House Rules) will star in Spider-Man, the feature film based on the Marvel Comics series of the same name.
Columbia chairman Amy Pascal made the announcement late July 31.
Sam Raimi will direct Spider-Man. The studio called Raimi "a self-confessed fanatic of the cagey, web-spinning hero." "I am delighted with this choice," Pascal said in a statement. "Tobey's acting ability and incredible screen presence and Sam's creative vision are a powerful combination to bring Spider-Man to the screen."
"As an actor, Tobey is a director's dream," Raimi said in a statement. "He has all the qualities we were looking for in our Peter Parker."
Columbia also revealed the first elements of the film's closely held plot. The story centers on student Peter Parker, who, after being bitten by a radioactive spider, gains superhuman strength and the spider-like ability to cling to any surface. Peter first uses his powers to make money, but when his beloved Uncle Ben is killed by thieves after Peter chooses not to get involved, he vows to dedicate his life to fighting crime.
David Koepp (Stir of Echoes) has drafted a preliminary screenplay for the film; Scott Rosenberg (Gone in 60 Seconds) has also collaborated on the script. Columbia said the film is slated to begin shooting in Los Angeles in November. The production will then move to New York. Spider-Man is being readied for a November 2001 release.
Cage To Be Green Goblin?
he Popcorn U.K. Web site reported a rumor that Nicolas Cage is in talks to take the lead villain role in Sam Raimi's upcoming Spider-Man movie.
Cage would reportedly play the Green Goblin, otherwise known as Norman Osborn, the site said.
The site added that Julia Stiles (10 Things I Hate About You) is rumored to be up for the role of M.J. Watson. Sony announced that Tobey Maguire will put on Spidey's tights to star in the movie, which is based on the Marvel Comics series of the same name.
Episode II Photos Leaked
he Dark Horizons Web site has posted unauthorized photographs from the Australian tabloid The Daily Telegraph of actors on the set of Star Wars: Episode II.
The Telegraph photos depict actors Hayden Christensen (Anakin Skywalker) and Ewan McGregor (Obi-Wan Kenobi), as well as extras on the set.
The Telegraph reported, meanwhile, that Natalie Portman (Queen Amidala) had completed her Episode II scenes at Fox studios in Sydney and was vacationing in Queensland before shooting resumes in that Australian province. Episode II shooting in Sydney wraps by the end of August, Dark Horizons reported.
Episode II Halfway Done In Oz
fter about five weeks of shooting, the production of Star Wars: Episode II has reached its halfway point in Australia, according to the official Star Wars Web site.
Digital cameras have speeded up production, the site reported.
"Literally, the day we finish shooting a set, we can take it down," production designer Gavin Bocquet told the site. "Because we're shooting with a digital camera, there's no real need for rushes. Everybody's seeing the final reproduction precisely on a very sophisticated monitor. On the day of shooting they're seeing actually what you see, rather than having to wait until the next day to see the rushes or the transfer from the film to tapes three days later. You get clearance on the set almost the day you finish it."
The sets that crews have worked long hours to create, and that have been up and ready for three months, are struck down in mere hours to make room for new sets to be built, the site reported. "We're taking down the first wave of sets that we've built and quickly erecting the second wave," Bocquet said. "Same sort of principle as last time, because of the amount of set work we have to do. On the first one, we had about 54 studio sets of various sizes. I think this time we already have a total of 68." Episode II's production schedule calls for two and a half months at Fox Studios Australia, followed by shooting in Tunisia and Italy.
Meanwhile, Christopher Lee has posted to his official fan club Web site about his upcoming role in Episode II. "As many of you will know by now, I have been asked to appear in the next episode of Star Wars, which is being filmed in Australia. I expect to start shooting at the beginning of August. It will be the first time I shall work with George Lucas, and it will be a great adventure into the 'galaxy.' I am, of course, looking forward to this immensely. It will be yet another magical experience."
Stewart: Trek X Script Underway
atrick Stewart, Capt. Jean-Luc Picard on Star Trek: The Next Generation, told the Popcorn U.K. Web site that the script for the 10th Trek movie is well underway.
John Logan (Gladiator) is the main writer.
"What we have at the moment is a 28-page storyline, which has been developed by John Logan; Brent Spiner, who plays Data; and Rick Berman, our executive producer," Stewart told the site. He said to expect a first draft very soon.
Stewart added, "[Paramount is] not yet totally committed to the movie, but it looks as though it's going to happen."
Eastwood Took Pains For Cowboy
lint Eastwood, star and director of Warner Bros.' upcoming SF movie Space Cowboys, told EW.com that the arduous shoot aggravated the aches and pains of its aging actors.
Donald Sutherland, 66, fell backwards in his heavy space suit and cracked a knee, and James Garner, 72, dislocated his shoulder after a fall.
"I had a chronic shoulder dislocation on the set of Thunderbolt and Lightfoot back in '73, so I knew how to pop it back in," Eastwood, 70, told EW.com. "Jim went right back to work and finished the day. But he didn't play golf for a while."
Tommy Lee Jones, 53, said the actors' NASA space suits were particularly troublesome. "The space suits were uncomfortable," Jones told EW.com. "They're painful to put on, painful to take off, painful to wear. And they have little air conditioners you have to carry around, which are always breaking down, and lots of hoses that are always getting kinked. They're always biting or scratching or pinching you somewhere." Space Cowboys opened Aug. 4.
Reeves: Matrix 2 Script Done
eanu Reeves told USA Today that brothers Andy and Larry Wachowski have completed the script for The Matrix 2, the sequel to their hit 1999 SF movie The Matrix.
"It's fantastic," Reeves said. "It has even more ambitions than the first one. My character [Neo] is more developed."
Reeves added, "There are a lot of physical demands in it. It's more sophisticated in the action sequences and fight sequences." Reeves said that the brothers will try to outdo the previous film's dazzling visuals. "[They're] trying to achieve certain camera perspectives."
USA Today reported that the cast will assemble in November to begin pre-production training. The Matrix 2 and 3 will begin back-to-back production in the spring. Matrix 2 is slated for a late 2002 release; Matrix 3 for summer 2003.
Paxton To Helm Frailty
ctor Bill Paxton will make his feature directorial debut with the supernatural horror movie Frailty, according to The Hollywood Reporter.
Matthew McConaughey is reportedly in talks to star in the movie, slated to begin shooting in early October, the trade paper reported. Paxton and McConaughey co-starred in U-571.
Brent Hanley wrote the script for Frailty, which tells the story of a single father of two boys in rural Texas who may or may not be able to identify demons. As the father embarks on a mission to eradicate evil people, one son sees him as a hero, while the other sees him as a killer, the trade paper reported.
Bomb Scare Clears Trek Con
olice evacuated the Philadelphia venue of a Star Trek convention for about an hour July 29 because of a bomb scare, according to the official Star Trek Continuum Web site.
The convention went on outside the Adam's Mark Hotel as police determined that the suspected bomb was just a box full of clocks intended for the nearby Republican National Convention's Illinois delegates, who were staying in the hotel, the site reported.
Star Trek stunt performers Leslie Hoffman and Brian Williams demonstrated bat'leth fighting on the hotel lawn while news helicopters hovered overhead. Star Trek: Deep Space 9 star Armin Shimerman and Star Trek: Voyager star Robert Duncan McNeill signed autographs and had their pictures taken with fans under the sun.
Blair's Josh In Oz Chiller
oshua Leonard (The Blair Witch Project) will star in Cubbyhouse, an Australian independent supernatural horror movie that begins production next week Down Under, according to the film's official Web site.
The cast will also include Belinda McClory (The Matrix), Lauren Hewett, Jerome Ehlers and Craig McLachlan.
Cubbyhouse tells the story of the Graham family, which relocates from Los Angeles to the Gold Coast of Australia. The children stumble upon a derelict children's playhouse, or Cubbyhouse, that turns out to be a portal to hell.
Murray Fahey will direct from a script by Fahey and Ian Coughlan for Beyond Films.
New Exorcist Trailer Bows
new trailer for the re-release of the classic supernatural horror film The Exorcist debuted on the Web and in theaters Aug. 4, according to The Hollywood Reporter.
A previous trailer was rejected by the Motion Picture Association of America as "too intense," the trade paper reported.
The revised trailer changed some sounds and removed some images, which the MPAA had deemed objectionable. Warner Bros. will release a digitally enhanced version of William Friedkin's 1973 horror film--with 11 minutes of previously unreleased footage--on Sept. 22 in select cities.
Marsters: Eager For New Buffy
ames Marsters, who plays the platinum-blond vampire Spike on The WB's hit series Buffy the Vampire Slayer, told USA Today that he's eager for the coming season.
Creator Joss Whedon has said to expect more of the Brit vamp, who became a regular character last year.
Marsters said, "In the beginning, I was afraid. ... But it's like a roller coaster. A third of the way through, you just throw your head back and begin laughing. I told him, 'Joss, I'll do anything you want.'"
Drusilla Returning To Buffy?
oss Whedon, creator of The WB's hit series Buffy the Vampire Slayer, told TV Guide Online that he hopes to bring back one of the show's cooler villains: Drusilla the wacky vampire, played by Juliet Landau.
"I have not heard anything final about a deal, but we are interested in seeing her either on Buffy or [its spinoff] Angel," Whedon told the site.
Whedon added, "I can't make any promises, but we are definitely investigating the idea." Drusilla, the nutty paramour of James Marsters' Spike, vanished at the end of Buffy's second season.
If details can be worked out, Drusilla's return will make for toothsome drama. "We have to make sure that it's the worst possible time for Spike," Whedon said. "Also, we had problems the last time we tried to bring Dru back; talks fell through because of scheduling or something. So before we get into writing the story, we have to make sure that it's doable."
Landau told TV Guide Online that she's game. "There's so much dimension to the character; it's not just playing a straightforward villain," she said. "For instance, her relationship with Spike has a sweet side. So I'm definitely interested."
Fire On Rollerball Set
fire broke out on the Montreal set of Rollerball, the SF movie currently in production in that Canadian city, but resulted in little damage and no injuries, according to a report on Cinescape Online.
The film is a remake of the 1975 SF classic film of the same name.
Cinescape cites Montreal Global TV as reporting that the fire started Aug. 3 on a locker-room set in an old concrete pipe manufacturing plant in Blainville, Quebec, just outside Montreal. Carpenters working on the film tried to put the early morning fire out, but were finally forced to call in firefighters. The fire was extinguished in less than an hour. Fire officials were investigating the cause. MGM reported that the fire did not damage the film's main set, the Rollerball track.
Verhoeven Amazes In Hollow
aul Verhoeven, director of the upcoming SF thriller movie Hollow Man, told SCI FI Wire that he wanted to push the envelope for invisible-man movies.
"I wanted to amaze people by what is possible now," he said. "In the last five or six years, we have made so much progress in the digital world ... and a lot of things that were not possible two years ago are in this movie."
Verhoeven said that when writer Andrew W. Marlowe gave him the script, he said that the special effects described in it weren't even invented yet. "He's very good friends with people [at the special effects house] Digital Domain, [and said,] 'I know this will be possible in a year, but it's not possible now. So you have to find a way to use all your creativity'--he meant of course the special effects people--'to create a world that I describe on paper. It should be possible, but it's not possible yet.' And he was right. We solved it in a year. We had about one, one and a half years, to do it. We started immediately with [research and development]. ... And until the very last moment, until about 10 days ago, we [were] still [putting] the last shots [of] special effects ... into the movie. ... I often despaired, because it took so long, and it was so difficult, that sometimes I thought we might not make the date, but we did."
The effects include a man disappearing in anatomically correct layers from the skin down. When invisible, Kevin Bacon's character is glimpsed covered in water, blood, mist, fog, fire and smoke, among other things.
Verhoeven said Bacon was perfect for the role of mad scientist Caine. "First of all, I felt that I needed an actor who was willing to play basically a charismatic leader, and could do that, and at the same time would be willing and able to go into evil territory. And I think basically, you need a good actor. And I think we all know that Kevin Bacon is a really good actor. He's done so many different things, and all in the best way, and I know that he's played villains. I studied that a little bit. I studied his more charismatic characters. I felt that he could absolutely do the part. And would be willing to do something evil like that, because it also includes killing people, animals, [and] especially [performing] violent behavior towards women. A lot of things that basically some actors might back off on."
Verhoeven added, "And on top of that, I wanted someone who was very down to earth and would be willing to go through all the unpleasantness that is inherent in doing a movie like this for an actor. And also willing to accept the fact that he's partially replaced, later on in the movie, by a three-dimensional model of himself." Hollow Man opened Aug. 4.
Ryan Ready To Voyage Home
eri Ryan (Star Trek: Voyager's Seven of Nine) told TV Guide Online that she's ready to come back to Earth in the upcoming seventh season, the show's last.
"I'm putting my vote in now; I think we will," Ryan said. "But I don't know if it'll be midway through the season, [giving our characters] time to develop what happens once we're there, or if that'll sort of close the show as a finale. I'm not entirely convinced that [the writers] know yet!"
Roxann Dawson (B'Elanna Torres) told TV Guide that she's as eager to know what happens as the fans. "We'll probably make it home, although I'm not a writer, and I don't really know what they're planning to do," she said. "They keep us in the dark, I think, so that we don't tell people. But I have a feeling that we'll make it home. I don't know if we'll make it home in one piece, but I think we'll get here."
Meanwhile, TV Guide reported that Ryan will begin shooting Wes Craven Presents: Dracula 2000, due in theaters this December.
For her part, Dawson is publishing the first in a planned trilogy of science fiction novels, Entering Tenebria, co-authored by pal Daniel Graham, TV Guide reported. "I was always sort of interested in any kind of a medium where you could just stretch your imagination," says Dawson. "And science fiction is just the best for that. I mean anything can happen!"
Bonham Carter Goes Ape
elena Bonham Carter will join the cast of Tim Burton's remake of Planet of the Apes, playing an ape princess, according to The Hollywood Reporter.
The Fox movie is set to begin shooting in the fall for a summer 2001 release.
Carter will appear in the movie with Mark Wahlberg, Tim Roth, Michael Clarke Duncan, Paul Giamatti and Estella Warren. Carter's princess will be a humanitarian who believes that apes and people can coexist peacefully, the trade paper reported.
Wahlberg will play a pilot, Duncan will play an ape warrior and Roth will play an ape military commander. William Broyles Jr. is writing the script, which is described as a "re-imagination" of the original 1968 Apes movie that starred Charlton Heston as an astronaut who finds himself on a planet inhabited by talking apes.
Depp To Play Ape?
ohnny Depp, longtime collaborator with director Tim Burton, is rumored to be in line for the role of an ape in Burton's upcoming remake of Planet of the Apes, tentatively titled The Visitor, according to the Coming Attractions Web site.
Depp, who has reportedly come in for makeup tests, would play a character like Roddy McDowall's Cornelius in the 1968 original movie.
Coming Attractions attributed the rumor to a report on Los Angeles radio station KROQ-FM. Paul Reubens (Pee-Wee's Big Adventure) has been previously rumored to be up for the Cornelius role, but Coming Attractions says he is not involved with the film.
Edlund: Tick On Course
en Edlund, creator of The Tick comic and executive producer of the TV series of the same name, told the Comics Continuum Web site that things are on course for the mid-season show on Fox.
Edlund is sharing producer credits with Barry Sonnefeld, Larry Charles and Barry Josephson for Sony Pictures Television.
"Certain things happened in the pilot, in the development of this live-action incarnation of The Tick, that sort of diverge from previous things," Edlund said. "Number one, he looks like a big blue Teletubby, because he's got an open face with his mask now." Edlund added, "Things had to change to some degree, but I think the spirit of the comic is there, and we're going to keep working to make it more and more like the comic book, oddly enough. Because we can't afford the action from the cartoon series. That's very expensive."
The pilot, which Sonnenfeld directed, involves a Russian robot called The Red Scare that seeks to assassinate former President Jimmy Carter. "The pilot contains about the most action we could even afford, and it's going to go down from there in a sense," he said. "We have to be extremely clever and think this stuff through. It's going to be a tough year, but we'll get to the point where the tone of the show, which--and this is the pitch I've been using--is it's not an action-comedy; it's a comedy about action."
Reeves Up For Godhood?
eanu Reeves is interested in playing a god in a Greek-themed fantasy movie being developed by producers Barrie Osborne (Lord of the Rings) and Stephen Hamel, Variety reported.
Hamel wrote the first draft of the screenplay and is poised to direct the as-yet untitled movie, about a king who wishes to become a god.
The movie tells the story of a king who covets immortality and a god who wants to become a man. The king's daughter gets caught in the middle.
SCIFI.COM Gets Xena
tudios USA Domestic Television has signed a deal to broadcast 3-D animated series created by Internet programmer Brilliant Digital Entertainment on SCIFI.COM and on USA's stable of local TV station and other Web sites nationwide, Variety reported.
A Web version of the syndicated television series Xena: Warrior Princess is currently running as the first of Brilliant's library of multipath series to appear on SCIFI.COM and USA's other Web sites.
Brilliant is also creating programming based on TV, music or film characters that include Superman, KISS, Popeye and Ace Ventura.
Metal 2000 Comes To Video
olumbia TriStar Home Video will release Heavy Metal 2000 on VHS and DVD on Oct. 17 in a package that includes the original 1981 animated SF movie Heavy Metal, according to The Hollywood Reporter.
Heavy Metal 2000, based on a story by comic book writer Kevin Eastman, is the sequel to the rock-and-roll feature film.
Heavy Metal 2000 is the SF story of Julie (voiced by Julie Strain), a steel-eyed huntress and expert warrior who tracks a group of ruthless space pirates led by the evil Lord Tyler (voiced by Michael Ironside). The movie features music by Bauhaus, Billy Idol, Monster Magnet, MDFMK, Pantera, Coal Chamber, Machine Head, Insane Clown Posse, Twiztid, System of a Down, Days of the New, Sinisstar, Queens of the Stone Age, Full Devil Jacket, Hate Dept., Puya, Apartment 26 and Zilch.
The widescreen DVD will feature a Julie Strain: Super Goddess featurette, animation tests, trailers and language tracks in English, French, Spanish and Portuguese.
Game Boy Movie Due
he Gone Fishing production company will develop Game Boy, a fantasy movie based on a pitch by writer John Mattson, Variety reported.
Game Boy tells the story of an Indiana Jones-type action hero who discovers that he's actually the star of a best-selling online computer game, the trade paper reported.
Mattson also sold the comedy fantasy pitch Food to Jan De Bont's Blue Tulip Productions. That live-action and animated film tells the story of a Thanksgiving dinner from the point of view of the food.
Scott, Curry Star On SCIFI.COM
ampbell Scott and Tim Curry are the latest actors to star in J. Michael Straczynski's City of Dreams, an original audio production of SCIFI.COM's Seeing Ear Theatre.
Scott will star in episode four, premiering at 3 p.m. EST Aug. 7; Curry will star in episode five at 3 p.m. EST Aug. 14.
Scott will play Gregory Ferguson in "Tolling of the Hour," a demanding boss who must pay for his sins by seeing his life fly by ever more rapidly until he has lived an entire lifetime in a single day.
Curry will play Ben Joseph in "Night Calls," which features two parallel story lines. Joseph is called by the Holy One (also played by Curry) to build a second ark, like Noah's. The second, interwoven story line introduces the character Mark, who gives his friend Richie an Internet address to hell.
Bugaloos Movie In Works
ersey Films has optioned the feature-film rights to The Bugaloos, Sid and Marty Krofft's 1970s puppet television series, according to The Hollywood Reporter.
The series told the story of a rock band made up of teen-age insects.
Kerry Brown and Russell Scott will write the screenplay, which will be produced by Jersey partners Danny DeVito, Michael Shamberg and Stacey Sher, along with Sid and Marty Krofft, the trade paper reported. Other Krofft TV projects are in development, include movie versions of H.R. Pufnstuf and Land of the Lost at Sony and Family Affair at Warner Bros.
Bacon: Hollow Was Hard
evin Bacon, star of the upcoming invisible-man movie Hollow Man, told SCI FI Wire that he underwent a grueling makeup regimen daily to vanish on-screen.
"I'm sure that your people are familiar with the idea of green screen, where ... actors act in front of a green screen or a blue screen, and that background was replaced," Bacon said. "In this case, I really was the blue screen or the green screen."
Bacon added, "It meant that I needed to be completely covered in green or blue or black, depending on whether we were working with water or just air or smoke or steam. Depending on how much definition they needed for a particular shot, say muscle definition, I would either be painted from the waist up, or from the neck up, ... which required an undercoat of white sprayed on like a car being painted, and then the green. I wore green contact lenses, which were about the size of a half dollar, [to] cover the entire eye. Green dentures were made. And a hood. Sometimes a wig.
"Every day was probably at least ... four hours of makeup total," Bacon said. In the film, Bacon's invisible character, scientist Sebastian Caine, wears a pink latex mask. "The mask ... has cutout eyes, so you see through to the back of the mask, because ... I'm in there, but I'm invisible. That's what I think of as the hollow man. In that case, I would cover my eyes in green and my teeth in green, and then have this latex mask glued to my head. ... I tried to wear it all day one time, and I just wanted to jump out of a window. So I would pull it off at lunch, and then have a half hour or so of nothing on my skin, and then they would reapply it afterwards." Hollow Man opened Aug. 4.
Gosnell To Helm Fantastic?
he Los Angeles Times reported that Fox wants Raja Gosnell (Big Momma's House) to direct Fantastic Four, its proposed feature-film version of the Marvel Comics series of the same name.
Warner Bros., meanwhile, is trying to woo Gosnell to direct a live-action movie version of the animated television series Scooby Doo, the newspaper said.
"We expect and hope to make [Fantastic Four] pretty soon," Tom Rothman, chairman of Fox Filmed Entertainment, told the Times. "If X-Men hadn't worked, we may have reconsidered." Rothman said Fox is looking at a lighter movie, "more comedic, not as dark [as] and less angst-ridden than X-Men."
The Times reported that Gosnell has been working closely with Chris Columbus (director of the upcoming Harry Potter and the Sorcerer's Stone) and his producing partner Michael Barnathan to get Fantastic Four off the ground. Screenwriter Sam Hamm (Batman) is to deliver another rewrite in the next month or so, the Times reported.
Henstridge Lands On Mars
s rumored, Natasha Henstridge (Species) will join the cast of John Carpenter's Ghosts of Mars, replacing Courtney Love, the Hollywood trade papers reported.
Henstridge will play the leader of a team assigned to rescue Martian colonists bedeviled by vengeful spirits.
Love withdrew from the film after injuring her ankle. Henstridge joins Ice Cube and Jason Statham in the Screen Gems SF thriller. Mars is slated to start shooting next week, according to The Hollywood Reporter.
Showtime Boards Web Starship
howtime has bought Starship Regulars, an animated SF comedy series developed for the Internet's Icebox.com, Variety reported.
The deal marks the first time an Internet series has made the transition to traditional television.
Starship Regulars tells the story of ordinary men and women aboard a military spaceship. Episodes of the three-minute show will run simultaneously at Icebox and during Showtime's "Sci-Friday" night lineup, starting Aug. 11, and later on Showtime's own Web site. Next June, Showtime will develop the series as 13 live-action half hours, to be produced by Icebox and executive produced by Icebox founder and series creator Rob LaZebnik.
USA Buys Series 7
SA Films has acquired domestic distribution rights to writer-director Daniel Minahan's digital film Series 7: The Contenders from Blow Up Pictures, according to The Hollywood Reporter.
Series 7 satirizes reality television programming in the not-too-distant future, when the highest-rated television program selects people at random to kill each other for a cash prize, the trade paper reported.
Brooke Smith stars as the show's eight-months-pregnant reigning champion; Glenn Fitzgerald is her high-school sweetheart and newest competitor. The film also features Donna Hanover, the estranged wife of New York Mayor Rudolph Giuliani. USA Films is owned by USA Networks, which also owns SCIFI.COM.
Fur Flies For Centropolis
entropolis Entertainment will develop The Fur Flies, a fantasy comedy based on a pitch by Don Mancini (Child's Play), according to The Hollywood Reporter.
Mancini will write the script, which centers on animals in airplane cargo bins who band together to save the day.
Centropolis partners Dean Devlin and Roland Emmerich (Independence Day) will produce the project with Richard Kraft and Allison Abbate.
Verhoeven Mulled Starship Sequel
irector Paul Verhoeven told SCI FI Wire that he and writer Edward Neumeier were once asked to come up with ideas for a sequel to their 1997 hit movie Starship Troopers.
The original film, based on Robert Heinlein's classic SF novel of the same name, was co-produced by Touchstone and TriStar Pictures.
"They asked me to write down my ideas," Verhoeven said while promoting his upcoming invisible man thriller, Hollow Man. "They asked Ed Neumeier the same. But I think at the moment they're still hesitant to spend so much money."
Verhoeven added that he once considered a sequel to his 1990 film Total Recall, based on Philip K. Dick's story "Minority Report," but the film rights were sold and the movie is now being developed as a stand-alone project by Steven Spielberg. Total Recall was based on another Dick story, "We Can Remember It for You Wholesale."
Tomb Raider Shoot Begins
omb Raider, the feature-film version of the Eidos video game series, officially began production in London this week, Paramount Pictures announced.
Simon West is directing Angelina Jolie in the role of Lara Croft in a release targeted for summer 2001, the studio said.
Patrick Massett, John Zinman and West wrote the screenplay. Iain Glen will play Powell, the film's arch-villain and the adversary of Lara's father, Lord Croft, the studio announced. Lara Croft's occasional accomplice is played by Daniel Craig. Leslie Phillips will play Wilson, a former admirer of Lord Croft who has now turned against him and joined forces with Powell.
The cast and crew will travel to Cambodia and Iceland for exterior sequences, as well as working on London locations. They will also shoot on the soundstages of Pinewood Studios outside London. To prepare for the role, Jolie has undertaken a strenuous training regimen, which includes gymnastics, bungee jumping, weapons, motorcycle riding, kickboxing, martial arts and weights, Paramount said.
SCI FI To Air Nostradamus
he SCI FI Channel will premiere the original supernatural thriller film Nostradamus on Oct. 13 at 9 p.m.
The film will also air Oct. 13 at 12 a.m. and Oct. 15 at 5 p.m., SCI FI announced.
The two-hour film stars Rob Estes as a homicide detective investigating a series of strange multiple murders. He is assisted by a clairvoyant FBI agent played by Joely Fisher. The apparent perpetrator is a time-traveling assassin from the 15th century seeking to bring about Armageddon by killing people whose names appear on a sacred list. Through the course of his investigation, Estes learns that he is actually Nostradamus himself. Estes must stop the assassin and the secret society that sent him before the world is destroyed.
Astin Is Good Neighbor Sam
ean Astin, who plays Sam Gamgee in Peter Jackson's upcoming Lord of the Rings movie trilogy, told E! Online that he sees his role as more than that of a simple servant to the story's hero, Frodo.
"He begins as a frightened gardener and ends up mayor of Hobbiton," Astin said during a break in filming in New Zealand.
Astin added, "Both Frodo and Sam are compelled to go places emotionally and physically that they both never could have imagined. Their truer selves emerge through that. Frodo is a sacrificial lamb--he sacrifices ... part of himself and his innocence to preserve the ideal world of the Shire. By the end of the movie, Sam has a wisdom that only experience can bring, a world-weariness that will inform the rest of his life as the patriarch of Hobbiton. He seems to have a fetish for Elves, too."
Astin added, "Sam is the personification--I should say the Hobbitification--of loyalty and goodness. He doesn't talk very much; he's not Gandalf or Frodo or Saruman--vocally grappling with these weighty issues. But Sam is always there and always faithful to Frodo. That' something you don't see a lot of in contemporary society."
The first of the Rings movies, which are based on J.R.R. Tolkien's novels of the same name, will be released in December 2001.
Welch Takes Bait
Production designer Bo Welch will make his directorial debut with the SF comedy movie Live Bait for Imagine Entertainment and Universal Pictures, according to The Hollywood Reporter.
Bait is scheduled to begin shooting in early spring.
Comedian Ryan Stiles and Sean Masterson wrote Bait, which tells the story of two men seduced by beautiful women who are really aliens gathering human DNA in the form of sperm.
Welch has received Oscar nominations for art direction on The Birdcage, Men in Black and A Little Princess and was the production designer on Beetlejuice, Edward Scissorhands, Batman Returns and Wild Wild West, among other films.
X-Files Crew Member Dies
production crew member working on an episode of The X-Files died and six others sustained injuries when an electrical line sent a 4,800-volt charge through scaffolding on which they stood, according to The Hollywood Reporter.
Six people were standing on the scaffolding, and a seventh person was on the ground, a fire department spokesman told the trade paper.
Authorities identified the dead man as Jim Engh, who fell off the scaffold after it touched the power line, CNN reported. Another man was in serious condition with a chest injury late July 31 at a Los Angeles area hospital. Five people were treated and released for minor injuries, CNN reported. No actors were present when the accident occurred. The California Occupational Safety and Health Division is investigating the accident.
It was not clear how the power line came into contact with the scaffolding, which stood 15 feet above the ground at the back of a three-story apartment building in West Los Angeles on July 31. According to a production notice at the scene, the crew was filming a scene involving dialogue, a foot chase down an interior rear stairwell and rain effects on rear stair windows.
Richardson Stars In Snow White
iranda Richardson (Sleepy Hollow) will play the evil queen in ABC's upcoming live-action telefilm Snow White, Variety reported.
Richardson, who also voices the evil Mrs. Tweedy in the current animated hit movie Chicken Run, will play Snow White's devious stepmom, Queen Elspeth.
Kristin Kreuk will play the title role, and Tyron Leitso will take on the role of Prince Alfred. Caroline Thompson (Edward Scissorhands) wrote and will direct Snow White, a darker take on the classic fairy tale. The plot has Snow White's mom dying during childbirth, leaving baby Snow and dad John for dead on an icy field, Variety reported.
King: More Plant Coming
leased with the demand for his first online novel, The Plant, author Stephen King said he would proceed with a third, 25,000-word installment on Sept. 25, which would be sold for $1.
Writing on his official Web site, King said 152,132 people had downloaded the first part, and 116,200, or 76.38 percent, had paid $1. In addition, 23,000 have promised to pay later, King said. Part two goes up Aug. 21.
"The pay-through rate has been higher than I dared hope," King said. The horrormeister had said he would continue writing and posting installments as long as 75 percent or more people agreed on the honor system to pay for $1 for each segment.
King also said the next few segments would be considerably larger than the first ones. "Installments four through seven or eight would be much longer--perhaps as long as 25,000 words--and the download price would go up to $2.50," King said. "What do you think about this? Will it work?" he asked.
King said he paid $124,150 for print ads in Publisher's Weekly and USA Today, to test the Web servers, for project management fees, for server set-up fees and compositor's fees and other costs. He added that he has not been disappointed that downloads of The Plant have lagged those for his short story "Riding the Bullet," which drew more than half a million downloads.
Jurassic 3 Writers Hired
lexander Payne and Jim Taylor (Election) will write the script for Universal's upcoming Jurassic Park 3, the Los Angeles Times reported.
The duo gained an Oscar nomination for their Election script.
Joe Johnston (October Sky) will direct JP3, in which Sam Neill reprises his Jurassic Park role of Dr. Alan Grant. Neill did not appear in the second sequel, The Lost World: Jurassic Park.
Mixx Loses Kare Kano Rights
ixx Entertainment has lost the U.S. rights to the manga version of the hit Japanese TV anime Kareshi Kanojo no Jijou (nicknamed Kare Kano).
The rights are once again available, the company said.
Mixx Entertainment publisher Henry Korman said the deal had not been formally completed for the manga, which Mixx had renamed He Says/She Says. Korman offered no explanation for why the deal fell through.
The creators of Neon Genesis Evangelion produced Kare Kano, which tells the story of two high-school overachievers. The series has ranked No. 1 in Japan's market for some time. Right Stuf International is currently adapting the series for U.S. distribution.
Maguire To Play Spidey
s rumored, Tobey Maguire (The Cider House Rules) is in final talks to play the lead role in Spider-Man, Columbia's movie based on the Marvel Comics series of the same name, Variety reported.
Maguire, who was rumored to have tested for the role last week, would get $3 million to $4 million for the first film, with options for richer deals for two sequels, the trade paper reported.
Maguire would play Peter Parker, the young photographer who becomes Spider-Man after being bitten by a radioactive arachnid. Filming is set to begin in New York and on the Sony soundstages in Los Angeles in November, with an eye to a November 2001 release.
Director Sam Raimi reportedly favored Maguire throughout the search process, during which time virtually every young male actor in Hollywood was rumored to be in line for the coveted role. Maguire impressed Columbia executives when he put on the webslinger's suit during a test, and the studio signed off on him as its choice late Friday, Variety reported.
Cameron Focuses On Angel
ames Cameron told the New York Daily News that his upcoming Fox SF TV series Dark Angel will focus on character as much as on technology.
"I've grown up on a steady diet of science fiction, and the element that gets short shrift is character-driven rather than technology-driven," said Cameron, who has directed Aliens, The Abyss and the Terminator films.
The advantage of series television is that "you can develop character movements slowly," Cameron added. "You can develop relationships slowly. That's a freedom you don't have in film. I have 13 hours to tell a story instead of two."
Dark Angel will air Tuesdays at 9 p.m. starting this fall. It stars Jessica Alba as a genetically enhanced human prototype who escapes her military handlers. "As we wrote this thing, we found what emerged for us was that it really was a story of male-female relationships, family relationships and a young girl who can basically do whatever she wants," Cameron told the newspaper. "She has to invent her own morality."
Zwart To Helm Wolff
orwegian commercial director Harald Zwart will direct Universal Pictures' live-action feature Wolff and Byrd, based on Batton Lash's comic series Wolff & Byrd, Counselors of the Macabre, according to The Hollywood Reporter.
The movie, formerly called Supernatural Law, is slated for a January start.
Wolff tells the story of lawyers who represent monsters and ghouls in court and save the world from a possible apocalypse. Stephen Mazur (co-writer of Liar, Liar) and S.S. Wilson (co-writer of Wild Wild West) adapted the comic book for the big screen. Buffy the Vampire Slayer producer Marti Noxon wrote the most recent draft, the trade paper reported.
Face/Off Duo Pen SF Film
olumbia Pictures bought an untitled SF comedy pitch from writers Mike Werb and Michael Colleary (Face/Off), according to The Hollywood Reporter.
Laura Ziskin will produce the movie.
The film is described as American Pie meets Men in Black and "stranger than Face/Off." Central to the plot is the idea that perfection is always an illusion, the trade paper reported. The writers recently did a rewrite of the script for Tomb Raider, the movie based on the Eidos video game series of the same name, that is being directed by Simon West. Ziskin is also producing Columbia's upcoming Spider-Man and the proposed sequel to Jumanji.
Thor Series Strikes TV
rtisan Entertainment will develop a live-action television series based on the classic 1960s Marvel Comics series Thor, according to The Hollywood Reporter.
The series is part of the licensing pact Artisan struck with Marvel in May.
Artisan is seeking an executive producer to run the show, the studio's first venture into series television. Thor is being designed as a first-run syndicated or cable show.
Campbell Voices Evil Game
HQ and Heavy Iron Studios are developing Evil Dead: Hail to the King, a PC game based on the Sam Raimi-directed Evil Dead series of supernatural horror movies.
The game, coming in the fall, will feature voice-overs by Evil Dead star Bruce Campbell.
The game picks up eight years after the events in Army of Darkness, the last installment of the Evil Dead films. Campbell's character, Ash, returns to the cabin in the woods to battle the evil forces that have crossed over to our world.
Ghibli Museum To Open
he Mitaka Forst Ghibli Museum, exhibiting the works of Studio Ghibli, described as the "Disney of Japan," will open in October 2001 at Inogashira Park in Mitaka City in Tokyo.
A foundation comprising officials of Mitaka City, Tokuma Publishing and other groups will run the museum.
The museum will feature multiple exhibition halls, shops and a screening room. Studio Ghibli created such anime favorites as My Neighbor Totoro, Kiki's Delivery Service and Princess Mononoke.
The start of construction missed an end-of-July deadline, but construction will begin very soon, a Mitaka City official said. The Ghibli museum, to be built at a cost of about 5 billion yen (about $50 million), is expected to draw 800,000 to 1 million visitors in its first year.
Straczynski Web Novel Due
abylon 5 creator J. Michael Straczynski will debut his new book Tribulations exclusively on the Bookface Web site, the site announced.
Tribulations will be released for free in four weekly installments starting Aug. 7. Later in August, the site will offer readers the option of buying the paper version of the book through Darktales Publications.
Tribulations is described as a contemporary dark fantasy novel set in present-day Los Angeles. Susan Randall, a crime reporter with the Los Angeles News-Tribune, encounters Raymond Weil, a man with a questionable past who believes that the series of murders she is investigating has a supernatural origin.
Straczynski joins Stephen King and other authors who have used the Web to launch new books.
Klumps Top Box Office
ddie Murphy's Nutty Professor II: The Klumps topped the box-office rankings in its premiere, taking in an estimated $42.7 million during the weekend of July 25, according to the Hollywood trade papers.
It was Murphy's biggest opening ever, Variety reported.
What Lies Beneath dropped a modest 26 percent from its opening last week to take the No. 2 slot with an estimated $22 million, for a total of $68.5 million after two weeks. But X-Men was fading fast, with a 51 percent drop in box-office earnings and a take of $11.5 million, for a total of $121.8 million after three weeks. X-Men was expected to earn a total of about $150 million domestically.
Pokemon 2000 came in at No. 6 with $6.3 million; Thomas and the Magic Railroad came in ninth with $4.2 million and Chicken Run cracked the tenth slot with $3.4 million.
Fourth Crow Film Coming
imension Films is working on a fourth installment of the Crow movie franchise even though the third film in the series, The Crow: Salvation, does not have a U.S. release date yet, according to The Hollywood Reporter.
Rapper DMX has signed on to star in The Crow: Lazarus, with filming scheduled to begin before the end of the year, the site reported.
James Gibson wrote the script for Lazarus, which tells the story of a hard-living rap artist who leaves the music scene for a woman. Soon after, he is killed in a drive-by shooting. He comes back from the grave to seek revenge on the biker gang responsible for his murder, the trade paper reported.
Junger To Helm Knight
il Junger (10 Things I Hate About You) will direct the Martin Lawrence time-travel comedy Black Knight, Variety reported.
Shooting of the New Regency/Fox movie is slated to begin in November.
Lawrence will play a fast-talking hustler working in a medieval-themed miniature golf course when he is transported back to the Middle Ages. There, he teams up with a broken-down ex-knight and a beautiful peasant girl to defeat an evil king. Darryl Quarles (Big Momma's House) wrote the script.
Briefly Noted
-
Kathryn Morris (The Contender) will join Jude Law and Haley Joel Osment in the cast of Steven Spielberg's SF movie A.I., Variety reported.
-
Katherine Heigl, star of The WB's teen alien series Roswell, will play a pre-med student in Warner Bros.' upcoming thriller film Valentine, which also stars Heigl's WB colleague David Boreanaz (Angel), Variety reported.
-
Ansible magazine reported that organizers of the Arthur C. Clarke Award, recognizing outstanding British SF books, have more than doubled the monetary prize to £2,001 ($2,990) for next year, in recognition of Clarke's seminal SF film and novel 2001: A Space Odyssey.
-
Fans of Bruce Campbell's syndicated television series Jack of All Trades have created a Web site and letter-writing campaign to argue against the cancellation of the low-rated show. Fans are asked to enclose cocktail swords with their letters.
-
ADV Films has updated the official Web site for Sin: The Movie, an anime version of Ritual Entertainment's first-person shooter game Sin. Visitors can view images and a trailer from the movie, which will be released on VHS and DVD in October.
-
Fox has opened an official Web site for its upcoming mid-season series The Lone Gunmen, a spinoff of its hit The X-Files. The site currently contains little but a promotional poster.
-
The Ain't It Cool News Web site reported a rumor that film composer Howard Shore would write the score for Peter Jackson's upcoming Lord of the Rings trilogy of movies. Shore wrote the scores for New Line's upcoming SF thriller The Cell and last year's Dogma.
-
Star Wars: Episode II stunt coordinator Nick Gillard, editor Ben Burtt and visual effects supervisor John Knoll will speak at a "Meet the Filmmaker" program sponsored by the Popcorn Taxi Web site in Sydney, Australia, Aug. 7-10, according to the official Star Wars Web site. The three will take a break from production of the sequel to appear in the program at Fox Studios.
-
The Dark Horizons Web site reported that producer Jerry Bruckheimer has bought the rights to the cloning movie Gemini from Touchstone and is now seeking Nicolas Cage to star. The SF thriller tells the story of an assassin whose younger clone is sent to kill him.
-
Star Trek: Voyager brought 50 extras made up as wounded or sick aliens to the Paramount lot to appear in "Critical Care," the episode now in production. The episode will feature the Doctor working aboard a multilevel hospital ship.
-
Paramount Pictures will develop the SF romantic comedy film Love Simple, from screenwriter Brent Boyd, according to The Hollywood Reporter. Love tells the story of a young research scientist whose IQ drops the deeper he falls in love.
-
The Matrix has sold more than 3 million DVDs, making it the best-selling title in the format's brief history, Warner Home Video announced. The Matrix is the first DVD title to top the 3-million-unit milestone, which represents nearly half of the entire estimated installed base of DVD players (7.5 million) in North America.
-
The Macintosh version of the Heavy Metal: F.A.K.K.2 video game will ship in the next three or four weeks, according to the Inside Mac Games Web site.
-
The Henson Co. has bought Time Dogs, a pitch for an animated film by Chris Leone and Laura Harkcom, with Leone directing, according to Variety.
-
The 60-second trailer for The SCI FI Channel original miniseries Frank Herbert's Dune has been posted to SCIFI.COM. Dune premieres in December.
-
Visitors to the SIGGRAPH convention in New Orleans viewed a preview of Shrek, the upcoming computer-animated fantasy film voiced by Mike Myers, according to the Dark Horizons Web site. The film tells the story of an ogre who dreams of becoming a knight.
-
Galaxy Online launched a section to showcase classic and new science fiction stories. "The Writer's Corner" features works of fiction, essays and discussions of the craft of writing by well-known SF authors.
