Chow Saves Bulletproof Scott
eann William Scott, who co-stars with Chow Yun-Fat in Bulletproof Monk, told SCI FI Wire that he did many of his own stunts in the martial-arts fantasy film—wrenching his back in the process.
Scott said in an interview that his back seized up the day following a strenuous stunt, in which he was dragged across a rooftop by a cable.
"I bend down, and I had this spasm," Scott said. "I thought I was dying. Yun-Fat basically picks me up, puts me over his shoulder, and ... he's like basically walking to my trailer. I was so in shock. I was like, 'He's a hero.'" Chow tossed Scott onto his bed, ordered his shirt off and began massaging the spasm out of his back, Scott said. He "was so concerned about me," he said. "He's such a great guy. ... He's like,
'You're stupid. You do too many stunts.' ... I'm like, 'That's because you're Chow Yun-Fat. You've done a few action movies.' ... Since then I haven't been able to walk the same. No, I was fine." Bulletproof Monk opened April 16.
King Puts Finger On Monk
aime King, who co-stars in the supernatural martial-arts film Bulletproof Monk, told SCI FI Wire that she trained hard for the role of a kick-ass street kid.
King (sometimes billed as James King) worked out with star Seann William Scott before and during the film's six-month shoot, and even injured herself, she said in an interview.
"We got to jump on, like, trampolines, learn flips, learn karate, kung fu, Hong Kong street fighting," said King, who plays a character called "Bad Girl." "We learned so much different stuff. It was wild. And then when we got up [to Canada, where the film was shot,] we trained pretty much every single day and on our days off."
King suffered a broken left middle finger during the production. "But the funny thing is, I broke my finger not on set doing kung fu," she said. "I broke my finger when I fell down the stairs prior to going on set. ... We were actually filming the scene right on location next to a hospital. So we'd block a scene, I'd go get my X-ray, go back and shoot the scene, then go check out the X-ray, then go back and finish the scene. And I literally did the whole thing with a broken finger." Monk, also starring Chow Yun-Fat, opened April 16.
Johnson Takes On Ghost
aredevil director Mark Steven Johnson will rewrite and helm Ghost Rider, based on the Marvel Comics series, for Columbia Pictures, accoring to The Hollywood Reporter.
The project aims to go into production by year's end.
Nicolas Cage is attached to star in the project as a former motorcycle stuntman who agrees to let his body become host to a vengeful spirit in exchange for the safety of his true love, the trade paper reported.
Shane Salerno wrote the original draft of the script. Marvel Entertainment's Avi Arad and Crystal Sky's Steven Paul are producing the project with Johnson's producing partner, Gary Foster, the trade paper reported.
Johnson To Rewrite Ghost
ark Steven Johnson, who will direct a Ghost Rider movie, told Empire Online that his first job is to begin a new draft of the screenplay.
Blade writer David Goyer wrote an early draft.
"The studio wants me to write my own version of Ghost Rider," Johnson told the site. "I want to go back to the source material and use more of the comic. I'm just sitting down to write now. This project has been close to going before. Hopefully it's not cursed. I'm hoping that we could be shooting next winter."
Nicolas Cage is slated to star as the titular cursed superhero. Johnson wrote and directed Daredevil, an adaptation of another Marvel Comics franchise.
Singer Has More X-Ideas
ryan Singer, director of the upcoming X-Men sequel, X2,
told the Comics Continuum Web site that he has story ideas for a third film.
"There are three ones I would like to address if I were to go into a third film that I would like to go into fruition," Singer told the site. "You have to see how these things go."
X2 is slated for release on May 2.
Wolverine Contest Begins
o promote its Xbox video game X2: Wolverine's Revenge, Activision is sponsoring a national radio promotion that will offer eight grand prizes of a trip for two to the X2 feature-film premiere in Hollywood, Calif., on April 28.
The promotion, "The Hunt for X2 Wolverine's Revenge," begins this week and will run in New York, Los Angeles, Chicago, San Francisco, Washington, Boston, Atlanta and Dallas.
Radio stations in each market will dispatch vans to various locations to pass out sweepstakes entry forms and a winning phrase that could send winners to the premiere. Secondary prizes include the Xbox game system and DVD playback kits, tickets to a local screening of X2, movie merchandise, copies of the special-edition X-Men 1.5 DVD and Activision's X2 Wolverine's Revenge game, the company announced.
Wolverine's Revenge shipped April 15. X2 hits theaters on May 2.
Gillies Woos Dunst In Spidey 2
ew Zealand actor Daniel Gillies will star as Kirsten Dunst's love interest in Columbia Pictures' upcoming Spider-Man sequel film, Variety reported.
Gillies will portray an astronaut who woos Mary Jane Watson (Dunst), true love of Peter Parker (Tobey Maguire).
The Amazing Spider-Man began production on April 12, under the direction of Sam Raimi.
Dunst Unsure About Kaena
irsten Dunst told SCI FI Wire that she's not sure what's happening with Kaena: The Prophecy, a 3-D computer-animated fantasy film for which she voiced the lead character.
Anjelica Huston and the late Richard Harris also provided voice-overs.
"I did [that] so long ago," the Spider-Man star said in an interview. "They're still animating that. It's about a girl who's saving her planet. I'm that girl."
Dunst is no stranger to voice-over work, having previously worked on The Animated Adventures of Tom Sawyer, Anastasia and Kiki's Delivery Service. "You don't have to be in hair and makeup at 5 a.m.," she said. "I don't know why I've done so many animated movies. ... It's fun to go in there and play and not be seen and to do different voices."
The actress adds that Kiki's Delivery Service, which was directed by legendary Spirited Away filmmaker Hayao Miyazaki, was the most difficult to do. "I had to match the mouth movements that were already there [in the Japanese version]," she said. "That was like looping, which was kind of awful. I had to fit words perfectly into the flaps of [Kiki's] mouth. I couldn't do whatever I wanted to do. Usually, though, it's great. You can be overdramatic and exaggerated and do the silliest things, and it will work."
Heinlein's 'Spacesuit' Optioned
arner Brothers has optioned film rights to Robert Heinlein's classic SF tale "Have Spacesuit—Will Travel" for Harry Potter producer David Heyman, via his Heyday Films banner, Variety reported.
Vince Gerardis and Ralph Vicinaza will executive produce under their Created By banner. No screenwriter has been hired.
The film will tell the story of a teenager who loses a contest that will take the first teen into space, but wins the consolation prize: a spacesuit from the original Apollo missions. When he discovers the spacesuit has made alien contact, the boy is propelled into an adventure of intergalactic proportions, the trade paper reported.
Heyman is now in production in London on the third installment in the Potter franchise, Harry Potter and the Prisoner of Azkaban.
Kong Will Be All Kiwi
irector Peter Jackson told the New Zealand Dominion Post newspaper that his upcoming remake of King Kong will duplicate New York on kiwi sets.
Jackson said he would construct 1930s-era New York sets on a paddock on the outskirts of Wellington.
"We will build somewhere in the Wellington area," Jackson told the newspaper. "We'll just find some flat land and build a big back [lot] set of New York streets and then use our computers to extend the buildings, make the streets longer and the buildings higher."
Two-thirds of the film is set on Skull Island, so location scouts will also be looking for jungle-type locations and beaches around the country, the newspaper added. Shooting is slated to start in mid-2004, with a release in 2005.
Cameron Mulls More Aliens?
ames Cameron, who directed Aliens, held out the possibility of helming another installment of the popular SF franchise in an interview with the Canadian Edmonton Sun newspaper.
Cameron told the paper that it would have to be truly scary and likely an R-rated film.
The 1979 original Alien, directed by Ridley Scott, "holds a special classic niche as one of the great terrifying experiences," Cameron said. "And the trick [to making a new Alien film] is you don't go crazy and make a $150-million movie, because you don't want to have to compromise. You don't want to try to do a PG-13 Alien that is all things to everyone."
Cameron added, "It's got to still maintain its roots in this kind of cinematic id. Ridley did it really beautifully. He just kind of put you into this Freudian nightmare space."
Potter IV Script Begun
avid Heyman, producer of the Harry Potter film series, told the BBC Online that work is already starting on a fourth film.
Screenwriter Steve Kloves started on the script for Harry Potter and the Goblet of Fire last week, Heyman said during the launch party for the Harry Potter and the Chamber of Secrets DVD.
"The approach is that he's going to write the script as though it's one film," Heyman told the site. "And hopefully he'll be able to do that.
When he gets to the end, we'll make an assessment about whether that's the right thing to do or not. The goal is to try. If not, we'll split [Goblet of Fire] in two. But at the moment we're trying to do it in one."
Heyman added that preproduction will begin towards the end of the year, with production to start sometime next year. "My hope would be that it'll be the same cast, [but] it's too early to tell, though," Heyman said.
For his part, Chris Columbus, who directed the first two Potter films, held out hope that he might step behind the camera again. (Alfonso Cuaron is directing the upcoming third film, Harry Potter and the Prisoner of Azkaban, which is currently in production.)
"Maybe film five," Columbus told the BBC. "Four is starting a little too quickly. But five is a possibility."
Weisz Now Up For Mummy III
achel Weisz—the Mummy star who previously said she didn't want to do any more sequels—has apparently had a change of heart and told SCI FI Wire that she now wants to do a third installment.
"If there is one, I hope they ask me," Weisz said in an interview. "It would be kind of weird not to."
When The Mummy Returns was released in 2001, Weisz told SCI FI Wire that "twice is definitely enough." Weisz first played Eve Carnahan, the Egyptologist who fell for heroic Rick O'Connell (Brendan Fraser), in 1999's original The Mummy.
A third Mummy film would reportedly place Imhotep (Arnold Vosloo) in modern times.
Fans Hope For Miracles
ans of ABC's supernatural series Miracles, which the network has pulled from its schedule indefinitely, are rallying to save the show.
Led by fans Angela Mitchell, Lara Giesbers and Heather LaFlame, the fans plan to sell T-shirts, take out an ad in the trade paper Variety and mail napkins to the network, a campaign echoing the mailing of tiny Tabasco bottles to The WB to renew Roswell. The fans also plan to open a Web site on April 15.
ABC pulled Miracles this month, though seven episodes remain to be aired. The show averaged fewer than 7 million viewers a week, and the last original episode, which aired March 10, drew an audience of only 5.7 million.
Episode III Gets Animated
an Gregoire, the "previsualization supervisor" for George Lucas' upcoming Star Wars: Episode III, told the official Homing Beacon newsletter that they have begun editing the prequel's opening sequence, though not a frame of film has been shot.
Gregoire's team is using animatics, computer-animated moving storyboards, to establish a template for the live action and final animation, he said.
Gregoire leads the team of 11 computer artists who are envisioning and exploring Episode III in animatic form, the newsletter reported. A veteran of Episode II—Attack of the Clones, Gregoire is applying the lessons from such sequences as the Clone War and the droid factory.
"We're taking what we learned in terms of developing assets first and getting those loaded up and as well-defined as we can early into the process," Gregoire told the newsletter. "Then we go about animating the shots. It lends a lot more continuity to the sequence, visually and creatively, and kind of streamlines the entire process."
The animatics can include temporary dialogue (read by editor Ben Burtt), music and sound effects, Gregoire said. "As the shots progress, the animatics artists have a tremendous amount of control over what they put into it, as long as they stick with the essential essence of what is supposed to be happening."
Wahlberg Fitted For Jacket
ark Wahlberg will take the lead role in the time-bending thriller film The Jacket, Variety reported.
Section Eight and Mandalay will co-produce and are courting British director John Maybury. George Clooney, Steven Soderbergh and Peter Guber will produce.
Wahlberg will play a soldier who has been convicted of a murder and believes he's traveling through time. Marc Rocco (Murder in the First) and Massy Tadjedin wrote the script.
Hill To Debut In Stepford
ountry superstar Faith Hill will make her big-screen debut in Paramount's remake of The Stepford Wives, Variety reported.
The studio is talks with the Grammy-winning singer, with an eye to casting her as one of the idealized suburban wives in the dark SF comedy, the trade paper reported.
Nicole Kidman toplines a Stepford cast that includes John and Joan Cusack, Glenn Close, Christopher Walken and Roger Bart. The remake of the 1975 movie was scripted by Paul Rudnick and is being produced by Scott Rudin and Donald De Line, the trade paper reported.
Another Zone Remake Due
roducers of UPN's new Twilight Zone series are once again going back to the well with a remake of another classic episode, "Eye of the Beholder," written by Rod Serling.
The remake will air at 9 p.m. April 30, the network announced.
Molly Sims stars as Janet, a woman desperate to conform to her society's physical ideal by going under the plastic surgeon's (Reggie Hayes) knife for the 11th time. This final effort leads her into a literal chamber of horrors. David Ellis (Final Destination 2) directed from Rod Serling's script.
The original "Eye of the Beholder" aired Nov. 11, 1960, and starred Donna Douglas (The Beverly Hillbillies) as Janet.
Stokers Honor Williamson, King
he Horror Writers Association has named authors Stephen King and Jerry Williamson as the winners of Bram Stoker Awards for Lifetime Achievement, acknowledging superior achievement in an entire career.
The awards are named for the author of Dracula and will be presented at the association's annual conference, June 6-8 in New York.
The Lifetime Achievement award is presented to individuals who are at least 60 years of age or have been published for a minimum of 35 years. Previous winners include John Farris, Ramsey Campbell, Charles Grant and Ray Bradbury.
King is the author of more than 30 horror novels and is the first writer to have had three, four and five titles appear simultaneously on the New York Times best-seller list.
Williamson is also the author of more than 30 horror novels, including Affinity, The Haunt and Spree. He is also the editor of the renowned Masques anthology series.
SCIFI.COM Matches Record
CIFI.COM attracted 2.5 million unique visitors during March, matching the record it set in December 2002, during the airing of Steven Spielberg Presents Taken, the site announced.
Traffic to the site increased 40 percent over the previous two months, coinciding with the site's redesign.
SCIFI.COM unveiled its new design and structure—including a new, interactive schedule guide—in late February to reflect the re-branding of the SCI FI Channel. More updates are currently in development that will further improve the navigation and appearance of other areas of the site.
About half of SCIFI.COM's traffic is generated by companion sites to the Channel's original programs. Popular destinations include sites for Frank Herbert's Children of Dune, Tremors: The Series, Farscape, Stargate SG-1 and Taken.
Stoker Nominees Announced
he Horror Writers Association announced the final ballot for this year's Bram Stoker Awards.
Named in honor of Stoker, author of Dracula, the award honors superior achievement in horror works published in the English language.
Winners will be announced at a banquet during the association's 2003 annual conference in New York June 6-8. A full list of nominees follows.
Novel
•From a Buick 8 by Stephen King
•The Hour Before Dark by Douglas Clegg
•The Lovely Bones by Alice Sebold
•Lullaby by Chuck Palahniuk
•The Night Class by Tom Piccirilli
First Novel
•Atmosphere by Michael Laimo
•The Blues Ain't Nothin' by Tina Jens
•The Lovely Bones by Alice Sebold
•The Red Church by Scott Nicholson
Long Fiction
•"Cape Wrath" by Paul Finch
•"Coraline" by Neil Gaiman
•"El Dia de Los Muertos" by Brian A. Hopkins
•"My Work Is Not Yet Done" by Thomas Ligotti
•"The Origin" by David B. Silva
Short Fiction
•"Details" by China Miéville
•"Disappearances" by Mort Castle
•"The Green Man" by Christopher Fowler
•"The Misfit Child Grows Fat on Despair" by Tom Piccirilli
•"The Plague Species" by Charlee Jacob
Fiction Collection
•The Collection by Bentley Little
•Everything's Eventual by Stephen King
•Knuckles and Tales by Nancy A. Collins
•Nations of the Living, Nations of the Dead by Mort Castle
•One More for the Road by Ray Bradbury
Anthology
•Children of Cthulhu, John Pelan and Benjamin Adams, eds.
•The Darker Side: Generations of Horror, John Pelan, ed.
•The Mammoth Book of Best New Horror 13, Stephen Jones, ed.
•Shivers, Richard Chizmar, ed.
•The Year's Best Fantasy and Horror: Fifteenth Annual Collection, Ellen
Datlow and Terri Windling, eds.
Nonfiction
•Hellnotes, David B. Silva, Paul F. Olson and Garrett Peck, eds.
•Jobs in Hell, Brian Keene and Kelly Laymon, eds.
•Ralan.com, Ralan Conley, ed.
•Ramsey Campbell, Probably: Essays on Horror and Sundry Fantasies by Ramsey Campbell
•Supernatural Fiction Writers: Fantasy and Horror, Second Edition by Richard Bleiler
Illustrated Narrative
•Fort: Prophet of the Unexplained (issues 1-4) by Peter Lenkov
•Howard the Duck (issues 1-6) by Steve Gerber
•Nightside (issues 1-4) by Robert Weinberg
Screenplay
•Frailty by Brant Hanley
•Minority Report by Scott Frank and Jon Cohen
•The Ring by Ehren Kruger and Scott Frank
•Signs by M. Night Shyamalan
Work for Younger Readers
•Abarat by Clive Barker
•Abu and the 7 Marvels by Richard Matheson and William Stout
•Cat in Glass and Other Tales of the Unnatural by Nancy Etchemendy
•Coraline by Neil Gaiman
Poetry Collection
•The Gossamer Eye by Mark McLaughlin, Rain Graves and David Niall Wilson
•Guises (poetry section "Night Unmasked") by Charlee Jacob
•Night Smoke by Bruce Boston and Marge Simon
•This Cape Is Red Because I've Been Bleeding by Tom Piccirilli
Alternative Forms
•Buckeye Jim in Egypt by Mort Castle (audio script based on the Mort Castle story)
•Flesh and Blood, Jack Fisher, ed.
•Imagination Box by Steve and Melanie Tem (multimedia CD)
•The Tree Is My Hat by Larry Santoro (audio script based on the Gene Wolfe story)
CBC Picks Up Sawyer's Columns
F author Robert J. Sawyer's weekly radio column Science FACTion: The Cutting Edge of Science has been picked up as a regular weekly feature by CBC Radio after a successful eight-week test run, Locus Online reported.
Sawyer's three-minute commentaries will be heard on local CBC morning shows across Canada, starting July 1.
Specific air dates and times will vary; check local listings, the site reported.
Tactics Scares Up Viewers
he April 4 one-hour series premiere of the SCI FI Channel's original reality series Scare Tactics scared up a 1.5 average rating (1.24 million housholds), becoming the most-watched non-news cable program for the night among viewers 18-49, the network announced.
With 1.37 million viewers in that age group, Scare Tactics' 10 p.m. telecast also become the channel's best-ever original series premiere in that demographic.
The show also delivered more viewers aged 18-34 (556,000) in prime time than any other non-news show on basic cable for the night, the network said.
New half-hour episodes of Scare Tactics aired in their regular 10 p.m. ET/PT timeslot, starting April 11. The show was followed at 10:30 p.m. with a rebroadcast of the previous week's episode.
Fox Falls For Wonder
ox Broadcasting Co. ordered 13 episodes of the reality-bending dramedy Wonder Falls for the fall season, according to The Hollywood Reporter.
The series was created and is executive produced by Todd Holland and Bryan Fuller for 20th Century Fox TV and Regency TV.
The series revolves around a Niagara Falls souvenir shop worker, played by Caroline Dhavernas, whose life is forever changed when she has a nervous breakdown and finds that inanimate animal figures communicate with her, the trade paper reported.
The series is slated to begin production within the next few weeks, with episodes to begin airing in the summer.
Firth, Suvari Trauma-tized
olin Firth and Mena Suvari will star in Trauma, a supernatural thriller film directed by Marc Evans, Variety reported.
Trauma starts shooting at the end of April in London and on the Isle of Man, the trade paper reported.
The original screenplay, by first-time Scottish writer Richard Smith, is about a man who wakes from a coma after a car crash and becomes haunted by images of his dead wife. Firth plays the bereaved man, with Suvari as his new-age neighbor, who encourages him to contact his wife through a medium, with shocking consequences, the trade paper reported.
Piana Slips Into Snakeskin
ommercials helmer Dario Piana will direct the SF horror film Snakeskin for Emmett/Furla and Millennium Films, Variety reported.
Snakeskin deals with a man who must hunt down his genetically enhanced ex-partner, who has stolen a package that could change the balance of good and evil in the world, the trade paper reported.
Paul Sloan, who will also co-star in the picture, wrote the script.
Adams Bio Gets U.S. Publisher
oston-based publisher Justin, Charles & Co. announced that it acquired U.S. rights to Hitchhiker: A Biography of Douglas Adams by M.J. Simpson, chronicling the life of the author of the hugely popular Hitchhiker’s Guide to the Galaxy and its sequels.
Adams' five-book SF series, published between 1979 and 1992, has combined sales of more than 5 million copies.
Hitchhiker: A Biography of Douglas Adams was released this month in the United Kingdom and will be published in the United States on Nov. 1. The U.S. edition will include updates and additions, including a new introduction by SF author Neil Gaiman, the publisher said.
Simpson is an authority on Adams, having collected information and material about him for the last 20 years. Simpson is co-founder of Britain’s best-selling science fiction magazine, SFX, and author of The Pocket Essential Hitchhiker’s Guide.
Williams Has Final Cut
obin Williams will star in Lions Gate's SF movie Final Cut from first-time writer-director Omar Naim, according to The Hollywood Reporter.
The film is scheduled to go into production in June.
Cut is set in a world where people are implanted with a chip that records their lives. Williams will play a Cutter, an individual who has final cut on the recorded history of his clients. In his latest assignment, he has discovered a window into his own dark history and has set off a chain reaction that has put his life in danger, the trade paper reported.
Nick Wechsler is producing, with Naim's manager Guymon Casady at Management 360 executive producing. Lions Gate's Marc Butan is overseeing the project. Tak Fujimoto (The Sixth Sense) is in negotiations to come aboard as director of photography, the trade paper reported.
DreamWorks Buys Steel
reamWorks bought Dan Gilroy's SF spec script Real Steel for Robert Zemeckis' ImageMovers to produce, Variety reported.
Steel is set in the near future, where 2,000-pound humanoid robots battle in the boxing ring and a promoter takes his fighter to the robot boxing championships.
ImageMovers will produce, with principals Zemeckis, Jack Rapke and Steve Starkey shepherding the project and Bennett Schneir helping develop it, the trade paper reported.
Breathing Life Into Suspiria
imension Films has acquired remake rights to Dario Argento's classic Italian horror film Suspiria, with writer Stephen Katz (Shadow of the Vampire) attached to pen the screenplay, Variety reported.
Michael Nash and Amanda Klein will produce through their Primal Pictures company, the trade paper reported.
The 1977 original was produced by the director's brother, Claudio Argento, and starred Jessica Harper, Joan Bennett and Alida Valli in the story of an American student in a prestigious European ballet academy that fronts for a secret witches' coven, the trade paper reported.
Suspiria earned a cult following among genre fans for its dreamlike set pieces, garish colors, bravura camerawork and booming soundtrack by the director and Italian fright-rock band Goblin, Variety reported.
Cobb Quits Andromeda
he Sci-Fi Talk Web site reported that Keith Hamilton Cobb will leave the syndicated SF series Andromeda, where he plays the Nietzschean Tyr Anasazi.
Cobb said he was joining castmate Brent Stait (Rev Bem) and former executive producer Robert Hewitt Wolfe, both of whom left the show a while back, the site reported.
"I know that the American fan base, as expressed
online, seems rather displeased with the developments of the third season," Cobb said. "My own personal opinion as far as my character, that it's always been somewhat lacking and has only gotten worse. So I had not planned to do a fourth season for that reason."
Cobb said that he will appear in four episodes of a fourth season, if the producers want him.
Left Behind 11 Hits Stores
rmageddon, the 11th volume in the best-selling Christian-themed Left Behind series, hit stores on April 8, Cinescape Online reported.
The latest installment in Tim LaHaye and Jerry B. Jenkins' post-apocalyptic series sets the stage for the final battle between good and evil, as foretold in the Bible.
The books have proven to be popular not just among fundamentalist Christians, but also among mainstream readers, jumping to the top of the New York Times, USA Today and Wall Street Journal best-seller lists, the site reported. Armageddon carries a retail price of $24.99.
Paramount Does Monster Mash
aramount Pictures bought Monster Mash, a live-action/computer-animated family horror film from writer Ben Tripp, with Jordan Kerner producing, Variety reported.
Set during Halloween, the movie centers on monsters who feel free to emerge during the holiday, when no one will notice them, the trade paper reported.
Kerner Entertainment production head Paul Neesan will executive produce and supervise development. Tripp's manager Lawrence Mattis also will executive produce, the trade paper reported.
Paramount also acquired film rights to the 1962 hit pop song Monster Mash by Bobby "Boris" Pickett for use in the film. The producers plan to record an update of the song by a modern band for the film, the trade paper reported.
Fantasy Origins Ships
quare Enix announced that it has shipped Final Fantasy Origins in North America.
Origins compiles remastered PlayStation editions of the original Final Fantasy game and its sequel, Final Fantasy II.
The remastered editions of the 1980s-era games feature new cinematic movies, new opening theme songs, updates of the original event sequences, enhanced graphics, improved sound quality and new gameplay modes designed to make the games accessible to both beginners and role-playing game veterans alike, the company announced.
In conjunction with the game's release, BradyGames has created the Final Fantasy Origins Official Strategy Guide.
Green Joins Scooby Two
harles Roven, one of the producers of the upcoming Scooby-Doo sequel film, told SCI FI Wire that filmmakers have cast Seth Green (Buffy the Vampire Slayer) in a key role.
The casting marks a reunion of sorts between Green—who played the werewolf, Oz, on UPN's Buffy—and former castmate Sarah Michelle Gellar (Buffy), who reprises the role of Daphne in the Scooby sequel.
"And there'll be other interesting casting that, hopefully, we'll be able to reveal to the public within the next couple of weeks," Roven added in an interview. "We start shooting on April 14 in Vancouver. And the same cast is back."
The sequel reunites Scooby-Doo stars Gellar; her real-life husband, Freddie Prinze Jr. (Fred); Matthew Lillard (Shaggy); and Linda Cardellini (Velma) in a new mystery adventure set for release on March 26, 2004. Raja Gosnell again directs.
Coulter Goes It Alone
ew Line Cinema is in talks with Emmy-nominated director Allen Coulter to helm the ghost-story thriller film Alone, according to The Hollywood Reporter.
Based on a script by Kevin Taft, Alone centers on an agoraphobic high-school student who learns that her home is haunted, the trade paper reported.
New Line-based Phantom Four Films, which is run by Blade 2 writer David S. Goyer, is producing.
Warner Scares Up Ghost Story
riter Jeff Lowell has sold an untitled ghost story spec script to Warner Brothers, Variety reported.
The romantic comedy centers on a man who begins a new relationship, but is haunted by the ghost of his dead wife, the trade paper reported.
Adam Shankman's Disney-based Offspring Productions is producing, with Shankman and Jennifer Gibgot sharing producing credits, the trade paper reported.
Mann Signs Onto Tonight
ichael Mann will direct Artisan's superhero movie Tonight, He Comes, Variety reported.
Vincent Ngo wrote the script, which will be produced by Akiva Goldsman, the trade paper reported.
Tonight focuses on a tortured superhero who crash-lands in Sheepshead Bay, Brooklyn, and tries to revitalize himself by romancing an alluring housewife, the trade paper reported.
Briefly Noted
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Director Bryan Singer denied to SCI FI Wire that his upcoming X-Men sequel movie will carry a subtitle, as reported by other Web sites. The sequel, which opens May 2, is simply called X2, the director said.
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Warner Brothers has posted the final theatrical trailer for the upcoming sequel film The Matrix Reloaded, which opens May 15.
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Columbia Pictures is in talks with Antz helmer Todd Alcott to write a feature-film version of the Fantasy Island TV series, according to The Hollywood Reporter.
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Dark Horse comics said that the final two issues of its eight-issue Fray series, from Buffy the Vampire Slayer creator Joss Whedon, will finally appear after more than a year's delay. Issue number seven is due April 23, and issue number eight is due June 18.
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Best-selling author Anne Rice, 61, underwent gastric bypass surgery on Jan. 15 and has since lost 44 of 254 pounds, the New Orleans Times-Picayune newspaper reported. Rice told the newspaper that she wants to lose another 100 pounds or so to be able to go on a book tour this fall.
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Conceptual art of characters and makeup from the upcoming Hellboy movie, with audio commentary, has gone live on the official Web site.
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TheOneRing.Net reported that the trailer for the third Lord of the Rings film, The Return of the King, will screen with The Matrix Reloaded, which opens May 15.
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The Comics Continuum reported that Daredevil director Mark Steven Johnson still plans on helming the spinoff film Elektra, even though he just signed on to direct Ghost Rider as well.
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Screenwriters Sam Brown and Jack Angelo have been tapped by New Line to write Lucky, a live-action family film about a movie-star dog who goes out into the world to find the love of a boy, Variety reported.
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Graham Masterton, who was slated to be the World Horror Convention's author guest of honor, canceled plans to attend the event, scheduled for April 17-20 in Kansas City, Mo., due to his wife's illness. Stepping in is Brian A. Hopkins, Locus Online reported.
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Filmmakers were spotted unloading a crate marked "R2D2 box 6" at Fox Studios in Sydney, Australia, marking the start of production on Star Wars: Episode III, the Moviehole Web site reported.
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Steven Spielberg has topped Premiere magazine's 2003 list of the 100 most influential people in Hollywood, TV Guide Online reported.
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Chow Yun-Fat, star of the supernatural martial-arts movie Bulletproof Monk, did not travel from his home in Hong Kong to Los Angeles for the film's premiere on April 9 because he is heeding travel warnings issued by the World Health Organization and "in deference to his wife," his spokesman told The Hollywood Reporter. Hong Kong is an epicenter of severe acute respiratory syndrome, or SARS.
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Japan wished anime character Astro Boy a happy birthday on April 7, the fictional date the robot was created, with a relaunched TV series, fireworks and a display of a $1 million, 32-karat-diamond, ruby and emerald doll at Tokyo's Mitsukoshi Department Store, Variety reported.
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Fox Licensing & Merchandising and Inkworks have teamed up to release Buffy Connections trading cards, a 72-card series printed on holographic foil board and based on UPN's Buffy the Vampire Slayer series, the companies announced.
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British small press Big Engine is going into insolvency, and its SF magazine, 3SF, has ceased publication after three issues, Locus Online reported.
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Mainframe Entertainment has announced completion of its first one-hour prime-time special, Scary Godmother Halloween Spooktakular, scheduled to air on Canada's YTV network on Halloween, the Comics Continuum Web site reported.
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A judge has tentatively agreed to grant a motion by Variety and the Los Angeles Daily Journal to open the record in a licensing dispute between Marvel and Sony over the film Spider-Man, which was filed in February under seal, Variety reported. L.A. Superior Court Judge Alexander Williams was expected to issue a formal order on April 14.
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Universal's monster-hunter adventure romance Van Helsing wrapped 11 weeks of shooting in the Czech Republic last week and will move to Los Angeles to finish shooting, Variety reported. Universal is owned by Vivendi Universal, which also owns SCIFI.COM.
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The IGN FilmForce Web site reported that filmmakers have decided to leave out the character of Campion Bond from the upcoming film adaptation of the League of Extraordinary Gentlemen comic series.
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Disney has posted the new trailer for its upcoming supernatural film Pirates of the Caribbean: The Curse of the Black Pearl, which opens July 9.
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David Carradine will appear on the April 27 episode of ABC's Alias, playing a mysterious monk with information on the Rambaldi prophecies, the Dark Horizons Web site reported.
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Warner Brothers has partnered with NBC Sports debuted a new two-and-a-half minute trailer for the upcoming sequel film The Matrix Reloaded at 3 p.m. ET April 13, during NBC's Arena Football League coverage, according to The Hollywood Reporter.
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Lord of the Rings star Elijah Wood will voice the lead character in Warner Brothers/Village Roadshow Pictures' upcoming animated penguin movie Happy Feet (aka The Kingdom), Variety reported. George Miller, John Collee, Warren Coleman and Judy Morris wrote the script, which Miller (Babe) will direct.
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TNN announced that it will air reruns of Star Trek: The Next Generation, Seven Days and Highlander from 3 p.m. to 6 p.m. on weekdays, starting April 14.
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Simon West (Con Air) will director a fourth Jurassic Park movie, Variety reported.
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