Movie Minesweeper - The Smoking Ban Edition

- Christian Bale is hyping the next Batman film, and somewhat preemptively, the following one.

- Flooding has wrecked a location being used in the shoot of Baz Luhrmann's Australia and the schedule has needed some rapid rejigging as a result.

- Richard Roundtree has been cast in Speed Racer as Ben Burns, racing legend turned commentator.
- Joe Carnahan has posted a photoshopped LA picture to his blog, suggesting the look of White Jazz as well as how easy the retrostyling is going to be. Apparently. There's a special star cameo from Gorgeous George in the picture too.

- Rob Schmidt is to direct a feature film adapted from Stephen King's novel Insomnia. I like Schmidt a lot and I hope he can do a great job, something that can stand comparison to, say, Dark City.

- This infamous Cloverfield film - or whatever it ends up being called - is reportedly being directed by Matt Reeves. We already knew Drew Goddard is writing and J J Abrams producing - which gives us a 1-out-of-3 score, by my reckoning. I bet it isn't as good as Diary of the Dead.

- George Wolfe is directing Blood on the Leaves, while Jamie Foxx is to star and co-produce. The film is an adaptation of Jeffrey Stetson's novel about a conflicyed young attorney. He faces off with a black history professor accused of murderous vengeance against white men who were accused of committing racially motivated attrocities during the civil rights conflicts.

- The SciFi Channel's Tin Man has had it's first preview, and several details have been reported.

- Semi Chellas has been recruited to adapt Michelle Redmond's novel The Year of Fog into a screenplay. I'll place an early bet on Sarah Polley directing.

- Cinematographer Phedon Papamichael is directing From Within, a horror yarn about murderous mystery in a small Christian community. Yep - another one of those.

- TV vet Kevin Dowling has signed to (apparently) direct K-Ville, a New Orleans drama about which I know (or at least recall) little else.

- Jeffrey Wells has posted an audio recording of the entire Shock and Awe: New Wave Exploitation panel discussion from the LA Film Festival. Eli Roth, Jack Hill and Craig Brewer? How can you resist.

- As you probably suspected from the Sid Haig story last week, Rob Zombie's Halloween rehash has undergone some reshoots. What surprised me, a little at least, is how extensive these reshoots are: six new kills and an entirely remodelled finale.

- Latino Review are shamelessly hawking The Losers in the guise of a script review. They certainly seem to have some incredible contacts at Latino Review, but their script reviews make me feel ill. They seem to lap up anything as long as it is puerile, juvenile or adolescent and then forego any kind fo meaningful commentary or insight heap nauseating hyperbole all over the script instead. Every crappy comic book adaptation and toy tie-in is labelled 'dope', or 'the bomb'? Shameless.

- Jaime Lee Curtis is to play a human being in South of the Border.

- There's a Star Wars themed burlesque show coming to Dallas in which the performer dresses as Princess Leia in her metal bikini thing. I saw the link at TheForceDotNet.

- Hamas have killed off their Mickey Mouse lookalike. He died 'as a martyr' while 'protecting' his land from and Israeli 'terrorist'.

- The Simpsons' Jay Kogen is in talks to direct a straight-to-TV teen comedy film for MTV. The idea is to create modern equivalents to John Hughes' output, premiere them on the box and then push them to DVD - with even a theatrical release mentioned as a possibility. An incredibly remote possibilty, I imagine.

Movie Minesweeper - The So Many Deletions Edition

Disney have removed the Enchanted trailer from the internet. Sooner or later, however, they'll put it back... and I'll be watching them. In the meantime, more movie minesweeping.

- Another strange deletion. At the blog of Daniel Lee, editor, a post relating to the Iron Man trailer today vanished into thin air. What did it say? Let me share: I start to say "Joe Carnahan!" but am interrupted when he says "Hi, I'm Joe" and extends his hand. I shake his hand and he asks me if I'm working on Iron Man. I tell him I am... and he asks if he can see what I'm working on. Joe Carnahan asks me if he can see the piece I'm cutting. I say "absolutely" and play my teaser for him. It's still in rough shape at this point, but he seems to dig it.

- Sacha Baron Cohen has already begun the filming of Bruno in LA. He appears to be ambushing the World Trade Week, and has a new hairstyle.

- Jay Roach is making a comedy that is, reportedly, a little bit similar to Vertigo. And I don't mean High Anxiety.

- Michael Patrick King is to direct the Sex and the City fillum.

- Sam Neill is the latest cast member to join Daybreakers. I liked Undead rather a lot. You?

- Mike Mills new video for Blonde Redhead's Top Ranking is online, starring Miranda July. Download it directly.

- As promised earlier, Michel Gondry's new video for Paul McCartney's Dance Tonight is now online too, starring Mackenzie Crook, Natalie Portman, some laundry and a mandolin. A nicer quality version most be forthcoming, this YouTube encode is hardly acceptable. There's also a nice behind the scenes clip at Dazed and Confused.

- A dozen writers have formed the 1.3.9 co-op, a group of writers who will set about penning pet projects for thespians. So, let's suppose for example, Al Pacino really wanted to play Gonzo in a live action, non-puppet Muppet movie, he'd get one of these guys and they'd draw him up a screenplay. What is this going to mean in reality? Lots of ego boosts hitting the page but never making it to the screen?

- Our Lady of Victory is a based-on-true-events underdog yarn about women's basketball and it is going to star David Boreanaz and Carla Gugino.

- Beowulf is to screen at Venice - in 3D. I think that's a genuine wow moment in the making and I wish I could be be there. Other films tipped to screen include Ken Loach's These Times, Ang Lee's Lust, Caution, Todd Haynes' I'm Not There, PT Andersons There Will Be Blood and Jiang Wen's The Sun Also Rises. Two and a half out of six 'aint bad.

- Mike Myers' Walter Mitty is being scripted by Jay Kogen, a Simpsons scribe.

- A walk-on role in Terminator 4 is to be auctioned off tonight.

- In the UK? Win a pair of tickets to a screening of Stardust... and a Q&A; with Neil Gaiman afterwards.

- What does the word Pingu mean to you?

- You can download a Lost game for your suitably equipped iPod. If you wish.

- Radical Publishing is another one of these comics/Hollywood two-headed calves, like that Virgin set up recently launched with Shekhar Kapur. Destined to fail?

- Reuters have listed the films Warner Bros. are restoring to 4k resolution.

- Was a pilot filmed for the alternate Veronica Mars? The one where she's in the FBI? TVSquad seem to think so - and they've run a full synopsis of it. Somebody please find me a copy!

- BBC Films are undergoing something of a rejig.

I'm off to find more links to trailers Disney don't want you to see (for some reason).

Carnahan Drools Over Sin City 2

Joe Carnahan has seen what may be the teaser for Sin City 2, and he's almost wet himself.

He posted his impressions on his blog.

Robert Rodriguez stopped by the office yesterday and showed me what may become the teaser for Sin City 2 and HOLY SH*T is it something. I don't want to let any cats out of any bags, so all I can say is there's not a hetero male moviegoer alive that's not going to deeply DIG that spot. Remember, he's doing A Dame To Kill For and brother has he got it. That guy's enthusiasm for filmmaking is infectious too. A solid bloke and a good soul.

I think this suggests once again that Rose McGowan has the role of Ava Lord - who else has been at Robert's disposal to shoot teaser material of late? Of course, Angelina Jolie or Rachel Weisz may have stopped by for an afternoon... seems less likely, but really - who knows? Maybe the specific role of Ava Lord doesn't appear and this is just a montage of dames to kill for, ending with a "none as to-kill-for-as-this-one' moment with a silhouette exhaling cigarette smoke. We'll find out sooner or later, I'm sure.

On the Grind House DVDs maybe?

Bunny Lake Is Dead

Joe Carnahan has posted to his blog about the recent departure of Reese Witherspoon from Bunny Lake is Missing, and it sounds to me that he's off the film. Make your own mind up:

Scuttlebutt: How about NOTHING. How about a situation where the press tries to stir it up. These things happen. Movies go away every day. Reese is dealing with a lot of stuff in her life. So am I. We were running up against it as far as time for prep and shooting and scripting, etc. I had already commited to White Jazz and the longer we stretched Bunny the more in jeopardy the WJ schedule became. And there was just no way I could let that happen. I need a nice extended prep period for that flick.

And now I've got it.

That's it guys. I wish there were some truly tasty bits of gossip but there just aren't. Sorry.

Onward and upward y'all! White Jazz awaits.

I'm prepared to bet the eventual Bunny Lake film, from a different director, is better than White Jazz.

Will Reese come back onboard for a different director? I think she might, though not any time soon, maybe.

Bunny Lake Is Rescued?

Reese Witherspoon has quit Joe Carnahan's remake of Bunny Lake is Missing. The film's start date is fixed, leaving the producers - well, those that remain, as Reese was amongst their ranks initially - trying to find a replacement.

I think this might save the film. What do I mean? Possibly not what you expect. I like Reese just fine. But I think this might crash the project, leaving it without a director. As far as I can tell, the script by Doug Wright is very, very strong, and deserves a better man than Carnahan. He can go off and do White Jazz which is highly unlikely to have such a good script.

Soderbergh's the man for the Bunny job. Here's hoping it lands on his desk soon.

In the meantime, let's all enjoy the DVD of Otto Preminger's original Bunny Lake is Missing one more time - even if, for some reason, the incredible Saul Bass poster art isn't used on the disc's cover. D'oh!