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Apparently the thing to do these days is that when you have a movie premiere, you hire some telegenic actors to interview people on your red carpet and stream it live via Ustream for your official MySpace page.

That’s just the thing that the folks in the Avatar marketing department did for the movie premiere last night, and it was one of the crew members at Flickchart.com who was paying attention to the feed whose ears perked up during director Bryan Singer’s interview when he mentioned that he’d signed a deal to direct the next X-Men Origins film.

To view the interview for yourself, check out the below, fast-forwarding to where the pin is stuck in the middle of the slider bar:

UPDATE: Fox has since confirmed Singer’s signing and has also announced that screenwriter Jamie Moss (Street Kings, Ghost in the Shell) has been brought on for a “back to the drawing board” rewrite, as THR put it.

Courtesy of Variety comes the news that Sony Pictures has optioned the English-language screen rights to The Girl with the Dragon Tattoo; I automatically curse because that’s one more book that needs to jump to the top of my “to read” list.

In fact, I’m actually a little angry to be covering this news today because this means that I have to summarize the plot; thank goodness deceased author Stieg Larsson’s website provides a very blissfully brief one:

Forty years ago, Harriet Vanger disappeared off the secluded island owned and inhabited by the powerful Vanger family. There was no corpse, no witnesses, no evidence. But her uncle, Henrik, is convinced that she was murdered by someone from her own deeply dysfunctional Vanger clan. Disgraced journalist Mikael Blomqvist is hired to investigate.

(My usual M.O. when reading a book or watching a movie is to know as little as possible before going into it so that I’m surprised. Yes, I know that makes going to the movies a little difficult, but considering that I underwent a near-media blackout for X-Men and was rewarded with awesomeness, I firmly stand by my method.)

Writing Michael Fleming notes that the deal hasn’t been finalized because there’s a bit of contention between Larsson’s parents and his longtime partner Eva Gabrielsson over the rights. If this isn’t a data point in an argument over why civil or common-law unions aren’t strong enough—even for heterosexual couples—I don’t know what is.

Despite not having a final deal, Steve Zaillian (American Gangster, Moneyball) has been approached to write the script. A Swedish-language film starring Michael Nyqvist (as Blomkvist) and Noomi Rapacehas (as hacker Lisbeth Salander) already been made, earning almost $100 million after its release last February. Music Box Films acquired the U.S. distribution rights; no word yet on if or when they’ll release it.

The news that Mel Gibson is making another period epic which will likely feature some pretty awesome battle scenes is not a surprise. I mean, of the four movies he’s directed, none of them have taken place in the present day and only one of them can’t be considered an epic (The Man Without a Face, which I liked).

(In fact, a more enterprising person—like a film student—could probably write a whole paper on why Gibson’s directorial efforts don’t take place in the modern day. If someone out there does write such a paper, I’d like to be mentioned in your bibliography, please.)

However, joining him on his next period drama will be Leonardo DiCaprio, and the two are going to set sail for the Scandinavian countries to make an epic about Vikings. Currently unnamed, the film is being written by William Monahan (The Departed, Kingdom of Heaven) and filming is set to begin in Fall 2010.

According to Variety, the thread that links Gibson, DiCaprio, and Monahan together is producer Graham King who has worked with Gibson once (Edge of Darkness), DiCaprio four times (Gangs of New York, The Aviator, The Departed, and Blood Diamond) and Monahan three times (including Body of Lies and London Boulevard).

Of the collaboration, King told the trade paper, “This will be an awe-inspiring story, created with some of the industry’s finest cinematic talent, and I am just over the moon to be making this film with Mel, Leo and Bill.”

Considering that they’re not going to start filming till fall, it looks like I won’t be hearing more news about this project for at least two more months. It’s definitely one that I’m going to keep my eye out for, though.

The lurcher hit of the year, Pride and Prejudice and Zombies hit everyone who reads books with surprise and delight at how seamless the insertion of a zombie apocalypse was with the 19th century romantic novel by Jane Austen.

Now comes word that Natalie Portman liked it so much that her production house handsomecharlie and Darko Films with Lionsgate as the financier and distributor have won the bidding war over the rights to the film adaptation for which she will star as Miss Elizabeth Bennett. At Variety, producing partner Annette Savitch had this to say:

Natalie and I are longtime passionate fans of Jane Austen’s books and this a fresh, fun and thought-provoking way to approach her work…. The idea of zombies running rampant in 19th century England may sound odd, but it lends a modern sense of urgency to a well known love story.

I totally love Portman, mostly because she’s got a wicked sense of humor that hits you from out of nowhere. And… it’s never a bad time when I get to link to and watch this again.

Related Posts: Jane Austen and zombies and aliens and vampires, oh my!

Drones, the film I co-directed with Adam Busch, got into the Slamdance Film Festival. We’ve known for about a week and it’s been really rough not to scream the news out to everyone in the whole world. Now, the cat is out of the bag, so I can finally scream, but I’m so damn tired that all I can do is give a quick “yip” of happiness.

Did I just use the word ‘yip’? Yes, I did.
—Actress/author, and now, director Amber Benson, on how her week has been. (You can follow her on Twitter here.)

As long as there have been journeys to the East, Hollywood has had a fascination for the “Westerner in Japan” story, the most recent being Tom Cruise’s turn in The Last Samurai or Bill Murray’s in Lost in Translation, both in 2003.

Now, it’s the ladies’ turn as Kate Bosworth’s first production project Lost Girls and Love Hotels will be directed by French director Jean-Marc Vallee (The Young Victoria), according to The Hollywood Reporter.

Based on the debut novel of Canadian Catherine Hanrahan, the screenplay by Nadia Conners (The 11th Hour) looks a little like this:

The story centers on a woman (Bosworth) who tries to forget her past while working in Tokyo as an English specialist at a stewardess training institute by day and losing herself in a sex- and drug-addled oblivion by night. She finds herself on the road to redemption when she becomes interested in a missing Western girl.

The article goes on to recount a whole bunch of other stories that are getting Hollywood interest, including the upcoming (and very un-PC-ly titled) debut memoir Japan Took the J.A.P. Out of Me by Lisa Fineberg Cook which got its rights optioned by Chickflicks Productions, Jake Adelstein’s non-fictional Tokyo Vice (perhaps buoyed by Adelstein’s recent appearance on “The Daily Show”), and the “Vertigo Pop! Tokyo” comics miniseries by Jonathan Vankin and Seth Fisher (you can read an article about the miniseries here).

To try and explain the fascination Westerners (and the U.S. in particular) have with Japan might be partially rooted in what happened 68 years and two days ago, when Japanese forces bombed Pearl Harbor and single-handedly changed that country’s destiny. Who were these people who dared to cross an ocean almost undetected and wreaked so much havoc?

There’s also an entire generation of Americans who have been raised to see Japanese culture as “cool”—particularly its animation and comics—and not only have some of them traveled to Japan to visit, several have lived there as expatriates.

As someone who has not only always wanted to go to Japan but has friends who currently live or have lived there, I hope the movie does justice to the actual experience…but I’m also not holding my breath.

We commit ourselves to be a media with a sense of national responsibility. Now that foreigners can produce a popular movie out of the story Hua Mulan, why can’t we Chinese present its own to the world?
—Guo Shu, executive president of Starlight International Media Group, explaining why China’s new Mulan should be superior to the Disney version

Apple’s got the exclusive trailer for Brooklyn’s Finest (which you can download in HD as well) and I have to say that the more I see, the more I like it and am intrigued by it.

Apple’s description of the plot is as thus:

Burned out veteran Eddie Dugan (Golden Globe®-winner Richard Gere) is just one week away from his pension and a fishing cabin in Connecticut. Narcotics officer Sal Procida (Oscar® nominee Ethan Hawke) has discovered there’s no line he won’t cross to provide a better life for his long-suffering wife and seven children. And Clarence “Tango” Butler (Oscar® nominee Don Cheadle) has been undercover so long his loyalties have started to shift from his fellow police officers to his prison buddy Caz (Wesley Snipes), one of Brooklyn’s most infamous drug dealers. With personal and work pressures bearing down on them, each man faces daily tests of judgment and honor in one of the world’s most difficult jobs. When NYPD’s Operation Clean Up targets the notoriously drug-ridden BK housing project, all three officers find themselves swept away by the violence and corruption of Brooklyn’s gritty 65th Precinct and its most treacherous criminals. During seven fateful days, Eddie, Sal and Tango find themselves hurtling inextricably toward the same fatal crime scene and a shattering collision with destiny. The film captures the volatile and deadly world of one of New York’s most dangerous precincts through the eyes of the men and women pledged to protect and serve, as they face the wrenching choices that make them Brooklyn’s Finest.

As a Brooklyner myself, I was wondering exactly where this precinct was; a quick Google search informed me that there is no actual “65th Precinct” because it was de-commissioned a while ago. The building where it once stood (scroll down a bit) is located in Brownsville and is now covered by the 73rd Precinct.

Anyway, what intrigues me about this story is not just first-time screenwriter Michael C. Martin’s rags-to-celluloid story, but the story itself. From the trailer, it looks as if everything is going to unfold in a Crash-like way with twists and turns, with the viewer cheering for one character in one moment and hating him soundly the next.

The movie gets its U.S. release on March 5, 2010.

Related Posts: Quick Cut: Brooklyn’s Finest gets resold to Overture, Making Out with the Media: The Sundance deals, Making Out with the Media: Mike Meyers is a Bastard, and Other Stories

Well, not really. This PDF list from spoof-news site The Hollywood Roaster features such a long list of truly horrible puns and terrible plots that there’s no way in hell that these were ever actually serious scripts. But then again, The Hollywood Reporter‘s Jay A. Fernandez made a prediction: “I’m bound to be reporting in the not-too-distant future that one of the ludicrous loglines on this list has actually been thrown into development by a major studio.”

I disagree with his choice, because what with Tiger Woods’ recent marital woes being revealed, the world might actually need a movie like this:

ATTACK OF THE PREGGOS
by Barry Warren
An unfaithful husband gets his comeuppance when his wife and
mistress simultaneously pretend they’re pregnant.

…and it’s all Paul Greengrass’ fault.

Variety reported late yesterday that Greengrass will not be directing the fourth film in the series which began with The Bourne Identity in 2002 and culminated in a metric ass-tonne of awesomeness.

The article quotes statements attributed to Greengrass from a press release from Universal Pictures:

Jason Bourne existed before me and will continue, and I hope to remain involved in some capacity as the series moves on… You won’t find a more devoted supporter of the Bourne franchise than me.

Of course, Greengrass’ statement is very quick to add this disclaimer-filled note:

My decision to not return a third time as director is simply about feeling the call for a different challenge. There’s been no disagreement with Universal Pictures. The opportunity to work with the Bourne family again is a difficult thing to pass up, but we have discussed this together and they have been incredibly understanding and supportive. I’ve been lucky enough to have made four films for Universal, and our relationship continues.

Writers Michael Fleming and Marc Graser think that it’s because star Matt Damon is already working with Greengrass on The Green Zone for Universal—which they say is being quietly marketed as “Bourne in Iraq”—and initial screenwriter George Nolfi on The Adjustment Bureau for Universal that this deal which had been previously semi-cemented in October 2008 is now falling apart.

And who can blame Greengrass, really? If you’re already making one movie about a kickass military man, do you really need to make a second one with the same actor?

Of course, Fleming and Graser have a cunning plan on how everything can be fixed. One of their scenarios has Nolfi impressing Damon on Bureau and that would lead the actor—who has been putting his creative oar in—to ask that the screenwriter return to the script and also be the new director. Their other scenario has Duplicity director Tony Gilroy stepping in because he’s also been one of the Bourne series writers to date.

Finally:

Or Universal could reboot the entire series from scratch with a new spy and director. The films were never closely tied to Ludlum’s books and any future pics could take creative license as well with a new cast, characters and situations.

I think I’d prefer to see what’s behind door number three, myself. Jason Bourne is a complex enough character in the original novels that turning out a whole new franchise about another one of Treadstone’s luckless runaways or doing a nouveau Casino Royale-style reboot where we see a different looking Bourne on one of his first missions wouldn’t be so bad.

Meanwhile, if you’re still hankering to see Damon kick ass, Green Zone will be released in the U.S. on March 12, 2010 and Bureau is filming as we speak.

Related Posts: George Nolfi is Bourne again

After reading the news from Variety that Paramount Pictures has secured the U.S. distribution rights to Area 51—the directorial follow-up by Oren Peli to this year’s surprise hit Paranormal Activity which Paramount will release sometime next year—I can’t help but wonder how Peli’s reinvention of the “found footage” narrative structure that worked so well for Cannibal Holocaust and The Blair Witch Project could work for some of the other movies coming out in 2010:

February 5, 2010: Dear John – The love letters detailing the tumultuous relationship between main characters John Tyree (Channing Tatum) and Savannah Curtis (Amanda Seyfrieid) are replaced by “recovered” .mov files of their iChat conversations, complete with chat and text messages where John lovingly says to Savannah: “Wanna cyber? lol”

March 19, 2010: Season of the Witch – The tale of a medieval knight (Nicolas Cage) whose mission is to deliver a witch to her ultimate doom would be told entirely through tapestries. Movie tie-in merchandise would include a “do it yourself” shuttle and loom.

May 7, 2010: Iron Man 2 – Played by Robert Downey, Jr., Tony Stark’s vlog would contain lots of references to starlets he dated while he also pouts about that upstart Justin Hammer (Sam Rockwell) stealing his schtick.

Honestly, the bloom is starting to fall a little bit off of Peli’s rose for me. I thought it was so cool that he reinvigorated that kind of narrative structure for the 21st century (and no, I don’t think Cloverfield counts); however, upon hearing that the second movie he’s making is utilizing the same technique (but was made for more money) I’m starting to wonder if he’s a one-trick pony.

Not to say that one can’t make a perfectly good career out of making the same kind of movie over and over again. Look at Alfred Hitchcock or Billy Wilder, for goodness’ sake. But I think that the forgiveness I extend to Messrs. Hitchcock and Wilder is due to the fact that there’s a huge body of work to examine rather than just two movies.

I guess I’m just going to have to give Peli one more chance, right?

Where one man once tried, two other men will now succeed… or so Columbia Pictures hopes.

According to The Hollywood Reporter, Sahara screenwriters Thomas Dean Donnelly and Joshua Oppenheimer will now be working on the adaptation of the Naughty Dog videogame Uncharted: Drake’s Fortune.

If you’re not playing the PS3 game right now, the story revolves around Nathan Drake, a purported descendant of explorer Sir Francis Drake, who is in search of the lost treasure of El Dorado. Originally, Kyle Ward was attached as the screenwriter when the studio picked up the rights back in June, but as Borys Kit puts it:

[The] very much in-demand scribe has video game adaptations Kane & Lynch at Lionsgate and Hitman 2 at Fox — and with the studio putting the project on a faster track, the decision was made to hire a new writer.

And this is when I ask: Why the need for the faster track? Considering that Paramount has movies like The Last Airbender and Dune on its slate for 2010 and the Star Trek sequel and the fourth Mission Impossible for 2011, you wouldn’t think they’d need another summer action tentpole, would they? Why spend all that production money on a series that might end up being mediocre like the Tomb Raider movies were?

Or better yet, why not use that money to fund some original work instead of videogame adaptations and franchise sequels? Or if one must go the adaptation route, why not bring some much-needed attention to underrated series like Artesia and Finder?

[Insert rest of standard rant here.]

Just in case you didn’t get enough hot werewolf action this weekend with New Moon or think that The Wolf Man won’t be enough to satisfy your lycanthropic lust, Joel Kastelberg and Etchie Stroh have got you covered.

As reported in Variety, the two producers are re-launching the 1980s Howling franchise as The Howling: Reborn from a script written by Joe Nimziki, a former studio executive. What’s more, Nimziki will be making his directorial debut as well.

Exact details on the plot are being kept very much under wraps, and filming will start next February with a release date for next Halloween.