• Morning Deal Report: Straw Dogs Are Barking

    I wish I could say it was still April Fool’s Day, but as much as I’ve tried to convince myself this isn’t happening…it is, in fact, happening. Writer/director Rod Lurie is going ahead with his remake of Straw Dogs, and he’s found his star. And it is…drum roll…incredibly bland James Marsden! “The new Straw Dogs, from Screen Gems, follows Los Angeles screenwriter David Sumner (Marsden), who moves with his wife to her hometown in the deep South. Once there, tensions build in their marriage and old conflicts re-emerge with the locals, leading to a violent confrontation,” per The Hollywood Reporter.

    Arnold Schwarzenegger has agreed to appear in the upcoming Terminator Salvation, but this time he won’t be doing any acting. All together now: So what’s the difference?

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  • David O. Russell: People Person

    A new David O. Russell film is in production, which must mean that the notoriously prickly filmmaker isn’t getting along with somebody. George Clooney was the first to report that Russell might not be all sunshine and roses on the set; actor and director famously had “creative differences” while making Three Kings. Clooney elaborated in an interview with Playboy in 2000. “David is in many ways a genius, though I learned that he's not a genius when it comes to people skills...He yelled and screamed at people all day, from day one...he screamed at the script supervisor and made her cry. I wrote him a letter and said, 'Look, I don't know why you do this. You've written a brilliant script, and I think you're a good director. Let's not have a set like this. I don't like it and I don't work well like this.'...He turned on me and said, 'Why don't you just worry about your fucked-up act? You're being a dick. You want to hit me? You want to hit me? Come on, pussy, hit me.' I'm looking at him like he's out of his mind. Then he started banging me on the head with his head. He goes, 'Hit me, you pussy. Hit me.' Then he got me by the throat and I went nuts. I had him by the throat. I was going to kill him. Kill him.”

    So that went well, and although it’s sad that there’s no video evidence of this dust-up – at least, none that’s surfaced so far – the same can’t be said for I Heart Huckabees.

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