Recent Movie News

Al Pacino going to Happy Valley with Brian De Palma

Although Al Pacino has been attached to play controversial US college football coach Joe Paterno for some time now, the details of the film have only just started leaking. The biggest news is that the film, which is called Happy Valley, will see Pacino reunite with Scarface director Brian De Palma.

The story follows Paterno, a legendary sports figure who became embroiled in the Penn State child molestation case that rocked America in 2011 and 2012.

Paterno had been head coach for the University for decades when an abuse scandal surrounding former assistant coach Jerry Sandusky broke. Revelations surfaced that Paterno and others in the football programme had been aware of Sandusky's actions, but did little to stop it for fear of bad publicity damaging their winning team. Paterno was fired and the University demolished his statue.

"Happy Valley reunites the Scarface and Carlito's Way team of De Palma & Pacino for the third time and I can't think of a better duo to tell this story of a complex, intensely righteous man who was brought down by his own tragic flaw," the producer Edward R Pressman tells Deadline. The story is certainly a complicated one, but could be a fascinating one in the hands of De Palma and Pacino.

Laeta Kalogridis writing new Terminator

While Terminator may have been salvaged in Terminator: Salvation back in 2009, we've not heard much from the robotic assassin. But, that doesn't mean that the Terminator wheels haven't been in motion. Now Laeta Kalogridis and Patrick Lussier have been hired to write the script for the next instalment.

Kalogridis' name should be familiar to any James Cameron fans, as she worked on the script and produced the first Avatar, also wrote and produced Shutter Island, and scripted Alexander for Oliver Stone. Patrick Lussier is behind films such as Drive Angry, My Bloody Valentine and White Noise 2. David Ellison, who's Skydance Pictures has teamed up with Annapuma Pictures after they paid a fortune for the rights to The Terminator franchise, has hired the pair to write something else that's Sci-Fi focused but from the sounds of it Terminator will be their main focus.

Stephen Lang on for The 34th Battalion

Having gotten such a rush from playing a macho soldier in Avatar and then moving on to live in Australia for short-lived sci-fi series Terra Nova, actor Stephen Lang may have found his dream project which will allow him to combine the two as he's signed up for Aussie Indie movie The 34th Battalion. And he's also going to be joined by Vinnie Jones.

Luke Sparke, who co-wrote the script with his executive producer dad Ian, is directing the film, which will follow the adventures of the heroic Australian Army unit fighting the Germans during World War I. The story will focus on four men from New South Wales who joined the army in 1916 after the terrible Gallipoli campaign.

Jones is conscripted to play the British-born lieutenant colonel that led the battalion while Lang will play a US office who is part of the squad.

Luke Hemsworth, the lesser-known older brother to Chris and Liam, is feature alongside Remember Me's Emilie de Ravin, Charles Mesure and more.

Hayley Atwell won't return to Captain America

This news was a bit of a shoo-in, given that Captain America: The Winter Soldier moves the action from Captain America: The First Avenger to the present day, but actress Hayley Atwell, who played Peggy Carter in the first film, won't be returning for the second.

Cap Am has had a few love interests in his time, with Peggy being the most prominent and appearing in his pre-freeze days in the '40s., and Sharon Carter, Peggy's sister, who turns into Peggy's niece in the present day.

While it was clear that Peggy wouldn't be appearing, since the next flick moves into the future, whether Hayley Atwell would appear as Sharon was still left to be seen, and especially considering The Avengers made mention of the fact that Peggy was still alive, albeit slightly more wrinkly.. Now however, Hayley has confirmed that she won't be returning to the film franchise in any form.

Actresses such as Emilia Clarke (Game of Thrones), Jessica Brown Findlay (Downton Abbey), Teresa Palmer (Warm Bodies),Imogen Poots (Fright Night, Knight Of Cups), and Alison Brie (Community, Mad Men) have reportedly tested for the sequel's lead female role, but we don't have any casting yet.

Joseph Gordon-Levitt added to Guardians Of The Galaxy race

Holy cabbages, batman! It looks like the actor who may have been chosen to don the famous black cape for the DC Universe might be stolen by Marvel!

Deadline reports Joseph Gordon-Levitt is in the running for the lead role of Peter Quill in James Gunn's Guardians Of The Galaxy, joining a shortlist that includes Jim Sturgess and Zachary Levi.

But what does this mean about his rumoured connection to Batman and the Justice League?

According to Deadline, there's not only a possibility that Joseph is in the mix, he might already have been offered the role in the film, which follows an American astronaut who ends up in space and as the head of a cosmic superteam.

This news throws a huge monkey wrench in the rumours that Gordon-Levitt will appear as Batman in the Justice League movies, if that was truly on the cards would he really even entertain the idea of appearing in another super hero movie?

James Gunn, who is re-writing and directing the Guardians movie, came out late last year to say that the Sturgess and Levi casting news was inaccurate. Could he have been referring to Levitt's involvement?

It's a Happy New Year for The Hobbit: An Unexpected Journey

The Hobbit: An Unexpected Journey has spent a third week in the UK box office chart's number one spot, holding off competition from Life Of Pi and Jack Reacher.

Ang Lee's Life Of Pi took another bite out of the chart as it cooled in number two, while Jack Reacher missed his one shot at the top spot and arrived in third.

Pitch Perfect went up an octave and moved into fourth, Parental Guidance arrived to look after the fifth position, while Rise Of The Guardians began to thaw as it moved into sixth and Skyfall slipped into seventh.

Tinkerbell And The Secret Of The Wings fluttered around in eighth, Nativity 2: Danger In The Manger prepared to say goodbye to the Christmas season in ninth and The Twilight Saga: Breaking Dawn - Part II rounded out the charts in tenth.

Maggie Gyllenhaal on for Frank

Maggie Gyllenhaal will soon be rubbing shoulders with Michael Fassbender as she's reportedly been cast in Lenny Abrahamson's Frank.

Written by Jon Ronson and Tinker Tailor Soldier Spy's Peter Straughan, tells the story of a young musician (Domhnall Gleeson) who joins a band led by the quirky, mysterious front man Frank (The Fass).

Our hero thinks that this could be his big break, but he doesn't quite realise what he's gotten himself into. There's no word out on who Gyllenhaal will play in the flick.

The movie is largely based on the fictional tale of the antics of cult musician and comedy legend Chris Sievey, who first found recognition as the leader of punk group The Freshies, but would go on to become better known for the papier-mâché head styling of Frank Sidebottom.

The Hobbit: An Unexpected Journey heads into 2013 as the US number one

The Hobbit: An Unexpected Journey will be celebrating tonight as it has fought off tough competition from Django Unchained and Les Miserables and kept its top spot at the US Box Office for a third week running.

Quentin Tarantino's latest Django Unchained arrived in the second spot, while the top of the charts was still a dream for Les Miserables as it barricaded itself in third.

Billy Crystal and Bette Midler put their heads together as Parental Guidance arrives in fourth, Jack Reacher becomes less of a hero as he moves into fifth, while This Is 40 slowly ages in sixth.

Steven Spielberg's Lincoln moves into seventh, The Guilt Trip slips into eighth and Monsters Inc 3D scares in ninth. Which means that, rounding out 2012 is Rise Of The Guardians in tenth.

Quentin Tarantino talks Killer Crow

Director Quentin Tarantino has a film up his sleeve which will team up with Inglorious Basterds and his latest movie Django Unchained to create a trilogy. While promoting the later Tarantino said that his previous release Inglorious Basterds, could spawn what may become the third film in a historical trilogy featuring some unused script material.

Quentin has often spoken about the unused script material from Basterds, and now he's saying he's considering a third revisionist film to stand alongside Django and IB, this time focusing on characters originally intended to feature in stories running alongside those of Brad Pitt's Lt Aldo Raines and his squad.

"My original idea for Inglorious Basterds way back when was that this would be a huge story that included the smaller story that you saw in the film, but also followed a bunch of black troops, and they had been f***ed over by the American military and kind of go apeshit," Tarantino tells The Root.

"They basically - the way Lt. Aldo Raines and the Basterds are having an 'Apache resistance' - the black troops go on an Apache warpath and kill a bunch of white soldiers and white officers on a military base and are just making a warpath to Switzerland."

The Hobbit makes an expected journey to the top of the US charts

If there's one journey we were expecting Peter Jackson's The Hobbit to make, it was to the top of the US Box Office. Indeed, Bilbo and his friends have done Tolkien proud as they've ventured into the number one position in their first week of release state side.

Taking no nonsense from Jack Frost and his bunch of merry men, The Hobbit pushed Rise Of The Guardians down into second, while Lincoln continued to ride high, perhaps thanks to his seven Golden Globe nominations, in third.

Bond carried on the mission with Skyfall in fourth, while Life Of Pi washed up in fifth, and The Twilight Saga: Breaking Dawn Part II slipped into sixth.

Wreck-It Ralph got a disappointing score and remained in seventh on the leader board, Playing For Keeps made a play for eighth and Red Dawn moved down into ninth.

Rounding out the charts this week Silver Linings Playbook made a reappearance in tenth.