"Alice in Wonderland" teaser trailer is here!! (FIXED AGAIN)

A look at "District 9"'s crazy alien technology, a more detailed synopsis, and a new TV spot

Source: Slashfilm.com

Thirty years ago, aliens made first contact with Earth. Humans waited for the hostile attack, or the giant advances in technology. Neither came. Instead, the aliens were refugees, the last survivors of their home world. The creatures were set up in a makeshift home in South Africa’s District 9 as the world’s nations argued over what to do with them.

Now, patience over the alien situation has run out. Control over the aliens has been contracted out to Multi-National United (MNU), a private company uninterested in the aliens’ welfare – they will receive tremendous profits if they can make the aliens’ awesome weaponry work. So far, they have failed; activation of the weaponry requires alien DNA.

The tension between the aliens and the humans comes to a head when an MNU field operative, Wikus van der Merwe (Sharlto Copley), contracts a mysterious virus that begins changing his DNA. Wikus quickly becomes the most hunted man in the world, as well as the most valuable – he is the key to unlocking the secrets of alien technology. Ostracized and friendless, there is only one place left for him to hide: District 9.

More new "Iron Man 2" stills

Trailer for "Bright Star"

Well...aside from that distracting narration, the trailer looks really promising. The only question is whether the September 18th release date includes the US...or are we going to have to keep waiting for this one?

New picture of Scarlett Johannson in "Iron Man 2"

Extended clip from "9"

Charlize Theron could headline "Atlas Shrugged" mini-series...or movie?

Interesting...veeeeery interesting. I kind of love/hate the mini-series idea. On one hand, if it's a mini-series, then more of the story can be fleshed out, but on the other hand, "Atlas Shrugged" even in its gargantuan length (1100 pages) always seemed like it would be so much more impressive on the big screen, even if lots of plot had to be simplified or cut out entirely....

Source: Slashfilm.com

When the economic crisis went into full swing, bookshops started to notice an odd trend: people who hadn’t read much more than a Grisham or Clancey novel in the last decade were suddenly rabid Ayn Rand fans. Atlas Shrugged, with its message of capitalism unfettered by government control, blasted back onto bestseller charts in the last year, making the long-gestating film adaptation seem a lot more likely. NowCharlize Theron is seriously interested, says the Risky Biz Blog, and because she and the producers are concerned that simply making a feature film wouldn’t do justice to the novel’s epic length (1100+ pages) it may instead become a miniseries for Epix, the new pay-cable network that Lionsgate is setting up with MGM and Viacom.

Theron was one of a small group of actresses (among them Anne Hathaway and Julia Roberts) that expressed interest in heroine Dagny Taggart a few months back. Theron’s commitment to the project remains a grey area, though it is said she’s been driving development on the project in recent months.

This is only the latest chapter in an effort to film the novel that is becoming almost as epic as the book itself. Loads of talent have been involved over the past four decades, and Angelina Jolie has been the prime mover on the film for quite some time. For a while director Vadim Perelman was attached. Or so the trades said, and so he said in many interviews. But in June of last year Jolie claimed he’d never been part of the project. Now, appropriately, it seems like she’s taking a back seat in the development. James Hart and Braveheart writer Randall Wallace have both written drafts (Hart’s said to be longer and more ‘mini-series friendly’) but any adaptation of the gigantic, didactic novel (really, this thing is more of a sprawling Rand manifesto than a narrative) is going to be problematic. If adapted as a mini-series, one whole episode could be that damned long speech by John Galt, the mysterious guy who leads a secession of creative and innovative minds from society.

Beyond the current surge of interest in the book there’s one more reason to get this going sooner rather than later: if a film doesn’t go into production by the end of next year, the book option reverts back to the Rand estate. At that point, you can bet that the price to renewing it will skyrocket.