MOVIE NEWS

THE BOURNE ULTIMATUM

BLOOD VAMPIRE

Director Ronny Yu (Freddy Vs Jason) will helm a live-action adaptation of hit anime Blood Vampire, starring South Korean actress Jin Ji-hyun. The film, retitled Vampire, has a budget of $30 million and concerns a vampire employed by the US government to hunt demons in post-WWII Japan. Shooting in China stars next March 2008.

HIS DARK MATERIALS

Author Philip Pullman is increasingly impressed with the casting for the movie versions of his three children's books. So far the project has secured the talents of Dakota Blue Richards (Lyra), Nicole Kidman (Miss Coulter), Daniel Craig (Lord Asriel) and Eva Green (Serafina), and can now add Sam Elliot (Hulk) as daring aeronaut Lee Scoresby.

Pullman: "The film of The Golden Compass is progressing very well. I spent yesterday at the studios in Shepperton, meeting some of the cast, including Sam Elliott, who's playing Lee Scoresby. Sam's resemblance to the Lee in my mind is just astonishing. His Lee has all the presence, the experience, the battered integrity, the humour, and the courage of the aeronaut who first walked into my story thirteen years ago."

"I can't imagine a better cast, and the sets and costumes are just astounding. They were filming the scene where Lyra approaches Iorek Byrnison at the gyptian camp and asks him to take her to the village near the lake, because the alethiometer has told her that there's something she needs to see there. Dakota had to speak to the empty air, because Iorek, of course, is being constructed pixel by pixel in a computer somewhere; but his voice is provided by Nonso Anozie, and a better bear you'd have to go a long way to find."

The trilogy concerns a young girl called Lyra who encounters parallel worlds, talking bears and witches in an epic story that caused controversy because of its religious content.

IRON MAN

Robert Downey Jr (right) is set to star as billionaire inventor Tony Stark (aka Iron Man), in the new superhero movie from director Jon Favreau (Zathura). Speaking about the role, Downey Jr said: "The suit for Iron Man is so complex and does so much stuff that except for once or twice or from the chest up, I'm not required to do all that much. What I will do is a lot of motion capture so that the movement isn't just some random stunt guy. A lot of time I look at CGI and I'm like 'What's the reference for this? This looks like a cartoon reference not a person.' So I said I want to do all the motion capture work, which is like eight months after finishing shooting, but as much as it as I can do, I will."

"I went after [the role] like a greyhound after a rabbit. I loved Marvel and Iron Man to me is the goods. To tell you the God's honest truth, I'd thrown them all away for Sgt. Rock, because I really grew up on Hogan's Heroes, Sgt. Rock. I'm still addicted to the History Channel and the Military Channel is my thing, but Tony's the best because I could never be Sgt. Rock. He's a little bigger and more butch and has a cigar, I don't see it. Tony's a perfect fit for me, and if I was ever going to do this type of thing, I thought, you know, like early '40s. Great, because when you hang up your 'macho hat' and start directing or doing other stuff, it's not an embarrassment to be doing this in your late '40s still if we wind up doing three of them."

Iron Man is scheduled for release on 2 May 2008.

THE INCREDIBLE HULK

The sequel to Ang Lee's Hulk, directed by Louis Leterrier (Transporter 2), from a script by Zak Penn (X-Men III), is set to arrive in cinemas on 27 June 2008. It is very unlikely that any of the original stars will return, despite contractual obligations, due to the original film's lukewarm success.

MAD MAX 4

Director George Miller is still keen to do a fourth Mad Max movie, although original star Mel Gibson is increasingly unlikely to be involved. Miller has confirmed: "We were about three months off shooting [Mad Max 4] when the Iraqi war came and the American dollar collapsed against the Australian dollar so we lost our budget. Also, we couldn't get the container ships out because of security and stuff."

"Though I think there will be another Mad Max; the time has gone where Mel can be in it. I think the last opportunity was about four years ago and you know the character's lean and hungry. He was twenty one when he first played Mad Max and he's now in his fifties. Also I think he's much more interested in what's happening behind camera than in front. It needs a lean and hungry actor and he's not into acting so much anymore and I think he just loves producing, writing and directing. But I think if fates allow there will be another Mad Max though it is certainly two films away for me, but the time's gone when Mel can run around the wasteland anymore."

WANTED

Morgan Freeman is set to star alongside rising British hot property James McAvoy, for Wanted – a sci-fi action movie that will mark the English-language debut of Russian filmmaker Timur Bekmambetov. Wanted is based on a series of graphic novels by Mark Millar, about a man (McAvoy) who discovers that his long-lost father is an assassin. After his dad is murdered, the son is recruited into a covert organization of killers and trained to follow in his father's footsteps. Freeman will play Sloan, the lead assassin who trains McAvoy.

OBITUARIES

Jack Palance (1919-2006)

The Academy Award winning actor most famous for his role in classic Western Shane, while modern audiences will know him best as Curly in City Slickers (earning him an Oscar), has died of natural causes at his Californian home.

Palance made over 100 films in his fifty-odd year career, after leaving a professional boxing career in the early-1940s, which led to him serving in World War II (where he earned a purple heart, good conduct medal and a WWII Victory medal).

He is survived by his wife Elaine Rogers and three children; Holly and Brooke.

Basil Poledouris (1945-2006)

You may not know the name, but you know the music. Poledouris was the composer responsible for such classic scores as Big Wednesday, The Blue Lagoon, Conan The Barbarian, Red Dawn, RoboCop, Lonesome Dove, The Hunt For Red October, Free Willy, It's My Party and Starship Troopers.

He died after a battle with cancer. He is survived by his wife Bobbie and their two children Zoë and Alexis.

US TOP 10 (CINEMA)

All figures are weekend box-office gross, including Sunday estimates (at the time of posting):

• 1. Borat ($28.3m)
• 2. The Santa Clause 3: The Escape Clause ($16.9m)
• 3. Flushed Away ($16.6m)
• 4. Stranger Than Fiction ($13.4m)
• 5. Saw III ($6.98m)
• 6. Babel ($5.56m)
• 7. The Departed ($5.16m) (total to date: $110m)
• 8. The Prestige ($4.78m)
• 9. The Return ($4.48m)
• 10. A Good Year ($3.72m)

UK TOP 10 (CINEMA)

• 1. Borat (£4.51m)
• 2. The Prestige (£1.18m)
• 3. Saw III (£0.89m)
• 4. Step Up (£0.63m)
• 5. The Departed (£0.44m)
• 6. Open Season (£0.38m)
• 7. Breaking and Entering (£0.36m)
• 8. Barnyard (£0.35m)
• 9. The Devil Wears Prada (£0.34m)
• 10. Sixty Six (£0.21m) <