The Random - Primeval, Aronofsky/Portman, The Karate Kid, DiCaprio's Online Poker film, Honey Pot, Friday 13th, The Birds, Akira,

- British dinosaur-themed sci-fi series Primeval will not be returning for a fourth season reports Total Sci-Fi Online. The still popular show has fallen victim to substantial budget cuts at the fledgling ITV network in the UK which has seen other popular shows like crime procedural "Wire in the Blood" similarly get the axe before their time.

- Natalie Portman is attached to play the lead in Darren Aronofsky's supernatural thriller Black Swan says The Hollywood Reporter. Black Swan centers on a veteran ballerina (Portman) who finds herself locked in a competitive situation with a rival dancer, with the stakes and twists increasing as the dancers approach a big performance. But it's unclear whether the rival is a supernatural apparition or if the protagonist is simply having delusions. Mark Heyman has done a rewrite of John McLaughlin's original script for the film.

- Paramount Pictures has picked up an untitled film pitch about the world of Costa Rica-based online casinos for Leonardo DiCaprio to star in says the trades. Brian Koppelman and David Levien (Rounders, Ocean's Thirteen) came up with the idea which DiCaprio and Jennifer Davisson Killoran will produce for his Appian Way production company.

- Paramount Pictures and Montecito Co. have picked up Liz Meriwether's action-comedy script Honey Pot says Variety. While the storyline is being kept top secret, the film will feature two female leads and be set in the world of international espionage.

- Steven Conrad ("The Pursuit of Happyness") has been hired to rewrite the remake of The Karate Kid for Sony Pictures says Risky Biz Blog. Conrad takes over for Chris Murphy who was originally hired to write the script of the reboot starring Jackie Chan, Jaden Smith and Taraji P. Henson.

- Talking with Movieweb producers Brad Fuller and Andrew Form spilled on the progress of various Platinum Dunes projects.
First up, the sequel to this year's hit Friday the 13th remake. "We want to have fun. We want to present something that audiences haven't seen before. One of the things they haven't seen before is Jason in the snow" said Fuller.
The pair also admits that their planned remake of The Birds is still very much stuck in development - "We keep trying. I don't know. That is so hard to get the script right. We struggle with it. I won't have anything to say until the script is finished. We lay ourselves out there and get annihilated out there online all day long,and [The Birds] just opens us up to a whole different level of annihilation…it doesn’t feel like that’s up next for us.”

- The Leonardo DiCaprio-produced live-action adaptation of Katsuhiro Otomo's classic 1988 anime feature Akira has been ditched according to Bloody Disgusting. The project was a two-part film that Warners and DiCaprio's Appian Way had been developing with Gary Whitta ("The Book of Eli") scripting and Ruairi Robinson directing. Now according to BD, who first broke the news of the project 18 months ago, not only has Robinson left the project but the overall project is "dead as a doornail" according to two sources.

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Derek Mears talks about Predators

Derek Mears, the guy who played Jason in the Friday the 13th reboot has apprantly been rumoured to have something to do with Robert Rodriguez's Predators.

This video below from MovieWeb shows that it was news to Derek, but he does seem excited at the prospect.

He's got the build and the speed to make a pretty good Predator, but again, it is very early days on the project and I doubt they've got into the casting yet.

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The Random - Monsters Inc 2, Rocky Marciano, Friday the 13th 2, Damn Yankees, Eclipse, Mars Needs Moms,

It seems we might get a new glimpse at our favorite monsters Mike and Sully in the next few years. Blue Sky Disney is reporting that Monsters Inc. director Pete Docter is working on a sequel to his 2001 hit Pixar film.

According to The Hollywood Reporter, Mikael Salomon will be directing Undefeated: The Rocky Marciano Story. This is the first authorized biopic about the former boxing champion. He is the only one to ever retire and remain undefeated. The film looks at Marciano's early life up until his untimely death in a plane crash in 1969. Terri Apple wrote the screenplay.

According to The Risky Business Blog, New Line Cinema and Platinum Dunes are going full steam ahead on the next installment of Friday the 13th. Damian Shannon and Mark Swift, the writers that brought us the recent Friday the 13th reboot, are again drafting the script. The next film is being called "a follow-up."

In a story from Variety, it seems that New Line Cinema has attached Jim Carrey and Jake Gyllenhaal to their reboot of the famed musical, Damn Yankees. Writing the script are comedy veterans Lowell Ganz and Babaloo Mandel. Beginning on a Broadway stage in 1955 the musical won seven Tony Awards. It focuses on the mild mannered Joe Boyd, a man who loves a pro baseball team so much that he decides to sell his soul to the devil in order to aid them. Currently, the hope is that Carrey will be the devil and Gyllenhaal will play Boyd.

According to Entertainment Weekly, it looks like Drew Barrymore is on Summit Entertainment's shortlist to possibly direct Eclipse, the third film in the Twilight series.

Seth Green will star in Walt Disney Pictures and ImageMovers' performance-capture feature Mars Needs Moms! says The Hollywood Reporter. An adaptation of the Berkeley Breathed children's novel, the story follows a boy named Milo (Green) who stows away aboard a spaceship to rescue his mom (Joan Cusack) after she was kidnapped by aliens. Mindy Sterling ("Austin Powers") will play the alien leader of Mars, inspiring terror in all who meet her. Dan Fogler (Fanboys) is playing Gribble, a friend of Milo. Elisabeth Harnois has also joined the cast.

Antonio Banderas has joined Woody Allen's next project says The Hollywood Reporter. He'll be joining Josh Brolin, Anthony Hopkins, Naomi Watts and Freida Pinto in the film which is scheduled to start shooting in London in the summer.

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