Christian Bale joins The Fighter

Christian Bale and "Three Kings" director David O. Russell are joining "The Fighter" for Relativity Media and Paramount Pictures says Variety.

The drama follows boxer Irish Mickey Ward (Mark Wahlberg) and his unlikely path to become world lightweight champion.

Bale plays Dicky Eklund, Mickey's half-brother and a talented fighter who once went the distance with Sugar Ray Leonard in a title fight but then turned to crime and landed in prison.

Then he turned his life around and helped his underperforming brother find the spark for a remarkable run that led to the world title.

Matt Damon, Brad Pitt and director Darren Aronofsky were previously attached to the project and has since moved on.

David Hoberman and Todd Lieberman are producing with shooting kicking off in July.

Source: Dark Horizons

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Big deal for Diehl's books - Hooligans, Sharky's Machine, Crazy Heart and more.

Informant Media has optioned "Hooligans," a novel by the late author William Diehl, whose books include "Sharky's Machine" and "Primal Fear."

The sale includes both the novel and a script that Diehl wrote before he died. Novel is the story of a band of rogue cops who reassemble to settle an old score in a Southern coastal town that is changing as it legalizes gambling.

Informant Media's Judy Cairo and Michael A. Simpson will produce with AEI's Ken Atchity and Chi-Li Wong. Simpson, Diehl's longtime screenwriting partner, is refining the script. Informant Media most recently completed "Crazy Heart," which stars Jeff Bridges, Robert Duvall and Maggie Gyllenhaal, with Butcher's Run Films and MTV Films.

Separately, Diehl's "Sharky's Machine" is set up for remake at Warner Bros., with Phil Joanou attached to direct and Mark Wahlberg exec producing.

AEI, which reps the Diehl estate, also recently optioned his 1990 novel "27" to Breaking Ball Films, whose Scott Abramovich is writing the script. AEI is producing a screen version of the Diehl novel "Eureka" with Neil Canton and Danny Davids.

Source: Variety

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Mark Wahlberg takes no Prisoners...wait..sorry, he takes one prisoner.

Fresh from the exploits of bullet time in Max Payne and running from the wind in The Happening, Mark Wahlberg will star in the dark kidnap thriller Prisoners for Madhouse Entertainment reports the trades.

Aaron Guzikowski penned the script which centers on a Boston man who turns vigilante after his six-year-old daughter and her best friend are kidnapped. He takes matters into his own hands by in turn kidnapping the man he suspects responsible.

The project is now out to directors, though studios are apparently very keen to land the property so expect it to be in production shortly.

Source: Dark Horizons

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Matt Damon in sci-fi film, The Adjustment Bureau. Will Ferrell and Mark Wahlberg in cop comedy, B Team

Variety reports that studios that are trying to fill 2010 release slates are weighing spec packages that would give them either an Adam McKay-directed action comedy starring Will Ferrell and Mark Wahlberg, or a drama that will reunite Matt Damon with his The Bourne Ultimatum scribe George Nolfi.

Damon is at the center of The Adjustment Bureau, a contemporary science fiction love story that was shopped to studios by Media Rights Capital.

Nolfi wrote a script that is loosely based on a Philip K. Dick short story, and he will make his directing debut on the film, which will begin production by late summer.

Nolfi scripted the Damon-starrer Ocean's Twelve, but they developed a closer relationship when he scripted The Bourne Ultimatum. He is also writing the fourth installment of the Bourne franchise for Universal.

Separately, several studios were bidding Tuesday on B Team, a McKay-directed action comedy that casts Ferrell and Wahlberg as cops, with Chris Henchy writing the script.

Henchy co-wrote the upcoming Ferrell-starrer Land of the Lost, and he is co-executive producer of Entourage, the HBO show on which Wahlberg is executive producer.

Even though B Team and The Adjustment Bureau come with pricey packages -- buyers essentially commit to make the movies -- both pictures are expected to have studio homes before the week is over.

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Mark Wahlberg wants slap a guy in the big nose

Saturday Night Live recently had a sketch where they took the piss out of Mark Wahlberg talking to plants in The Happening. In the sketch they have Mark talking to animals (the below interview shows the sketch). In this interview they ask Mark what he thought of the sketch (to be fair the bloke did sound like Wahlberg.

He starts of with,"When I see that kid, I'm going to crack that big ****ing nose of his. Then I'm going to tell him, 'say hi to your mother for me'...I'm going to go down to 30 Rock...and I'm going to slap him in the big nose...I guaran-****ing-tee you."

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Director of Max Payne gets his PG-13 rating. Idiot!

"Max Payne" director John Moore has won his fight and secured a PG-13 rating for the video game adaptation reports Shack News.

Initially rated R by the MPAA, Moore strongly criticized the MPAA in an interview - calling the ruling unjust. Moore and crew "trimmed some frames more for the sake of trimming frames" and the film will now open with the PG-13.

The director also tells Game Daily that he is planning a "Gamer Dedicated Cut" of the film:"It's a little slower and a little more atmospheric. There are some rougher edges on it, but it's not going to be a bloodfest. I want this to be the Max Payne that I set out to shoot. It's not that I wanted to release one version in the theaters and make a cheap buck by following up with a blood-drenched DVD version. The movie you see in the theaters will be an intense experience and the movie you see on DVD will be as intense an experience with some extra sensibilities for people who really adore the game."

In my opinion making it a PG-13 will suck an awful lot of the appeal out of the movie. What do you think?
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Max Payne - R Rated? Good or bad thing?

Looks as if the Max Payne movie is going to be R rated and not PG-13 as the film makers wanted (our previous posts on the Max Payne posters and trailer's are here). Now this is good for the older movie going audience and could mean that it will be close to the game with lots of brutal killings. However, it does of course mean it might not do as well at the box office as a PG-13 rating would. The Max Payne games are a few years old now so the main fans of the game will all be old enough to go and see an R rating.

However, Max Payne director John Moore is not happy with the MPAA’s decision to give the film an R and is supposedly trying to cut the film down to the original PG-13. He tells Das Gamer, of his frustration with the whole process:

We’re suffering from what I call Batman blowback. The Motion Picture Association of America gave The Dark Knight a PG-13 rating and basically sucked Warner Bros. cock…The MPAA changes their rules willy-nilly and it depends on who’s seeing your actual movie at the time. It’s very difficult to get a hold on what’s acceptable. The only thing you can use is current standards. So I go and see The Dark Knight and I say, “Gee, that’s pretty gnarly for PG-13,” but I felt good about Max Payne after coming out of the theater. I thought Max wasn’t going to have a problem. And that’s not the case. They’re coming down on us pretty hard.
[The MPAA] really hung themselves with The Dark Knight. Every other filmmaker in town is knocking on their door saying, “Please sir, may I have my PG-13 rating and be as fair to my movie as you were to The Dark Knight.”

What is your opinion of all this? Should it be an R or PG-13? Should the Dark Knight have been rated R and, if it had, would it have been the huge box office smash?

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Max Payne - Trailer

Max better watch out for those plants that are trying to kill you...oh wrong film. I hope Mark does a better job in this one than The Happening.