June 29, 2006

A change has been made by New Line Cinema concerning the progress of its new project, "Redneck Games." As reported by Variety, the company has shockingly decided to no longer use Shane Morris' comedy pitch and turns to the favor of Mike Karz and Josh Weinstock in bringing it up on wide screen.

The movie will take its focus of a noted athlete, who has fallen from grace, in his effort to redeem himself through competitions at the Redneck Games. A real event, Redneck Games were created in 1996 as a response to the Summer Olympics in Atlanta and feature unusual activities like Bobbing for Pig's Feet, Hubcap Hurl, the Mudpit Belly Flop, Armpit Serenade and the Butt Crack Competition.

The hard pressure she has to face when living in Malibu has led Britney Spears considers relocating to her home state of Louisiana. The pop singer is said to believe that the fast life of Los Angeles may be behind many of her marital problems.

And so, Britney is reportedly moving back to Lousiana and even has been upgrading her mother Lynne Spears' house so she can stay there.

The coldness in "The Ice at the Bottom of the World" turns warmer this time, not only due to the presence of the hot yet gifted actress Charlize Theron in the project, but also because "Mississippi Burning" director Alan Parker has been attached to be its director for sure, according to Variety's report.

A Picturehouse and New Line International production, the flick reunites Theron with Picturehouse's exec Bob Barney whose Newmarket had distributed the actress' vehicle, "Monster", which won her an Oscar for Best Actress in 2004.

The opportunity to star in the same film finally comes for Marcia Gay Harden and her daughter Eulala Grace Scheel as both have been set to star together in the forthcoming drama thriller "Home".

The mother-and-daughter will play mother and child in the Mary Haverstick direction.

Two shining stars, Sienna Miller and Peter Sarsgaard, are advancing in progress to join "The Mysteries of Pittsburgh", a flick based on Michael Chabon's 1988 debut novel. Miller is in final negotiations to play the role of Jane while Sarsgaard is still in talks for that of Cleveland who is a friend of the film's lead character, Art Bechstein.

Expected to start rolling by fall in Pennsylvania, "Pittsburgh" will be helmed by "Dodgeball: A True Underdog Story" director Rawson Marshall Thurber who also writes the screenplay. The picture is the second Chabon tome to begin casting in recent months after Paramount Pictures has set to make "The Amazing Adventures of Kavalier & Clay" based on Chabon's Pulitzer Prize-winning novel.

Has his recent controversial TV drama series "The Book of Daniel" canceled after religious protests after just eight shows, Aidan Quinn is moving on.

The actor reportedly has joined the cast of the upcoming drama movie titled "Dark Matter". Has been tapped to play a science professor in the film, the actor is working with such notable names as Meryl Streep, Blair Brown, and Liu Ye, who makes his American film debut.

Keeps being the subject of accolades even after its triumph at this year's Academy Awards, "Crash" indeed still makes big sound in public when its screenplay won the Humanitas Prize as announced by the organization on Wednesday, 28 June, and so adding another honor to the film's screenwriters, Paul Haggis and Bobby Moresco. For their impressive work, the two were granted $25,000 from $145,000 prize money shared with other nine winning writers at a luncheon at the Hilton Universal Hotel.

Considered to be one of the works that helps "liberate, enrich and unify society", "Crash" screenplay has been recognized by the event's judges to be able to "reach out with respect and compassion to all of our brothers and sisters." The film itself focuses on the intertwining stories of an array of diverse characters over 36 hours in Los Angeles.

Indie rock trio Sleater-Kinney is planning on an "indefinite hiatus". "After 11 years as a band, Sleater-Kinney have decided to go on indefinite hiatus," according to the statement released Tuesday June 27th, 2006 by Sub Pop, the band's Seattle-based record label, and posted on the band's Web site.

"The upcoming summer shows will be our last. As of now, there are no plans for future tours or recordings." The girl-power punk rockers, however, still have five summer shows coming up, including Lollapalooza in Chicago on Aug. 4, where they are set to say their final goodbyes.

Fans of horror-thriller flicks, please welcome "Ambrose Fountain" to the burgeoning list of upcoming films of the genre. The Hollywood Reporter reports that Craven-Maddalena Films has firmly set to develop and bring up the project to the surface with Brian Sieve handling the scripts.

"Ambrose Fountain" centers around strange phenomena happened to the owners of vineyard in Napa Valley, California. Upon investigating the case, they soon find out that their property actually keeps a dark legacy that has been buried mysteriously over the years.

Mariska Hargitay and her husband of two years, actor Peter Hermann, welcomed the arrival of their first child ever, a son, Wednesday June 28th, 2006 in Los Angeles.

The baby boy was born at Cedars-Sinai Medical Center and weighed in at 10 pounds, 9 ounces, via C-section. Hargitay's father, actor Mickey Hargitay, also was at the hospital to welcome his grandchild.

"The Last Station" probably won't be the last destination moviegoers head for if they put their priority on seeing Anthony Hopkins, Meryl Streep, and Paul Giamatti sharing the screen together. Production Weekly has reported that the three stars have given their agreement to join forces in this latest project of Michael Hoffman, an adaptation of Jay Parini's novel of the same title.

All lauded thespians in Hollywood, Hopkins was last seen in "The World's Fastest Indian" while Streep in "A Prairie Home Companion" which still circulates around U.S theatres and Giamatti in "Cinderella Man" as manager also good friend of Russell Crowe's Jim Braddock. Meanwhile, Hoffman has been known for his directorial works in "Restoration" (1995) and "A Midsummer Night's Dream" (1999) among others.

The Spelling family feud begins. The furious Tori Spelling breaks her silence on her feud with mother Candy Marer Spelling.

In an interview with US Weekly, due out Friday, the actress reveals all. She claims to have learned of father Aaron Spelling's death last week as she dined in Toronto. She said she got the heartbreaking news via BlackBerry on the night of June 23.

Jeff Gordon is ready to get married again. The NASCAR racer announced his engagement to Belgian model Ingrid Vandebosch on June 24 at California's Infineon Raceway, just north of San Francisco, where he is the current top driver.

Gordon and his first wife, Brooke Sealy, divorced in 2003 after nine years of marriage. He then met Vandebosch on the set of the movie "Taxi", in which she played a bank robber and Gordon made an unbilled cameo appearance. Since then on they began dating.

As the 2006 Toronto International Film Festival is getting closer to draw its curtain up, the event's programmers have officially announced on Tuesday, June 27 25 pictures which will encounter their North American premieres at the festival.

Nearly all of movies featured turned out to have seen their screenings at this year's Cannes Film Festival held last May , like "Babel", "The Wind That Shakes the Barley", "The Caiman", and "Lights in the Dusk."

Grammy-winning songbird Nelly Furtado's latest album "Loose" brings her to the peak of the album charts with the set sold for more than 100,000 copies this week in the United States. Moving 219,000 for the week ended Sunday June 25th, the Mosley Music/Geffen set earning Furtado her best single-week sales and her first No. 1 on the big chart.

What is more from the star is that the album's first single, "Promiscuous" featuring Timbaland, has peaked at No. 2 on the Billboard Hot 100. Back to the Billboard 200, securing the runner up position is Underoath's third full-length effort, "Define the Great Line" which sold 98,000 copies in its first week. The Dixie Chicks' "Taking the Long Way" slips from No. 2 to No. 3 with 87,000 units, and Keane's second Interscope album, "Under the Iron Sea," moved 75,000 copies in its first week to open at No. 4.

Another new project from Warner Independent Pictures, "Rails and Ties" is now set to work its way to production as the company has appointed Alison Eastwood to bring it up to cinemas. Making her directorial debut, Eastwood has been known for her acting works in a number of films like those in "Tightrope" (1984), "Midnight in the Garden of Good and Evil" (1997), and "Poolhall Junkies" (2002).

In the meantime, Eastwood's father, lauded actor/director Clint Eastwood, will produce the feature through his production company, Malpaso Prods., which has been based on the Warners for over 30 years.

The hit maker is comeback to music biz. After year of deafness, successful surgery allows Foxy Brown to regain her hearing and now she's ready for a studio comeback.

Last December, the rapper revealed her hearing had become so bad and thus underwent surgery in February. Now as her hearing has almost fully returned, she marks her comeback with a cameo performance at the 10th anniversary of Jay-Z's first album, "Reasonable Doubt" at New York City's Radio City Music Hall on Sunday June 25th.

Has Jessica Simpson found love? Apparently she has as the actress has been romantically linked to comedian Dane Cook, her co-star in their forthcoming flick "Employee of the Month".

Earlier this year, tongues were wagging over Simpson's reported relationship with Cook while they filmed the movie. At that time, however, Cook was still with his longtime girlfriend Racquel Houghton.

While "The Da Vinci Code" still takes its run on cinemas, director Ron Howard has already planned to develop a new film and was reported by Variety to have interest in helming "The Changeling", a Universal Pictures and Imagine Entertainment production.

The project, therefore, joins the shortlist of big screen features the famed filmmaker is considering as his subsequent projects while he himself is attached to direct several pictures which included "Last Man Home" also "The Serpent and the Eagle."