Just when you thought it couldn't get worse for Lindsay Lohan, Nikki Finke's Deadline Hollywood Daily reports that Lohan has been dropped from the true-life crime flick, Manson's Girls. According to DHD, "people associated with the movie told agents that Lohan quickly became more of a deficit than an asset when they discovered that they couldn't find any name actresses who wanted to co-star with her. (And even some name actors...) So now Lindsay is off the pic."

Ouch, that can't be good for her self esteem, although the gossip gal in me would have liked to hear the names of some of those "name actors".

Ever the astute observer, both of movies and of real life, Roger Ebert posted on his shiny new blog today a great post wondering what Hillary and Bill: The Movie might look like. Ebert talks about great political movies of the past, especially noting two of my own faves, Barry Levinson's Wag the Dog and Warren Beatty's fantastic Bulworth (two of the best political movies ever made). He ponders what a movie -- a narrative, not a documentary -- following the private moments of Hillary and Bill Clinton, during the last days of this seemingly endless primary campaign, might look like. Ebert writes:

Yet there must have been private moments of despair. The two realists, as able as anyone to read the trends, must have spoken privately about their shrinking options. And on Tuesday night, as Hillary's double-digit lead in Indiana dwindled to very small single digits, there must have come a time when one of them said, "We've lost this thing."

What were those moments like? What kept them going between themselves? Did they encourage one another, or was there an unspoken pact not to voice the unspeakable? Was there blame when Bill had one of his unwise moments? Did their shared past, of success and scandal, enter into it, or were they absorbed in this moment?

In answering those questions, there you would find the movie.

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First there was Josh Hartnett as a drifter. Then came Demi Moore as a captive courtesan, while Woody Harrelson sign on to be a bartender (once again) and Shun Sugata grabbed an uncle role. Now, we've got a bad guy. The Hollywood Reporter posts that the big bad of Bunraku will be played by Hellboy Ron Perlman, just days after he signed on for The Job.

Guy Moshe's film will be set in a Sin City sort of hyperstylized universe, and as Jessica originally shared, it's got a whole bunch of weird artistic genres that it's pulling from -- puppets, video games, origami, comic books, and even German expressionism. Hartnett's Drifter teams up with a samurai played by Japanese actor Gackt, and they go after Perlman's Eastern European gang lord. I ... have absolutely no idea what to expect from this. The story is simple enough, but I can't imagine how origami, puppets, and other mish-mashed styles will fit into this martial arts story. Oh yeah, and if that wasn't enough, Hartnett originally compared it to Alfred Hitchcock's Rope.

Will we really be getting a film that's one long take of CGI, puppets, martial arts, and fights between good guys and bad guys? It sounds more like one of those weird dreams that wakes you up and wonder what your dream mind was thinking.

I'd probably go to see A Good Old Fashioned Orgy just for the title. It's got punch, and it is a great, brief description of what's to come. It sort of reminds me of The Best Little Whorehouse in Texas for a new generation. But the story is different, and instead of a big-busted country singer, we're getting a little slice of Saturday Night Live. Variety reports that Jason Sudeikis, Will Forte, and Leslie Bibb have signed on to star in the film, which will be directed by co-writers Pete Huyck and Alex Gregory (King of the Hill).

Sudeikis will star as a 30-year-old dude with wealthy parents. However, he's "forced to grow up when his father decides to sell the family vacation home in the Hamptons, bringing an end to his tradition of throwing elaborate summer theme parties. Wanting to go out with a bang, he enlists his friends to throw one final party." Yes, it's an orgy. I guess he doesn't mind seeing all his friends nude, or bumping bare butts with a buddy.

There's great potential for this flick, which begins production this month in North Carolina. But it makes me wonder -- how long until we get another sex-centered comedy? Sex comedies used to be more about the thinking, and then maybe the doing, but now we've got both an orgy and Zack and Miri Make a Porno on the way. What's next?

Now that you know what Josh Brolin's George W. Bush will look like, you should know that you'll get to see him in action real soon -- probably sooner than you thought. The ever-courageous Lionsgate has picked up Oliver Stone's W, and plans to release it on October 17th. Of this year. That's 2008. Before the election. Notably, the movie hasn't even started shooting yet -- it goes into production on May 12th in Louisiana.

I never really thought the film would fail to find distribution, though early buzz on the screenplay has been fairly toxic. I did think there was going to be a race between when W would be finished and when Dubya would be finished -- that is, out of office. But apparently Stone is not messing around and plans to deliver the film in a few months, with Lionsgate hoping to capitalize on the furor that will surround the election.

Jeez -- maybe it's because I read too many blogs (or because I live in Pennsylvania, suddenly a battleground state), but it's barely May and I'm already tired of the election. Is W really how people will want to spend their leisure time in late October? I can't imagine, but I respect the folks at Lionsgate enough to think they know what they're doing. Incidentally: Dick Cheney remains uncast. Any suggestions?

I don't think it will be quite like the clip above, but we're about to get a new serving of William Tell. Variety reports that producers Fred Caruso and D. Constantine Conte are bringing Tell's story to the big screen in The Adventures of William Tell. Stunt coordinator and second AD Ian Quinn is going to make his directorial debut with the $60 million production, which was adapted from Friedrich von Schiller's play by Cornelius Schregle.

But here's the kicker, aside from probably hearing that super-speedy overture in a non-Lone Ranger setting -- it will star Charlie Chaplin's granddaughter, Kiera Chaplin. She will play Tell's wife in the film, although there's no word on who will play Tell himself. Now, we all know the music, but do you know the story? It's about the 14th century legend of a man who was forced to shoot an apple off of his son's head to win his freedom from some jerky Austrian occupiers. "The event is said to have triggered a rebellion by the Swiss against their Austrian rules and transformed Tell into a mythical freedom fighter." (... as well as one very sneaky and insidious song.) Production will start on the film this fall, with a release schedule for 2010.

You know, they say that you shouldn't go into business with family and friends. Yet many people still do, and many people also begin to take the advice to heart sooner or later. But what about people you meet in a support group? That sounds totally rational, doesn't it? Let's take it a bit further -- imagine you go into business with strangers you know all have anger issues. It sounds like hell in real life, but may make for a funny film on the big screen.

Variety reports that Heather Graham, Jennifer Coolidge, Matthew Settle (the cool art dad from Gossip Girl), and Amber Heard have signed on to star in a new black dramedy called Ex-terminators, which was written by Suzanne Weinert, and will be the feature directorial debut for Scrubs helmer John Inwood. So yes, this film will focus on "three women who meet in an anger-management therapy group and decide to form a traditional business using very untraditional methods."

This is feeling like one of those projects that could very easily be good, and just as easily be stereotypical and over-the-top bad. Whichever it ends up being, I imagine it will have a healthy dose of quirk involved, considering all the time Inwood has spent on Scrubs. Production began last week in Austin.

Things seem to be getting a tad confusing over on the Transformers 2 front. As of now, Michael Bay and his team plan to begin production in early June ... IF there isn't an actor's strike. (I know, another strike -- we're sick of 'em too.) Regardless of what might happen, they still need to cast this monster -- and that's where all this he said/she said is coming into play. Not long ago, Jonah Hill was rumored to be in negotiations for a part opposite Shia LaBeouf, but that's no longer happening. Now, if Michael Bay is to be believed, Australian actress Teresa Palmer is no longer in the film and was never considered in the first place. This is odd, because we were under the assumption that Moviehole (who first reported the casting) actually spoke to Palmer and SHE confirmed her own involvement.

Over on his personal blog, however, Bay denies everything. In a very brief statement, he says: "No we have stopped negotiating with Jonah, and Teresa Palmer was not considered for a role." Um, okay. If you say so. To further complicate the situation, IGN now reports that another Aussie actress, Isabel Lucas, has been cast in the role of Alice in Transformers 2. This bit of news comes via her management agency, Meissner Management, who list the actress as having that role. She's relatively new to the block, and will have parts in the upcoming vampire flick Daybreakers, as well as the HBO miniseries The Pacific.

No official word on Palmer or Lucas, so we'll have to wait and see if Michael Bay has anything to say about these latest rumors. Cute girl, though, I'll give her that.

When word hit last year that John Waters was going to make a children's movie, I was all sorts of excited -- the King of Sleaze branching out into new and impressionable territory! I imagined kid-ified versions of his past films, or just what was in store for a film with the name "Fruitcake." But then there was nothing, and the Waterific news seemed like a distant memory ... until now!

The Hollywood Reporter posts that Parker Posey and Johnny Knoxville have signed on to star in the film. This will be Ms. Posey's first foray into the world of Waters, which is ridiculously long overdue, while Knoxville is following John right out of A Dirty Shame. There's no word on who they'll play, but this is what we know of the story: It focuses on a boy named after his favorite dessert. (ew) "He runs away from home during the holidays after he and his parents are caught shoplifting meat, then meets up with a runaway girl raised by two gay men [My Two Dads!] and searching for her birth mother."

Parker and Johnny could be ma and pop itching for some free meat, or maybe he's one of the gay men and she's the birth mother. Whoever they play, there is absolutely no way I'll miss this movie. Not with Waters and Posey together. I just wish this was the sort of film that would have a set visit. You can definitely expect to hear more from me as the cast fills out, but it will take a little while to get to us -- John plans to film it over a real winter.

With five nominations, it looks like Superbad will be the star of the 2008 MTV Movie Awards, and its three jubilant male leads -- Michael Cera, Jonah Hill, and Christopher Mintz-Plasse -- deserve the kudos. But one major talent behind the whole affair has stayed relatively anonymous while these young up-and-comers bathe in the spotlight: Director Greg Mottola. The erstwhile independent filmmaker, responsible for some of the best installments of Arrested Developed and Undeclared, launched his career a solid decade before the rise of Judd Apatow with a charming little low budget comedy called The Daytrippers. Starring Stanley Tucci, Hope Davis, Liev Schreiber, Parker Posey and a host of other fantastic character actors, the film follows a wildly dysfunctional family over the course of a single day, as Davis, playing a worrisome housewife, tries to track down her unfaithful husband (Tucci).

Mixing warm humanity with pitch-perfect screwball timing, Daytrippers marked the sort of debut that told you a filmmaker had a big career ahead of him. After a modest premiere at the Slamdance Film Festival, it landed at Cannes, barely got a theatrical release and promptly vanished thereafter. Mottola turned to TV work, and slipped out of the film scene for a good ten years. These days, it's no easy task to track down Daytrippers on DVD -- you can nab second-hand copies on Amazon for decent rates, but not a single retail outlet carries it. Aside from the occasionally airings on cable, the movie has vanished.

Hmmm ... well, file this one under "this could be an interesting casting decision." Variety reported yesterday that Ellen Page, who's been one of my favorite young actresses since I saw her in Hard Candy, has signed on to play one of classic literature's greatest (and most adapted) heroines, Jane Eyre, in an adaptation for BBC.

On the one hand, I can see Page physically in the role -- she looks very like the waif-like Jane in the ancient hardcover edition of the book I inherited from my great-grandmother, all narrow-faced and doe-eyed. And she's certainly proven that she has the acting chops to take on a serious role (see her performances in both Hard Candy and An American Crime).

Of late, though, she's become so identified with the snarky, wise-cracking teenagers she played in Juno and Smart People, that it may be a bit hard now to wash the modern, smart-mouthed teen out of our collective viewing palettes. I say this as a fan of both Page and Juno -- and Lord knows, I've taken enough crap here and elsewhere for loving Juno over the last year -- but I'm trying to wrap my mind around Page as one of the most depressing heroines in literature (all right, Wuthering Heights' Cathy is perhaps more depressing, but until the very end of the book, Jane Eyre isn't what I'd call cheery and uplifting).

Oren Moverman's upcoming directorial debut, The Messenger, already seemed pretty tasty when Jessica posted that the super-talented Ben Foster had signed on to star. Then Jena Malone and Eamonn Walker signed on. Now, The Hollywood Reporter posts that Woody Harrelson and Samantha Morton have also joined the cast. Unfortunately, there's no word on who they'll all be playing, beyond Foster starring.

Foster will play an army dude who is assigned to one of the crappiest jobs out there, aside from cannon fodder. He gets teamed up with someone he doesn't like and has to inform families when their loved ones have died in combat. Somehow, he ends up falling for a soldier's widow, which I imagine complicates matters. THR goes on to state that this is being billed as "a poignant, life-affirming road movie." As a "road movie," it could be that Foster drives around to tell these families. However, he needs enough time to fall for a widow, so maybe we're going to get some military Three for the Road type action? Whatever the case, the film starts production on May 20, so maybe we'll hear more soon.

Who would you rather be on the road with: Ben Foster or Woody Harrelson?

I've been hankering for a good crime flick with a women in the lead for a long time (I can't be the only one who thinks that Catherine Zeta Jones' pregnant drug runner deserved way more screen time in Traffic). But, in the grand tradition of most crime movies, women are relegated to the sidelines as either 'the downfall of the anti-hero', or, 'sexy punching bag' -- neither of which is very flattering, but hopefully that will change with Queen of the South. Variety reports that Eva Mendes has signed to star in the big screen adaptation of Arturo Perez Reverte's crime novel, La reina del sur (Queen of the South).

The story is being touted as a "female Scarface," and centers on a woman who flees to Spain when her drug-dealing boyfriend is murdered. Once she arrives, she starts her own narcotics operation to finance revenge against her lover's murderers -- and quickly becomes top dog. Joining Mendes in the cast are Josh Hartnett and Ben Kingsley in as-yet unnamed roles.

News of the flick first surfaced last year, with Mendes, Jennifer Lopez, and Penelope Cruz on the short list for the role, but in the end Mendes won out. Personally I would have liked to see Lopez take on the role (it's been too long since we had the chance to see her be a bad ass), but I guess in a pinch Mendes will do.

Do you think Warners made the right choice with Mendes? Or is there anyone else out there who would have liked to watch Lopez 'tussle' just one more time?

Catching an afternoon screening of Iron Man last weekend, the questionably denigrating representations of Afghani villains bugged me less than the bizarre cultural references in the trailers preceding it -- especially when it came to accents. Three previews in a row contained characters speaking intentionally mangled English, a fact all the more recognizable because all of them were played by well-known actors. You Don't Mess With Zohan showed Adam Sandler as a tough Israeli hair stylist. The Love Guru preview found Mike Myers blabbering on with South Asian inflections. Rounding things out in perhaps the most innocuous case, Cate Blanchett popped up as a Communist baddie in Indiana Jones and the Kingdom of the Crystal Skull. Are these gross caricatures or fair play?

We've touched on this issue before, but it looks like each month the trend gets a little stronger. There's edgy and there's a line: Borat may or may not send the wrong message, but the character's faux Kazakh accent tells you a lot about the way Americans tend to judge foreigners on the basis of their less-than-perfect English. The specific nature of the satire gives Cohen's performance an underlying purpose -- unlike, say, Love Guru, which seems more like a chance to ignorantly marvel at Myers' ability to turn Indians into a continuous punchline. Recently, a few Hindu groups launched protests against the film. This could mark uncharted terrain for Myers, who did not, as far as I know, get lambasted by any hippies after the first Austin Powers.