Director David Fincher’s adaptation of 20,000 Leagues Under The Sea is still struggling to pull together a cast, but once it does they already have a destination for shooting the film. Deadline is reporting that the Australian government has offered Disney a one-off incentive payment of $22.5 million to produce the film Down Under.

Australia has been fairly aggressive in their attempts to lure film companies to their shores to shoot films, offering in the past various tax incentives. They feel that what is spent in bringing foreign productions to the country would be outweighed by the boosts to the local economy. But this payment is by far the largest carrot that they have dangled at Hollywood yet.

Disney is still waiting to see what kind of cast Fincher assembles before giving the final go ahead on the project, but if it does it will probably shoot at Fox Studios in Sydney and Village Roadshow Studios in Queensland.

With this kind of fire lit under him, I would not be surprised if we hear some solid casting news on the film within the next couple of weeks.

There was a time when Twentieth Century Fox seemed eager to get right to work on a sequel to their English-language adaptation of The Girl With The Dragon Tattoo, The Girl Who Played With Fire, with an eye for getting the film out sometime in late 2012/early 2013. Well, here we are smack in the middle of that initially projected timeframe and despite screenwriter Steve Zaillian having turned in a script that the studio likes, there has been no forward movement on the project.

So what’s the holdup? According to a story in the Hollywood Reporter, the delay all boils down to money. Specifically, although the film managed to make $233 million worldwide against its $90 million budget, the film is only considered by the studio as a modest success. And while they want to continue with their adaption of Stieg Larsson’s bestselling trilogy, they also want to do it in a way that might maximize their profits a bit more – i.e., they want to make the next film cheaper.

The chief stumbling block in decreasing the film’s budget is one of its stars, Daniel Craig. The Hollywood Reporter’s story alleges that the actor feels he is due a pay raise, especially in light of his latest James bond film Skyfall passing the $1 billion mark in worldwide box office receipts. And if Craig doesn’t budge in his salary demands the Reporter is saying that the studio is contemplating writing his character of investigative journalist Mikael Blomkvist out of the film entirely.

While it sounds like sacrilege to fans of the original novels and their Swedish film adaptions, excising Blomkvist from the film doesn’t seem like it would be too hard to do. For much of the novel’s narrative the reporter is separated from the books’ heroine on Lisbeth Salander (Rooney Mara), and when it came time for Zaillian to start in on the adaption there was some speculation that he would actually change some plotlines to give them more onscreen time together. Would it be too hard for him to nudge things in the opposite direction and turn it into a solo Lisbeth film?

The only problem here is that Fox has already paid out a mid-seven figures sum to Zaillian for his work on the screenplay and would have to write another check to have him do another draft. Currently, Zaillian is working on the HBO series Criminal Justice, starring James Gandolfini, so there is a question of his availability even if Fox is willing to open up their wallets.

Meanwhile, while he waits for this impasse to be solved, director David Fincher is still working at developing a number of other projects. He recently signed on for an adaption of Gillian Flynn’s psychological thriller novel Gone Girl, though it is being reported that Flynn’s screenplay of her own book has a ways to go before being camera ready. Another Fincher project that does have a screenplay polished enough for production is his take on Jules Verne’s classic novel 20,000 Leagues Under The Sea, though the director and studio Disney are not seeing eye-to-eye on the budget.

In a multi-part series, Comic Book Film Editor William Gatevackes will be tracing the history of comic book movies from the earliest days of the film serials to today’s big blockbusters and beyond. Along with the history lesson, Bill will be covering some of the most prominent comic book films over the years and why they were so special. This time, we discuss the strange journey of Heavy Metal from Europe to America to the Silver Screen.

National Lampoon has given us a lot over the years. It has given us writers such as Doug Kenney, Michael O’Donaghue, P.J. O’Rourke and John Hughes. It gave exposure to comic actors like John Belushi, Gilda Radner, Christopher Guest, Chevy Chase and Bill Murray. It has even “Presented” films like Animal House, Vacation, and Van Wilder.

It has also, in a roundabout way, given us the film Heavy Metal, too. Well, at least the magazine the movie was based on.

Heavy Metal magazine began as the French magazine Métal Hurlant, an anthology graphic magazine started in 1974 by legendary French artists Jean Giraud A.K.A. Mœbius and Philippe Druillet. It presented comics drawn and written from a distinctly European point of view, along with text articles on all areas of popular culture.

National Lampoon publisher Leonard Mogel was in Paris to try and get Lampoon published in France when he stumbled across Métal Hurlant (which stands for “Howling Metal”) and saw it as something that might work in the United States. He licensed the magazine, renamed it Heavy Metal to have it resonate with American audiences more and started publishing it on high-stock glossy paper as a monthly magazine.

The mag gave European artists such as Giraud, Milo Manara and Esteban Maroto exposure in the U.S. as their work in Métal Hurlant was translated and reprinted in Heavy Metal. It featured work from such luminaries as H.R. Giger, Stephen King, Harlan Ellison and William S. Burroughs in its pages. And it published serials by artists like Arthur Suydam, Bernie Wrightson  and Howard Cruse, among others.

It’s these serials that got adapted into the 1981 film, Heavy Metal, which like the magazine was an anthology of stories inspired and written by creators that worked for the periodical.

The film featured six installments with a framing sequence tied together by one mystical object, a glowing green sphere of unearthly power called the Loc-Nar. The individual installments feature the distinctive variety of styles that were at home in the magazine, ranging from futuristic noir to historical horror, from imaginative fantasy to satiric humor. The film was produced by Ivan Reitman, featured the voices of SCTVers John Candy, Joe Flaherty, Eugene Levy and Harold Ramis. And it had an eclectic soundtrack that featured Black Sabbath, Blue Oyster Cult, Stevie Nicks, Devo and Cheap Trick.  That line up of musicians was one of the reasons why the film took so long to be released on home video, as nailing down the rights to the music became an issue.

In 1992, longtime Heavy Metal fan and co-creator of the Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles Kevin Eastman bought the magazine and set himself up as publisher and editor. Heavy Metal 2000 was released early on in Eastman’sreign as publisher, but had more to do with the man then the magazine.

Heavy Metal 2000 was not adapted from a story that appeared in the pages of the magazine, but rather from a 1995 miniseries Eastman did with artist Simon Bisley called The Melting Pot which was published by Kitchen Sink Press. The original comic was not an anthology, so the film contains only one story, not six like the first Heavy Metal. It does feature a diverse soundtrack with many songs from popular alternative and metal acts of the day, like Queens of the Stone Age and System of a Down. And a glowing green rock does play a role in the proceedings, to sort of tie it in with the first film.

The plot focuses on Julie (voiced by, and most certainly inspired by, Eastman’s then-wife, B-movie actress and former Penthouse Pet of the Year Julie Strain) fighting an evil tyrant with the power of self-regeneration. She fights to free her sister from the tyrant’s captivity, all the while trying to end his reign of terror.

There is another film in the works, at the very least loosely connected to the Heavy Metal brand called War of the Worlds: Goliath.

The film is a sequel to H.G. Wells’ novel, War of the Words, and appears to be some kind of steampunk manga film. It is voiced by Adrian Paul and Adam Baldwin, among others. It is set for a 2012 release, however, footage was shown during the 2009 San Diego Comic Con with a promised 2010 DVD release. Since it was already delayed two years, I’d say that 2012 date should be taken with a grain of salt.

There has been a planned remake of the original in the works, first helmed by David Fincher and then by Robert Rodriguez. Considering Rodriguez’s track record of getting films he is attached to made is about one in four, it might be a while if there will be another Heavy Metal film in the future.

Next time, Swamp Thing gets revitalized in the comics and a film in theaters within years of one another. Did one have any effect on the other?

It’s that time of year again. Tomorrow, the Academy of Motion Picture Arts and Sciences will announce the nominees for the 84st Annual Academy Awards.

Every year there are snubs and surprises, thrills and controversies. There is no way of knowing who will be nominated, especially in a year when the Best Picture nominees could be 5 films, or ten films, or any number in between.  We here at FilmBuffOnLine, who believe the day nominations are announced should be a National holiday, are going to try and handicap the process for you.

We will try to tell you, in the most non-committal way possible, who we think are Almost Certain to get a nomination, who Definite May Be nominated, and whose nomination is a Outside Shot in the major categories (the four acting categories, Best Director, and Best Picture). We are trying to cover all bases, but don’t come to us if you lose money on your Oscar Nomination pool.

Best Actor:

Almost Certain:

George Clooney, The Descendants; Jean Dujardin, The Artist

Definite Maybe:

Michael Fassbender, Jane Eyre, X-Men: First Class, A Dangerous Method or Shame; Leonardo DiCaprio, J Edgar; Brad Pitt, Moneyball

Outside Shot:

Demián Bichir, A Better Life; Ryan Gosling, Crazy, Stupid Love, Drive, or The Ides of March; Gary Oldman, Tinker Tailor Soldier Spy

Clooney and Dujardin have won the most hardware this year, which not only make them a lock to be nominated, but also likely one of them will be taking home the award.

Fassbender has been great in a lot of films (listing X-Men: First Class was a bit of a joke, he’ll most likely get the nod for Shame, but I think he gave an Oscar worthy performance in that film) so he is practically a lock for a nomination. The next two are about 50/50 of getting in. The Academy seems to have something against DiCaprio, and his performance as J. Edgar Hoover while not horrible (he got a lot of nods for other awards for it), was not amazing enough to overcome that film’s lackluster performance critically or financially. Brad Pitt eked out a couple of wins along the way (most notably, the New York and Boston critics), and while Moneyball was well received, I don’t see it as 100% Oscar material.

If DiCaprio and Pitt don’t get nominated, there are worthy choices waiting to take a spot. Bichir was great in a small film with a limited release that opened over the summer. These all work against him, but he is deserving of a nod. Gosling, like Fassbender, was great in a lot of films this year, and has been nominated before, but none of the films he was in seem to pass Oscar muster. Oldman was flat out amazing in Tinker Tailor, but his subtle performance might be lost on Oscar voters.

Best Actress

Almost Certain:

Viola Davis, The Help;  Meryl Streep, The Iron Lady; Tilda Swinton, We Need to Talk About Kevin; Michelle Williams, My Week with Marilyn

Definite Maybe:

Glenn Close, Albert Nobbs

Outside Shot:

Bérénice Bejo, The Artist; Elizabeth Olsen, Martha Marcy May Marlene; Charlize Theron, Young Adult

On paper, this seems to be the category that seems to have the least wiggle room. Davis, Streep, Close, Swinton and Williams are all in the type of roles that Oscar voters seem to trip over giving nominations to. But in every round of nominations, there are bound to be surprises, and this category is ripe for one.

Bejo and Olsen have the best chance of breaking in, in my opinion. But Bejo is getting pushed for Best Supporting Actress instead of Lead, even though she essentially had a lead role. Olsen got good notices in her role, but suffers from the same “too early/too small handicap” that Bichir has. Theron has received nods for Best Actress in the Golden Globes (where there are nominations for comedy and drama) and the Critic’ Choice Awards (where there are six nominees). She has an Oscar pedigree, but Young Adult could very well be seen as less than Oscar worthy.

Best Supporting Actor:

Almost Certain:

Kenneth Branagh, My Week with Marilyn; Christopher Plummer, Beginners

Definite Maybe:

Albert Brooks, Drive; Jonah Hill, Moneyball

Outside Shot:

Nick Nolte, Warrior; Viggo Mortensen, A Dangerous Method; Andy Serkis, Rise of the Planet of the Apes or The Adventures of Tintin; Armie Hammer, J Edgar; Tom Hardy, Tinker Tailor Soldier Spy

Plummer has won the Golden Globe and Critic’s Choice award Supporting Actor, making him a lock for an  Oscar nomination, if not the actual award. Branagh has been consistently nominated for his apt portrayal of Laurence Olivier, so he could get the nod as well. Slightly less certain but highly possible are nomination of two actors best known for comedy, Brooks and Hill, for playing against type. After that, place your bets. Will Nolte’s “sports mentor” role make the grade? Will Mortensen’s change of pace role as Sigmund Freud catch the Academy’s attention? Will the Academy make a statement and move towards the future by giving Serkis the nod for his superior motion-capture work? Does the Academy like J Edgar more than the critics and the general public do, thereby swing the nod to Hammer? Will Hardy represent Tinker Tailor‘s stellar cast with a nomination? Will it be another cast member? Or will the film be ignored?

Best Supporting Actress

Almost Certain:

Octavia Spencer, The Help; Bérénice Bejo, The Artist

Definite Maybe:

Melissa McCarthy, Bridesmaids

Outside Shot:

Jessica Chastain, The Help or Take Shelter; Janet McTeer, Albert Nobbs; Carey Mulligan, Shame; Shailene Woodley, The Descendants

What I said for Christopher Plummer above also applies to Spencer. The only chance Bejo doesn’t get nominated here is if she gets nominated for Best Actress. But that race is crowded so I think she’ll land here. She is deserving.

The only thing keeping me from making McCarthy almost certain is the Academy’s apparent hatred of the comedy. They do not like to give nominations from comedies, no matter how good the role or film is. This time, though, I think they’ll make an exception.

After that, pick two. Chastain and Woodley might have a slight advantage, but McTeer has a good chance and Mulligan could sneak in.

Best Director:

Almost Certain:

Michel Hazanavicius, The Artist; Martin Scorsese, Hugo

Definite Maybe:

Woody Allen, Midnight in Paris;  Alexander Payne, The Descendants

Outside Shot:

David Fincher, The Girl with the Dragon Tattoo; Terrence Malick, The Tree of Life; Bennett Miller, Moneyball; Steven Spielberg, War Horse or The Adventures of Tintin; Tate Taylor, The Help

Hazanavicius is definitely most deserving and Scorsese won the Golden Globe, so they should both be nominated. After that, Payne is almost a lock, as is Allen, due to the number of nominations they received. After that, well, ot depends. Fincher got a Directors Guild nomination, Malick has been on a lot of west coast critics awards list, which might be a barometer of how the Academy will go. Miller might ride the surprising accolades Moneyball is getting this award season with a nomination. And months ago, it looked like it wouldn’t be a question if Spielberg would be nominated, but for which film. Now, here he is, a long shot for any nomination at all. Weird. And Taylor has to be consider taking into account the number of great performance that came from that film.

Best Picture:

Almost Certain:

The Artist; The Descendants

Definite Maybe:

Hugo; The Help ; Midnight in Paris

Outside Chance:

The Tree of Life; War Horse; Moneyball; The Girl with the Dragon Tattoo; The Adventures of Tintin; Tinker Tailor Soldier Spy or just about any other film out there that has a miniscule amount of buzz.

Not having a definite number of nominees beforehand really plays havoc with the prognosticating business. I tried to pick out the five most likely films to get nominated, but with the possibility of five more, well, it could be any film of a certain stature.

So, what do you think? Am I on to something, or totally wrong? I guess we’ll find out tomorrow.

Yesterday we talked about how Sony is looking to move forward on adapting the two literary sequels to The Girl With The Dragon Tattoo despite their film version’s rather mediocre box office performance to date. But one of the unknowns in their plan was whether director David Fincher would be back to helm the second and third installments.

But Sony does want the director, they’re either going to have to make a convincing argument as to why he should take the job or else move their planned start date for the film of late 2012/early 2103 as The Playlist is reporting that Fincher is looking to make his next project his long in development adaption of Jules Verne’s 20,000 Leagues Under The Sea and is hoping to shoot in the last quarter of this year. And with yesterday‘s Directors Guild Award nomination, The Girl With The Dragon Tattoo is now situated as a frontrunner in the Oscars race. Sony will indeed wish to capitalize on thany awards season wins as quickly as possible.

Fincher has been developing this project for several years now. Right now there is a new draft of the screenplay being worked on by Andrew Kevin Walker and the Playlist’s unnamed source is stating that the director would like to be shooting before the year’s end. This, of course, would put it just around the same time that Sony wants to get cameras rolling on The Girl Who Played With Fire.

Would Fincher be willing to go straight from wrapping the shooting on Leagues to shooting Fire while trying to simultaneously oversee the post-production work on the former? It has been done before. Steven Spielberg has even done it twice – Once moving on from Jurassic Park to Schindler’s List and more recently with The Adventures Of Tintin and War Horse.  It should be noted that in both cases, Spielberg was coming off of a visual effects-laden film. Perhaps the presumably visual effects-heavy post-production work for Leagues will allow Fincher to be able to perform a similar maneuver.

While the box office for Sony’s English-language adaption of The Girl With The Dragon Tattoo might not have been as big as expected given the popularity of the Stieg Larsson’s source novel and the critical praise that the original Swedish adaption has received, but the studio has decided to continue forward with adapting the two other books in Larsson’s Millennium series.

As it stands now, the David Fincher-directed adaption is projected to barely break the $100 million mark for ticket sales. (It’s current box office take is currently just shy of $77 million according to Box Office Mojo). Compared to the film’s production costs and the intensive marketing campaign the studio bankrolled, that’s not enough for Sony to break even. However, the film is just starting to roll out into foreign markets and the studio brass is bullish that the film will clear more in the neighborhood of $300 million by the time that is completed.

Banking on that outcome, Sony has already put to work Dragon Tattoo screenwriter Steve Zaillian on adapting the second book in Larsson’s trilogy, The Girl Who Played With Fire with an eye towards getting the film before cameras by late 2012 or early 2013.

Of course, there are a number of unknowns concerning the project and the presumably eventual adaption of the third book, The Girl Who Kicked The Hornet’s Nest. There have been rumors that the two films would shoot back-to-back, though the studio has apparently not made that decision. More interesting, is the fact that it looks like Dragon Tattoo director David Fincher’s participation in the second or even third film has not yet been determined. Presumably when he signed on for the first film there was an option in his contract for all three, but it remains to be seen whether Sony will exercise that option or not.

As to the script for Fire, Deadline is reporting that Zaillian is making some changes to the original book’s plot line, reportedly to bring titular hero Lisbeth Salander into more focus in the film than she is in the Larsson’s original novel, which keeps her separated from hero Mikael Blomkvist for much of its plot. I would assume that Zaillian is looking at ways to have the two working more together through his screenplay.

Can the studio do better with a sequel? Although rare, it is not unheard of. Deadline’s report hints that the studio realizes that it might have made a mistake releasing a dark, R-rated film during the year-end, holiday season, quoting an anonymous studio as exec as saying “It was too cocky of us. We might think about that next time.” I have a feeling that the English-version of Dragon Tattoo will really find its audience once it hits home video later this year thanks to some award season wins and that income from DVD and blu-ray sales will help seal the deal for Sony to give the go-ahead on getting the sequels in front of the cameras as quickly as they can.

Director David Fincher is reuniting with his Se7en scripter Andrew Kevin Walker for a film that should be decidedly less dark than their previous collaboration. Walker will be doing a rewrite on Fincher’s 20,000 Leagues Under The Sea project he has been developing at Disney over the past year.

The film is set to be a loose adaption of the classic Jules Verne novel which Fincher is set to film in 3D.

Walker joins a pretty impressive list of writers who have already taken a crack at the project. Scott Z Burns was the most recent, following on the heels of Michael Chabon and Randall Wallace.

Given that Walker’s resume includes such films as 8mm, Sleepy Hollow and The Wolfman as well as doing some uncredited script doctoring on Fight Club and Event Horizon, he certainly seems like an odd choice for Disney’s family friendly film. My thought is that we’ll wind up seeing something a bit more slyly subversive and edgy than Disney’s original film version of the novel from 1954. Not that I’m saying that that version starring Kirk Douglas and James Mason is bad. Far from it, it’s one of my favorite of Disney’s live action films. But I think it’s fare to say that what ever Fincher has in mind is going to be far different.

Going in to last night’s Directors Guild Awards the smart money was on David Fincher’s The Social Network to walk off the award for Feature Film direction. But the smart money lost as in a surprise move the award instead went to Tom Hooper for The King’s Speech.

Charles Ferguson took home the award for Documentary Feature for his look at the root causes of the 2008 financial crisis  Inside Job.

The King’s Speech‘s win at the Directors Guild positions it as the frontrunner of the Academy Award’s Best Director. Except for six instances, every winner of the DGA award in the 63 years of the Guild has gone on to win the Oscar. The most recent exception to this was in 2002 when Rob Marshall won the DGA for Chicago while Roman Polanski won the Academy Award for The Pianist. Vote in your office Oscar pool accordingly.

Christopher Plummer has joined the cast of David Fincher’s adaptation of Stig Larsson’s novel The Girl With The Dragon Tattoo.

Plummer will be playing Henrik Vanger, the man who hires disgraced journalist Mikael Blomkvist (Daniel Craig) to investigate the disappearance of his beloved great-niece who vanished four decades earlier. Oddly, Max Von Sydow had been previously linked to the role and there seems to be no word as to why he no longer is.

The Girl With The Dragon Tattoo starts shooting later this year for a December 21, 2011 release.

Via The Hollywood Reporter.

Rooney Mara has been cast as computer hacker Lisbeth Slanader in the English language adaptation of Swedish novelists Stieg Larsson’s best-selling thriller The Girl With The Dragon Tattoo. She’ll appear opposite Daniel Craig in the David Fincher directed film.

Incredibly, Mara beat out several other, better-known actresses for the role including Natalie Portman, Anne Hathaway, Ellen Page, Mia Wasikowska,Scarlett Johansson and Carey Mulligan. Mara doesn’t have much of a resume. Her biggest role so far has been a lead in this years A Nightmare On Elm Street remake. She does, however, have a role in Fincher’s upcoming The Social Network, due out this fall, which possibly gave the director a bit more insight as to what the actress can do.

If you’ve read the book or seen the 2009 Sewdish film adaptation from director Niels Arden Oplev, than you already know why their was fierce competition among actresses for the role. Lisbeth is one of the more complex female characters to come along in quite a while and in the first book/film travels an arc that starts from an exceedingly dark place.

For me, Rooney will have to go a long way to replace the impression that actress Noomi Rapace made on me in the role in the original Swedish film. Of course, a majority of English speaking folks will never see that version, nor the two sequels that adapted Larsson’s other two books – The Girl Who Played With Fire and The Girl Who Kicked The Hornet’s Nest. That’s a shame as her performance was one of the most compelling I’ve seen in any language for quite a while.

Presumably Mara is under contract for possible sequels if the first film does well.

The English language version of The Girl With The Dragon Tattoo begins shooting next month in Sweden for a December 2011 release.