Movie Minesweeper - The You Were On, You Were Off Edition

- The plug has been pulled on Jan De Bont's Stopping Power. That's the John Cusack actioner that was to have a forty-odd minute chase scene. The culprits? One of the financial backers, though producers Internationalmedia haven't said which one.

- Rob Cohen is keeping a blog during the production of his Mummy sequel. There's a stuntman called Steve Sommers working on the film! How ironic.

- Ian Jeffers is rewriting Castelvania, from page one.

- Joel David Moore has talked about the shoot for Cameron's Avatar but given very little/absolutely nothing away. Does anybody else think Moore looks like Calvin Harris?

- On the contrary, Kanzaman Productions have stepped forward to pitch into the pot for Donald Petrie's My Life In Ruins. As it stars Nia Vardalos, you won't be too surprised to hear Tom Hanks' Playtone were already on board.

- Stefan Ruzowitzky's The Counterfeiters has been put up as Austria's official selection for the foreign-language Academy Award.

- Gruesome videogame Manhunt 2 is being released uncut in the Netherlands. Of course.

- The first still from Wes Anderson's short The Hotel Chevalier has appeared online.

- The most expensive animated film in Indian film history is gearing up for a December release and the producer has been talking about it. it's called Cheenti Cheenti Bang Bang as Cheenti means Ant in Hindi.

- Redacted has gone down very well in Venice, and De Palma has been giving interviews. For the record, I'm incredibly eager to see this film. Everything I know about it instills a great degree of confidence.

- Ms P. Spice (nee Adams) is to appear in Ugly Betty.

- Joe Harris is to direct The De2cent. Previously, Harris has worked as an editor - on the first Descent and Snatch as well as Matthew Vaughn's movies.

- A blogger's version of Star Trek ala Edward Gorey is proving quite the online hit.

- This is hilarious. The latest JLA casting bullshi... rumour has Jake and Maggie Gyllenhaal cameoing as The Wonder Twins. Superb.

- Kyle Ward's draft of Kane and Lynch has been selected to go into production, and quickly. A strike racer and no mistake.

- There's a pretty interesting audio interview with Leigh Scott, director of Transmorphers online. While I think it's rather old (days, maybe weeks old), I've only just received the link. It's very candid and frank and makes a fairly good stab at getting to the core of what went wrong with the film. I could point out any number of other problems, of course - but there would be more good things to say too. Why outlets like Assylum don't let directors have free rein, I'll never know. The right directors could knock out some really neat little gems. How do they think people like Jack Hill and Paul Bartel and Johnathan Demme and so on got going?

- The Grindhouse Trailer Classics DVD is to include a 17 minute featurette directed by Jake West and starring Emily Booth.

- Ulrich Thompson is the latest addition to the cast of Tom Tykwer's The International.

- Bond 22 has been shooting in Madrid. Not bad for a film with a 4/5ths unwritten script. Hardly inspires confidence, does it?

- Tarantino turned down the option to make a Hawaii Five-O movie. Why? Because he doesn't like the show. Or Hawaii.

- Jeffrey Wells has posted an mp3 of the expanded Puttin' On the Ritz from the stage version of Young Frankenstein.

- NBC will not be renewing their contract with iTunes, so after December, you'll have to catch up with missed epsiodes of Earl elsewhere.