PAIN AND GAIN (Cast News)

• THE OTHER GUYS PAIN AND GAIN

Mark Wahlberg & Dwanye Johnson

Dwayne "The Rock" Johnson is currently in talks to star in Michael Bay's upcoming comedy Pain and Gain. Johnson's fellow The Other Guys co-star Mark Wahlberg is also up for headlining the low-budget (for Bay anyway) feature.

Variety claims that both actors have sat down with Bay to discuss the film. Johnson's involvement is said to be further along than Wahlberg's, but sources add that the project is still in the early stages of casting.

Based on a 1999 article from the Miami New Times, Pain and Gain follows a pair of bodybuilders who get mixed up in an extortion ring and a kidnapping that goes horribly awry. Captain America writers Christopher Markus and Stephen McFeely have already penned the script. The project has been described to have a similar tone to the Coen Brothers' Fargo.

The modest $20 million picture will be produced by Bay and Donald De Line. 

STAR TREK 2 (Cast Buzz)

• STAR TREK 2

Benico del Toro

Ever since his name first surfaced as the possible villain in Star Trek 2, Benicio del Toro has gotten a taste of the Trekkies. That just means that the star got himself the hell out of this franchise!!

That’s right Del Toro has left the franchise and will not be part of the new Star Trek film.

This could be a big blow for the production, because certainly an actor of Del Toro's caliber should be beneficial to the Star Trek reboot, which mostly features a younger, less seasoned cast.

Edgar Ramirez & Jordi Molla

Variety is reporting that Edgar Ramirez is now a strong contender for the same role. His far from being locked down for the role, however Jordi Molla is also said to be up for the part.

Ramirez is best known for his leading role in Olivier Assayas' miniseries, "Carlos" while Molla recently starred in Colombiana.

The news comes on the heels of word that both Alice Eve and Peter Weller have signed on for (also undisclosed) parts, joining John Cho, Simon Pegg, Chris Pine, Zachary Quinto, Zoe Saldana, Karl Urban and Anton Yelchin.

Recent reports suggest that the role in question may be none other than Khan Noonien Singh, iconically brought to life by Ricardo Montalbán in the original series episode "Space Seed" and brought back for the 1982 feature film, Star Trek II: The Wrath of Khan.

Although Montalbán was himself of Latin decent (as are Del Toro, Ramirez and Molla), the character of Khan was originally intended to be of Indian ancestry. In the "Star Trek" universe, Khan was a genetically engineered tyrant who seized control of much of the Earth in the 1990's during a conflict known as "The Eugenics Wars." At the conclusion of his reign, Khan escaped the Earth in a starship, the Botany Bay, and was held in suspended animation with his crew until he was found and revived in 2267 by Captain James T. Kirk. As a point of reference, the first Abrams film takes in 2258, though in a diverging timeline. In theory, Khan could have been awakened as far back as 2233 when Nero (Eric Bana) first arrived and, from then on, altered history.

All that being said, Khan's appearance in the sequel should still be considered rumor for the time being. What is known is that the film will boast a script from Alex Kurtzman, Roberto Orci and Damon Lindelof and that it will begin shooting in early 2012, targeting a May 17, 2013 release.

HANGOVER 3 (Update)

• HANGOVER 3

Just before the release of The Hangover Part II, director Todd Phillips was already stirring up chatter for a threequel. As he puts it, the Wolf Pack movies were always envisioned as a trilogy, stating, "The third would be very much a finale and an ending... As far as where it takes place, I'm very open."

Bradley Cooper has a Hangover

Bleeding Cool reports that Hangover star Bradley Cooper may have the answer to that question, and on Graham Norton’s Show, Cooper revealed some potential movie details.

"I think that we adhered to the formula in the second one, for those who've seen it, and the third one, I think, which would close the whole trilogy," said Cooper. "I think it'll take place in Los Angeles and maybe not adhere to the structure, it might be different."

Cooper added that he hopes to start filming next September. Ed Helms and Zach Galifianakis have also confirmed that they would return for the film.

CROSSFACE (In Development)

• CROSSFACE

SRG Films has announced their plans to adapt the Matthew Randazzo book "Ring of Hell: The Story of Chris Benoit and the Fall of the Pro Wrestling Industry" into a big-screen biopic entitled Crossface. Full details from the official press release are as follows:

Chris Benoit

"Crossface", a biographical thriller, delves into the pressures WWE superstar Chris Benoit faced throughout his wrestling career as the combination of drug-use, depression, and head trauma became increasingly impossible for him to handle. The true story made headline news in 2007 when Chris murdered his wife and young son before taking his own life.

SRG Films head Dale Alexander Carnegie is producing the film, while William Morris Endeavor (WME) is on board to package the project. Former Weinstein Company staffer, Sarah Coulter, turned in the first draft of the script in mid-October.

"All of us grow up believing that wrestling is fake, but looking at the shocking number of deaths in the industry, it quickly becomes evident that there is nothing fake about the dangers of this sport," Carnegie said. "Chris Benoit has become a poster child for everything that's wrong with professional wrestling and Sarah's terrific script captures his struggles and the many factors that led to the deaths of three people."

Coulter added: "People immediately point to steroids, never thinking about the brain trauma these wrestlers can, and do, incur in their profession, nor do they consider the rigorous schedule that keeps them working even when they shouldn t be. The Benoit story is one that needs to be brought into the light.:

SRG Films, currently in talks with directors and actors, plans to begin filming in the fall of 2012.

ARTHUR & LANCELOT (Cast News)

Marion Cotillard

• ARTHUR & LANCELOT

Marion Cotillard is leaving Gotham City behind for Camelot. The Oscar-winning Inception and Dark Knight Rises beauty may join the cast of Arthur & Lancelot for Warner Bros.

Vulture reports that the French actress " is being offer the role of Morgana, the sorceress half-sister to Arthur."

David Dobkin will direct. Game of Thrones' Kit Harrington and The Killing's Joel Kinnaman play Arthur and Lancelot, respectively.

AVENGERS (Hiddleston Speaks)

• LOKI GOES TO NASA

Tom Hiddleston spoke briefly to UK's ELLE magazine about filming Marvel's The Avengers. He said his favorite day was at the Space Power Facility at NASA's Plum Brook Station which is near Sandusky, Ohio.

Loki gets captured by S.H.I.E.L.D.

"My favorite moment on set was filming at a NASA location the size of a cathedral. I flew around like a trapeze artist in a rocket-testing facility in the company of Samuel L. Jackson and Jeremy Renner. That was a pretty good day at work," he said.

He also talked about being in the company of such an all-star cast.

"For the first 10 minutes after you meet them, they have the wattage and charisma of movie stars. Then you have a coffee with them and you realize we're all the same, we're all just people.

"All of the actors in 'The Avengers' are so nice. Marvel has these code names for projects and the code name for 'The Avengers' was Group Hug. It felt very much like a group hug on set."

Disney will release Marvel's The Avengers in theaters on May 4.

ANDY SERKIS TALKS ANIMATION

• ANDY SERKIS ON THE FUTURE OF ANIMATION

Andy Serkis Deserves That Oscar!!!

Actor and pioneering motion-capture champion Andy Serkis, who plays Captain Haddock in Steven Spielberg's mo-cap Tintin movie, says it's time for people to rethink what animation means.

In a chat with The Hollywood Reporter, Serkis -- who is the subject of an Oscar campaign to get him nominated as Best Supporting Actor for his motion-capture performance as Caesar in Rise of the Planet of the Apes -- declared: "The category of animation should be under review because Tintin is entirely derived from actors' performances created in a conventional live-action way and manifested onscreen in a painterly, animated fashion. There has to be a review of all these storytelling methods. It's not necessary to exclude one from a category. A lot of people are being quite defensive about it. I think people should not be so Luddite. Don't say, 'No, traditional animation is this.' They've got to think out of the box and start to embrace all these different methods and mediums. This year will be a very interesting watershed point in our understanding."

Serkis doesn't think there should be a separate Oscar category created for motion-capture performances: "It should be in the [regular] acting category because the acting part of the process is entirely the same. I've been bombarded by hate mail from animators saying, 'How dare you talk about 'your' character when all these people work on it after the fact? We're actors as well.' They are actors in the sense that they create key frames and the computer will join up the dots, carefully choreograph a moment or an expression and accent it with an emotion. But that's not what an actor does. An actor finds things in the moment with a director and other actors that you don't have time to hand-draw or animate with a computer."

WRATH OF THE TITANS (EW gets First Look)

• WRATH OF THE TITANS

The new issue of Entertainment Weekly has this first look at Sam Worthington in the sequel Wrath of the Titans, coming to 3D and 2D theaters on March 30th. Ralph Fiennes, Liam Neeson, Danny Huston, Edgar Ramirez, Bill Nighy, Toby Kebbell and Rosamund Pike co-star in the Jonathan Liebesman-directed fantasy action adventure. The first film, Clash of the Titans, earned $493.2 million worldwide in 2010.

You can check out the image below the synopsis:

Sam Worthington

A decade after his heroic defeat of the monstrous Kraken, Perseus—the demigod son of Zeus—is attempting to live a quieter life as a village fisherman and the sole parent to his 10-year old son, Helius.

Meanwhile, a struggle for supremacy rages between the gods and the Titans. Dangerously weakened by humanity's lack of devotion, the gods are losing control of the imprisoned Titans and their ferocious leader, Kronos, father of the long-ruling brothers Zeus, Hades and Poseidon. The triumvirate had overthrown their powerful father long ago, leaving him to rot in the gloomy abyss of Tartarus, a dungeon that lies deep within the cavernous underworld.

Perseus cannot ignore his true calling when Hades, along with Zeus' godly son, Ares (Edgar Ramírez), switch loyalty and make a deal with Kronos to capture Zeus. The Titans' strength grows stronger as Zeus' remaining godly powers are siphoned, and hell is unleashed on earth.

Enlisting the help of the warrior Queen Andromeda (Rosamund Pike), Poseidon's demigod son, Argenor (Toby Kebbell), and fallen god Hephaestus (Bill Nighy), Perseus bravely embarks on a treacherous quest into the underworld to rescue Zeus, overthrow the Titans and save mankind.