RUNNER RUNNER (Cast News)

• RUNNER RUNNER

Gemma Arterton has joined Ben Affleck and Justin Timberlake in New Regency and Stone Village Pictures' Runner Runner, reports Variety.

Gemma Arterton

In the dramatic thriller, directed by Brad Furman (The Lincoln Lawyer), "Timberlake plays a Princeton student cheated out of his tuition money playing online poker who ends up the right-hand man of the site's corrupt boss (Affleck). Arterton plays Timberlake's love interest."

LES MISERABLES (Trailer)

• LES MISERABLES

Les Miserables

Universal Pictures has debuted the first trailer for director Tom Hooper's Les Miserables, opening in theaters on December 14 and starring Hugh Jackman, Russell Crowe, Anne Hathaway, Amanda Seyfried, Eddie Redmayne, Aaron Tveit and Samantha Barks.

Les Miserables is the motion-picture adaptation of the beloved global stage sensation seen by more than 60 million people in 42 countries and in 21 languages around the globe and still breaking box-office records everywhere in its 27th year.

Set against the backdrop of 19th-century France, the film tells an enthralling story of broken dreams and unrequited love, passion, sacrifice and redemption–a timeless testament to the survival of the human spirit. Jackman plays ex-prisoner Jean Valjean, hunted for decades by the ruthless policeman Javert (Crowe) after he breaks parole. When Valjean agrees to care for factory worker Fantine’s (Hathaway) young daughter, Cosette, their lives change forever.

GRUDGE MATCH (Cast News)

• GRUDGE MATCH

Sylvester Stallone and Robert De Niro could go head-to-head in the Warner Bros. boxing comedy Grudge Match, The Wrap reports.

Robert DeNiro and Sylvester Stallone

Peter Segal, who last directed Get Smart, will direct the tale of two aging boxers who plan one final match against one another.

Stallone and De Niro represent two of the most iconic on-screen boxers. The former wrote and starred in Rocky while the latter played Jake La Motta in Martin Scorsese's Raging Bull.

Doug Ellin ("Entourage") has drafted Grudge Match's latest draft with Bill Gerber, Carrie Gillogly and Mark Stephen Johnson producing.

LEXICON (Matthew Vaughn to Direct)

• LEXICON

Though the novel won't be released until mid-2013, X-Men: First Class director Matthew Vaughn has purchased the rights to Max Barry's upcoming novel, Lexicon.

Matthew Vaughn

"['Lexicon'] is about a secret persuasion society that builds and deploys words as weapons," Barry writes on his official site. "The people who wield these words are known as poets; the story centers around a young woman who is recruited into their ranks, and the man she falls in love with. Which you are not allowed to do, as a poet. I could explain why, but I’m not going to. Just trust me."

Vaughn himself has plans to write and direct the big screen adaptation, though he'll first produce Kick-Ass 2 and will direct the still-untitled First Class sequel, tentatively planned to shoot in January of 2013.

MALEFICENT (Cast News)

• MALEFICENT

Brenton Thwaites 

Disney has cast an unknown actor by the name of Brenton Thwaites to take on the role of the young prince in Robert Stromberg's Maleficent. Thwaites is from Australia and had a role in a TV series called Home And Away, he also starred in the Lifetime Channel movie Blue Lagoon: The Awakening.

Well Thor’s Chris Hemsworth was also in Home and Away, so it seems like that show could be the breeding ground for Australia’s top talent.

He will join a star studded cast that includes, Angelina Jolie as Maleficent, Elle Fanning as Aurora and Sharlto Copley is Stefan, described as "the half-human and half-fairy bastard son of the human king."

The cast also includes Imelda Staunton (Vera Drake), Miranda Richardson (Harry Potter), Kenneth Cranham (Made in Dagenham), Sam Riley (Brighton Rock) and Lesley Manville (Another Year).

IRON MAN 3 (BIG UPDATE)

• IRON MAN 3

The Iron Patriot to debut in Iron Man 3

Shane Black's Iron Man 3 will feature the red, white and blue Iron Patriot armor.

Iron Patriot on Set

The armor made its first appearance in 2009's "Dark Avengers" #1. Following the events of the "Secret Invasion" crossover, Norman Osborn was mistakenly heralded as an American hero and tasked with leading a group of government sanctioned-Avengers. Taking the technology from Stark Industries, Osborn designed his suit to represent the then-recently-deceased Captain America.

Because the character of Osborn is a Spider-Man villain and the rights rest at Sony Pictures, it's pretty much a certainty that a different character will be donning the suit in the upcoming film.

The armor is being worn by James Badge Dale, who plays Eric Savin in the feature film. First announced earlier this month, Savin becomes, in the comic books, the cyborg villain Coldbood. At this point it is unknown whether or not we'll see the actor in multiple costumes or if Coldblood and Iron Patriot are being merged into one character.

Now we normally do our speculation of such things on FILMRAP, but since this is quite a big story we decided that we will do our speculation here!

We think that the Iron Patriot suit will be manufactured by the military, seeing that the War Machine armor is available to them thanks to Rhodey. This obviously allows them easy access to the suit, and they study it and start developing their own.

We do think that something will go wrong with the suit, and almost leave Savin for dead. Using nano-tech they will keep him alive, somewhat as the cyborg villain.

In Iron Man 2 Tony states that the world is atleast 10 years away from developing a Iron Man suit, and now with the use of Nano Tech, we can see that there are people that can make it.

So just like Iron Man 1 where Tony found out that his weapons were being sold to the enemy, this time around he finds that the world can manufacture the Iron Man suit with the use of Nano tech, making this story much more personal for our hero, leaving out the Avengers.

Well that’s what we think will happen atleast.

Ben Kingsley is the Mandarin

In other Iron Man 3 news, the folks at Latino Review have got an interesting lead on what is happening on the Iron Man 3 set and apparently not everyone is as tight lipped as the heads of Marvel Studios.

A crew member let it slip that, as predicted, Sir Ben Kingsley is indeed playing The Mandarin in the film but he will NOT be the primary antagonist. Guy Pearce's Aldrich Killian will be the main focus of evil in the film with The Mandarin being more to the side of it all. Perhaps waiting for his time to take the spotlight in Iron Man 4?

Now in production in North Carolina, Iron Man 3 stars Robert Downey Jr., Gwyneth Paltrow, Don Cheadle, Ben Kingsley, Guy Pearce, James Badge Dale, Ashley Hamilton and Jon Favreau. The film is scheduled to hit theaters on May 3, 2013.