Movie Make-out

This is pretty neat: Variety says Agnes Quill, an online comic by Dave Roman (Astronaut Elementary) and a host of artists, has been options by Paramount Pictures. Slave Labor Graphics published a collection a couple of years ago.

Publishers Weekly (via Amazon) describes the series thusly:

Agnes Quill is an odd girl. At the age of 16 she inherits not only her grandfather’s estate but his unique ability to speak to the dead. Now all the ghosts in the gothic town of Legerdemain are finding their way to her door — some want a favor, some want revenge, some just want company or a little adventure.

Evan Spiliotopoulos (whose screen credits are mostly straight-to-video Disney cartoons) will be writing the script for director Thor Freudenthal (Hotel for Dogs)… um… hm… well, good luck with that.

Anyway, congratulations, Dave. I’m jealous. Hopefully the deal you signed gets you a respectable sum of money whether the movie happens or not. And if it does happen, hopefully it either makes you gobs of money or doesn’t suck… (ideally both, of course).

Preacher fans dodged a bullet when the planned HBO mini-series by Mark Steven Johnson (Ghost Rider, Daredevil) was put into turn-around, but they may not need to wait long to see what will undoubtedly be a better — if shorter — version in all the live-action glory you can handle: The Hollywood Reporter says that American Beauty and Road to Perdition director Sam Mendes has signed on to helm the project for Columbia Pictures.

As HR describes it:

Created by Garth Ennis and Steve Dillon, Preacher, which ran from 1995–2000, told the story of a down-and-out Texas preacher possessed by Genesis, a supernatural entity conceived by the unnatural coupling of an angel and a demon.

Given immense powers, the preacher teamed with an old girlfriend and a hard-drinking Irish vampire and set out on a journey across America to find God — who apparently had abandoned his duties in heaven — and hold him accountable for his negligence.

No word on if it’ll be a done-in-one or if the film will adapt the first story arc (or combine a couple of story arcs) and try for one very, very fucked up franchise. No writers are attached yet (HR says Mendes will “lead the search” while he spit-polishes Revolutionary Road), so it’s possible this hasn’t even been decided yet.

The film will be produced by Neil Moritz (under his Original Films banner) and Kickstart Productions’ Jason Netter, who are also developing an adaptation of Garth Ennis’s The Boys.

Shrug.

He’s going to concentrate on his music career. He’s been working on an album with Tim Burgess (frontman of the Charlatans UK) for some time.

“This” (Phoenix’s last performance) refers to James Gray’s Two Lovers. And the “it seems like it’s Casey’s time” comment might make a little more sense if you know that Casey Affleck is married to Summer Phoenix.

Related Post: Update on Synecdoche, New York; Che; Two Lovers

In contrast to my bitching about the traditional May/December romance as being perpetuated in the post just below this one, I offer up to you Funky Brown Chick’s list of top 10 movies featuring a romance or sexual relationship between an older woman and a younger man.

Her picks are pretty stellar (they include How Stella Got Her Groove Back [also an awesome book] and Harold and Maude) but I have to wonder why she didn’t include Susan Sarandon/James Spader in White Palace.

As if being on Showtime’s TV show “Weeds” and starring on Broadway in Henrik Ibsen’s Hedda Gabler aren’t enough for her, Mary-Louise Parker will be the May to Michael Douglas’ December in Solitary (formerly known as Solitary Man), says the Hollywood Reporter.

Other cast members will include Susan Sarandon, Danny DeVito and Jenna Fischer, whom I am guessing will play Douglas’ wife, his funny best friend or boss, and Parker’s best friend, respectively.

Filming will start in Manhattan this November.

Related Posts: So What’s Michael Douglas’ Career Up to These Days?