What we previously knew about the plot of Terminator Salvation: The Future Begins: Christian Bale plays an older John Connor; a young Kyle Reese shows up in the form of Anton Yelchin; Sam Worthington plays some guy named Marcus. After Skynet brings about a nuclear near-apocalypse, our heroes must keep the machines from wiping out the rest of humanity. That's it. Now, thanks to a Warner Bros. start-of-production press release we know a lot more -- or do we?

"In the highly anticipated new installment of The Terminator film franchise, set in post-apocalyptic 2018, Christian Bale stars as John Connor, the man fated to lead the human resistance against Skynet and its army of Terminators. But the future Connor was raised to believe in is altered in part by the appearance of Marcus Wright (Sam Worthington), a stranger whose last memory is of being on death row. Connor must decide whether Marcus has been sent from the future, or rescued from the past. As Skynet prepares its final onslaught, Connor and Marcus both embark on an odyssey that takes them into the heart of Skynet's operations, where they uncover the terrible secret behind the possible annihilation of mankind."

If you read that a couple of times, it doesn't really make very much sense ("the future Connor was raised to believe in is altered in part..."?). Studio marketing departments aren't known for lucid prose. It's not clear whether the human resistance Connor's going to lead (or so we keep being told) actually gets formed in this movie, or how Reese -- Connor's father -- enters the picture. But at least we have a sense of the storyline, and of who "Marcus" is. Parenthetically, we also learn that Charlotte Gainsbourg will take over as Kate Connor -- the Claire Danes role from Rise of the Machines.

After a lot of hemming and hawing, some hopeful casting news, and outrage over McG being attached to direct, it looks like Terminator 4 is good to go.

There are a few things to glean from this Hollywood Reporter story. First, obviously, is what's in the headline: Moon Bloodgood, who played Generic Love Interest in Pathfinder and starred in the canceled television series Journeyman, has been cast as the female lead, a survivor of the nuclear holocaust we witnessed at the end of Terminator 3: Rise of the Machines. She joins Christian Bale, Sam Worthington, and Anton Yelchin. Second, notwithstanding earlier reports to the contrary, the third sequel is apparently still called Terminator Salvation: The Future Begins. Finally, the movie is scheduled to begin principal photography on May 5th, which means that barring some Terry Gilliam-scale disaster, this long-speculated-about project is actually happening.

Count me among the McG skeptics. Previous installments of this franchise have been helmed by world-class action movie craftsmen (disclaimer: I am a fan of Jonathan Mostow), and I'm not convinced that McG has either the chops or the instincts to fill their shoes. The mincemeat he made of a terrific story in We Are Marshall doesn't inspire confidence, and the pyrotechnics of the Charlie's Angels films don't tell me much. That said, I'm excited for the Terminator saga to continue, since there's a lot more of this story to tell (and since Google is currently building SkyNet). Has anyone been watching the Fox TV show?

Word from The Hollywood Reporter is that New Zealand actor Karl Urban has joined the cast of J.J. Abrams' Star Trek re-start. Fans of fantastical cinema will no doubt remember Urban from his work in Lord of the Rings, The Bourne Supremacy, Doom, The Chronicles of Riddick and Pathfinder. Mr. Urban will be playing medical officer "Bones" McCoy, a character made famous by the late DeForest Kelley. Plot details are still being kept under wraps, but here's what the all-new Enterprise crew looks like...

Captain Kirk (previously played by William Shatner) -- Chris Pine (27 years old)
Spock (Leonard Nimoy) -- Zachary Quinto (30)
Sulu (George Takei) -- John Cho (35)
McCoy (DeForest Kelley) -- Karl Urban (35)
Scotty (James Doohan) -- Simon Pegg (37)
Uhura (Nichelle Nichols) -- Zoe Saldana (29)
Chekov (Walter Koenig) -- Anton Yelchin (18)


...and Eric Bana as the villainous Nero. (With a special appearance from Leonard Nimoy!) Production on the film is expected to run from November to March. So what do you think of the whole crew?

Also, feel free to pick through our numerous reports on this flick. Like right here, here and here.

Last week we learned that Zachary Quinto would be playing the youthful version of Spock in J.J. Abrams' impending rendition of Star Trek -- and now we have a new cast member to contemplate. According to The Hollywood Reporter, Russian-born actor Anton Yelchin has been cast as the young Pavel Chekov. One need not be a hardcore Trekkie to recall that Chekov was played by the ultra-cool Walter Koenig in the original Trek series and the first series of theatrical flicks.

For his part, the 18-year-old Anton Yelchin is the offspring of two figure skaters -- and a rather solid young actor. You may remember him from such movies as Hearts in Atlantis, House of D and Alpha Dog, plus he also plays the title character in Jon Poll's Charlie Bartlett, which recently moved from a summer release to November 7. Mr. Abrams is presently hard at work trying to cast the rest of the young-sized Enterprise crew -- plus he aims to cast some big names as the villain and the "grown-up" captain. The as-yet-untitled 11th Trek flick is scheduled for release on Christmas of 2008. (Previous reports on this project can be found here, here and here.)

It was back in May that we found out about the next project from actor/director John Stockwell. He's the guy who has gone from a Crazy/Beautiful Kirsten Dunst film to three bikini-babe movies -- Blue Crush, Into the Blue and Turistas -- with some L Word eps thrown in for good measure. Now he's topping it off with Middle of Nowhere, a comedy penned by Michelle Morgan about an irresponsible mom who "blows her eldest daughter's college fun on her younger daughter's beauty pageant campaign." That being said, it's supposed to be "a bittersweet comedy about a clashing mother and daughter." That doesn't sound bittersweet; that sounds classless. When the deal was first made, Susan Sarandon was cast as the uber-classy mom, with Eva Amurri, her real-life progeny, playing her eldest daughter.

Now Variety has reported on the names that are following the famous mother/daughter pair -- there's Anton Yelchin, Justin Chatwin and Willa Holland. While none are big yet, each has had some roles with decent exposure. Yelchin recently played Byrd Huffstodt on Huff, Chatwin was Tom Cruise's kid who ran off to fight the aliens with no weapons in War of the Worlds and Miss Holland was Kaitlin Cooper on The O.C. There's no word on who each will play, but I imagine that Holland might be the younger, beauty-queen sister. There's also no mention of oceans, beaches or bikinis yet, but I imagine we'll at least get one healthy dose of the ever-important swimsuit competition.