MarkLevin Tagged Articles at Cinematical

The story behind The Greatest American Hero is getting a new spin! The Hollywood Reporter posts that Barry Sonnenfeld is gearing up to direct The How-To Guide for Saving the World, a new action comedy script written by Ben David Grabinski. However, unlike Ralph, this unknowing earthling is "a loser who discovers a book on how to prevent an alien invasion and then has to put that knowledge to use when one actually occurs." I bet the guy wishes he lived back in the '80s, when aliens would provide how-to manuals for dorky yet powerful superhero suits.

Meanwhile, "Hitchcock" is getting a whole new spin on the big screen. Variety reports that New Regency has grabbed a pitch by Nim's Island writer/directors Mark Levin and Jennifer Flackett called The Family Hitchcock -- for the pair to write, produce, and direct. The family in question won't gain lots of weight and make shadow art of themselves. Instead, they find themselves in danger when they house-swap with a family in Europe. Man, you can never trust those shifty Europeans!

And finally, Variety reports that we're soon to get another comedy called Naked. As they describe it, the film will focus on "an insurance salesman who vows to run from Santa Monica to Studio City to prove himself to his wife and save their failing marriage." I'm assuming that the word "naked" should be placed after "run," since the piece said that this script is based on Fernando Sabino's The Naked Man. If not, that's definitely not a titillating, or naked-ish, premise.

It's a good thing Child Protective Services never saw Nim (Abigail Breslin) in action or there wouldn't be any movie. Nim would be quietly toiling away in school, perhaps going to the mall and texting her friends. But in the new PG-rated family film Nim's Island, she climbs trees (and volcanoes), swings through the jungle, cooks dinner using mealworms as a main ingredient, reads adventure stories and talks to animals. Nim's father, Jack (Gerard Butler), is a marine biologist who has set up residence on a remote, South Pacific island to study microorganisms. It's just the two of them, so when Jack goes off on a two-day expedition to find new samples, Nim insists on staying behind. But after a huge storm, Jack is left stranded in the middle of the ocean. And when "pirates" (really tourists) invade the island, and her father fails to return on schedule, Nim gets scared.