Robert Zemeckis's Beowulf took a lot of hits for its perceived silliness, a verdict I could never quite sign on to. First of all, silly compared to what? Have these people seen the 1999 space opera Beowulf starring Christopher Lambert? Compared to that, Zemeckis's Beowulf is a sober meditation on the human condition. Have they seen the Gerard Butler clunker Beowulf and Grendel? Come on, guys: considering what the movies have done to this story in the past, last year's high-tech effort seems like serious business to me.

What about the source material – the ancient Old English epic poem upon which these movies purport to be based? If you've ever read it (or tried to read it), the perversions of the adaptations shouldn't surprise you. It's both begging for action movie treatment and impossible to faithfully adapt into anything resembling a compelling action movie. The story is credited with generating many of the archetypes we see in our fiction, and indeed, it's so archetypical that by modern standards, it's a skeleton; there's nothing there.

Seriously – you know how people complain about movies whose plots can be fully described in one sentence? A faithful Beowulf would take this phenomenon to new heights. A synopsis would read something like this: Beowulf beats up Grendel, Grendel's mom, and a dragon, and dies. The end. Some complained that the Zemeckis version distorted Beowulf, but I'd have liked to see their reaction to an undistorted adaptation. Trust me, it wouldn't work. There's a reason that all these screenwriters have scrambled to add elements to the story.

Any time I hear news about a new project from director David Fincher, I get a little excited. Barring his debut, the studio-monkeyed Alien 3, Fincher has had a remarkably impressive run as a flick helmer: Seven, The Game, Fight Club, Panic Room and Zodiac, with The Curious Case of Benjamin Button on the way. So even though he already has a few projects in development, Mr. Fincher has signed on to direct an adaptation of Charles Burns' graphic novel Black Hole. Neil Gaiman and Roger Avary, who last collaborated on Beowulf, will bang out the screenplay for MTV Films and Paramount Pictures.

The Hollywood Reporter offers this as a plot synopsis: "The story follows a group of high school students whose lives are altered drastically when they come in contact with a sexually transmitted disease called the "teen plague" or "the bug." But if you head on over to the publisher's site, you'll find a much more thorough breakdown. To me it sounds like John Hughes meets (early) David Cronenberg ... and obviously that'd be just fine by me. Here's hoping Fincher makes Black Hole his very next project.

Well here's some rotten news to brighten up your Monday morning: Oscar-winning screenwriter Roger Avary (best known for co-writing Pulp Fiction, although he also had a fairly big hit with last year's Beowulf rendition) was arrested late Sunday night for charges stemming from a car accident that took the life of 34-year-old Italian man Andreas Zedini.

Mr. Zedini was a passenger in Avary's car. According to Reuters, "Avary, 42, was charged with vehicular manslaughter and driving under the influence ... He was released from jail after posting $50,000 bail." Mr. Avary's wife also sustained serious injuries, although details on her current condition are unknown. Reuters further indicates that the fatal accident occurred "in the city of Ojai, 80 miles northwest of Los Angeles, at about 1 a.m."

Horrible news indeed. Here's hoping for some good news regarding Mrs. Avary.

With Beowulf, the latest motion-capture film from director Robert Zemeckis, one of mankind's oldest tales is hurled up onto the movie screen using the cutting edge of new technology. As in The Polar Express, Zemeckis's first foray into motion-capture animated moviemaking, the actors are first shot on a soundstage, wearing motion-indicating elements that allow computers to turn their movements and facial expressions into sets of data; then, that data is animated by computers and artists, so that real motion and facial expressions can be re-cast in fantastic settings and melded with wild imaginings. As if that weren't enough, the resulting movie in this case has also been enhanced so the theatrical experience is 3-D; swords, dragons and flame leap from the screen, hovering right before your very eyes. It all sounds wonderful.

But, as so often happens in life, the execution falls somewhat short of the expectation. I know it seems like a betrayal of the critic's job -- to look deeper, to see beyond the obvious -- to begin with complaints about the animation in the film, but it would be even more of a betrayal of the critic's job to not point out the most obvious and glaring fact about Zemeckis's technique. Namely, that it looks horrible. A scientist working in the burgeoning field of the human perception of virtual simulacra would talk Beowulf's animation in the context of the "uncanny valley," the phenomena where, when confronted with a robot or virtual avatar that has a high degree of match to human movement and appearance, the human mind flip-flops and instead obsesses about the smaller elements of mis-match, jarred by the mistakes in the image instead of thrilled by the accuracies. (Confronted with a 98% accurate simulacra, for example, most people instead fixate on the 2% difference.) But I'm not a scientist working in the burgeoning field of the human perception of virtual simulacra; as a layman, I can only offer that in Beowulf (as in The Polar Express), Zemeckis seems to have created a world peopled by drowning victims brought back to life after a three-week soak: Pale, puffy, slow-moving revenants with no light in their eyes.

It's almost been two years since buzz first started about the Castle Wolfenstein project. At the time, we posted that iD Software was lining up the classic video game as their next step into movies after Doom. That was pretty much the end of that for a while. Now, perhaps fueled by all the 80s remakes and recreations lately, they're back in the wolfie frame of mind. Producer Samuel Hadida has gotten the rights to another in the series -- Return to Castle Wolfenstein. I'm not a huge fan of video-games turned into films. (Although I really want a nice documentary on how the heck you play the old-school Labyrinth game without falling into the Bog of Eternal Stench or running out of time.) But is this a good idea?

While I've no clue how it all will turn out, I'm pretty intrigued by who he's tapped to direct the flick -- he's re-teaming with Roger Avary, with whom he worked on Silent Hill. Avary is one of the names behind Pulp Fiction and he's helped kill Zoe, so he's got the gun angle down-pat. I think this could potentially be a fun film if he whips up some of the aesthetic from The Rules of Attraction and makes this a classy, funky-looking adaptation. He says: "I've been playing the character of B.J. Blazkowicz sine the epic Wolfenstein 3D first bruised my brain and have ever since wanted to bring his adventures to life on the big screen. It's time to bust some dams, storm some bunkers and blow up some bridges." Call me crazy, but I'm not entirely hating the thought.

With ComicCon right around the corner, we're about to be bombarded with news of upcoming wheeling and dealing for all things comic book, and it looks like Roger Avary might be getting started a little early this year. ShockTillYouDrop has reported that Avary, who is scheduled to make a ComicCon appearance on the 26th, is hoping to breathe a little life into his plans for a big-screen version of the comic book The Nocturnals. Avary also made the announcement that he is off the Silent Hill sequel saying, "If Christophe's not gonna do it, I'm not...". (Avary wrote the first Silent Hill, while Christophe Gans directed.) So while that might be good news for some, it definitely opens up some free time in Avary's schedule. While speaking with Shock, Avary seemed enthusiastic about The Nocturnals project noting, "I'd love to see that made. I actually gave the comics to [Beowulf producer] Jeff Rapke and was like, 'Check this out, this is the s**t!'". Expletives aside, I have to admit the comic sounds like it definitely has some box office potential.

Created by Dan Brereton, The Nocturnals ran from 1994-1995 as part of a six-part miniseries for Malibu Comics. The story focused on a fictional California town overrun by a supernatural phenomena, with leader Doc Horror and his gang battling your usual assortment of supernatural baddies. Some of the main characters include a gun-slinging scarecrow, a Komodo Dragon-boy and a bad-ass tadpole called Starfish. So if nothing else you have to give Brereton credit for originality. Avary has wrapped up work on Robert Zemeckis' Beowulf, and he'll next be moving on to a big-screen version of the video game Driver. So even if Avary manages to put a deal in place for Nocturnals, it could still be some time before a feature film makes its way to theaters.

I'm still disappointed that we will never get to see Glitterati, the semi-spin-off of The Rules of Attraction, which does exist but which writer-director Roger Avary claims will never be released to the public. I still have hope that Avary will eventually get his Glamorama adaptation off the ground -- Kip Pardue deserves the work. But while I wait for Avary to stop writing bad Silent Hill films, I will have to get hyped up for another Bret Easton Ellis adaptation: The Informers. Based on the author's 1995 collection of interrelated vignettes, the film is the first to be adapted by Ellis himself (with help from documentarian Nicholas Jarecki, who was originally set to direct and is also a producer). As can be expected of Ellis' work, the film will follow a number of amoral characters, including a pop star, a Hollywood player and a vampire. The criss-crossing stories are set in Los Angeles in 1983, though it is possible the adaptation -- like Rules -- could be modernized.

The Informers will be directed by Gregor Jordan, who better not let me down. So far, Ellis has been adapted three times and each film's director managed to create a style and tone that -- if not exactly captured the same style and tone of the source -- fit the material brilliantly. Jordan's film Buffalo Soldiers was a decent enough satire of the army during peacetime, but it just wasn't edgy enough for me. The characters in that pic should have been just as despicable as any in an Ellis book. So, therefore I pray the director will push himself a little further this time -- he at least will be working from a script that likely will have Ellis' teethmarks all over it. With that under consideration, I'm not too worried. Sure, Jordan probably won't make as great a film as Avary or Mary Harron (American Psycho) has, and he may not even make a film as notably atmospheric as Marek Kanievska (Less Than Zero) made, but I'm crossing my fingers that it will follow in the footsteps of those mostly underrated, mostly perfect adaptations. I do imagine a worst case scenario, though, which resembles the terrible 80s-set ensemble piece 200 Cigarettes. Other projects involving Ellis that may eventually see the light of the projector include an adaptation of his novel Lunar Park and the author's script for The Frog King.

So while Neil Gaiman might be busy adapting his own books left and right into screenplays; one script that he is definitely not working on is the sequel to Silent Hill. Gaiman had been working with Silent Hill writer Roger Avary on the script to the upcoming motion capture extravaganza Beowulf, sparking rumors that Gaiman was going to write the script for the sequel to the video-game inspired horror. Gaiman posted on his personal blog however that any talk of his involvement was just idle internet gossip, saying "If I get home to find an invitation to write Silent Hill 2 with Roger is waiting for me I'll let you all know, but for right now I think it's a discredited internet rumour". Silent Hill fans can rest easy knowing that Avary will be returning to write the script with French director Christopher Gans also back at the helm.

So it looks like Gaiman will be busy working on his own scripts and I admit I'm always a little worried. Part of me is excited to see how some of my favorite books will turn out on screen, and the other part of me is terrified that they are just going to screw it up (especially when it comes to the never-ending talk of an American Gods movie). With the upcoming film versions of Stardust, Books of Magic and Coraline it looks like I'm going to get plenty of chances to find out.

[via Dark Horizons]

Those who love movies and video games in equal measure have had a red circle scrawled around the release date for Silent Hill for quite some time. Sure, there's nothing new about a horror flick based on a popular game series, but not many of those movies come attached to names like Christophe Gans (Brotherhood of the Wolf) and Roger Avary (The Rules of Attraction, Killing Zoe). With filmmakers like these on board, the odds of a half-decent movie being produced increase exponentially. And let's give the gamers a break. One can only take so many Dooms and BloodRaynes and Resident Evil: Apocalypses (sue me, I liked the first one) before starting to get a little desperate. So the hopes pinned upon Silent Hill were pretty high, if only those of a small-yet-passionate fanbase.

And then came word that Sony wouldn't be pre-screening the flick for press, which automatically placed Silent Hill in a "sight-unseen" garbage bin, alongside cinematic detritus like When a Stranger Calls, Stay Alive, BloodRayne, and Underworld: Evolution. (A note to Sony and the other studios: I'd quit it with the "no press screenings" approach; the moviegoers are getting wise to this gimmick.) Needless to say, the "press blackout" strategy didn't do a whole hell of a lot to generate excitement among the loyal Hill fans, but ...

Thursday's odds and ends:

• John Turturro has joined the cast of Noah Baumbach's still-unnamed new project, a comedy currently filming on Long Island. In the movie, Nicole Kidman and Jennifer Jason Leigh play sisters, one of whom visits the other with her 12-year-old son in tow. Jack Black will play the husband of one of the women and, while there's no information available about his character, I think it's safe to assume that Turturro is not playing the son.

• Laurence Fishburne has agreed to star in Prey, an indie film that sounds very much like someone saw Misery again recently, and decided that the story was too good not to steal. In the movie, Fishburne's character "sets out on a solo hunting expedition in the middle of winter and severely injures his leg. He is rescued by a mysterious trapper with secretly sinister intentions." Dun dun dun! James Marsh is directing; production begins this fall.

• Apparently Silent Hill agreed with Roger Avary -- he's signed on to write (and direct, this time) another video game adaptation, this one of a game called Driver. If, like me, you know nothing about this game, The Guardian educates us with the news that it "[centers] on an undercover cop posing as a getaway driver who is put through his paces during a tough heist." When this project was originally announced two years ago, Michael Madsen was going to play the cop; whether he's still involved or not is anyone's guess.