Ordinary movie producers get to shag top-drawer hotties, shine their shoes with tongues of fans, and get shopping carts loads of honorary awards when they're too old to be players anymore. But Christian movie producers get all of the above, plus a free pass to heaven when they croak. Thanks to Richard Mavers for the tip on the news that the writers of Turn Me On Deadman are auctioning the rights to their script on eBay. The hope is that someone will buy it and produce it. Writer Nathyn Brendan Masters notes: "While this wouldn't take a huge amount of money to produce there would be a bit more involved to do it as well as we would like. If you or someone you know has been looking for this type of project then please feel free to place a bid."

Bidding starts at a measly dollar. We learn that the story is of haunted backward-masking on a popular CD, which destroys the life of a student who tampered with the occult. The talents involved previously did the evil Ouija board flick The Wages of Sin (above). "Decent!" raves DVDverdict.com about this earlier effort, but a less glowing review is here at moviecynics.com. We get a lot of mainstream Christian horror in The Reaping and The Exorcism of Emily Rose (here's an interview with Emily Rose's director Scott Derrickson, claiming that horror is the perfect venue for the Christian evangelical.) Not only is this the first time we've seen a script-bidding auction on eBay, it's the first time we've heard that there's a direct horror market for religious viewers.

The Hollywood Reporter announced that Jon Hamm, star of *HBO's Mad Men, has signed for a role in the update of the sci-fi classic. Hamm plays Don Draper on the series about the heyday of the advertising business. Hamm will join Keanu Reeves as the alien Klaatu, and Jennifer Connolly will play a research scientist. According to THR, Hamm will play "Dr. Granier, a NASA official who recruits Helen (Connelly) for the scientific team investigating an alien's arrival on Earth". For those of you out there who aren't familiar with the 1951 classic, it centers on an alien and his giant robot friend who land on earth to chastise man about their violent ways. They bring a simple message to earthlings, "Live in peace or be destroyed". Of course, we don't listen and it all goes downhill from there. Variety had reported that the film was going to get a little modernizing in both the story and the FX department, saying, "The 1951 film's premise, a response to the rise of the Cold War after WWII, is being updated, and the film will use advances in visual effects."

News of the remake first surfaced back in February, and the jury is still out on whether Keanu Reeves is the right choice as the harbinger of earthly doom. Scott had brought us the news back in April that Scott Derrikson had been hired for the remake and that Last Castle scribe David Scarpa is in charge of the script. The production is expected to be an expensive affair and locations have already been scouted in Vancouver for the lengthy shoot. Hamm is currently filming Boy in The Box with Josh Lucas while Mad Men is on break. The Day the Earth Stood Still is set for release on December 12th, 2008.

*Correction: Mad Men airs on AMC.

Wait, they still cast Jennifer Connelly in non-melodramatic roles? According to Variety, the actress has signed on for the remake of The Day the Earth Stood Still. She will take on the part of "Helen Benson", the character originally played by Patricia Neal (who hopefully will be able to make a cameo), and as she does in every film, the Oscar-winning Connelly will likely emote way too much. Sure, she's fine for a lot of serious dramas, but when it comes to sci-fi/comic book movies, she hasn't really fit the part since Labyrinth, and even then she was a bit too pouty. Of course, she may seem more chipper in this remake, as she'll be acting opposite Mr. Serious himself, Keanu Reeves. As we learned long ago, Reeves will be portraying the alien Klaatu. Variety also reports that Kathy Bates may co-star in the movie, but doesn't mention the role she'd play.

I guess in some ways The Day the Earth Stood Still is a sci-fi melodrama, and Neal herself emoted plenty. In fact, she looked like she was going to start screaming and/or bawling in nearly every scene I recall. But then, she doesn't actually cry when you expect her to. She almost acts like more of a robot than Gort. And this should be fine, since aside from emoting, Connelly is good at looking drowsy and a bit empty. Anyway, I can't imagine the remake is going to have the same serious tone as the original. Hollywood just doesn't make movies like that anymore. Certainly the redo will not have Bernard Hermann's iconic music or Leo Tover's beautiful black and white cinematography to give it the same atmosphere. As we've told you previously, the new version is being directed by Scott Derrickson (The Exorcism of Emily Rose) and has been written, according to Variety, by novelist Ryne Douglas Pearson (Simple Simon which became the movie Mercury Rising) and David Scarpa (The Last Castle), who penned a rewrite. The remake begins shooting in Vancouver next month.

Looks like after letting the project percolate for quite some time, Fox is raring to go on their remake of Robert Wise's 1951 sci-fi classic The Day the Earth Stood Still. And who'll be playing Klaatu -- the strangely human-looking alien who visits earth with an important message AND a massive robot? None other than Neo himself. According to Variety, Keanu Reeves signed a deal over the weekend, which means this remake is officially working in hyper-drive.

The re-do will be directed by third-timer Scott Derrickson, who really displayed his sci-fi chops on The Exorcism of Emily Rose and Hellraiser 5: Inferno. Nah, I just kid the guy. Fox must have seen something in his reel to warrant this kind of responsibility, so I'll lay off Derrickson for now. The fact that Fox is remaking such a classic film ... hell, it seems kinda pointless to rail against the machine now that War of the Worlds, The Time Machine, Psycho and Halloween have all been remade. Sigh. Let's just keep our fingers crossed that it's one of those "Hey, better than I expected!" remakes instead of one of those "Ugh, I just knew it would suck!" ones.

Variety also indicates that screenwriter David Scarpa (The Last Castle) will be on adaptation duty. Good luck Dave! You're remaking one of the classic sci-fi screenplays (written by Edmund North, based on the story by Harry Bates) for your second assignment! Ah, and get this part: "The 1951 film's premise, a response to the rise of the Cold War after WWII, is being updated, and the film will use advances in visual effects." As if we thought they would actually stick with the original themes and laser-buzz special effects.

Previous reports on this project are available here and here. And since Fox looks to be fast-tracking this one in advance of "The Strike," you can expect more reports soon. (Release date: May 8.) And Keanu is easily as wooden as Michael Rennie was, so I don't see a big problem in the casting department. (Just kiddin', Keanu!)

Last February we shared with you a few vague reports that seemed to indicate one thing: Fox had claimed a May 5 (2008) release date for a remake of The Day the Earth Stood Still, which is one of the first movies I remember watching with my dad and is therefore an unquestionably awesome film. (Lots of other people like it too, apparently.) In an effort to fill my previous report with text other than "Why the HELL would they remake this movie?" I threw out a few possible directors for the project ... but I never saw this one coming.

Scott Derrickson, the guy who directed Hellraiser: Inferno and The Exorcism of Emily Rose (as well as an adaptation of Milton's Paradise Lost, which is almost finished), has been tapped by Fox to remake Robert Wise's science-fiction classic. Now, I don't know the guy and I'm sure he's got more talent than his current filmography might indicate ... but did Fox really just hire a two-time low-budget horror helmer to oversee a remake to one of the most beloved sci-fi stories of all time? According to one reliable source, that's precisely what Fox did.

Early word indicates that the story will be "modernized" and that the production will be one of the largest (and longest) to hit Vancouver in quite some time. For those of you too young and/or disinterested to give the original Day a fair shake, I'll remind you that it's about a spaceman who arrives on Earth (with a giant robot) with a mission: Get humans to stop killing each other already. But when humanity responds the way it always does in sci-fi movies, the spaceman (and his giant robot) have to take more ... drastic measures. (It's all right there in the title!) Best of luck to Mr. Derrickson on this project; more information will be shared as soon as it becomes available.

We've got a million Shakespeare adaptations, and now it is time for a little John Milton. His epic poem, Paradise Lost, is gearing up for the big screen. Well, some parts of it are. A few years ago, novice screenwriters Philip DiBlasi and Byron Willinger were shopping around their adaptation of the poem, which has since been re-written by Stuart Hazeldine. Now, Vincent Newman has bought the script, which will be co-financed by Legendary Pictures. While no cast is yet on-board, he's itching for Daniel Craig or Heath Ledger to play the famous fallen angel named Lucifer. Craig has already kiboshed rumors of joining I, Lucifer, so we'll have to wait and see if this is more up his alley.

Newman has stated: "if you get past the Milton of it all, and think about the greatest war that's ever been fought, the story itself is pretty compelling." The plan is to have "less Adam and Eve and more about what's happening with the archangels." That's right, it's gearing up to not be an epic re-telling of a classic poem, but more of an adaptation that takes out the blank verse and leaves the warring action. The producer is also concerned with the nudity of Adam and Eve, so I wouldn't be surprised if the film becomes just the 'war on God'. Personally, it seems like a good time to challenge that worry, rather than uphold the violence = good, body = bad mentality. Regardless, it's sounding more like an action fanboy re-imagining than a cinematic adaptation.

Scott Derrickson, who directed Hellraiser: Inferno and The Exorcism of Emily Rose might helm the feature, which really secures it as a religious horror/war movie. All of this aside, the hope is to still keep it faithful to theological writings so that, as Hazeldine states: "I wanted to make sure that for the faith audience, I guess, that they will see it more as The Passion of the Christ than The Last Temptation of Christ." That's a bit of a leap, considering the fact that Paradise is not a religious text, but a fictional poem. With so many changes and concerns, I don't see why they don't just make their own story, rather than hacking up a classic epic.

After being explored in the TV documentaries Paradise Lost: The Child Murders at Robin Hood Hills and Paradise Lost 2: Revelations, the case of the West Memphis Three is once again being committed to celluloid, albeit in a fictional form. According to this morning's Variety, Dimension Films has acquired the rights to Mara Leveritt's Devil's Knot: The True Story of the West Memphis Three, and is fast-tracking the movie into production.

"West Memphis Three" is the name that has been giving to the three men who were convicted of murdering three young boys in 1993, an event sometimes called the Robin Hood Hills Murders. The boys were the victims of sexual assault and were tortured in ways that suggested to investigators that they had been the victims of a Satanic ritual; the convicted men were involved in Goth culture and were allegedly "[fascinated] by the occult." Since their convictions, many questions have been asked about the guilt of the trio, and both Paradise Lost films and Leveritt's book offer evidence of their innocence.

Dimension's film is being written by The Exorcism of Emily Rose team Scott Derrickson and Paul Harris Boardman, and Derrickson (who, by creepy coincidence, is also scheduled to write and direct the upcoming screen version of John Milton's Paradise Lost) is expected to direct.