Repeat after me, in a drone-like voice if necessary: "I am very happy that my friends, colleagues, and thousands of complete strangers will be attending Comic-Con while I am stuck at home, pining away pitifully on my battered old laptop." Seriously, even though I won't be in attendance, I am eager to read all the cool movie news that should be emanating from San Diego starting on July 23.

Erik has already detailed the events arranged by 20th Century Fox, and now Cinematical has gotten a look at what Warner Brothers has planned -- and it looks pretty good, my friends. Panels have been scheduled for Watchmen, with director Zack Snyder, Terminator Salvation, with the always entertaining McG, and Star Wars: The Clone Wars, with director Dave Filoni, producer Catherine Winder, and, I'll bet, a large army of Storm Troopers trampling the unwary.

Jeremy Piven, Ludacris (AKA Chris Bridges) and Mr. Madonna (AKA Guy Ritchie) will talk RocknRolla, while Rain (AKA Korean sensation Ji Hoon Jung) will excite fangirls -- though I can't guarantee he'll dress the part -- as Ninja Assassin, with director James McTeigue and fellow star Naomie Harris. The new version of Friday the 13th will also be spotlighted, with Jared Padalecki and Derek Meaks ready to talk Crystal Lake and hockey masks.

As always, film talent is tentative, but the Cinematical talent is confirmed and will be on hand to provide great coverage that should make us all wish we were there.

Earlier this week, we learned that Jason Voorhees will be wearing both the burlap sack and the iconic hockey mask in the new Friday the 13th remake (or is it technically a remake of the first three movies?). Now, in honor of today being 2008's only Friday the 13th, MTV (one of the new film's co-producers) also shares a report from the set of the movie. They don't have anything as interesting to tell us as IESB.net did with the headgear news, but they do have video coverage, which you can watch above.

Any fan of the franchise should be excited after watching this footage. We get to see a hot young actress (Amanda Righetti) running through the woods, a dilapidated cabin, a sign telling us its Camp Crystal Lake and an overlong view of the hockey mask prop. That's almost all the ingredients needed for a Friday the 13th movie (it sounds so easy to do, right?). Oh, and finally we get to see the actor portraying Jason (Derek Mears) wearing ... a t-shirt and no make-up.

Who else is preparing a Friday the 13th marathon this Friday? If you are, you'll be reminded that baddie Jason Vorhees does not wear the iconic hockey mask until Part III. He barely even shows up in the first installment (it's his mom, Pamela Vorhees doing the killings, remember?), and then in the first sequel he's wearing a burlap sack over his head. Finally, in the third film Jason acquires the hockey mask when he kills its original owner. So, here's the question that's been burning inside all horror fans since the announcement of a Friday the 13th reboot: what will Jason be wearing to cover his face? And here's the answer: both sack and mask.

The surprising yet satisfying answer was found out by IESB.net during a visit to the Austin, Texas set of the movie. Producers Brad Fuller and Andrew Form admitted to condensing the events of the first three films so that we can see the moment when Jason puts on the mask for the first time. But apparently there will be an actual switch from sack to mask, which will make the sequence different from the events of Part II and Part III. Another reporter on set referred to this new switch sequence as Jason's "Darth Vader Moment." Also, IESB learned that the switch will be shot twice, once from behind and once from the front, revealing Jason's ugly mug. However, it supposedly has not yet been decided which one (if not both) shots will end up in the final cut.

The remake/reboot of Friday the 13th arrives in theaters on the next Friday the 13th to occur after this week: February 13, 2009.

And here are yet another round of small casting bites, courtesy of Variety:

• You might not be familiar with the name Frederic von Anhalt, but you're certainly familiar with his famous wife -- the one and only Zsa Zsa Gabor. While he only has a few acting gigs to his name, the man has scored a part as "a corrupt Las Vegas casino owner" in Charlie Matthau's upcoming flick Baby-O, which has begun filming in Las Vegas and LA -- the same locales used in Matthau's 2007 production, Mikey & Dolores. As for von Anhalt, this seems to be a side gig to his many adult adoptions. According to IMDb, Frederic and Zsa Zsa have adopted a handful of grown men lately.
• Chris Hemsworth, meanwhile, looks to be your regular sort of actor. Aside from his high-profile gig playing Captain Kirk's father in Star Trek, he is also looking for A Perfect Getaway. This is that Hawaiian thriller with Timothy Olyphant, Milla Jovovich, Steve Zahn, and Kiele Sanchez, which you can find out more about here. Hemsworth gets to play some dude named Kale.
• Kale is not one of the stalkees in his gig, but I don't know if the same can be said for Arlen Escarpeta, who you might remember from We Are Marshall, or from The Ten, where he got Oliver Platt's Arnold Schwarzenegger impersonation as a father figure. Arlen has picked up "a lead role" in the remake of Friday the 13th, which is shooting now down in Austin. Will he survive, or will he be a victim?
  
• Finally, there's Alexis Dziena, who has nabbed a gig as a sister to Kristen Bell in When in Rome. Dziena will player Bell's younger sister "who's getting married on a whim." This is just one of many roles the actress has nabbed lately. She was in Fool's Gold, and just wrapped a part in Nick and Norah's Infinite Playlist.

Just when we thought we knew who would be battling Jason Voorhees, along comes a new female foe for the hockey-masked serial killer. Recently we reported that Amanda Righetti was in "final negotations" to star in the new version of Friday the 13th, to be directed by Marcus Nispel. Well, something went awry in those negotiations, because The Hollywood Reporter now says that Danielle Panabaker has been cast as the female lead.

Your first reaction might be, "Who is Danielle Panabaker?" (OK, that's what I said.) She's been appearing on the TV show Shark opposite James Woods and has also been featured in several movies that I haven't seen (Mr. Brooks, Yours, Mine and Ours, Sky High). Have you seen her? Does she have the right stuff to go toe to toe with Jason?

Jared Padalecki is still set to play a leading role as someone who investigates the murderous activities at Crystal Lake. THR adds that Jonathan Sadowski, Travis van Winkle and Aaron Yoo have also been cast, and notes that Panabaker "is playing the adventurous, athletic girlfriend of van Winkle, who plays a rich alpha male type that gathers everyone together. Yoo, who was Shia's buddy in Disturbia and is one of the college card sharks in 21, will play a "quirky" guy. Sadowski plays "a techie who knows the horrific history of Camp Crystal Lake," which means, I guess, that's he's seen the other movies? Filming is scheduled to start very soon in Austin, Texas.

For every beast you need a beauty, right? We just heard from Scott Weinberg that the very cool "giant guy" Derek Mears has been cast as Jason Voorhees in the upcoming new version of Friday the 13th. Before that, Jared Padalecki was selected to play a leading role as someone who investigates the murderous activities at Crystal Lake. But to really jump start the franchise, the movie badly needs a hot chick talented actress to amp up the action. Will Amanda Righetti fit the bill?

Variety is reporting that Righetti is in "final negotiations" to play the female lead. Will she play the "final girl"? That would fit the pattern of the female leads in the other Friday the 13th movies. She could join a small, illustrious list that includes Adrienne King, Amy Steel, Dana Kimmell, Kimberly Beck, etc. Righetti has been steadily building her career, mostly in glossy TV shows (The O.C., North Shore). She has the good looks and steely thesping ability that "final girl" requires. To see more of Righetti, in more ways than one, check out the awesome cheese that is Angel Blade.

Production company Platinum Dunes has signed Marcus Nispel to direct, and I join Scott W. in his minority opinion regarding Nispel's work on the Texas Chainsaw Massacre remake -- that flick freaked me out for reasons I don't really want to explore too deeply. Filming on Friday the 13th begins on April 21 in Austin, Texas.

A few years back I was lucky enough to spend a few days on the set of The Hills Have Eyes 2. I hate to say that I thought the final product was pretty ... meh, but the 2.5 days I spent on the set in Morocco were something pretty special. Among the many actors, stuntpeople, FX technicians and general crew members I met, one of the very coolest was a giant guy called Derek Mears. Everyone on the set was very nice, but Mears was the one who made sure to invite the "horror geek press" back to his hotel lounge so we could have a few beers and give the guy the scoop on American sports, recent horror movies, new video games, comic books, etc. (The man had been cooped up in Ouarzazate for a few months by this point.)

Anyway, Derek was a sincerely gracious dude (and he DID make for a pretty creepy freakin' mutant in Hills 2), so I'm happy to share the news (via BD.com) that he's landed the role of mad slasher Jason Voorhees in Platinum Dunes' upcoming remake of Friday the 13th. So while you might not recognize the face, you've probably seen some of Derek's work in flcks like Cursed, Zathura, Men in Black 2, and The Haunted Mansion. (Plus a whole lotta TV work.) Odds are you won't see a whole lot more of Mears once he dons the legendary hockey mask -- but the Jason character has always been played by a huge, likeable lug, and I think Mears fits the bill quite nicely. Plus he's really freakin' huge, and that's a big plus. The new Friday is due early next year.

After doing a surprisingly good job on the Texas Chainsaw Massacre remake -- and then taking five steps back with the misguided Pathfinder -- it looks like Marcus Nispel has been signed to direct the Friday the 13th remake for Platinum Dunes, Paramount, and New Line Warner Bros. Not only that, but actor Jared Padalecki has been signed for a lead role. According to The Hollywood Reporter, "the remake will focus on the serial killer, who will wear his now-iconic hockey mask. Padalecki will play the lead, who investigates what happened up at Crystal Lake."

Seems like a strange direction for a "remake" to take, but obviously I'm more than happy to see the flick before I get all excited or all furious. We'll be waiting until February 13 of next year (yes, it's a Friday) to see what Nispel and screenwriters Mark Swift and Damian Shannon have in store for us. More casting news as it comes in -- and if the Dunes guys opt to go PG-13 on this project, I may just lose my mind.

The Sundance Flu, The Sundance Cold, The Sundance Fever ... how about The Sundance I Feel Like Complete Sh*t ...

Looks like J.J. Abrams does plan to go all Wonder Years for his Star Trek flick! Coming Soon reports that 11-year-old (about to be 12) Jimmy Bennett has landed a role as Young Kirk in Abrams' upcoming Star Trek film, due out at Christmas. Bennett has played a little kid in films like Hostage, Firewall, Poseidon and Evan Almighty. A young Spock will also be featured, leading this writer to believe both characters will appear in the film and talk about how much they "like, like" Winnie Cooper. Fingers crossed.

The Hollywood Reporter has confirmed (what was already previously reported) that New Line is in talks with Platinum Dunes to re-launch the franchise that helped secure their name as one of the big players in town, A Nightmare on Elm Street. Dunes partners Michael Bay, Brad Fuller and Andrew Form will produce, and a writer will be hired once the strike comes to an end. Since it's a full-out re-do, expect Robert Englund to not play Freddy Krueger, though we imagine he'll still have a role in the film (perhaps as part of Freddy's family). God bless the guy they get to fill his shoes; he'll have to convince tons of hardcore fans that he's the real deal. Dunes and New Line are also prepping a re-launch of the Friday the 13th franchise, with Marcus Nispel directing.

And finally, though it's not really a fanboy film (but I needed one more thing to throw in here, so cut me some slack), Moviehole reports that director Phillip Noyce has officially dropped out of that planned Amelia Earhart biopic starring Hilary Swank. MH spoke with Noyce, who gave the following reason for his departure: "I had worked on Amelia for 5 months from July to end of December 2007, finding all the locations and extensively storyboarding the flying sequences - When it didn't appear that the film was going ahead, I had to make a painful decision to move on and returned to a project that had long fascinated me... Mary Queen of Scots. Scarlett Johansson will play Mary in a film to be shot on location in Scotland, England and Ireland during 2008." Apparently Swank is still attached to the film, which we all thought was moving ahead as planned (script issues, maybe), so we'll keep you updated and let you know what happens.

Before I get started, I should probably warn you: I have a big soft-spot for Sarah Michelle Gellar. I'm a huge Buffy the Vampire Slayer nerd; I've even started buying the comics for season eight, for goodness sake. So I am a little predisposed to defend her choices -- and let me tell you, it hasn't always been easy. In an interview with RadioFree.com Gellar confirmed that she is still in the lead role for the big screen version of American McGee's Alice. Gellar told RadioFree, "unfortunately, it was the victim of regime change in the studio. And I'm not getting out. And contrary to what you may have read, it's still my project."

The film will be based on Rogue Entertainment's third-person shooter set in the world of Alice in Wonderland. The story centers on a pretty twisted incarnation of Alice -- her parents are killed in a fire, and after slipping into a catatonic state, she is institutionalized. "Years later, the White Rabbit summons Alice to aid a radically altered Wonderland, now under the despotic rule of the Queen of Hearts" (played by Jean Marsh). Marcus Nispel is attached to direct -- he is also at the helm for the Friday the 13th update slated for 2009. The Alice script has undergone a few re-writes over the years, but it looks like the final version is going to be the one written by Jon and Erich Hoeber (Whiteout).

Back in December, rumors began to surface that Maggie Grace (LOST) had taken over the role, but it would seem that maybe the gossips confused it with Grace's other project with Gellar, The Girls Guide to Hunting and Fishing. Alice has been kicking around since 2000, back when Wes Craven was attached, and hopefully this time around, Nispel and company will be able to make it into a reality. But fans need not worry; Gellar tells RadioFree: "...I'm not giving up. Because I believe there is such a beautiful, crazy, cool, twisted story to be told there. [jokes] And if I have to get down and write it myself one of these day [sic], I may have to..."

[via ComingSoon.net]