Producer Scott Faye is keeping the faith -- but fans of the Electronic Arts video game American McGee's Alice will have to wait an indeterminate amount of time to see a movie version. According to McGee's own blog (and thanks to Shock for the tip), Mr. Faye has announced that Universal has placed the project into turnaround -- which essentially means it's comatose until another backer snags the property. (IF another backer snags the property.)

Here's what the producer had to say: "Jon and Erich Hoeber have written a very compelling feature film screenplay adaptation of the Alice game. Their screenplay will certainly serve as a jumping off point as we find a new studio home for the project. In terms of the realistic chances of seeing the Alice project being produced, all I can say is that I have invested (along with Julie Yorn and Karen Lauder, my producing partners on the project) a lot of time and effort in this project. We will get it made." Just not at Universal, unfortunately. Earlier reports indicated that actress Sarah Michelle Gellar and director Marcus Nispel were attached to the project, but as Inspector Clouseau used to say "Notennymore."

For those who are unfamiliar with American McGee's Alice (I really should play this game already), it's sort of a dark semi-sequel to Lewis Carroll's Alice's Adventures in Wonderland (or Alice in Wonderland, if you prefer). Filmmakers previously (and temporarily?) attached to the project include director Wes Craven, screenwriter John August, and actress Jean Marsh. (Thanks to Wiki for the reminders.) So to those who've played (and hopefully enjoyed) this video game, here's my question: Who should direct the thing?

Though his role in the film isn't official yet, Dwayne "The Rock" Johnson told MTV that he's in the process of working on playing Black Adam in the upcoming live-action adaptation of the popular comic Shazam! Not long ago, MTV sat down with The Rock (who's been a frontrunner to star in Shazam! for quite awhile now), and the actor asked fans to choose which role they'd rather see him in: the hero, Captain Marvel, or the villain, Black Adam. Fans overwhelmingly picked The Rock to play Black Adam (probably because they're itching to see the tough guy take on a villainous role for once), and Rock confirmed to MTV that the role is currently being shaped to suit him. While out promoting Southland Tales, The Rock said he'd be meeting with director Peter Segal later that night to discuss the part further.

Now all they need to do is find their Captain Marvel, aka Billy Batson, and it will be interesting to see if they attempt to pull off both with one actor. Batson is a regular old teenager who's chosen by a wizard named Shazam! to the the champion of good. And every time Batson utters the words "Shazam!" a lightening bolt strikes and transforms him into an adult by the name of Captain Marvel. So do they get an actor in his early 20s, try to pass him off as a teen and then age him up to play the Captain? Early rumors suggested Jake Gyllenhaal was up for the part, but screenwriter John August squashed that. Who would you like to see play Captain Marvel and/or Billy Batson? Should they try to work around one actor, or bring on two? Shazam! is set to hit theaters at some point in 2009.

With many taking full advantage of the long holiday weekend, myself included, the box office numbers tumbled in a bit later than usual, but it appears that Spanish-language thriller Ladrón Que Roba a Ladrón won on a per-screen basis with an average of $6,090 at 340 locations, based on estimates by Leonard Klady of Movie City News. That put it #2 overall in per-screen averages behind Rob Zombie's Halloween. In Ladrón, two thieves resolve to steal the fortune of an man who's built his empire by selling useless health aids to poor people via infomercials. The official site has the fake infomercials plus Spanish and English language versions of the trailer.

Death at a Funeral is holding up nicely, averaging $5,260 on 264 screens for distributor MGM. Directed by Frank Oz, the dark ensemble comedy declined just 2% while adding three screens in its third week of release. Also in its third week out, the superb doc The King of Kong: A Fistful of Quarters increased its take by 27.3%, according to Box Office Mojo, adding seven screens and averaging $4,571. Cinematical's Scott Weinberg gave each film a positive review, and word of mouth must be good.

Other debuting specialty titles included John August's The Nines, which drew an extremely healthy $14,650 each at the two screens where it was booked. (Our own Ryan Stewart really liked it too.) On its sole screen, Indian drama Vanaja made $10,500, which should be considered a triumph in view of it subject matter and lack of stars. (Read Christopher Campbell's positive review to see why: I've seen it and I agree completely.) Johnny To's Exiled finally made its theatrical premiere. I loved this terrific, tangy, self-aware, modern Hong Kong Western -- Scott Weinberg liked it, though not as much as me -- so I wish it made more than $9,550 in two engagements so far.

Joe Swanberg's Hannah Takes the Stairs dropped an astounding 81.4% in its second week, taking in just $1,100 for a total of $14,200 so far. Good thing the budget was low. You'd have to think that all the press on so-called "mumblecore" films in general would help, but perhaps the audience is more limited than expected or hoped.

What are The Nines? I have no idea, but I think The Eights are koala bears. That's about as close as you'll get to answers in this film, screenwriter John August's directorial debut, but don't let that deter you -- this is one of the most fun, most brain-twistingly clever films of the year. It's at once a serious meditation on the responsibilities of creators, a light-hearted poke at people in the entertainment industry who apply life-or-death stakes to everything that happens to them, and a metaphysical meditation on exactly what constitutes reality. Is television reality? The characters certainly seem to think so. Who are we to tell them they aren't real? And what about our creator? Do we have one? If so, what would that creator think about what we're up to, and how would they go about inserting themselves into the everyday world to get a closer look? What guise would they use? The Nines is a movie that raises about six million major, thought-provoking questions but then holds back on answering most of them.

The film is structured as a three-part anthology, with three actors -- Ryan Reynolds, Melissa McCarthy, and Hope Davis -- playing different characters in each part. Part 1 has Reynolds playing a capricious Hollywood actor who totals his car and ends up being put under house arrest in his gigantic Hollywood home -- some punishment, right? Going stir-crazy under the watchful eye of his ultra-chipper publicist, played by McCarthy, Reynolds' character becomes enamored with a sultry next-door neighbor, played by Davis, and starts to challenge his house arrest. Part 2 is a more autobiographical section, with Reynolds playing a television executive fighting to keep his pet project in development while also submitting to the demands of a Project Greenlight-style reality show, starring him. Davis plays a cold-hearted network executive in this piece, while McCarthy plays a thinly-disguised version of herself, acting out a version of her own past experiences with August. Part 3 is a self-contained story, starring Reynolds and McCarthy as a couple with a child, lost in the woods -- Davis plays a mysterious jogger. Still with me?

Those of us who lament the lack of movies based on original material -- the few that aren't adapted from a book, TV show, or videogame, and that aren't remakes or sequels -- are looking optimistically at the new deal 20th Century Fox has cut this week with a dozen writers. Variety reports that the writers have agreed to write spec scripts (the kind you write before you get paid, instead of pitching an idea and getting paid to write it up) that Fox will buy at a much lower cost than usual. If the movie goes into production, the screenwriters are guaranteed inclusion in the filmmaking process as producers, so their scripts won't be rewritten without their permission. If the project isn't greenlit by the studio, the writers can actually take back their scripts to keep them from preproduction limbo.

The writers and writing teams include Michael Arndt (Little Miss Sunshine), John August (The Nines, Charlie and the Chocolate Factory), Ted Elliot and Terry Rossio (Pirates of the Caribbean), Stuart Beattie (Collateral, Australia), Michael Brandt and Derek Haas (3:10 to Yuma), Tim Herlihy (The Wedding Singer), Simon Kinberg (X-Men: The Last Stand), Craig Mazin (Scary Movie 3), and Marianne and Cormac Wibberley (National Treasure). Notice how many of the films associated with these writers are remakes, sequels and adaptations; this agreement gives them to chance to show us some of their original plots and characters.

August explains the agreement very clearly on his blog -- it's worth reading even if you're familiar with the industry terms Variety uses frequently. He notes that this is an experiment, both for the writers and the studio. The writers get the chance to develop original material and gain more control over the movie itself, and the studio gets to buy into interesting scripts from A-list writers at a bargain price. "While this deal is largely about rights and money, I think it has the potential to lead to some better, more original movies. If so, that's a win for everyone," August concludes.

Above is an exclusive look at the final one-sheet for The Nines (click on poster for larger image), written and directed by John August. Yup, the extremely talented screenwriter (and frequent Tim Burton collaborator) is making his directorial debut with a film about three people (a troubled actor, a television show runner and a video game designer) whose lives and stories all intertwine to form a single narrative that explores the relationships between author and character, actor and role, creator and creation. Alternately funny and unsettling, The Nines is like a riddle where the answer may just lead to another question. The film stars Ryan Reynolds, Melissa McCarthy, Hope Davis and Elle Fanning. Additionally, you can check out the trailer over at IGN, as well as two puzzles (via UGO and Coming Soon) which should keep you busy until the flick arrives in theaters on August 31.

In covering the San Diego ComicCon, Geoff Boucher's Los Angeles Times blog notes that writer-director John August will not be in attendance, since he's toiling away on New Line's film adaptation of Shazam!, the Captain Marvel movie. As has been reported, Jake Gyllenhaal and The Rock are two possible candidates to play the superhero, possibly in the before and after transformation. The Captain is a crippled newsboy named Billy Batson who is endowed by a Dumbledorish wizard to transform himself into a mighty scarlet-clad superhero. Captain Marvel has been on screen since the Republic serial of 1941 when Tom Tyler played him, even though Captain Marvel looks awfully like Fred MacMurray in C. C. Beck's classic comic books. In August's own blog, the perennial collaborator with Tim Burton (Charlie and the Chocolate Factory, Big Fish, et al) tried to describe his own geek-free vision of what's going on. He includes a cheat sheet to describe some of the better moments in print with the Big Red Cheese...none of the comic book pics include Frank Miller's DK 2, where Miller proposed an interesting theory: That Captain Marvel's alter-ego Billy Batson could die of old age, leaving him trapped in that big torso and doorman's costume.

Boucher talks about August's provocative remarks, but here's the entire quote from August's blog (words that will really make the old-time fans of Captain Marvel wish they had a large Styrofoam boulder to throw at him): "Every time I read one of these [comic books]," says August, "I'm struck with the same realization I encounter trying to watch The Honeymooners or a black-and-white movie. Wow. Old thing suck." He goes on to add: "... Old-time comic books were awkwardly written, crudely drawn, and bewilderingly inconsistent with their rules. They were making up the art form as they went along, and today's comic books are better for the accumulated wisdom." The breezy inconsistency between an art form sucking and yet having accumulated wisdom bypasses August. One had to be grateful for the correspondent who wrote into August saying "Pretty harsh words from the guy who wrote the film version of Charlie's Angels" ... even if he did put a smiley emoticon next to it. Check out the LA Times story for more on the movie, including when it's set, what Captain Marvel will look like and who might play villain.

Edited to correct quote.

The directorial debut by veteran Hollywood screenwriter John August is among the seven films selected for the International Critics' Week program, which will be held during the upcoming Venice Film Festival. The Nines had its world premiere at Sundance early this year and was subsequently picked up by Newmarket Films for U.S. release and GreeneStreet for international. Ryan Reynolds and Hope Davis star in what's been described as "a compelling blur of reality, science fiction and metaphysical fantasy." A fall release is expected.

The program is composed entirely of first features, so it would seem to be a good scouting ground for new talent. Last year the Critics' Week Prize was awarded to Dito Montiel's A Guide to Recognizing Your Saints, which didn't strike Cinematical's James Rocchi as either new or very talented, so obviously opinions will differ. Still, I'm curious to see the closing night feature, Jónas Cuarón's Year of the Nail. It's "a thoughtful, tender but quite hip look at two young people with too much separating them for a match to ever be possible," according to Robert Koehler's Variety review. Koehler thought distributors and film festivals looking for new voices "should come a courting," so maybe it will secure additional exposure for the first film by the son of Alfonso Cuarón.

As with scripter John August, other experienced industry professionals have moved into the director's chair. Veteran French actor Jalil Lespert is represented by 24 Measures (pictured). Set on Christmas Eve, it's a drama about "four young people that were never meant to meet." Long-time assistant director Andrea Molaioli gets his shot with The Girl in the Lake, a thriller about a possible serial killer preying upon young people. International Critics Week will take place between August 30 and September 8; Cinematical will be on the scene in Venice.

John August is a talented screenwriter who wrote both Charlie's Angels films (hey, somebody had to get each ass jiggle down on paper!) and is a favorite of Tim Burton, having worked on scripts for Big Fish, Charlie and the Chocolate Factory and the massively disappointing Corpse Bride. In my opinion, August has never equaled his incredible script for 1999's Go, one of the most underappreciated films of the 90's, but the guy's got the goods. He also has an endlessly informative and always humorous screenwriting blog that should be required reading for any aspiring writer. On it, he debunks the rumor floating around the internet right now that Jake Gyllenhaal has been tapped to play Captain Marvel in Shazam! - the script August is currently working on. He does say in the entry that Gyllenhaal is likely to be one of the names mentioned for the role when the time comes, but that those discussions aren't even close to starting. We covered the Gyllenhaal rumor last week, but, it should be noted, we did not present it as fact. The direct link to August's response is here.

According to August, casting for Shazam! "has come up exactly zero times" and the project "currently has no start date, no release date, no movie whatsoever. There's just a script to be written. Which I should probably get back to." So there you have it. Don't rule Mr. Darko out, but he's nowhere near getting fitted for a codpiece just yet. Peter Segal is scheduled to direct Shazam!, which we'll more than likely see in 2008. Segal seems like an odd choice, as thus far he's only shot comedies, and mostly terrible ones (though to be fair, he does have one genuinely hilarious flick under his belt). August's directorial debut, The Nines, with Ryan Reynolds and Hope Davis, premiered to great notices at Sundance in January, and was recently picked up by GreeneStreet Films. Hopefully we can look forward to that this year.

[via IGN]

Here's how you know I'm a moron: When I first started reading this story, I immediately scratched my head and thought, "Wait, they're remaking that horrible Shaquille O'Neil movie?" Yes, I'm an idiot ... and this is a disability I live with each and every single day. That movie was Kazaam, but this one is Shazam! -- you'll notice the latter has an 'S', an extra 'A' and an exclamation point at the end to let you know it means business. New Line is adapting the DC Comics series for the big screen, and just attached John August to pen the script. Peter Segal will direct, as well as produce alongside Michael Ewing.

By this point, it's pretty obvious I'm not all too familiar with Shazam! The story (which sounds pretty damn cool) revolves around a teenager named Billy Batson who becomes the superhero Captain Marvel when he utters the magic word ... which, of course, is Shazam! The project has certainly made the rounds; at one point, William Goldman and Bryan Goluboff were brought on to pen drafts. However, Segal was interested in August's natural ability to tell big, ambitious stories set in fantastic worlds without sacrificing character. Says August, "What's terrific about the character is that he looks like this superstudly superhero but is really a 13-year-old boy. And to approach everything that is great about a superhero movie from a 13-year-old boy's perspective was a unique way in."

Known for helming a string of very successful comedies (including 50 First Dates, Anger Management, The Longest Yard and Nutty Professor II: The Klumps), it will be interesting to see how Segal approaches a superhero flick. There's no doubt August will turn in a larger-than-life script, and if Segal can stay the course and do what he does best, Shazam! should explode at the box office once it hits theaters. But here's the big question: Who do you get to play the kid and the adult? (And please don't say Ben Affleck.)