Variety reports that two new films, both of them based on books, will be set in India. First, there is the new Peter Weir film: Peter Weir will direct “Shantaram,” the Warner Bros. adaptation of the Gregory David Roberts novel that will star Johnny Depp. Weir will develop the script with Eric Roth. WB hopes to begin production late next year. Pic is being produced by Initial Entertainment Group’s Graham King along with Depp’s Infinitum Nihil banner and Plan B’s... Read more

A friend tells me I should start a blog devoted entirely to my personal life, instead of letting stray, cryptic comments about my personal life wander into occasional film-related posts here. I might do that, but not just yet. In the meantime, those curious to know more about my wife — whose hospitalization is referred to here and here and here (plus a comment here seems to be an oblique reference to this or this) — and the as-yet-unborn twins... Read more

Just got off the phone from a live eight-minute chat with Engaging Your World, a radio show on WVNE 760 am in Worcester, Mass. I don’t know whether there’s an online audio archive of these interviews anywhere, so if you find one, let me know. They had initially contacted me some weeks ago, around the time Kingdom of Heaven came out on video, and I think we were originally going to talk about that movie, but the interview got put... Read more

Variety has an interesting story up now on the story behind Peter Jackson’s last-minute decision to replace composer Howard Shore with James Newton Howard on his remake of King Kong: Howard, a six-time Oscar nominee whose scores include “The Sixth Sense” and “The Village,” replaced Howard Shore as composer on the film. Shore — whose cameo as the pit-band conductor during Kong’s New York theater appearance survives the cut — won three Oscars for his music for “Kong” director Peter... Read more

Hello to everyone who is discovering this blog via Tom Schaefer’s column, which was published last Saturday in the Wichita Eagle under the headline ‘Your guide to getting the most out of movies’. (It was also picked up off the Knight Ridder wire by the Holland Sentinel, the Macon Telegraph and perhaps other papers.) Schaefer’s column begins: Grab a bag of popcorn and find a good seat. Thanksgiving weekend usually means a run on movies at your local theater. But... Read more

While checking out some of the sites that have linked to this blog, I discovered this interesting take on Pride & Prejudice, which is largely a reply to, and rebuttal of, Gene Edward Veith’s review in World magazine. For example, Veith writes: The movie is sumptuous to look upon, capturing well both the sights and the feel of early 19th-century England. We are immersed in a graceful culture where sexual immorality is a devastating blow to the family honor. And... Read more

I don’t know how legitimate this “previously unpublished letter” is, but the website nthposition has posted this item, purportedly written by C.S. Lewis, author of The Chronicles of Narnia: The Kilns,Headington Quarry,Oxford18 Dec. 1959 Dear Sieveking (Why do you ‘Dr’ me? Had we not dropped the honorifics?) As things worked out, I wasn’t free to hear a single instalment of our serial [The Magician’s Nephew] except the first. What I did hear, I approved. I shd. be glad for the... Read more

My article on the 1979 and 1988 adaptations of The Lion, the Witch and the Wardrobe for television is now up at CT Movies. Incidentally, one of the more interesting bits has been trimmed out of there. The part where I quote my friend and colleague Steven D. Greydanus to the effect that a line in the 1988 version is “rank heresy” is still there; but the part where I reply that the line in question might not be so... Read more

Less than a week after Moviefone posted a battle-scene clip from the new Narnia movie, some TV station in Sweden has posted a nine-minute preview featuring footage from the very beginning and very ending of the film, and various points in-between. Make of it what you will. Personally, I’m not quite sure why the footage begins inside a Nazi bomber cockpit. And perhaps my dim memories of the wartime preparations in All Creatures Great and Small deceive me, but shouldn’t... Read more