Hailing Frequencies #389

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Hailing Frequencies #389
2.25.08

HELLO

And here's the three hundred and eighty-ninth edition of "Hailing Frequencies."

If you want to be notified when this newsletter is updated, email me to be put on my "notification" list.

It's lovely outside -- beautiful sunshine and a clear blue sky. The weatherman says tomorrow it will rain all day, and Wednesday will get down into the 30s. Everyone I know in New Orleans has a cold, 'fly, or pnemonia.

POST-STRIKE MOVIE PRODUCTION SCHEDULE

Source: Collider.

20% FICTION
Scheduled Start Date - Early March 2008
Shooting Location - Los Angeles
Producer: Robert De Niro - Bret Saxon - Jeff Bowler - Josh Kesselman - Josh Silver
Writer/Director: Barry Primus
CAST: Val Kilmer
A dramatic comedy about a jaded Hollywood acting coach to the stars who travels from Los Angeles to Rivergrove, a small town where he finds a new kind of happiness teaching the locals a few acting tricks.

25/8
Scheduled Start Date - April 7
Shooting Location - Connecticut
Producer: Marianne Maddalena - Wes Craven - Iya Labunka
Writer/Director: Wes Craven
As legend has it, a notorious serial slayer will return to the sleepy community of Riverdale to finish off the seven children born on the night he purportedly died. But is the slayer really dead, or is he still at large? Or has the mysterious evil personality that once impelled his bloody spree entered the body of an unwary teen, who will now be compelled to do his evil bidding?

AMELIA
Scheduled Start Date - April 2008
Shooting Location - Toronto - Nova Scotia - Hawaii
Producer: Kevin Hyman - Ted Waitt - Lydia Dean Pilcher
Director: Mira Nair
Writer: Ron Bass
CAST: Hillary Swank
Swank will play Earhart in the formative stages of her career. George Putnam, a publisher and publicist, was engaged by society denizen Amy Guest to set up a daring nonstop flight across the Atlantic Ocean. When Guest was talked out of trying to become the first woman to make the trip, she dispatched Putnam to find a female pilot, and to turn the flight into a media event.

AMERICAN CAROL
Scheduled Start Date - Late February 2008
Shooting Location - Los Angeles
Producer: Steve McEveety - John Shepherd
Writer/Director: David Zucker
A comedy that re-imagines Charles Dickens' “A Christmas Carol,” set on the 4th of July.

BEYOND A REASONABLE DOUBT
Scheduled Start Date - March 3
Shooting Location - Shreveport, Louisiana
Producer: Mark Damon - Ted Hartley - Moshe Diamant - Avi Lerner
Writer/Director: Peter Hyams
CAST: Michael Douglas - Amber Tamblyn - Jesse Metcalfe
A remake of Fritz Lang's 1956 film noir. The story is about a journalist (Metcalfe) looking to take down a corrupt district attorney (Douglas) by setting himself up as a suspect in a murder he didn't commit. His plan backfires when the D.A. uncovers the scheme and gets rid of the evidence the journalist has amassed to prove his innocence, making him look like he did, in fact, commit the murder.

CADILLAC RECORDS
Scheduled Start Date - March 10
Shooting Location - New Jersey - Mississippi - Chicago
Producer: Sofia Sondervan - Andrew Lack
Writer/Director: Darnell Martin
CAST: Adrien Brody – Jeffrey Wright - Columbus Short - Beyoncé Knowles - Emmanuelle Chriqui - Cedric the Entertainer - Tammy Blanchard
About Leonard Chess, the legendary founder of the South Side Chicago blues label Chess Records. The period piece follows the rise and fall of Chess Records, which launched the careers of such R&B greats as Muddy Waters, Etta James and Chuck Berry. Chess, who was inducted into the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame in 1987, scoured the South, checking out the various blues scenes and selling records from the back of his Cadillac.

CHERI
Scheduled Start Date - April 7
Shooting Location - France - London
Producer: Thom Mount - Tracey Seaward - Bill Kenwright\
Writer: Christopher Hampton
Director: Stephen Frears
CAST: Michelle Pfeiffer
Set in 1920s Paris, where the young son of a wealthy courtesan is educated in the ways of love by a middle-aged friend of the man's mother. When he is forced to give up the six-year relationship after marrying someone else, the young man can't forget her and retreats into a fantasy world.

THE CHRONICLES OF NARNIA: THE VOYAGE OF THE DAWN TREADER
Scheduled Start Date - Summer 2008
Shooting Location - Prague - New Zealand
Producer: Cary Granat - Mark Johnson - Andrew Adamson
Director: Michael Apted
Based on C.S. Lewis’ novel, “The Chronicles of Narnia: The Voyage of the Dawn Treader.” In the enchanted land of Narnia, Edmund and Lucy join King Caspian on a sworn mission to find the seven lost Lords of Narnia.

ELOISE IN PARIS
Scheduled Start Date - Mid June 2008
Shooting Location - London - Paris - New York
Producer: Thomas D. Adelman - Patrick Meehan - Ron Rotholz
Director: Charles Shyer
Writer: Hallie Meyers-Shyer - Larry Spencer - Charles Shyer
CAST: Uma Thurman
Based on the children's book "Eloise in Paris" by Kay Thompson. Eloise is an irrepressible six-year-old who lives with her British nanny, her dog Weenie, and her turtle Skipperdee in New York City's Plaza Hotel. Eloise makes a nuisance of herself -- riding elevators, dragging sticks along the walls as she roller-skates down the corridors, and "helping" the staff prepare rooms for official functions.

GIALLO
Scheduled Start Date - March 17
Shooting Location - Torino, Italy
Producer: Rafael Primorac - Richard Rionda Del Castro - Oscar Generale - Claudio Argento
Director: Dario Argento
Writer: Sean Keller - Jim Agnew
CAST: Ray Liotta - Asia Argento - Vincent Gallo - Elsa Pataky
Yellow (Gallo) chooses his victims based on their beauty, because he himself is not beautiful. Scorned and rejected in the orphanage where he was raised as a child, he now hunts beautiful women to torture and to kill.

HIGH SCHOOL MUSICAL: SENIOR YEAR
Scheduled Start Date - April 21
Shooting Location - Salt Lake City
Producer: Bill Borden - Barry Rosenbush
Writer: Peter Barsocchini
Director: Kenny Ortega
CAST: Zac Efron - Vanessa Hudgens - Ashley Tisdale - Lucas Grabeel - Corbin Bleu - Monique Coleman
The continuing adventures will revolve around seniors Troy (Efron) and Gabriella (Hudgens) facing the prospect of being separated from one another as they head off in different directions to college. Joined by the rest of the Wildcats, they stage an elaborate spring musical reflecting their experiences, hopes and fears about their future.

I LOVE YOU, MAN
Producer: Donald De Line - Ivan Reitman - Tom Pollock - Jeffrey Clifford
Writer/ Director: John Hamburg
CAST: Paul Rudd - Jason Segel
Centers on a man about to get married who actively seeks out a male friend to be his best man for the wedding.

JENNIFER'S BODY
Scheduled Start Date - March 17
Shooting Location - Vancouver
Producer: Jason Reitman - Mason Novick - Dan Dubiecki - Brad Van Arragon
Director: Karyn Kusama\
Writer: Diablo Cody
CAST: Megan Fox - Amanda Seyfried
The story of a cheerleader who is possessed by a demon and starts feeding off the boys in a Minnesota farming town. Her "plain Jane" best friend must kill her, then escape from a correctional facility to go after the Satan-worshiping rock band responsible for the transformation.

THE LAND OF THE LOST
Scheduled Start Date - March 3
Shooting Location - Los Angeles
Producer: Sid Krofft - Marty Krofft - Jimmy Miller - Julie Wixson-Darmody
Director: Brad Silberling
Writer: Chris Henchy - Dennis McNicholas
CAST: Will Ferrell - Danny McBride - Anna Friel
Eccentric paleontologist Dr. Rick Marshall validates his discredited theory of time travel by heading back into an alternate universe inhabited by dinosaurs, monkey people and reptilian Sleestaks.

MOON
Scheduled Start Date - January 2008
Shooting Location - United Kingdom
Director: Duncan Jones
CAST: Sam Rockwell
About a man stranded on the moon for three years.

OPEN ROAD
Scheduled Start Date - February 2008
Shooting Location - Baton Rouge, Louisiana
Writer/Director: Michael Meredith
CAST: Jeff Bridges - Justin Timberlake - Mary Steenburgen
The father-son dramedy, centers on the adult son of a baseball legend who, together with his girlfriend, embarks on a road trip with his estranged father.

PATRIOTS
Scheduled Start Date - Early April 2008
Shooting Location - New Orleans\
Producer: Raymond Brothers - Scott Glassgold - Michael Beugg
Writer: Robert Eisele
Director: Tim Story
CAST: Forest Whitaker
Whitaker would play Al Collins, basketball coach for John Ehret High in Marrero, La., who led his Patriots to the state championship a year after Katrina ravaged the school and displaced many of its students.

PRINCE OF PERSIA: THE SANDS OF TIME
Scheduled Start Date – July 2008
Producer: Jerry Bruckheimer - John August - Mike Stenson - Chad Oman
Director: Mike Newell
Writer: Jeffrey Nachmanoff
Passing through India en route to Azad, King Sharaman and his son, the Prince of Persia, defeat the powerful Maharajah of India with the promise of honor and glory.

SPREAD
Scheduled Start Date - February 25
Shooting Location - Los Angeles
Producer: Jason Goldberg - Peter Morgan - Aaron Kaufman
Writer: Jason Dean Hall
Director: David Mackenzie
CAST: Ashton Kutcher - Jennifer Jason Leigh
A world-class seducer, handsome, directionless Jason has made a career of exploiting women -- particularly rich women like the beautiful Samantha, who serve his purposes very nicely. When his women are out of town, Jason tools around in their luxury cars and lures other young women to their mansions, pretending that the "spread" belongs to him. But Jason isn't getting any younger, and his manipulative wiles are wearing thin.

THE SURROGATES
Scheduled Start Date - Late April 2008
Shooting Location - Boston
Producer: David Hoberman - Todd Lieberman - Max Handelman - Elizabeth Banks
Director: Jonathan Mostow
CAST: Bruce Willis
Based on the graphic novel "The Surrogates" written by Robert Venditti and Brett Weldele. Story is set in the near future, where humans live in isolation and interact vicariously through surrogate robots who are better-looking versions of themselves.

THE TAKING OF PELHAM 1, 2, 3
Scheduled Start Date - March 3
Shooting Location - New York
Producer: Todd Black - Jason Blumenthal - Steve Tisch
Writer: David Koepp
Director: Tony Scott
CAST: Denzel Washington - John Travolta
Remake of the 1974 film...the latest incarnation takes place in contemporary New York and is set in motion when four hijackers take over a subway train and hold the passengers for ransom.

TERMINATOR SALVATION: THE FUTURE BEGINS (T4)
Scheduled Start Date - May 5
Shooting Location - New Mexico
Director: McG
Writer: John Brancato - Michael Ferris
CAST: Christian Bale - Josh Brolin
In the future, in a full-scale war between Skynet and humankind. John Connor, now in his 30s and fiance Kate Brewster realize they must create a resistance organization with Earth's remaining survivors against the army of robots slowly being built up by Skynet.

THIS SIDE OF THE TRUTH
Scheduled Start Date - April 14
Shooting Location - Boston
Producer: Lynda Obst - Oly Obst - Asif Satchu - Mordecai Wiczyk
Writer/Director: Matthew Robinson - Ricky Gervais
CAST: Ricky Gervais - Jennifer Garner - Rob Lowe - Louis C.K. - Jonah Hill
The comedy takes place in a world where everybody tells the truth. Gervais plays a storyteller whose job is to ramble on about the 1300s. Faced with losing his job because his terrain is a boring period in history once he gets beyond the Black Death, he invents lying as a way to save himself.

THE TRIAL OF THE CHICAGO 7
Scheduled Start Date - Late March 2008
Shooting Location - Los Angeles
Producer: Walter Parkes - Laurie MacDonald
Writer: Aaron Sorkin
Director: Steven Spielberg
CAST: Sacha Baron Cohen - Philip Seymour Hoffman - Jeff Daniels - Colin Hanks - Will Smith
Based on the 2007 documentary Chicago 10, by Brett Morgen. At the 1968 Democratic Convention, protesters, denied permits for demonstrations, repeatedly clashed with the Chicago Police Department, who waged a week-long terror campaign that resulted in riots witnessed live by a television audience of over 50 million.

THE UGLY TRUTH
Scheduled Start Date - April 15
Shooting Location - Los Angeles
Producer: Tom Rosenberg - Gary Lucchesi - Steve Reuther
Writer: Karen McCullah Lutz - Kirsten Smith
Director: Robert Luketic
CAST: Katherine Heigl - Gerard Butler
Romantically challenged morning show producer Abby Richter who is reluctantly embroiled in a series of outrageous tests by her chauvinistic correspondent to prove his theories on relationships and help her find love.

UNTITLED SAM MENDES PROJECT (aka THIS MUST BE THE PLACE)
Scheduled Start Date - March 31
Shooting Location - Connecticut
Producer: Ed Saxon - Marc Turtletaub - Peter Saraf
Writer: Dave Eggers - Vendela Vida
Director: Sam Mendes
It follows Verona and Burt’s journey around the U.S. as they search for somewhere to put down roots and raise the baby they are expecting. Picking up some wisdom and warnings from their adventures, they find to their surprise that sometimes you have what you need right in your own (long neglected) backyard.

UNTITLED SUPERNATURAL THRILLER (aka BORN)
Scheduled Start Date - March 3
Shooting Location - Chicago
Producer: Michael Bay - Andrew Form - Brad Fuller - Jessika Borsiczky-Goyer
Writer/Director: David S. Goyer
CAST: Gary Oldman - Odette Yustman - Cam Gigandet
The psychological thriller follows an 18-year-old who is haunted by a Dybbuk - the soul of a dead person barred from heaven - in the form of a young boy who perished in Auschwitz.

THE VICIOUS KIND
Scheduled Start Date - March 1
Shooting Location - Norfolk, Connecticut
Producer: Tim Harms - Neil LaBute
Writer/Director: Lee Toland Krieger
CAST: Adam Scott - Brittany Snow
Snow will play a woman targeted by the obsessed older brother of her boyfriend after he brings her home for Thanksgiving. Scott will play Caleb, the obsessive older brother.

WASP 2008 (WOODY ALLEN SPRING PROJECT)
Producer: Letty Aronson - Stephen Tenenbaum
Writer/ Director: Woody Allen
CAST: Larry David - Evan Rachel Wood

WELCOME TO THE RILEYS
Scheduled Start Date - Late April 2008
Shooting Location - New Orleans
Producer: Ridley Scott - Tony Scott - Michael Costigan - Stephen Margolis - Guy Collins - Steven Zaillian
Director: Jake Scott
CAST: James Gandolfini - Kristen Stewart
Story concerns a man and a woman who have been driven apart by grief after losing their daughter and are brought back together when they meet a troubled young woman.

WHEN IN ROME
Scheduled Start Date - March 31
Shooting Location - New York - Rome, Italy
Producer: Benny Medina - Jeff Pollack - Gary Foster - Andrew Panay - Rikki Bestall
Writer/Director: Mark Steven Johnson
CAST: Kristen Bell
Bell will play a successful real estate agent in New York who can't find a lasting relationship. When her younger sister impulsively marries in Rome, she flies out for the wedding and, after picking up coins from a reputed "fountain of love," finds an overabundance of suitors waiting for her back home.

THE WOLFMAN
Scheduled Start Date - March 17
Shooting Location - London - Castle Combe - Lacock
Producer: Scott Stuber - Mary Parent - Andy Davis - Nigel Gostelow
Director: Joe Johnston
CAST: Benicio Del Toro - Anthony Hopkins - Emily Blunt
Remake of the 1941 film "The Wolf Man" directed by George Waggner. The film will be set in Victorian England. Del Toro will play a man who returns from America to his ancestral homeland, gets bitten by a werewolf and begins a hairy moonlight existence.

AND TV

ABC announced the return dates for many of its primetime series:
April 7: Samantha Who? at 930p with 6 eps
April 8: Boston Legal at 10p with 6 eps
April 13: Desperate Housewives at 9p with 5 eps and a special two-hour finale
April 20: Brothers & Sisters at 10p with 4 eps
April 24: Ugly Betty at 8p with 5 eps, Grey's Anatomy at 9p with 5 eps and Lost at 10p with 5 eps
ABC's dramas Pushing Daisies, Private Practice and Dirty Sexy Money will all return next season.

FOX has ordered Bones, House, Back to You, 'Til Death, The Simpsons, American Dad, and Family Guy back into production. Premiere dates have also been announced for:
March 2 at 930p: Unhitched (series premiere)
March 4 & 6 at 9p: New Amsterdam (series previews)
March 10 at 8p: Canterbury's Law (series premiere)
March 14 at 8p: The Return of Jezebel James (one-hour series premiere)
April 1 at 9p: Hell's Kitchen (season premiere)

ALIENS: COLONIAL MARINES

Sega has made a first-person-shooter on the franchise, available for the Xbox 360, PlayStation 3 and Window-based PC platforms in late 2008.

In Aliens: Colonial Marines, players are part of a United States Colonial Marine squad and must prepare to face an huge alien assault more intense and horrific than ever before. It's loosely based on the Bradley Thompson and David Weddle story for Aliens.

HARRY POTTER

Looks like David Yates will be directing the final Harry Potter movie.

Harry Potter and the Half-Blood Prince is in production and has a tentative opening date of November 21, 2008.

HIGHLANDER: THE SOURCE DVD

Certainly it's easy to hog pile on the production of "Highlander: The Source" for its litany of offenses, and we'll get to that in a moment; but special attention must be paid to producers Peter Davis and the late William Panzer: two men who have made it their life's work to bleed the "Highlander" saga dry with a continuous display of harebrained sequels and other coin-hungry franchise ephemera. They've taken something that was once rousing and inventive and now have officially driven it right into the ground.

LEGO

The Lego Group was at Toy Fair celebrating the 50th anniversary of the Lego brick, 30th anniversary of the minifigure, the 10the anniversary of Lego Mindstorms, and most exciting for Lego fans, some 135 new products, where functionality of each new product was the keyword of my tour. New to the various Lego lines are:

Lego Agents, a secret agent building and role-play concept comprised of six sets; getting a makeover is the Mars Mission line with new transforming vehicles; the Castle gets new products including a battle between trolls and dwarves; Exo-Force includes new battle machines and vehicles; Lego City gets a new police HQ and the Coast Guard a nifty doc; other new items include six pull-back jumping racers, four Ferrari sets and Tiny Turbos playsets for the Lego Racers line.
In the licensed Lego category are the Indiana Jones and Speed Racer lines, as well as a new extension for Lego's Star Wars line, which will be based on the upcoming new animated Star Wars: The Clone Wars series. Lines getting new items are SpongeBob SquarePants, which gets a great little Sandy Cheeks minifigure, and Batman with four new sets and a Harley Quinn minifigure.

LOST

TV Guide says ABC may move Lost back an hour on Thursdays to 10 PM, to follow Grey's Anatomy, beginning in late April.

MISC...

Nickelodeon is developing a live-action Dora the Explorer primetime TV movie, featuring CG special effects. The network will host a nationwide search for an actress to star.
Imagi studios has hired Timothy Harris to script the CG animated movie AstroBoy..
The Brothers McLeod's new animated short-form series Pedro and Frankensheep (10x5), about a really smart Bolivian guinea pig, and his robot, begins airing on CBBC (UK) next week.
Smallville's Kristin Kreuk will play martial artist Chun-Li in Twentieth Century Fox's adaptation of the Street Fighter videogame series.
CBS' Ghost Whisperer is coming out in comic book form from IDW, with the first issue of the five-issue series on sale March 26.
FOX's 24 will return to production for its seventh season, but the series will not premiere until January 2009.
Well, it's Kelsey Grammer and David Zucker's turn to do another The Christmas Carol, with Grammar as Scooge and the "indie comedy" actually named An American Carol. And with that name, I'm sure it won't be the same story we've seen 10,000 times before.
Leonardo DiCaprio and Warner Brothers will produce a live-action film based on the Japanese manga Akira, with Ruairi Robinson directing.
Toy Story 3 spoiler from The Wall Street Journal (highlight to read): Woody and friends are donated to a day-care center after their owner, Andy, leaves for college.
Mike Myers and Mark Waters may be bringing us a remake of The Secret Life of Walter Mitty.
Carol Barbee, executive producer of CBS' Jericho, told SCI FI Wire this is "make or break" time for the show.
"Roland Emmerich, who is set to direct the apocalyptic film 2012, told SCI FI Wire that the movie is based in part on the idea that the Mayans predicted the end of the world in the title year."

MONOPOLY: ALIEN INVASION?

Universal Pictures and Hasbro have agreed on a six-year partnership to produce at least four movies based on some of Hasbro's brands, which includes Monopoly, Candy Land, Clue, Ouija, Battleship, Magic, The Gathering and Stretch Armstrong. You may remember that someone already made a movie based on Clue, and it sucked. But I'm sure Candyland: Revenge of the Gumdrops, which be just great.

THE MUMMY

Rob Cohen and crew are working hard to finish up The Mummy: Tomb of the Dragon Emperor in time for its August 1 release date. He's posted on his blog that the real problem is all those wild f/x: "The visual effects work is going on apace. We have nine finals at this point out of 800 shots. Sounds dismal and hopeless, but this is how vfx work goes: the first 50% of the time on 10% of the shots and the second 50% on the 90%. There is so much R & D going in defining the visual rules for each fantasy creature, object, or landscape (what does Shangri-la look like?) that the refinement of this first 100 shots defines all the rest. Once the aesthetics and methodology are set, the production pipelines are refined and the work begins to accelerate."

RANDOM DIALOG QUIZ

Can you name the TV show? "So...move out of your parents' basements, and get a real job...and grow the hell up!

Highlight to read the answer: Saturday Night Live (William Shatner hosting)

RATINGS THIS WEEK

ABC: Lost [r] 3.6/6, Lost 7.7/12
CW: Supernatural [r] 1.7/3, Supernatural 2.0/3
CBS: Ghost Whisperer [r] 4.2/7
NBC: Movie: Knight Rider [r] 3.0/5
SCIFI: Stargate Atlantis 1/1SCIFI: Stargate Atlantis 1/1
NBC: Movie: Knight Rider 7.1/11
BC: Medium 5.7/10
FOX: Terminator: Sarah Connor Chronicles 4.9/7
CBS: Jericho 3.9/7
CW: Reaper [r] 1.3/2

SOUNDS LIKE SCI-FI, ETC.

Google is ta.king with Arizona-based Space Data about delivering wireless coverage to rural areas using hot air balloons, says The Wall Street Journal. With a $1,500 wireless receiver in av$500 balloon, that's a a fraction of the cost of a wireless tower, even considering maintenance.

STAR TREK

CBS Interactive is offering full-length episodes of Star Trek TOS, The Twilight Zone (seasons 1 and 2), and season one each of MacGyver, Hawaii Five-O and Melrose Place. Distribution will occur across the CBS Audience Network, which is comprised of 300+ Websites and partners, including AOL, Microsoft, CNET Networks, Comcast, and Joost, plus social application partners, including Automattic, Brightcove, Clearspring and more, as well as Websites from CBS-owned television, radio and affiliated stations. The classic TV shows will be ad-supported, free to the user, and available immediately. Sweet.

Bad news for people who bought the first season of Star Trek TOS on HD DVD. HD DVDs have basically bit it, so the next season will be Blu Ray only.

STAR WARS

Ever wonder what happened to Fanboys? Here's the story in a comic nutshell.

STARGATE

Stargate Atlantis's last two episodes have earned 1/1.

SGA's season five has gone before cameras, and Robert Picardo will be in 12 of the 20 episodes.

Hey, it's about dang time! Michael Shanks will finally come back to Atlantis in season five, this time in a two-part episode written by Martin Gero, which hopefully does not mean that Daniel will die again.

SUPERNATURAL

Supernatural is taking an up-tick in the ratings, with the show matching its best performance of the season in adults 18-34 and women 18-34, and scoring a season high with men 18-34. It also attracted its largest audience of the season (3.22 million).

WOLFMAN

Okay, so Universal is remaking The Wolfman, and Hugo Weaving will play an investigator, Benicio Del Toro is the harry guy himself with father Anthony Hopkins, and Emily Blunt is the girlfriend. Joe Johnston (Jurassic Park 3) will direct, and production rolls next month in London for a February 13, 2009 release date.

X-FILES

Chris Carter and Frankk Spotnitz spoke about the X-Files 2 movie at the WonderCon in SF, as reported by an SCI FI Wire. Good bits:

"[The movie is]a stand-alone, scary movie. Scary, exciting movie. But it's also very much about these characters, very personal. A romantic, I think, emotional story."

The sequel mirrors the passage of real time since the end of Fox's The X-Files TV show. "The truth is, after all that time, Mulder and Scully were different people, and we were different people, so the 'X-File' we came up with five years ago is still the X-File in the movie, but their personal lives--the state of their relationship, all those things--have changed over time, and that was kind of interesting," Spotnitz said. "To not only think about them after all this time, but, really, us as writers and what mattered to us and what we wanted to say in this movie [has also changed]."

Gillian Anderson has a nice one up too:

"It's an interesting challenge as an actor to do something [like this]," he said. "It's not quite like being in a play, where you're re-creating the character every night from the beginning, but it is something like that, I would imagine. It's something closer to that than making a film that's a one-off. There's a certain kind of honoring of the past work that you've done. ... You don't want to explode the character just because you don't remember, [or] because you're bored. And then you also want to honor the fact that the person has had five years of a life happening. So it's tricky. It's interesting. That makes it interesting."

The film is in production in Vancouver, Canada, with a tentative July 25, 2008 release.

X-MEN

Well, I'm still bummed that he died without trying to swim out that portal, but it's great to hear that Dominic Monaghan will be a mutant who can fly in X-Men Origins: Wolverine. The release date is May 2009.

Weekend Box Office Estimates: Feb 22-24, 2008
Vantage Point (Sony)                             $24.0 million - opening weekend
Jumper (Fox)                                         $12.7 million - 2 wk total $56.2m
The Spiderwick Chronicles (Paramount)      $12.6 million - 2 wk total $43.6m
Step Up 2 The Streets (Buena Vista)         $9.8 million - 2 wk total $41.4m
Fool's Gold (Warner Bros.)                        $6.3 million - 3 wk total $52.4m
Definitely, Maybe (Universal)                     $5.2 million - 2 wk total $21.8m
Be Kind, Rewind (NewLine)                        $4.1 million - opening weekend
Juno (Fox Searchlight)                             $4.1 million - 12 wk total $130.4m
Welcome Home Roscoe Jenkins (Universal)   $4.0 million - 3 wk total $35.5m
There Will Be Blood (Paramount Vantage)     $2.6 million - 9 wk total $35.0m
Source: Box Office Mojo

TOP BOOKS SCI-FI/FANTASY @ Amazon, 2.11.08
1. Breaking Dawn (Twilight Saga, Book 4), by Stephenie Meyer
2. The Road (Oprah's Book Club), by Cormac McCarthy
3. Harry Potter and the Deathly Hallows, by J.K. Rowling
4. The Outlaw Demon Wails (Rachel Morgan, Book 6), by Kim Harrison
5. The Host: A Novel, by Stephenie Meyer
6. Revelation (Star Wars: Legacy of the Force, Book 8), by Karen Traviss
7. Predatory Game (GhostWalkers, Book 6),by Christine Feehan
8. His Dark Materials Trilogy (The Golden Compass; The Subtle Knife; The Amber Spyglass)
9. Small Favor (The Dresden Files, Book 10), by Jim Butcher
10. Celebutantes, by Amanda Goldberg

TOP DVDs SCI-FI/FANTASY @ Amazon, 2.11.08

1. Enchanted (Widescreen Edition)
2. Stargate - The Ark of Truth
3. Battlestar Galactica - Season Three
4. 30 Days of Night
5. Lost - The Complete Third Season
6. I Am Legend (Two-Disc Special Edition)
7. The Golden Compass (New Line Platinum Series)
8. The Complete Matrix Trilogy (The Matrix/ The Matrix Reloaded/ The Matrix Revolutions) [HD DVD]
9. Battlestar Galactica - Razor (Unrated Extended Edition)
10. Lost - The Complete Second Season

INSANE TREK TRIVIA (no googling!)

This Week's Question: What does Worf say is the reason TOS Klingons look so different from TNG/DS9/VOY/ENT Klingons?

Send your answer to julia.houston@gmail.com. All correctly answering trivia maniacs will have their names mentioned in the next letter. The first winner gets to make a request, anything they like -- within reason -- for the next "Hailing Frequencies" issue. Please let me know if you don't want me to post your email address if you win.

Last Week's Question: Where did Thelev hide his transmitter?

Answer: Data: In his antenna.

First winner
Robert

Second winner
Lou

Third winner
Name withheld

Fourth winner
Joanie

Fifth winner
Wayne

Sixth winner
Michael

Seventh winner
Doug

Eighth winner
Debra

CAPTION CONTEST

Send in your best caption for the picture below. The best (as in, my favorite) entry will appear in next week's issue.

[Insert caption here.]

THIS WEEK'S WINNER:

"Disney begins the new scifi series; The BionicRaccoon."- Debra

Honorable mentions

"A band of killer racoons are making their way to the set of star trek to show their disdain for rolling back the start date of the movie. Along the way, this huge elf told the racoon leader that he would give them a ride in Santa's sleigh to speed their arrival to the star trek set. Upon learning of the elf's plan, Santa flat out refused to transport the band of racoons. This made the group very unhappy." - Susan

"Eeeww! I just wanted to give you a hug but you slipped me the tongue, you little rascal!" - Doug

"Meanwhile...Back on the Klingon homeworld our "little green guy" is brutally attacked by a killer targ." - Brown

"And as you can see, Will Ferrel has no pee-pee." -- BTCHONWHLS

"I am going to tell Santa to put you on the naughty list!" - Elaine

LETTERS TO THE EDITOR"

Last week's topic:What was the last sci-fi or fantasy movie you saw and got excited about?

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Oh, dear!

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Next week's topic: What was the sci-fi or fantasy movie that gave you the biggest let-down when you finally saw it?

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Send me something if you've got something to say. It can be about anything that's on your mind!

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