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Elizabeth Banks, then: funny. Hot. Good actress. Tinkerbell: fairy. Fictional. Flighty. Combine the two, and what do you get? Disney will be hoping it’ll mean a big, successful live action rom-com that extends the Tinkerbell “brand” outside the kiddie arena. Oh, and, er a good film.

Thanks to a weird conglomeration of producers, including Adam Shankman, Jennifer Gibgot and McG, Disney is pressing ahead with Tink, which is still largely wrapped in mouse-guarded secrecy, but will apparently play up the more mischievous side of the famed fairy character. And no, we have no idea if it means that Banks will be dressing up in costume as Tinkerbell, or if she’ll play a woman who gets romantic assistance/problems from the magic dust-sprinkling one. But we can dream, right?

Elizabeth Wright Shapiro, who was part of the team that developed the story (and who has been working with Banks on various projects in the past that are in different stages of development), will write the screenplay. It's still early days on the project, and there's no director attached yet.

Banks was last seen in Role Models and The Uninvited, and has been spending time as a recurring guest on 30 Rock, She’s also got several comedy films either shooting or in the can waiting for release.
 

Elizabeth Banks, who captured movie-goers' attention with scene-stealing turns in "The 40-year-old Virgin," may seem an unlikely choice to hand out Hollywood's premiere awards for the science of movie-making.

The 35-year-old Massachusetts native, gamely poking fun at her unfamiliarity with "digital intermediaries" and "ambient occlusion," presided ably with the aid of a teleprompter over this year's Scientific and Technical Awards from the Academy of Motion Picture Arts and Sciences on Saturday.

"I don't know what a sine curve is. At all," said Banks after an award recipient thanked his father for teaching him how to chart his first such graph.

The lesser-known companion to the Academy Awards, which one attendee called "the poor man's Oscars," honors the army of technology wizards that toil behind the scenes of the movie industry.

Most years, a young starlet hands out the awards in a low-key ceremony about a fortnight before the world's foremost forum for film awards.

Past hostesses have included Jennifer Garner, Kate Hudson and Jessica Biel.

Viewers will glimpse a brief recap of the event when the Oscars are televised live on March 7.

Among the awards dished out for movie magic in 2009, several honored achievements in 3D filmmaking, a hot topic in the wake of James Cameron's "Avatar," the most successful film of all time with a gross of over $2.4 billion worldwide.

Among such honorees was Richard Kirk, who designed and developed "Truelight" described as a system to enable accurate color presentation in digital film previews.

"I can only hope that one day I'm as awesome as my friends and family now think I am," he joked after receiving a gold plaque with a miniature representation of Oscar statuette.

Other awards included nods for achievements in motion-capture, computer graphics, lighting, camera technology and a plethora of other processes used in post-production.

Many award winners called the event the highlight of their career. They included Masaaki Miki of Japan's Fuji Film corporation, part of a trio that developed a new form of digital intermediate film called ETERNA-RDI, used to reproduce film digital masters.

"Just one word: we did it!" the native Japanese speaker yelled at the end of the evening.

(Editing by Alan Elsner)

She’s no stranger to the promotional trail, and last night (October 1) Olivia Wilde was spotted paying a visit to “The Late Show with David Letterman.”

The “House” hottie looked amazing as she posed for the paparazzi outside the Ed Sullivan Theatre, sporting a grey dress with matching heels and a black jacket.

In related news, Ms. Wilde has recently signed on to star in the Paul Haggis thriller film “The Next Three Days,” slated to begin filming in Pittsburgh next week.

Olivia will be joining an already stellar cast including Russell Crowe, Elizabeth Banks, and Jonathan Tucker.

Paul Haggis begins filming his new movie, the Russell Crowe/Elizabeth Banks-starring thriller The Next Three Days, this week and, just in the nick of time, he’s fleshed out his cast with Olivia Wilde and Jonathan Tucker.

Wilde, the unbelievably gorgeous House star who’s slowly but surely turning her attentions to movies (she’ll next be seen in Tron: Legacy), will play a woman who befriends Crowe’s character as he tries to exonerate his wife (Banks) of a murder she claims she didn’t commit. We’ve no idea if ‘befriends’ has any bouncy-bouncy connotations at this juncture, by the way.

Tucker, who worked with Haggis on In The Valley Of Elah, will play a street thug – or urban entrepreneur, if you will - who runs a meth lab. So clearly the flick, based on the French movie Pour Elle, will take Crowe into some pretty murky areas.

Haggis is also producing the movie, which will shoot in Pittsburgh.

 

The lovely, charming, and talented Elizabeth Banks is in talks to star in Paul Haggis’ latest flick, the suspense thriller, The Next Three Days.

Based on the recent French hit, Pour Elle, Banks – who’s increasingly dipping into serious roles after a string of comedic movies made her name - would play Laura, a woman who’s jailed for a murder she didn’t commit (or did she? Etc. etc.). Russell Crowe has already signed on to play the husband who won’t, in the grandest tradition of Reeves & Mortimer, let it lie, and so begins his own investigation.

Sounds like it could be a pretty interesting thriller, and it certainly gives Haggis a chance to stretch as a director after the dramas, Crash and In The Valley Of Elah. Of course, this all means that we’re still no closer to a Due South movie, but we can still dream, right?

Filming on the Lionsgate flick is scheduled to begin next month. 

James McAvoy, Elizabeth Banks, Laura Linney and Anna Friel – who may or may not fight crime in their spare time as the superhero group, Helluvacast – have signed on to star in Jacob Estes’ black comedy, The Details.

McAvoy and Banks will star as a couple who discover that their back yard has been overrun by raccoons, which then leads to a series of disagreements and over-reactions… with (darkly) comedic results.

We’re not sure how Linney and Friel will factor into the plot, but it’s going to be fun seeing these four excellent actors spark off each other.

The Details will be Estes’ first movie since Mean Creek, waaaay back in 2004. He got the gig when producer Mark Gordon hired him to rewrite another script, but ended up reading The Details instead, and loved it.

Filming will start on the indie this summer in Seattle.
 

Actresses Leslie Mann and Elizabeth Banks will explore the comic side of bad relationships in "What Was I Thinking?," a movie based on the nonfiction book of the same name.

New Line has picked up the project.

In the book, Barbara Davilman and Liz Dubelman compiled 58 bad-boyfriend stories.

Producer Lynda Obst enlisted Susanna Fogel and Joni Lefkowitz, who wrote the Sarah Jessica Parker HBO pilot "The Washingtonienne," to come up with a movie story.

The film will revolve around a woman who gets dumped during her engagement party. Her friends spring into action and whisk her away on a ski trip for healing and hedonism. Threading through their adventures on the trip are four flashbacks dealing in "worst ex-boyfriend" tales.

"It's a story of how women help each other," said Obst. "And we do that by telling stories." Obst also described the project as "a girls' Apatow movie," referring to filmmaker Judd Apatow's signature male-centric comedy style.

Mann (who happens to be married to Apatow) would play a woman who dates a lot but never seems to have serious relationships, while Banks is a woman on the rebound. Two other lead female parts have yet to be cast.

Mann co-stars in the Zac Efron-toplined "17 Again." After that, she appears in Apatow's "Funny People," as well as Robert Rodriguez's "Short" and "I Love You Phillip Morris," starring Jim Carrey and Ewan McGregor.

Banks recently starred in the comedies "Zack and Miri Make a Porno" and "Role Models," as well as the horror movie "The Uninvited."

(Editing by Sheri Linden at Reuters)

The Money Shots is a new daily column here at JoBlo.com highlighting some of the very best scenes in movie history (at least according to us). All are presented to you in near DVD quality and in extended format. Money Shots will bring you the classics without fear of spoilers so if you haven't seen the movie advertised, you might want to watch the movie in its entirety first. In honor of this Friday's release of THE UNINVITED, where Elizabeth Banks plays an evil stepmother (check out the trailer here), we'll be taking a look at some of the worst moms in movie history this week! While we have lots of amazing footage to bring you, we do welcome your feedback on clips you'd like to see highlighted. Feel free to Strike Back below or send an e-mail to me (that's my address in the upper right-hand corner). Otherwise, sit back and enjoy the show!
THE GOONIES - "Kids Suck" -- click here to buy this DVD at Amazon.com --
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