De Palma to direct 'Untouchables' prequel
Brian De Palma has returned to the scene of the crime for ''The Untouchables: Capone Rising," a prequel to his 1987 hit film about lawman Eliot Ness's takedown of Al Capone.
The film, to be written by ''Rounders" scribes Brian Koppelman and David Levien, centers on young Capone's arrival in Chicago and his rise to criminal kingpin status. The drama charts his collision course with Irish cop Johnny Malone, the character played in the original film by Sean Connery. Antoine Fuqua was originally attached to direct.
De Palma became interested in the subject matter over the past two months, and the hope is to get the prequel into production next year.
INTO AFRICA: Leonardo DiCaprio is in negotiations to make his next picture ''The Blood Diamond," which will be directed by Ed Zwick. Set in Sierra Leone circa 1999, a time when the nation was in the midst of a horrific civil war, the film would have DiCaprio play the role of a smuggler who specializes in the sale of ''blood diamonds," also known as ''conflict diamonds" -- the precious stones used to finance rebellions, privateers, and terrorists. When he encounters a farmer whose young son has disappeared into an army of child soldiers, the fates of the two men become linked.
FAMILY TIME: Luke Wilson has joined the cast of the family picture ''Hoot," which will be directed by Wil Shriner.
Wilson will play a bumbling cop stymied by middle schoolers, played by Logan Lerman and Brie Larson, on a crusade to save an owl habitat. The movie is based on Carl Hiaasen's bestseller and revolves around a Montana boy who moves to Florida and unearths a threat to the local population of endangered owls.
Wilson's upcoming credits include ''The Family Stone" with Diane Keaton, and the Mike Judge comedy ''Idiocracy."
PARTNERS: ''Dirty Pretty Things" star Chiwetel Ejiofor will play Denzel Washington's cop partner in ''The Inside Man," a drama that Spike Lee is directing.
Ejiofor plays detective Bill Mitchell, who helps detective Miller (Washington) unravel a tense hostage situation as he matches wits with a bank robber who sets out to pull off the perfect robbery. Clive Owen and Jodie Foster also star. Russell Gewirtz and Menno Meyjes wrote the script.
SPY KID: Sophie Okonedo, Alicia Silverstone, Bill Nighy, Mickey Rourke, and Damian Lewis have been cast in ''Stormbreaker," the movie version of Anthony Horowitz's bestseller that starts shooting today. Geoffrey Sax (''White Noise") directs the film.
In ''Stormbreaker," Brit teen Alex Pettyfer will play reluctant spy Alex Rider. Missi Pyle, Ashley Walters, and Sarah Bolger will also star in the story of a 14-year-old orphan who finds himself forced to work for MI6.
HIS NEXT STEP: Ryan Shiraki, a former producer for ''Saturday Night Live," is adapting and directing a film version of David Leavitt's short story ''Family Dancing," which revolves around a dysfunctional family that is forced to reunite for a graduation party. Material from wires services was used in this report.
