Bana returns to life of crime in Deadfall

Will Deadfall be the scariest performance of Eric Bana's career? Picture: Magnolia Pictures Source: Supplied

William Colvin, News.com.au, reports

He’s played everything from Delta Force operatives to big green monsters, but it looks like Australian actor Eric Bana is returning to the kind of role that put him on the map: the hardened criminal.

Most famous for his gritty portrayal of infamous Aussie crim Mark 'Chopper' Reed, the first trailer for Bana’s new film Deadfall has just hit the web, in which he plays a psychotic criminal on the run after a robbery gone wrong.

The film’s subject matter and star studded cast, which includes Olivia Wilde and Kris Kristofferson, could make it a must-see, despite the mixed reviews it received at the Tribeca Film Festival in April.

The trailer gives us a hint at what to expect with plenty of murder, car-crashes and calm yet highly sinister hyperbole from Bana’s character. At the very least it can’t be worse than the 1993 film of the same name, in which Nicholas Cage gave what was widely believed to be the worst performance of his career.

Eric Bana no longer attached to film Elvis & Nixon

Eric Bana says he is no longer involved with making the film Elvis & Nixon. Picture: Craig Barritt/Getty Images for Heineken/AFP Source: AFP

The Herald Sun reports

Eric Bana has confirmed he won't be whipping out his blue suede shoes to play Elvis in a coming bio-pic.

The Aussie heart-throb lined up last October to play the rock and roll king in movie Elvis & Nixon.

But Bana told The Hollywood Reporter he was no longer involved.

"I'm not doing that. I was attached for a while, but I'm no longer attached," he said at the Tribeca Film Festival screening of his latest movie Deadfall.

The story focuses on a meeting between Elvis and US President Richard Nixon at the White House in 1970.

Gum leaf mafia spreads its branches

Red Dog star ... Rachael Taylor shines. Photo: Getty Images

Michael Idato, The Age, reports

In the corridors of power in Los Angeles they call it, jokingly, Aussiewood. But the invasion of the film and television industry's Mecca by Australian actors is a very serious business.

First there was Mel, Nicole, Russell, Hugh and Cate. Then the LaPaglia brothers, Heath Ledger, Miranda Otto, Guy Pearce and Julian McMahon. To that we add Melissa George, Eric Bana, Rachel Griffiths, Matt Passmore, Sam Worthington, Ryan Kwanten and Josh Lawson. For the 2012 television ''pilot'' season we can add almost a dozen more names, some well known, some still emerging, who form the vanguard of Australia's biggest Hollywood invasion in recent memory.

Almost 100 pilots will be filmed during the pilot season, for the US broadcast networks ABC, CBS, NBC, Fox and the CW, and leading cable channels such as FX, HBO and Showtime. Not all survive but for emerging Hollywood talent they are a toehold on the entertainment industry's main game.

Of those pilots, easily the most Australian is Americana in which Anthony LaPaglia will play a fashion industry titan and Natalie Mendoza will play a ''beautiful 30-something bitch''. To rub a little more Australian salt into the wound, Rabbit-Proof Fence director Phil Noyce will co-produce and direct the pilot.

Other pilots featuring Australians include the futuristic military thriller Last Resort, which stars Dichen Lachman, Daisy Betts and Daniel Lissing, a more traditional firehouse drama Chicago Fire with former House star Jesse Spencer and a supernatural thriller 666 Park Avenue, which will star Rachael Taylor.

There are no fewer than two iterations of the Beauty and the Beast tale in development as pilots and both feature Australians in lead roles. Chris Egan and Meegan Warner will star in a version that remains true to the Disney fairytale for the US network ABC, and Jay Ryan will star in a contemporary take on the story for the CW.

American television industry analyst Nellie Andreeva last week described casting non-American actors as leads for US television shows ''a growing trend over the past decade''. Notable examples include Welsh-born Matthew Rhys (Brothers & Sisters) and Ioan Gruffudd (Ringer), English-born Damian Lewis (Homeland) and Hugh Laurie (House) and New Zealand-born Martin Henderson (Off the Map).

Australian casting director Faith Martin says the trend is in part due to a more ''universal'' process in American casting and producers who are more mindful that overseas program sales are a bigger part of the balance sheet.

''They are choosing people who will speak to a more universal audience,'' Martin says. ''Equally, a lot of our actors are well trained, they have a basic training that is a little more thorough.''

Martin also said US casting directors were drawn to the ''natural beauty'' of Australian actors. ''There is a naturalness here that I think they find very attractive … underneath that is solid training and the ability to do the job.''

The former Seinfeld star Jason Alexander framed it in much simpler terms on Twitter. ''Amazing preponderance of Brit and Aussie actors in US TV and films,'' he wrote. ''Conclusion: we must really suck.''

Eric Bana replaced by Gerard Butler in Robert Luketic's diamond heist thriller Brilliant

First movie role since rehab ... Actor Gerard Butler at the 2012 Vanity Fair Oscar Party in West Hollywood, California. Picture: Pascal Le Segretain/Getty Images/AFP Source: AFP

The Daily Telegraph reports

Australian actor Eric Bana is out of Robert Luketic's diamond heist thriller Brilliant.

Bana, 43, has been replaced by Gerard Butler.

Bana was first linked to the role back in September 2011, but has since been recruited to an as-yet-untitled terrorism thriller from Intermission director John Crowley, magazine Variety reported.

Butler, who starred in the 2006 movie 300, will play a small-time crook who gets dragged into a major robbery and will see Butler and Luketic reunite for the first time since their 2009 romantic comedy The Ugly Truth.

Cameron Diaz will portray Butler's female accomplice in Brilliant and a female lead is still to be recruited, according to Variety.

Butler's reported signing comes days after the 42-year-old completed a three-week rehab programme to combat a prescription drug dependency.

He was last seen in Marc Foster's Machine Gun Preacher, where he played a drug-dealing biker-turned-protector of Sudanese child soldiers.

Luketic gathers a team for a heist

Robert Luketic directs Gerard Butler and Katherine Heigl on the set of The Ugly Truth. Photo: Saeed Adyani

Philippa Hawker, The Age, reports

The Australian director is entertaining a host of ideas, including television projects, as he prepares to shoot a feature here.

AFTER a succession of Hollywood movies, director and Victorian College of the Arts graduate Robert Luketic (Legally Blonde, Monster-in-Law) is back in town, with plans to shoot a feature in Australia for the first time.

He has closed a deal with Eric Bana, he says, to star in Brilliant, a heist movie that is due to start production in April next year. At the moment, he's checking out locations. ''Whether it's shot in Sydney or in Melbourne remains to be seen. I know for sure a portion of it requires Melbourne, but we don't know how much time we will spend in each place.''

There are plenty of other elements not yet in place. Bana - who is in New Orleans playing Elvis - is on board, ''as the first piece of the puzzle,''Luketic says. ''I have this wild dream that I will get Geoffrey Rush to play the co-lead, and I have my eye on Rose Byrne and Mila Kunis, but it's early days, none of that's confirmed.''

Bana's character ''steals priceless objects for the sport of it''. His associate is a streetwise young woman who is a small-time pickpocket. There's a massive diamond heist, Luketic says, and a set-up with some unexpected twists.

''There's a wonderful thing that happens - it's very refreshing, it's not what you think it is, and it's one of the reasons I wanted to do the movie.''

One of his inspirations is Norman Jewison's visually inventive 1968 caper movie, The Thomas Crown Affair. But for the music, he wants a contemporary feel. He is on the lookout for ''an interesting DJ or someone who works in electronic music to make a piece for us''. He is also keen to talk to the English outfit the xx, and plans to ''jump on a plane and hunt them down''.

But Brilliant isn't the only thing on his mind. He has turned to television for the first time, with three projects in development: a legal procedural show that he is working on with the CW network in the United States; ''a darker, more cable-style story of a woman with three kids who runs an upmarket escort ring; and a third series, the tale of a dynastic American family and an unexpected inheritance.

He is executive producer, and would shoot the pilot. A lot of feature directors are interested in working on TV now, he says, because cable will take risks that studios aren't prepared to consider.

There are also ''a lot of other movies competing for my time'', he says, including a film to be shot in China, and another in New York. ''You have to entertain a few things at once … one may not happen and another may be postponed.'' In fact, he says, as we have been speaking, he has had three emails updating him on various projects.

He is discussing an all-Australian project with Sydney animation and special effects outfit Animal Logic (Happy Feet). ''We're very guarded in the world of animation,'' he says, adding he can't go into detail but it's ''uniquely Australian, it's set in Queensland, and it's very cool''.

He is also planning to find time for his role as mentor for the film and video component of the Qantas Spirit of Young Australia awards. Entrants can be filmmakers aged between 18 and 30, and entries close on March 30 next year.

Luketic, who recently got his pilot's licence - ''I have a share in a jet and I fly myself around'' - will make himself available, for a year, for the winner. He is keen to share his experiences, to show that it's not just about ''getting your foot in the door, but about how to be a survivor and have a career, regardless of which part of the business you work in''.

He is particularly struck, he says, by the way the film world seems to be polarised, more than ever, between ''your $100-million-plus big studio movies and ultra-ultra-low-budget films - we don't even say 'low budget' any more. But in between, it's dwindling. It's either rich or poor. It's an interesting time, globally.''

www.soya.com.au

Aussie actor Eric Bana to play Elvis Presley in "Elvis & Nixon"

Michelle Castillo, CBS News, reports

(CBS) An unlikely meeting between Elvis and Nixon is going to get the movie treatment, and Eric Bana going to play the King, according to the Hollywood Reporter.

In addition to starring in Elvis & Nixon, the Hollywood Reporter said that Bana will also act as executive producer through his company, Pick Up Truck Pictures. This is the first U.S. production for Bana's company.

The movie revolves around the Dec. 21, 1970 meeting between Presley and Nixon. Presley had requested a meeting with the former president through a six-page letter, in which he asked to become a "Federal Agent-at-Large" in the Bureau of Narcotics and Dangerous Drugs. The musician presented Nixon with family photos and a Colt 45 pistol during the meeting.

Danny Huston is in talks to play Nixon, the Hollywood Reporter added.

The film marks the first directorial effort from Cary Elwes, best known for his starring role in The Princess Bride. Elwes will next be seen in The Adventures of Tintin: The Secret of the Unicorn. Variety said Elwes was fascinated by how this unlikely meeting was able to take place, and decided to make it the subject of his first film. Elwes also wrote the screenplay along with Joey Sagal and Hanala Sagal.