Universal Pictures has set Josh Brolin to star in “Cartel,” the Asger Leth-directed drama that is now on track to begin production in January in Mexico City.  

 

Brolin steps into a role Sean Penn was set to play, until he left the project in June to take a movie business sabbatical for personal reasons.

Brian Grazer is producing for Imagine Entertainment. .

In the Peter Craig-scripted drama, Brolin will play a man on a mission to protect his son after his wife is brutally murdered in the gritty world of Mexican cartels. Hillary Seitz (“Eagle Eye”) is rewriting.

The drama is inspired by the 1993 Italian film "La scorta," which followed four cops' struggle to guard a special prosecutor trying to bring mob bosses to justice.

Robert Stone and Webster Stone will exec produce “Cartel.” Leth makes his dramatic feature directing debut, after helming the 2006 documentary "Ghosts of Cite Soleil."

Brolin continues a run that started with “No Country for Old Men” and “American Gangster,” followed by his Oscar-nominated turn in “Milk.” He recently wrapped a lead in Woody Allen’s untitled London feature, and the Warner Bros. drama “Jonah Hex.” Next up for Brolin is the Oliver Stone-directed “Wall Street 2: Money Never Sleeps” for Fox.

 

He’s repped by WME.

ICM has signed director Samuel Maoz, whose drama “Lebanon” won the Golden Lion at the Venice Film Festival.

Maoz was one of several filmmakers who were schmoozed by agents at the Toronto International Film Festival, where the film also played and was acquired by Sony Pictures Classics. The pic is based on Maoz’s personal experience as a soldier during Israel’s invasion of Lebanon in 1982.

“Lebanon” was the first dramatic feature for Maoz, who has a track record in documentaries. ICM also signed Australian filmmaker Robert Connolly at Toronto, where his film “Balibo” screened, with Anthony LaPaglia starring. 

Hugh Jackman,who just opened on Broadway in “A Steady Rain,” is in talks to star onscreen in the Shawn Levy-directed “Real Steel” for DreamWorks.

Pic is a Rocky-esque tale of a fighter who has to reinvent himself when human boxing becomes obsolete, replaced by 2000 pound human-like robots. Jackman is negotiating to play the ex-fighter, who becomes a Robot Boxing promoter, but whose chances of success are hampered by his access to sub-standard robot parts. That is until he discovers a discarded robot that always seems to win. The ex-fighter has also discovered he's the father of a 13-year old son, and they bond as the robot brawls its way toward the top.  

John Gatins is rewriting the current draft with Levy, and the studio is eyeing a May production start. 

Pic is being produced by Angry Films’ Don Murphy and Susan Montford. The executive producers are Steven Spielberg and ImageMovers troika Robert Zemeckis, Jack Rapke and Steve Starkey. Levy is also a producer.

Levy, who just completed the Fox comedy “Date Night” with Steve Carell and Tina Fey, came aboard the project several weeks ago. The studio hopes to get underway before next summer.

Jackman is starring opposite Daniel Craig in “A Steady Rain,” a Keith Huff play that opened Tuesday night at the Gerald Schoenfeld Theater. Jackman and Craig play lifelong best friends and partners on the Chicago police force. The play finishes its sold-out limited run on December 7. 

“Real Steel,” which was originally scripted by Dan Gilroy, has been rewritten by Les Bohem and then Gatins. 

The premise is based on a short story by Richard Matheson. It's a reunion between Matheson and Spielberg. Matheson wrote Spielberg’s directing debut, the telepic “Duel,” and he was story editor on Spielberg’s “Amazing Stories.”

The early works of Matheson--who is still writing in his 80s--continues to inform current Hollywood films. That includes the Will Smith-starrer “I Am Legend,” the upcoming Richard Kelly-directed Cameron Diaz-starrer “The Box,” the Imagine/Universal comedy "The Incredible Shrinking Man," and Summit Entertainment’s “Countdown,” which is based on Matheson’s short story “Death Ship,” and was scripted by "Wanted" writers Michael Brandt and Derek Haas.

Jackman is repped by WME.

Paramount Pictures has set December 4 as the limited launch date for “Up in the Air,” the Jason Reitman-directed adaptation of the Walter Kirn novel. Pic will broaden the following week, and then open wide on Christmas Day.

The studio’s release plans have been the subject of conversation since the film was warmly received at the Toronto International Film Festival. Prior to the fest, Paramount intended to begin its rollout November 13, going wide in early December. That would have put the film up against the Grant Heslov-directed “The Men Who Stare at Goats,” another Clooney-starrer which garnered strong reaction at Toronto.

Overture Films will release “Goats” wide on November 6. 

Paramount adjusted its release plan for “Up in the Air” to give each Clooney film its space in the marketplace, according to Paramount Pictures vice chairman Rob Moore. 

“Following the exceptional response `up in the Air’ and `the Men Who Stare at Goats’ received in Toronto, and with Overture releasing wide on November 6, we have made a strategic decision to release `Up in the Air’ at the beginning of December,” Moore said. “The film’s rollout will begin December 4, with the complete rollout plan to announce shortly. By shifting dates, we can ensure that both of George Clooney’s films have their best shots at success.”

It’s remarkable that a 32-year old crime committed by a 76 year old man who has not been in the U.S. since 1978 can stir such intense controversy in the community.

The debate resonated on a personal level with me because Roman Polanski has been a presence in my life for some forty years and I have occasionally argued with myself about his conduct.

Polanski is indeed a living cauldron – a man whose moods can signal both great warmth and also peril.

Cultured and well-read, Polanski can be the ideal dinner companion. As a filmmaker he becomes obsessive and stubbornly self-destructive. In the Hollywood of the ‘70s, he was the ultimate sybarite who was not content unless he was poised at a precipice. The Polanski of Paris became the devoted artist and family man – a man of maturity and perspective.

I’ve always felt a measure of guilt for the role I played in luring him to Hollywood. In the Paramount days I found the perfect Polanski property, a hit novel called “Rosemary’s Baby,” but I was unable to persuade Polanski to venture into the arms of a Hollywood studio. Robert Evans was brilliantly persuasive and he became Roman’s friend and mentor.

“Rosemary’s Baby” and “Chinatown” established Polanski’s reputation as a superstar filmmaker. The Manson murders, however, dredged up the dark years Polanski had tried to repress – his escape from the Nazis, then the Russians, the deaths of his loved ones.

I had never known anyone who, as a young man, had survived such searing tragedies. But even during his “hot” Hollywood years, danger seemed to hover nearby. Before Sharon Tate was murdered (she was eight months pregnant), several of his friends and working colleagues had met with bizarre accidents. I once said to Evans, “I love Roman, but he’s a dangerous person to have as a friend.”

It seemed as though Polanski courted danger, even after his incident in the hot tub and his resulting exile from the U.S.. He was always photographed at the wrong time with the wrong companions. Even as I knew he was working hard in film or theater, the “noise” around him suggested scandal and peril.

Two years ago, I spent time with him at the Cannes Film Festival, and he seemed to be in a buoyant mood. But when I asked him whether he’d ever like to live in Hollywood again, he was nervous and indecisive. It seemed as though he wanted the right to return and deal with the problems of the past. At the same time his life in Hollywood had, in some ways, been a re-run of the nightmares of his past.

Under the present circumstances, I hope he will never return whether by choice or by mandate of the court. Though I acknowledge that his crime was a hideous one, Roman Polanski is an artist who has suffered greatly, who has caused and survived great danger and who, after all, deserves to live his life.

Temple Hill Entertainment has acquired screen rights to “LA Candy,” the bestselling debut novel by Lauren Conrad, ex-star of reality series “The Hills” and “Laguna Beach.”

Temple Hill partners Marty Bowen and Wyck Godfrey will produce. Conrad will be executive producer through her Blue Eyed Girl Productions banner. The book was published in June by Harper Collins and has been on the bestseller lists of The New York Times for 14 weeks.

It amounts to a teaming between the exec producers of "Twilight" and one of the leading lights of youth-geared reality shows. Informed by Conrad’s experiences, “LA Candy” tells the story of a 19-year old who moves to Hollywood, quickly finds fame as a reality series star, and then has to deal with the ramifications of living a surreal fishbowl life. Conrad plans to write two more books on the reality travails of protagonist Jane Roberts.

“Lauren, who became an icon in that reality show world, came to us with a structure of how to tell the story in an interesting fashion, that was separate and apart from the book,” Bowen said. “We loved her take. Her book is an honest portrayal of what it must be like to set out to be normal, then sign on to become famous and eventually realize, wow, this isn’t at all what I’d planned for myself.”

Bowen said they will set a writer before looking for a studio/financier for the project, which was sold by UTA. Conrad will be involved in shaping the direction of the script.

Conrad’s film deal comes the same week she launched a line of clothing that is being sold exclusively at Kohl’s.

Temple Hill is exec producer of the “Twilight” sequels “New Moon” and “Eclipse,” and is producing the Screen Gems drama “Dear John,” which stars Amanda Seyfried and Channing Tatum, directed by Lasse Hallstrom.

CBS Films is in talks with George Tillman Jr. to direct “Faster,” an action drama that Dwayne Johnson will star in. Production is set for January, 2010.

Johnson will play an ex-con bent on avenging the death of his brother, who was murdered 10 years earlier when the two were double-crossed during a heist.

When Johnson began negotiating, his “Gridiron Gang” helmer Phil Joanou was expected to direct the film, but he dropped out several months ago. Joe and Tony Gayton wrote the script. Tillman last directed the Notorious B.I.G. biopic, “Notorious.”

Tillman’s State Street partner, Bob Teitel, is expected to join the roster of producers that include Castle Rock’s Martin Shafer and Liz Glotzer. Joe Gayton will be exec producer.

Pic is a coproduction between CBS Films and Sony Pictures Wordwide Acquisitions Group.

The great Larry Gelbart died Sept 11 at age 81, and, typically he left behind a stack of amazing projects that were not quite ready for prime time. I’ve been told that Gelbart’s will mandated the following inscription on his grave: “At last…a plot.”

A profile of Gelbart appeared in the latest edition of Written By, Richard Stayton’s excellent Writers Guild magazine, and it contained several Gelbartisms. Among them:

“The question you’re asked most on the senior circuit is “How do you start?” My question is, “How do you finish?”

“I just turned 81 and I’m not going to be Judd Apatow. I was Judd Apatow.”

“There’s nothing new. What we keep getting are new people who insist on saying the old things over and over again. Life is on a loop.”

Gelbart, who gave us “Oh, God” and “Tootsie” and “MASH” and “Sly Fox” and myriad other treasures had been working on an autobiographical play, a musical version of “Tootsie,” a sequel to “Oh, God” and many other scripts as well. “I need to write,” he explained. “I need to know what I think about things.”

Gelbart appreciated the attention he got late in life, but it also worried him. “I’m like some kind of Hollywood monument. They circle me at meetings and say, ‘My god, he’s alive. He wears shoes.’”

Upon being told that his photo would be the cover of Written By, he said, “The magazine waits until you look like something off Galapagos Islands, then they put you on the cover.”

There will never be another Larry Gelbart.

There’s a sense of outrage throughout the community about the Roman Polanski affair, but leave it to the brain dead editorial board of the Los Angeles Times to defend the L.A. District Attorney. Forget the fact that the case dates back to 1977, that the judge behaved improperly, that the “victim” in the case has said “leave it alone” and that the D.A. should have better things to do with his funds – the Times nonetheless insists that the 76 year old filmmaker must return to L.A..

In making this demand, the Times’ chief editorial writer, Nicholas Goldberg, betrays the same dumb rigidity as does Steve Cooley, the L.A. District Attorney. The irony is that Polanski is in the midst of editing a  movie called “Ghost.” The subtext of the story concerns the mindless rigidity of England’s former prime minister, Tony Blair, in supporting the Bush policy in Iraq.

I believe Roman Polanski should be left alone to finish his movie and that the Los Angeles court system has more urgent issues to contend with.

Peter Chernin’s transition from News Corp. exec to producer at 20th Century Fox is just getting underway, and he has come aboard several film projects being developed by the studio.

The flashiest of the bunch is “The Deep Blue Goodbye,” an adaptation of the John D. MacDonald mystery novel series that has Leonardo DiCaprio attached to star.

Chernin joins Appian Way’s DiCaprio and Jennifer Davisson-Killoran as producers on a project that has a strong draft by Dana Stevens (“For Love of the Game”) that is drawing interest from directors. Amy Robinson is also involved in a producing capacity. 

DiCaprio is in line to play Travis McGee, a self-described beach bum who lives aboard the 52-foot houseboat The Busted Flush, and alleviates his cash flow problems by hiring on as a “salvage consultant.” He recovers property for clients, taking a hefty percentage and getting into a lot of danger and romance in sun-drenched Florida. “The Deep Blue Goodbye,” the first of a 21 volume bestselling series, was originally published in 1964.

Chernin, who in June named veteran Universal Pictures production exec Dylan Clark to run his film division, is expected to emerge as an aggressive buyer for material to feed both his film and TV shingles. Clark, who signed when he had six months left on his U contract, doesn’t officially start until October.

Aside from “Deep Blue Goodbye,” Chernin is coming aboard several other percolating Fox projects. 

They include “Queen & Country,” an adaptation of the Greg Rucka-created Oni Press comic book about a female agent hunted after she carries out a high-level assassination in Eastern Europe. Ryan Condal is writing the script. Jenno Topping was already aboard as producer.

Chernin has also joined as producer on “Man and Wife,” an Alan McElroy action-thriller spec about a hit man who pretends to be an average husband, and a wife who learns to love him in a totally unexpected way. Ralph Winter came attached to produce when the project was acquired in 2008.

Execs transitioning to producers often get started by coming aboard projects they shepherded or liked. Observers said that Chernin’s deal is so strong—he has two “put pictures” per year for the next six years—that he can be a powerful ally in getting pictures made at a time when mounting mid-budget dramas is more difficult than ever.