Undead Boy Meets Undead Girl in 'Breathers'

New details about Diablo Cody’s adaptation of S.G. Browne’s Breathers: A Zombie’s Lament surfaced today. The project, announced last February, has been laboring in development. Now, the script is being shopped to directors, and Joseph Gordon-Levitt and Scarlett Johansson are “loosely attached” to the project. Read the full story

From the people who brought you Juno, the trailer will surely read. And that’s the truth. Screenwriter Diablo Cody and writer/director Jason Reitman have teamed up to shoot Young Adult, a film about a ghost writer who comes to realize that her identity is lost in her pseudonym, then decides to try and get it back. [Deadline Hollywood] The ghost writer will be played by Charlize Theron, who hasn’t done much over the last couple of years, save stuff like The Road and Hancock.

Theron’s character goes back home to see her high school boyfriend, who’s married with kids.

The project’s being shopped around the studios, and apparently Mandate Pictures will get producer Steve Rales (The Darjeeling Limited) to come on to finance, courtesy of Reitman’s connections.

This reads like something between Stranger Than Fiction and ABC’s October Road. I can dig something like that, as long as Cody’s writing grows with her characters’ ages.

What do you think of this project? Theron? Reitman? Cody?

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Diablo Cody, Academy Award winning scribe of Juno fame and more recently Jennifer’s Body, hard at work on her TV series The United States of Tara, has also been developing a couple new big screen stories, Vulture is reporting in an interview [via The Playlist].

The first is an unnamed project involving a female anti-hero who is stalking her high school sweetheart. She referenced a lack of the female archetype of this character: “You don’t get to see women be antiheroes that often, where it’s like somebody like Mickey Rourke, who gets a comeback in The Wrestler. It’s rarer that you’ll have a studio say, ‘Let’s have an actress come back and be ugly!’” Read the full story

After experiencing an ultra-successful 2009 — not to mention the Oscar possibilities that still lie ahead — it’s safe to say that pretty much everyone has their eye on Jason Reitman. Well, according to this article from /Film, the man behind Up in the Air has lined up his next project. After some speculation that Jay and Mark Duplass were working on a script for Reitman to direct, it turns out that the brothers instead will direct the film themselves, with Reitman on board to produce. Read the full story

20th Century Fox | US | 102 mins

Jennifer’s Body comes from the Oscar winning mind of Diablo Cody, the writer behind the very good Juno and the highly enjoyable United States of Tara. This film features the same form of dialog — hipster lingo filled with pop culture references. It’s less successful this time around due to the scare-less gags, hit and miss comedy and the fact that there’s no character that is nearly as compelling as Juno. It tries to find the perfect balance between horror and comedy, and it just doesn’t work as well as it should. That doesn’t mean at all that it’s bad considering it is still enjoyable, but it still never reaches its fullest potential.

After a voodoo sacrifice event, the beautiful and condescending Jennifer (Megan Fox) becomes a man eating demon. She obtains this curse after being taken away to a voodoo sacrifice event after a blazing fire erupts at a crappy small town bar. From there on, she’s hungry for eating horny teen boys. While Jenifer continues to devour boys to feed her appetite, her BFF Needy (Amanda Seyfried) is hesitant and unsure about what to do. She’s lived under Jenifer’s gigantic shadow throughout her whole life and now she must kill her. After finally getting rid of this hesitation, she’s ready to stop Jennifer after she starts eyeing her dorky boyfriend Chip.

This was obviously intended to be a throwback to the fun horror comedies of the 80′s, but all it does is rehash old tricks. The story is, for the most part, fairly predictable. As stated earlier, this is extremely formulaic. When characters such as the jock and the hilarious goth kid are introduced, its not hard to predict their character’s fates. There’s also a few plot points that aren’t fully expanded on. Needy’s relationship with her mother is a completely wasted subplot and the rules of Jennifer’s condition also aren’t fully explained. When she’s full and fed, is she back to normal and just aware of her curse/actions? Is she just partial demon during these moments? Does she enjoy this power? The film never explains. Much of the story feels half baked and rushed. It’s messy and not very original, and it also features one of the year’s most cringe worthy and laughably over dramatic death scenes. Read the full story

20th Century Fox has released the first trailer for the upcoming Jennifer’s Body over at Shock Til You Drop, the trailer was originally suppose to debut this Friday with Bruno. The story revolves round high schooler Jennifer who becomes possessed by a boy eating demon. After her best friend Needy learns about her demon and boy eating problem she learns she must fight her off to save all the boys and herself. Jennifer’s Body is written by Diablo Cody and is directed by Karyn Kusama (Aeon Flux). The film also stars Megan Fox, Amanda Seyfried, J.K. Simmons, Adam Brody, and Amy Sedaris. Jennifer’s Body hits theaters September 18th, 2009.

This actually looks surprisingly good. Not enough horror comedies are released now a days, except for the great Drag Me to Hell which was criminally overlooked by general audiences. Its got everything the horror geek inside of me wants i.e lots of over-the-top blood, a funny story, and cheesy one liners. Another aspect that I am so impressed by is that Megan Fox actually looks good here. Maybe she was right that she could be a good actress if she was given the right material, which she wont get from the Transformers films. She looks funny, scary, and even kind of intimidating. Hopefully the end product lives up to this fun trailer.

Are you still excited for Jennifer’s Body? What do you think of this trailer?

/Film reported today that Megan Fox’s (Transformers) new film Jennifer’s Body has been given an R rating by the MPAA (Motion Picture Association of America). But don’t get your hopes up for any nudity from Fox. According to the official rating the R was received for “sexuality, bloody violence, language and brief drug use”. The film is written by Diablo Cody, the Oscar winning scribe behind Juno. The film is directed by Karyn Kusama (Aeon Flux) and also stars J.K. Simmons, Amanda Seyfried, Adam Brody, Amy Sedaris, and Chris Pratt.

Jennifer’s Body hits theaters September 18th, 2009.

Are you looking foward to Jennifer’s Body? Did you expect this rating?