Sure Shots: Antonio Banderas; Shirley MacLaine; Kate Winslet

* Antonio Banderas has made a hell of comeback. No longer making crap like Spy Kids(he was cut from the last film), he found his stride again with the twisted The Skin I Live In, and will appear in Steven Soderbergh's Haywire next week. Now he's set to step into the shoes of late Cuban dictator, Fidel Castro, in Castro's Daughter. The story will focus on Alina Fernandez, Castro's daughter who escaped disguised as a tourist and wrote the autobiography on which the film is based. The script is by Bobby Moresco(Crash) and Nilo Cruz, directed by Michael Radford(Il Postino) [ScreenDaily]

* After nearly two decades trying to get a remake off the ground of 1947's Danny Kaye classic, The Secret Life of Walter Mitty, the ball finally got rolling for real last summer when Ben Stiller came aboard to star and direct. Now with a spring start date being eyed, the cast is starting to come together. Shirley MacLaine has joined the film, playing the mother of Walter Mitty, a forgettable guy who is bossed around by everyone in his life. His only escape is his vivid imagination, in which he dreams all sorts of exciting things for himself, but in reality these thoughts only land him in trouble. Look for this one to land some time in 2013. [Deadline]

* Kate Winslet is jumping back into Oscar fare, after taking a bit of a break in 2011. Her next project appears to be an adaptation of The Guernsey Literary and Potato Peel Society, to be directed by Kenneth Branagh. Set just after the conclusion of WWII, Winslet plays Juliet Ashton, a writer in search of a story. When a man from Guernsey(off the coast of Normandy) she's never met discovers a book with her name in it, the two begin a correspondence that changes her life forever. He and his eccentric colleagues in a secret society society share stories about the island, their lives, and how the German occupation affected them. With Winslet, Branagh, and a script by Don Roos(The Opposite of Sex) expect this one to be a major factor next Oscar season. Filming is expected to begin in March. [TheDailyMail]