Pierce Brosnan and Ashley Greene have the 'Urge'; Catherine Zeta-Jones is 'The Godmother'

Pierce Brosnan is set to star in Urge, and hopefully it turns out better than The November Man did. Directed by Aaron Kaufman, the film has Brosnan as the creator of a designer drug that causes a group of friends to lose their ability to control urges. One of those friends will be Twilight actress Ashley Greene, who will play Theresa.  Filming begins this month. [Deadline/THR]

Speaking of drugs, Catherine Zeta-Jones will star as Colombian drug lord Griselda Blanco in The Godmother. Directed by Eva Sørhaug (90 Minutes), the film will chronicle Blanco's violent rise to the top of the Medellin cartel, the only woman to do so. She didn't become known as La Madrina (the "Black Widow") for nothing. For more on her, check out the great documentary, Cocaine Cowboys. [Deadline]

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Trailer for Zach Braff's Kickstarter-Funded 'Wish I Was Here'

If you need a director who can find just the right indie band to score a major crossroads in somebody's life, that guy is probably Zach Braff. A decade after doing just that with his directorial debut, Garden State, he's back with his follow-up, Wish I Was Here, and now there's a new trailer that expands upon the teaser from a few weeks ago.

Braff leads the ensemble which includes Kate Hudson, Donald Faison, Joey King, Ashley Greene, Josh Gad, and Mandy Patinkin, playing a failed actor and struggling father forced to reconsider his entire approach to life. Basically this is pure Braff and everything that entails, so if you don't mind that his movies look like music video soap operas then this is something you'll be anticipating.

Wish I Was Here opens in limited release July 18th before expanding the next two weeks.

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First Trailer for Zach Braff's 'Wish I Was Here'

There's very little elbow room when it comes to Zach Braff's directorial debut, Garden State; you either love it or you loathe it. Sure it was trendy and came to symbolize the sort of maudlin, pretentious indie flick that became a thing for far too long, but it also featured some great performances along with a point-of-view that was uniquely Braff's. It's taken him a decade and a pile of Kickstarter cash, but he's finally back with his follow-up project, Wish I Was Here, and basically if you dug Garden State then this is for you.

Debuting in January at the Sundance Film Festival, where critics were either lukewarm or downright deadly to it. Braff plays a struggling actor (hey, how novel) with a wife and kids, who decides to home school his children to save money. Not that you'll get any of that out of this trailer, which looks more like a music video for an indie band than a music video. The score is actually provided by The Shins, who got their big break with Garden State and probably worship the ground Braff walks on at this point.

Also starring Kate Hudson, Ashley Greene, Josh Gad, Mandy Patinkin, Jim Parsons, Joey King, and Donald Faison, Wish I Was Here opens July 25th.


Wish I Was Here Teaser by Stuff We Like

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Emily Ratajkowski joins 'Entourage'; Ashley Greene Enters 'Shangra-La Suite'; Shea Whigham Gets 'Term Life'

* From video vixen to movie star, Emily Ratajkowski has made the most of being the hot chick in Robin Thicke's 'Blurred Lines'. She's already wrapped up her role in David Fincher's Gone Girl opposite Ben Affleck, and now she's joined the starry cast of Entourage. Adrian Grenier, Kevin Connolly, Jerry Ferrara, Kevin Dillon and Jeremy Piven are back in the big screen version of the HBO series, with new faces including Billy Bob Thornton, Haley Joel Osment, Kid Cudi, and Liam Neeson. Directed by Doug Ellin, Entourage opens June 12th 2015.

* Strange casting as Ashley Greene will play Priscilla Pressley in Shangra-La Suite, opposite Ron Livingston as Elvis. Directed and co-written by Eddie O'Keefe, the film doesn't seem to have all that much to do with their relationship at all. Instead it's "set in 1974 and focuses on two troubled 20-year-olds who set out to kill The King." Interesting premise. [Deadline]

* Shea Whigham, who tends to be awesome in pretty much everything, has joined the Vince Vaughn action flick, Term Life. Directed by Peter Billingsley (Ralphie from A Christmas Story), the film has Vaughn as a low life that the entire criminal underworld wants dead. In a rare act of selflessness he takes out a $1M insurance policy to benefit his estranged daughter, only to discover that it doesn't take affect for 21 days, meaning he'll have to stay alive until then. Pretty cool concept, and with a cast that includes Hailee Steinfeld, Bill Paxton, Mike Epps, Jordi Molla, Jonathan Banks, and William Levy, this could be the first Vaughn in awhile worth getting excited over. Whigham will play a vice cop estranged from his own family. [THR]

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Sure Shots: Wendi McLendon-Covey; Ashley Greene; Maria Bello

* After starring in the long-running Reno 911, getting her big screen break in Bridesmaids, and turning up as one of the few highlights in What to Expect When You're Expecting, Wendi McLendon-Covey has shown she can shine even in an ensemble. She'll have a chance to prove it again as she's taken the first of four female leads in Tyler Perry's Single Moms Club. She'll play a snobbish book publisher wrestling with her personal and professional life in the film about four single mothers who bond after a school incident brings them together. Perry will write, direct, and star when production begins later this month. Hopefully he won't cast himself as one of the other single moms?  [Variety]

* Even though I loved Oliver Blackburn's rather racy and very violent thriller, Donkey Punch, I figured enough people hated it or didn't see it that we would never see him behind the camera again. Fortunately I was wrong, and he's back with his follow-up, the horror Satanic. Formerly titled Kristy, the film currently stars Haley Bennett(Kaboom), and has now added Ashley Greene(Twilight) to the story of a group of college kids who are attacked in their dorms over the Thanksgiving holiday. The script comes from Vanishing on Seventh Street's Anthony Jaswinski. [The Wrap]

* Already one of the most anticipated films of next year, Denis Villeneuve's Prisoners has gotten better with the addition of Maria Bello to the cast. Written by Aaron Guzikowski(Contraband), and starring Hugh Jackman, Melissa Leo, Jake Gyllenhaal, and Paul Dano, the story follows a small town carpenter(Jackman) who takes matters into his own hands when the cops fail to find his kidnapped daughter and her best friend. Bello will play Jackman's wife, with production set to begin early in 2013. [Deadline]

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Trailer Time: 'The Apparition', starring Ashley Greene and Sebastian Stan

You'd think at some point they'd figure out that by saying a supernatural horror is "based on true events" doesn't actually make a movie any scarier. It was a tactic that worked perfectly well back in the days of The Amityville Horror but this is a totally different time, and people are too savvy(or maybe cynical is a better word?) and smart to buy into the thought of some evil poltergeist ratting the silverware and slamming cabinet doors as a real thing. We don't need to be told "Hey, this is real!" for a movie to make us feel like it could happen. Yet every single time we get another exorcism or haunted house flick, you can bet on it beginning with those words: 'based on true events".

The trailer for The Apparition takes a slightly different tract, but its goal is exactly the same. The film is indeed based on the supposedly real university experiment that set out to prove the supernatural can be brought into existence through the power of thought. That if we simply believe in them strong enough, spirits and ghosts can be brought into reality.  The eager(read: moronic) group of scientists succeed all too well, and unleash the forces into the world, where they proceed to terrorize a young couple played Ashley Greene(Twilight) and Sebastian Stan(Captain America: The First Avenger). Tom Felton(Harry Potter), who is so much better than this, co-stars as the friend who knows more about the supernatural than anybody should. Todd Lincoln wrote and directed the film, and to me it just looks like a completely generic thriller best left to $5 DVD bins. I could be wrong, but the trailer doesn't hold a lot of promise. Why anybody would think that adding scientific formulas and reasoning to a horror movie would be effective is beyond me. The Apparition is set to open on August 24th....

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