Irish Director To Direct Akira

The second screen version of the Ben Hecht/Charles MacArthur play The Front Page, His Girl Friday changed hard-driving newspaper reporter Hildy Johnson from a man to a woman, transforming the story into a scintillating battle of the sexes. Rosalind Russell plays Hildy, about to foresake journalism for marriage to cloddish Bruce Baldwin (Ralph Bellamy). Cary Grant plays Walter Burns, Hildy’s editor and ex-husband, who feigns happiness about her impending marriage as a ploy to win her back. The ace up Walter’s sleeve is a late-breaking news story concerning the impending execution of anarchist Earl Williams (John Qualen), a blatant example of political chicanery that Hildy can’t pass up. The story gets hotter when Williams escapes and is hidden from the cops by Hildy and Walter–right in the prison pressroom. His Girl Friday may well be the fastest comedy of the 1930s, with kaleidoscope action, instantaneous plot twists, and overlapping dialogue. And if you listen closely, you’ll hear a couple of in jokes, one concerning Cary Grant’s real name (Archie Leach), and another poking fun at Ralph Bellamy’s patented poor sap screen image. Subsequent versions of The Front Page included Billy Wilder’s 1974 adaptation, which restored Hildy Johnson’s manhood in the form of Jack Lemmon, and 1988’s Switching Channels, which cast Burt Reynolds in the Walter Burns role and Kathleen Turner as the Hildy Johnson counterpart.~ Hal Erickson, All Movie Guide

The classic Anime flick  is to be made by Irish director Ruairi Robinson, reports Variety. The six part graphic novel will be split into two movies with Leonardo DiCaprio officially involved as producer and possibly star. The plot takes place in New Tokyo, a metropolis that was built after Manhattan was destroyed 31 years earlier.  The films are expected in theatres during the summer of ’09. Robinson will be directing from a script by Gary Whitta. This is Robinson’s first feature-film having previously helmed the Oscar-winning short Fifty Percent Grey