Twilight director Catherine Hardwicke won’t be directing the Twilight sequel, but she’s found another project that’s even better!

Hardwicke is in talks to direct a film adaptation of another young-adult fantasy series, “Maximum Ride.”   The five-volume series by James Patterson chronicles six teens, known as the Flock, who are genetically altered so that they are part human and part bird. Learning to fly, they escape the laboratory where they have been housed and are pursued by a pack of creatures called the Erasers that are part human and part wolf. [Yahoo]

Patterson isn’t a Mormon housewife like Stephenie Meyers so this probably won’t be an abstinence parable, but he did sell 16 million books in 2007. That’s one out of every 15 novels sold.  Also, I don’t know if I mentioned this or not, this book is about HUMAN-BIRD HYBRIDS.  I always wondered what those books they sell at Wal-Mart were about.  I hope at some point, they poop on the bad guy’s car.

The sequel to Twilight will go on without director Catherine Hardwicke.  Nikki Finke reported it a couple days ago, and Summit, most likely in response to the report, confirmed the story with a press release. The film was almost universally reviled by everyone but teenage girls and Mormons, but has already earned almost $160 million.

The word from inside Summit is that Hardwicke, the acclaimed Thirteen and Lords of Dogtown and The Nativity Story director, “was ‘difficult’ and ‘irrational’ during the making of Twilight,” one insider explains to me. “That doesn’t mean anything when you’re talking about a filmmaker because they all are, but still…”

But an outside source also informs me, “Summit didn’t like her. They’re saying the DP [director of photography] Elliot Davis is the one responsible for the film’s sumptuous visual look, that the editor Nancy Richardson had to save the film in post-production, and Summit thought Hardwicke’s [CAA] agent Beth Swofford was alternately ineffectual and hysterical. It certainly demonstrates, while CAA agents boast of their vast influence, how little clout and muscle they actually have, or are willing to use, to protect their artists.” [DeadlineHollywoodDaily]

Hmm, I wonder if Nikki’s “outside source” happened to be someone who worked at a rival agency…  In other news, I have the clout and muscle of a hundred bulls, but I only use it to defend the meek and the cute; the pygmy baby hippos, the tiger cubs in lawn chairs. Meanwhile, my sumptuous visual look is provided by the underpants I wear on the outside of my full-body leotard, as well as TWO capes.

^{From the upcoming film “Ernest Goes to the Twilight Premiere”.  And by “film” I mean “surveillance footage”.}

Not surprising, given its rabid, retarded fan case, Dawson’s Crypt took the top spot at the box office this weekend with a huge $70.6 million opening.  Elsewhere, your mother has a gaping opening available for pretty much any sailor who happens by.

Catherine Hardwicke’s film also enjoyed the biggest opening ever for a female director [hee hee!], blowing [hehe!] away the previous standard of $41.1 million set by Mimi Leder’s “Deep Impact” [*punches self in the dick*] in 1998 .

“Twilight” made a whopping $20,636 per theater, according to Sunday morning estimates.  And the fangirls will get another taste soon enough: Summit Entertainment, which released “Twilight,” announced during the weekend that it’s going ahead with production of “New Moon,” based on the second book in Meyer’s internationally best-selling series. Robert Pattinson and Kristen Stewart will return as its star-crossed lovers.  [I am Jack's total lack of surprise.  Jack's devastatingly handsome, oiled up, be-speedo'd lack of surprise.]

Meanwhile, here is a non-fan-written synopsis of the second book:

In the second book, Edward the sparkling vampire leaves Bella for her own good, and she spends most of the book trying to kill herself with motorcycles and cliff-diving. Sort of. And then her best friend falls in love with her and turns out to be a werewolf, but Bella runs away to save Edward from committing suicide by public sparkling in Italy. In the third book, Jacob the best friend/boyfriend wannabe/werewolf turns into a total asshole trying to force himself on Bella, and a vampire with a grudge from the first book is trying to kill her, but more importantly, Bella and Edward argue about whether they should have sex, get married, and/or vampirize Bella, and in what order.  Hand to God, I did not make one word of that up. Twilight means never having to say you’re kidding.

But of course, the Twilight phenomenon is totally, like, a girl power moment.  *flashes peace sign a lá Spice Girls and blows kiss*

Read the rest of this entry »