If you told me you wanted to make another Bad Lieutenant – Abel Ferrara’s 1992 classic starring Harvey Keitel – I’d say there’s no reason to do that.  But if you told me Werner Herzog would direct and it would star Xzibit and Val Kilmer, I’d say, “…I’m listening.”   Anyway, they’re calling this one Bad Lieutenant: Port of Call New Orleans (watch the trailer below).  It ponders the question, “Can we recreate the magic of Wicker Man if we do it deliberately?”

Asked why Nic Cage was right for the part, Werner Herzog said (I imagine), “I choose za Cage, because ven I look eento za forehead, I don’t zee za facial expression or zee human feelinks – za happiness, za sadness, za empazee – I zee nuzzink.  I look eento za forehead oont zere ees nuzzink but blackness.  Za cold eendifference of muzzer nature.  Ees beautiful.”

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Werner Herzog’s remake of Bad Lieutenant (which he insists isn’t a remake for some reason) picked up two new cast members: Val Kilmer and Xzibit.  Eva Mendes plays the love interest, and Fairuza Balk is also in it, presumably playing someone ugly and weird.

The original followed the depraved adventures of a corrupt policeman (Harvey Keitel) investigating the rape of a nun. The new film will feature Cage as the titular crooked cop and capture the spirit of the original, with the protagonist’s drug intake, accepting sexual favors as bribes and other elements that endeared so many to the 1992 version. [HollywoodReporter]

I. Cannot. Wait. For this movie.  Nic Cage trying to out-act Harvey Keitel as a hardass cop?  Val Kilmer in the Nolte of his career?  Both teamed with the guy from Pimp My Ride and the chick who always plays a witch or a Nazi?  Hot damn, this is like when I used put bees in a jar and shake them all up until they stung each other, only one of the bees is NIC CAGE.  This movie is going to punch the bear so hard.     

Worstpreviews has some new pictures of Xzibit from the set of X-Files 2 (X-Files: I Want to Believe), in which the formerly b’cornrowed rapper and host of Make My Car Look Ridiculous plays an FBI Agent.

I like Xzibit, and I don’t think I’m being racist when I say that he seems pretty neighborly and non-intimidating for a black dude.  Okay, I’m being told that is actually very racist.  Carry on then.

We never had this conversation. *jumps out window*

Rapper Xzibit, Amanda Peet [NWS pics - you're welcome] and Scottish comic Billy Connolly have signed on for director Chris Carter’s next big-screen adaptation of the hit TV series. Citing a policy of secrecy surrounding the plot line, Fox would not confirm any details regarding the three actors’ roles. But sources said Xzibit and Peet will play FBI agents alongside David Duchovny’s Mulder and Gillian Anderson’s Scully. The supernatural thriller is a stand-alone story, not a sequel or continuation of the hit 1998 feature adaptation. [Hollywood Reporter]

The lede in this story was, “The X-Files movie will be packing more heat.”  What the fuck’s that supposed to mean?  That all rappers carry weapons?  That’s some racist shit – Xzibit would shoot you for saying that.

And by the way: Xzibit, David Duchovny, Gillian Anderson, Amanda Peet, Billy Connelly – this may be the weirdest cast of all time.  If Xzibit and Billy Connelly get in a freestyle fight by the lunch truck, I might have to go and lie down. Gillian Anderson is now 67 years old. True story.