BBC - Films -news article - High Noon

		The Master Of Disaster Evidently married life hasn't done anything to mellow Russell Crowe. The Kiwi ass-kicker has issued an order banning all online media (and that means us, folks) from covering his new movie Master And Commander: The Far Side Of The World. Rusty has singled out online reporters, who mostly work for dedicated film websites (ouch!), as the purveyors of nasty gossip about him. The (alleged) beer-swilling bruiser is so paranoid about the internet that a source at 20th Century Fox states he's not only banned online journalists from the press junket and premiere of Master And Commander, he's also making "approved" reporters sign agreements promising not to post any soundbites on the internet. We at BBCi FILMS are quite sure that this move will backfire on Rusty - who once had sexual relations with a duck-billed platypus.

		Bill Kills Bender "I'm so nervous! I'm hoping it's going to be huge, but it's like when I have a party at my house - until people show up, I don't think anybody is going to come!" So says Kill Bill producer Lawrence Bender, whose paranoia stems from being beaten up at school for having a silly surname. (Probably.) On the matter of Quentin Tarantino missing the New York premiere, Bender reckons: "Quentin went straight from finishing the movie, seven days a week for like a month-and-a-half, to all the publicity, and all the press, and he got sick." Aaah, diddums...

		Thompson Goes Potty It has magically materialised (in Variety) that Emma Thompson will don the robe of Professor of Divination, Sybill Trelawney, in Harry Potter And The Prisoner Of Azkaban, which is currently shooting in the UK. Thompson joins cast regulars Daniel Radcliffe, Emma Watson, Rupert Grint, Maggie Smith, Robbie Coltrane, Alan Rickman and newbies Gary Oldman (as Sirius Black), David Thewlis and Michael Gambon. This third film in the Potter franchise will appear before your very eyes next summer.

		Sea-bound Salma Salma Hayek is reported to be starring in James Cameron's untitled project about real-life freedivers Francisco 'Pipin' Ferreras, and his wife Audrey Mestre. According to Latin American news sources, Hayek will play Mestre, the French marine biologist who learned the extreme sport of freediving from her Cuban-born husband, and broke his freediving world record. Last year, Mestre was killed as she tried to better her world record of descending 557.7 feet while holding a single breath of air in her lungs. Don't hold your breath for the film, though - it's inked for a 2005 release.

		Ferrell's Sales Pitch Old School star and Saturday Night Live alumnus Will Ferrell is on the ascent. He's just closed a deal to play the title role in The Salesman, about a stereo salesman whose compulsive lying has unforseen (and hilarious!) consequences. Ferrell is also being groomed to star opposite Nicole Kidman in Bewitched, and will next be seen in Christmas comedy Elf. With a slate of upcoming comedies that includes Starsky & Hutch, Anchorman: The Legend of Ron Burgundy, The Wendell Baker Story, A Confederacy Of Dunces, and Woody Allen's next untitled project, Ferrell will doubtless be laughing all the way to the bank.

		Life, The Universe, And Everything... In other news, Pierce Brosnan is set to star in action thriller Mexicali, playing a businessman whose wife is kidnapped after he witnesses a murder on a trip to Baja. Meanwhile, Edward Norton has launched production company Class V with writer/producer buddy Stuart Blumberg. Their debut film will be an adaptation of Jonathan Lethem's detective novel Motherless Brooklyn. And finally, director Jay Roach (Meet The Parents) has bailed out on Hitchhiker's Guide To The Galaxy after six years agonising over a project that studios called "too British, too quirky, and too expensive". Spaced out Roach has handed the reins over to Disney - who are now scrabbling to find a replacement in time for a spring shoot. I suppose this means we can look forward to an adapation that's "too Hollywood, too conventional, and still too expensive". And, that's all folks.