Upcoming Sequels and Remakes

Hollywood studio Miramax is planning sequels to its much loved hits, including 'Shakespeare in Love', 'Bad Santa' and 'Swingers'.

Former Miramax bosses Harvey and Bob Weinstein have taken control of their old company's movie library.

They said, "We are very close to these films, and the new management of Miramax also feels that we are in the best position to create sequels that are worthy and compelling in their own right."

A sequel to the Oscar-winning 'Shakespeare in Love' is a top priority for The Weinstein Company.

Harvey said, "We always knew the movie came out too well for us to ever top ourselves. (But) many people are still asking for it and it will still be better than 90 per cent of the movies out there."

The 1998 movie starred Joseph Fiennes as a young Shakespeare struggling with writer’s block, until he falls for Gwyneth Paltrow's Viola.

The indie film mogul said he's also looking to make follow-ups to 'Rounders', 'Copland', 'Shall We Dance' and further instalments of 'Bridget Jones's Diary', 'From Dusk Till Dawn' and 'Clerks'.

Harvey also added that properties like Vince Vaughn's lad comedy 'Swingers' had potential to be made into a TV series.

Miramax's new chief executive, Mike Lang, welcomed the deal, saying, "Harvey and Bob came to us during the sale process. And our view was that [we] don't care about the issues in the past, it's a great opportunity to do a deal with them on films they are so very well positioned to make."

Fans of the movies, however, might not be so impressed with their favourite classics being given sequels.

The Total Recall remake will begin shooting in March of next year.

Total Recall was a 1990 film starring Arnold Schwarzenegger as a freedom fighter from Mars who is relocated to Earth.

According to Cinema Blend, the remake will be directed by Len Wiseman, who directed Underworld and Underworld: Evolution. No-one has been cast in the Schwarzenegger role, though it has reportedly been offered to Colin Farrell.

The film will shoot in Toronto on a $200 million (Ł129.8m) budget. The original Total Recall grossed about $119 million (Ł77.3m) on a $50 million (Ł32.5m) budget.

Total Recall is expected to open in theatres in 2012.

After Warner Bros. has been unsuccessful producing Lethal Weapon 5, it appears the studio and producer Joel Silver have decided to go the route of rebooting the series with Will Beall assigned the task of writing.

Plans were underway to bring back the cast of the original Lethal Weapon film franchise -- most notably Mel Gibson and Danny Glover -- for Lethal Weapon 5 . Schedules could not match up and the recent controversies involving Mel Gibson helped push the studio to reboot the series with a new cast. Beall's take on the script is said to maintain the tone of the original, which is "a hard R-rated edgy street cop movie."
Will Beall is a former Los Angeles police officer and author of the novel L.A. Rex. His recent script Gangster Squad has been picked up by the studio with Zombieland's Ruben Fleischer attached to direct the adaptation. The film is a period crime drama about an elite crime squad that fought against organized crime kingpins like Mickey Cohen.

The 3D remake of iconic 1966 sci-fi movie Fantastic Voyage is to be directed by The Night Of The Museum director Shawn Levy. The original movie was directed by Harry Kleiner, and was based on a story by Otto Klement and Jerome Bixby. It inspired an animated television series, a Salvador Dalí painting of the same name, as well as an Isaac Asimov novelisation.

Deadline.com reports that the new film will follow the same story as the original: a team of scientists shrink themselves and enter a colleague’s body in order to save him from a blood clot.

However, in the new version once the scientists enter the body the film will be almost exclusively CGI. Avatar director James Cameron is signed on to produce.

It's rumoured that Hugh Jackman could be about to sign on to play the lead. He’s due to star in the Levy-directed Real Steel in October, and the pair are reportedly looking to work together on an "untitled action/adventure project".