Peter Jackson's Dambusters

Peter Jackson, the celebrated director of Lord Of The Rings, has confirmed plans to remake classic film 'The Dam Busters'. The $US50 million movie will be shot in the UK as well as in Jackson's native New Zealand next year.

The WingNut Films production will be based on the book The Dam Busters, the 1954 British film of the same name. The story is based on a heroic and daring mission in World War II when Royal Air Force bombers destroyed German dams using bouncing bombs. The Dambusters chronicles the story of Operation Chastise, a top-secret RAF bombing mission designed to strike a decisive blow against the Nazi war machine at the height of its aggression. A "bouncing" bomb which could skip across water was developed by scientist, Barnes Wallis, but to be effective, the bomb had to be dropped from close range and at very low altitude. In specially-modified Lancaster aircraft, the airmen trained for a single mission, whose potential for success was small.

The film will be called simply 'Dambusters' and Christian Rivers - who has worked with Jackson for over 17 years - will make his directorial debut on the remake. Christian Rivers won an academy award this year for his work with Weta Digital for special effects for King Kong.
Computer-generated visual effects and models will depict much of the mission and 10 replicas of the bombers.

In a statement Jackson said it was one of the most remarkable true stories to come out of World War II. When the original movie was released many details of the raid were still closely guarded secrets. "It has since been declassified by the British Government, making the dynamics of the story and the people involved even more intriguing," Jackson said.

Invincible

It seems box-office luck has got a habit of favoring Disney in recent times. Disney's new success is Mark Wahlberg's football tale "Invincible" which went the distance at the box office, debuting as the top weekend movie with $17 million.

"Invincible" is inspired by the true story of Vince Papale (Mark Wahlberg), a man with nothing to lose who ignored the staggering odds and made his dream come true. In 1976 when the coach (Greg Kinnear) of Papale's beloved hometown football team hosted an unprecedented open tryout, the public consensus was that it was a waste of time -- no one good enough to play professional football was going to be found this way. Certainly no one liked Papale -- a down-on-his-luck, 30 year-old, substitute teacher and part-time bartender who never even played college football. But against these odds, Papale made into the team and soon found himself living every fan's fantasy -- moving from his cheap seats in the upper deck to standing on the field as a professional football player.

The film is directed by Ericson Core. It's rated PG for sports and some mild language. Here is the official site: invincible.movies.com.

World Trade Center

Nicolas Cage as Sgt. John McLoughlin in 'World Trade Center'

After the release of 'United 93' in May, here comes another movie based on the most tragic day of America's history - 9/11/2001. Academy Award-winning director Oliver Stone tells the true story of the heroic survival and rescue of two Port Authority policemen – John McLoughlin and Will Jimeno – who were trapped in the rubble of the World Trade Center on September 11, 2001, after they went in to help people escape. The film also follows their families as they try to find out what happened to them, as well as the rescuers who found them in the debris field and pulled them out.

Two years after the forgettable 'Alexander' (2004), this comes as quite a refreshing change from Oliver Stone who also gave us some excellenent films like 'JFK', 'Platoon' and 'Wall Street'. Nicolas Cage also comes up with a very strong and involved performance after a long time. We also liked Michael Peña very much. We noticed his very strong performance first in 'Crash' and we believe he's set for a big time of his career ahead. Other noteworthy performances were from Maria Bello, Maggie Gyllenhaal, Jay Hernandez.

The film is rated PG-13 for intense and emotional content, some disturbing images and language. Here is the official site: WTCmovie.com.