
Paul Thomas Anderson's follow-up to last year's critically divisive The Master is gathering up a rather diverse ensemble cast, his first since Magnolia's star-studded medley of interconnected characters. Inherent Vice – based on the Thomas Pynchon novel of the same name – follows a pot-smoking private investigator (played by Joaquin Phoenix) as he investigates an alleged kidnapping of an ex-girlfriend.

The cast of HBO's hit series Game of Thrones will be glad that the journey from television to film doesn't compare to the traveling across Westeros on the show. Many stars have already made the leap, with Nikolaj Coster-Waldau appearing in Mama and Oblivion, Richard Madden taking a lead role in Cinderella, and Emilia Clarke joining James Franco in The Garden Of Last Days, and Kit Harrington takes lead in Pompeii by Paul W.S Anderson. The big screen seems to be agreeing with the cast, as there have been no complaints yet and another two of the show's own are to be cast in new films.
Peter Dinklage, also known as Lord Tyrion to Game of Thrones fans, is set star in an Edgar Allen Poe adaptation, while Carice Van Houten, who plays Melisandre, is to play silent movie star Greta Garbo in a new Swedish biopic.

A stunning new poster for Catching Fire, the second installment of The Hunger Games series, has been released by Lionsgate. It depicts a very different Katniss Everdeen (Jennifer Lawrence) to the previous film. Katniss is standing on top of a mountain, holding her signature bow and arrow with the mocking jay cleverly disguised in the clouds within the background. I'm sure everyone would agree, it's a pretty powerful image, promising a riveting film to come.

A film that nobody wants to see (apart from perhaps your 5-year-old cousin who has their own iPad, naturally), the Angry Birds Movie has been officially confirmed by Sony, who have acquired the distribution rights to the movie-version of the hugely successful mobile game. Rovio, the developers of the game, will be financing, developing and producing the movie themselves.

The first trailer for John Well's adaptation of August: Osage County has been released, showcasing the film's impressive cast.

One of the most pleasing and reassuring pieces of recent film news has been Warner Brothers' commitment to financing and distributing Paul Thomas Anderson's next project. The multiple Oscar nominee struggled for some time to gain backing for his enigmatic 2012 drama The Master, finally receiving funds from Californian heiress Megan Ellison's Annapurna Pictures. Now that one of the best contemporary US directors is seemingly back in the good books of the money men, however, focus has shifted to the what, the when and the whom.

Peter Jackson & Weta have managed to keep the design of Smaug the dragon tightly under wraps, apart from a brief glimpse in The Hobbit: An Unexpected Journey, but it appears we may now have our first look at the mighty beast himself.

Jane Austen, Ian McEwan, Leo Tolstoy… and E. L. James?
Out of absolutely nowhere, Atonement and Anna Karenina director Joe Wright has emerged as the frontrunner to direct the upcoming film adaptation of erotic smash hit novel Fifty Shades of Grey.

Ben Affleck (of Pearl Harbor and Paycheck fame) is to return to the setting used in his first two directed features - Boston, Massachusetts - in his second adaptation of a Dennis Lehane novel (the first being Gone, Baby, Gone) Live by Night, of which he will also write, produce, and star in.

Masterful Paul Thomas Anderson fan site 'Cigarettes & Red Vines' have unearthed news that he will direct Inherent Vice, based on the novel by Thomas Pynchon.
