A period drama that’s in turnaround from a major studio wouldn’t necessarily be expected to make many waves in the Hollywood tentpole era.

But that’s pretty much what “The Wettest County in the World” — a story of Depression-era bootleggers from Red Wagon and “The Road” director John Hillcoat — is doing.

The project was set up at Columbia about a year-and-a-half ago. But it has since been put in turnaround and is now in the process of being reconfigured as an indie, with financing still coming together.

But that hasn’t stopped the project from becoming the brass ring for the next generation of Hollywood A-listers.

Shia LaBeouf, Scarlett Johansson and Ryan Gosling are among the actors whose names have been presented as associated with the project to reps and execs around town (though none is yet on board). The names of Paul Dano and Michael Shannon have also surfaced in connection with the project.

Fox Searchlight wants to be sedated.

The specialty division is in negotiations to board a project about the life of the Ramones, based on a memoir titled "I Slept With Joey Ramone" by the musician's brother — and, notably, featuring the band's tunes.

The project, which had initially been conceived and come together independently under manager-producer Rory Rosegarten, would get a significant boost with the boarding of the specialty division.

Written by Joey Ramone’s brother Mickey Leigh and longtime punk writer and Ramones chronicler Legs McNeil, the book centers on the life of Joey Ramone, aka Jeffrey Hyman, the lead singer of the seminal punk act.  The memoir is set to be published by Simon & Schuster imprint Fireside in December.

Rosegarten is a former exec producer on "Everybody Loves Raymond" who negotiated several years ago to buy the rights to the book as it was being written and, most critically, the rights to the music. The presence of so many rights has made the negotiating process a complicated one, and the deal with Searchlight is not closed, cautioned people close to the situation.

It's still a heck of a tale. John Cummings, Jeffrey Hyman, Thomas Erdelyi and Douglas Colvin were the four key members of the Ramones, going by the names Johnny, Joey, Tommy and Dee Dee Ramone. Formed in Queens, NY, in 1974, the four (unrelated) musicians became cult symbols and fathers of the punk movement, attaining little commercial airplay but heavily influencing modern music with songs like "I Wanna Be Sedated," "Blitzkrieg Bop," “Rockaway Beach” and "I Wanna Be Your Boyfriend" (and also giving rise to the countercultural catch phrase "Gabba Gabba Hey"). Other members — including Marky, C.J. and Richie Ramone — also played with the band at various points.

Back when 2008 was on the way out and film bloggers everywhere were looking for something to write that didn't contain the words Slumdog Millionaire, we made the not-so-bold prediction that among the self-financed startups of the past few years — Overture, MGM, Weinstein Company and Summit , in the main– at least one wouldn't be in business by the time we were trying to find things  to write about other than next year's Slumdog Millionaire.

Ten months later — and before we've even begun to avoid the words Up in the Air–  it looks like that crystal-balling is coming true, though not always in the way we might have expected.

Most of the companies have taken their lumps. After a solid start to the year with "Valkyrie" — common wisdom has it as a middling performer, but it made $200m worldwide — MGM waited another nine months before it released another of its own movies. And then it had a rough time of it, opening "Fame" to just $10m this weekend. Given that it won't be releasing another movie until the first quarter of 2010, that means the revenue could be pretty slow in coming.

Overture has made sleepers out of specialized fare like "Sunshine Cleaning" and "The Visitor," but  continues to look for the home run. And while the MGM-ers-turned-Maloners are hoping George Clooney's "Men Who Stare at Goats" and/or Michael Moore's "Capitalism: A Love Story" finally knocks one out of the park, neither has yet given strong indications of being a slugger, more like a .280 hitter with occasional opposite-field power.

The Weinstein Company snuck out with a few wins — no one could have guessed "The Reader" would have gotten kudos and $35m, and of course "Inglourious Basterds" is a $243m global standout — but it's an understatement worthy of a French diplomat to say it still needs a lot more help.

Jessica Alba is becoming a Focker.

The actress is in negotiations to join the Ben Stiller-Robert DeNiro comedy "Little Fockers." She'd play the role of an attractive pharmaceutical rep whose looks wreak havoc on male characters in the story.

Paul Weitz is directing the third installment in the Universal and Tribeca Productions franchise. Universal is banking heavily on "Fockers," one of the studio's few go-to franchises and an important one given its shaky summer. Production is set to begin in the next few months, with a 2010 release date more than likely.

The picture is expect to pick up where 2004's "Meet the Fockers" left off, with Stiller's Gaylord Focker and Teri Polo's Pamela Byrnes having a child (or children — reports abound that they could be having twins). John Hamburg penned the latest version of the script.

Even if Alba's role isn't huge — and with so many other big actors (Stiller, DeNiro, Wilson) already set, it may not be — the move is a shrewd bit of casting for Universal. The franchise needs to rope in young men, and with the movie's promise of babies and family — not always said demo's main interest — it could use a Maxim-esque presence.

The WME-repped Alba, incidentally, is set to star in the Robert
Rodriguez thriller "Machete" for Sony as well as Garry Marshall's
romantic comedy "Valentine's Day" for New Line. Both are also movies that could — and need to — bring in the boys. That's what she does. The focker.

Antoine Fuqua is the new warden.

The "Training Day" helmer is in negotiations to direct Aaron Guzikowski's hot spec script "Prisoners." The project is being fast-tracked, with preproduction set to begin shortly for a likely January or February shoot.

"Prisoners" is set up at Alcon, which will release it via Warner Bros. next October.

Guzikowski, repped by WME and Madhouse Entertainment, created a stir when "Prisoners" first went out earlier this year, with the script attracting interest from high-profile directors such as Bryan Singer. Mark Wahlberg and Christian Bale were also attached to star, and a number of studios were keen to pick up the package.

But producers eventually decided to sell to Alcon, which bested entities such as Summit and Relativity, and reconfigured it without cast and with a slightly lower budget (about $30 million-$40 million) so that it could move forward more quickly.

By Steven Zeitchik

Quietly but assuredly, like a tiptoeing cartoon rabbit, animation is becoming the unsung story of this year's boxoffice.

With Sony's "Cloudy With a Chance of Meatballs" holding strong this weekend to get to $60 million, it now has an outside shot of hitting $100 million (not an excellent shot, but another couple of solid holds and it's almost there).

That, in turn, means the animation world could hit a milestone in 2009 — the first time that more than five movies will exceed $100 million. "Up," "Ice Age" and "Monsters vs. Aliens" already did it, and the "Alvin and the Chipmunks" sequel — er, squeakuel — will do it; the only question is whether "Meatballs" and Disney's hand-drawn "The Princess and the Frog" have the stuff.  Even without them, the sector could get over the hump thanks to Pixar's rerelease of the two "Toy Story" pics.

All this coin for cartoons may seems like an inevitability, but animation has come pretty far pretty fast; as recently as 2005 only three animated pics cracked the $100 million mark.

The burst of success has all sorts of implications for the biz. It means that it may make more sense than ever to put an animated specialist like John Lasseter in charge of one of the country's biggest studios. It means that there's a rising tide than can lift other boats — including indie animated studios like Imagi (behind Summit's upcoming "Astro Boy") and Exodus Film Group (behind MGM's "Bunyan and Babe"), not to mention spur specialty divisions to get in on the action (Focus Features' two biggest earners this year could wind up being animated pics).

This time of year, there's usually a lot of pundit interest over which movie screener is sent to awards-voters ahead of all others. Misguided interest, we should say. Being the first screener out is as about meaningful in the long run as being the first person chosen in your junior-high punchball game.

Two years ago it was "The Namesake," "Once" and "Waitress" (collective Oscar noms: one)  that reached voters first. A couple years before that it was "Junebug," also hitting mailboxes in September. The quirky drama picked up an Oscar nom for Amy Adams, but really, would that have gone any differently if the screener went out in, say, early October?

No one's taken the plunge yet this year, though for a minute there it looked like Summit was trying to beat the rush. We received several reports late in the week that the studio has sent out copies of "The Hurt Locker" to various people in the industry.

With the movie one of the few awards-y titles already on voters' minds, it seemed like an odd move. Conventional wisdom would dictate to wait until later in the season, when voters could really use a reminder. But with the the landscape quiet for now — there hasn't been a heavyweight contender opening in the three weekends since Labor Day — there was also a certain logic. Voters are already anxious this year because they have twice as many spots to fill (like having twice as much homework) and they're finding mainly romcoms and zombie movies in these early fall days.  What better way to give them a little peace of mind than nudge them about a title they may already be thinking about anyway?

It may seem like teen musicals are everywhere — and if Rich Ross takes over at Disney, they probably will be — but if "Fame" pulls up in third position this weekend, it could be time to sing a downbeat note.

As recently as a year ago the teen musical could do no wrong. Riding a pop-cultural tsunami to give meteorologists chills, the third installment of "High School Musical" stormed in to theaters with a $42m opening weekend and landed with a $252m global take, enough to outfit the world in cheerleader costumes.

But the tracking for "Fame" is pointing to a likely finish in the low teens this weekend — not a horrible showing but probably not what MGM had in mind when it made the reboot the linchpin of its original-production slate (more on them in a later post).

The middling outlook may be a function of brand — someone who was a teenager when the Irene Cara-Debbie Allen movie came out could be a grandparent by now (a 48-year-old grandparent, but a grandparent still), not exactly a good thing for a teen-targeted movie. And despite some clever promotions by MGM, the Fame name hasn't hugely penetrated teen consciousness.  A bunch of tough reviews haven't helped either.

David Cronenberg is again buzzing with "The Fly."

The auteur is in talks to develop a reboot of the 1986 classic with Fox, the studio that released that film, writing and potentially directing the new pic.

The move marks an about-face for the Canadian director, who in the past has said he did not want to be involved on a remake of the film. Cronenberg did work on an opera version of "The Fly" that was staged first in Paris and then in Los Angeles.

The 1986 title, itself a remake of Kurt Neumann's 1958 sci-fi classic, starred Jeff Goldblum and became a huge hit for Fox, earning $40 million and turning into a phenomenon. It centered on Seth Brundle (Goldblum), an eccentric scientist who, after an experiment with teleportation goes awry, is transformed into a fly. Geena Davis starred as Goldblum's love interest and partner, Veronica.

Beware of bloggers writing the "ten things we learned from a festival" piece, especially after a festival has ended.

That's why we'll write the "six things we learned from a festival" piece, mainly as a way to get into some films we saw in the usual end of fest rush. Plus, Toronto is all about the awards season to come, so don't look at it as a rundown of what happened but a preview of what will be.

Yes, that makes us feel better.

"The Road": It's better than many of the reviews had it. Sure, it's bleak — always funny to hear that thrown out like it's a dirty word — but so was "There Will Be Blood" and like a hundred other really good pictures. There are some issues, namely, director John Hillcoat going to the same bag of tricks a few too many times (man wandering a threatening apocalyptic landscape so long he can't tell good guys from bad, and reacts questionably when under duress). But there's still plenty of suspense and compelling moral ambiguity to this (impressively shot) survivalist tale, not to mention some touching moments between father and son. Actually "Blood" is not a bad comparison since, like that movie, this one also concerns a father trying to protect his boy in a frontier setting of sorts. Star Viggo Mortensen deserves an Oscar nod — the question is, with "Single Man" the newest plaything at the Weinstein Company, does his campaign take a backseat to Colin Firth's?

A "Sherlock Holmes" sequel is afoot.

Three months ahead of the release of its Robert Downey Jr. action pic, Warners is developing a new installment.

The studio is poised to bring on Kieran and Michele Mulroney, the scribes who are penning its "Justice League: Mortal"  tentpole, to pen a draft of the new tale. Brad Pitt has had discussions with producers to star as Holmes' nemesis Moriarty in the new pic, say people familiar with the project, though there is no deal in place for him to take the part.

Susan Downey, Dan Lin, Joel Silver and Lionel Wigram produced "Holmes," a holiday release that, from well-received footage at Comic-Con, appears to be an action-heavy rendition of the world Sir Arthur Conan Doyle created.

Guy Ritchie helms the pic, and Downey stars as the title character; Jude Law plays protege Watson, and Rachel McAdams stars as love interest Irene Adler. Much of the talent is expected to return in the new pic, as could Ritchie as director.

Lots to hash out after a busy weekend, including the continuing coup of the animation junta: "Cloudy With a Chance of Meatballs" becomes the fifth animation or animation hybrid to open to at least $30m in '09 (by this time last year only three movies had pulled off the feat).

But allow us to look at the career of one Diablo Cody, whose "Jennifer's Body" fell harder than a New England Patriots offensive lineman this weekend. Some are ready put nails in the coffin, heap dirt on the grave and take the mortician out for a waltz. The pseudonymous Cody, after all, struck gold her first time out — a $227 million global juggernaut in "Juno" and a nice little Oscar statue for her mantle, if Cody was the kind of person who had a mantle.

But her second time out she's pretty much faceplanted with "Jennifer's Body," a highly uneven teen-camp horror mix that struck out both with critics (42% on Rotten Tomatoes) and filmgoers (just $7 million in a wide opening weekend). The movie's buzz was so tepid at Toronto that it actually became known as "the other Amanda Seyfried lesbian movie," no easy feat considering that the first was an art film from Atom Egoyan.

But there are reasons the grave dancers may not want to strike up the band just yet.  Wunderkind screenwriters tend to have beginner's luck — and a follow-up jinx.