Will Miyazaki's "Ponyo" ever hit U.S. theaters?

Actually, the most depressing news out there is that Jackie Earle Haley has signed on to play Freddie Krueger in Platinum Dunes' remake of "A Nightmare on Elm Street." Digest that for a second.

Now, on paper, Mr. Haley as Freddie isn't that much of a stretch. He certainly has the manic look down, but any news about what Michael Bay's Platinum Dunes company is up to just turns my stomach and makes it do flips.

Remaking fun movies like "Friday the 13th" and "Nightmare" aren't exactly bold artistic moves, but neither are they really high cinematic crimes. But the Platinum Dunes folks have no plans to stop there; they've got real classics in their sights too.

Further along is a "retelling" (the dirty little euphemism used to claim you're not making a "remake") of Hitchcock's "The Birds." I'm still hoping this will never happen, but assuming it does it will star Naomi Watts in Tippi Hedren's iconic role and have Martin Campbell of "Casino Royale" fame as its director.

Even more insidious but still in pre-infancy stage (if that's possible) is the company's plan to remake what remains my single favorite horror film, Roman Polanski's "Rosemary's Baby." If anyone out there has the power to stop all this madness, please do!

OK, enough of that. This was supposed to be all about Hayao Miyazaki, a subject which makes me much, much happier.

It seems that not only does his new film, "Ponyo on a Cliff by the Sea" (to be retitled simply "Ponyo") finally have a U.S. release date of Aug. 14 (more than a friggin' year after it debuted in Japan!), but it also has some kids in the lead voice roles that just might give it enough cache to even open in my little corner of the world.

Ensuring that Billy Ray Cyrus will apparently be able to live off the talents of his kids forever, it seems there's another little Cyrus running around, named Noah, and he has landed the titular role of the goldfish princess who just wants to be human. Just in case that's not enough Disney for you, it seems that yet another of those Jonas kids, someone named Frankie, will voice the role of Sosuke, the young boy who befriends Ponyo.

I really have no idea who any of those people are, but if that's what it takes to finally bring this to American movie theaters, bring it on. Among the adults involved in this are Cate Blanchett, Matt Damon, Tina Fey and Liam Neeson.

And in even better news that only impacts, well, me, I'm off to see "Adventureland" today at 2:15, and I'm fairly confident it's just going to rule. Peace out.

Hiya! Hiya! There's a new Muppets movie in the works!

Statler: Well, how do you like the film?
Waldorf: I've seen detergents leave a better film than this.

Yeah, yeah, I suppose there's pretty big news out there today about a certain wizard's seventh book being divided into his seventh and eighth film, with David Yates coming back to direct them both, but if you look at the world like I do, that just pales in comparison to this:

There's gonna be a new Muppets movie! Not a remake of the movie I was convinvced, at 9 years old, was the greatest cinematic creation of all time, but an actual new Muppets movie.

I shouldn't get so excited about this, I suppose, but I can't help it. I just love the Muppets beyond all reason, and everything about this project sounds right so far (though really, we don't know too much at all right now.)

The facts, so far, are these: Former "Geek" Jason Segel and his writing partner, Nick Stoller, will come up with an original Muppets script, with Stoller set to direct.

So, just how does someone land this rather distinguished honor? Well, apparently, the Henson folks had a hand in Segel and Stoller's upcoming camp Apatow comedy "Forgetting Sarah Marshall," which hopefully won't suck when it drops April 18. In the flick, Segel's character, who has just had his heart broken by Veronica Mars (more on that, sort of, later in this post), somehow ends up performing a "Dracula" puppet show using creations from the Henson shop. How exactly this emboldened Segel to make a pitch to the Henson folks to come up with a Muppets movie I'm not sure, but he did, and, thankfully, both Henson and Disney bit.

Along with being an alum of both "Freaks and Geeks" and "Undeclared," easily my two favorite one-season-only TV shows, Segel of course also stars on the very funny (but somehow apparently on the "bubble") "How I Met Your Mother," which returns to CBS with new episodes Monday. If you like this show at all, please tune in so CBS doesn't pull the plug on a fourth season!

As for the Muppets movie, I offer only one dose of caution. Please, please, please remember that the Muppets thrived on jokes, like the one that started this post, that were always a little cheesy but also always appropriate for all ages. They were never (too) crude, and they were never, to the best of my memory, computer-generated. With those simple rules in mind, I say congratulations Mr. Segel, and please have a lot of fun with this!

Warner Independent gets its 'Wishbones'

How exactly does every book Tom Perrotta write get made into a movie? Don't get me wrong: "Election" is close to a minor comic masterpiece, and once I finally got around to seeing it, "Little Children" was easily one of the best movies of 2006. I'm just saying, the dude certainly is on a winning streak.

His newest novel, "The Abstinence Teacher," which I haven't read, was picked up by Warner Independent Pictures before it came out, and now the same studio has purchased the rights to my favorite Perrotta novel, "The Wishbones."

Though admittedly rather similar in tone (but not structure) to Nick Hornby's "High Fidelity," it's still an endearing tale of growing up (and refusing to.) The "hero" is a 30-year-old New Jersey wedding band (the Wishbones) musician who still lives with his parents. Just as he's about to marry his longtime girlfriend, he begins an affair with a Bohemian poet from Manhattan and, well, the rest you can find out for yourself.

The "Little Miss Sunshine" producing duo Albert Berger and Ron Yerxa are overseeing both this and "The Abstinence Teacher," which is being directed, not too coincidentally, by "Little Miss Sunshine" helmers Valere Faris and Jonathan Dayton. A little incestuous, perhaps, but if it leads to good movies, so what?

Please, Naomi, say it ain't so!

A question for Naomi Watts: If you have to spend the next two years or so saying nice things about thoroughly unnecessary and, in the latter case, outright criminal remakes, does your soul die or just erode a bit?

I like Naomi Watts in a lot of things ("Eastern Promises," "The Ring" and, way back when, "Flirting" come to mind), but how in the world did she end up in both Michael Haneke's remake of his own movie, now known apparently as "Funny Games U.S.", and Michael Bay's latest assault on cinema, an actual remake of "The Birds" (being directed by Martin Campbell)?

I'm sure she'll make movies I'll like (or even bother to see) again, but in the meantime she's left to heap empty praise like this on the "The Birds" remake:

"It's a work-in-progress at this point. I think it's a wonderful film. There are great things in it that interest me. The script isn't completely there yet, it probably won't happen until next year."

I hope that means there's still time to pull out of this before it destroys you, Naomi!

From "Veronica Mars" to "90210"?

I suppose that "Veronica Mars" creator Rob Thomas has gotta eat, but this project just sounds too silly to be real (which of course means it is.)

The programming geniuses at the CW have indeed commissioned Thomas to develop a contemporary spinoff of "Beverly Hills 90210" for CBS Paramount Network TV.

Though I'm almost certain I couldn't bring myself to tune into this, assuming it ever hits the airwaves, I do have one question: Since most of the "kids" seemed to be at least 30 when the original "90210" went off the air, won't they be approaching 50 now? Who in the world really wants to see that?

And since you're in the spinoff biz, CW, why didn't you bite on Thomas' original spinoff pitch, which would have put Kirsten Bell's Veronica Mars character at the FBI Academy? Sheesh.

A new trailer for "The Incredible Hulk"

OK, enough silliness. I'll end instead with this fairly cool trailer for the upcoming "Incredible Hulk" movie starring Edward Norton, Liv Tyler and Tim Roth. I think I'm just about the only person in the world who actually liked Ang Lee's take on the hulk, but I will admit that from what little I've seen of this new version it does look and feel a lot more like a comic book movie at heart. Peace out.

Remake news so bad I couldn't possibly make it up

This being Monday and all, I'd love to be the bearer of better news. And at least part of me hopes you've all heard this somewhere else first to soften the blow.

When I first heard the idea that someone would actually remake "The Birds," I just assumed it was some kind of urban legend. No one would really do that, would they?

Well, as has happened at least once before, it seems I'm wrong. I hope Martin Campbell lives a long time and makes a lot more movies, because it's gonna take a heck of a lot of good karma to survive this.

Until now he's had a good enough run. "Casino Royale" was the best Bond movie in many, many years, and his "Zorro" sequel was fun enough. The ride stops, however, stops when he puts his hands on Hitchcock.

Here, as far as I can muster from the French site Cinempire.com, are the details: The bold fools who will write this abomination for Campbell are Paul Harris Boardman and Scott Derrickson (the team that wrote "The Exorcism of Emily Rose," a surprisingly entertaining flick.) In case you haven't vomited from all this yet, brace yourself, because it only gets worse.

What do you do when you know you're taking on a remake that should never even be started? Call it a "re imagining," of course. The formerly fairly talented Todd McFarlane is doing the same thing with "The Wizard of Oz," unless I rather quickly develop a talent like Maya's on "Heroes" and can do the world a big favor by taking all these idiots out (stay tuned, by the way, for much better news about "Heroes" in the next segment.)

And, worst of all about this madness: Naomi Watts is at least rumored to be in negotiations to fill the shoes of Tippi Hedren (who, I was pleasantly surprised to find, is still alive and kicking.) If she still has the energy at age 77, I would hope she'd use her foot on Ms. Watts' also rather pleasant posterior to kick enough sense into her to get her to just say no to this.

Whew. That's a lot of bile for a Monday morning, so how about some much better news about another blonde I like even more than Naomi?

Veronica Mars on "Heroes" tonight!

Just typing that was enough to make me smile, so I indeed hope I have that right. I've enjoyed hearing Kristen Bell's voice on "Gossip Girl" (yes, I'll admit it, I watch that), but it will be so much better to see her face again too on "Heroes."

As far as I can tell from the commercial, she's pursuing Peter Petrelli (Milo Ventamiglia) for some reason. The best NBC could come up with for a tagline was "what power will she have?" I would have at least added "Veronica Mars back on TV? F*** yeah!) A bit misleading, perhaps, but much more effective. Definitely tune in tonight.

More incredibly bad news

Sorry to alternate like this, but I'm still not fully awake, to be honest.

What's worse than a thoroughly unnecessary remake? In my book it would have to be these so-called "spoof" movies that won't just die. Apparently enough people (though hopefully no one reading this) went to see "The Comebacks" in week one that it made nearly $6 million. Not a ton, I guess, but probably enough to justify it's excremental existence.

Can it get any worse? After you watch this clip, you'll know the answer is definitely yes. I won't spoil it for you, because it's something you have to see to believe. I'll just leave you with a few questions. If you steal complete scenes from a flick, when does it stop being a "spoof" and just become a crime? And, not that I want to see her more often, but does Carmen Electra have a contract that only allows her to star in these flicks?. Anyways, I won't delay your agony any further. Click on the video if you dare, and please, please, remember I'm just the messenger. Peace out.