Move over, Wii. You’re no longer the only motion-controlled gaming system in town. While Playstation 3’s Sixaxis controller had some motion-sensing capabilities, it wasn’t much to write home about. But yesterday, at Sony’s GDC press conference, the company officially revealed their new motion-controller, simply called “The Move.”

Looking curiously similar to the Wii-mote, the Move will feature True 3D rotation, buttons similar to the regular Sixaxis, and an analog trigger. The Move also has rechargeable batteries, and plugs into the same USB port as the Sixaxis.  The device seems to have two controllers, like the Wii-mote and nunchuck combination seen on the Wii.

The difference is that the Move’s two devices are connected wirelessly. The Move is said to be far more sensitive and responsive than its predecessor, because it uses the Playstation Eye to detect movement as opposed to a sensor bar like the Wii.

Games like LittleBigPlanet and EyeToy were demoed with the Move, and third party publishers like Square Enix, Konami, EA, Ubi, Disney, Sega, WBI, Crave, and Activision are all behind this new technology. It also looks like the Playstation 3 will start getting ports of games originally slated for the Wii, the first one being The Lord of the Rings: Aragorn’s Quest.

The Move will be released on its own, bundled with the Playstation Eye, and in a Playstation 3 bundle. No idea how much the controller will cost on its own, but bundled with the Eye it’ll set you back about $99. You’ll be able to get your hands on the Move this fall.

Who hasn’t walked down the street and seen people with their heads buried in their iPhones? And you know they aren’t all looking up stock quotes or making work calls. Most are playing Paper Toss or checking in with Foursquare. We even see those jealous Verizon customers with their Droids as they secretly wait for their carrier to pick up the iPhone.

Smart phones are the way technology is pointing with their layers of functionality and ever increasing capabilities. That’s why it wasn’t a surprise Thursday morning when the Wall Street Journal reported that Sony would be entering the smart phone arena. Of special interest to this particular item though is that it will be “capable of downloading and playing PlayStation games”, possibly referring to PlayStation One titles specifically.

Reported as a device that “blurs distinctions among a netbook, an e-reader and a PlayStation Portable,” they are already expecting a 2010 launch. It is possible that Sony may make a big announcement regarding this phone next week during the Games Developers Conference.

With ever declining PSP sales and the lackluster response to the PSP Go, one would think the portable device market was in trouble. Nintendo has shown with the DS and the record breaking game sales of Plants vs. Zombies on the iPhone have shown that this isn’t the case however and that Sony is just searching for its niche still.

There’s a lot of interesting stuff on the radar this week. An Avatar alumni could face off against Conan, Modern Warfare developers bring a fight to Activision, and director Guy Ritchie may be breathing new life into the heroes of Camelot.

Fox finds its shadow for $1 million and David Slade may be the man

Fans of the comic book series The Shadow rejoice as it seems the reboot continues to move forward.  While it was thought Sony and director Sam Raimi (Spider-Man, Army of Darkness) would bring a new version of the character to the big screen things have changed somewhat.

After Raimi began shopping the property around Fox decided to purchase the rights. Sadly, it sounds like Raimi may no longer direct, possibly replaced by David Slade.  Slade directed the vampire film Thirty Days of Night which, unfortunately, felt just that long in the theater. Here’s hoping he can put a little more adrenaline into The Shadow.

How I Met your…Smurf?

Neil Patrick Harris will be venturing to the land of blue, three apples tall creatures in Smurfs: The Movie.  The How I Met Your Mother star won’t be playing a Smurf though.  As this film will be a mix of live action and animation, Harris will be playing the lead live action character.  Too bad, I would have liked to know just which Smurf he’d play.  ”Awesome” Smurf maybe?  Let us know your picks in the comments.

‘Wolverine 2′ starts shooting next January

X-Men Origins: Wolverine was pretty good, but it was missing one thing: ninjas!  Hopefully that will be rectified in the sequel which is set to begin shooting next January.  Delving into Wolvie’s Japanese mythos the script follows stories penned by two pretty big names:

“Based on a story cycle by Frank Miller and Chris Claremont, Wolverine’s adventures in martial arts will be a love story featuring a Japanese actress, I am told. ‘It’s a beautiful story,’ says a source, ‘and will be very different than the first film.’”

Okay, I’m not really sold on the “love story” angle but considering the number of women that went to see Wolverine (pretty much for mutant hunk, Hugh Jackman) at least this will be one you can take your girlfriends to.

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Back in September, we brought you word of an indie superhero flick out of Canada making some waves at the Toronto Film Festival. It looks like the film has now grown in popularity and moved South, as it’s getting an official DVD release with Sony Pictures, and a limited theatrical run as well.

The film stars Woody Harrelson as a mentally disturbed man named Arthur Poppington who decides to take justice back in his city and fight crime as the masked avenger, The Defendor. The film also stars Kat Dennings, Sandra Oh, and Elias Koteas, which rounds out the cast to a pretty decent level.

Either way, Harrelson’s performance has gotten rave reviews, and will be hitting New York and Los Angeles in a few months to coincide with it’s April 13th release date on DVD.

The studio amped up the marketing with a new trailer, which you can check out after the jump, thanks to our pals at Trailer Addict.

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Jeff Blake, Chairman of Sony Pictures Worldwide Marketing & Distribution announced today that the upcoming Spider-Man reboot will be coming to theaters on July 3rd, 2012 in full 3D. According to Blake: “Spider-Man is the ultimate summer movie-going experience, and we’re thrilled the filmmakers are presenting the next installment in 3D. Spider-Man is one of the most popular characters in the world, and we know audiences are eager and excited to discover Marc’s fantastic vision for Peter Parker and the franchise.”

Set to be directed by Marc Webb (500 Days of Summer) with from a screenplay by James Vanderbilt (Zodiac), the still untitled Spider-Man film will quickly reboot the franchise that had starred Toby McGuire as Peter Parker. Now already eight years after the original film’s release, a new generation’s webslinger will step on to the silver screen.

With visuals like shooting webs and swinging through Manhattan, it seems like the Spider-Man franchise would work well in 3D as long as they were about to avoid the somewhat stereotypical “throw something at the screen” actions that some of these style films fall in to. Our main concern though is making sure there are no 3D song and dance routines down Broadway.

With more and more news hitting daily on the upcoming Green Lantern film, there will of course be more information hitting the web that shouldn’t actually be out there. Between how big of a film this is turning out to be, and how much of a fanbase the DC character has developed over the decades of print, there were bound to be a few leaks.

With that news comes some potential new concept art for the alien life that we’ll be seeing in the film. Martin Campbell already confirmed that we’ll be seeing Kilowog, Abin Sur, and Toma-Re in the upcoming flick, but these is the first time we’ll be seeing what they could actually look like.

The images first hit on one of the Green Lantern fan message boards, and was later confirmed by several sources to be legit. This comes only days after Warner announced that Sony will be doing the special effect work for the upcoming film.

Check out the concept art after the jump, and be sure to keep it here for more Green Lantern news as it comes our way.

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Coming directly from the “that didn’t take long” department comes word that Sony has already confirmed a new director for its next Spider-Man film and that person is (500) Days of Summer helmer Marc Webb. Representatives of Columbia Pictures and Marvel Studios made a joint announcement today regarding the decision.

In a joint statement by Amy Pascal, co-chairman of Sony Pictures Entertainment, and Matt Tolmach, president of Columbia Pictures, the studio highlighted what went into the decision: “At its core, Spider-Man is a small, intimate human story about an everyday teenager that takes place in an epic super-human world. The key for us as we sought a new director was to identify filmmakers who could give sharp focus to Peter Parker’s life.”

“We wanted someone who could capture the awe of being in Peter’s shoes so the audience could experience his sense of discovery while giving real heart to the emotion, anxiety, and recklessness of that age and coupling all of that with the adrenaline of Spider-Man’s adventure,” continued the statement. “We believe Marc Webb is the perfect choice to bring us on that journey.”

Let’s hope so.

As first reported via Deadline Hollywood, things are going in a completely different direction in the cinematic world of Spider-Man. According to the report, the fourth film featuring the web slinger won’t star Tobey Maguire or be directed by Sam Raimi. In fact, none of the creative team from the first three films will be returning and the next film will be an entire reboot of the franchise.

This news comes after recent reports of script and villain problems and delays in filming in order to reach a projected release date in 2012. In addition, Sony released a statement today and we’ve got that for you right here:

Culver City, CA (January 11, 2010) — Peter Parker is going back to high school when the next Spider-Man hits theaters in the summer of 2012. Columbia Pictures and Marvel Studios announced today they are moving forward with a film based on a script by James Vanderbilt that focuses on a teenager grappling with both contemporary human problems and amazing super-human crises.

The new chapter in the Spider-Man franchise produced by Columbia, Marvel Studios and Avi Arad and Laura Ziskin, will have a new cast and filmmaking team. Spider-Man 4 was to have been released in 2011, but had not yet gone into production.

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In the 1990’s, a pair of French directors brought us two fantastical movies unlike anything I had ever seen before. Delicatessen (1991) and La cité des enfants perdus (The City of Lost Children, 1995) were wildly imaginative, twisted, and haunting, but they were also quite beautiful. Marc Caro and Jean-Pierre Jeunet packed their movies with so many visual delights that repeated viewings were necessary to absorb even a fraction of them. I forgot how much I loved those films. . . until now.

Watching Terry Gilliam’s The Imaginarium of Doctor Parnassus, I experienced the same awe and wonderment that those French films evoked in me. Imaginarium is like a grown up version of The Wizard of Oz, painted liberally by the storytelling brush of  the Grimm brothers. It’s dark and twisty, colorful and lovely all at the same time.

Mainstream audiences might recognize some of Gilliam’s work (Monty Python and the Holy Grail, Twelve Monkeys, Brazil, Fear and Loathing in Las Vegas), but this film will probably not garner him any new fans, it is just too bizarre. The Gilliam loyalist, however, will be richly rewarded by this visual masterpiece. Before I continue, just a warning that this review contains mild spoilers.

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With Cameron’s Avatar raking in over $1 Billion, and just about every big-budget film coming out in the next year getting the “3D treatment”, it only makes sense that three large companies would decide to partner up so that America would have that technology in their homes, 24/7.

It looks like that’s exactly the case here, as Sony, IMAX, and Discovery announced this morning that they will be developing a 24 hour channel that will broadcast in high-quality 3D. From the New York Times:

Discovery Communications, which operates the Discovery Channel, TLC and other cable channels, will distribute the channel, which has a 2011 start date. It is expected to showcase a mix of 3-D content, including entertainment and sports. It will also show some of the natural history programming for which Discovery is well known.

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