Channing Tatum and Mila Kunis have been offered the lead roles in the Lana and Andy Wachowki directed Jupiter Ascending. The Warner Bros project’s plot has been kept under tight wraps.

This is the first major science fiction film franchise that the Wachowkis have been involved in since The Matrix. Just like The Matrix trilogy, Jupiter Ascending is an original creation by the duo.

Channing Tatum is becoming a formidable leading man, particularly with his back-to-back box office successes The Vow and 21 Jump Street. Mila Kunis is also a strong draw as she is coming off of Black Swan and Friends With Benefits. She is also set to star in two much anticipated films in the Seth MacFarlane directed comedy Ted and  the Sam Raimi directed Oz: The Great And Powerful.

The Wachowskis have just finished production of the film Cloud Atlas. The Wachowskis hadn’t directed a film since the craptastic 2008 film Speed Racer. The duo were trying to find financiers for a different film script last spring. It was for a hard-R drama they wanted to direct about a gay relationship between a U.S. soldier and an Iraqi. Unfortunately for them, they had no luck finding the funding. There is speculation that the Wachowskis are doing this project for the purpose of funding this other project.

The Wachowskis are using the billions of dollars that the Matrix trilogy pulled in to get Warner Bros excited about this new project . The film is on track to start production later this year.

It’s hard not to be at least curious about a show called Friends with Benefits. After all, who among us hasn’t secretly wanted to sleep with an attractive friend and, bonus, have no strings attached? I see some hands raised out there.

That little revelation bring us to the new NBC show called, wait for it, Friends with Benefits — which has nothing to do with the recent movie of the same name, by the way. This show, which features Veronica Mars and Party Down alumni Ryan Hansen along with Danneel Ackles, Zach Cregger, Andre Holland and Jessica Lucas, is about a group of singles in their twenties and their romantic ups and downs as they try to maneuver the dating world. I know, I know.

Anyway, to help spark your interest, we’ve got some previews for the how for you right now. In them you get to meet Sara and Ryan, two close friends looking for love. Ben may be picky, but at the end of his date, he might be justified while Sara starts to worry about her future.

Friends with Benefits premieres tomorrow night (Friday) at 8/7C on NBC. I’m going to give it a shot because of Hansen. Click through to check out the previews.

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It turns out, after tons of doubt that Captain America: The First Avenger would undertake the final Harry Potter film in the box office on the biggest nerd weekend of the year, San Diego Comic-Con, we were all wrong.

In reality, the film actually did just that, and took the #1 spot for the weekend, totaling an impressive $65.8 million here in the US. While this is excellent news for the new films from Marvel Studios and Paramount, the real story here is how much of a drop Harry Potter had.

From last weekend’s $169 million opening to a mere $48 million this weekend, the film dropped over 70% in just a week. Either everyone who was going to see this film saw it in the first weekend, or the word of mouth wasn’t as good as the folks at Warner Bros were hoping for.

Also opening this weekend, the R-rated version of No Strings Attached, starring Justin Timberlake and Mila Kunis and titled Friends With Benefits managed to stay in the top 3 with an estimated $18 million. Just a simple million less than the one that starred Kutcher and Portman.

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Welcome to another edition of On the Radar where we delve into all corners of the entertainment, tech and geek Internets for news, views and whatnot that may have escaped our regular coverage during the week. Let is know if we missed something interesting.

Let’s get started!

• Just because they seem to be running out of ideas that aren’t hand-delivered to them by either Marvel or Pixar, Disney is now working on a feature length film based on their Matterhorn ride. Let’s hope this one doesn’t spawn as many sequels as Pirates.

• Both No Strings Attached starring Ashton Kutcher and Friends With Benefits starring Mila Kunis are eerily similar. How similar? Here’s a mashup trailer to prove it.

• Diablo Cody is stepping away from her hamburger-shaped typewriter and behind her hamburger-shaped camera as she takes on directing Lamb of God.

• In honor of his newest masterpiece hitting theaters, here is the premise to every Michael Bay film in under 60 seconds.

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This week on The Flickcast Chris and Matt are on duty and discussing, dissecting and, in some cases, dissing some new movies, TV shows, comics, games and geek stuff. Among the topics this week are more on The Walking Dead, the debut of Conan’s new talk show, upcoming films Skyline and Friends with Benefits, George Lucas and the new Force Unleashed II video game, the Back to the Future Trilogy on Blu-ray and the bizarreness of Robert Altman’s 1980 film Popeye.

Of course, the guys also made new picks for your enjoyment this week including Matt’s pick of the drama spoof Fatal Instinct, featuring Armand Assante and Sherylin Fenn, and Chris’ double pick of Call of Duty: Black Ops and the upcoming Skyline, which hits theaters this Friday.

As always, if you have comments, questions, critiques, offers of sponsorship or whatever, feel free to hit us up in the comments, on Twitter, at Facebook and MySpace or via email.

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It may be taking a bit longer than someone like Blake Lively, but Mila Kunis has some rising stock in Hollywood. A few flops may have held her back, like American Psycho 2 or Max Payne, but with the tandem success of Family Guy and Forgetting Sarah Marshall, Kunis is becoming quite the name in the comedy world. Now she’s teaming up with another recent comedy favorite, with his outrageous SNL popularity, Justin Timberlake.

The two are teaming up for the upcoming sex comedy Friends With Benefits about a two friends that try to master then art of “stringless sex”. Of course, things don’t go as planned, and one falls for the other. Who will it be?

The interesting part of the film is it’s R-rated nature. In the newest red band trailer, you get plenty of vulgarity from both Kunis and Timberlake. And yes, ladies, Justin even sings a Semi Sonic song.

Check out the NSFW red band trailer after the jump, and check out Friends with Benefits in theaters on July 22nd.

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When I went to bed last night, lulled by the barrage of television spots for The Bounty Hunter, I had only one thought — the world needs more romantic comedies! I mean, we only have one coming out this weekend! And then we have to wait an entire week for The Last Song! You’re killing me Hollywood.

Thankfully, Ivan Reitman senses the need, and is coming to the rescue.  According to Variety, Reitman will be helming an untitled romantic comedy for Paramount. He’s lured Natalie Portman and Ashton Kutcher to star, and it already has a release date of January 7, 2011.

Penned by Elizabeth Meriwether, the script has the working title of Friends With Benefits. (If IMDB is to be believed, it had an even raunchier working title that rhymes with Muckmuddies.  I can’t imagine why they had to change that.) The story is being kept secret, but it revolves around how much easier it is to fall into a sexual relationship over something with emotional bonds.

In other words, friends with benefits. Reitman feels this is untapped territory when it comes to the genre of cute people in love.  “It’s an issue ripe for discussion.”

January 7, 2011. The day when Portman, Kutcher, and Reitman became pioneers in the field of cinematic romance. Mark your calenders. History will be made.