While Hollywood has proven that magicians may look cool, they definitely don’t always rake in the big bucks across the globe. It’s been shown time and time again with films like The Prestige, The Illusionist, and The Sorcerer’s Apprentice. Though, for that last one, we blame Nic Cage.

It looks like Working Title films, the company behind the series The Tudors and the film Hot Fuzz, are now working on a brand new adaptation of the classic Merlin tale, which will take the old wizard to modern day.

The script comes from historical novel author Jay Basu, who plans on rebooting King Arthur’s spiritual wizard in a “contemporary setting.” Expect to see the film to keep a prominent British cast, as most of the films from Working Title are done out of the UK.

Not much is known about the script or what we can expect from the film, but you can expect to see plenty of respect paid to the character, as legendary actors like Sam Neill, Ben Kingsley, and Donald Pleasence have donned the robe and pointy hat at one point.

Keep it here for more news on this film as it develops.

Just two weeks  before filming was to begin,  Nicholas Cage has pulled out of Joel Schumacher’s Trespass. According to reports, Cage is on vacation and will stay in the Bahamas.

Rather than waiting for the star, the studio plans to keep the film on schedule and will move forward without Cage. The studio is currently scrambling for a replacement. The rumored forerunner for the role is Liev Schreiber.

In the film, Cage was set to play opposite Nicole Kidman as a husband who is kidnapped with his wife by a group of thugs looking for ransom. The problems began when Cage decided that he rather play one of the kidnappers instead of the lead male role.

One thing is for sure, Cage isn’t known for pulling out of projects or turning down roles. Even with a recent streak of wins such as Knowing and Kick-Ass, Cage has taken on some horrible roles in films like The Wicker Man, Next, Ghost Rider, The Sorcerer’s Apprentice, Astro Boy, Bangkok Dangerous and the upcoming Season of the Witch.

How bad could a role be that the man who was the “star” of The Wicker Man remake decided to drop out? Could it be that Schumacher is past his prime and is making a film that even Cage knows is horrible? Or is it another bad move by Cage who may end up regretting it? Only time will tell.

Audiences continued to embrace Inception this past weekend, as the Christopher Nolan movie dropped only 30% from its opening weekend, and earned an additional $45 Million at the box office. This bodes very well for the film, which now looks poised to enjoy some staying power at the box office.  The cerebral caper has a ten day total of over $143 Million.

Salt proved to be a solid number two film, earning $36.5 Million, with a per screen average of around $10,000. Despicable Me continues to delight audiences, as the film only dropped 26% in its third week, making over $24 Million.  The movie has now made over $161 Million in its three week run.

The Sorcerer’s Apprentice added almost another $10 Million to its two week total, and came in at number four for the weekend. Holdover Toy Story 3 came in at number five with $9 Million.

Newcomer Ramona and Beezus failed to crack the top five, coming in at number six.  The g-rated flick only made about $8 Million, but it should be noted that it only opened on about 2,700 screens. The film reportedly only cost around $15 Million to make, so it should have no problem making a profit.

Indie film The Kids Are All Right continues to have a strong per screen average.  This week it averaged over $13,000 on just over 200 screens.

Cerebral movie lovers can rejoice.  Christopher Nolan’s Inception handily won at the box office over the weekend, raking in over $60 Million. The film made over $3 Million on midnight showings Thursday night, and netted $20 Million on Friday, a true testament of the loyalty of Nolan’s fans.  Marketing a cryptic plot is no easy task, so Warner Brothers has to be happy about the opening weekend.

On the other hand, it might be a long climb to recoup the $160 Million budget.  The film will have to rely on repeat business from fans to maintain box office legs.  Everyone I know who really liked the movie has said they want to see it again, but it remains to be seen whether people actually follow through with those intentions. At any rate, it is nice to see an original film have a good opening weekend.

Despicable Me came in at number two, dropping about 42% from its opening weekend, which was a little higher than I would have anticipated.  It still earned a healthy $32 Million, and has grossed $118 Million in ten days. Disney’s wide release The Sorcerer’s Apprentice earned a paltry $17 Million, far below most industry expectations. The film opened last Wednesday, so its cumulative stands at $24 Million.  The film had a budget of $150 Million, so unless it performs well overseas, it stands little chance of recouping its budget.

Twilight: Eclipse dropped off 57% from last weekend, which is a fairly significant drop.  It managed $13 Million, and has made almost $265 Million in three weeks. Toy Story 3 is still doing well after five weeks, earning $11 Million over the weekend.  Its cumulative now stands at $362 Million.

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If you saw the trailer for The Sorcerer’s Apprentice and thought to yourself, “YES.  I have been waiting for this.  The team that brought us National Treasure and National Treasure: Book of Secrets have made another film starring Nic Cage that looks a bit like Percy Jackson and the Olympians: The Lightning Thief and I totally want to see this. I am SO THERE.”, then you will not be disappointed in The Sorcerer’s Apprentice.  I had kind of the opposite reaction when I saw the trailer – falling somewhere between “Oh no.” and “Huh.  I think I’m going to have a grilled cheese sandwich for lunch today.”

Generally speaking, this type of movie just isn’t my cup of tea, so when I entered the theater my expectations were neutral – to say the least. That said, it was a lot better than I expected it to be.

Loosely based on The Sorcerer’s Apprentice segment of Disney’s Fantasia, the film has a relatively simple premise. The wizard Merlin – of Arthurian legend fame - is going about the business of doing battle with his nemesis, Morgana le Fay.  Though aided by his three apprentices – Balthazar (Nicolas Cage, equipped with flowing extensions), Veronica (Monica Bellucci) and Horvath (Alfred Molina), Merlin is destroyed by Morgana due in large part to an act of betrayal by of one of his followers, the amusingly named Horvath.

What follows is a little difficult to explain, but during the kerfuffle Veronica sacrifices herself by taking the spirit form of Morgana into her own body while a deeply wounded Balthazar uses magic to trap the remaining three wizards inside a matryoshka doll. Before his demise, Merlin had given Balthazar his Dragon Ring, explaining that he would eventually cross paths with a wizard whom the ring would chose to belong to and that this person would be powerful enough to defeat Morgana. For centuries Balthazar searches for his new apprentice – to no avail – collecting several other dark magicians to fill the nesting doll along the way.

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There is no doubt this weekend is going to be a massive draw for the overall box office. Between Warner Brothers’ Inception, and Disney’s The Sorcerer’s Apprentice, there will be plenty of things for adults and kids alike to check out in theaters.

The latter of the two films is quite intriguing because it’s a feature script based on the short from Fantasia of the same name. Only instead of Mickey Mouse, we get Jay Baruchel and instead of the silent wizard, we get Nic Cage. One of those trades sounds worthwhile.

The film is also supposed to incorporate some of the elements of Harry Potter, while staying as contemporary as a film like Jumper. Also, expect plenty of high-tension CG fight scenes taking place in downtown Manhattan.

We’ve got four new clips from the film you can check out, including one with one of our favorite film baddies, Alfred Molina. Take a look at them after the jump. Catch Disney’s The Sorcerer’s Apprentice in theaters this Friday.

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To all who have survived the month of June by successfully traversing lines of blood-sucking twihards, I congratulate you. You can relax now because the steaming month of July is less about men of iron and teenagers who use SPF 60 and more about whiz kids, dreamers, and spies.

Movie studios may appear to be throwing grenades into your trench, but don’t let the eye-catching blue and orange of the movie posters fool you. These grenades are merely filled with smoke and a good amount of marketing slickness. They will explode in your face only when you yank the pin by paying $12. Then, they will have truly won the battle. Instead of succumbing to the propaganda, arm yourselves wisely with the reviews below.

Those in the know will hold their breath until August when the golden generation of action heroes team up to save the world, kick some ass before kicking the bucket, and get sweaty enough to take off their shirts- giving both men and women some very good reasons for sitting in an air-conditioned multiplex.

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Earlier this week, we brought you three exciting new clips from the upcoming Disney blockbuster Prince of Persia: The Sands of Time. We got our first look at the drama between Dastan (Jake Gyllenhaal) and Nizam (Ben Kingsley), as well as some of the immense action that the film plans to deliver.

Today, we’re bringing you even more. The screenplay comes from Boaz Yakin who was set to originally write the Batman Year One project directed by Darren Aronofsky. That film later became Chris Nolan’s Batman Begins. Also, the team of Doug Miro and Carlo Bernard helped move the Prince script along. They also wrote the script for Disney’s upcoming The Sorcerer’s Apprentice.

In the clips today, we get our first look at Alfred Molina in the film, sporting a spiffy tan. Also, we get a bit more action and roof-jumping from Gyllenhaal’s Dastan, and a cool “Sand Trap” scene showing off some of the CG effects of the film.

Check out those clips after the jump. Catch Disney’s Prince of Persia: The Sands of Time as early as midnight tonight across the U.S.

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If heading out to the typical summer blockbusters (Iron Man 2, The A-Team, Toy Story 3 and The Twilight Saga: Eclipse) is already a given and you’re looking for other movies to occupy your time, or if you’re looking for film to take the kids to, Disney is hoping that a live action adaptation of a portion of Fantasia will be just what the doctor ordered.

The decision to adapt the iconic moment (and THE image of Mickey Mouse in the minds of fans around the world) into a full-length, live action film has its roots in Cage’s fondness for the film (he watches it every year) and a quick, on-set conversation with a former producer.

“When I came up with this idea, I was on Next. I was talking with (producer) Todd Garner and I said, ‘Man, I really want to play a magician. I want to play a sorcerer.’ He came in the next day and said, ‘Nic, I got it. Let’s do Sorcerer’s Apprentice.’ Then I went to my partner at the time, Norm Golightly and we got a script out of it.

We all thought, ‘You know who would really put this on a fast track, who would give it all the panache and all the big entertainment style, nobody better than Jerry Bruckheimer.’ So we went to Jerry and being the good friend and great producer that he is, he read it and he said, ‘Hey, we’re doing it.’ We just got off of National Treasure 2 and that was a great experience. We thought the only man that could really do it and make this unique, bring the comedy into it and the humor into it and make it really connect with big audiences like kids and adults was Jon Turteltaub. That’s how it happened.”

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