Fifteen films, including the hit March of the Penguins, will compete for next year's best feature-length documentary Oscar at the 78th annual Academy Awards, organizers have announced.
Of the 15 contenders, five will be picked as nominees for the next year's Oscars when nominations are unveiled just before dawn on Jan. 31, and only one will be awarded the golden statuette when it is handed out on March 5.
The most high-profile of the 15 entrants selected by the Academy of Motion Pictures Arts and Sciences to vie for the award is French director Luc Jacquet's documentary, March of the Penguins.
The moving and anthropomorphic story of the gruelling annual ritual of Emperor Penguins, who walk across a 90km stretch of icy and desolate Antarctica in search of a mate, became a surprise global box office hit.
It has taken US$76.8 million in North America alone and US$26.9 million in the rest of the world.
This year's best actress Oscar-winner, Hilary Swank, and fellow nominee Imelda Staunton are teaming up to star in a new high school drama called Freedom Writers, the industry press said.
Filming on the movie, which is based on a true story that took place at a gang-ridden school in California, is set to begin in Los Angeles next month, according to the Hollywood Reporter.
Swank, 31, in March snatched the Academy Award for her role as a boxer in Million Dollar Baby from British star Staunton, who had been nominated as leading actress in the abortion drama Vera Drake.
US funnyman Leslie Nielsen, famed for his role in the Naked Gun movies, and Baywatch babe Carmen Electra will co-star in the third sequel to the spoof horror flick Scary Movie.
The pair will top the cast list of Scary Movie 4 that will parody Night Shayamalan's fright flick The Village, the industry press reported.
Also joining the cast are US daytime television heartthrob Simon Rex.
US actor Matthew McConaughey was named by People magazine this week "the sexiest man alive."
The 36-year-old actor, who starred in A Time to Kill, Amistad and Contact, as well as a series of romantic comedies and action films, has earned the top spot because of his ability to combine "a heaping helping of Texas's finest southern charm with the best of all the heartthrobs who've come before him," the magazine said.
Meanwhile, Robert De Niro is to return to his acting roots by playing a mafia hit man in The Winter of Frankie Machine, Variety has reported.
The movie is based on an as yet unpublished book by Don Winslow about a Mafia hit man who has given up the game to become the proprietor of a bait shop. When he finds out that he's been targeted for a hit, he gets back in the business.
De Niro became a superstar with his role as Vito Corleone in the classic mafia movie The Godfather 2 in 1974.
Actress Sharon Stone has agreed to drop her lawsuit against a plastic surgeon she accused of libel in return for his performing free surgery for children with facial deformities, the doctor's lawyer said. The settlement became final on Monday when Stone filed papers in Los Angeles County Superior Court dismissing her complaint against Dr. Renato Calabria, whom she accused of making false claims that she had had a face-lift, his attorney, Arthur Barens said.
British screen heartthrob Orlando Bloom is also experiencing legal problems after being sued by his former management firm for US$660,000 in commissions allegedly owed for his work, including the Pirates of the Caribbean movies.
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