Here’s more of today’s casting news:

• Dominic Cooper (Captain America: The First Avenger) is in negotiations to join Luke Evans in Dracula, the Universal picture directed by Gary Shore.
• Alicia Vikander (Anna Karenina) is in talks for The Man from U.N.C.L.E., the Guy Ritchie-directed adaptation of the TV series that stars Tom Cruise and Armie Hammer.
• Pierce Brosnan (The Thomas Crown Affair), Jessica Alba (Sin City) and Kristin Scott Thomas (The English Patient) will star in How to Make Love Like an Englishman for director Tom Vaughan.

Hit the jump for more on each casting announcement.

Alicia Vikander (Anna Karenina) is in talks to star in Ex Machina, the upcoming directorial debut from screenwriter Alex Garland (28 Days Later).  The story centers on a billionaire programmer who invites a young employee to spend a week at his remote estate and to participate in a test involving an artificially intelligent female robot that he invented.  Oscar Isaac (Drive) is set to play the billionaire and Vikander’s Anna Karenina co-star Domhnall Gleeson will play the employee.  Of course, this leaves Vikander with the role of artificially-intelligent female robot, as The Wrap reports.  Filming is set to begin later this year.

Rising stars Oscar Isaac (Drive) and Domhnall Gleeson (Anna Karenina) are set to lead Ex Machina, the directorial debut from screenwriter Alex Garland (28 Days Later).  As we reported last week, the story centers on a billionaire programmer who invites a young employee to spend a week at his remote estate, participating in a test involving an artificially intelligent female robot that he invented.  At this point, I assume the theme from Weird Science kicks in.  According to The Wrap, Isaac would play the billionaire and Gleeson would play the employee.

Hit the jump for more.  Filming is set to begin this summer or fall.

Just after Cate Blanchett was reported as being in negotiations to play the evil step-mother in Disney’s Untitled Cinderella Story, we now have a trio of international actresses being eyed for the lead role. The contenders for the coveted glass slipper are the Irish-born Saoirse Ronan (Hanna), Britain’s Gabriella Wilde (The Three Musketeers) and Swedish Alicia Vikander (A Royal Affair). Originally pitched by Aline Brosh McKenna (The Devil Wears Prada), Disney picked up the project for a substantial sum in 2010. Chris Weitz (About a Boy) wrote the script and Simon Kinberg (X-Men) will produce. Hit the jump for more.

[This is a re-post of my review from the 2012 Toronto International Film Festival.  Anna Karenina opens today in limited release.]

Joe Wright is a gifted director. His direction is daring, inventive, captivating, and unforgettable. But that doesn’t make him a great director. A great director finds a way to take the material he’s given and bring it to its maximum potential. Joe Wright doesn’t elevate his movies; he exceeds them. Pride and Prejudice and Hanna are marvelous, but Atonement and The Soloist are terrible. Granted, any director can only do so much with a script he’s given, but Wright seems content to leave his poor stories in the dust so that we can sit in awe at his bold direction like the long take of Dunkirk in Atonement or the musical colors in The Soloist. In his new film, Anna Karenina, Wright has once again blown past his story by using a melodrama to wrap his fascinating framing device rather than the other way around. Anna Karenina is a wonder to behold, but it leaves you wondering what you’re holding.

Joe Wright is a gifted director.  His direction is daring, inventive, captivating, and unforgettable.  But that doesn’t make him a great director.  A great director finds a way to take the material he’s given and bring it to its maximum potential.  Joe Wright doesn’t elevate his movies; he exceeds them.  Pride and Prejudice and Hanna are marvelous, but Atonement and The Soloist are terrible.  Granted, any director can only do so much with a script he’s given, but Wright seems content to leave his poor stories in the dust so that we can sit in awe at his bold direction like the long take of Dunkirk in Atonement or the musical colors in The Soloist.  In his new film, Anna Karenina, Wright has once again blown past his story by using a melodrama to wrap his fascinating framing device rather than the other way around.  Anna Karenina is a wonder to behold, but it leaves you wondering what you’re holding.

The first trailer and poster for director Joe Wright’s Anna Karenina has been unveiled.  The film is an adaptation of Leo Tolstoy’s classic tome about late 19th century Russian society and stars Keira Knightley an adulterer who questions her happiness.  We knew from Wright’s previous resume (Atonement, Pride & Prejudice, Hanna) that Anna Karenina wouldn’t be a straightforward, boring period piece, and this trailer speaks volumes to the director’s strength as a filmmaker.  The visuals are absolutely gorgeous and he appears to using some truly mesmerizing set design to change the film’s setting in one take.  Knightley, Jude Law and Aaron Johnson all look great, and I’m really looking forward to seeing how Wright’s adaptation plays out in full.

Hit the jump to watch the trailer and check out the poster.  The film also stars Kelly Macdonald, Matthew Macfadyen, Domhnall Gleeson, Emily Watson, Alicia Vikander, Olivia Williams and Ruth Wilson.  Anna Karenina opens on November 9th.

Legendary Films held their first ever Comic-Con panel today kicked off their inaugural run with aplomb, bringing out plenty of A-list talent and displaying concept art for four different projects.

In addition to Pacific Rim, Legendary brought  Jeff Bridges, Ben Barnes, Sergei Bodrov and Alicia Vikander for Seventh Son, Bradley Cooper and Alex Proyas for Paradise Lost, and Mark Protosevich and Casey Hudson for Mass Effect.  Read on for a summary of the presentation and details on the concept art.

Warner Bros. and Legendary Pictures reportedly offered Alex Pettyfer and Jennifer Lawrence the parts of Tom and Alice in The Seventh Son — the upcoming adaptation of the first book in the Last Apprentice series — but they passed on the roles.  Since then, the studios cast out a wide net: Sam Claflin, Caleb Landry-Jones, James Frecheville for Tom; Alicia Vikander, Imogen Poots, Felicity Jones,  Gabrielle Wild, and Dianna Agron for Alice.  Variety reports that Claflin and Vikander have emerged from the young Hollywood scuffle to enter negotiations to star.  Claflin is poised for a breakout as the effective Orlando Bloom replacement in Pirates of the Caribbean: On Stranger Tides.  Vikander is a Swedish actress seeking her first credit in Hollywood — WB and Legendary considered her earlier in the year for a role in the sequel to Clash of the Titans.

From a creative standpoint, Vikander may have lucked out.  Jeff Bridges, Julianne Moore, and their ten combined Oscar nominations are in talks to play the Spook and Mother Malkin, respectively, for director Sergey Bodrov (Mongol: The Rise of Genghis Khan). Joseph Delaney’s young adult novels center on “a 13-year-old who’s the seventh son of a seventh son and learns about wizardry from a forbidding spook.”  Read the synopsis for Revenge of the Witch, the first in the series, after the break.

Two competing  Snow White re-imaginings — Relativity Media’s The Brothers Grimm: Snow White and Universal’s Snow White and the Huntsman — have sparked casting rumors for a few months now.  Back in October, Tom Hardy (Inception) was rumored to play Eric the Huntsman in Snow White and the Huntsman with Charlize Theron set to star as the Snow White’s evil stepmother.  Meanwhile, Relativity was circling Natalie Portman, Scarlett Johansson, and Anne Hathaway for The Brothers Grimm: Snow White.

New casting rumors have surfaced for both films tonight.  One links Julia Roberts to The Brothers Grimm.  The other links Michael Fassbender (Inglourious Basterds) to Huntsman and reveals Universal’s shortlist to play Snow White: Riley Keough (The Runaways), Felicity Jones (The Tempest), Bella Heathcoat (Neighbours), and Alicia Vikander (Beloved).  Details after the jump.