Fans of David Fincher have been itching to see a new feature film from the director since 2011’s release of The Girl with the Dragon Tattoo, and we received a fairly promising update on his potential next project just yesterday.  The filmmaker has been developing a big-budget remake of 20,000 Leagues Under the Sea for quite some time with an eye towards making it his next film, and yesterday we learned that Disney is being wooed by a major tax credit to shoot the film in Australia this year.  Though Fincher was hoping to nab frequent collaborator Brad Pitt as his star, the actor had yet to officially sign on to the project.

Now a new report has surfaced with plenty of updates on all things Fincher, including word that he’s looking at a number of actors—including Channing Tatum—to possibly lead 20,000 Leagues given that Pitt has passed, that he may have to push production on the remake back to next year and film something else in the interim, and the possibility that he might not helm any of season two of the Netflix series House of Cards.  Hit the jump to read on.

If The Girl with the Dragon Tattoo had been the smashing success Sony hoped for, we would probably be getting the sequel, The Girl Who Played with Fire, by the end of this year.  Surprisingly, audiences didn’t want to watch “The Feel Bad Movie of Christmas”, and while the film managed to gross $232 million worldwide, it was still a disappointment when you consider the $90 million budget.  Sony wants to continue The Millennium Series, but the studio is carefully considering how to proceed.

Hit the jump for what the future may hold for Lisbeth Salander.

Director David Fincher’s adaptation of The Girl with the Dragon Tattoo was a sizeable hit when it opened last December, but the film wasn’t the runaway box office success that some were expecting.  It’s global take of $232 million was enough to justify an adaptation of author Steig Larsson’s sequel The Girl who Played with Fire, but development on the follow-up has been slow-going.

Fincher has yet to officially attach himself as the director of Fire, and rumblings of head-butting between the director and Sony during the production of Dragon Tattoo didn’t exactly make Fincher’s return for the sequel a sure thing.  However, in a recent interview Fincher revealed that he’s still very much mulling over a return to the world of Lisbeth Salander.  Hit the jump to see what he had to say.

In David Fincher’s The Girl with the Dragon Tattoo, Rooney Mara tore up every second that she was on screen as the complicated and complex computer hacker Lisbeth Salander. For that Academy Award-nominated performance, she was honored with a Virtuoso Award at the Santa Barbara International Film Festival (SBIFF). Collider was there to cover and attend the event, and we’ve compiled the highlights of what the actress had to say, both on the press line and during the Q&A.

While there, Rooney Mara talked about what the whole award season experience has been like for her, how she felt like she didn’t get to know director David Fincher at all from the four days she worked on The Social Network, that she doesn’t know when the next films in the Millennium trilogy will start shooting but that she would love to do them simultaneously, and that if Fincher decided not to direct the other films, it would be hard without him but she would get through it with his blessing. Check out what she had to say after the jump.

David Fincher‘s adaptation of The Girl with the Dragon Tattoo opened to disappointing box office although it didn’t absolutely tank.  It’s an R-rated movie opening at the holiday season, but Sony expected a bigger success based on the ridiculous sales of Stieg Larsson‘s novel of the same name.  More worrisome for Sony is that the movie, despite being set out the US, isn’t connecting with international audiences, and according to Deadline, “GWDT pened only 3rd in the UK, and disappointing in Asia, and ‘not as good as hoped for’ in Sweden, Denmark, and Finland.”

Sony has held off on giving the greenlight to the sequels, The Girl Who Played with Fire and The Girl Who Kicked the Hornet’s Nest, but they’ve had Dragon Tattoo screenwriter Steve Zaillian at work on both.  Now the studio has officially pulled the trigger on completing the “Millennium Trilogy”.  Hit the jump for more.

While director David Fincher’s The Girl with the Dragon Tattoo is far from a box office bomb, the feature film adaptation of Stieg Larsson’s bestselling crime novel hasn’t exactly broken records. The $90 million pic has grossed a little over $60 million domestically since its release on December 20th, but given the widespread popularity of Larsson’s book series many believed the film would be performing better. While Sony has been planning on adapting all three books in Larsson’s Millennium series from the start, Dragon Tattoo’s box office performance had me wondering if their plan would be altered. My question was given an answer today, with the news that Sony is still moving forward with an adaptation of The Girl Who Played with Fire. Hit the jump for more.

Last weekend, Sony held a big press junket in New York City for director David Fincher‘s The Girl With the Dragon Tattoo and I got to participate in a great press conference with Fincher, Rooney Mara, and Daniel Craig.  Click here if you missed it.  As most of you know, Dragon Tattoo is the first in Stieg Larson’s Millennium trilogy and it centers on a disgraced journalist (Craig) who’s hired to investigate the mysterious 40-year-old disappearance of a young woman.  Mara plays Lisbeth Salander, a brilliant young hacker who teams up with Craig.

Shortly after the press conference ended, I got to sit down with screenwriter Steven Zaillian for an exclusive interview.  As a big fan of his previous work on American Gangster, Moneyball, Searching for Bobby Fischer (which he wrote and directed) and Schindler’s List (full resume here), I was excited to hear about his collaboration with David Fincher and also how he writes screenplays.  In addition, we also talked about how he got involved in the project, how quickly it came together, the changes he made to make Dragon Tattoo work as a movie, the status of the sequels and how they might shoot them back to back, and he also revealed that he might be directing the remake of Timecrimes.  Hit the jump to read or listen to the interview.

With director David Fincher‘s The Girl With the Dragon Tattoo set to open in a few days, earlier today I attended a press conference in New York City with Fincher, Rooney Mara, and Daniel Craig.  In the coming days I’ll have a transcript (with audio), but I wanted to post a bit of news from the interview today.

Even though the first film has yet to open, with the popularity of Stieg Larson’s Millennium trilogy, it’s almost certain Dragon Tattoo will be a big hit for Sony and they’ll likely move ahead with the sequels as fast as they can.  Since the second and third books (The Girl Who Played With Fire and The Girl Who Kicked the Hornet’s Nest) are one story, Fincher was asked if he might shoot the sequels back to back.  Continued after the jump.

The shroud of mystery surrounding Stieg Larsson’s potential 10 book narrative that began with The Girl With The Dragon Tattoo has an interesting new twist. While the Swedish author never lived to see the roaring success that his trilogy and book adaptations have become, he might have one last trick up his sleeve. Larsson died at the age of 50 from a heart attack, but he may have finished a fourth novel in the potential 10 book arc that was recently discovered by his long-term partner Eva Gabrielsson. However, there is an enormous caveat that is frustrating and relieving at the same time. Hit the jump for full details on why this might not become a fourth film and more.

Daniel Craig has closed a deal to star in David Fincher’s adaptation of Stieg Larsson’s The Girl with the Dragon Tattoo as well as its two sequels, The Girl Who Played with Fire and The Girl Who Kicked the Hornet’s Nest.  Deadline reports that Craig will begin filming in early fall after he wraps on Jon Favreau’s Cowboys & Aliens.  Combined with James Bond—which is currently in stasis due to MGM’s financial woes—Craig is now in two major franchises and possibly a third since he has an option on a Cowboys & Aliens sequel.

In the “Millennium Trilogy” (Girl with the Dragon Tattoo is the first part) , Craig will play disgraced financial journalist Mikael Blomkvist, but the role attracting the most attention is that of asocial but brilliant hacker/researcher Lisbeth Salander.  Reportedly, the final candidates for the part are Emily Browning (Sucker Punch), Sarah Snook (Sleeping Beauty), Sophie Lowe (Blame), Rooney Mara (Fincher’s upcoming The Social Network), and an unidentified French actress.  Hit the jump for a synopsis of the book.  The Girl with the Dragon Tattoo is slated to open on December 21, 2011.