Boxing Match

News of yet another high powered cinematic reunion tops the Hollywood trades today.

Michael Fleming of Variety:

Paramount Pictures is poised to put "The Departed" co-stars Mark Wahlberg and Matt Damon back in the ring together.

Wahlberg & Damon in The Departed
The two are set to work together again.

Studio has fast-tracked "The Fighter," a drama about boxer "Irish" Micky Ward's unlikely road to the world lightweight title. His Rocky-like rise was shepherded by half-brother Dicky, a boxer-turned-trainer who rebounded in life after nearly being KO'd by drugs and crime.

Mandeville's David Hoberman and Todd Lieberman will produce.

"House" exec producer Paul Attanasio is working on a rewrite that will be completed within two weeks. If they like the script, Wahlberg and Damon will commit, and each will make "The Fighter" his next film. Shooting will begin in early summer in Massachusetts.

Attanasio, who recently adapted John Steinbeck's "East of Eden" for Imagine, is rewriting a draft by Lewis Collick. Eric Johnson and Paul Tamasy penned the original script. Emphasis in the rewrite is on the themes of brotherhood and redemption.

Like the Ward brothers, Wahlberg and Damon are both Massachusetts natives, and they have met several times about "The Fighter." Wahlberg, who's up for a supporting actor Oscar for "The Departed," is about to open in Paramount thriller "The Shooter" and recently wrapped "We Own the Night" for 2929 Prods. and Universal. Damon just wrapped "Ocean's Thirteen" and "The Bourne Ultimatum."...

The Departed placed the two young actors in an interesting dynamic together. It sounds like The Fighter will put new challenges in front of them as well

Meanwhile...

Two new movies are opening on this Valentine's Day 2007, to capitalize on the busiest "date night" of the year:

Music and Lyrics (reviews) has the current romantic comedy king Hugh Grant teaming up with Drew Barrymore love and and laughs; Tyler Perry is back with Daddy's Little Girls (reviews)'; while the topical Close to Home (reviews)--looking at the Israel-Palestine conflict through the eyes of young Israeli female soldiers begins its run in a limited number of places...