Uh oh, trendy hipster movie alert. Twee darlings Ryan Gosling (Lars and the Painfully Whimsical Script) and Michelle Williams (Dudes Doin' It, Wyoming Edition) are set to costar as wistful lovers in a movie melancholicly titled Blue Valentine. Imagine the twinkly music and the shaky-cam shots of mournful streets blurring into focus and, perhaps, the voiceover! [Variety]

Ohh dear. Are you sitting down? Can I get you some tea? Here, have one of these cookies. OK, hon, I have some bad news. You know how much you wanted David E. Kelley to have a new show about lawyers on TV? And remember how it looked like his Kristin Chenoweth show, delightfully titled Legally Mad, was going to be that show? Well, love, unfortunately... Oh, this is so hard. Wait, what's that? The idea of another one of Kelley's aggressively quirky horrid lawyer shows on the air makes you want to burn the Earth down? Oh, well. Me too. So, fuck it. It didn't get picked up. Neither did Lauren Graham's sitcom. Yeah. Drink? [Variety]

Still have a hankering for the heady days of Hawaii Five-O and Magnum P.I.? You know, butt-kickin' crime-fightin' in the balmy bliss of America's most beautiful colony. Well, Jerry Bruckheimer has heard your late night whimpering and is coming to your aid. His Honolulu set procedural Cooler Kings has been greenlit by A&E. The show is about a group of Igloo salesmen who decide to solve mysteries on their lunch breaks. Right? [Variety]

Speaking of A&E, Kevin Costner would like to take that wolf up on its offer of a second dance and head back into the West...ern genre. He's in talks with the net to produce, definitely, and act in and direct, maybe, something about the post-Civil War wild wild West. Sort of like that TNT series from a while back except, we'd imagine, with less Skeet Ulrich. [THR]

Simon Baker the Mentalist will soon be dealing with a mental case. He's playing a lawyer out to expose Casey Affleck as the small town sheriff turned horrid murderer that he is in Michael Winterbottom's adaptation of Jim Thompson's The Killer Inside Me. The Winterbottom factor makes me intrigued, though the presence of Jessica Alba as a hooker and Kate Hudson as a schoolteacher girlfriend gives me pause. [THR]

Oh, cute. Dermot Mulroney is directing a movie. He was so good on The Practice. [THR]

Boomp3.com

Swing Vote star Kevin Costner’s moment of pleasure quickly turned into regret as Costner began to wonder where the ice cream would end up. After the ice cream cone failed to answer his question, Costner assumed that the ice cream would go to his thighs. Costner paused for a moment and continued to plow through his cone. Using his regular guy charm, Costner said, “I guess I’ll just have to swim extra lap at the pool in the morning.”

[Photo Credit: X17]

*A Call To The Bullpen is a work of fiction. Although the pictures we use are most certainly real, Defamer does not purport that any of the incidents or quotations you see in this piece actually happened. Lighten up, people ... it's a joke.

After the jump: Michael Douglas has a party, Woody Harrelson has a complex, and Bull Durham plots a return by Costner demand.

· Eighteen years after giving the hardware to his father, the American Film Instutute selected Michael Douglas to receive next year's Lifetime Achievement Award. [BBC]
· Kat Dennings is in talks to co-star in Defendor, featuring Woody Harrelson as a man who believes he possesses superhero powers and Dennings as the ADD-afflicted, poor-spelling neighbor girl who gives him his name. [THR]
· Kevin Costner, Tim Robbins and Susan Sarandon are all reportedly in talks to return for Bull Durham 2: The Beer League Years. [Page Six]
· Crisis averted! After less than a day of protests, Bollywood's dancing girls and nearly 100,000 other actors, filmmakers and crew concluded their big-budget production Kuchi Kuchi Pay Us Bitches in record time. [NYT]

WHAT'S NEW: Barring some Joker-emulating fanboy's cackling sabotage of a few thousand projectors nationwide, this will likely be the week The Dark Knight slips out of first place behind The Mummy: Tomb of the Dragon Emperor. Make that "first place at the box office," that is — not necessarily in our hearts, where the roundly loathing critical reaction to Mummy doesn't have us too confident in its overall superiority. But that's August for you, and despite the Batmobile at its tattered heels, The Mummy's awfulness shouldn't keep about $52 million worth of American ticketbuyers away. Sorry about that. Or, if you're up for a counterprogramming schlep to Norwalk, Lionsgate's buried Clive Barker adaptation Midnight Meat Train finally opens in one theater. Again, welcome to August. It can only get better. Really.

THE BIG LOSER: In fairness, we're checking out Swing Vote this weekend, so we don't know for ourselves yet whether or not it's a joy to behold. But let's recap for second: Kevin Costner's latest is the story of an alcoholic single dad whose vote is discovered to hold the key to a presidential election. Its plot is essentially lifted from a 1939 John Barrymore film. It's over two hours long. Costner financed it himself, and best promoted it Wednesday night as Conan O'Brian's Chinese-restroom-tour sidekick. Kevin, we really are puling for you, but why are we not encouraged?

THE UNDERDOG: Speaking of counterprogramming, the small drama Frozen River is about as antisummer as its gets: A broke single mother (Melissa Leo) in frigid upstate New York, whose American dream consists of a new double-wide and a Christmas with actual presents under the tree, falls into an immigrant-smuggling ring with a young Native American woman (Misty Upham). That's it — that simple, that stark, and quite strong. And don't hold its Sundance Grand Jury Prize against it; for every brooding indie convention into which it trips, Leo and Upham dig out with help from writer/director Courtney Hunt's elegant eye and gut-punch plot twists. It's not an August miracle or anything, but it's easily the best thing opening in town this weekend.

FOR SHUT-INS: New DVD releases include Martin Scorsese's Rolling Stones concert doc Shine a Light, the 25th anniversary rerelease of WarGames, and a three-way tie for Must-Have-Right-Now Box Set: The Hills: The Complete Third Season; Beverly Hills 90210: The Fifth Season; and Girlfriends: The Fourth Season. Don't rush off to buy them all at once — we have a feeling they'll be there for a while.

So are we worrying too much? Is The Mummy 3 ready for misunderstood masterpiece status? Or is that Swing Vote? Or will Heath Ledger surge back to make fools of us all? We're up for anything at this point in the season — fire away below, and help us count down the days until Pineapple Express.

KEVIN COSTNER'S “Swing Vote” tells the story of an apathetic man floating through life, happy to play whatever cards life deals him. Costner's approach to making the film couldn't have been more different: Rather than watch the Capra-esque fable about a deadlocked election drift away, the actor stepped up to invest more than $21 million of his own money to finance it.

...Costner decided to star in the film and looked for a backer for "Swing Vote's" tentative $20-million budget. But the model some financiers wanted to use — by raising capital through foreign pre-sales — didn't strike him as equitable.

"They want to raise it on your name, but you're not actually benefiting from that," Costner says. "So I looked to my wife and said, 'Why don't we just do this?'"

We can think of three separate reasons why not, but who are we to judge? Oh, right, we're Defamer. In that case, Kevin, kudos for your financial risk-taking, but in this weekend's Mummy/Swing Vote matchup, we're casting a third party vote for another viewing of The Dark Knight.

• Kevin Costner bets on himself again in 'Swing Vote' [LAT]

Both movies are about drunken single parents (Costner, Barrymore) who through a quirk are in the position to decide an election with their single vote. Both become celebrities and are courted by politicians to the point of bribery; and both finally see the light thanks to their children. ...

There are differences, too — running time, for starters (Swing Vote's 127 minutes to Great Man's 72 minutes) and what Lumenick characterizes as the "egregious product placement [of Costner being] named 'Sexiest Man Alive' by People Magazine." (We're sure Life Magazine had an analogue worth offering to RKO 70 years ago.) But the critic later uncovers arguably the most devastating — if throughly wonky — smoking gun with Costner's fingerprints all over it:

But I believe there may be very oblique nod in the movie itself that only an extremely hard-core movie buff like myself would pick up. It occurs in a scene where the Democratic president candidate, uncomfortably played by Dennis Hopper, is pretending to be knowledgable about trout fishing in a conversation with Costner's character, a fishing buff whose vote he is trying to reel in. Hopper's campaign manager, played by Nathan Lane, at one point slips Hopper some handwritten notes that he secretly reads from.

In real-life Barrymore was a drunk who, by the time he made The Great Man Votes — released two years before his death — was in such bad shape he couldn't memorize lines (but could still act the pants off Costner). Garson Kanin, who directed Great Man, wrote in his memoirs that Barrymore read his lines from small blackboards that were strategically placed around the set.

Le scandal! All right, fine — If Drew Barrymore isn't defending the family honor at a press conference by tomorrow afternoon, then we probably can't summon enough energy to care either.

• Goodnight, Sweet Prince: Kevin Costner Channels John Barrymore [NYP]

· Transitioning into the "paycheck-hungry Oscar-winner playing a dad with a creepy child" phase of his career (see De Niro, Robert and Hide and Seek), Kevin Costner accepts a lead role in the horror flick The New Daughter. A possibly haunted burial ground is involved. [THR]
· Jessica Biel will star in the United Artists of Tom Cruise-produced thriller Die a Little, a project during which the actress will be evaluated for her potential fitness as Katie Holmes' inevitable replacement. Hey, Holmes can't stay young enough to pretend to have his robot babies forever. [Variety]
· Shockingly, Lions for Lambs actor/director Robert Redford is not the Bush Administration's biggest fan. [Variety]

[Image: Shock-O-Rama.com]

Cayden Wyatt Costner weighed seven-pounds, 14-ounces when he was born 10:30 Sunday morning at an undisclosed Los Angeles area hospital. [...]

The actor, 52, and his wife, 33, married in September 2004. Cayden Wyatt is Costner's fifth child and the first for Christine Costner.

While we wish the Costners much happiness with the latest—albeit obtained through less trendy, non-African-orphan-adopting routes—addition to their family, we reluctantly feel the need to remind them that celebrity propagation is not without its risks. For every kid who turns out to be a formidable Brown graduate, one always runs the chance of creating another who ends up pulling the short genetic straw. Still, that doesn't mean those lesser offspring can't experience functional and fulfilling lives, possibly even one day starring in their own A&E reality series.

• It's A Boy For Kevin Costner, Wife Christine [CBS2.com/AP]

#10. Mick Jagger & Jerry Hall Estimated settlement: $15 to $25 million #9. Lionel & Diane Richie Estimated settlement: $20 million #8. Michael & Diandra Douglas Estimated settlement: $45 million #7. James Cameron & Linda Hamilton Estimated settlement: $50 million #6. Paul McCartney & Heather Mills Settlement pending: Possibly more than $60 million

#5. Kevin Costner & Cindy Silva Estimated settlement: $80 million #4. Harrison Ford & Melissa Mathison Estimated settlement: $85 million #3. Steven Spielberg & Amy Irving Estimated settlement: $100 million #2. Neil Diamond & Marcia Murphey Estimated settlement: $150 million #1. Michael & Juanita Jordan Settlement pending: Possibly more than $150 million

Hollywood is, not surprisingly, respectably represented, with two superdirectors, three aging leading men, and one father of a calorically challenged reality TV sidekick all sitting within just a few impressive ranks from each other, right alongside the trade-in prices for upgrading to their newer, sleeker wife models. So what can we learn from this list? For starters, that there's nothing like a nine-figure settlement to really hammer home the importance of not skimping on the lawyer who'll draft your prenuptial agreement.

• Most Expensive Celebrity Divorces [Forbes]

According to City News Service, Costner filed a hefty lawsuit against a music promoter for breach of contract on Tuesday in LA superior court.

Kevin's Music LLC are charging Mahee Worldwide Ventures Inc., a New York based music promotions group with failing to live up to their end of a musical bargain.

"Defendants made numerous promises regarding their capabilities to promote Mr. Costner's music and (their) willingness to pay for the right to do so," the lawsuit stated. "Instead... defendants continued to make false promises and ultimately disappeared ...," CNS reports the lawsuit stated.

For the curious, YouTube has some footage of a live KCB performance in Iowa last summer, including one ditty he introduces as a song "for a lot of mommies out there, and girls that are going to be mommies," titled "The Porch Song." (We hope by that he meant it's a lullaby. Based on those sleep-inducing specifications, we find it to be an incredibly successful composition.) Still, the lawsuit should have profound implications on the entire bullshit celebrity band industry, leaving promoters leery of ever taking on another group, lest a pissy Richard Gere and the Dolly Llamas sue them into bankruptcy over failing to procure the agreed-upon number of asses-in-seats at their last five county fair bookings.

• Kevin Costner Sues Over His Rock Band [AccessHollywood]

• Casting for killers [LAT]

He hired Francis and Carla Caneva to manage the operation and gave them ownership of 6.5 percent. He fired them in July 2004, asking them to part ways as partners, too. When they declined, he chose to dissolve the partnership.

In order for that to happen, the casino's fair market value had to be determined. Costner hired an accountant who put the value of the Midnight Star at $3.1 million. The Canevas got another Deadwood casino owner to testify that he would pay twice that — $6.2 million.

No mention is made of what led to the radical management restructuring, but based on a cursory perusing of the Midnight Star's depressingly sparse website, we'd say whatever the Caneva's shortcomings, thinking too big was not one of them. (The
"Memorabilia" link does bring you to photos of the casino's original prop and costume displays, arranged behind glass in an artful, flattened-on-hangers motif.) Hopefully, business will soon return to normal: It would certainly be a shame if further legal wranglings forced the Star to the same fate as The Burt Reynolds & Friends Museum, keeping decades of priceless, self-curated collectibles away from crowds of starstruck tourists looking for some up-close Hollywood history along with their half-pound Tatanka burgers.

• Costner casino battle to S.D. top court [AP/Yahoo]

CONSTRUCTION on the tank — measuring 80 by 100 feet and 12 feet deep, with a 50-foot-high blue screen behind it — began in New Orleans late in the summer of 2005. "We were about 80% done with it at enormous expense," says Ahmad. (Neither he nor anyone else involved would divulge the cost.) Then Hurricane Katrina hit, and the production had to shut down and relocate to Shreveport, La., where the tank had to be rebuilt.

The tank holds 750,000 gallons of water. The water had to be heated to 80 degrees for the actors. But even then the actors and others in the water were often chilled. "Every single time we went to the tank, the temperature dropped in Louisiana," Ahmad recalls. "It dropped down to the 40s."

Moreover, the actors and support staff would often get nauseous in the rolling waters. "They were heroic," Ahmad says. "They were in the water for very long periods of time." [...]

[Director Andrew] Davis admits the tank work got pretty crazy at times. The noise from the motors was so loud that a special public address system had to be built to communicate between scenes. And he had to sit in a soundproof booth with three different headsets so he could talk to the camera operators, the special effects crew and the actors.

Regrettably, no film's seasickness-verisimilitude budget is unlimited; once audience testing revealed that reshoots of some of the action sequences would be required, there was no money left for the prohibitively expensive reassembly of their custom-built water tank. Sharp-eyed audience members may be able to detect the corner-cutting moments from the reshoot, where the raging Bering looks suspiciously like the infinity pool in director Davis' backyard, and in which Costner and Kutcher do their best to act buffeted by the somewhat smaller waves generated by the off-screen splashfight of some kickboard-mounted PAs.

• The water bill? Don't ask [LAT]

Our lovely tipster is referring, of course, to this photo of Mr. Costner, which was apparently taken after he enjoyed (semi-enjoyed?) a good old-fashioned lunch with the family at Ono. Unfortunately, our tipster makes the assumption that a father would not pat his teenage daughter on the ass. Aw tipster, how adorable is your naivet ? These are celebrity families. Let us throw our pre-conceived notions of a healthy family dynamics out the window of our black, luxury SUV, shall we?

In fact, it is indeed very likely that the cute, blonde teenager in question is none other than Costner's daughter Lily, oh, excuse us, Miss Golden Globe 2004.

Disgusting? Obviously. But this wouldn't be the first time Costner brought Lil' Cos out to play at an inappropriate time. You may recall a certain incident when a young, female masseuse in Scotland got to meet him as well. Charmingly, Costner put on that display while honeymooning with second wife Christine Baumgartner.

Okay, insinuating that Kevin Costner got a chubby from playing grab-ass with his daughter is low, even for us. Maybe we should give him the benefit of the doubt. Perhaps the old guy had a few too many sakes at lunch and confused her with his wife. Honestly, they do look kind of similar.

Gawker Stalker

Of the many physiological impressions Kevin Costner left in wet cement at his recent Chinese Theater sidewalk induction ceremony, he omitted arguably his most potent appendage for obvious reasons of public decorum, thereby robbing generations of starstruck tourists the thrill of pawing at the cylindrical divot it would have left in the pavement. And though previous attempts have been made to capture the everyman's manhood through a curtain of pleated chinos, only now can we say that the mission has been fully accomplished. Rejoice: You now know what Kevin Costner looks like sporting a semi-chubby in a crisp white suit.

• Previously: Generations Of Fans To Compare Their Head Sizes To Kevin Costner's [Defamer]
• Kevin Costner's Pleat-Snake [Defamer]