Hollywood’s Avatar-inspired love affair with 3D doesn’t appear to be ending anytime soon. But at least one famous movie fan is refusing to join the crowds at the multiplex.

Legendary gangsta rapper Snoop Dogg has revealed to MTV that he’s not a fan of the latest movie trend. “I’m way too up in the sky to watch a movie in 3D,” Snoop said. “I don’t want that stuff coming right in my face.”

Pressed for details, Snoop revealed his secret history with 3D movies. “The last movie I saw in 3D, I’mma be honest with ya, is Friday the 13th Part III in 3D. Jason threw that spear, man. That spear hit me right in the eye, man. I never watched a 3D movie again. I’m superstitious. I can’t do it.”

Snoop’s new direct-to-DVD film Malice N Wonderland is a spin-off his 2009 album of the same name. In the film, Snoop plays a super-powered dude named Malice fighting his way out of Wonderland. And no, it’s not in 3D.

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The funniest film threesome of 2009 has finally agreed to reunite. Though it sounds like a complete no-brainer that The Hangover will have a sequel, the follow-up to the biggest grossing R-rated comedy of all time almost didn’t happen.

Rumours had been floating for months that stars Bradley Cooper, Zach Galifianakis and Ed Helms were less than inclined to return for a second round, but Deadline.com is now confirming that the sequel is a go.

Turns out it was protracted negotiations over the stars’ salaries that was holding up development. Though The Hangover raked in over $467 million at the worldwide box office, the three actors had been paid about $300,000 a piece for their work. Before negotiations began, Warner Bros. reportedly slipped each star a million dollar bonus, but their agents and lawyers were still adamant that this time their clients should receive a bigger piece of the pie.

So, for the second film, each actor will receive about $5 million and a percentage of the gate. Director Todd Phillips, who is also back on board, will clear $10 million. The original film — a surprise hit when it was released last year — cost only $34 million to make (which is not a lot in Movieland).

No word yet on the story of the sequel, despite rumours that it follows the boys on a trip to Asia. “There’s a lot of rumours,” Phillips has said. “There was a rumour also that it was going to Mexico or something and neither are true.”

Warner Bros is hoping to release The Hangover 2 in the summer of 2011.

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As if being a sprightly and hilarious little blonde pixie isn’t enough for Anna Faris to have in common with Goldie Hawn, now they’re going to share a role. The Hollywood Reporter says New Line is developing a remake of Hawn’s 1980 classic Private Benjamin with Faris set to star.

Faris, star of The House Bunny and Observe and Report, will be putting on fatigues for the comedic role of a prissy young woman who, after her husband dies on their wedding night, joins the army. The original film was one of the top grossing of 1980 and was greeted with three Oscar nominations – including one for Hawn.

The new film will be set in the modern world, but insiders reportedly say the studio wants to be careful not to be perceived as making light of the troops or the wars in Iraq and Afghanistan. The comedy instead will centre on the fish-out-of-water elements of the tale.

Amy Talkington, who recently had her update of Valley Girl snatched up by MGM, is being tapped to write the flick, but no director is yet attached. Faris has recently been busy doing a lot of cartoon work. Her distinctive voice can be heard in Cloudy with a Chance of Meatballs, Alvin and the Chipmunks: The Squeakquel and the upcoming Yogi Bear.

New Line is set to produce a number of updated hits from the 1980s. Private Benjamin joins Vacation and Police Academy on the remake slate, lest anyone think Hollywood has completely run out of ideas.

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One of the great culture institutions of the 1990s has taken a big step forward in its push to leap to the silver screen. The Hollywood Reporter says Paramount has hired writers Brian Gatewood and Alessandro Tanaka to come up with a script for a new Baywatch movie.

Yes that’s right, the TV series about the lives and loves of bodacious lifeguards on the beaches of sunny California is being developed as a feature film. Even better, THR says Ghostbusters and Up in the Air producer Ivan Reitman is onboard to produce the flick, which the studio hopes to launch in the summer of 2011.

Co-writer of The Break-Up Jeremy Garelick has been tapped to direct the picture, which appears to be heading in the direction of comedy, rather than the beach-based drama of the original series. The take would be not dissimilar to that of Drew Barrymore’s reinvention of Charlie’s Angels – another kitschy  TV series that did boffo business at the movies.

The original Baywatch series spanned an entire decade, running from 1989-1999 starring David Hasselhoff and Pamela Anderson. Originally on NBC primetime, producers brought it to syndication after it was axed by the network. There, the show set new records for popularity, with the Guinness Book of World Records reporting that at its peak the show was watched by 1.1 billion viewers a week.

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Twilight fans, prepare to set your hearts aflutter. Stephenie Meyer, the creator of the series, has surprised the faithful by announcing on her website that a new book will soon be joining the original four on shelves.

The Short Second Life of Bree Tanner is a 192-page novella that tells the story of Bree, the youngest vampire, played in the films by Canadian actress Jodelle Ferland. According to The Hollywood Reporter, the novella reveals what happened to little Bree in Seattle, giving readers a fascinating bit of background on one of the more interesting members of the vampire clan.

Meyer had originally planned to include the story, which she wrote while penning the original novels, in an upcoming Official Guide to Twilight. Given its near 200 page size, however, Meyer has now opted instead to publish the story on its own.

All of this, of course, has led to great speculation over what it could mean for the smash-hit film series. David Slade, director of Eclipse, the upcoming third Twilight film, reportedly read the novella before passing it on to the actors to help inform their performance. A buzz has already begun that The Short Second Life of Bree Tanner could turn into a second life for Twilight and the story could launch a spin-off movie.

When published, the novella will be used to help raise funds for the American Red Cross.

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The sequel to The Dark Crystal is still “inching” its way towards production, according to artist Brian Froud.

A follow up to Jim Henson and Frank Oz’s film has been in the works for several years now, with talk of blending puppetry, animatronics and CGI animation. But there hasn’t been any visible movement. Now Total Film is reporting that Froud, a fantasy illustrator who was the primary concept artist for the 1982 original — as well as on Labyrinth (1986) — has been talking about the project with Leicester Square Television.

Froud and his wife Wendy – who also worked with her husband on the Dark Crystal and Labyrinth, creating creatures, sets and props — were promoting their new fortune-telling card set, The Heart Of Faerie Oracle, when chat turned to the movie.

Brian said, “I don’t know how many years they’ve been trying to do a Dark Crystal 2, but we are involved. I have done some designs and I’ve been talking to the director, we’ve been involved in the script. We don’t know quite when it’s gonna go.”

And Wendy stated that “it’s inching its way closer,” adding that the sequel, tentatively titled The Power of the Dark Crystal, will stay true to its Puppetry roots. “The backgrounds will be CGI, but the main characters will be puppets,” she said. “They decided that was really the only way they wanted to do it to keep the integrity.”

Total Films says that, last they heard, director Michael Gracey was at the helm and the film was slated for a 2011 release.

Meanwhile, Empire Online is guessing that “the director” to whom Froud refers is Genndy Tartakovsky, the Russian-born animator behind Samurai Jack, The Clone Wars and Dexter’s Laboratory.

The Dark Crystal takes place on the planet Thra, in an age of chaos. Jen, an orphaned Gelfling, embarks on a quest to find a missing piece of the crystal and restore order to the universe.

Will Smith will return for an Independence Day (a.k.a. ID4) sequel, and maybe even a third movie.

IESB says a source has told them that the major movie star is locked in for not only Independence Day 2, but a third instalment as well. The plan is reportedly to shoot both films back-to-back, a process which could begin in 2011 — 15 years after the release of the original ID4.

20th Century Fox has been kicking the idea around for a while but has hit various roadblocks, according to IESB, one of them being Smith’s price tag. The star commands $20 million up front plus first dollar gross. This was apparently enough to keep the movie from getting made. However, now that Fox has all that extra Avatar money, it’s reportedly a different story.

Fox has yet to confirm the news but, if it is all true, Roland Emmerich will return to direct. The project will be his next directorial pursuit after Anonymous, a thriller that makes the case for Edward de Vere, 17th Earl of Oxford, as the real author of the works attributed to William Shakespeare. Smith also has projects in development, the next of which might be Men in Black 3.

Independence Day is about a hostile alien invasion of Earth. Released in 1996, it was the highest grossing film of that year and has since earned a total of $817,400,891 at the worldwide box office.

Meanwhile, Fox is also planning an Avatar sequel, a well as reboots the Predator and Alien franchises.

The story of how indie horror flick Paranormal Activity took over two years to build a reputation at film festivals before finally receiving a wide mainstream release at the end of 2009 is legendary. The story of the sequel will be quite a bit different.

Announced at the tail end of last year, the second film landed a locked-in release date of October 22 2010, even without a director attached. Well, thankfully, now they’ve got one. Oren Peli, who produced and directed the original, has announced that Kip Williams will be making the follow-up.

This means that Williams, whose previous pictures include The Adventures Of Sebastian Cole, Wings Over The Rockies and The Door In The Floor, will have just six months to prepare, shoot and edit the sequel. An insane schedule by any measure.

In recent weeks speculation over who would direct the film had reached a fever pitch, with names like Akiva Goldsman and Brian De Palma being bandied about after original choice Kevin Greutert left the project to shoot Saw VII — also scheduled for an October release.

The original Paranormal Activity was a spooky little story about a young married couple who realize they’re sharing their home with something supernatural. And scary. The picture, which was shot for just $15,000, earned over $100 million at the box office. No details yet as to the story of the sequel.

The massive global success of Avatar has rewritten the rulebook for making box office champions. Now, even the most successful film franchises are cribbing a page from that book, as Harry Potter goes 3D.

We’ve known for some time, of course, that the last two installments in the Potter franchise were going to have a third dimension, but now comes word that the earlier films in the series may get the same treatment. Potter producer David Heyman told MTV it’s “just a matter of time” before the complete series gets the in-your-face treatment.

“Those discussions haven’t yet happened, but I’m sure it’s just a matter of time,” he said. “You know what? I actually shouldn’t say that. Who knows? It would be great. You can never tell. I hope so.”

The final chapter in the Harry Potter saga, Harry Potter And The Deathly Hallows will be told in two parts. And though neither was shot in 3D, efforts are already underway to convert the films into the popular new format.

“Harry Potter is already an epic film,” said Heyman. “But having that added dimension will make it even more epic, and that seemed like an opportunity that was too hard to pass up.”

Be forwarned citizens of Tokyo, Godzilla is planning a comeback! The giant, irradiated lizard, who spent decades setting the gold standard for city-stomping, will soon be making a return to the silver screen.

Legendary Pictures will team up with Warner Brothers to once again relaunch the  Godzilla franchise, according to The Hollywood Reporter. Both companies are aiming to have a new monster epic crashing into theatres by 2012.

“Godzilla is one of the world’s most powerful pop culture icons,” said Thomas Tull, chairman and CEO of Legendary “Our plans are to produce the Godzilla that we, as fans, would want to see.” The last big Godzilla flick was 1998’s New York-set retake, directed by Roland Emmerich and Matthew Broderick. Many would argue that, among numerous other sins, that film made the mistake of redesigning the classic beast.

Godzilla first marched out of the ocean and into Japanese theatres (as Gojira) back in 1954. Since then, the character has appeared in countless movies, TV shows, cartoons and video games. Originally a metaphor for the destruction wrought on Hiroshima by the atomic bomb, Godzilla eventually became one of the greatest movie monsters of all time.

Legendary Pictures and Warner Brothers have teamed up on a number of blockbusters in the past, most notably Batman Begins, The Dark Knight and The Hangover. Their most recent collaboration, Clash of the Titans, opens Friday.

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