No Superhero Flicks For Jason Statham, and 5 Other Stories You'll Be Talking About Today

Happy Friday! Also in today's edition of The Broadsheet: Isla Fisher is in talks for some magic... Harlan Ellison wants to stop the new Justin Timberlake film from opening (or at least get paid)... Lionsgate wants an Abduction franchise... Cannibal Holocaust's director has a few regrets... and more.

· I absolutely love this critical profile of Jason Statham by The Guardian's Catherine Shoard. There is so much here you really must read, but the real news is simply the actor's reassurance that he is not in the market for comic-book moolah: "Me in a cape? I don't fancy that. Tight tights? Nah! I don't think that's right for me. I just respond more to true stories, that's my flavor. [...] I dunno. Luckily, I get to play some good bits that make people think I'm tough. Who knows! Ha ha ha! I just gravitate to those more testosterone-filled sort of parts than me playing something a bit more fairy-like." The Stath, everyone! [The Guardian]

· Here's why we keep a grain of salt at the ready: Less than two months after Amanda Seyfried was said to be "joining" the Mark Ruffalo/Jesse Eisenberg magician heist flick Now You See Me, Isla Fisher has reportedly snuck in to negotiate for the deal Seyfried couldn't close. The role would call for Fisher to play "a master technician who builds contraptions to aid in the illusion of the heists." [Variety]

· Speaking of Seyfried, legendary sci-fi author Harlan Ellison is suing to not only stop the Oct. 28 release of her film with Justin Timberlake, In Time, but to have all copies destroyed. Yowza! At issue are the similarities cited between the movie (from filmmaker Andrew Niccol) and Ellison's celebrated 1965 short story "Repent, Harlequin! Said the Ticktockman." [THR]

· Lionsgate chief Joe Drake has big plans for Abduction! "I know that Taylor [Lautner] and Lionsgate would both like to see this become a big franchise. You know, we think it's our Bourne." Has he heard the word on the street? We'll see about that... [THR]

· "In my youth, growing up, I spent a lot of time in the country close to animals and therefore often seeing the moment of their death," says Ruggero Deodato, the director whose infamous, seminal bloodbath Cannibal Holocaust -- newly recut for DVD -- maybe shouldn't have featured so many real scenes of animal slaughter after all. "The death of the animals, although unbearable -- especially in a present-day urban mindset -- always happened in order to feed the film's characters or the crew, both in the story and in reality." Now you know. [The Guardian]

· Here is a crowd-sourced Time Magazine profile of Joseph Gordon-Levitt. It's not bad! [Time]

[Photo: Getty Images]