The 3PM Dispatch Star Wars, Hobbit, Blade Runner 2, Mary Poppins

Hey Idiots, Greedo Always Shot First, You Were Just To Stupid To Realise!
George Lucas granted The Hollywood Reporter an audience and used the interview to push his pro-Greedo-shot-first propaganda that he's been pedaling for years. "The controversy over who shot first, Greedo or Han Solo, on Episode IV, what I did was try to clean up the confusion," Lucas told them. "Obviously it upset people because they wanted Solo to be a cold-blooded killer, but he actually isn't... I put a little wider shot in there that made it clear that Greedo is the one who shot first, but everyone wanted to think that Han shot first." So who do you believe; George Lucas or your lying eyes? 

Sir Pete Casts Funny Scotsman In 'The Hobbit'.  
Peter Jackson has cast Scottish funnyman Billy Connolly in The Hobbit. Connolly will be starring as Dain Ironfoot, a Dwarf who leads his people into the climactic Battle of the Five Armies near the end of the book.

Ridley Scott Is "Absolutely Not" Ruling Out The Possibility That Harrison Ford Dreams Of Electric Sheep...
With more will-they-won't-they actions than a prime time drama, director Ridley Scott has now thrown his two cents in on the whole Harrison Ford being in the new Blade Runner thing. So will Ford be in it? "Don't know yet," Scott told EW, who then asked if he would rule out Ford's involvement in the film. "Absolutely not," he responded before adding that he and his writers were still talking about what direction they'll be taking the film in. "We're still in discussions about whether it should be a prequel or sequel. It's an interesting conversation."

Mary Poppins Returning To Big Screen! Kind Of...
Deadline report that Disney are close to finalising plans to make a film about Walt Disney's fourteen-year campaign to convince the prickly Australian author P.L Travers to sell the movie rights to her children's book Mary Poppins. Eventually Travers relented and sold the rights to her book - which was said to be semi-autobiographical and highly personal to her - but reportedly hated the final film and refused to sell Disney the rights to any more of her work. Deadline also say that Tom Hanks and Meryl Streep are rumoured for the lead roles.

Princess Diana BioPic Coming.
Naomi Watts has signed on to play Princess Di in an upcoming biopic on the "people's princess". Titled Caught In Flight it reportedly will focus on the last two years of her life, after she divorced Prince Charles, went to the gym a lot and had a scandalous love affair with a ridiculously wealthy international playboy of dodgy repute. The film will be directed by Oliver Hirschbiegel, the director of the fantastic Downfall. 

Adaptation Of 'Paradise Lost' Is Now A Lost Cause.
Legendary Pictures has pulled the plug on their planned adaptation of John Milton's epic poem Paradise Lost. Budget problems are bring cited, with the FX budget reportedly ballooning up by 20% over initial costings. The Hangover star Bradley Cooper had signed on to play the devil Lucifer.

Today In It Is Now Clear Who Shot First: George Lucas's latest Star Wars tinkering makes it abundantly clear who shot first and finally puts the debate to bed...  

Today In Trivia: At the time Mary Poppins was Disney's most expensive film to make. Their investment in the movie was savvy however as the film became the highest grossing flick of 1965 and was Disney's top grossing film for 20 years. It was also the first Disney film to be released on DVD.

Today's Bad Movie Tagline: The tagline for Naomi Watt's 2001 action thriller Down: "YOUR NEXT STOP... IS HELL". Wait, Hell's the next stop? I was supposed to get off well before Hell. Damn, I hate when I miss my stop. 

Happy Birthday!: To Jurassic Park's Laura Dern who is 45 today.

TODAY'S POLL
Are There Too Many Famous Faces In 'The Hobbit'?
The UK newspaper The Guardian have an opinion piece running that is arguing that Sir Pete has crammed entirely too many famous faces into The Hobbit and that this will destroy the escapism of the movies. Do you agree? Let us know!

The poll results will be in Monday's edition of The 3PM Dispatch.

THURSDAY'S POLL RESULTS
Despite piracy, Sky and rapid on-demand downloads, over half of all Flicksters still visit their local video shop on the regular...

Do You Rent Films From A Video Shop?
44.44% -  Yep! - All the time
31.11% -   Occasionally! - If I really want to see something I missed 
24.44% - Nup! - Video shops? That's old school bro

Help Bring Jay And Silent Bob To New Zealand!
Director Kevin Smith and regular collab partner Jason Mewes are touring their podcast show Jay And Silent Bob Get Old in Australia in April. We've started a campaign to try to convince them to come to NZ once they wrap over in Oz. If you'd like to join the campaign then please tweet @JayMewes @ThatKevinSmith @thisguyjeff @FlicksNZ with your message of touring encouragement and the hashtag #KevinandJayCometoNZplease
Nice one, thanks! Hopefully we'll see you at their NZ gigs...