Quick Hits: Liam Neeson, Jeremy Renner, Young Professor X, Director for R.I.P.D and Mulan

From time to time you will see Quick Hits here at Daily BLAM! These articles will serve for quick cast and crew announcements or even brief production notes on movies in the pipeline. As more information on topics becomes available our coverage will expand.

Liam Neeson's Upcoming Movies Slate

Neeson has landed (or nearly landed) two roles recently. The first will be as Admiral Shane in Universal's Battleship. He is also in talks to re-team with A-Team director Joe Carnahan in The Grey; a story about a oil drilling team crash landing in Alaska and having to fight off vicious, aggressive wolves who see the humans as intruders who must be killed.

R.I.P.D. Gets an Official Director

Robert Schwenke (Red) has been officially announced as the director for the Dark Horse comic adaptation R.I.P.D.. The movie will star Ryan Reynolds as a dead cop recruited to hunt other ghost for the Rest in Peace Department.

Schwenke has also been in talks with Summit Entertainment to remake The Osterman Weekend

Jan De Bont to Direct Ziyi Zhang in Live Action Mulan Movie

De Bont (Twister) will direct Chinese actress Ziyi Zhang (Crouching Tiger, Hidden Dragon)in an English-language production of the classic tale about Hua Mulan, a young heroine girl who pretends to be a man in order to join the the Emperor's army.

Source: THR.com

Jeremy Renner up for Role in Hansel and Gretel: Witch Hunters

While at the Venice International Film Festival, Renner (The Hurt Locker) revealed he is up for the part of Hansel. Noomi Rapace (The Girl With The Dragon Tattoo) is reportedly set to star as Gretel.

The movie picks up Hansel and Gretel fifteen years after their ordeal with the witch and the gingerbread house. The two are now bounty hunters who go after witches.

Source: Collider

Lawrence Belcher Cast as Young Charles Xavier

Bleeding Cool is reporting the young actor will be in X-Men: First Class as the future leader of the X-Men when he was a child.