The nominees have been announced for the fourth annual Scream Awards, held every year by Spike TV. The decisively more “fan-friendly” award ceremony (compared to the Oscars) honors films from the sci-fi, fantasy, horror and comic-book genres of movies, TV shows and comic books. The awards are described as, “the first and only global event of its kind,” to honor those genres.

The Scream 2009 nominees were chosen by the Advisory Board of Hollywood and Genre Leaders, a list which this year includes the likes of Wes Craven, Roland Emmerich, Neil Gaiman, Frank Miller, Eli Roth and Zack Snyder, plus many more. The event will be taped on Saturday, October 17th this year at The Greek Theater in Los Angeles, and will air on Spike TV ten days later on Tuesday, October 27th (check for local times).

Along with the awards, the show will also be airing some exclusive, world premiere of footage of some of the most anticipated movies of 2010! Presenters and musicians for the event are to be announced shortly.

Harry Knowles at Ain’t It Cool News has been hard at work in recent weeks tracking down and verifying a very interesting piece of information: The director for the upcoming film adaptation of the biggest MMO ever, Blizzard Entertainment’s World of Warcraft, will be Sam Raimi.

We all know Sam Raimi for his Evil Dead films, the three Spider-Man films (and the upcoming Spider-Man 4) and more recently for his well-received horror movie from earlier this summer, Drag Me to Hell.

Short version: Sam Raimi returns to the format that put him on the map with Drag Me to Hell – and you won’t be disappointed.

Screen Rant reviews Drag Me to Hell

If you’re a REAL Sam Raimi fan, you’ve heard of him long before he ever sat in the director’s chair for the first Spider-Man movie. His claim to fame came with a little trilogy of films known as the Evil Dead series.

The first film was made on a shoestring budget and launched Bruce Campbell into the B-movie limelight. Evil Dead 2 was essentially a remake of the first film but with a bigger budget. While many people think that film is the best of the series, to me the crown jewel is the third film: Army of Darkness.

Last month we got some big news surrounding Spider-Man 4. Among the scheduling changes for the upcoming Marvel movies, we also were told that Spider-Man 4 would hit theaters May 6, 2011. The other unsurprising update that made a splash was that Raimi really wants Kirsten Dunst to return as Mary Jane Watson.

From what we’ve heard, Dunst has been hesitant about returning for another installment, perhaps because of some negative fan feedback about her being cast into the role in the first place which still hasn’t died down.

Raimi is taking it into his own hands and is reportedly set to meet with Kirsten Dunst to talk about her return for the next Spidey adventure. In a group interview last week, Raimi discussed the current situation:

Despite the fact that the first trailer for Sam Raimi’s upcoming (and much overdue) return to directing horror called Drag Me To Hell, wasn’t as scary I had hoped it would be, this brand spanking new one-sheet suggests differently.

It’s an intriguing, undoubtedly striking piece of imagery that does what a poster for this type of film should do – startle, grab attention, intrigue, and give off a creepy vibe. But don’t let me convince you, have a look for yourself (click on the image below for high res):

At the opening weekend to 2009’s SXSW Film Festival, IGN got a chance to chat with Sam Raimi, director of the Spider-Man and Evil Dead films.

In their discussion, IGN brought up something many of us have been eagerly waiting on for quite a while now: a new Evil Dead film. On the heels of Raimi’s return to the horror genre with Drag me to Hell, it looks like there’s hope yet for the return of Ash to the big screen.

Yet another film that’s had some trouble behind the scenes, Sam Raimi’s new horror movie Drag Me To Hell finally has a trailer. The pictures released so far have looked very creepy indeed and with Raimi’s resume (with the mega exception of the awful Spider-Man 3) this hopefully promises to be something very scary and fun.

I had the pleasure of seeing an early test screening of Sam Raimi’s new film, Drag Me To Hell this past week at a super secret viewing in Burbank, California.  It was a rough copy to say the least, which was announced to the audience before the start of the film, but I didn’t care.  I’ve been a fan of Raimi’s since his original foray into horror with Evil Dead so my excitement and anticipation was hard to contain.

Yes, I know, we ALL want another Evil Dead movie. But if any of you are holding your breath, I suggest it might be time to exhale because this bad boy isn’t going to happen until Bruce Campbell is old enough to look like William Shatner in Star Trek: Generations.

There has been a low-level buzz percolating on this possible project for a couple of years now, but in the end it’s all just talk.

Since Drag Me To Hell was first announced late last year I was always sceptical about the quality of the script. What first set off warning signs was the fact that the script was written after Army Of Darkness in 1992 and that it went into production during the writers skrike. In my first post on the film I said:

“The script must be outstanding if it sat on a shelf for fifteen years and now can go into production without a rewrite (that was sarcasm, in case you missed it).”

However, I am always willing to give any film-maker the benefit of the doubt, but when Ellen Page dropped out due to “scheduling conflicts” I was sure that the script wasn’t up to snuff. In fact I said that I believed the reason Page quit the project was because she was unhappy with the script.

Now it would appear that my gut instinct was right. According to a script review from Latino Review the script is a dog, and a cliched dog at that!

I’ve been following the development of Sam Raimi’s Drag Me To Hell since it was first announced that Spider-Man director Sam Raimi would be returning to his horror roots with a film that he wrote fifteen years ago with his brother Ivan.

First it was announced that Ellen Page, who is hot right now due to the success of Juno, would be taking the lead in the supernatural thriller. But then she dropped out due to scheduling difficulties, and was replaced by Alison Lohman.

Now Raimi has snagged another young actor to star as Lohman’s boyfriend: Live Free Or Die Hard’s Justin Long.

Alison Lohman has replaced Ellen Page in Sam Raimi’s Drag Me To Hell.

We first reported last week that Page had dropped out due to “scheduling conflicts”.

Luckily for Raimi, Lohman was available to star in the film that’s based on a script which he wrote with his brother Ivan fifteen years ago. The movie begins shooting on March 31st, two weeks after it’s planned start date.

The rush was on to get an actress for the film as Ghost House Pictures and Mandate Pictures wanted to get the film in the can before the possible SAG strike in June.

When Sam Raimi’s Drag Me To Hell was first announced I was skeptical that the script was up to snuff as it had sat on a shelf for fifteen years. However when Ellen Page signed up it looked like the project was starting to move ahead at a good pace, and that it might actually turn out to be a first rate film.

But… Page has now dropped out of the film due to a “scheduling conflict.”

A joint statement from Ghost House Pictures and Mandate Pictures says:

“We were racing to start production so that we could accommodate Ellen’s schedule. But like so many other productions trying to start before the potential SAG strike date, this one needed more time and we had to push back the start of production.”

Sam Raimi is to return to his low budget roots with Drag Me To Hell, a supernatural thriller that he wrote with his brother.

Variety is reporting that the script was written after Army of Darkness in 1992. The film was originally known by the very generic title: The Curse.

Raimi’s Ghosthouse producing partner Rob Tapert says that “Sam calls it a ’spook-a-blast,’ a wild ride with all the chills and spills that ‘Evil Dead’ delivered, without relying on the excessive violence of that film,”

Obviously then it’s going to be PG-13.

Sam Raimi doesn’t have to work on anything at all if he doesn’t want to, but his options are wide open. Following the success of his Spider-Man films the red carpet now belongs to him. He’s kicking back and pondering quite a few projects right now, including the possibility of Spider-Man 4. From the sound of it, he (and Marvel and the studio) realize that they need to do something very different with the next Spider-Man film considering the reaction of moviegoers to the weirdness that was Spider-Man 3.

Regarding Spidey, Raimi stated:

“Right now, Sony is meeting with different writers to try and bring a fresh, new story and approach to the ‘Spider-Man’ franchise, different writers have been coming in and spinning different tales of where ‘Spider-Man’ could go from here… A lot of people are working very hard to work on a really good story right now.”