Diane Lane has been cast as Martha Kent, Superman’s adoptive mother, in director Zach Snyder’s upcoming Man of Steel reboot for Warner Bros. and Legendary Pictures. At 46-years-old, Lane is the youngest actress to play the role (Eva Marie Saint was 80 in the 2006 Bryan Singer redo Superman Returns; Phyllis Thacker 57 in the 1978 original).

Lane tells USAWeekend:

It’s going to be a wild ride… I love [director Zack Snyder’s] 300 and I’m very flattered to play Martha Kent and live up to his vision. It’s pretty cool… I’ve always wanted to raise a good man. I thought that was the biggest challenge a woman could have, and so I get the embarrassment of riches.

Lane is the first to be cast in the film since the studios announced “Tudors” star Henry Cavill as their Superman. (Update: Hollywood vet Kevin Costner will play Jonathan Kent in the Christopher Nolan-produced project).

Lane’s recent genre creds include Doug Liman’s (The Bourne Identity) teleporting sci-fi thriller Jumper and Gregory Hoblit’s (Fallen) internet-killer drama Untraceable. Additional creds include Judge Dredd (1995), Knight Moves (1992) and Lady Beware (1987).  However, it’s her Oscar-nominated performance in the erotically-charged drama Unfaithful (2002) that continues to haunt my penis to this very day.

Syfy has set an April 23 air date for Roadkill, its creature-feature collaboration with RH1 Entertainment. The film stars Clatto fav Kacey Barnfield and Stephen Rea (Interview with the Vampire) as siblings terrorized by a giant bird-like monster after flattening an old gypsy with an RV while on a roadtrip with friends.

Peep the trailer:

The official synopsis reads:

Kate (Barnfield) and her brother Joel (Rea) have gathered their five best friends for a scenic RV road trip to their high-school reunion. But their cross-country adventure is about to take an unexpected turn for the worst when an ancient curse takes wing by way of a massive creature.

It’s called the Simuroc, and this gigantic bird of prey has found the perfect, helpless quarry in Kate and company. Stranded in the backwoods of the predator’s territory, there’s little chance for escape.

Directed by Johannes Roberts, the film was shot in Ireland and costars Eliza Bennett (Inkheart), Colin Maher (“Camelot”), Oliver James (Without a Paddle: Nature’s Calling), Ned Dennehy (Reign of Fire), Diarmuid Noyes, Eve Macklin and Kobna Holdbrook-Smith.

Barnfield is best known for her performances in Sony Screen Gems’ Resident Evil: Afterlife—her American film debut—and Syfy’s Lake Placid 3, in which she goes full-frontal nude. Up next for the 22-year-old British babe is Steven Monroe’s (I Spit On Your Grave) man-vs-beast period piece Jabberwocky.

Whatcha gonna do, brother, when Hulkamania runs wild on you and makes you look guilty of double homicide?

That is the question that Clayton Elie, played by wrestler “Diamond” Dallas Page, will be asking himself when he moves into a small Midwest town and faces off against a vicious serial killer (Hulk Hogan) in Rock On Films’ Black River.

The wordy synopsis reads:

After losing his son to a tragic accident, Clayton Elie’s life was destroyed by alcohol abuse and violence that ended his marriage. When he moves to the small Midwestern town of Black River in an attempt to begin again, he finds himself at the center of a series of murders that echo a long dormant secret from the town’s past.

After several sleepless nights that lead to a long night of heavy drinking and a subsequent blackout, Clayton awakens the next morning to find his neighbor and her small child brutally murdered and the murder weapon inside his apartment.

When he is forced to hide the evidence by the untimely arrival of an FBI profiler, Clayton’s life rapidly deteriorates into a storm of violence, murder and small town intrigue. Is Clayton a cold-blooded killer, or the victim of a malevolent force that has descended upon the town of Black River?

I’m not a wrestling fan, but I think the Hulkster could totally play a convincing bad guy, provided he leaves his Mr. Nanny pink tutu behind and administers the dreaded butt-drag move.

Black River is directed by Joe Eckardt, whose previous work includes the 2005 documentary Champion, a biographical look at actor Danny Trejo’s vida loca.

Seven years after stalling out with his feature film debut Torque, director Joseph Kahn is now taking a stab at the horror genre with his quirky Breakfast Club-meets-Scream slasher Detention. Premiering at this year’s SXSW Film Festival, Detention follows a group of high school troublemakers as they fend off aliens, a serial killer named Cinderhella, and one very angry pooch.

Peep it:

Horror fans will probably recognize 19-year-old actress Spencer Locke as “K-Mart” from the Resident Evil sequels Extinction and Afterlife. Locke has also appeared as Amber Bradley on The CW’s “Vampire Diaries (‘Miss Mystic Falls’)” and as Travis Cobb’s girlfriend Kylie on Courteney Cox’s hilarious ABC show “Cougar Town.”

Detention also stars Josh Hutcherson (Journey 2: The Mysterious Island), Dane Cook (Mr. Brooks), Walter Perez (“Friday Night Lights”), Erica Shaffer (Puppet Master: Axis of Evil), Parker Bagley (Nightmare On Elm Street), Alison Woods (Superhero Movie), and newcomers Aaron David Johnson and Shanley Caswell.

Kahn has directed music videos for U2, Garbage, Britney Spears, and Blink 182.

Pop-singer-turned-rom-com-actress Mandy Moore is making her leap into the horror genre in Buried writer Chris Sparling’s directorial debut Falling Slowly. Joining the 26-year-old babe will be “LOST” and 300 star Rodrigo Santoro.

The duo will play a a couple haunted by a demonic force squatting in their new apartment. While this premise is definitely old-hat (like using the term “old-hat”), I can only hope Sparling draws inspiration from the 1985 classic ghost story School Spirit and shows us the poltergeist yanking Moore’s towel away when she steps out of the shower.

In Moore news, the busty vocalist’s throat will next be voicing the character of Mara in Disney XD’s new animated series “Tron: Uprising.” The show is set to debut sometime next year and will also include the vocal talents of Elijah Wood, chronic-masturbator Paul Reubens, and genre icon Lance Henriksen.

Sparling, whose Buried script won the National Board of Review award for Best Original Screenplay, also penned director David Brooks’ upcoming  feature film debut ATM, starring the lovely Alice Eve.

Peep the “Tron: Uprising” teaser:

Big news for 19-year-old British actress Eleanor Tomlinson. The barely legal up-and-comer has scored the lead female role in director Bryan Singer’s (X-Men, Usual Suspects) much buzzed about 3-D fantasy-adventure Jack the Giant Killer.

Tomlinson will play Princess Isabella, a royal runaway who is abducted by giants shortly after meeting her would-be hero Jack (Nicholas Hoult). The film, a dark and frightening take on the classic “Jack and the Beanstalk” fable, begins production this month in London.

Costars in the Warner Bros. and Legendary Pictures release include Ewan McGregor as head of the king’s elite guard, Stanley Tucci as the king’s evil advisor, and Bill Nighy and John Kassir as the two-headed giant ruler Fallon.

Tomlinson is best known in the States for her performance as Fiona Chattaway in Tim Burton’s awful Alice in Wonderland redo. She also starred as young Duchess Sophie von Teschen in the 2006 period-thriller The Illusionist.

British actress/model Gemma Atkinson and her eye-popping 34-E’s are ready for takeoff in Black and Blue Films’ new in-flight frightener Airborne. Atkinson—who serves as co-producer on the project—stars as Harriett, a passenger aboard a jumbo jet carrying an ancient evil that has gotten loose.

Airborne is Atkinson’s second horror feature. She made her spook-show debut last year in Eyeline Entertainment’s werewolf thriller 13HRS. The 26-year-old stunner is best known, however, for her portrayal of self-cutter Lisa Hunter on the British teen-soap “Hollyoaks” and its various spinoffs.

Airborne costars Fiona Ryan (“The Tudors”), Kimberly Jaraj (I Can’t Think Straight) Julian Glover (Mirrors), Craig Conway (The Descent), Sebastian Street (Stag Night of the Dead), and Alan Ford (Exorcist: The Beginning).

Props to HorrorAsylum for the scoop.

Little Deaths, a kinky horror anthology pic from U.K. directors Sean Hogan (Lie Still), Andrew Parkinson (Venus Drowning), and Simon Rumley (Red, White, & Blue), will hold its North American premiere at this year’s SXSW Film Festival in Austin, TX. Three tales in all, the film follows dysfunctional couples done in by their psychosexual tendencies.

Peep the trailer:

The synopses read:

House and Home: Written and Directed by Sean Hogan

A well-to-do yuppie couple pose as concerned religious do-gooders in order to lure homeless girls back to their home for perverted sex games. Deciding upon their latest target, a mysterious young woman named Sorrow, they drug and imprison her before subjecting her to a series of assaults and humiliations. However, the captive girl is not as helpless as she first appears, and the couple soon find the rules of the game have changed…

Mutant Tool: Written and Directed by Andrew Parkinson

Jen, a former prostitute and recovering drug addict, is undergoing therapy in a bid to turn her life around. Her new therapist, Dr. Reece, comes as a recommendation via her boyfriend, Frank. But unbeknownst to Jen, Frank and Dr. Reece are involved with a bizarre black market narcotics trade, in which the semen from human mutations created during WWII Nazi experiments is harvested and processed for its psychic effects on the human brain. And now the last known mutant is dying, and a suitable replacement must be found…

Bitch: Written and Directed by Simon Rumley

Stuck in a destructive relationship that isn’t going anywhere and lousy dead-end jobs which have no future, Claire and Pete live in a council flat and are united only in their love of rock music. The flame of passion having long since died, the couple derives a strange sexual pleasure from an unspoken sadomasochistic role-playing game where Claire finds new and inventive ways of mistreating Pete – and Pete, ever the devoted lap dog, takes what she dishes out time and time again. But in an unspoken game the boundaries are hazy, and when Claire unwittingly takes things one step too far, Pete devises a way to teach the bitch to heel, once and for all.

Little Deaths stars Kate Braithewaite, Daniel Brocklebank, Brendan Gregory, Siubhan Harrison, Jodie Jameson, Luke de Lacey, Holly Lucas, Jason Maza, Tom Sawyer, and Christopher Fairbanks.

Looks like it’s going to be a good year for horror comedy. Magnet Films is set to roll funny Frenchman Quentin Dupieux’s outrageous hell-on-wheel thriller Rubber into theaters on—wait for it—April 1. Of course, the tale of a homicidal, telekinetic tire named Robert would be completely unrelatable without a love story—hence, the new poster (pictured above) teasing Robert’s inflatuation.

Rubber’s official synopsis reads:

Robert, an inanimate tire that has been abandoned in the desert, suddenly and inexplicably comes to life. As Robert roams the bleak landscape, he discovers that he possesses terrifying telepathic powers that give him the ability to destroy anything he wishes without having to move.

At first content to prey on small desert creatures and various discarded objects, his attention soon turns to humans, especially a beautiful and mysterious woman who crosses his path.

Peep the trailer:

Things aren’t looking too fabulous for British actress and Orbit Gum pitch-woman Vanessa Branch in After Dark Originals’ new alien frightener Area 51. The 37-year-old stunner plays a news reporter hunted down by a vicious extraterrestrial creature while taking a military guided tour of Nevada’s infamous Air Force base.

Helmed by actor-turned-director Jason Connery (Alone in the Dark 2), Area 51 costars Rachel Miner (“Californication”), Bruce Boxleitner (Tron: Legacy), some guy named Jason London and John Shea, who played Lex Luther on ABC’s “Lois & Clark: The New Adventures of Superman.”

The film premieres on the Syfy Channel Feb. 26 (Yup, tomorrow)

Peep the trailer:

Branch, best known in the States for shilling Orbit Gum while wearing white miniskirts, made her horror film debut as a tortured serial killer victim in Immortals director Tarsem Singh’s trippy psychological thriller The Cell. She has since played jilted wench Giselle in all three Pirates of the Caribbean films and wife to Charlie’s brother Liam on ABC’s much-missed “LOST.”

The Orbit girl will next be blowing up the big screen with Samuel Jackson (The Avengers), Nina Dobrev (“The Vampire Diaries”), Daniel Dae Kim (“LOST”) and Kellan Lutz (Nightmare on Elm Street) in Jonah Loop’s directorial debut The Killing Game. She plays a BBC reporter in the fight-to-the-death actioner.