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Though his music can be heard in all corners of the globe, Paul McCartney’s songwriting process is impressively homegrown. When he teamed with Elvis Costello for sessions that would ultimately yield his 1989 album Flowers in the Dirt, the pair met at McCartney’s personal studio: a converted corn mill dubbed Hog Hill Mill, a short drive from his farm in rural southern England. Armed with nothing more high-tech than a pencil, paper and acoustic guitar, two of the world’s most influential composers climbed the steps to a small office tucked above the studio and pulled tunes out of thin air.

An expanded reissue of Paul McCartney‘s 1989 album Flowers in the Dirt is due out March 24, but fans were treated to a sneak peek Wednesday with a previously unreleased acoustic demo.

“Twenty Fine Fingers”—a breakneck rockabilly tune that harkens back to rock pioneer Buddy Holly—features McCartney duetting with fellow Liverpudlian Elvis Costello, who served as cowriter on the project. Four of their collaborations, “My Brave Face,” “Don’t Be Careless Love,” “That Day Is Done” and “You Want Her Too,” appeared on the completed album, while “The Lovers That Never Were,” “So Like Candy” and “Playboy to a...

Paramount Pictures has acquired the Peter Guralnick book Sam Phillips: The Man Who Invented Rock 'N' Roll for a new movie adaptation that Leonardo DiCaprio is set to star in and produce. The actor will produce with his Appian Way partner Jennifer Davisson Killoran. Paramount is currently seeking a screenwriter to adapt the project.

Deadline reports that the studio will move quickly to find a writer and a director for this project, which is the second novel adaptation Paramount has acquired for the actor this week, who recently signed a first-look deal with the studio. We reported last week that the studio picked up the rights to the book Truevine: Two Brothers, A Kidnapping, And A Mother's Quest; A True Story Of The Jim Crow South, which is based on the true story of two African-American brothers who were kidnapped and put on display as circus freaks in the 1800s.

Claire van der Boom and Eamon Farren are playing the leads in Love is Now, a romantic drama now shooting in Sydney and regional Nsw.

It.s the first narrative feature from writer/director Jim Lounsbury and producer Behren Schulz, who formed Eponine Films in 2009.

The plot follows experienced photographer Audrey (van der Boom) and aspiring snapper Dean (Farren) as they embark on a trip through orchard country and a passionate relationship develops.

The supporting cast includes Anna Torv, Dustin Clare, Heather Mitchell and Chris Haywood.

Schulz told If that he and Lounsbury came up with the idea on a plane trip and the first draft of the script was written in one weekend.

He raised the budget from private investors and sponsorship from Nikon and Reid Cycles. The filmmakers announced the partnership with Nikon at Tropfest last year; the film is being shot on Nikon cameras and Nikkor lenses.

Highly anticipated blockbuster Prometheus topped the box office in its opening weekend, grossing $6,775,006 from 467 screens.

Prometheus, which stars Guy Pearce, Charlize Theron, Noomi Rapace and Michael Fassbender, follows a team of explorers as they seek to uncover the origins of mankind by journeying to the darkest corners of the universe. The Fox-distributed picture, which is directed by Ridley Scott, is a prequel to the filmmaker's 1979 movie Alien.

Men in Black 3 dropped to second place, losing 40 per cent in its third weekend. The threequel took $2.1 million across 504 screens. Roadshow's What to Expect When You're Expecting ($1.74 million), Disney's The Avengers. ($1.28 million) and Paramount's The Dictator ($755,170) rounded out the top five.

Meanwhile relationship comedy Friends with Kids debuted in sixth place for Roadshow, earning just $479,904 from 150 screens. The film, which is almost a Bridesmaid's reunion - both movies star Maya Rudolph, Chris O'Dowd, Kristen Wiig and Jon Hamm - has received lukewarm...

Mel Gibson action-thriller Get The Gringo debuted with a whimper at the Australian box office this week.

The Adrian Grunberg-directed film, which is being distributed by Icon Film in Australia, took $340,000 for an average of $2,242 – although it had a modest release on just 152 screens.

Chick flick What to Expect When You’re Expecting enjoyed a stronger debut, but failed knock Men In Black III off the top spot. The Roadshow-distributed Jennifer Lopez vehicle was shown across 305 screens – double the exposure of Get the Gringo – and took $2.431m gross for a $7,971 average.

Men In Black continued to draw a big audience, adding another $3.605m in its second weekend to its first weekend run of $5m, according to the Motion Picture Distributors Association of Australia.

Across 596 screens, the $3.6m taking averaged $6,049 per screen for the Will Smith film which has to date grossed $10.05m.

The Avengers has muscled into the sixth...

Men in Black 3 easily retained the top spot at the box office in its second weekend of release, grossing a further $3.6 million for Sony Pictures.The film dropped 28 per cent from last weekend, but gained an additional four screens. It earned a screen average of $6,049 from 596 screens.

Pregnancy ensemble comedy What to Expect When You're Expecting debuted in second place for Roadshow. The star-studded picture -- which features a cast including Cameron Diaz, Jennifer Lopez, Elizabeth Banks and Chris Rock -- has received generally poor reviews but grossed a respectable $2,431,104 from 305 screens. (Its screen average of $7,971 was beaten only by winter sports film Warren Miller's Like There's No Tomorrow , which had an impressive screen average of $72,213. Although it is, of course, worth noting that the film only played on one screen.)

The Avengers remained in third place, grossing an additional $1.7 million for Disney, while The Dictator ($1.34 million) and...

It was the global financial crisis that inspired filmmaker John Duigan to write his latest film. The director, whose last Australian film was Sirens back in 1993, found himself reading an increasing number of articles about the impact of the economic downturn and how the rise in the cost of university fees and living expenses had seen a number of students picking up work in the sex industry.

Careless Love is the story of. Linh (Nammi Le), a social anthropology student at Sydney University who secretly works part-time as an escort to help pay her family's mortgage. As her worlds begin to collide, Linh struggles to compartmentalise.

The script spent three years in development, with Duigan keen to fast track the filmmaking process.

"I was attached to a couple of films overseas for four to five years," he says. "And when one of them fell through for the umpteenth time, I...