We have news from around the world today, but mostly from Foxborough and Australia. Two places both alike in dignity, but then suffering complete indignities like American Idol and movies about teenagers who save the world.

Area unattractive person Natalie Portman may be working with the creepily-mustachioed Darren Aronofsky on a new supernatural thriller-chiller. Black Swan is about a prima ballerina who is suddenly threatened by a rival dancer—but is the rival dancer even real? The title is sorta interesting, given all the stuff about Black Swan theory and the creepy, tingling, post-millennial thoughts of destruction and apocalypse it evokes. But, yeah, this is just a movie about ghost ballet. So. [THR]

The Hallmark Channel is doing something with how commercials are aired, by like jiggering with the length and continuity of commercial pods, where like Mutual of Omaha will sponsor a whole, shortened commercial pod, and it's going to revolutionize, maybe, the way sponsorship is delineated and these are important things to discuss, no really they are, because TV is sorta scratching its head right now trying to figure out this whole DVR thing and industries rise and fall and Black Swans occur and here we are powerless to stop it and all, but mostly... Mostly we're just surprised that people want to pay to advertise on the Hallmark Channel. Really, guys? Really? [Variety]

That cutesy-sounding comedy You Again, about Kristen Bell being upset 'cause her brother is marrying a girl who used to make her life a living hell, has rounded out its cast with a bunch of fabulous broads. Like Kristin Chenowith and Sigourney Weaver and Betty White and Jamie Lee Curtis. The film's original title Lady Bits: The Legend of Bear Mountain now seems, more than ever, like it was the right one to go with. [THR]

Local butt-face Leonardo DiCaprio has signed on to star (and produce with his Appian Way movie making company) an as yet untitled thriller about online casinos. Yes, it's true. There are many online casinos and we've known many a young lad who've profited and suffered at their hands. Though that's all a kind of pallid-faced, blue-tinted early evening sadness sort of thing. Not really the stuff of thrillers. But, hell. If you can jazz up cellphones like they did in One Missed Call, sure, why not, you can jazz up internet cards. (Note: They did not jazz up anything in One Missed Call, which should have been called Just Don't Answer the Damn Phone, Shannyn Sossamon.) [Variety]

Thousands of sad people lined up on Sunday in Massachusetts. No, it wasn't a Bruins game. It was for American Idol! Determined to realize their dreams of becoming walking, talking, singing contracts, hopefuls like our proud homegirl Tiffany "Shorty" Dorsey from mighty Walpole (they've got a prison there, you know) showed up and belted-while-crying for the judges. We know it's happened before, Boston, but still some of us thought you were better than this. Nothing terribly Puritanical about weeping in front of Paula Abdul, is there? [THR]

Oh, more girlnews! Paramount has picked up an action-comedy pitch from Liz Meriwether called Honey Pot that is basically about if a bunch of ladies were superspies like Jason Bourne. Surely there'd be a lot more talk about periods and commitment! Meriwether is the salient cultural critic who is also giving us the upcoming TV pilot Sluts and the film Fuckbuddies. And no, we are not making those up! [Variety]

Stuart Beattie, who cowrote the documentary Australia, has been tapped to direct a movie version of Tomorrow When the World Ends. That book is part of a series (The Tomorrow Series) about a group of Aussie teenagers who band together to defend their homeland against invaders. Evidently the film has "youth-targeted themes and PG-13 sex and violence", so that's kind of exciting, but we thought we already covered all this with Home and Away. Isn't that what that was about? Australian teenagers? Saving Australia? Or something? [THR]