Fall's familiar faces

LOS ANGELES -- Hollywood may not have a Harry Potter, Spider-Man, Shrek or Capt. Jack Sparrow on its upcoming lineup. But the fall and holiday schedule does offer filmgoers a chance to catch up with some familiar characters, stories and movie-making teams.

Florist Vanessa, voiced by Renee Zellweger, listened to Barry B. Benson, voiced by Jerry Seinfeld in "Bee Movie," which will hit theaters in November. (DreamWorks Animation SKG)

It'll be reunion season for actors and filmmakers such as Russell Crowe and Ridley Scott ("American Gangster"); Cate Blanchett and Shekhar Kapur ("Elizabeth: The Golden Age"); Nicolas Cage and Jon Turteltaub ("National Treasure: Book of Secrets"); Johnny Depp, Helena Bonham Carter and Tim Burton ("Sweeney Todd"); and Ben Stiller and the Farrelly brothers ("The Heartbreak Kid").

It'll be reacquaintance season for some classic characters in Robert Zemeckis' retelling of the Norse legend "Beowulf"; "Fred Claus," a North Pole comedy about Santa (Paul Giamatti) and his black sheep brother (Vince Vaughn); and "I Am Legend," with Will Smith in a new take on the sci-fi thriller "The Omega Man."

There's even the return of a venerable genre, the Western, which has fallen on hard times in modern Hollywood. Crowe and Christian Bale star in the remake "3:10 to Yuma," about a poor rancher helping to escort a captured gang leader, while a second Old West tale comes close on its heels with "The Assassination of Jesse James by the Coward Robert Ford."

Brad Pitt, starring as James, said his own celebrity helped him sympathize with the outlaw, whose notoriety as a heroic Robin Hood figure was heavily fabricated.

"I liked the themes of fame, the obsession with fame. The idea of the Jesse James character being trapped behind a facade and not knowing how to get out," said Pitt, who plays James in the last year of his life as he lapses into paranoia over potential betrayal by accomplices and intimates, including young idolizer Ford (Casey Affleck).

"We operate under the assumption everyone is pretty much up on the Jesse James myth, so we start dissecting the myth," Pitt said.

Reclaiming her throne

Nine years after "Elizabeth," Cate Blanchett, Geoffrey Rush and director Shekhar Kapur reteam for "Elizabeth: The Golden Age," resuming the story of Britain's Queen Elizabeth I.

Brad Pitt played Jesse James in the new film, "The Assassination of Jesse James by the Coward Robert Ford," slated for distribution this fall. (Warner Bros. Pictures)

The new film has the spinster monarch juggling romantic temptation for Sir Walter Raleigh (Clive Owen), opposition from Mary Queen of Scots (Samantha Morton) and the threat of conquest by Spain and its armada.

"The first film was about denial, what one has to do to sort of extricate oneself from oneself in order to rule. At the beginning of this film, she's still in a place of denial, but this film is more about acceptance in a way," Blanchett said. "On a domestic, prosaic level, you have a woman who realizes: 'Am I not going to have children?'

"On a bigger scale, you have a woman asking, 'Do people love me for who I am or for what they want from me?' Anyone in a position of power must go through that."

Catching a buzz

Jerry Seinfeld returns with his first major project since "Seinfeld," co-writing and providing the lead voice in the animated comedy "Bee Movie."

The premise: Worker bee Barry B. Benson (Seinfeld) befriends a human florist (Renee Zellweger), who becomes his aide when he sues humanity for stealing the honey his species toils to produce.

"Barry stings them in the one place it really hurts" -- their wallets, said Seinfeld, whose story has its roots in his fascination with nature documentaries.

"The ones about bees I've always found amazing," Seinfeld said. "The sophistication of their culture and architecture, and this amazing substance they make. Their communication system, their navigation system, and how they're not supposed to be able to fly. It always struck me as a great setting for a story."