GENIUS CASTING!!! This is funny - when I was reading this book, I pictured Dakota Fanning as the younger sister.  They both are remarkably talented - so I think this is brilliant casting.

Thespian prodigies Dakota and Elle Fanning have agreed to play Cameron Diaz’s daughters in My Sister’s Keeper for director Nick Cassavetes.

The film is an adaptation of Jodi Picoult’s 2004 novel about a young girl (to be played by 9-year-old Elle) who sues her parents for emancipation after they conceived her in hopes that her genes would save the life of her cancer-stricken sibling (13-year-old Dakota).

The project reunites Cassavetes with screenwriter Jeremy Leven and producer Mark Johnson, two key members of his team behind the hit tearjerker The Notebook. It’s due to start shooting early next year.

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It’s always weird to me when a child actor grows up.  Like I saw pictures of that cute kid from “Jerry Maguire” today and he’s 16! (And slightly cute)  Go here to see him today - in a speedo!

And whatever happened to Haley Joel Osmemt? He has a new movie coming out - go here to see him today!

Anyway - Kate Hudson, Dakota Fanning and Virginia Madsen were all in Pasadena filming a short film yesterday. Kate Hudson is gorgeous as ever!

No movie arrived at the Sundance ‘07 fest with more controversy than Hounddog, the so-called ”Dakota Fanning Rape Movie” in which the 12-year-old actresses stars as an Elvis-obsessed little girl growing up in the 1950s South. Leading up to the film’s Jan. 22 premiere, writer-director Deborah Kampmeier expected protests outside the theater, as well as inside, thinking that maybe even a few moviegoers would stand up and boo. But as the lights went down at Park City’s Racquet Club Monday night, there was not a single peep of dissent, not even during the rape scene, which turned out to be brief and devoid of graphic shots, or during the Q&A with Kampmeier, Fanning, and other cast members following the screening.

For Kampmeier, the subdued atmosphere was a good sign. ”We were prepared for the worst, and I think we got the best,” she told EW the day after the premiere. ”I think people were expecting something more controversial, and it’s like, ‘Oh, that’s it?’ ” Added Fanning: ”I hope people weren’t let down!”

By Tuesday afternoon, however, it looked as though some people were disappointed — but not because of the movie’s lack of exploitive violence. ”Hounddog is an indigestible gumbo of Southern Gothic ingredients seasoned with snake oil, biblical hash, and thoroughly unpalatable spice,” wrote Variety film critic Todd McCarthy. ”Aside from Fanning and the controversy, the film has nothing going for it commercially.”

Ouch.

It’s not the kind of review a filmmaker hopes for when debuting any movie at a festival, especially one up for acquisition. At press time, no distribution deal for Hounddog had been announced, but when Kampmeier met with EW before the Variety review appeared online, she seemed confident that there was interest from buyers. ”We’ve got my lawyers on it, talking to people,” she said. ”Look, some people are going to love this film, some people are going to hate it. Some people it will resonate with, some people it won’t.”

As for Fanning, she seems to be weathering the after-storm just fine, thank you. But she isn’t ready to call Hounddog a definitive turning point in her career. ”I guess people will see me a little bit older now, but I’m not all grown up yet,” the precocious pre-teen explained. ”I just want to keep taking steps forward and doing what I believe in.”

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So people don’t want to see Dakota get raped?  Shocking!

This is one thing I just DON’T understand about parent’s of child actors.  How can they be okay with this?  Erin and I were watching The Parent Trap last night (the Lindsay Lohan one) okay, so we like that movie - back off!  But we were saying how it’s just so sad that kids start off so innocent - then end up… well, Lindsay Lohan.  Enough said.  But from the looks of it, our little Dakota will be treading in the same water.

Dakota Fanning Ventures Into Dark Territory, Scares Away the Money

Kid phenom Dakota Fanning is going the way of Brooke Shields and Jodie Foster – and then some – as she tackles a dicey, but potentially award-worthy role in which she endures a sexual assault and appears naked in several scenes.

The 12-year-old thespian is starring in “Hounddog,” a dark story, as Lloyd Grove puts it, of “abuse, violence and Elvis Presley adulation in the rural South,” in which her character gets raped in an explicit scene and appears nude or wearing only undergarments in others. Fanning’s mom and agent apparently see the film as Oscar material for Dakota, but potential investors apparently shied away from its creepy material. Production shut down briefly, but filming will wrap tomorrow in North Carolina.

“It’s not just the rape scene,” says Fanning agent Cindy Osbrink. “The whole story is challenging Dakota as an actress…I’ve seen the dailies, and in every scene she gets better and better.”