Quick Takes: Eddie Murphy as mayor

Eddie Murphy may soon star in a more serious role, playing former Washington Mayor Marion Barry in an HBO film.

An HBO spokeswoman said Friday that the network is working with Spike Lee and Murphy on the project, though she said it’s in the early stages of development. Lee would direct the movie, and Murphy would play Barry, who, during his third term as mayor, was videotaped smoking crack cocaine in a hotel room during an FBI sting operation. He eventually served six months in federal prison on a misdemeanor drug possession conviction and was elected again to the D.C. Council in 1992.

The film would be adapted from the 1994 book “Dream City: Race, Power and the Decline of Washington, D.C.,” by Tom Sherwood and Harry Jaffe.

—Associated Press

Director charged over tax credits

A Los Angeles-based filmmaker was charged Friday with defrauding Massachusetts of almost $5 million in inflated tax credits for two movies he made along the state’s scenic Cape Cod shoreline.

Daniel Adams, 50, is accused of fraudulently submitting tax credit applications that claimed exaggerated expenses related to 2008’s “The Golden Boys” and 2009’s “The Lightkeepers,” said Brad Puffer, spokesman for Attorney General Martha Coakley.

Adams was arraigned Friday morning in Boston Municipal Court on two counts each of making a false claim to the state and larceny over $250. He pleaded not guilty and was held on $100,000 bail.

—Reuters

Jolie screens film for war victims

Victims of Bosnia’s 1992-95 war had most of their anxieties over a film by Angelina Jolie put to rest at a private screening this week.

Objections to filming Jolie’s tale of love between a Serb man and a Muslim woman in Bosnia last year forced the Hollywood star to shoot most of the film in nearby Hungary. Only some of the exterior scenes were shot in Bosnia.

But the Thursday night screening of “In the Land of Blood and Honey” in Sarajevo to representatives of victims’ associations elicited positive reactions from some of Jolie’s toughest local critics.

“She has made a fantastic film for Bosnia and Herzegovina, I can really say that from the angle of a victim,” Murat Tahirovic, the president of Bosnia’s association of wartime detainees, told Federal Television in Sarajevo.

—Reuters

Cubans flock to zombie movie

The hottest ticket in Havana is a gory, campy zombie flick with a wicked sense of humor about Cuba’s obsessive relations with the United States, one that revels in islanders’ knack for making the best of things even when everything around you — buildings, streets, human limbs — is falling to pieces.

Audiences thronged movie houses this week to catch screenings of “Juan of the Dead,” or “Juan de los Muertos” in the original Spanish, and organizers had to hastily add extra midnight screenings to accommodate the crush.

The Charles Chaplin Cinema bustled with several hundred eager spectators who stormed the doors once they opened Thursday night. And that was just those with special connections. Hundreds more lined up around the block outside.

Writer-director Alejandro Brugues said he was euphoric to see the crowds and credited the turnout to the movie’s first-of-its-kind nature for Cuba, whose films tend to be low-budget affairs about ordinary life.

“We don’t do much action cinema,” he said. “That’s something that should change.”

—Associated Press

AMC books ‘CSI: Miami’

Don Draper, meet Lt. Horatio Caine: “CSI: Miami” is headed for AMC.

The cable network announced Friday that it had acquired the first 10 seasons of the CBS forensics drama starring David Caruso as the hard-boiled Caine — more than 200 episodes in total — plus an additional two seasons if those episodes are produced.

“CSI: Miami” will premiere on AMC on Jan. 2 and run weekdays at 5 p.m.

AMC has lately staked out a reputation for high-prestige original programming, such as “Mad Men,” “Breaking Bad” and “The Walking Dead.” By buying repeats of an established broadcast hit, the cable outlet is turning to a ratings-boosting tactic long used by other networks, including USA and A&E.

—Scott Collins