Helmers are jumping onboard projects left, right and center - some first timers, others acclaimed veterans. Here's a few:

The Lookout
Oscar-nominated writer Scott Frank ("Out of Sight", "Get Shorty", "Minority Report") is set to make his directorial debut on DreamWorks' "The Lookout" according to The Hollywood Reporter. Frank will direct from his own script about a former high school hockey star, disabled in a car accident, who outwits a group of criminals who plan to rob the small-town bank where he works as a janitor. No cast is currently attached. Frank also penned the upcoming films "The Flight of the Phoenix" and "The Interpreter."

Dexterity
Gavin O'Connor (Miracle) will direct Jude Law in Paramount's Dexterity, the drama that is set to start filming in May after 12 years in development reports Coming Soon. Karen Croner (One True Thing) penned the adaptation of the Douglas Bauer novel, a story of a young couple set against the fortunes of a factory town in upstate New York after the husband is laid off. Law will play Ed King, a blue-collar laborer who falls in love with a factory co-worker, and then struggles when the factory closes down and decimates the town

Fear & Respect
Paramount Pictures has optioned worldwide film rights to Midway Games' new property "Fear & Respect," which John Singleton is developing as a video game according to IGN. The urban-action adventure game is set in South Central Los Angeles and is a third-person game about a young man who has to make survival choices in the urban world of Los Angeles.

The Long Green Shore
Russell Crowe may be headed behind the camera soon according to TVNZ. Crowe will tackle his first role behind the camera in The Long Green Shore and has engaged the talents of award winning American producer Mark Johnson for the film. Based on a novel by John Hepworth and set during World War II, 'Shore' tells of a Aussie battalion charged with purging Papua New Guinea of the retreating Japanese but on arrival on the island, they are greeted with the corpses of Americans and Japanese.

Thanks to 'Lisa'.