UPDATED: Twilight Franchise Closing In On Has A Director

UPDATE: Variety reports that Chris Weitz has officially signed on.

It was rumored earlier, but now it looks like Summit Entertainment has all but signed Chris Weitz on as the director for New Moon, the second film in the lucrative Twilight series. Entertainment Weekly breaks the news that though nothing official has happened yet, Summit has broken off talks with other potential directors and is finalizing the deal with Weitz. Word is that Weitz has a good relationship with Summit president of production, Eric Feig, and could be in Vancouver as early as Monday to begin preproduction on the film if everything goes smoothly. Weitz and his brother Paul launched the American Pie series with the first film in that franchise back in 1999, then did the very good About A Boy together before Chris went on to do last year's The Golden Compass on his own. Despite its box office troubles, I actually enjoyed the film and it seems Summit liked what he did, too. I think Weitz is a talented guy and though he may be male, he definitely does have some of the pedigree to assuage any people who cry foul. Let's see if he can improve on what Catherine Hardwicke started.