According to reports, Murphy is the one who approached the studio about bringing back the character of Axel Foley, no doubt emboldened by the return of characters such as Rambo, Rocky, John McClane, and Indiana Jones.

The current goal is to get the film in production by 2009 with sights set on a summer 2010 release. Brett Ratner (Rush Hour, Red Dragon, X-Men: The Last Stand) is in negotiations to direct.

The first Beverly Hills Cop was released in 1984 and grossed $316 million worldwide (close to $650M in today’s dollars). That film spawned two sequels, the last of which was released in 1994. All together, the three films grossed $712.9 million worldwide.

If this film is released in 2010, it will have been 16 years since the previous film in the franchise. That would be comparable to the 16 years between Rocky movies, 19 years for Indy, 12 years for John McClane, and 20 years for Rambo.

Still, one must ask the question, is there really an audience for this type of movie in this day and age? The last film in the franchise didn’t do nearly as well as the first two did and Eddie Murphy isn’t exactly known for his cutting edge action films these days.

Would you go see a fourth Beverly Hills Cop movie?

Variety is reporting a diverse group of actors and directors are teaming up and spreading out across New York to shoot New York, I Love You. The film will be a “mixture of contemplative romance and unabashed civic boosterism.” The anthology of shorts follows the format of “Paris, je t’aime,” (which means “Paris, I love you” in French) a surprise specialty hit released last year.

Orlando Bloom, Olivia Thirlby, Hayden Christensen, Ethan Hawke, Scarlett Johansson, and Natalie Portman are among the actors who will be directing segments of the film. The film is already garnering attention for marking the directorial debuts of both Johansson and Portman.

Directors who have signed up for the project include Mira Nair, Brett Ratner and Alan Hughes, plus international directors Fatih Akin, Andrey Zvyagintsev and Wen Jiang.

Paris je t’aime quietly racked up $5M in domestic box office last year and kicked off producer Emmanuel Benhiby’s planned global series that could see numerous locales get the “I love you” treatment, with Shanghai and Africa on the drawing board.

Actors who have already been confirmed for New York, I Love You include Carlos Acosta, Kevin Bacon, Justin Bartha, Rachel Bilson, James Caan, Bradley Cooper, Chris Cooper, Drea de Matteo, Irrfan Khan, Cloris Leachman, Blake Lively, Emilie Ohana, Maggie Q, Shu Qi, Eli Wallach, Saul Williams, Robin Wright-Penn, Anton Yelchin and Ugur Yucel.