Following her recent trip to Hollywood, Noomi Rapace has signed on to star in Sherlock Holmes 2.

Since The Girl with the Dragon Tattoo first hit cinemas, Rapace's intense performance as Lisbeth Salander has won her fans all over the industry. Now, the 30 year old actress will be taking on her first English-speaking role.

Work on Guy Ritchie's sequel has been speeding up over the months, with no official word yet on who will be playing Holmes' nemesis Moriarty. Speculation about the appearance of Mycroft, Sherlock's brother, is also doing the rounds. Until now, the only confirmed news has been that Robert Downey Jr and Jude Law will both return as Holmes and Dr Watson.

As for Rapace, she may well follow Rachel McAdams' steps and play a love interest for one of the two gents. She may even be a villain. Some sources are suggesting she'll be playing a French gypsy for some reason. Either way, she's bound to be impressive.

Shooting starts on Sherlock by the end of the year, with Ritchie's second outing now suffering from even higher expectations: they'll somehow have to top the BBC's recent take on the deerstalking detective. 

Cuts are in the air as kids go back to school this September. But with education funding reduced and renovation plans scrapped, who do you turn to when your local primary or secondary has collapsed into a pile of rubble?

With its varied back-catalogue and comfortable seating arrangements, the cinema could well be your best bet to educate your offspring.

Nick Clegg can’t stop you seeing a film based on your postcode, and Michael Gove is all for people starting up their own state schools. Even Odeon’s website agrees: "the cinema can provide a useful and relevant study aid," it readily enthuses. Starting up your own school? Don’t use the chip shop – use your own home cinema.

When it comes to the national curriculum on a budget, you can forget the Three Rs. The letters you want are these: DVD.

Here’s a rundown of your basic introductory syllabus:

What with the horrifying Human Centipede hitting the cinemas and the recent release of Splice, I (as a research scientist) am starting to feel a bit persecuted. You may think I’m paranoid but more often than not, scientists end up as the bad guys in movies.

Whether we're villains with God complexes or clueless, well-intentioned beings who mess with things way beyond them, us test tube folk always get left carrying the buck. Especially when Bad Things Happen.

Researchers in medical sciences, and particularly genetics, seem to be the most likely to be given the Frankenstein (or "Harold Shipman") treatment. But is Hollywood right? Are we all horrible, heartless or just plain ignorant? If The Human Centipede is "100% medically accurate", let's open the Pandora’s Box of Hollywood’s past scientific failures and see just how accurate their "evil" scientists are.

Everyone's favourite sociopath hacker is making friends in Hollywood. Yes, Noomi Rapace - the Girl with the Dragon Tattoo - has turned heads around the world with her performances as the heavily-pierced seriously-unstable Lisbeth Salander. And now, as the sequel arrives in cinemas next week, rumours are running around that she's lining up a few new movies.

Top of the list are Sherlock Holmes and Mission: Impossible. If Warner Bros get their way, Rapace will be up alongside Robert Downey Jr in Sherlock's second outing (their babies would be interesting to look at), and if Paramount get theirs, she'll be ducking and diving with Tom Cruise when Ethan Hunt returns in M:I 4.

But that's not all. She's also had talks with James McTeigue for The Raven, Tommy Wirkola (for that Hansel and Gretel: Witch Hunters movie), and even McG. For This Means War, not for Transformers 3. She's supposedly also met with Ridley Scott, but no-one knows why.

Deadline reports that, most of all, Hollywood are stumped to see that those piercings can come out: "They're shocked to find she's nothing like Lisbeth. They go into the meeting to ask if they have a villain, and they leave wondering if they have a female lead."

That's all part of Noomi Rapace's charm, of course. Find out how unscary she is in our Q&A with her. Then check out the trailer for her next appearance as Lisbeth Salander, in The Girl who Played with Fire. That's out here next Friday.