President Ronald Reagan named May 25, the day Etan went missing, National Missing Children's Day.
Etan vanished while walking to a school bus stop on his own for the first time.
He added that police had already informed Etan's family of the development in the case.
Stan and Julie Patz, Etan's parents, still live a block away from the scene and wouldn't comment on the new developments.
CNN: After suspension, search for Etan Patz to resume Monday
Stiller not only stars in the film but also directed it and wrote the script, with Etan Cohen and Justin Theroux.
He's scheduled for release in November 2012, and Mr. Patz is hopeful prosecutors will proceed with Etan's case before he's freed.
"We're looking for human remains, clothing or other personal effects of Etan Patz, " NYPD Deputy Commissioner Paul Browne said of the current investigation.
CNN: After suspension, search for Etan Patz to resume Monday
Even before the Etan Patz case, groups were working in the 1970s -- largely out of the spotlight -- on the issue of missing children.
The street-level space is currently an eyeglass store, but at the time of Etan's 1979 disappearance, it was a deli where Mr. Hernandez briefly worked.
Stan and Julie Patz, Etan's parents, wouldn't comment on the developments.
Etan's family and Adam Walsh's parents have been particularly media savvy, she said, as they kept their cases front and center before the public and law enforcement.
In 2004, a State Supreme Court judge in Manhattan found Mr. Ramos responsible for Etan's death in a civil case brought by Mr. Patz and his wife, Julie.
Investigators looking for evidence in the suspected murder of 6-year-old Etan Patz returned Wednesday to the Manhattan building where police believe a former bodega worker murdered the missing boy decades ago.
It was interest in Miller that prompted authorities to bring a cadaver dog about 10 days ago to the SoHo basement, where Etan apparently had encountered the carpenter, then 42, a source said.
Pedro Hernandez of Maple Shade, New Jersey, told police he choked Etan Patz to death and left his body in a bag in an alley, New York Police Commissioner Raymond Kelly told reporters.
Just weeks after Etan disappeared in May 1979, an attacker abducted the first of more than 20 children to be kidnapped and killed in Atlanta, stirring fear until police arrested a suspect two years later.
After Etan disappeared, investigators tried what was then a novel technique to try to find him: They put his face on thousands of milk cartons, a technique that would become more common in the next few years.
Police Commissioner Raymond Kelly said on Wednesday that he couldn't comment on any search or a published report that Mr. Hernandez kept a picture of Etan hidden in his belongings years after the disappearance of the boy.
The prime suspect in the case, Jose Ramos, who was the boyfriend of a woman who had earlier been hired to walk Etan to school during a bus strike, is currently serving time in prison for molesting two boys.
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