The Week in Film: Some Movies are "Precious" While "Some Stare at ... Goats"?

CRUMBS & BITS

OMG! *hyperventilates* *takes in a breath* Sorry about that! Ahem. Let’s try this again. One of my favorite books, Life of Pi by Yann Martel, is going to the big screen! OMG! And guess who’s directing! Come on, guess, okay, never mind, I’m too excited, I’ll just tell you: Ang Lee! Yeah, I heard Taking Woodstock wasn’t great, but come on, he directed The Number One Gay Movie (as voted by you)!

The book is about an Indian boy who is stranded on a lifeboat with an orangutan, a broken-legged zebra, a Royal Bengal tiger, and a hyena. That’s quite a group, no? It’s about his survival and his interaction with the animals and I know it doesn’t sound like much, but it’s one of the most gripping and compelling books I’ve ever read.

The writing hypnotizes you with its pacing and storytelling, and by the end, you won’t know what hit you. I’ve always thought that Pi might be hard to pull off onscreen as the book takes place mostly in the boy’s thoughts, and was more like the character telling us a story. He talks to the animals, but they obviously don’t talk back. So we won’t see much dialogue-driven interactions. Then again, there was Cast Away, and all he had was a volleyball. Anyhoo, can’t wait! Roar!

You can read the news snippet here.

In other news, Keir Gilchrist (gay Marshall on United States of Tara) has been cast in the lead for It’s Kind of a Funny Story, starting production in December. The movie is about a sixteen-year-old (Gilchrist) checking himself into a mental health clinic because of the all the stress of being a teenager is Just. Too. Much!

It gets weirder.

Because the kiddie/teenage ward is full, he is placed in the adult ward. I’m sure there are some rules, and by some, I mean many, that the adults are breaking here because I really don’t see this happening in real life. I mean, really? Then again, it’s a movie, and these things are easy to overlook when you’re entertained.

I mean, with Zach Galifianakis (The Hangover) and Lauren Graham (Gilmore Girls, of course, and also star of this winter’s NBC series Parenthood) already cast along with a slew of other actors like Emma Roberts (of the upcoming Valentine’s Day), Academy Award nominee Viola Davis (Doubt), Zoe Kravitz (The Brave One), Aasif Mandvi (The Proposal), and Jim Gaffigan (Away We Go), this dramedy looks quite promising. Now (and I’ve been doing a lot of this lately) all we have to do is wait.

That’s it for this week. Stay safe and stay sharp. Until next week!