This and That

I've been incredibly unmotivated about this whole blogging thing lately. It's not from lack of ideas so much as it is want of free time. The next few weeks will be super busy, too, what with my wife graduating, visits from family, work craziness, and preparations for a three-week trip to Europe. Nonetheless, I've been coming across a lot of cool stuff lately, so here's some random notes, mostly relating to movies, music, etc. Enjoy: • Via Looking Closer Journal we learn that Fast Food Nation, Eric Schlosser's wonderful exposé of the fast food industry, is soon coming to film. But not as a documentary. Instead, it will be a thriller based on Schlosser's book. Interesting. Read more here. • The website for The Lion, the Witch, and the Wardrobe film is live. This thing looks amazing. Please somebody leak the trailer. Soon. • There's a new trailer for the new Batman film up here. I'm still harboring resentment that the Frank Miller/Darren Aronofsky version of the film didn't happen. But I'll still take this one. • I've been drooling with anticipation over Donnie Darko writer/director Richard Kelly's new film, Southland Tales. Things are getting even more interesting. Apparently Kelly has cast The Rock in the film. There are only five to ten directors alive who could do that without the film automatically sucking. Kelly is one of them. Southland Tales will also feature a hugely elaborate website. And six separate 100 page graphic novels, each written by Kelly, will serve as a prequel to the film. This guy has guts. But, as I said, he's one of a few who can pull all this off. Read more here. • You may not be familiar with Steve Taylor. Taylor is a musician and aspiring film director. He's probably best known for a career as a musical satirist who worked on the outskirts of the CCM genre back in the 80s. His solo music is decent, but anyone with the guts to write a song called I Blew Up the Clinic Real Good deserves props. Taylor should be remembered, though, for his work in the band Chagall Guevara. The five-piece put out one amazing album back in 1989 and then folded. It's long out of print, but you should be able to find it easily on eBay. If not, I'll burn you a copy. It's that good. Really. Taylor also founded the record label Squint back in the 90s, which released Sixpence None the Richer's self-titled album (the one with Kiss Me>, and Chevelle's first album, Point #1. Taylor also planned to put out kick-ass LA rap outfit L.A. Symphony's masterpiece Call It What You Want (it's since been released but is no longer for sale; also worth hunting for on eBay). Anyways, I say all that to tell you that Taylor has a new film coming out, The Second Chance, about two very different pastors, one a white mega church pastor, the other a black pastor of an inner city church. It looks interesting, is critical of the church (almost always a plus), and should spark a lot of good discussion. I'm excited to see it when it comes out this fall. Oh, and the mega church pastor? He's played by Michael W. Smith. And apparently he's not as shitty an actor as he is a musician. There's an interview with Taylor up here.