Virtue and Vice

Another day, another literary-to-big-screen adaptation. There Will Be Blood director Paul Thomas Anderson wants to direct a film version of Inherent Vice, the 2009 novel from genius reclusive writer Thomas Pynchon. The book is made for cinema: a charismatic, burnt-out private detective named Doc Sportello, a mysterious disappearance, a bevy of beautiful women, and a good-looking cop, all set in Malibu and Las Vegas after the Summer of Love.

Rumor has it Robert Downey Jr. might play the lead male role of Sportello. Keep your fingers crossed for a decent adaptation – this might be one killer of a film.

Text Molly O'Brien

James Franco: Hot and Smart

Eat, Pray, Love, the film based on Elizabeth Gilbert’s 2006 memoir, arrived in theaters on Friday, and boy, was the publicity for that movie unbelievable. You can’t watch television for two minutes without seeing Julia Roberts eating gelato over and over again and hearing that Florence + the Machine song in the trailer. Well done, ad campaign, well done.

One benefit from oversaturating the market is being able to see James Franco in the previews – dang, is that man attractive or what? Besides being ridiculously good-looking and having made one of the funniest guest appearances on 30 Rock ever (playing himself, only with the slight problem of being in love with a Japanese body pillow), Franco is also pretty erudite, getting an MFA in writing at NYU and now accepted to a Ph.D. program at Yale. He also reportedly has plans to write some sort of vampire novel à la Twilight, though something tells me it might just end up better than Stephanie Meyer's creation. Hopefully we’ll get to see the fruits of his labor soon and be able to sigh over his looks and his brain. Sigh.

Text Molly O'Brien