I just love Jane Lynch. She might appear in pretty much anything, good or bad, but she's also a complete scene stealer. She's one of Christopher Guest's irresistible improv actors. She's had great bits in never-seen comedies like Bam Bam and Celeste as well as huge blockbusters like The 40 Year Old Virgin. And heck, she makes throwing balls at a felt female reproductive system seem natural on The L Word.

Variety reports that she's been cast as Julia Child's sister in Nora Ephron's upcoming flick Julie & Julia. First I had to wrap my head around the thought of Meryl Streep as Julia Child. I just can't imagine anyone pulling her off without it seeming like a caricature. And then they had to go and throw the Tooch into the mix as Paul Child. And now Lynch as her sister? My god, this is one irresistible cinematic family.

The film follows Julie (Amy Adams), a secretary aiming to cook all of the recipes in Mastering the Art of French Cooking, and also shows bits of Child's life in Paris during the '40s and '50s. Now I've just got to find a theater that allows alcohol, or brown bag it, because really, you can't watch Julia without a good vino.

Wow. You just don't expect to see a movie this awful playing at the Sundance Film Festival (even if a good deal of the film was shot in Utah). Truth be told, I don't expect to see a movie like this anywhere, but man oh man. I always try to think of something positive to say, no matter what the movie is, but this experience has defeated, deflated and depressed me. I'm actually a little irritated about it.

The flick is a very broad comedy called Adventures of Power, because the lead character is named Power. It's a waaaayyyy-too-late Napoleon Dynamite retread that would have been just as witless had it arrived two weeks after that overrated little hit. For the record, I have nothing against writer / director / lead actor Ari Gold; as a matter of fact, this movie was my very first experience with the guy -- despite the fact that he's already appeared in several indies and some award-winning short films. But going only by what I just witnessed in Adventures of Power, Mr. Gold is A) a plainly bland and lifeless director, B) a (gotta say it) pretty damn terrible screenwriter, and C) a lead actor with the screen presence of cottage cheese.

You just can't trust that pesky Mark Harmon, even if he is with the NCIS and used to be a doctor. According to The Hollywood Reporter, he's just signed on to a new indie romcom that has him cheating on his girlfriend. He and Tricia O'Kelley (Luke's ex-wife on Gilmore Girls) have both nabbed roles in Blayne Weaver's new flick, Weather Girl. So far, the film, which will begin production this month, is bringing together a pretty decent collection of talent, all to come together under that "crazy woman" cliche.

As THR describes it, the film's about "a Seattle morning show weathergirl (O'Kelley) who, after learning her boyfriend (Harmon) has cheated on her, is fired after freaking out on-air. Forced to move in with her little brother and to cope with being 35, single, and unemployed, she begins an unlikely romance with a younger man -- her brother's best friend." Wacky comedies are good and all, but can't we move away from flicks where the girl goes crazy in public and then flips about being single? At the very least, have her deal with it with some discretion! Heck, in comparison, Ingrid Bergman was completely discreet in Indiscreet. Anyway...

Most of the cast is now in place. It looks like Harmon might be the host of the television show, because Kaitlin Olson is listed as his co-host. Patrick J. Adams will be Byron, the younger man that O'Kelley falls for. Jane Lynch will play the manager of a restaurant where O'Kelley goes to work, Marin Hinkle and Alex Kapp Horner have also signed on, and Andy Richter and Blair Underwood are finishing up negotiations for roles as well. Beyond that, there's also two Veronica Mars alums to top things off. Ryan Devlin (Mercer) will play her younger brother, and Enrico Colantoni (Keith) is also attached.

The parody subgenre once gave us comedy classics like Young Frankenstein, Airplane!, Top Secret!, and The Naked Gun. This glorious tradition has been disgracefully violated in recent years by the likes of the cleverly titled Epic Movie and Date Movie. (As for the latter -- a spoof of comedies? Outstanding idea!) Walk Hard: The Dewey Cox Story, a parody of musical biopics like Walk the Line and Ray, marks the pretty damn triumphant return of the spoof film. The movie also marks the return of Judd Apatow, and I'm pleased to report that Walk Hard completes a 2007 hat trick for the man. It easily joins Knocked Up and Superbad to form the unholy trinity of the year's superior comedies.

Starting in fictional rock star Dewey Cox's boyhood Tennessee home and ending some sixty years later after his bouts with women, booze, and pills, the film traces the blood pumping rise...of Cox. (First and last Cox joke, I promise.) The script gets Cox making music quickly, and good thing. I'm not sure why the first ten minutes of Walk Hard were released online as part of the marketing plan, they're easily the weakest scenes of the film. But once John C. Reilly enters the picture, portraying Cox at age fourteen despite being 25 years older (a dig at Kevin Spacey in Beyond the Sea?), it's pretty much smooth sailing.

While Gregg Araki's early films have been the subject of much debate, the tide began to change with his impressive Mysterious Skin -- delving into the troubling world of molestation with class and depth. His accomplishments continue with Smiley Face, in a light and stoned capacity, of course. For his latest, Araki has dipped into the world of comedy and shows that he can leave many of his usual, challenging themes behind and make an easy-to-serve, and completely fun, mainstream comedy.

Anna Faris is Jane -- a struggling, pothead actress -- who somehow travels from point A -- her couch, to point Z -- the top of a ferris wheel. How she got there is a strange melange of events that puts Dude, Where's My Car to shame. Earlier that morning, Jane fired up her bong and got nicely stoned. In a munchie daze, she looks in her fridge and discovers a platter of cupcakes on which her roommate (Danny Masterson) has written a note for Jane to keep her hands off. Thinking she'll just eat the cupcakes and make more, Jane devours each and every one -- and only after does she realize that the cupcakes had pot in them. From there, Jane exists in a sea of stoned stupidity and verbose clarity (at least, in her own mind).

Alan Cumming may be busy with multiple acting gigs and his new perfume, but somehow, he also found time to direct his second indie feature, Suffering Man's Charity. When I first saw this news, I made a high-pitched noise and dove into the net, searching for any information I could find. I loved the crisp colour in his digital collaboration with Jennifer Jason Leigh, The Anniversary Party, and I was ready for more.

Now Cumming has released a picture on his website, and I have to share my delight. He's veering from his path of characters with blurry lines of sexuality and real-life drama, and into comedic horror. But that's not the kicker. He's doing it with everyone's favourite brooding Angel, David Boreanaz.

Suffering Man's Charity tells the story of John Vandermark (Cumming), a cello teacher who harbors a secret attraction to a struggling writer named Sebastian (Boreanaz). Vandermark moves the writer into his home, and Sebastian has a fatal accident. The teacher finds the writer's unpublished manuscript, publishes it as his own, and finds himself haunted by Sebastian as the novel becomes a success.

While the quirk factor has Cumming written all over it, it's definitely new territory for Cumming's solo directorial debut. The cast is, once again, filled with great names from Jane Lynch to Carrie Fisher, but the biggest shock is the pairing of Cumming and Boreanaz. Erik Davis recently mused about the unlikely pairing of DeNiro and 50 Cent, but this duo might take the cake. The man who banks on testosterone-infused sexuality is facing off against the quintessential man of blurred sexuality. Who do you think will come out on top?

My pals and I were working hard at SXSW 2004 when we caught wind of a recently-added "on the down low" movie screening that sounded pretty cool. It was a comedy called Surviving Eden, and it was directed by Greg Pritikin, whom we already knew from his sadly underrated ventriliquism comedy Dummy. Prior to the screening, Greg asked that we not review the movie, positively or negatively, because it was still very much a work in progress.

Me and my two cohorts laughed a whole lot at Surviving Eden, and we left the theater a little bummed that we'd been asked not to review it. But we didn't.

Flash forward 2.5 years later, and here comes the flick's theatrical premiere! Cineville will be releasing Surviving Eden in NYC on August 25th, in Chicago on 9/1 and in Austin on 9/8. Most of us won't be able to check the movie out until it hits DVD, but it's basically a very amusing spoof on reality TV, and (more specifically) the "fake-celebrity" status that comes as part of the package. The colorful cast listing includes Michael Panes, Peter Dinklage, Cheri Oteri, Jane Lynch, Sam Robards, Illeana Douglas, Deep Roy and John Landis. Keep an eye out for it.