Most directors' first effort is NOT a huge blockbuster smash of a comedy starring Ben Stiller and Vince Vaughn, but that's how writer/director Rawson Marshall Thurber hit the scene: with Dodgeball. But based on the filmmaker's second effort, I'm guessing that Thurber took a lot of good-natured ribbing from his film-school friends and decided to snag some "indie cred" by doing a smaller movie for his second feature. That's all well and good, but it's too bad that the resulting movie -- The Mysteries of Pittsburgh -- is such an inert, episodic, and familiar piece of very typical festival fare. It's as if Mr. Thurber watched six Sundance films at random, and then just copied his favorite scenes from each one.

Based on the novel of the same name by Michael Chabon, The Mysteries of Pittsburgh is about the son of an infamous gangster who spends his last summer before "adult life" roaming around with two "free-spirited" pals. The year is 1983, and young Art Bechstein (Jon Foster) is at a serious crossroads. Completely opposed to his father's lifestyle, Art (reluctantly) plans to become a stockbroker in a few months' time -- but that means a few open months in which he can A) work at a chintzy discount book store, B) cast lovesick glances towards his new friend Jane (Sienna Miller), and C) become close pals with a bisexual street thug called Cleveland (Peter Sarsgaard). Oh, and D) nail his slightly unhinged boss (Mena Suvari).

I'm a big fan of author Bret Easton Ellis' work. Since many of his novels rely on the inner workings of characters' minds, they can be difficult to adapt to the big screen. The film version of Less Than Zero made cocaine addiction look like Pretty in Pink. I know I'm in the minority, but I detested Mary Harron's American Psycho. The only adaptation I feel got Ellis exactly right was Roger Avary's excellent take on The Rules of Attraction. Now three more films are going to try and re-create Ellis' world. Darren Star is working on The Frog King with Joseph Gordon-Levitt. There is no director yet, but a movie version of Lunar Park has been announced. And director Gregor Jordan (Ned Kelly) has put together a cast for the film translation of Ellis' 1995 novel The Informers.

The Hollywood Reporter writes that Billy Bob Thornton, Kim Basinger, and Superman himself Brandon Routh are in "various stages of negotiation" to star in the ensemble film. The Informers is set in Los Angeles in 1983 and it tracks seven stories. The major characters are: a movie executive (played by Thornton), his wife (Basinger), his mistress, a rock star, a kidnapper, and a vampire (Routh, apparently looking to darken up his image). Rounding out the cast are Ashley Olsen as a "sexually promiscuous girl" (doesn't it seem like those twins are getting a ton of work these days?), Jon Foster (Stay Alive), Austin Nichols (John Monad on the baffling John From Cincinnati), and Lou Taylor Pucci (star of the very good Thumbsucker and the not very good Chumscrubber -- yes, they're different movies). Sounds like it could be a great flick! Now, whatever happened to Roger Avary's planned Glamorama movie? I would love to see that come to light. Did Zoolander steal its thunder?

A few month ago, we reported the exciting news that a film version of Michael Chabon's The Mysteries of Pittsburgh was in the works. (For those of you not familiar with the book, it's a coming-of-age story set in Pittsburgh during the 1980s, and focuses on Art Bechstein and the unconventional group of friends he makes during his last summer "of his youth.") At that time, Sienna Miller, Peter Sarsgaard and Max Minghella were already signed to star in the film, with Minghella playing Bechstein. It looks, however, as if things have changed: Production Weekly is reporting that Jon Foster (known primarily for his work on NBC's summer series Windfall, and a starring role in Stay Alive) is now playing Bechstein, and there's no indication of what might have happened to Minghella. The PW story also reveals that Mena Suvari has joined the cast in the role of Phlox, a "worldly, exotic, and slightly eccentric" member of Bechstein's posse.

The movie is slated to go into production in early September under the direction of screenwriter Rawson Marshall Thurber.