Jonathan Demme and Stephen King teaming up for cool time trip

It seems like forever since I've seen a movie directed by Jonathan Demme, and even longer since I've seen anything that sprang from the over-active mind of Stephen King. I did, however, enjoy Demme's last movie, "Rachel Getting Married," quite a bit, and I have "Something Wild" just sitting in my Netflix streaming queue. And now also comes word that the director, who doesn't work nearly often enough, is teaming up with King for what should be a pretty epicly fun time trip.

Demme is attached to write and direct a feature film based on King's upcoming novel, "11/22/63," which as you can perhaps guess from the title is a science fiction work that centers on the assassination of JFK. Here's the official plot description from King's website:

Jake Epping is a thirty-five-year-old high school English teacher in Lisbon Falls, Maine, who makes extra money teaching adults in the GED program. He receives an essay from one of the students — a gruesome, harrowing first person story about the night 50 years ago when Harry Dunning’s father came home and killed his mother, his sister, and his brother with a hammer. Harry escaped with a smashed leg, as evidenced by his crooked walk. Not much later, Jake’s friend Al, who runs the local diner, divulges a secret: his storeroom is a portal to 1958. He enlists Jake on an insane — and insanely possible — mission to try to prevent the Kennedy assassination. So begins Jake’s new life as George Amberson and his new world of Elvis and JFK, of big American cars and sock hops, of a troubled loner named Lee Harvey Oswald and a beautiful high school librarian named Sadie Dunhill, who becomes the love of Jake’s life — a life that transgresses all the normal rules of time.

Sounds like a movie trip well worth taking, so stay tuned for more on this as soon as I see it. And after that today, before a couple of videos, it's all about TV comedy, starting with a show that I was slow to pick up on, but have now become quite addicted to this summer: Psych.

Silly? Sure, but how could a show about psychic detectives be anything else? Luckily, thanks to stars James Roday and Dule Hill, it's also always fast and funny, and it wears its geek flag proudly, especially with the sublime "Twin Peaks" tribute episode "Dual Spires" (get it?), the last one I've managed to catch so far. And now comes word from USA that season six will premiere on Oct. 12 at 10 p.m. Bring it on already!

And in other potentially very funny TV news, Larry David's constant enabler and agent on "Curb Your Enthusiasm," the great Jeff Garlin, has just signed a deal with ABC Studios to write, executive produce and star in a half-hour comedy. No word yet on just what it might be about, but with Kid in the Hall Bruce McCullough on board to co-write this, I'm still betting on something very funny.

Now on to a couple of videos to wrap up an admittedly short report so that I can get some housework done before going to see "The Help," starting with the second trailer I've seen for "50/50," one of the movies I'm definitely most looking forward to for this fall. As you'll see from the trailer, Reel Fanatic fave Joseph Gordon Levitt stars in the comedy of sorts based on Will Reiser's battle with cancer, and he's joined by Seth Rogen and Anna Kendrick, who I'll watch in just about anything outside of the "Twilight" oeuvre. Enjoy the trailer, and keep an eye out for the movie on Sept. 30.

And finally today, I just bought the album "Watch the Throne" by Jay-Z and Kanye West, and though it's gonna take a little while to absorb all that ego, it sounds pretty epicly good so far. Below is the video for the first single, "Otis," which was apparently directed by Spike Jonze, though you really can't detect many signs of that. What is has, however, is a great sample of Otis' "Try a Little Tenderness" and, for some reason, Aziz Ansari failing pretty miserably at dancing. Enjoy, and have a perfectly pleasant weekend. Peace out.

What will happen when it's Sunny again in Philadelphia?

One of the very few bright spots during this TV summer with no "Psych" and no "Mad Men" has been FX's one-two comedy punch of "Wilfred" and then "Louie" on Thursday nights.

If you've never seen either, I'd recommend giving them a chance tonight starting at 10 p.m. "Wilfred," an Australian import starring Elijah Wood, is as close as I've seen to a real trip on mainstream TV in many years. Co-star and show creator Jason Gann plays the titular "Wilfred," the dog who only Wood's character can talk to (almost always after consuming copious amounts of marijuana) and who becomes his partner in all kinds of depravity. Just trust me, it's much funnier than I make it sound here.

And "Louie" creator and star Louis CK was probably the biggest surprise in this year's Emmy nominations, garnering a much-deserved one in the category of best actor in a comedy. The show mixes CK's often caustic standup comedy with vignettes from his life raising his two young daughters as a divorced dad and getting into all kinds of uncomfortable situations. It's a dry and definitely acquired taste, but one I look forward to every week.

The best of FX's comedies, however, at least for me, will always be "It's Always Sunny in Philadelphia." It's just the ultimate release after a long day of work, because not only are the characters always constantly trying to undermine each other with petty (and uniformly ridiculous) schemes, but it thankfully has absolutely no conscience at all.

You'd think it would get old, but for me it certainly hasn't yet, and now FX has announced that the show is returning for a 13-episode seventh season beginning Sept. 15. And what will the gang get up to next? Well according to FX, Charlie, Dee, Mac, Dennis and Frank will "prepare for the apocalypse, hit the beach at the Jersey Shore, produce a child beauty pageant and take a walk down memory lane at their high school reunion."

All that has me laughing already, so definitely tune in when "It's Always Sunny in Philadelphia" once again.

And in a bit of movie news, it seems we may finally get to see what ever became of Joss Whedon's horror movie, "Cabin in the Woods," but I'll believe that when we finally really get to see it.

The movie, co-written by Whedon and Drew Goddard, and directed by Goddard, was originally scheduled to come out in 2009, but got swallowed up in the bankruptcy of MGM and other things that are beyond the rather silly scope of this site.

Now, however, it seems that Lionsgate has acquired the rights to the movie starring Chris Hemsworth, Richard Jenkins, Bradley Whitford and Whedon mainstay Amy Acker, among others, and has set a release date of April 13, 2012.

The title should pretty much make it clear what this is about, but here's how Whedon, in typical modesty, described it: "the horror movie to end all horror movies." I somehow doubt that, but at least now we'll all get to find out for ourselves.

And after that brief report, I'll leave you with this audio-only clip of the new song from Jay-Z and Kanye West because, well, I don't think I'll ever get too old for good hip-hop and because this song, "Otis," just makes truly audacious use of the Otis Redding song "Try a Little Tenderness." Their collaborative album, "Watch The Throne," which will easily set the record for the most ego ever assembled on one record, is set to hit the Web Aug. 1 and then record stores on Aug. 5. Enjoy, and have a perfectly adequate Thursday. Peace out.