I just finished reading A Scanner Darkly, which I picked up more or less at random while at the bookstore last night. I then read it in three or four sittings today, which is great. I love the fact that my schedule is so loose now that I can just spend all day reading a book. A really good book. Philip K Dick is just totally awesome, and his novels always leave me in a state of superb mindfuck. But I’ve only read two others, VALIS and The Divine Invasion. I’m pretty sure that I should just go through and read all of them now. I’ve never really hunted down everything an author has before…. that’s not true, actually. I’m also slowly working my way through everything Marie Louise Von Franz ever wrote. I think if I could have the works of the two of those authors, I would be more than happy to give up a lot of other stuff.

The title, A Scanner Darkly, is a modified reference to a line in the Bible, from 1st Corinthians 13:12 (KJV):

For now we see through a glass, darkly; but then face to face: now I know in part; but then shall I know even as also I am known.

Anyway, right, SO GET THIS! I found out/remembered that there is a movie version of A Scanner Darkly, currently in production and due out next year. Which is awesome enough in its own right. But guess who’s directing it! Richard Linklater! The dude who did Waking Life, which ruled (plus a bunch of other stuff).

The cast also looks pretty good, although I’m none too sure about Keanu Reeves as Fred/Bob Arctor. But who knows, he may also be just right for it. He’s weird like that sometimes. Robert Downey Jr. as Barris looks PERFECT and Winona Rider as Donna is also totally dead-on, I think.

Whoa, wait, this is going to be animated (or partly animated?)? That’s weird, but I’m optimistic, cause I think, based on Waking Life that Linklater is really close to this material, on a personal level, and that should come across no matter what, based on the kind of filmmaker he seems to be.