The Empire Film Group has announced it will shoot a $10 million feature-length, mainstream family comedy, “;Soakers,”; here this fall. The press materials note that it will “;benefit from state of Hawaii production incentives,”; but state Film Commissioner Donne Dawson said she had not heard from the company since their Los Angeles meeting in April.

“;It's a genuine project,”; she confirmed. “;It's just that they have not sent me anything officially to let me know they are coming, the time frame or anything else. But I do know they were talking intently about coming here when I met with them.”;

Calls to Empire were not returned.

Potential locations include a small town, a school and a military base. According to the synopsis, two young twins move from Chicago to Hawaii with their mother to live with their grandfather following their father's death. The conflict involves aliens trying to dominate the world. Saving the day is a group called the Supreme Organization of Alien Kicking Extreme Rockin Squad (acronym: SOAKERS), who discover the only way to destroy those nasty aliens is by spraying them with even nastier snot. The pitch? “;Spy Kids”; meets “;Jimmy Neutron.”; Should be fun for the kids though ...

“;Milk”; writer and executive producer Dustin Lance Black led a question-and-answer session during the Rainbow Film Festival last weekend, but before he arrived, he took a moment to speak with me via phone outside his favorite Hollywood coffee shop. When I asked how a now-very-visible Academy Award winner accomplished intense creative work in a public place, he chuckled.

“;I have a little corner, a nook,”; he said. “;I kind of hide out. It's noisy and all these characters are coming and going. The loneliness of the writer is sort of solved by finding your perfect coffee shop ...”;

Dynamic celebrity chef Emeril Lagasse is coming to Hawaii to headline the Kahala Food & Wine Classic June 12-13, and bringing plenty of Louisiana Creole with him.

Lagasse owns 10 restaurants (soon to be 11) in New Orleans and elsewhere, hosts his own TV show, and is the best-selling author of 13 cookbooks. The Kahala event includes an outdoor dinner with the chef, followed by a cigar tasting, a live cooking demonstration, wine tasting, more cigars and a New Orleans cuisine dinner prepared by the man himself. Purchase the whole package or go a la carte. For more details, call the Kahala Hotel & Resort at 739-8760, or visit http://www.kahalaresort.com ...

The first 2009 production of “;Emme's Island Moments Revisited”; follows up with previous guests Dean Pitchford, a Saint Louis High graduate and producer of “;Fame”; and “;Footloose”; (soon to be remade with “;Gossip Girl's”; Chase Crawford), actress and singer Tia Carrere, who will produce and star in a movie about Rell Sunn, and musician (and now movie actor!) Willie K. Emme Tomimbang's new show airs at 9 p.m. tonight on KHON, and re-broadcasts at 4 p.m. Saturday ...

Maui residents have a relatively consistent supply of good films through the Maui Film Festival. Now Consolidated's Kukui Theatre will add to the mix with a summer run of independent, foreign and specialty movies. The program started May 15, and will end with Ang Lee's “;Taking Woodstock”; in early September. For more information, visit www.ConsolidatedTheatres.com...