The future keepers

The basic premise: An alien culture that cannot hear sound comes to Earth and inserts a bio-chip into the brain of a composer to funnel the experience of music to their society for the first time -- but the fellow they pick is a hack writer of B movie scores, and the aliens hunger for a richer experience than his talent can deliver. Then the bio-chip begins to push and inspire him to new heights of creativity, but it also begins to scorch his mind.

"He's making this fantastic music, but the rub is he's burning his brain out," Hackett said. "In many ways it really is my father's story. He couldn't not write -- he had these experiences he had to write about -- but it was all at a tremendous cost to him. So the fictional story and his own dovetail beautifully."

That would hint at a movie that chronicles a writer's life by blurring the lines between his real world and the one he created on the page, à la "Naked Lunch" or "American Splendor" (which also starred Giamatti). The "Naked Lunch" comparison seems especially relevant; like William S. Burroughs, Dick also lived an unhinged life. Paranoia, drug binges and fractured relationships are at the heart of the story, and Hackett admits having deep reservations about seeing it play out on a screen.

"But I think this movie is going to be made, it's inevitable, so I think the family should be part of it. I think it's better to be in the room definitely," Hackett said. "I think I've come to the point where I think it's a positive if we can play a role and have some influence and keep it sensitive and make sure it has a heart and not just focused on the sensational."

Her half-sister, Leslie, echoed that: "In a way, we feel we have to do it, because someone is going to make a film to fill that void."

Dick was married five times before his death at age 53 in Orange County. He had three children, each by a different wife. Isa, which is short for Isolde, was the second of the children, and her mother, Nancy Hackett, divorced the author in 1972 after six difficult years. The girl kept in touch with her father through letters and occasional visits, and she said she intuitively understood how to navigate around his anxieties, such as his intense discomfort in crowds and extended social interactions.