The Six Types Of Failed Screenwriters

(Formerly known as Deleted For Controversial Material, the post is back because fuck you :p I'm surprised I still have it...)

AUTOBIOGRAPHIST
Has one script, usually a "urban" drama / crime drama or similar inner city potboiler. Loves it like a mother, e.g. won't stop talking about it, and won't do anything to change it no matter how many ways and in how much detail you explain how awful it is.

CLOSET BIGOT
Let's be clear here: this writer is NOT a racist, sexist, homophobe or xenophobe. The CHARACTERS are. Trouble is, that includes the hero.

LAZY NOVELIST
Turning your beat sheet into a novel is always a much better idea than writing another screenplay. You take complete control of your vision, in the form of a tome you can publish online, today, for the world to endure. Trouble is, it takes forever, and your sale will be roughly, if you really advertise, about $8. Plus you have to know what dangling participles are, how to use adverbs, where to put punctuation, and other things that won't get you meetings in LA.
So the Lazy Novelist drifts in the netherworld, cranking out 160 page specs with the act 2 break on p 34, packed with thick direction blocks, clumsy formatting and soliloquys on every other page. Concise premise? Likable characters? That's for those hacks in Hollywood the Lazy Novelist never got to be.
Which brings us to the...

OUTSIDER
Extremely disciplined, fervent student of structure and characterization, and a true movie fan. S/he also studies the business, and follows sales and trades and the inside scoops and lingo…from her/his house in Wisconsin. Or South Dakota. S/he would go indie and film the script on a shoestring, but s/he's really busy with work, kids, sick parents, things like that.
Probably knows the…

CONTESTANT
Is really excited that s/he won the Tuscaloosa Film Festival script contest. S/he also "placed" or was a quarterfinalist on any other number of other contests where the requirements to place basically involve your script not being written in crayon. There are only two contests in the world where Third Place means anything at all (barely): The Olympics, and Nicholls. And no agents or producers in Hollywood ever ask you what contests you placed in. The Contestant's specs are proof why.

ONLINE BLOWHARD
Hey! This isn't funny anymore! :p

The 2010 Short Oscars: Animated!

I got to see the Animated nominees a little earlier than I thought I would. As usual, fantastic storytelling and a wide palette ranging from nasty humor to dark melodrama is here. The 3D thing has almost completely overtaken the program, and good old fashioned cell animation or even Flash is seeming almost a thing of nostalgia these days. The blazing exception, and hands down my favorite, is "Logorama", a dizzying nightmare in rotoscope told entirely in corporate logos and mascots. Yes, you read that right. An urban nightmare and apocalyptic specter is rendered using a homicidal Ronald McDonald, lecherous Pringles characters, and the fall of planet Pepsi. Of course this is France's entry, as an American animator would be hung up by his packaging for making a movie like this, and it's our loss. I haven't seen animation this nasty and subversive since the coke damaged 80s era of "Ren And Stimpy" or "Jack Mac and Rad Boy", which is saying something.
On a completely different tip is the latest from Wallace And Gromit representing Britain in "A Matter Of Loaf And Death", involving true love for Wallace and Gromit too amidst a murder spree affecting bakers like our heroes. Even funnier is Spain's "The Lady And The Reaper", which turns a little old lady's acceptance of death into a Tex Avery-esque battle between the Grim Reaper and a vain surgeon. There are many other entries in the current program scoring Noteworthy status - whatever that means - including Canada's "Runaway", about a runaway train and the nebbish assistant driver who tries desperately to save the day. It's the other 2D entry and it's a beaut, simply drawn and full of great sight gags.

So that's both programs. Watch them online right now!
BTW Anyone want to explain why shorts are not shown before movies anymore but commercials are?

Short Subject Oscars 2010

This week is the Live Action subjects, and for those who saw last year's nominees, I can wholeheartedly say this year offers a vastly improved quintet of pieces. Hard to pick a winner out of this bunch, but for me it would be "The New Tenants". The one recognizable face is Vincent D'Onofrio, as a cuckolded husband and one of the many characters that pass through a gay couple's door in one fateful sequence of events. Sure it could be a one act play, but I'll take it on film too. I very much loved "Instead Of Abracadabra" as well, a hilarious story of a struggling magician trying to impress a girl, his conservative parents and local audiences at the same time. Very reminiscent of Wes Anderson in it's celebration of nerdy achievement and it's unremittingly cheerful outlook.
I'll be back soon with the Animated Program! ETA Watch all the shorts right now!

Ranking the Movies of 2009

It's that time of year again. Well, last year the time never occurred for personal reasons, so this year I'm back with a vengeance. A big shout out to any visitors from dvdtalk.com, and also to my tweet and Facebook followers, and friends from sites like Absolute Write. Welcome to my hole in the virtual wall.
As always, this is only theatrical films, ranked as I feel they should be. 2008 movies get a * marking. Drum roll and raise your pints, folks...

MOVIE OF THE YEAR: Moon
HONORABLE MENTION: Gran Torino (from 2008, but certainly at the top of either year's list)
SILVER: The Men Who Stare At Goats
BRONZE: A Serious Man
The Brothers Bloom
The Road
Inglorious Basterds
Broken Embraces
Soul Power
* The Dark Knight IMAX Experience
Let The Right One In
Gomorrah
The Hurt Locker
The Fantastic Mr Fox
Cold Souls
Watchmen
In The Loop
Food, Inc.
Angels And Demons
Nine (Tim Burton produced animation, will see the musical in 2010)
Antichrist
* The Wrestler
Tetro
Bad Lieutenant: Port Of Call New Orleans
A Perfect Getaway
Star Trek
Zombieland
2012
TURKEY OF THE YEAR: The Informant! / The Girlfriend Experience (Special mention tie. Steven Soderbergh, get with the program!)
DISHONORABLE MENTION: Frank Miller's The Spirit (another 2008 entry, but deserving of special warning to the curious)

And here are special events and revivals deserving of special praise or infamy. Support your local movie theater!

Mishima (with Paul Schrader)
El Topo (remastered and original Spanish with subtitles)
Near Dark
Monty Python's Life Of Brian
The Oscar Shorts Live Action and Animated
Alien
Jaws
All That Jazz
Todd Haynes' Safe
The Big Lebowski (with costume contest)
Barbarella
From Beyond (with screenwriter Dennis Paoli)
Piranha

And don't forget the Brooklyn Film Festival and Focus on French Cinema in Westchester, just a couple of great festivals that are coming back this year. And the greatest website of them all, netflix.com (Best Video of Hamden is pretty good, too ;) )

Hope next year is just as good!