Genre: Sci-fi
Premise: A group of strangers must band together in Moscow after a mysterious alien force invades the city
About: This project has been in development for awhile and, as far as I can tell, is waiting for someone or something to breathe new life into it. The original draft was written by M.T. Ahern & Leslie Bohem four years ago, and now Spaihts has given his take on the material. Spaihts, for those who don’t know, wrote the Avatar-sounding space thriller, “Shadow 19” back in 2006, which won the admiration of Keanu Reeves. Reeves (no relation) then hired Spaihts to pen “Passengers,” his weird idea about a guy who wakes up early on a 100 year space journey. The script wowed Hollywood and finished Top 3 on the 2007 Black List. Suddenly Spaihts was a big name and interviewing for all the big sci-fi assignments. That’s when he landed this job, rewriting “The Darkest Hour” for controversial director Timur Bekmambetov (Wanted). That in turn landed him a writing assignment for Disney’s “Children of Mars,” and of course, the biggest deal of his career so far, the Alien reimagining for Ridley Scott.
Writer: Jon Spaihts
Details: 118 pages (November 30th, 2008 draft)

When you look at the writers out there today, there really isn’t anyone who’s churning out consistently good sci-fi, which is probably why Spaihts (a name I couldn’t pronounce with a blaster to my head) surprised everyone by landing the Alien reboot. But is it that surprising? Roger definitely loved Shadow 19. And Passengers is one of those scripts it seems like everyone loves (except for one person, notably). So I decided to momentarily forego all this touchy-feely Sundance fare and finish up the Spaihts trifecta. Let’s get our hands dirty with a little sci-fi, shall we?

Rex Halley is an American entrepreneur trying to take advantage of Moscow’s new influx of wealth. Or, at least, Moscow’s new influx of wealth two years ago, when this script was written and people had wealth. Equal parts eager and naïve, the 27 year old Trump aspiree cracks the deal of a lifetime, making him a millionaire within seconds, only to have it sucked away when his company’s board of trustees, all Russian, unanimously vote to fire him. A few minutes later and he’s just as unemployed as the guy who stands in front of your local Jack In The Box.

In the meantime we meet Natalie, an American abroad looking for some fun, Vika, a waifish 16 year old Russian girl, Sean, a dorky American video game developer, Skyler, a dickhead lead singer for an American metal band, and Matvei, a “don’t fuck with me” Russian policeman as big as the horse he rides on. Each is experiencing Moscow in their own way, working in it, enjoying it, enduring it. None of them know each other yet, but they will.

Cause on that very night, small golden meteor type rocks start falling from the sky, crashing all over the city. Emerging from these meteors are alien beings called “Spooks.” Seemingly driven by light and energy, these evil E.T.s are nearly invisible except for the dense glow they give off when moving around. As everyone spills outside to see what this strange phenomena is all about, the phenomena starts ripping them to pieces. These “things” are made up of a bunch of small furiously rotating metallic shards. These shards are to a human being what a juicer is to an apple. And let’s just say that after that night, Moscow could supply enough apple juice to make sure Mott’s would never have to plant another apple tree again.

We slam forward a few weeks to see our heroes, who have found each other and are nestled up inside a makeshift bunker, jumpier than a trampoline full of kangaroos. The entire city is dead, 28 Days Later style. No electricity. No society. Not another soul in site. Their days have been relegated to scavenging for water. But most of the stores have been ransacked, and leaving the bunker is always risky. There are spooks around every corner. These guys are somewhere around Plan W. They’re running out of alphabet.

Luckily a beacon of light appears halfway across the city – a highrise with an entire floor lit up. The revelation confuses and excites them. Someone else is alive! But why are they broadcasting their location to the Spooks? Could it be a trap? They decide to take a chance and go to the building because…well, because what else are they going to do? The owner of the highrise is Sergei, a Russian Einstein who’s a whiz with electronics. He’s figured out that the Spooks don’t see like we do, so as long as you protect your place with lead lining, you can run as much electricity as you want and they won’t spot you. Sergei is the first sign of hope for this desperate group. Someone who sounds like they actually know what they’re doing.

But the party is short-lived. A greedy Skylar uses the opportunity to steal all of Sergei’s food. As he sneaks out the door, the knucklehead leaves it open. This alerts the Spooks to their location, and pretty soon the Spooks are upon them producing more Spook Meat. Hmm, I don’t know why but that sounded dirty in a weird way.

Anyway, only a few of members of the group survive, and now they’re worse off than they were to start. They’re stuck in the middle of the city with nowhere to hide. Will they live? Will they die? You’ll have to read to find out.

It’s funny. You can see Timur Bekmambetov’s influence on the material right away. I’m guessing this was originally set in an American city. But Timur moved it to Moscow, most likely because of familiarity. Even though that choice came from a selfish place, it actually ends up really helping the screenplay. We’ve seen the American-City-gets-invaded thing a billion times before. By throwing these Americans into Russia, making *them* the aliens to this country, it adds a whole new dynamic when the invasion hits. Anyone who’s been away from home when something bad happens knows how alienated you feel, how unfamiliar everything becomes, how desperately you pine for home. Watching Rex and Natalie and Sean and Skyler creep through this foreign land, it’s not just about coming out alive, it’s about getting back to where they belong.

I also really liked the aliens. While they weren’t perfect, they were at least original. They’re not bug like or reptile-like, the kind of aliens I see in 99% of the scripts I read. They’re a mix of light and energy and metal. And that weird combination inspires all sorts of questions. Why are they built that way? What are their needs? What are their intentions? It was a cool choice and one I thought worked well.

Unfortunately the final act takes a bit of a nose-dive. It makes that mistake of trying to do too much in too little time. How can you take down an alien race in 30 minutes when in the opening 90 pages you haven’t killed a single one? This results in a lot of rushing, a lot of warped logic (i.e. “Well if we do *this*, then they’ll go over there and then we can bomb all of them together!”), an entirely new location we have to learn about, new characters we have to file. In fact, the final act has so much going on that you could conceivably build an entirely new screenplay out of it.

But there’s easily enough stuff here to make it worth the read. It’s a fun script that tackles an age-old story from a slightly different angle

[ ] What the hell did I just read?
[ ] wasn’t for me
[x] worth the read
[ ] impressive
[ ] genius

What I learned: Spaiths does a perfect job describing his characters. Like any good writer, he has a hierarchy for his descriptions, cluing us in on which characters are here for the moment, which are here for a few scenes, and which will be key characters in the story. If I have a pet peeve, it’s writers who don’t have any system for describing their characters. For example, they’ll describe their main character with a single word: “cool.” Then describe a waitress in scene 48 who has one line as, “dripping with sex, the waitress wears a uniform that’s several inches too high. Her lips are naturally ruby red, and her eyes are caked in mascara. An exotic beauty.” I’m expecting that woman to be on every page of the screenplay! So be smart in how you describe your characters. If it’s a main character, give them 2 or 3 lines of description. A secondary character, 1 line of description. A minor character, a couple of descriptive adjectives is fine. And if it’s someone only making an appearance in that scene, simply give us their profession or describe them in their name (ie. “Waitress” or “Asshole Lawyer”). Let me give you an example of why this is important. Matvei, the horse policeman, appears early on in the script, but only for a moment. He won’t appear again for another 40 pages. However, since Spaihts took two full lines to describe him, I knew he was going to be a key character later on, so I paid attention. You don’t necessarily have to have *this* description hierarchy system, but you should have some system.

My pick: Avatar

While the idea to alter the “Best Picture” category to include 10 nominees was never met with universal praise, it was thought by some that it would at least make the race for the top Academy prize more interesting. That hope appears to have died now that we close in on the famous awards show. As the awards circuit receives more attention every year, the result is a well-publicized race that weeds the contenders down to a praised pair (in this case, Avatar vs. The Hurt Locker). In a field of five, this isn’t that big of an issue, as everyone can sort of pretend that the others have an “outside shot.” But when you expand the field to ten, it becomes glaringly obvious that 5 of the films have no shot at all. If you put films into a category where everyone knows they don’t even have a 1% chance of winning, then why include them in the first place? I guess the answer is that getting nominated *is* the Oscar for these films. And that we should celebrate them for their achievement today, but forget about them on Awards Night. As for my pick, I’m going with Avatar. It wasn’t my favorite movie of the year (that goes to District 9), but I think when you talk about the best FILM, you gotta go with the James Cameron goliath. It excels in so many areas of the filmmaking medium. So that’s where my money’s going. Which about you? Here are all the nominees.

Avatar
The Hurt Locker
The Blind Side
District 9
A Serious Man
Precious
Up In The Air
Inglorious Basterds
An Education
Up

My pick: Jason Rietman’s “Up In The Air.”

In the adapted screenplay category, I think this one’s pretty clear cut. Up In The Air has been getting a lot of publicity out of the Reitman/Turner credit-gate, and in a category that plays 8th fiddle to the brawnier Oscar categories, sometimes a little publicity is all you need to get people to vote for you. It’s a fine screenplay so I’m down with the choice, but I wish there was something with a little more oomph leading the way. Out of the nominees, the only other screenplay I read was “An Education,” and I didn’t like it. I loved the randomness and unpredictability of District 9, but I get the feeling the script is a bunch of incomprehensible notes scribbled in a notebook. I haven’t read or seen In The Loop so I can’t comment on it. And I think Precious is a little too heavy-handed to win the award. Here are the nominees…

Up In The Air by Jason Reitman
An Education by Nick Hornby
Precious by Geoffrey Fletcher
District 9 by Neill Blomkamp and Terri Tatchell
In The Loop by Armando Iannucci, Jesse Armstrong, Simon Blackwell, Ian Martin and Tony Roache

My pick: Quentin Tarantino’s “Inglorious Basterds.”

Finally, the big cajomma, or at least as far as the writing world is concerned. Best screenplay for a completely original work. To me, this is as done a deal as going to In and Out at least once a week. Quentin’s got the thing wrapped up. I still haven’t read or seen The Messenger, so I’m coming at this with a bit of ignorance, by I feel pretty confident about my choice. The reason you gotta give it to Quentin is that he takes so many chances in his work where no one else would even try. He’s the only writer I’m comfortable with writing a ten minute dialogue scene. His characters are always bursting with originality. I don’t always like his movies, but I’m always impressed with what he brings to the table. Inglorious Basterds may be the best script he’s ever written, so you have to give it the Oscar. As for the others, I couldn’t make it past 30 pages of A Serious Man. It’s just too scattershot and, quite honestly, wasn’t my thing. Up starts off wonderfully but becomes increasingly predictable as it goes on. And The Hurt Locker likewise starts off great, but gets lost for awhile in the second act in my opinion. But I mean, this category isn’t even a race, is it? The nominees…

The Hurt Locker by Mark Boal
Inglorious Basterds by Quentin Tarantino
The Messenger by Oren Moverman and Allesandro Camon
A Serious Man by The Coen Brothers
Up by Pete Docter, Bob Peterson and Thomas McCarthy

What about you? What are your picks?

I remember when I watched the pilot for this show. Someone slipped me an early screener. The promos hadn’t even started yet. It was before all the hype, before all the buzz. All I knew was that it sounded like a cool concept. A plane crashes on an island and there are survivors. In no way was I prepared for what I watched. It was easily the best pilot episode for any show I had ever seen.

Michael Eisner, then calling the shots for Disney/ABC, famously said about Lost, a show he viciously opposed greenlighting, “Who’s going to care? A bunch of people crash land on an island. Then what?” I’ll tell you what, Michael: Flashbacks. The risky structure of flashing back to the character’s previous lives, while simultaneously making every character on the island the protagonist, just wasn’t done. And if you’re going to put a show up against the best TV shows of all time, it has to have changed the game somehow. And there’s no question that Lost changed the game. I will never forget watching the third episode in the series, Walkabout, in which John Locke’s character was higlighted. To me, that’s the best hour of television I’ve ever seen.

Now I won’t pretend like the show didn’t get “lost” at times. The third season was…err…umm…interesting? But just when you thought the show didn’t have any more rabbits to pull out of its hat, it found its rhthym again and gave us some superb television. I don’t know if I’d call Lost the best show ever written. But everything considering, I’d say it’s somewhere in the conversation. Here we are on the eve of the final season, so I pose this question to you: Is Lost the best written TV show ever?

Script Link: Pilot episode

Genre: Drama/Love Story
Premise: A couple struggles to keep it together on the last leg of their marriage.
About: I know I said l was finished with Sundance script reviews but people kept pushing me to review more, so I’m pumping out a couple extra this week. Derek Cianfrance and his writing partners have been trying to make this movie for 12 years. Their hard work was rewarded when Ryan Gosling chose “Blue Valentine” over Peter Jackson’s “The Lovely Bones” (and left poor Jackson with the 3rd rate Mark Wahlberg in the process), new “serious actress fave” Michelle Williams joined him, and the Weinsteins bought the film at Sundance. While this may be a 2004 draft, from every review I’ve read of the film, it sounds almost identical to the shooting script.
Writers: Derek Cianfrance, Joey Curtis & Cami Delavigne
Details: 121 pages (2004 draft)

I know everyone loves Ryan Gosling, and I think he’s a fine actor, but I can’t say I’m a huge fan of the material he chooses. The double-dip combination of Half-Nelson and Lars And The Real Girl is about as enjoyable as sneaking into your local pizzeria and crawling into one of their ovens for the afternoon. I have a real issue with indie films that hit you over the head with their relentless depression for all 100 minutes of their running time, and I have a particular issue with actors who choose to only appear in these types of films. It’s as if they’re so desperate to be taken seriously, that they’re willing to sacrifice any semblance of a good story in the process. I mean, okay, you’ve moped, you’ve screamed, you’ve argued, you’ve cried…wonderful. Here’s your Oscar. But what about us? What about the people who actually want to sit down and ENJOY a film?? To me, Gosling is the poster child for that type of actor, and it’s why I don’t get excited for his projects anymore.

Blue Valentine is the third in his “slit your wrists” trilogy. Whether you love it or hate it, this is not the kind of script you enjoy. It is simply something you endure – a no holds barred look at a miserable couple trying to make it through their miserable existence. No film coming out of Sundance divided audiences more than this one. This Movieline review implies it’s one of the worst films ever made. Yet this Firstshowing review seems to say it’s one of the most authentic experiences the reviewer has ever had at a theater. Where do I come out on all this?

Well, I can’t comment on the finished film. But I can say that this draft was one of the most unpleasant reading experiences I’ve ever had in my life. I could get into the fact that there’s no real discernible story. I could talk about how the flashback device seems designed to distract us from that fact. I could get into how terribly unlikable the characters are. I could talk about how absolutely nothing happens for long stretches at a time. I could talk about how the same emotional note is hit over and over and over and over again. I could talk about the lack of character development, the stilted dialogue, how all the flashbacks could’ve been wrapped up in a single one minute scene. I could basically talk about how I had no idea what this script was about until one of the characters spelled it out for me on page 90.

BUT

The movie DID sell. The movie DID work for some people. So why?

One word. Emotion. If you’ve had a recent traumatic break-up where someone fell out of love with you, this script will hit you hard. I think the empty helpless crushing pain of being left is so powerful that it renders all of my above problems moot. It sounds like in Derek’s review on Firstshowing, that that’s exactly what happened. It was a very personal experience for him. And I get that. It’s the one thing I always say. The X-factor in your script is your subject matter. You never know who’s going to be into it, and who isn’t. But man, I mean, as a screenplay, I don’t think this works at all.

So what happens in Blue Valentine? Not a lot. But I’ll try and give you the Cliff’s Notes. David Periera is “35 years old and 35 pounds overweight.” His wife, Cindy, is beautiful. The two have a 5 year old daughter named Frankie. There seems to be an unhappiness in their relationship but we’re not told what that unhappiness stems from. The first 30 pages are basically different variations of giving us this same information.

It was this plodding approach to the story that first turned me off. I’m okay when things move slow if *something* is building. But from what I could gather, this wasn’t going to be that kind of experience. In fact, the focus appeared to be put on the most random things, characters or moments that added nothing to the screenplay. For instance we learn that Cindy had a bit of a strange family. But their introduction didn’t seem to have any point. We’d read a scene where one of the family members flipped out and then…that was it. That moment or the effects of that moment or the result of that moment never ever played into the screenplay at all. Which leaves you wondering…well then why show it in the first place?

Then there was the daughter, who also fell into this category. Why was she here? Whatever was wrong with these two had nothing to do with her (even when we reveal a “secret” about her later on, one that’s supposed to be shocking – it has no effect on the dynamic of their relationship). After a lot of passive-aggressive bickering and weird conversations between the two, David gets the idea that they should go on a weekend trip together. It’s clear Cindy doesn’t want to go but she does anyway.

Gosling at a Q&A, talking about the film, smiling more in one answer than he did the entire movie.

During their trip, we occasionally jump back six years to the period when they first met. David was the son of a logger who dreamed of bigger things. Cindy was hoping to be a doctor and was also engaged to a guy named Bobby. Somehow their paths collided, they fell in love, and they got married.

The flashback structure is supposed to be there to contrast their past with their present, not unlike a more depressing version of 500 Days Of Summer. Although as I mentioned before, nothing happens in the flashbacks that warrants them. For example, during one present-day sequence, Cindy runs into Bobby, her old fiancé, while she’s at the grocery store. They speak for a few minutes, and it’s clear Cindy and Bobby had a past together and that Bobby doesn’t like David. Cindy gets back to the car and tells David about the meeting. We can see he’s not a fan of Bobby’s. Right then we know all we need to know about Bobby and David. There was a past – the two probably fought over her – and David won out. Yet nearly 20 minutes worth of flashbacks are given to showing us this scenario, even though it’s exactly as we assumed it had been. I’m a big believer in that you don’t use flashbacks unless they add some critical piece of information or move the story forward in a way that you couldn’t in the present. And I just didn’t see that here.

Anyway….

From an objective point of view, this device of jumping from the beginning to the end of a relationship SEEMS like it could be interesting. But since the past holds so few surprises, it feels more like an obligation. You’re predicting every word five minutes before it comes out of the characters’ mouths. She’s going to yell at him here, you say. Sure enough, it’s a scene of her yelling at him. It’s as if we’re watching those fake animals at Chuck-E-Cheese’s exchange pre-recorded lines with each other. I guess that was my biggest problem with the script, is it was so predictable. I wanted more than two people who were unhappy with each other in 50 successive scenes.

And the characters. Oh the characters. You had David, who was nagging clingy jealous and annoying. And you had Cindy, who was cruel heartless bitchy whiny and a sociopath. Not to be flippant but who wants to spend their evening with two people like that?

There’s not much more I can say about this script. I’m trying to find some positives here but it’s like trying to find positives in a plane crash. I guess one thing it’s got going for it is I won’t forget it. They say the worst scripts/movies are ones you forget 2 minutes after you finish them. If it stays with you then it at least had an impact. Well, I can say with certainty that I will never forget Blue Valentine.

[x] What the hell did I just read?
[ ] wasn’t for me
[ ] worth the read
[ ] impressive
[ ] genius

What I learned: A couple of things here. A gimmick is not a substitution for a story. Jumping back and forth in time isn’t going to distract your reader from the fact that your characters aren’t growing, that the script only hits one note, that the goals are vague, that the focus is put on meaningless scenarios/scenes/characters. If you’re going to use a unique way of telling your story (like Blue Valentine, like Eternal Sunshine, like 500 Days of Summer, like Pulp Fiction), make sure you put just as much effort into your story as you would if you were telling the thing straight up. In addition to that, in my interview with Stacey Menear, he made a great point about how good movies hit multiple emotional notes. You’re scared, you’re happy, you’re sad, you’re angry. Blue Valentine hit the same note over and over and over again – sadness – just suffocating us with depression. Make sure your script hits multiple emotional notes, WHATEVER the genre is!

Mike Le over at Geekweek gives his take on the twenty greatest movies about writers!