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An entire thread has been posted a year or two ago concerning the late Page Cook, his values and demerits as a booster/critic of film music, and his tenuous relationship with reality, so I've nothing much to add here. Just one tiny detail, no pun intended: The novel THE LAST DETAIL was written not by Towne but by Darryl Ponicsan. As an aside, it's been very gratifying that so many of you have had so much information to contribute to this thread, whose topic concerns one of my favorite films and scores. One never knows how many people will actually accept an invitation to one of these open house parties, and sometimes you have to throw out a lot of left-overs the next morning. But at the rate this thread is going, it's almost dawn, and I've just had to phone out for some more pizza and a few six-packs. So, keep it up, folks, I'm glad you're all enjoying yourselves. Just try not to step on my cat, is all I ask. Thanks.
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I've met Field, and liked him. His "method" shouldn't be looked at as a set-in-stone approach, but as a loose guide to keep one focussed on making sure that the story one's trying to tell has a workable structure. I did study with McKee and really loathed him. What a load of crap that arrogant S.O.B. peddles. Do we suppose that Billy Wilder or Preston Sturges sat around thinking "let's see, act one has to end by such and such a page, and act three must have these ingredients to make act one payoff, and we need this backstory here, or this character needs this arc or journey here"? I think they just wrote good scripts the way they wanted to write them. I doubt the words "act" "journey" "arc" or "backstory" were used much. And I think Mr. McKee and Mr. Field have done more to harm the film industry than they are given credit for. Executives are now expected to take their classes, which is why you have them spouting all this bullshit in meetings. And it's why every film feels the same (in whatever genre) and it's why the movie business is basically finished, at least in terms of creative writing. Which brings us back to Chinatown - can you imagine that film being made today? Couldn't happen - it would have flashbacks to Jake's past so we could "see" where his problems came from, every scene would be scored with thumping hideous music, and every door closing would sound like the end of the world, and every flashbulb going off would sound like a nuclear explosion, and every camera pan would speed up and be accompanied by a whoosh that sound like Hurricane Katrina - well, you get the point.
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Well put, Mr. Ki--, I mean Haines. I couldn't agree more (and I'm not just saying that as a bitter has-been screenwriter).
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Which brings us back to Chinatown - can you imagine that film being made today? Couldn't happen - it would have flashbacks to Jake's past so we could "see" where his problems came from, every scene would be scored with thumping hideous music, and every door closing would sound like the end of the world, and every flashbulb going off would sound like a nuclear explosion, and every camera pan would speed up and be accompanied by a whoosh that sound like Hurricane Katrina - well, you get the point. This is likely true if it was made today by studio hacks...but it would have been equally terrible (just differently so) if it was made by '70s hacks. There are a lot of movies made nowadays that have a more literate nature -- like Capote, which I thought was excellent. True, the good movies nowadays are typically made outside studio financing, but there are good movies and bad movies in any era. Maybe I'll now get an earful about how Capote was terrible, in which case excuse the example. Perhaps the argument is that genre movies today are terrible, whereas they used to be more intelligent, which also might be true. What can you do? I'm mainly playing devil's advocate. I think the best thing was said by a college professor of mine, when I pointed out in film theory class many of the arguments listed above, and specifically that contemporary movies have too many closeups because the audience is accustomed to TV. The professor said, "That may be true, but I try not to beat up on historical change." Thanks, Prof. Cameron! Also notably, he said it without being angry, which I think a lot of people could learn from. In my experience, the anger stems from a personal frustration about not being acknowledged or appreciated for our tastes (to say nothing of being appreciated for our work or our lives). For the record, I read McKee's "Story" avidly, I found it accurate and fascinating, and helpful in thinking about movies. I don't walk around with it tucked under my arm, or think the guy's a god -- he sounds like a jerk -- but I thought it was a great book. Finally, keep in mind that I should be the most bitter of anyone, because I've spent my adult life as a professional film music fan...but I'm really trying not to be. Bitter, that is. It's a waste of energy. Lukas
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Do we suppose that Billy Wilder or Preston Sturges sat around thinking "let's see, act one has to end by such and such a page, and act three must have these ingredients to make act one payoff, and we need this backstory here, or this character needs this arc or journey here"? That's like saying Mozart and Beethoven never bothered to construct their music with a beginning, middle and end, they just did it. There is no difference bewteen writing a screenplay and a symphony from a creative standpoint. Both require structure and discipline. If you think that Billy Wilder and his various writing partners (Charles Brackett, or Raymond Chandler, or I.A.L. Diamond, or Lesser Samuels, or Harry Kurnitz, etc.) just sat around and spitballed the scripts to SUNSET BOULEVARD, FIVE GRAVES TO CAIRO, DOUBLE INDEMINTY, THE LOST WEEKEND, ACE IN THE HOLE, THE PRIVATE LIFE OF SHERLOCK HOLMES, etc.), you're deluding youself, like so many folks who watch a movie on TV and think to themselves, "Hey, I can do that!" They sit down, write 120 pages of illiterate, undramatic junk and prove, once again, no, they can't do that. Talent may comprise the top 95% of writing a good screenplay, but the other 5% is discipline and knowledge of how these things are all put together. As I said, Field's method is infinitely flexible; its chielf value is in its just reminding writers that you can't wing it: like putting up a building, the nuts, bolts, joists and I-beams all have to be designed beforehand with the knowledge and intention of knowing how they're going to fit together. You can't, and don't, just make it up as you go along.
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As always, Mr. Hearn, you completely misunderstand my point. I'm too bored to explain it to you - a simple reading of my post will, however, clue you in - or not. Of course Mr. Wilder understood structure, as did Mr. Sturges. What they didn't do, Mr. Hearn, is have the ignorant babble phrases and rules about where acts fall, what journeys and arcs - oh, why am I bothering. My point was obvious but you just see what you want to see, just like misinterpreting Lukas' earlier post to bolster YOUR point.
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As always, Mr. Hearn, you completely misunderstand my point. I'm too bored to explain it to you - a simple reading of my post will, however, clue you in - or not. Of course Mr. Wilder understood structure, as did Mr. Sturges. What they didn't do, Mr. Hearn, is have the ignorant babble phrases and rules about where acts fall, what journeys and arcs - oh, why am I bothering. My point was obvious but you just see what you want to see, just like misinterpreting Lukas' earlier post to bolster YOUR point. If you're so smart, why do you argue with him? Is it a hobby? I guess I'm one to talk, here I am at 1:20AM... lk
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I agree with Lukas that there are excellent films being made today, certainly CAPOTE being one of them. GODS AND MONSTERS is another film from just a few years ago that I found exceptional. Perhaps the distant past looks better to us because only the great films last, whereas a lot of the drek joins that vast river of unremembered sludge that we surf past on the cable channels. It's also worth mentioning that Robert Benton, the screenwriter of CHINATOWN, wanted a happy ending in which Evelyn survived. He was talked out of it, fortunately, but it demonstrates the extent to which films are dependent on collaboration and, to a degree, dumb luck.
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While I enjoyed Capote and Gods and Monsters, for me they are not classics that I'll ever need to revisit, whereas Chinatown is a film I watch two or three times a year (same with Mr. Polanski's film of Rosemary's Baby). Also, Mr. Benton, a fine writer, didn't write Chinatown - Robert Towne did - and you're correct, he wanted Evelyn to live - not exactly a "happy ending" but at least an ending with hope. Polanski saw it differently (one doesn't have to be a brain surgeon to understand why) and, in the end, after many years, Towne now agrees.
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If you're so smart, why do you argue with him? Is it a hobby? I guess I'm one to talk, here I am at 1:20AM... lk That's a question. I suppose it IS something of a hobby, and I don't feel people like Mr. Hearn should just post stuff without response - of course, some might say he lives for the response. I get very amusing e-mails from people who are quite happy that I take the time to respond in my fashion, so someone's enjoying it.
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I believe that in Towne's version, Evelyn kills her father and goes to prison for the crime, keeping the reason for the murder a secret as Katharine is spirited away to Mexico; not precisely a happy ending, but not as tragic as the Polanski version. To me, one of the things that makes Chinatown such a classic is its tragic inevitability; few films really pull that off (I'd add the first two Godfathers and, oddly enough, Carrie -- I remember reading a Jay Alan Quantrill review of Carrie 30 years ago which talked about its "Shakespearean" quality, and I think that's what he meant -- that the characters and situation of Carrie lead logically and inexorably to a tragic conclusion). Some recent movies like House of Sand and Fog, Mystic River and 21 Grams try something similar and, for me, don't really pull it off -- partly because the downbeat endings seem contrived rather than inevitable, with characters behaving stupidly or illogically rather than following their inherent natures to an unhappy conclusion. I though the recent The King made an interesting stab at it, but it's strangely structured -- it's as if Oedipus Rex ended right before Oedipus discovered that he'd killed his father and married his mother (and I write this as one who has never actually read Oedipus). And Lukas, I'm glad to learn you're such a big Capote fan; I was especially impressed by the screenplay (by, of all people, actor Dan Futterman). The "exacerbated" scene, between Capote and Perry, was an especially superb piece of writing. "Perry, I know what 'exacerbate' means. There is not a word or a sentence or a concept that you can illuminate for me".
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As always, Mr. Hearn, you completely misunderstand my point. I'm too bored to explain it to you - a simple reading of my post will, however, clue you in - or not. Of course Mr. Wilder understood structure, as did Mr. Sturges. What they didn't do, Mr. Hearn, is have the ignorant babble phrases and rules about where acts fall, what journeys and arcs - oh, why am I bothering. My point was obvious but you just see what you want to see, just like misinterpreting Lukas' earlier post to bolster YOUR point. But, of necessity, acts inevitably do fall someplace, and a story told properly does have an arc. By saying that screenwriting is arbitrary, and there are no rules, you betray your own contrarian ignorance (not that there was any doubt of that, anyway).
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As always, Mr. Hearn, you completely misunderstand my point. I'm too bored to explain it to you - a simple reading of my post will, however, clue you in - or not. Of course Mr. Wilder understood structure, as did Mr. Sturges. What they didn't do, Mr. Hearn, is have the ignorant babble phrases and rules about where acts fall, what journeys and arcs - oh, why am I bothering. My point was obvious but you just see what you want to see, just like misinterpreting Lukas' earlier post to bolster YOUR point. But, of necessity, acts inevitably do fall someplace, and a story told properly does have an arc. By saying that screenwriting is arbitrary, and there are no rules, you betray your own contrarian ignorance (not that there was any doubt of that, anyway). I think what we have here are two people who are so mad at each other, the argument is secondary. It's amazing, and annoying, because the argument is at cross-purposes: Bruce says that you can't just boil screenwriting down to simple rules and terminology and expect it to create good writers (true), whereas Avie says that those rules are grounded in fact about good screenwriting (also true). Nobody is even listening. lk
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While I enjoyed Capote and Gods and Monsters, for me they are not classics that I'll ever need to revisit, whereas Chinatown is a film I watch two or three times a year (same with Mr. Polanski's film of Rosemary's Baby). Also, Mr. Benton, a fine writer, didn't write Chinatown - Robert Towne did - and you're correct, he wanted Evelyn to live - not exactly a "happy ending" but at least an ending with hope. Polanski saw it differently (one doesn't have to be a brain surgeon to understand why) and, in the end, after many years, Towne now agrees. Yikes! My apologies to Robert Towne for the thoughtless error. I'm wondering though, Haines, whether there have been any films in the last few years that you would regard as "instant classics". I didn't intend to imply that I thought either CAPOTE or GODS AND MONSTERS are on the same level as CHINATOWN. The truth is, I probably won't know whether they're true classics until time has passed and I've seen them over again a few more times. I'm just impressed by the quality of storytelling and the integrity of vision these films demonstrate. I'd be very interested to know whether there are recent films you admire. I may have missed something good!
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Uh, canapes, anyone?
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I have no anger whatsoever towards Mr. Hearn. It takes a lot to make me have anger and certainly a lot more than Mr. Hearn can heave my way. He simply refuses to understand the simple point of what I say and he instead makes the argument pedantic. I don't know from pedantic, frankly. As to films of recent vintage that I do think are instant classics - no American films come to mind, but several French films do, especially some by Patrice Leconte, who I really admire. And there's this little French movie called L'Appartement from the late nineties that I'm REALLY fond of - it was, of course, immediately purchased by a major studio, who promptly refused to let it be shown in this country or released on video or DVD in this country. Instead, they did their ususal inane and crass and totally pointless remake and in the process changed everything that worked about the original. And therefore, I rest my case, because what they did was strictly adhere to the BS of the Two Stooges. The original is very clever indeed, with terrific performances and interesting direction. The remake, BTW, was entitled Wicker Park and it's one of the worst movies I've ever seen.
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Uh, canapes, anyone? Paul Newman in The Prize: "Just because I didn't eat any of your damn canapes..." (as he's about to be thrown off a bridge by someone who was posing as a waiter who was serving canapes). Dialogue courtesy of Ernest Lehman.
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