So You Think You’ve Got a Film-Worthy Book or Script. Wicked Witch of Publishing Sees 10 Films and 20+ Shorts at the Hamptons International Film Festival and Begs to Differ.
I know that every book and every screenplay exists because of an heroic and obsessive act of creativity. However, after spending four days last week turnstiling into and out of and back into the United Artists 6-Plex in East Hampton for the 15th Hamptons
International Film Festival, I was scratching my head, wondering if a few of the filmmakers hadn’t wasted their time and everyone else’s.
Who in the world pulled Starting Out in the Evening from the bookshelf and deemed it worthy of a film? Did anyone take the time to get past the hype in Customer Reviews on Amazon and read some of the less than laudatory comments about Starting Out? “Not much happens.” “Brian Morton does not really tie up anything with his endings.” “…some of the individuals in the book seem put together in a piecemeal way.” “This book sat on my bookshelf for nearly five years….” (And perhaps, I might add, should have stayed there!)
And what depths of originality did the screenwriters plumb to come up with Rails & Ties, Four Minutes and AmericanEast?
Can’t Scriptwriters Find a Book or Write a Script that’s Not a Copycat!
Since the Martians have already landed on earth and appeared in many stories, I can’t expect a completely unique storyline divorced from any film I’ve ever seen about Martians. (Those eyes! Those eyes!) But I can hope to find a plot that isn’t simply a near-duplicate of an already oft-told story in one of the pre-fab story structures. Don’t I have a right to expect a few surprises, some unique twists and turns, some crackling dialogue that I can’t predict? I know fresh approaches to standard plots are out there. Indeed, I had three cross my path over this summer at www.thepublishingcontrarian.com/getpublished.
Yes, I expect Russell Crowe, the reprehensible, but charismatic bad guy in the movie 3:10 to Yuma, to do his best not to make that train and I can predict that the story may or may not end well for a lot of the characters who face the business end of Crowe’s six shooters. But it’s what happens en route that keeps me “in” for the full-bag-of-popcorn. I zone out when the movie becomes laughably predictable and filled with hackneyed dialogue. And I wonder, as did other grumbling nouveau cinema critiques as they left the United Artists Theater in East Hampton, New York, or stood in line at Starbuck’s across Main Street, what in the world people were thinking when they agreed to pour time and money and prayer into some of the rehashes I saw?
Obviously, I didn’t see all 103 movies offered at the Festival. I’m sure there were some terrific feature films. (D’Arcy, please give me another free pass next year!) But with the exception of the documentaries, I just can’t say every one I saw was terrific.
Here are a few of the feature films I did see. Don’t you agree that you have seen these films before? Deja view all over again!
Movie #1 — Starting Out in the Evening, an adaptation of Brian Morton’s book, starring Frank Langella.
Geezer author. Young thesis-writing student. Seduction. Geezer’s daughter, a biological-clock-ticking pilates instructor and her child-resistant lover subplot. So boring. So predictable. The audience scoffed throughout the film. (Did I really see Langella naked? Shield my eyes, please.)
Movie #2: Rails & Ties, an original screen play by Micky Levy, starring Kevin Bacon and Marcia Gay Harden.
Childless couple with regrets. Wife cancer riddled. Orphaned child. Emotionally distant husband who accidently killed the mother. Child blames himself and winds up with… You guessed it, as did the audience. (And I’m crazy about Kevin Bacon.)
Movie #3. AmericanEast, original screenplay by Hesham Issawi.
Widowed Egyptian immigrant owns a struggling restaurant. The FBI. Tweeny son who doesn’t want to be a Muslim. Belligerent Egyptian customer in his 20’s. Egyptian actor limited to playing terrorists. Daughter with an arranged marriage. Jew doing business with the immigrant. A “can’t we all just get along” film with good intentions, but very stereotypical characters in stereotypical situations speaking stereotypically .
Movie #4. Four Minutes, original screenplay (a German film so I’m not 100% sure) by Chris Raus.
A prison. A young murderer with musical talent and a nasty attitude. A lesbian piano teacher. A threatening fellow inmate. A musical competition in which “four minutes” will turn around the future of the murderer if she wins. The young murderer was so over-the-top and such an awful human being, I wanted to jump into the film and break her fingers before a fellow inmate got to do it. Yawn, yawn, yawn.
If I hadn’t had my free pass to these movies and had to pay $35, $12, $12, and $12, respectively, to spend about eight hours of my time (when I could have been reading a good book!), I’d be demanding my money back.
Yet, the documentaries were stellar films.
Who would have thought? Outstanding! That’s how I would describe them. Which is why I take my chances at The Hamptons International Film Festival, and don’t worry about what I am going to see. This hit or miss approach really paid off when it came to the documentaries.
#1. Soldiers of Conscience, directors/producers/ screenwriters Catherine Ryan, Gary Weimberg.
A really important film. I didn’t particularly want to see it, but stumbled in. I don’t want to ruin it for you by saying anything more about it. See it. It’s even-handed. It’s surprising.
#2. Steal a Pencil for Me, based on the autobiography Steal a Pencil for Me: Love Letters from Bergen-Belsen and Westerbork. (Three copies left on Amazon.com, selling for $40!)
East Hampton is a hugely Jewish town, so it was SRO for this devastating film about a young, unhappily married Dutchman and a single young woman who find themselves having a love affair in a concentration camp. Lots of tears in the audience. And surprise! Ninety-four-year-old Jaap Polak and his wife, Ina Soep, survivors married lo these many years, answered questions from the audience at the end of the film. Fabulous. Every child around the world should see this film, as should Mahmoud Ahmadinejad.
#3. Resolved, director/screenwriter/producer Greg Whiteley.
I was stunned by my ignorance about how competitive debates actually unfold. This film gives new meaning to “fast talking.” Even though I could barely understand a word the debaters said, the tension evoked by this film as real students (including the only two students who made it from a public school into the finals) battle it out, is tres exciting. Very worth seeing.
#4. Please Vote for Me, director Wijun Chen, in Mandarin with subtitles.
Three seven-year-olds wage a no-holds-barred democratic election in which one of them will become class monitor. The audience laughed out loud at the shocking depths to which the kids (and their parents) would sink to win votes. If the kids could have promised lemonade in the water coolers, they would have! Please Vote for Me ran on PBS this week, but I got to see it first!
#5. Youth Media Program, various artists under 21 from around the world.
Twenty + films, 1:09 minutes to 21:54 minutes. Touching, innocent, brave, amazing.
Note from the Wicked Witch of Publishing ™: By the way, last year’s festival featured a documentary about Robert “Bob” Bechtel, called The Killer Within. It will be on The Discovery Channel next week. Don’t miss it. See my review in last year’s posting about the Hamptons International Film Festival.
October 24th, 2007 at 11:47 pm
What I saw sucked–except one.
October 25th, 2007 at 8:44 am
Welcome back, again.
I too am amazed at the lack of imagination and surprise in movies.
Here’s a potential publishing coup, if you do translations-
From The International Herald Tribune:
http://www.iht.com/articles/2007/10/22/europe/politicus.php
October 25th, 2007 at 9:05 am
Welcome back Lynne. So glad you’ve taken the “Gone Fishin’” sign down! We’ve missed you and your clever, incisive blogging. I laughed out loud at your bite-sized synopses of movies based on books. (You could create a very successful Charades-like game where people guess the film from your hilarious descriptions. I’d like to see what you’d do with Gone With The Wind, Seven Brides for Seven Brothers, The Godfather, etc..)
I definitely won’t be reading the novels, or seeing the films you noted in the first half of your critique. But I’m definitely interested in seeing the documentaries you noted, thanks to your glowing and enthusiastic reviews! Thanks for a great report from The Hamptons International Film Festival. (Next stop Cannes?)
October 25th, 2007 at 9:12 am
She’s baaaaaaaccccccckkkkkk….
October 25th, 2007 at 9:31 am
I wouldn’t go to the HIFF if they paid me.
To sit with pretentious pseudo-aesthetes, who think it is cool to smell like a Turkish brothel while watching films that are conceived by intellectual dwarfs, is not my cup of guava jelly. Most of the audience are people in psychiatric therapy with proctologists.
Welcome back Wicked Witch!
Note from the Wicked Witch of Publishing ™: Yikes, you can bet D’Arcy Drollinger isn’t going to give YOU a free pass ever!
October 25th, 2007 at 9:35 am
The feature films bear out why I’ve disconnected my television and don’t go to the movie theater any more. It’s comforting to know, however, that documentaries are as alive–if not more so–than ever.
I checked the trailer for “Soldiers of Conscience” and it appears exactly as you say–it’s at the top of my list. The others look impressive as well.
October 25th, 2007 at 10:30 am
Nice reviews, Witch.
(Curmudgeon, I love you.)
Note from the Wicked Witch of Publishing ™: That comment will make
Curmudgeon’s day!!!
October 25th, 2007 at 2:41 pm
My wise father used to say that all movies are 15 minutes too long. As he got older, he changed that to an hour. The older I get, the more I think he was right. Perhaps these movies the Publishing Contrarian saw could have had better editing, with 15 minutes (or an hour) cut out? The one movie I saw at the festival was way too long.
Glad to see you back!
October 26th, 2007 at 7:49 am
Seems to me you need an off-trail film (no, not the usual techno-gay off trail film) to spur interest.
Right now, I’ll bet a hundred fuzzy-eared monkeys are making a drama of the California fires, but where is the definitive feature-length movie on Katrina?
Ah well, I wishe I’d titled one of my books The Fire In Los Angeles County istead of The Fire in Bradford, wich was finally published by Ricci’s Sports Bar in Newmarket, Otario. Hell, I drank there. Best the owner could do is become my publisher. We sold a whacking 1200 copies.
October 26th, 2007 at 10:56 am
Great stuff. Thanks for putting me on your list.
Josh Getland/LA Times
Note from the Wicked Witch of Publishing ™: Thanks for dropping by, Josh, and leaving a comment. I live for comments!
October 27th, 2007 at 6:25 am
Lynne,
You’re amazing to write all these reviews. There were a lot of gloomy films, that we stayed away from.
Glad you got the press pass.
October 27th, 2007 at 5:24 pm
Welcome back. Most commercial fims and books are so derivative because the editors and executives make their decisions by extrapolating from past successes. And writers who want to make a big score consciously manufacture their screenplays under the same assumption and the need to be able to describe and sell it in a two-sentence high concept pitch. As the late author and radio broadcaster Mike Hodel (his “Enter the Lion’ is a great Sherlock Holmes novel) said: “In Hollywood, everyone want to be first to be second.”
October 27th, 2007 at 7:52 pm
Doris Lessing?
I’m reading Greg Bear’s “Darwin’s Radio.” Fascinating.
Liked “1776″ by McCulloch a lot.
Been rejected by any good agents lately? Your manuscript, I hasten to add.
Glad everything’s copacetic in the Hamps.
Note from the Wicked Witch of Publishing ™: Too funny, Dave. For some reason I am completely unmoved by Doris Lessing’s death. I’m busy reading The Upper Class, a novel by Hobson Brown, Taylor Materne & Caroline Says. It’s a Harper Teen imprint about a “boarding school for society’s elite, overachievers, and rich screwups.”
October 29th, 2007 at 5:25 pm
Yeah, I’ve seen one movie in a theater in the past year (Stardust, incidentally). That is unless you count the ones that I was paid to see as a reviewer, and those had me rolling my eyes. It has not been a good year.
Although if you want to talk book adaptations, the only one within living memory that I’ve liked was The Devil Wears Prada, which was a terrible freaking book. As was The Shining, another excellent movie, and The Graduate. Maybe screenwriters just need to stop reading good books.
October 29th, 2007 at 5:59 pm
I applaud the wicked wit of the wicked witch!
Welcome back and thanks for relieving me of any residual guilt about not making much effort to attend the Festival this year. However, in the light of your more favorable comments I can still feel guilty about missing some of the documentaries.
For The Curmudgeon: I’m curious - what does a Turkish brothel smells like? Personally, I’m unlikely to find out any time soon.
Note from the Wicked Witch of Publishing ™: Maralyn (spelled correctly!) is the former director of The East Hampton Historical Society.
October 30th, 2007 at 10:02 am
I’ve just noticed that the following blogs have linked up to this posting:
Frank Wilson of The Philadelphia Inquirer
Michael Allen of Grumpy Old Bookman
Jacketflap
Chattanooga Writers Guild
S. T. VanAirsdale of The Reeler
October 30th, 2007 at 11:23 am
The Wellington Leg International Film Festival was a disappointment this year. The categories Dead Italians and Spaghetti Westerns led to some culinary documentaries capturing the coveted Greased Palm. PUTNEY SWOPE took the prize of the thirty fifth consecutive year.
At least the family sized box of Junior Mints were on sale. It took the sting out of “Robert Redford Lookalike Night.”
October 30th, 2007 at 5:42 pm
Lynne, alias Wicked Witch,
Welcome back just in time for your big night! You’ve been missed — though apparently not by Hamptoners, Hamptonians…Hamptoneezers?
I’m with both Bridget and Maralyn on kudos. While the “lice” of bad scripts leading to bad movies is always a cause (truly less than celebre!) for head-scratching, it’s once again refreshing to see the documentary crowd standing head and shoulders above, unafraid to take a risk, unconcerned with profitability or celebrity, making movies with a purpose.
At the risk of sounding self-serving, may I recommend for your reading pleasure “Next Stop Hollywood: Short Stories Bound for the Screen” (edited by Steve Cohen)? We (the contributors) would love to see one or two of our efforts realized in moving pictures, even (or maybe especially) if those pictures are the product of some outfit without much money, but with a lot of heart, brains and conscience.
Note from the Wicked Witch of Publishing ™: You can read some of Russell’s poetry at Showcase@LaurelHird.com.
October 30th, 2007 at 8:15 pm
Excuse me. Doris Lessing dead? I think not, my dear, leaving you unmoved. What you perhaps thought was the hooha surrounding a literary giant’s obit was merely the hooha surrounding a writer getting the Nobel, Nell.
Or do you have inside information unavailable to us mortals? Is “Doris Lessing” a pseudonym of Joyce Carol Oates — used because nobody’d believe she can write even more stuff?
Note from the Wicked Witch of Publishing ™: How come you are the only one who noticed that dumb error? I just don’t read her. Never have. (Sorry, Ms. Lessing.) As to Joyce Carol Oats? Hey, I like her fiction even though something terribly disturbing always takes place. I still haven’t recovered from Them, the first novel I ever read that was written by her. I felt terrible about her death.
October 31st, 2007 at 7:53 pm
You’re impossible. Joyce lives, of course.
November 4th, 2007 at 6:21 pm
For Maralyn: a Turkish brothel smells like patchouli oil, the noxious aroma of the sixties used to mask the body odor of people who smelled like moldy cruciferous plants.
November 4th, 2007 at 6:37 pm
And soon we’ll be able to see Stephen King’s 25 year old creativity in “The Mist”. It was a great novella with an ambiguous ending… no, wait, it didn’t have an ending. I wonder what King will do with that in the movie?
I agree, Lynne, we could all be reading a good book… um, after reading your blog, of course.
November 5th, 2007 at 9:00 am
For The Curmudgeon. Thanks. I guessed patchouli. (a la many NYC taxicabs), but never in a million years could I have come up with “moldy cruciferous plants”!
November 5th, 2007 at 10:39 am
I agree with what you said at the beginning of your post.
As a ghostwriter, I am inundated with queries in which people tell me that they are positive that their books will be made into a movie. Jung’s collective unconscious has told them so, or so they say.
Unbelievable!
November 10th, 2007 at 5:35 am
The day that the film industry puts interest before money will probably be the day that The Curmudgeon marries me.
I would imagine that all writers toy with a vision of their masterpiece in celluloid. I did, I do, seems to part of the process.
Thanks for the Amazon review, WW, it meant a lot.
Note from the Wicked Witch of Publishing: Kate Bousfield lives in Cornwall, England. She has a terrific blog called The Inner Minx.
November 24th, 2007 at 2:08 pm
November 23rd… A. O. Scott of The New York Times gives “Starting Out in the Evening” with Frank Langella a rave review in Scott’s article “A Scholarly May and a Literary December Meet in a New York Autumn.”
Did he sit alone in a theater? Did he not hear the scoffing of other theater-goers as I did? He calls the romance between Langella’s character and Lauren Ambrose’s “one of the most delicate and peculiar romances recently depicted on film.” Scott’s seen one too many films without a helmet.