USC Libraries Name Finalists for 30th-Annual Scripter Awards
LOS ANGELES--(BUSINESS WIRE)--The USC Libraries have named the finalists for the 30th-annual USC Libraries Scripter Award. In this particularly competitive year, voting resulted in ties for the film and television categories.
USC Libraries release finalists for the 30th-annual Scripter Awards, honoring the best adapted film and TV show.
Due to a three-way tie in the nomination round, the writers of seven films and the works on which the films are based will compete for the honors this year. The finalist writers for film adaptation are, in alphabetical order by film title:
--Author André Aciman and screenwriter James Ivory for “Call Me By Your Name”
--Screenwriters Scott Neustadter and Michael H. Weber for “The Disaster Artist,” and authors Greg Sestero and Tom Bissell for their nonfiction book “The Disaster Artist: My Life Inside ‘The Room,’ the Greatest Bad Movie Ever Made”
--Screenwriters Scott Frank, Michael Green, and James Mangold, and authors Roy Thomas, Len Wein, and John Romita, Sr., for “Logan”
- Screenwriter James Gray and author David Grann for “The Lost City of Z”
--Screenwriter Aaron Sorkin and author Molly Bloom for “Molly’s Game”
--Screenwriters Dee Rees and Virgil Williams and author Hillary Jordan for “Mudbound”
--Screenwriter Allan Heinberg and author William Moulton Marston for “Wonder Woman”
Writers of six television shows and their printed source material will vie for the Scripter Award this year. The finalist writers—including for the first time a single author with nominations for two series in a single year—for television are, in alphabetical order by series title:
--Screenwriter Sarah Polley and author Margaret Atwood for “Alias Grace”
--David E. Kelley, for the episode “You Get What You Need” from “Big Little Lies,” and author Liane Moriarty
--Noah Pink and Ken Biller for the episode “Einstein: Chapter One” from “Genius,” and author Walter Isaacson for his book “Einstein: His Life and Word”
--Bruce Miller for the episode “Offred” from “The Handmaid’s Tale” and author Margaret Atwood
--Peter Landesman, George C. Wolfe, and Alexander Woo for the television film “The Immortal Life of Henrietta Lacks,” and author Rebecca Skloot
--Joe Penhall and Jennifer Haley for “Episode 10” of “Mindhunter” and authors John Douglas and Mark Olshaker for their nonfiction book “Mindhunter: Inside the FBI’s Elite Serial Crime Unit”
Chaired by USC professor and past president of the Writers Guild of America, West, Howard Rodman, the 2018 Scripter selection committee selected the finalists from a field of 91 film and 28 television adaptations.
Serving on the selection committee, among many others, are film critics Leonard Maltin, Anne Thompson and Kenneth Turan; authors Lisa Belkin, Michael Chabon and Michael Ondaatje; screenwriters Geoffrey Fletcher and Erin Cressida Wilson; producers Suzanne Todd and Mike Medavoy; and USC deans Elizabeth Daley of the School of Cinematic Arts and Catherine Quinlan of the USC Libraries.
The studios distributing the finalist films and current publishers of the printed works are:
“Call Me By Your Name”—Sony Pictures Classics and Picador
“The Disaster Artist”—A24 and Simon & Schuster
“Logan”—20th Century Fox and Marvel Comics
“The Lost City of Z”—Amazon Studios and Simon & Schuster
“Molly’s Game”—STX Entertainment and Dey Street Books
“Mudbound”—Netflix and Algonquin Books
“Wonder Woman”—Warner Bros. and DC Comics
The networks airing the finalist television series and current publishers of the original printed works are:
“Alias Grace”—Netflix and Anchor
“Big Little Lies”—HBO and Berkley
“Genius”—National Geographic and Simon & Schuster
“The Handmaid’s Tale”—Hulu and Anchor
“The Immortal Life of Henrietta Lacks”— HBO and Broadway Books
“Mindhunter”—Netflix and Gallery Books
The USC Libraries will announce the winning authors and screenwriters at a black-tie ceremony on Saturday, Feb. 10, 2018 in the historic Edward L. Doheny Jr. Memorial Library on the University Park campus of the University of Southern California. Since 1988, Scripter has honored the authors of printed works alongside the screenwriters who adapt their stories. In 2016, the USC Libraries inaugurated a new Scripter award, for television adaptation. Television and film finalists compete in separate categories.
For more information about Scripter—including ticket availability, additional sponsorship opportunities, and an up-to-date list of sponsors—please email scripter@usc.edu or visit scripter.usc.edu.
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Showing posts with label James Mangold. Show all posts
Showing posts with label James Mangold. Show all posts
Friday, January 19, 2018
Wednesday, August 21, 2013
Review: "3:10 to Yuma" Remake a Superb Modern Western
3:10 to Yuma (2007)
Running time: 122 minutes (2 hours, 2 minutes)
MPAA – R for violence and some language
DIRECTOR: James Mangold
WRITERS: Halsted Welles and Michael Brandt & Derek Haas (based on the short story by Elmore Leonard)
PRODUCERS: Cathy Konrad
CINEMATOGRAPHER: Phedon Papamichael (D.o.P.)
EDITOR: Michael McCusker
COMPOSER: Marco Beltrami
Academy Award nominee
WESTERN/ACTION/THRILLER
Starring: Russell Crowe, Christian Bale, Logan Lerman, Dallas Roberts, Ben Foster, Peter Fonda, Vinessa Shaw, Alan Tudyk, Luce Rains, Gretchen Mol, and Ben Petry
Director James Mangold’s rousing, edgy Western, 3:10 to Yuma, is a remake of a 1957 film of the same name that starred Glenn Ford and Van Heflin. Mangold (Walk the Line) isn’t robbing the grave of Hollywood classics; instead, he has fashioned the Western as a modern, suspense-thriller that is as close to an old-fashioned horse opera as a modern film can be. Both the first film and Mangold’s remake are based on the short story, “Three-Ten to Yuma,” written by Elmore Leonard and first published in the March 1953 issue of Dime Western Magazine.
Rancher Dan Evans (Christian Bale) struggles to support his ranch and family during a long drought. Desperate for money, Evans agrees to transport the captured outlaw, Ben Wade (Russell Crowe), from nearby Bisbee to Contention, the closest town with a rail station. There, they’ll wait for the 3:10 train to Yuma, where Wade will be imprisoned while awaiting trial for his numerous crimes, mostly murder and robbery. Holed up in a Contention hotel, Wade attempts psychological havoc on Evans, offering Evans much more money in exchange for his freedom than he would get for holding Wade captive. Meanwhile, Wade’s henchmen, led by the vicious Charlie Prince (Ben Foster), storm into town offering money to any man who will shoot Wade’s captors. Complicating matters, Dan’s son, William (Logan Lerman), has stubbornly joined his father on this deadly mission.
Mangold’s sturdy remake isn’t an exercise in pointless violence, although the film is indeed violent, and while it is more graphically violent than Westerns from the 30’s to the 60’s, this modern version of 3:10 to Yuma heals the wounded heart of the Western genre which has, with a few exceptions, been in steep decline on the big screen. This is a grand character study, and acting its chief strength, relying on the considerable talents of Russell Crowe and Christian Bale.
The good guy/bad guy relationship between Crowe’s Ben Wade and Bale’s Dan Evans has to be played just right in order to work, or the relationship will seem like a tired old storytelling cliché. The characters that Bale usually play seem like the everyman as quiet man. Evans isn’t a hero or even a brave man, as we usually think of bravery, and his son William reminds him every chance he gets, by words, with a stare, or in his sullen expression. Evans, however, is determined this one time – in dealing with Ben Wade – to be heroic.
On the other hand, Russell Crowe’s Ben Wade is the devil – pure and simple. Supernaturally wily, he seems faster, stronger, smarter, and more vicious than any other human he encounters. He has given in to his pure instincts and wants – like an animal, but much more dangerous because he is ultimately a human without the checks and balances of ethics and morals.
The viewer wouldn’t be overdoing it by seeing Evans as the Christ-like sacrifice and Wade his devilish tempter. The good/bad dynamic, however, is a staple of the Western, and 3:10 to Yuma is rife with the genre standards. That is how this extremely well-acted and superbly-directed film honors the American Western, and 3:10 to Yuma honors this venerable genre with gusto.
8 of 10
A
NOTES:
2008 Academy Awards: 2 nominations: “Best Achievement in Music Written for Motion Pictures, Original Score (Marco Beltrami) and “Best Achievement in Sound” (Paul Massey, David Gaimmarco, and Jim Stuebe)
Sunday, March 09, 2008
Sunday, July 28, 2013
Review: Fight Scenes Cut Nicely in "The Wolverine"
The Wolverine (2013)
Running time: 126 minutes (2 hours, 6 minutes)
MPAA – PG-13 for sequences of intense sci-fi action and violence, some sexuality and language
DIRECTOR: James Mangold
WRITERS: Mark Bomback and Scott Frank (based on the characters and stories appearing in Marvel Comics)
PRODUCERS: Hugh Jackman, Hutch Parker, and Lauren Shuler Donner
CINEMATOGRAHER: Ross Emery (D.o.P.)
EDITOR: Michael McCusker
COMPOSER: Marco Beltrami
SUPERHERO/ACTION/MARTIAL ARTS
Starring: Hugh Jackman, Tao Okamoto, Rila Fukushima, Hiroyuki Sanada, Svetlana Khodchenkova, Brian Tee, Haruhiko Yamanouchi, Will Yun Lee, Ken Yamamura, and Famke Janssen
The Wolverine is a 2013 superhero movie from director James Mangold. Starring Hugh Jackman in the title role, it is also the sixth film in the X-Men franchise. This film is not a sequel to the previous Wolverine solo movie, X-Men Origins: Wolverine (2009). In the new movie, an old acquaintance summons Wolverine to Japan, where the hero becomes embroiled in a conflict involving family, gangsters, and ninja.
Following the events depicted in X-Men: The Last Stand (2006), Logan/Wolverine (Hugh Jackman) lives as recluse in an isolated forest outside a small town in the Yukon. He is haunted by the death of Jean Grey (Famke Janssen), whom he was forced to kill (in X-Men: The Last Stand).
A young Japanese woman named Yukio (Rila Fukushima) has been tracking Logan. She tells him that an old friend who was once the young soldier he saved decades earlier during World War II wants to see Logan before he dies. Once in Japan, Logan meets Ichiro Yashida (Haruhiko Yamanouchi), now a dying old man who is the head of a Japanese technology empire. He makes Logan a shocking offer, one that forces Logan to confront his demons. Logan considers himself through with being a soldier and a hero, until he is forced to protect Yashida’s granddaughter, Mariko (Tao Okamoto), from several kidnapping conspiracies. Although weakened and ailing, Logan is determined to show his adversaries that he is still the animal known as The Wolverine.
Hugh Jackman has come to embody Logan/Wolverine the way Christopher Reeve embodied Clark Kent/Superman, beginning over 30 years ago in Superman: The Movie (1978). Jackman carries The Wolverine on his broad, muscular shoulders, but given the hoopla leading up to The Wolverine’s release, one would think the film would be an all-time great superhero movie, but it is not.
Don’t get me wrong. The Wolverine has some superb and exhilarating action sequences and fight scenes – the kind for which fans of Wolverine in comic books have been waiting. The fight on top of a moving bullet train recalls the great battle at the end of the first Mission: Impossible movie in 1996. This is solid entertainment, but much of the character drama seems contrived. The screenplay by Mark Bomback and Scott Frank, who rewrote the original version written by Oscar-winning screenwriter Christopher McQuarrie (who does not receive a screen credit), turns the good female supporting characters into mere accessories to Wolverine. The mutant known as Viper (Svetlana Khodchenkova) is under-utilized, so she is ultimately wasted. Many of the male supporting characters are just caricatures of Japanese men or stock bad guys.
But Jackman saves the day. With the help of the action stuff, Jackman makes The Wolverine the best superhero movie of Summer 2013. Just getting a chance to see him in action makes me forget about the things in this movie that bother me. Jackman takes what could have been merely entertaining and gives it that extra-something that only true movie stars can give.
7 of 10
B+
Saturday, July 27, 2013
Thursday, April 25, 2013
Review: "Identity" Almost Great
Identity (2003)
Running time: 90 minutes (1 hour, 30 minutes)
MPAA – R for strong violence and language
DIRECTOR: James Mangold
WRITER: Michael Cooney
PRODUCER: Cathy Konrad
CINEMATOGRAPHER: Phedon Papamichael
EDITOR: David Brenner
COMPOSER: Alan Silvestri
HORROR/MYSTER/THRILLER with elements of crime drama
Starring: John Cusack, Ray Liotta, Amanda Peet, Alfred Molina, Clea DuVall, Rebecca De Mornay, John C. McGinley, John Hawkes, Jake Busey, Pruitt Taylor Vince, and Bret Loehr
The subject of this movie review is Identity, a 2003 mystery thriller and psychological horror film from director James Mangold. The film is set at a desolate Nevada motel during a nasty rainstorm. There, ten strangers are stranded and being killed off one by one. It’s actually a very good film until the end.
I often think that suspense thrillers and horror movies don’t have to be great, just effective, although there are great suspense and horror films. The plot and story may be familiar (it usually is), but the execution should make us forget that we’ve seen this before. We should be too busy jumping in our seats or making sure we locked all our doors and windows before the sun went down and we started watching a scary movie. Thus, while What Lies Beneath isn’t a great film, say like Psycho, it’s very well executed and does what it’s supposed to do: make us jump in our seats and feel something akin to the fear that the characters in the story feel. That is what Identity does.
Director James Mangold burst onto the film scene with the heartwarming and heart-wrenching drama Heavy, and entered the big time with Copland, wherein which he drew a very good performance from Sylvester Stallone. Identity is his first film that tackles the suspense/horror genre, and it’s a mighty good first leap.
Through the vagaries of coincidence, ten strangers are stranded at an isolated hotel during a nasty storm. As they begin to know each other, they discover that someone, either one of them or an unknown person, is killing them off one by one. As the most likely suspects are knocked off, the survivors are further confused when the bodies of the dead begin to disappear.
Writer Michael Cooney, the mastermind behind the Jack Frost films, creates what you could call a typical, professional Hollywood script, especially for a suspense film. The story has the usual clues and subtle tricks that you have to catch in order to learn the identity of the “bad guy.” It has the usual “bumps in the night,” an isolated setting for the story, the duplicitous characters, and enough false positives to scare off any pro football team. This is very good, if not spectacular work.
The strength of the film is in its cast and in its director. John Cusack is, as ever, very good as the leading man, and especially good in this case, as the smart guy trying to figure things out. Ray Liotta continues to shine in whatever roles he takes; everyone just seems to take him for granted. Mangold makes Identity part Alfred Hitchcock and a little slasher film. He’s subtle, even when the story seems to go over the top, as he takes advantage of Cooney’s suspense thriller settings: the lonely stretch of highway, the isolated motel, the overbearing and claustrophobic rainstorm, and the characters who come in all colors: shady, sneaky, weird, mental, dangerous, dishonest, weak, and angry. Mangold lets the cast run wild with these characters. He simply and quietly follows them, his camera greedily drinking what he’s carefully staged. It seems like zany and scary fun done with abandon, and while it is, Mangold knew what he was doing. He knew the buttons to push, and he knows where to take the story, every inch of the way, every scene in its place to give us the same sense of panic, fear, and growing desperation that his characters feel.
I had hoped that Identity would be fun and it was – good, spooky fun. When the story reveals its big secret, it does knock the steam out of the film, ruining the fun…almost. With the grace and athletic skill of a Kobe Bryant or Tracy McGrady, the film gets back on its feet for an ending that at least slaps you in the face if it doesn’t exactly bunch you in the stomach. Early in the film is a clue as to the killer’s identity. I ignored it, because a later scene corrected what seemed like a mistake when one character wrongly accuses another. That later scene was wrong and was a trick to throw us off. So pay attention to every step you take on this creepy trip.
6 of 10
B
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