The Rough Draft

Just saw, “The Dark Knight,” and really enjoyed it. Hype aside, it’s a worthy film. Chris Nolan’s done a spectacular job. The whole thing is pretty much note perfect.

I first met Chris Nolan about eleven years ago in Vancouver at the Vancouver International Film Festival. He’s the kind of guy, you’d like to hate. Fairly good looking, intelligent, and that really cool English accent you just know gets him all the girls. He was showing a 16mm print of his first film, “Following.” It was a dark little noir thriller, I really enjoyed. Mostly because it harkened back to an older sensibility of what made an effective film and it was all shot in glorious black and white. I stayed after the showing and had a brief chat. I was new to screenwriting and always up to learn new stuff. I mean hey, I know talent when I see it. Chris was very gracious and we had a nice talk about his film and other influences. Too long ago to remember specifics but he was a really nice guy and really knew his shit and you simply could not hate him in the least.

The next time I saw Mr. Nolan was in Park City, Utah. I was there for Sundance (just to watch and network), he was there for Slamdance, “Following,” had been picked up by Zeitgiest out of New York and they’d done a 35mm blow up. Chris was literally the first person I saw walking down main street. He recognized me and we got to talking again. Which was cool because he was equally as gracious as before. Even though it was about 2C. One of the funny things was, we were talking away and this guy sort of swishes past us in a swirl of black overcoat. I stop what I was saying.

“Was that John Cusack?” I crane my neck around to try and get a better look.

“I think it was.”

“Hmmm… I guess he really does own that overcoat.”

Anyway, I told Chris I’d swing by Slamdance and check out his new print and went on my merry way.

Later, I got into a screening at the Egyptian Theater of this little Australian action thriller called, “Two Hands.” Seeing as I couldn’t get into, “Blair Witch,” or “Run Lola Run,” I’ve got to say it was the best film I saw there that year. It starred a very young Heath Ledger. I remember looking at him on the stage at the end of the film doing the Q&A in this goofy sort of Yak hat and he had that weird purple light around him. You see every now and then I just get this gut feeling about people and I had it in spades about Heath, I also had it about Chris. You just know.

Heath’s death was a shock. Which sounds trite but I’d rather not give in to the rage and frustration it made me feel. It had only been ten years, he was just getting going and now we’ll never know.

As for Mr. Nolan, I can’t wait to see what he’ll do next. There’s a rumor he’ll adapt, “The Prisoner,” for the big screen. That’ be cool, really cool.

So here’s the update. Every Second counts continues to work its way through the system. Word back is pretty positive so far and there’s real interest in the script. In fact it’s attracting better talent every step of the way. The other script I’ve got down in LA just had a reading at Screen Gems. Word back was also positive but they want a rewrite from their notes before they’ll commit further to the project. That being said, it looks like we have a good hook on financing and distribution.

The possible CFC project also goes well. We’ve got the outline pretty much sussed out. It’s good enough me might blow off the CFC and go it alone. My writing partnership with Audrey is working out so well, we’re probably going to pen a low budget DV feature for this fall. With Ardent Pictures, “Devil’s Tale,” in the final stages of post it looks like our horror flick may not come off this year. Which sucks but that’s the one problem with this industry, it doesn’t give a crap about schedules.

But I ain’t bitching, I’m too busy to bitch.