The Movie Club Redux, Part 17: Lethal Writing

TO: Boltron, Levi, Lin
FROM: Tavis
RE: Riggs!!!!!!!

The WGA announces their nominations tomorrow. When it comes to screenplay awards I can't help but wonder if the people voting have actually read the scripts (with the WGA I'd hope the members have read them). All the other major awards (acting, directing, etc.) can be determined by just watching the film. But is it really fair to judge the screenplay this way? What can you learn about the script from watching the film? The dialog, that's about it. But what about all that other stuff on the page? Shouldn't the description and action lines also weigh in on the decision of whether or not to award the screenplay with a statue?

Take, for example, Lethal Weapon. Shane Black does some unconventional things with the description—he talks to you, he takes you along for the ride, he let's you see things exactly the way he intends to—and yet not one nomination for original screenplay. Sure, it's just a cops and robbers story—at least that's all it seems if you just watch the movie—and maybe by that regard it doesn't seem like a great original screenplay. But I think you'd be hard pressed to find many screenwriters who wouldn't agree that Shane Black's script is worthy of admiration, let alone an award for creative, original screenwriting.

Looking at the current contenders in this light (though I haven't read them all just yet), I'd have to select Tony Gilroy's wonderfully written Michael Clayton as the best original screenplay of 2007. The script completely turned my head around to the ways in which one could write descriptive paragraphs—and I've never seen a better use of parentheticals (boy, did that sound geeky—but true).

It's a shame that most screenplays will only be judged by their film version, and not on their words alone.