In my childhood, going to movies was all about the stories. I am sure that I was affected by the pictures and sound, but the things that I remembered were what happened to the characters. This led to a weird period where I would substitute reading cheap novelizations for going to films, because I got the same story either way. When I got to know more actors, I became more interested in the craft of acting and realized that a film’s performances could have as much to do with whether I enjoy it as the story. As I became more of a film geek, I got more interested in how the film was directed, shot and edited and how that affected how I felt about it. The writing grew less important to me.
But in 2006, it seems like almost every movie I saw sabotaged itself with crappy writing. The highly rated one’s were often the worst. I don’t know if I am getting pickier, or if the writing is getting worse.
The Queen (91 on Metacritic)
This is a great idea for a film, and it was artfully acted and edited. It is too bad that the script skimps on any insight on the characters or, their history or their future in favor of lengthy discussions of English flag-flying protocol and endless CNN clips. The great performances make it worth watching, but they don’t make it enjoyable.
The Departed (85 on Metacritic)
This one did better than most. The film was well shot and acted, and the script had moments of brilliance. I just wish it all would have been as good as the best parts. Most of the scenes with Vera Farmiga were stilted and cliched.
Casino Royale (80 on Metacritic)
The theory was to recreate the James Bond franchise with a more modern and sensitive hero, and to simultaneously return the series to its Ian Fleming roots by basing it closely on one of his books. The star was great and the directing was thrilling. But most of the scenes were predictable build-ups to predictable conclusions (I don’t have much doubt that Bond is going to win at poker and not leave the film married). And the script’s inability to decide whether this Bond was naive or suave made it difficult for the audience to know how to invest in the character. Because the script had to do so much work to accomplish these things, it was filled with needless and unbelievable interchanges between Bond and various women.
Children of Men (84 on Metacritic)
I saw this one last night, and it kicked off this train of thought. I am an Alfonso Cuarón fan, and he made this movie quite a spectacle to watch. The world was completely immersive, and many of the scenes were staggeringly beautiful or disturbing. But you lose a lot by having paint-by-numbers characters like ‘reluctant hero’, ’somewhat helpless heroine’, ‘quirky old guy’, ‘arrogant rich guy’ and ‘red shirt’. And it doesn’t help to spend the whole time putting characters I am not that interested in into predictable jeopardy, while saying nothing insightful about who they are and the time they live in. And to top it off, it took five writers to complete this thing (maybe there were even more uncredited ones).
I don’t regret seeing any of these, but they all could have been much more memorable with believable and surprising stories and dialog. I hope to see Volver, Old Joy and Pan’s Labyrinth soon; hopefully one of them will be better. Or else I’ll have to start doing my own screenwriting, and learn how hard it really is.
