Movie ideas
May/100
I’ve made no secret that I wanted to be a screenwriter before. It’s something that I’ve wanted to do as long as I can remember and I have a lot of ideas. The problem with my ideas though is that they are all movies I would want to see. Most of the movies that I end up loving are ones that don’t make millions and millions of dollars. I have been trying to change my thought process of late to think of the kind of movies that Hollywood actually buys and makes into movies and the kind of movies that become hits. This is actually a really difficult exercise.
I came up with one idea, called “When We’re 30 (or 40)” (or “The Marriage Pact”). It’s about a guy and a girl who are best friends in high school or college and after one breaks up with their girlfriend/boyfriend the two of them make a pact that if they don’t find anyone by a certain age that they will get married. Well, what if when they got to be that age one of them actually tried to take the other up on it. What would happen then? My thought process was that this is a familiar idea among people. I think it was on Friends and I know I have seen it somewhere else before too. Also, romantic comedies are cheap and one seemingly comes out every single week for the entire year. Some are good, most are bad, but almost all of them turn a profit. It speaks to the entire point of movie theaters in the first place, so people have a place to take their dates. Now, the problem with this idea is that I would never want to write this movie because I would never want to see this movie and even if I did write it I would be viewed as a bad writer because this movie probably wouldn’t be that good. It would most definitely star Kate Hudson and she is incapable of making a good movie. Still, I think I am on the right track with thinking about the kind of movies that are actually made in Hollywood.
What I am trying to do now is think of something more “high-concept”. A BIG idea, if you will. When I think high-concept I think about Brian K Vaughn selling a spec script for a million dollars after a bidding war. It was an incredible idea that went something like this:
“most of the people who identify themselves as anti-establishment individualists are almost always the ones voting for more government intervention, more government control.”
Jun/090
Sometimes I think my political “views” often alienate me from my friends (I parenthesize views because there are plenty of things I disagree with Republicans on, but I find them right more often than not. Yet, if I say to someone “I am a Republican” they most likely start an anti-Bush, pro-gay marriage, pro-abortion, Obama-is-going-to-save-the-world, pro-something else that doesn’t really matter argument with me.) Then I read something like this and feel better.
Likewise, most of the people who identify themselves as anti-establishment individualists are almost always the ones voting for more government intervention, more government control. They believe they are against ‘the man,’ but they almost never meet a problem they don’t think should be solved by, well, more ‘the man.’ People who claim to love the poor almost always favor policies that prevent the creation of wealth and jobs, the only two things that have ever consistently elevated men out of poverty. People who claim to be the most tolerant are almost always hostile to any opinion other than their own. People who believe themselves to be the most color blind and supportive of racial integration seem to be most in favor of holding people to different standards of accomplishment and conduct based on the color of their skin.
I’m as anti-establishment as it gets. I got kicked out of EIGTH GRADE. Think about that for a second. Eighth grade. Do you know how many virgins I knew in eighth grade? Fucking everyone because you are just a kid. Yet, I tend to agree with Republicans. Why? Because Republicans stay out of my fucking life and let me keep my money. That’s why.