Get Schooled on Paramount Vantage
Paramount Vantage has put up screening sites for several of their films. From a design perspective, the sites are beautiful. They're attractive, easy to navigate and meaty. Images, video, production notes. Lots of good information. Lots of material for bloggers and film enthusiasts. The thing that is MOST exciting to me is that each site includes a link to the final script. Read the scripts! Study the sites! Thank Paramount Vantage for the fantastic learning opportunity.
 | A MIGHTY HEART Brad Pitt's production company, Plan B Entertainment, brings the story of the death of Wall Street Journal reporter Daniel Pearl to the screen with Angelina Jolie appearing in the role of Marianne Pearl. Directed by Michael Winterbottom, A MIGHTY HEART was filmed in Pakistan, India and France during the summer and fall of 2006. |
 | INTO THE WILD Based on the Jon Krakauer's bestselling book, INTO THE WILD was written and directed by Sean Penn (one of my favorites filmmakers and actors). It stars the always intereresting, perpetually underappreciated Emile Hirsch. Based on the trek taken by 22-year-old Christopher McCandless as a sort of modern-day Thoreau. Krakauer's writing is powerful and inspiring. His piece on surfer Mark Foo in OUTSIDE was wonderful. And his Everest book, Into Thin Air was an amazing read. The thing that I like best about Krakauer's writing is that he doesn't "wimp out" in the end. His work always finishes as strong and descriptive as it began. Hope the movie does as well. |
 | THE KITE RUNNER David Benioff pens the script from Khaled Hosseini‘s brilliant novel by the same name and Marc Forster (MONSTER'S BALL) directs this powerful story of redemption and the chance to earn forgiveness. In a divided country on the verge of war, two childhood friends, Amir and Hassan, are about to be torn apart forever. It’s a glorious afternoon in Kabul and the skies are bursting with the exhilarating joy of a kite-fighting tournament. But in the aftermath of the day’s victory, one boy’s fearful act of betrayal will mark their lives forever. |
 | MARGOT AT THE WEDDING Written and directed by Noah Baumbach, MARGOT AT THE WEDDING stars Nicole Kidman, Jack Black and Mrs. Baumbach (Jennifer Jason Leigh) in a characteristically family-dynamic driven tale in the most intimate of human minefields. Like Baumbach's Academy-Award winning THE SQUID AND THE WHALE (one of Alec's favorite films of all time), this film is about an excruciating sibling relationship. I can hardly wait. |
 | THERE WILL BE BLOOD I knew the least about this film when I started writing about these scripts and it looks like it will be incredibly interesting. First, it stars Paul Dano (who most folks remember as Dwayne in LITTLE MISS SUNSHINE but I first became a real fan of at Sundance when he appeared in L.I.E. -- Long Island Expressway. Brian Cox was extraordinary in that film, as well.) Back to TWBB, it was written and directed by Paul Thomas Anderson (MAGNOLIA, BOOGIE NIGHTS). Paul Dano plays a charismatic preacher (from not talking in LMS to bible-thumper in TWBB) in a town that suffers the corruption and deception that follows an enormous oil-strike. |
