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scribed.
one wants to say, "But it was better in the script!" or say
"They didn't shoot what I wrote!" or "I was just the script doctor!
It's not my fault." But ultimately, as part of the "creative
team" responsible for those turkeys, I have grin and bear it.
For my most recent film, Conan the Barbarian, I got some
of the most deliciously bad reviews of my screenwriting career.
• "The few good elements are dwarfed by a generic, nonsensical
plot and shoddy storytelling."
• "non-stop blood-and-guts action aimed at game boys and
emotionally stunted lovers of adolescent fantasy . . . There
is no purpose to the film other than random blood splattering
amid scenes of bondage, primitive savagery and
S&M eroticism. It is empty of story or character."
• "The very fact no attempt is made to hide the over-acted
performances and under-developed storyline will sit perfectly
fine with fans of this kind of junk." (on Rotten Tomatoes,
that was one of the "positive" reviews.)
So how do I "feel" about having worked on one of the most
critically ridiculed movies of the year?
I had enormous fun working on Conan, and I've got a very
thick skin. I'm confident enough in my own work to know
that I write well, and I've accepted the fact that the filmmaking
process is collaborative, frustrating, and often unfair: setting
up the screenwriter to take the fall. That's okay. I can
take the heat. It's worth it.
Ultimately, I get hired again and again to write movies
based on the screenplays I've written that have gone unproduced.
These scripts often get rave "reviews" from the executives
and producers who read them, along with condolences,
"too bad that didn't get made. It's just fantastic, but female
leads, dramas and period films are just hard. They don't make
their money back. But, we love your writing and we'd like to
hire you to write Children of The Corn Part 36."
I have no delusions that I'm a screenwriting genius. I'm
a "genre hack" (as chronicled in my blog genrehacks.com)
and I'm an artsy, eccentric indie filmmaker. But when given
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