Quentin Tarantino recently turned in a script for his next film, Inglourious Bastards, a WWII action flick that to me sounds like a Dirty Dozen-Kelly’s Heroes mashup. Not that that’s a bad thing.
But when his script started making the rounds there was an extra reverb to the buzz that I’m sure always surrounds his output. Apparently it violated almost all rules of proper format, let alone spelling and grammar: “Bostin”, is my personal fave.
Time and again, screenwriters are lectured about making their scripts 100% perfectly formatted and warned that great scripts can get shit-canned for not having the right margins or type style. (Fuck if I know what they are—that’s what script writing software is for.)
Yet Tarantino turns in his with a sloppily handwritten cover page (note the title “Inglourious Basterds” [sic]) and rife with typos, creative punctuation and—true to form—lots of speechifying. Some have complained that there’s no excuse; others have hailed it as a masterpiece. I’ve not gotten a chance to read it, but did download a copy before the Weinstein Company pulled it from the World Wide Interweb Network System™.
Anyway, obviously nothing Tarantino’s pens will get shit-canned for spelling mistakes. Hell, judging by his last two films, they don’t even get shit-canned for being bad stories. Hopefully this one will restore my faith in his abilities, typos and all.
[...] Screenwriting, stresses that it’s critical for a script to have a hook. Unless you’re Tarantino or the scion of some mega-movie producer, a hookless script (and all the hard work you put into it) [...]
By: Help me make my movie « Heart of the Matter on August 20, 2008
at 6:40 pm
[...] Taratino, you basterd Quick sneak peek at Tarantino’s latest culture-clomp, a WWII yarn entitled Inglorious Basterds [sic]. First, some background about his typographically-challenged script. [...]
By: Taratino, you basterd « Heart of the Matter on March 22, 2009
at 8:54 pm