Blueprints: FYC, Adapted Screenplays

In this week's Blueprints, Jorge Molina looks into five adapted scripts that should be featured n the awards conversation. If you missed the Original Screenplay FYCs, they're here. 

While Original Screenplays tends to be where usually the Academy rewards more unconventional stories, the adapted screenplay category carries with it an air of respectability and prestige. Maybe it’s because it usually involves translation from a literary medium, respected novels or award winning plays. Maybe it’s because adaptations carry a built-in audience, something Hollywood values. Adapted screenplays have the advantage of arriving with an already fully formed and sometimes familiar story. But translating that into a cinematic medium is one of the hardest tasks for a writer: making the verbal into visual, compressing dozens of chapters into a two-hour story, learning what to leave in, what to take out, what to add or change.

Here are five screenplays that each took a previously published piece and turned it into an engaging, engrossing and cinematic experience....

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Watch at Home: Crazy Rich Asians, We the Animals, and The Ballad of Buster Scruggs

What's newly available for home viewing this week? 

DVD/Blu-Ray
• Blindspotting - Just discussed.
• Crazy Rich Asians -Currently the 12th biggest hit of the year, and hopefully the film that changes everything for Asian-American actors. We should probably watch and discuss again. Do you think it will be up for the Golden Globe Comedy or Musical Best Picture prize or SAG's Best Ensemble prize? I wonder.
• Kin - A sci-fi film about a weapon of unknown origin and two brothers in trouble.
• Skate Kitchen -a drama about skateboarding girls in Manhattan. Nominated for Breakthrough Director at the Gotham Awards.
• We The Animals - The nomination leader at the Spirit Awards this year. We've interviewed the director and we just love the film here at TFE. You really should see it and the book is a swift gorgeous read... the two experiences go well together but are also their own things, perfectly tailored to each medium.

New iTunes 99¢ Deals
• A Quiet Place - The Emily Blunt monster movie smash (and longshot Oscar hopeful) is this week's highlighted deal
• My Cousin Vinny - Revisit Marisa Tomei's hilarious Oscar-winning breakout
• Under the Skin - My personal #1 of 2014, the sensationally unsettling sci-fi masterwork from Jonathan Glazer and Scarlett Johannson in that brief run when Scarjo was experimenting with every movie and knocking it out of the park each time.

ALICE: Two people have asked me about President Pierce...well, complained. 
GILBERT: About what?
ALICE: The barking.
GILBERT: Well, I don't know what to say. President Pierce is a nervous creature and excited by animals larger than himself. 
ALICE: Almost all animals are larger than President Pierce.

Brand New Streaming
• The Ballad of Buster Scruggs (Netflix) - The Coen Bros originally planned this as a TV series. It became a standalone anthology movie. Add "President Pierce" to 2018's long list of memorable dogs onscreen. If you've watched it already which of the six stories is your favorite? 
• Loving Pablo (Prime) -Penelope Cruz and Javier Bardem reunited onscreen but the movie didn't make any waves
• McQueen (Prime) -Our review. This highly praised doc about the fasion designer Alexander McQueen is eligible for the Documentary Feature Oscar. 

Podcast: Green Book, Widows, and the Best Supporting Actor Race

Nathaniel R and Murtada Elfadl talk new films and the Oscar race

Index (68 minutes)
00:01 We didn't see Fantastic Beasts 2
01:46 Steve McQueen's Widows is more than a heist movie. We dive into its themes, best scenes, and particularly its all star ensemble: Viola Davis, Elizabeth Debicki, Brian Tyree Henry, Cynthia Erivo, Robert Duvall, Michelle Rodriguez,and Olivia the dog!
25:44 Widow's Best Picture chances?
28:09 'Crowd-Pleaser' Green Book does not please Murtada. Thoughts on the movie, escapist laughter, road trip tropes, and Mahershala Ali's Oscar clip.
42:05 Best Supporting Actor discussion including Richard E Grant, Mahershala Ali, Michael B Jordan, Daniel Kaluuya, Sam Rockwell, Adam Driver, Steven Yeun, etc...
52:00 Spirit Nominations: Suspiria for ensemble? We the Animals, Blame and other micro-indies that did well. Who is going to win?
1:07:00 Byeeee

Further Reading / References
• Shadow & Act's pan of Green Book
• Vox's pan of Green Book
• Middleburg's Green Book audience win
• The Spirit Award nominations
• Murtada's We the Animals interview
• Supporting Actor Oscar Chart

You can listen to the podcast here at the bottom of the post or download from iTunes. Continue the conversations in the comments, won't you? 

Green Book and Widows

The Spirit Award Nominations are Here

by Nathaniel R

Gemma Chan (Crazy Rich Asians) and former Spirit Award winner Molly Shannon (Other People) announced the Spirit nominations for the 2018 film year. No film truly dominated the announcement because, while We the Animals led with 5 nominations (YAYYYY) it wasn't nominated in the top category. Eighth Grade, First Reformed, and You Were Never Really Here each had 4 nominations. The highest profile expected contenders with not so great results this morning were BlacKkKlansman (only Adam Driver was recognized) and Can You Ever Forgive Me? (the Screenplay and Richard E Grant only). 

so happy for this little gem!

An important note before the full list of nominees: Unlike other major awards bodies, film festival releases are (sometimes) eligible here, overseas films even if they're in english are (mostly) ineligible outside of foreign film, and anything over a $20 million budget is (usually) ineligible here, so the eligibility pool is slightly different. Some examples of 'not eligible' this year for those reasons are: The Hate U Give and Beautiful Boy (too expensive) The Rider (festivals and nominated last year), Roma and The Favorite (both foreign film only though The Favourite led the Gotham nods). The Spirit Awards has multiple nominating committees assigned to different categories. Even better they meet several times throughout the fall before selecting the nominees which is, we think, why the nominations sometimes have a better spread of titles (in terms of release dates) than the Oscars do.

The full list of nominees along with a few comments are after the jump...

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Crazy, Now Richer Asians

by Nathaniel R

The past two years have definitely been a huge wakeup call to Hollywood -- American audiences are demanding more diversity onscreen. It wasn't just the sleeper smash of Get Out, or the bigger than Batman/Superman numbers for Wonder Woman, or the record-breaking figures for Black Panther. Add Crazy Rich Asians to the increasingly large stack of hits proving to the powers that be that people value representation onscreen and movies that reflect the ethnic diversity of real life and the fact that the human race is 50% female. 

Weekend Box Office Estimates (August 17-19)
W I D E 800+ screens	PLATFORM / LIMITED excluding prev. wide
1. 🔺 CRAZY RICH ASIANS  $25.2 (cum. $34) *NEW* Review, Michelle Yeoh	1. THREE IDENTICAL STRANGERS $498k on 276 screens (cum. $10.5) Review

2. THE MEG $21.1 (cum. $83.7)  Review	2. 🔺  PUZZLE $217k on 108 screens (cum. $733k)

3. 🔺  MILE 22 $13.6 *NEW*	3. 🔺  THE MISEDUCATION OF CAMERON POST $138k on 72 screens (cum. $404k)  Podcast, Interview

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