scripts and such with scarlett johanssen

got your attention, didn't i? no, i didn't get to meet miss johanssen. i had my tour of the weinstein co.'s offices below west hollywood today and got sent home with some homework to do before my first full day: tomorrow.

that is, my boss gave me three screenplays for soon to be released, already produced, or still in production movies. i'll be working in the dvd extras department, and these are the three projects being handled, i'm assuming. the first one i read was interesting, but not very engaging. it was a gritty story of two dead-beat guys competing for a full management position at a grocery store in chicago. the title page was missing, so i don't know what it's called. and i'm not sure how they're gonna market it. it had it's moments of comedy, but overall seemed more of a sad character study of two guys at the end of their ropes. as if joe shmo is gonna want to see that. the second screenplay was called "killshot." i looked it up on imdb. it's already shot and is in post-production. it's about a husband and wife(diane lane) who get mixed up with an indian hit man for the toronto mob(mickey rourke-i guess in indian makeup or something) and a young bank robber(the kid from angels in the outfield). it was a fun read. i think it'll make money, if anything, because of all the gun fights and diane lane and such. i haven't read the third script yet, but it's about a nanny, and imdb says she's played by scarlett johanssen. it's filming right now.

so there's your preview for three up and coming weinstein co. movies. hopefully i'll get to set up interviews with writers, directors, and maybe maybe some of the cast.

met a writer named jon block in starbucks just now. went to usc, went to emory, majored in screenwriting etc.. he's working on his twelfth script. none sold yet. used to have an agent, blah, blah. might get coffee with him later to pick his brain about the industry.

first celebrity sighting and a test screening

so i hung out this afternoon in west hollywood with an actor/busboy friend. we were walking down sunset boulevard when we saw a bunch of paparazzi outside the CNN building. naturally curious, we ventured a little look and inquired of the life-suckers as to who they were waiting to show up. they told us elizabeth taylor was supposed to arrive in a few minutes to tape an interview with larry king. some of you may have seen the interview tonight. the limo pulled up and her people helped her into a wheel chair. she waved at the paparazzi as they yelled her name non-stop, trying to get her to look their way so they could snap her picture for whatever. it made me think about the first time i saw her in a movie: national velvet. it was the movie with her and mickey rooney and some horse called national velvet. i don't remember much about the movie except that it's the movie that made me forever hate all horse movies. and that it's eight hours long.

so that was my first celebrity sighting. she looked a little dazed.

they were handing out tickets to a test screening of the yet to be released new hillary swank movie outside of a record store. it showed on the paramount pictures lot and we all piled into a small theater. after the movie, we had to fill out a survey as to how we liked it, our favorite scenes, etc. it was your typical tried and true "inspiring tale of a teacher who enters the inner-city public school and slowly impacts the kids, showing them they they have potential and need only reach inside to find their true worth" kind of movie. nothing we haven't seen three or four times before. it was a really cool experience, though, even if the movie was lame. first time on a studio lot. pretty kewl.

so i start work tomorrow and i'm nervous.

third post in one day- i need friends out here

some food for thought from dr. gene edward veith.

"Many people admit that they do not understand art, much less appreciate it. They might respond to the content of a work of art-a picture of Jesus or a sunset-but they do not know how to respond to the artistry of the work. They are unable to interpret or to evaluate what they see. What is this picture saying about Jesus or the sunset? Is this a good picture of Jesus or a bad picture of Jesus? Christians need to be able to answer such questions."

"taking pleasure in what it excellent is the definition of good taste."

i think this guy is right on. when i look at a work of art, do i judge its worth based on purely the content, or do i have the ability to see how form and content work together? it's a hard one, especially when it comes to visual arts like painting and drawing.

his thoughts on knicknacks and christian figurines in christian bookstores: "christianity is not a sickly sweet religion, contrary to the saccharine plaques and greeting cards that clutter up the bookstores."

it's time to develop a better taste and understanding of the arts.

my heart's been left in san francisco

sitting in starbucks again, and the girl directly facing me has a small smile on her face.

don't quite know what to make of it without giving the impression of staring. any ideas? i guess it must be the same with her, because i'd been smiling at something on the internet a couple of minutes before.

tony bennett sings and sings. i've never heard this kind of music in a coffee shop before. usually it's some kind of indie stuff, or mainstream rock, or whatever the hell all those weirdos play at hot corner. lounge style can be an amazing musical backdrop to a night of whatever.

she's smiling again.

it's hot but not humid in los angeles today

So I'm here in a downtown Los Angeles Starbucks. I've finally secured some time to set up this blog.

The drive took three days. From Atlanta to Los Angeles is around 2200 miles, 80% of which is incredibly scorching hot desert. The first day saw us(my dad and I) make it all the way across Alabama, Mississippi and Louisiana to stop and sleep at a hotel in Shreveport, LA. Alabama and Mississippi are incredibly dull states to drive across. And without air conditioning in a 12 hour driving day, they elicit anger. Anger and general depression, I guess.

The second day we drove all the way across Texas. Shreveport is right at the border of LA and Texas, so we basically spent an entire day in Texas. The Texas landscape was more bearable just because it was different. The land is so flat that you feel like you can see for hundreds of miles in all directions. Most of what mid Texas gave us was depressing ghost-like towns in between hundreds of miles of oil pumps littering the landscape.

Lower west Texas is when it got awesome, because the mountains started arriving. Or maybe rolling hills, since they weren't that big. Anyway, we stopped in El Paso, which is right on the Texas/Mexico border and definitely the armpit of Texas.

The rest of the trip from El Paso to Los Angeles consisted of a lot of New Mexico and Arizona desert and California mountains. And sweating.

The most amazing part of the trip was a sleepy little town situated between two huge mountains a couple of hundred miles outside of Los Angeles. It was called Palm Springs. Palm Springs is interesting, first, because it's probably the windiest place I've ever been in my entire life. We stopped to get gas, and I almost was taken away. Or blown away, maybe. haha So it's windy, right? Big deal? Maybe. But the second interesting thing was the literally thousands of wind energy harnessers(or whatever) all over the mountains and hills. I felt like I was either in Star Wars or Don Quijote. The giants are everywhere, and I am very, very afraid.

See for yourself. It was crazy strange.

So once we left the giants behind, things got back to normal. It was still hot, still dry, and the wind was trying to throw us off the road.