Dear screenwriter,
If you think your screenplay is having difficulty being made, wait till you read this article. Twenty Years, yes twenty years from inception to production. Even with a treatment written by Carl Sagan and Ann Druyan, it struggled to get to production. Numerous directors and screenwriters attached and fired. Each offering their own views of what the story should be about.
Even as a lover of sci-fi, I must admit that Contact slips from my memory, but I think I will have to revisit it soon.
If you want to know how Hollywood works, well, this is a good place to start.
It’s quite a journey! And quite a long read. My son joked that the article was longer than the film, but please stick with it.
https://www.vulture.com/2022/06/an-oral-history-of-contact-the-movie.html
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I loved that movie! Cool and really interesting article.
Luca Caserta yes Luca a very thorough insight into the history of the film. I loved it too, but it’s funny how some films just fall off our radar.
If anyone is interested, here’s the box office numbers from The Numbers website:
https://www.the-numbers.com/movie/Contact-(1997)#tab=summary
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Lots of famous execs and their friends in the article got paid a lot of $ to work on Contact.
Dunno, that part of Hollywood is well above my pay grade. I have never been invited to a home dinner with a Studio boss.
Dan MaxXx well maybe one of these days we may find such an invitation in our letterboxes!
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More likely a Bel Air Rabbi will do the introduction
Definitely food for thought!
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Hi Geoff, great movie
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Patience is certainly a virtue in filmmaking! Thanks for posting.
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Thank you for posting Geoff! This is definitely an amazing reminder for all of us creatives.
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James yes, a great reminder. And it was good to hear about all the various story ideas that writers and directors generated. Some of them were pretty ghastly with their views on Jodie Foster’s character.