Written by Frederick J. Chiaventone    Well, it’s all quiet on the Weston Front once again after rather an interesting time of late. Following all of the excitement at National Cowboy Hall of Fame it was good to get home, look in the mailbox and find a nice packet from an old friend with some very interesting contents -– film scripts. We’ll start today with the one which first attracted my attention but don’t go away as there’s more in the pipeline.

Written by Frederick J. Chiaventone    Once again it is all quiet on the Weston Front. I am slowly working my way through a stack of scripts which showed up mysteriously in my mailbox. Now, at least one of these projects will be going ahead but the others I fear are destined for the proverbial scrap heap of history. Not that this fate will in every case be deserved or warranted by the subjects or the writing but, all too often, nothing will come of some considerable effort. I will not say that this is fair or just -– remember, this is the same industry which produced Dude, Where’s My Car?, Swept Away, and now this nonsense about Cancun. The old expression "De Gustibus Non Est Disputandem" (there’s no accounting for taste) springs to mind. But that is neither here nor there right now. Instead we’ll move on to the most recent entry.

Written by Frederick J. Chiaventone    Let me start by saying that I have practically no interest in stories about aviation, aviators, airlines, engineers, or movie stars thus when this script showed up it naturally found its way to the bottom of the heap where I thought, "Well, maybe I’ll get around to it later." Okay, it’s later, I’ve read it. Not only did I read it but I read it in one sitting, mesmerized by a subject and characters for whom I had no initial interest. For those who know little or nothing about this project, which is the next film for Martin Scorsese and Leonardo DiCaprio, the storyline centers on the inexorable rise and ultimate mental disintegration of the aviation pioneer Howard Hughes. Before we start into this review I will state categorically that I will not give away the ending or some of what I believe are the more critical plot points. I want to see this film on the big screen and I want other film goers to do likewise. If Scorsese and DiCaprio can pull this one off it should, I would hope, prove a major coup.

Written by Frederick J. Chiaventone    Alright then, before we get too excited about this one let’s recognize that this version of "Alexander" is rather an older draft which dates back to late 1997 (yeah, it’s been around a while). In this draft Christopher McQuarrie is listed as "Director" and thus it pre-dates the arrival on scene of Baz Luhrman, Martin Scorsese, Leonardo DiCaprio, and a host of others. With any number of "Alexander the Great" scripts circulating these days it helps to note that this is the project which initially promised to go head-to-head (no pun intended) with Oliver Stone’s effort in which Colin Farrell is slated to play Alexander. Now, while we might easily expect the Dino DeLaurentiis version to take more of a hero-worshipping approach that project appears stalled if not entirely dead. Well, at least Alexander will not be played by "... a beeg-ah monkey..." so be thankful for small favors. And, if reports and rumors are to be believed, Ollie Stone, running true to form, will attempt to play this as a large conspiracy epic. So perhaps a "lone swordsman theory" will somehow be presented and then squashed as a product of the military-industrial complex. Gee, maybe he can get Michael Moore to play the investigator? All this however is rather irrelevant as the script which I have read appears now to be a dead issue... well, hibernating at the very least. Instead let us consider this a "horrible example" of good intentions gone wrong. I know that Stax over at IGN Film Force has seen and reviewed this script and although we normally appreciate similar pieces it appears that he likes this script a good deal more than I. Ah well, to each his own. Stax and I shall have to sit down with some coffee and chew this one over sometime.