Word: screenplay
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...most scenes, there are too many unexplored ambiguities and unexplained ellipses in the film for it to make a satisfying whole. Leo throws spells, but we have no idea what they're aimed against. (After consulting a critique of L. P. Hartley, the novelist on whose book the screenplay is based, the chants seem wearisome conceits in both book and movie). A pivotal relationship, that of Marion and her mother, is barely drawn; and it is not clear what happened to Ted Burgess, though he probably committed suicide...
...production subsidiaries. Many of the others are putting up the cash and hiring independent production companies or individuals to make their films. Doubleday is making a production deal for a film version of one of its own books, The Parallax View, by Loren Singer; it has contracted for a screenplay by Lorenzo Semple Jr. (Pretty Poison), and hired Director Michael Ritchie (Downhill Racer). Mattel has worked out an arrangement for eight children's films-what else?-with Producer Robert Radnitz (Misty, A Dog of Flanders); Radnitz is now at work in Louisiana on Sounder, from the 1970 Newbery Medal...
...wave. It has an allure not confined to members of FORTUNE'S august list of the 500 largest U.S. industrial companies. Kirk Douglas, after 25 years as one of Hollywood's most backable stars, recently had trouble raising money for A Gunfight, a property with a strong screenplay starring himself and Johnny Cash (see CINEMA). Then the Jicarilla Apaches, a wealthy Indian tribe (gas leases and mineral rights) with a sophisticated investment policy offered to put up the entire $2 million. For once, it was the Indians to the rescue...
Gilbert Ralston, who wrote the screenplay, sees Willard as "a rat morality play. It's based on the concept that man carries within him the seeds of his own destruction. The evil he does will turn back on him." That it certainly does. Willard (Bruce Davison) is an underachiever in his 20s who likes rats but is also something of a rat fink. He stands by spinelessly when his mean-minded boss (Ernest Borgnine) kills Socrates, one of his pets. Socrates' best friend, a rat named Ben, witnesses the act. It is thus easy, when Willard gets fired...
...display, the buzkashi alone is thunderously exciting and imparts a startling sense of participation. But he has tried to do too much. Besides his obsession with courage, he obviously also wanted to say something about greed, honor and duty, but the themes never mesh. Dal ton Trumbo's screenplay and his fake Arabian Nights dialogue do nothing to help. There is much talk of "the coolness of my shop" and characters greet each other with such fulsome salutations as "Peace on you, O master of the stables." Miss Taylor-Young bolts across the Panavision screen flaring her nostrils...