Oh happy day! The miracle-worker has come to Hollywood and solved all our problems. With his help, it’s only hits and blockbusters from now on, according to the New York Times, and the only issue is: Can we afford this guy? Quick, get your hammer and head for your piggy bank!
The article Solving Equation of a Hit Film Script, With Data profiles the success of one “chain-smoking former statistics professor named Vinny Bruzzese,” who is providing “script evaluation for as much as $20,000 per script” to producers in town gullible enough to believe he can analyze their projects into becoming win-win propositions.
“Demons in horror movies can target people or be summoned,” Mr. Bruzzese said in a gravelly voice, by way of example. “If it’s a targeting demon, you are likely to have much higher opening-weekend sales than if it’s summoned. So get rid of that Ouija Board scene.”
Given that name, that voice, and the other personal details that emerge from the piece by journalist Brooks Barnes, Vinny sounds like a character right out of a movie, i.e. if he didn’t exist, someone would have to make him up (my favorite bit: "He bills himself as a distant relative of Einstein's, a claim that is unverifiable but never fails to impress studio executives"). And come to think of it, the last time I encountered someone with a line of horse manure this well-crafted, he was wearing a straw boater and being played by Robert Preston, in a show called The Music Man.
If you’re the age of the average movie executive, you’re probably too young to have seen or even heard of The Music Man (recently a fellow reader giving notes to a studio exec on a sci-fi project realized that the exec had never seen Star Wars: true story). So this may account for Mr. Bruzzese’s success. What was that quote again – people who skip history class are doomed to keep taking make-up classes? – something like that.
The Onion’s version of the Times article would likely be titled, Hollywood Still Largely Populated by Idiots. But you really must read it. If it makes you laugh, as opposed to making your head explode (literally!), that’s a good sign. It shows that you’ve been around the block at least once or twice. If you’re reaching for the phone to get hold of Vinny, however, you deserve the resulting hole you’ll soon find in your pocket.
I’ve always thought that the famous William Goldman dictum about the
industry – “Nobody knows anything” – while a great quote and a good
argument-ender, isn’t entirely accurate. In my experience, Nobody knows
everything. There are some people in Hollywood (many of them deservedly
at the top of the heap) who do know some things. The savvy chairman of a major
studio was recently heard to say, “People like to see dogs in movies.”
Well, yes. This is inarguable, and I’ve got the data to back it up (in my desk drawer with the paperclips and bong-filters). But what I’m saying is: There are some knowns about storytelling and movie audiences that can be known. So chances are, Mr. Bruzzese’s “20-30 page reports” do contain insights that aren’t 100 % bullshit, or – I’m sorry – focus group-informed conjecture. So the hapless rube who’s paid through his nose for the report figures hey, it’s all good!... and Vinny departs with another suitcase full of moolah. Nice work if you can get it, bro.
It’s too bad, however, that those poor misguided amateurs Spielberg and Lucas didn’t have Vinny on hand when they were making Raiders of the Lost Arc – you know, the movie that featured the climactic scene (“Don’t open that ark!”) with all the summoned demons who spectacularly melted the Nazi villains into goo? Not a targeting demon in sight, yet the scene stayed in the picture, which probably accounts for that little project’s ignominious failure.
And we could continue in this vein, but why bother? The con-men and their latest gizmos have been with us since Biblical times, and will surely be there in centuries to come. As one Hollywood writer once said (he’s got a movie opening this week, years after his untimely death):
So we beat on, boats against the current, borne back ceaselessly into the past.
Get ready for the next step, when that analytics program downloads Final Draft and writes a script that will be a "sure thing." Wouldn't that be the ultimate test of this program's "genius?"
I have taken my glove and slapped its "face."
Posted by: Scott | May 06, 2013 at 06:17 PM
I love that you have a typo in "Raiders of the Lost Arc" which is funny because I actually thought that was your point - ie that there is no 'arc' for Indy. Unintentional puns AND irony, in one post! Awesome, Billy. :)
Posted by: Nat Peluso | May 07, 2013 at 01:42 AM
Ha! Great post Billy!
Got two funny comments, plus one that you should seriously consider:
- Sadly, Millenium Films is already a client of Mr. Bruzzese, so the much awaited bowling scene in Expendables 3 will be cut!
- Also, I heard that Mr. Bruzzese approached the Venice Film Festival to offer them advice in their selection of movies in order to make the festival more profitable, to which the Italians responded in two short English words :-)
- It's time to compress your romcom knowhow into a Mernit-software that you could license to Mr. Bruzz and other wannabe experts and earn royalty every time they dupe a new executive on the block!
Posted by: Agnes Fernandes | May 07, 2013 at 03:34 AM
Here is a similar approach by the UK-based company epagogix:
"The Formula - What if you built a machine to predict hit movies? By Malcolm Gladwell":
http://www.newyorker.com/archive/2006/10/16/061016fa_fact6?currentPage=1
What do you think about that?
Posted by: Dennis Fischer | May 07, 2013 at 03:56 AM
Scott: Yes, let's challenge it to a cyber-duel. Seems only fitting for the insult given to our noble profession.
Nat: Face red AGAIN (the "pun" was entirely unconscious) but glad that it proved amusing.
Agnes! Millenium and Vinny seem made for each other, if you ask me. And... Love the Italians. Never a people to mince words. Meanwhile, the very notion of Mernit software fills me with horror - it's bad enough that I have to deal with my own inner operating system, given the status of (what my late dad used to refer to as) my soup-strainer head.
Dennis: Yes, I remember reading this in the NYer, years back, and my impression was - better to enjoy reading Gladwell than to ever have to deal with something "created" by epagogix!
Posted by: mernitman | May 07, 2013 at 09:05 AM
I have nominated you for the Liebster Blog Award.
Posted by: Nanny Cool | May 12, 2013 at 11:33 AM
Great post, Billy! And I really enjoyed your class. Here's a piece I wrote in response to the same New York Times article: "The Algorithm of Hollywood"(http://www.huffingtonpost.com/seth-jaret/the-algorithm-of-hollywoo_b_3246877.html).
Like minds.
Posted by: Seth Jaret | May 16, 2013 at 01:47 AM
I have heard a lot about this topic over the last couple weeks, and the screenwriter's response has always been twofold:
1. Laughter and ridicule since they know it is a load of crap.
2. Dread and terror since they know their work will eventually be controlled by the type of people who might take this seriously.
Whether this "analysis" has any merit or not, I believe it would damage the collaborative nature of the development process. Writers and suits have been at war since the beginning. Their cooperation has always been tenuous at best. Using this type of approach will bring out the worst in both sides and encourage far uglier battles than ever before.
Posted by: SCRIPTMONK! | May 19, 2013 at 11:13 AM
Thank you Nanny!
And thank you, Seth - nice post.
ScriptMonk: You know I agree. It would help if more execs were willing to learn a bit more about the creative process... and if more screenwriters were a little more willing to understand the specific agendas of the buyers they deal with...
Posted by: mernitman | May 19, 2013 at 01:04 PM