Film scripts as Literary Classics

[krishna_lit]

There will be some films that tells the best stories or possess the best dialogues.... They too were all written by many writers. So, if some films' scripts/screenplays can be considered as literary classics, what would they be?

Like, for example: 'Titanic' can be taken for a classic love story, '12 Angry Men' can be taken for its best conflict based argumental scenes, 'Cast Away' as a very good drama, 'Indiana Jones' can be a best adventure classic, 'Schindler's List' or 'Gladiator' as a best War epic, 'Star Wars' for best sci-fi classic, 'Inception' as the best heist classic ever and so on....

What are your choices???

[hillwalker]

If you're limiting this to the written word - film scripts for reading only - then films like 'Titanic' and 'Castaway' don't work so well for me. The latter, if I remember rightly, has almost no dialogue since Tom Hanks spends most of his time alone. Similarly 'Gladiator' and the Indiana Jones movies are action-packed and enjoyable but I hardly think the script would provide rewarding reading unless you have already seen the films.

I have always liked the quick-fire humour in screw-ball movies like 'His Girl Friday' or 'Some Like It Hot' - dated for sure, but brilliantly snappy dialogue. Also the scripts for 'Citizen Kane' and 'One Flew Over the Cuckoo's Nest' would probably be worth reading for the sheer power of various scenes.

H

[krishna_lit]

If you're limiting this to the written word - film scripts for reading only - then films like 'Titanic' and 'Castaway' don't work so well for me. The latter, if I remember rightly, has almost no dialogue since Tom Hanks spends most of his time alone. Similarly 'Gladiator' and the Indiana Jones movies are action-packed and enjoyable but I hardly think the script would provide rewarding reading unless you have already seen the films.

H

Those films were just for an example, i know there will be many people who wouldn't like those films at all... and yes u were right abt Cast Away - lack of situation for dialogues can be unsatisfactory for a read... and by Indiana Jones i only meant for its story and the mannerism of the Indy's character.

Actually, as we all know, many of the classic movies are already based on books... and I'm pretty happy about it.

[WICKES]

There will be some films that tells the best stories or possess the best dialogues.... They too were all written by many writers. So, if some films' scripts/screenplays can be considered as literary classics, what would they be?

I can only think of two: Withnail and I (a British comedy set in London during the 1960s about the miserable, squalid lives of two out of work actors who drown their sorrows in alcohol and drugs). It's a film that is surprisingly little known outside of the UK. But it has, for me, the most beautiful poetic script of any film I've ever seen.

The other is David Lean's Lawrence of Arabia. Again, the script can be extraordinarily beautiul and poetic.

[kelby_lake]

I'd go for Sunset Boulevard, All About Eve, In The Company of Men...

[OrphanPip]

I'm a little bothered by the idea of breaking down artistic creations into their constituent parts. I suppose some film scripts could work as literature, in which case they would be like closet dramas, but then it is no longer really a film script but a different kind of cultural artefact. It is worthwhile to study theatre as text because it is more difficult, and costly, to attend theatrical performances, but that same barrier to the original art form doesn't exist with film. Film scripts should be studied as aspects of films rather than as a text that is not performed.

To further illustrate my point, let's take this short film adaptation of the Al Purdy poem, "At the Quinte Hotel." The script is quite simply a reading of the poem, where does the script become script and stop being poetry? To borrow from McLuhan, the medium is the message, and meaning is always shaped by the mode of production and the form you receive it in.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=vPKeczB3wrgt

[Seasider]

The dialogue in "The Big Sleep" was excellent.But then it was mostly Raymond Chandler's creation. "Casablanca had a memorable script, as did "The African Queen" but maybe it was just Humphrey Bogart's acting that made it sound so good.

[kelby_lake]

A lot of film scripts are based on plays or novels, such as Casablanca. I think most of the films mentioned here are adaptations, even if the adapted material is now forgotten.

[ralfyman]

There's a list here for the top 101 film scripts put together by the two WGA groups:

http://www.simplyscripts.com/wga_top_101_scripts.html

[mortalterror]

Most of the scripts people are referring to were originally plays and novels. Schindler's List: Novel, Lawrence of Arabia: autobiography (Seven Pillars of Wisdom), One Flew Over the Cuckoos Nest: Novel, His Girl Friday: play(The Front Page), All About Eve: short story(the Wisdom of Eve), In the Company of Men: play, The Big Sleep: Novel, Casablanca: play (Everybody Comes to Rick's), The African Queen: Novel

[MorpheusSandman]

To me, the more literary screenplays get, the further away they get from the real strength of cinema as an art-form. When Hitchcock helped to co-write his films he did so with a director's artistry, knowing how ever scene and shot was going to unfold. So I think there's a difference in "writing cinema" like Hitchcock did and "writing FOR cinema" which is what most screenplays are. Screenplays that are best appreciated as literature are likely those by Wilder, Bergman, and Sturges, and Mankiewicz.

[kelby_lake]

Most of the scripts people are referring to were originally plays and novels. In the Company of Men: play

I thought the play was unproduced?