Around 1995, I spent the best part of a year writing a script for a movie about Che. The movie was supposed to be released on the 30th anniversary of his death. Needless to say, it was never made. The first draft was brilliant, a thing of courage and beauty. The second was good. The third was quite good, and after that, a million notes from assholes later, it sucked shit. It was around that point that the director decided the film was really a love story. And he didn’t mean the obvious one between Che and Fidel. I was thinking in terms of Lawrence of Arabia. Fuck knows what he was thinking about except that arrogance and money could answer any question he might be asked. It was then that I knew what might have been the project of my life had died, and I went to the Formosa Café and became very drunk. Seems like everyone in the entire Los Angeles basin believes they can write a movie script. I know for sure that they can’t, but that still puts me in the minority.
The secret word is Hasta
And here’s my good pal Johnette singing "Everybody Knows", just to complete the cycle and serve as the requiem .
Che as a love story?
ReplyDeleteDidn't they do that already with the wooden acted folly of a movie in '69 with Omar Sharif and Jack Palance!?
Looking forward, apprehensively, to the two Soderbergh movies though