Was actually unaware of the questions about Murnau’s death you raise, so that’s some fascinating background that, for me, only adds to his mystique. (I had to Google for details. Decadent details like that don’t strike me as sordid at all; just mindblowing astonishing.)

No kidding, your comment really did leave me speechless. But in a good way.

But to be honest, that terrible accident deprived the world of one of its greatest artists, a titan who (had he lived beyond 40) would have given the world even more greatness.

I still mourn him.

Now who wants some fresh longganisa!?

Back to scripts. Lots of times I’ll only read the first half of a screenplay before seeing the movie, because I want to know a little, but not too much. It’s enough to see if the technique looks promising without needing to know how it ends. (scriptus interruptus, it’s a Tantric thing.)

Ryan, my hat’s off to you.

joel, there’s my creation, Woofman, (choong by night, Mario Lopez by day). But I can’t get anybody to publish my drawings.

I’m straining my noggin to recall the last comic book movie with a major character that was hispanic. The closest I can get is Bat Manuel from the short-lived but brilliant Tick TV show.

Maybe “latino” is esperanto for “fanboy.”

I read screenplays for films that I’ve already seen, but only occasionally. I remember reading The Sixth Sense some years back; Minority Report a couple of years ago; and several month ago I took a look at Batman Begins. I’m sure there are plenty of others but those seemed to be the highlights.

Case in point, Moriarty at AICN reviewed a JJ Abrahms Superman script years ago. He pretty much spoiled the whole damn thing but the script was so ridiculous that the review itself was better than the movie ever could have.

Also a review I read years ago of Sam Hamm’s Watchmen script, which was the mother of all adaption trainwrecks.

But those are the only two I can think of and my only interest in the review was that it was obvious neither movie was being made anyway.

Otherwise, the script can’t give you any indication of the acting, editing, cinemtography, direction, set design, costuming, music, sound effects, or producer-meddling that will ultimately inform the final movie.

Most of the time I read the screenplay of a movie that I won’t be able to see for a while, unless it is an adaptation, and then I read the book first. For instance, I once {a long time ago when my blog was read by me and no one else} said that I thought the screenplay for “Margot at the Wedding” was genuinely funny. I still have not seen the movie. And I only read that screenplay in like January, long after most people had seen the film.

Not trying to make excuses for my eagerness to read screenplays etc, not that I need to, but sometimes its the closest I can get to a certain movie, and I take the chance.

People can review screenplays all they like {like those annoying folks at the oddly titled Latino Review}, most people don’t really care.

Daniel, some info is good, I just haven’t found that line yet, and when you start, where do you stop? Like Jeff, my whole interest in tidbits on this movie related to the possibility that, yes, this would be the movie and that it would be happening relatively soonish. Beyond that, my interest wanes rapidly.

Clearly I’m not going near that script beforehand. Aren’t QT lines always best experienced on screen for the first time? Plus, Joel says why it’s not really going to shed light on anything new.

Script and movie are different things, but it’s interesting (to me) to see the various stages of the life cycle from larvae-chrysalis-butterfly (or — as I suspect we’ll see with Stone’s “W” — suck-taint-excrete.)

But I don’t like most script reviews because I have trouble getting past the “I got a copy and you didn’t” attitude. (Though I realize a lot of that attitude might be generated from my envious end of the equation.)

Script reviews are ridiculous anyway. You might as well review the storyboards.