Inception is the reason why I watch movies. It’s the reason why I write screenplays. And it’s the reason why I feel that cinema can be not only entertainment, but also a sophisticated (if expensive) expression of art.

Inception is quite simply one of the best movies of the year.

On the surface, it’s a thriller. But it’s also an action movie, a crime caper, a psychological drama, a mystery, and a contemporary sci-fi flick.

An outstanding Leonardo DiCaprio stars as Dom Cobb, who is a master of extraction – the crime of entering people’s dreams to steal valuable secrets. But his skills have also made him one of the most wanted men on the globe. His only path to redemption is to accept an offer from Japanese tycoon Saito (Ken Wantanbe) to enter into the dream of a corporate rival — not to steal an idea, but rather to plant one. This dangerous process is called inception, the act of planting an idea so deep into a mark’s subconsciousness that he will wake up believing the idea was his own and, therefore, more likely to act on it.

Most screenwriters would stop at the “stealing ideas in dream” premise and be pretty proud of themselves. But Nolan doesn’t settle for just “good;” he aims for brilliant, and pulls it off by adding the ingenious twist of inception.

Fortunately, Inception’s heady sci-fi themes are grounded by Cobb’s emotional character arc. His highly touted talents belie the fact that he’s actually estranged from his kids and wracked with guilt from holding a deadly secret about his wife.

In this way, Inception is a classic man-vs.-himself conflict, as much as it is a crime caper set in the mind. Without revealing any spoilers, I just have to say that this type of subgenre is usually handled pretty poorly (think The Hulk or The Wolfman), but Nolan makes Cobb’s internal battle pay off in spades.

Cobb’s characterization doesn’t come at the expense of the supporting characters, either. Nolan makes sure each of Cobb’s allies is given a little something to chew on. I could go on and on about Watanabe’s Saito or Tom Hardy’s Eames or Marion Cotillard’s Mal or, especially, Joseph Gordon-Levitt’s Arthur — but I won’t. Suffice to say, every character brings his or her own intricate piece to the puzzle that is Inception. No wasted faces, no wasted words. Their dialogue rings true, with each person having his or her own cadence and rhythm.

Inception’s screenplay does have one minor flaw, though: there are one too many flashbacks. Actually, they can’t be considered flashbacks; they’re Cobb’s subconscious projections based on his memories that pop up into various people’s dreams.

Um, yeah.

Kinda hard to explain without spoiling the magnificent subtleties. Just know that some of the scenes and images are repeated one too many times.

Audiences these days are so movie-savvy that a flashback (or pseudo-flashback in this case) only needs to be used once or twice to have them get the idea (no pun intended). More than that and it just gets redundant and slows down the pacing. At two and a half hours, Inception could probably endure some trimming and still retain much of its emotional and intelligent complexities.

I could write more about Inception’s cinematography, action, stunts, music, production design, and special effects, but I’d just be slathering on the same type of praise that I have been heaping on Nolan.

In today’s empty movie landscape of mindless remakes and retread sequels, Nolan has written something that is wildly unique, extremely creative, hyper intelligent, and most of all edge-of-your-seat exciting. If you haven’t seen Inception yet, just know that you’re going to come out of it feeling utterly mindf**ked.

Or maybe that’s just the idea that Nolan will plant in your mind….

Word came this month that Edward Norton will not reprise his role as Bruce Banner in any Hulk sequels or the upcoming Avengers movie, because of some dispute with Marvel. According to the comic book company, it’s because Norton doesn’t know how to be a team player. But his reps say Marvel pulled the rug out from under Norton during contract negotiations; rather than talk it through, the studio’s allegedly just cut him off and tried to slam Norton in the press for having a big ego and wanting too much money.

Who to believe? The truth lies somewhere in the middle. There’s a really good story from Yahoo Movies that chronicles the recent events.

But looking back, one has to question if Marvel has a master plan for its cinematic comic universe or if it’s just being a reactionary force.

• Exhibit A: Marvel replaced Terrence Howard with Don Cheadle in Iron Man 2. Personally, I loved that swap, being a Cheadle fan, but I gotta admit it was a bit jarring to see such a different actor as Lt. Col. Rhodes.
• Exhibit B: Marvel casts Chris Evans, the actor who played the Human Torch in the Fantastic Four franchise, as Captain America. Sure, the FF movie series is owned by Fox while the Captain America film rights are owned by Marvel, but do audiences know this? No. They only know that the Human Torch is now Captain America. This is the equivalent of Christian Bale being hired suddenly to play Superman.

Now Norton has been given the boot. What should we make of all this? What should I believe?

Norton’s classy response to Marvel should give us some clues.

He has been known to be super involved with his projects, which can sometimes cause friction behind the scenes (see American History X and The Incredible Hulk). But as a fan of his work, I’d like to think that it’s because he’s hyper intelligent (he’s a Yale graduate) and passionate about his craft. He’s also not just an actor; he writes and directs. So, when he comes onto a project, you’re getting more than just an acting puppet. You’re going to get a creative force who is going to try to make the best movie he knows how.

Does that rub people the wrong way? Apparently.

Regardless of who’s in the right, I think it’s lame that Norton won’t be in any Hulk sequels or the big-budget ensemble epic, The Avengers. I mean, think about what could have been: Oscar-nominated Norton as the Big Green Machine, Oscar-nominated Robert Downey Jr. as Iron Man, Oscar-nominated Samuel L. Jackson as Nick Fury, and Oscar-nominated Cheadle as Rhodes, with Evans as Cap and up-and-comer Chris Hemsworth as Thor –- all directed by comic-geek genius Joss Whedon?

That would have been effing fanboy heaven! … Now, we’ll just have to wait and see.

The prequel to The Lord of the Rings was set to be split into two films, be produced by LOTR director Peter Jackson, and be directed by Del Toro (Hellboy and Blade II). Del Toro even moved his family from Los Angeles to New Zealand to work on preproduction and screenwriting on The Hobbit.

Sadly, the innovative filmmaker officially announced last week that he had to pull out due to vague “family responsibilities” and other “contractual obligations.” But it’s clear the decision had more to do with the studio being in financial limbo.

“…it seems Del Toro got tired of waiting around in New Zealand while The Hobbit rights-owner Miramax tries to resolve its financial crisis. That and the fact that his family, who relocated with him to the foreign country, were ready to leave.

‘I believe these films will happen,’ he reassures Hobbit fans, saying ‘preproduction continues as we speak’.”

Let’s hope so! Who will Jackson call on next to direct? My money’s on Neill Blomkamp, director of District 9 and Jackson’s protege of sorts.

Click here to read Del Toro’s complete farewell letter.

Here’s Sloan picture-perfect description of the industry:

“I think of Hollywood as a giant, freezing-cold, bacteria-ridden whirlpool. On the outside of the whirlpool, closest to the shore (and financial security), are the executives, the studio heads, the big-name actors, writers and directors. As you move towards the center, you come upon the lower-level employees. And moving further inwards still, you come to the PA’s. There’s thousands of them, all clamoring and clawing, trying desperately not to get sucked into the deep, dark hole of anonymity and sadness.”

Check out the full blog here.

In it he talks about star John Travolta, the Church of Scientology, L. Ron Hubbard, and how it all went down because of his pecker.

Below is a little snippet, but for the full story, click here.

Let me start by apologizing to anyone who went to see “Battlefield Earth.” It wasn’t as I intended — promise. No one sets out to make a train wreck. Actually, comparing it to a train wreck isn’t really fair to train wrecks, because people actually want to watch those. It started, as so many of my choices do, with my Willy Wonker.

The Hurt Locker wins the Best Original Screenplay Oscar, along with Best Picture, Best Director and three other naked statuettes.

Wow.

I’m both thrilled for the filmmakers and kinda stunned at the same time. I love the fact that this “little movie that could” has, in fact, “did.” But is it really better than other great nominees out there?

From a screenwriting point of view, Mark Boal‘s script is an extremely taunt dramatic thriller, a fresh take on an established subgenre of war movies. It has extremely real characters, fantastic dialogue, and a real sense of immediacy. (It helps that Mark drew from his experiences as a journalist embedded with a real Iraq War bomb squad unit.) But, as I wrote previously, I was left wanting a stronger character arc (as the hero doesn’t learn anything by the end of the flick) and a bigger conflict.

From a directing stand point, I’m thrilled for Kathryn Bigelow, the first woman director to win the Oscar. She’s been around a while and is extremely talented. She pulled the strings at just the right moments to up the tension then pulled back . But is her work a bigger accomplishment than what he ex-husband James Cameron did with Avatar, a gargantuan movie that not only destroyed the box office but has redefined the very essence of 3-D movies and what can be done mixing live action, performance caption, and CGI? No doubt Avatar was a logistical nightmare from which he draw an amazingly thriller crowd-pleaser.

But should anyone really be that surprised the Avatar didn’t win any of the major awards? It is, after all, just an “sci-fi” flick, a genre that is looked down upon by the Academy. No genre film has ever won Best Picture.

Ultimately, though, any time a small indie like The Hurt Locker wins, it’s a good thing for filmmakers and screenwriters like me, guys on the out edges of Hollywood trying to bust into the inner circle.

Congrats, Mark and Kathryn!

Last Sunday, I was invited to attend Diana Lee Inosanto‘s DVD release party of her directorial debut, The Sensei.

For most martial artists, you’ll recognize the name. She is the daughter of martial arts legend Dan Inosanto and the “honorary niece” of one of the world’s biggest icons, Bruce Lee. But what you might not realize is that she’s also an actress, stuntwoman, and producer.

Now, she can add writer/director to her long list of accomplishments.

The Sensei is about a female martial arts instructor who secretly takes on a gay student in 1980s Colorado during the height of the AIDS scare. Though not flawless, the movie is a courageous and powerful piece — particularly considering it’s a low-budget independent and is Diana’s first ever directing gig.

More details about the project later. For now, I highly recommend you check it out on DVD when it’s released on March 9.

My Top 8 now becomes a Top 9. I didn’t bump anybody off the list because they’re all stellar work. But at the same time, I didn’t put Kathryn Bigelow’s intense drama (about a U.S. Army bomb squad unit) in the Top 5.

Why? It just didn’t blow me away (pun totally intended). Don’t get me wrong: I thought it was quite powerful. And critics lavished it with all sorts of honors (i.e. Writers Guild Award for Best Original Screenplay), but I felt the screenplay didn’t provide much an arc for the main character, Staff Sgt. William James, played by Jeremy Renner. He starts off as a cocky cowboy-in-fatigues figure and — save for a subplot about him befriending a locale Iraqi boy — he pretty much ends the movie in exactly the same fashion.

Almost no change. Nothing learned. Zero character development.

In my book, that’s not Top 5 screenwriting material. But still, the script by Mark Boal offers plenty of good things: a strong supporting cast, an exotic setting, a timely subject, and an intrinsically butt-clenching premise (a gung-ho bomb specialist takes over an Explosive Ordinance Disposal squad and clashes with his by-the-book subordinates in the midst of roadside bombs, insurgent snipers, and unrelentingly harsh Iraqi environment.

Some of the praise should go to Bigelow, who does an amazing job of capitalizing on the hair-raising tension and mind-numbing lulls (much like real-life military life) with her mix of documentary style camerawork and slow-mo visuals.

But then again, that’s why both Bigelow and Boal received Oscar nominations in their respective categories, eh?

1. Up
Written by Bob Peterson & Pete Docter
The first three on my list are all running neck and neck and neck for the top spot, but ultimately, I had to give it to Up, this funny, emotional, unpredictable, and technically brilliant animated film from (where else?) Pixar Studios. It has everything a near-perfect screenplay should have: real (and really flawed) characters, realistic (yet witty) dialogue, strong (and strongly motivated) villains, and a believable character arc (there’s two actually, one for each of the main characters). Who knew a cartoon about a senior citizen and a chubby kid in a balloon-powered floating house would be so riveting?

2. District 9
Written by Neill Blomkamp & Terri Tatchell
“Wow.” That was my first impression after seeing this movie. Smart on so many levels and wholly different from anything Hollywood could ever hope to produce, District 9 is a ticking time-bomb of a story: it starts off like a real-life documentary about alien refugees, sprints off like an action movie on fire, and ends with one cataclysmic sci-fi bang that leaves you blown away.

3. Avatar
Written by James Cameron
James Cameron’s screenplay for this year’s most anticipated film and history’s most expensive movie ever is by no means subtle. But it does exactly what a good script should do: act as the solid blueprint for an amazingly sound yet beautiful cinematic monolith to be built upon. From paying off small first-act setups to putting a 22nd-Century twist on cliched elements, the Avatar story is breathtaking, intense, and otherworldly — it reminds us of the very reasons we go to the cinema in the first place.

4. Star Trek
Written by Roberto Orci & Alex Kurtzman
Director J.J. Abrams is a pop-culture God. Just look at his recent credits. And his re-imagining of the original Star Trek series was a pretty damn good balance between appeasing the Trekkers and Trekkies (depending on your level of geekdom) and telling a suspenseful, witty, and action-packed sci-fi opera for the newbies. But it’s really the screenwriting duo of Orci & Kurtzman who should share in the glory. Though their screenplay has a few flaws ([spoiler until the end of the parenthesis] why the Hell does Kirk go from ensign to captain of the Enterprise in less than a day???), its solid structure is what allowed Abrams to pull off the sacrilegious move of remaking a classic.

5. Inglourious Basterds
Written by Quentin Tarantino
This historical fantasy made a big splash because it was Quentin Tarantino’s return to form, his entree back into pop-culture consciousness after the dismal performance of his half of Grindhouse, Death Proof. Unique anti-heroes (a band of covert U.S. Army Jews infiltrating Nazi-occupied France), long-winded monologues, and the most delicious villain we’ve seen in a long time. Sure some of his scenes needed to be trimmed (the pub scene was way too long!) and the alternate-history ending didn’t sit well with me, but overall, Inglourious Basterds was one of the most unique screenplays of the year and one of the most enjoyable movies.

6. Taken
Written by Luc Besson and Robert Mark Kamen
A stellar example of how a script with a simple premise -– Liam Neeson plays an ex-CIA agent who must find his daughter’s kidnappers in France -— can result in a tight, suspenseful thriller so long as the execution is done right.

7. The Hangover
Written by Jon Lucas and Scott Moore
There was no single funnier movie in 2009 than The Hangover. Lucas and Moore take the tired “bachelor party in Vegas” subgenre, put a subtle Memento-like slant on it, and deliver one of the most jaw-droppingly, surprisingly hilarious films of the year.

8. The Hurt Locker
Written by Mark Boal
This is an intense war thriller about a gung-ho bomb specialist who takes over a U.S. Army Explosive Ordinance Disposal squad and clashes with his by-the-book subordinates in the midst of roadside bombs, insurgent snipers, and internal demons. Not perfect and lacks a strong character arc, but otherwise pretty invigorating. Makes me glad I never joined the military — and grateful to those who have.

8. 9. The Blind Side
Written by John Lee Hancock
I usually don’t fall for the based-on-a-true-story, tear-jerking, feel-good dramas, but this Sandra Bullock-starring football movie took me by surprise. Why? Because the screenplay had well-rounded characters and a simple but effective plotline — all causing you to empathize with the main character. An effective family-friendly drama if ever there were one this year.

Honorable Mentions:

• Paranormal Activity
• I Love You, Man
• Watchmen
• The International

ttp://www.imdb.com/title/tt0409459/

He’s got some common-sense advice mixed in with some real-world experience. Here’s a taste:

“…you simply want to intrigue them enough so that they can’t wait to read the entire screenplay. If you have a twist ending you can tell them about the twist without giving it away. Make them want to read the full script.”

Meyers actually wrote a book called, coincidentally enough, Selling Your Screenplay. I haven’t read it, but it seems solid.