This Sunday, we finally get to find out what was the best screenplay of 2015. Just kidding, we only get to find out which two screenplays are finalists for that honor, which will actually never be known. The Academy Awards splits scripts into two categories, original and adapted, as if there are truly only two kinds. At least the divide isn’t too complicated this year. None of the adapted nominees are in fact original works, which just happen to be tied to a franchise or branded material. However, three of the original nominees are actually kind of adapted in that they’re derived from preexisting material — that material just happens to be history.
What even is the merit being judged by Academy members? Is the best original screenplay the one that is the most clever or imaginative? Is the best adapted screenplay the one that does the most work in translating story and dialogue from one medium to another? Is it a valuation of the words on the page or what we can appreciate solely from what we see and hear from the finished film? Studios do send out copies of scripts so voters can see and judge the writing itself, and the nominees are likely selected by people who pay attention to that step in the production process, but how many of those general members voting for the winner are truly thinking about or know how to think about just the script alone? Do they put too much value in dialogue? Plot structure? Characters’ names?
Below I’ve ranked all 10 of this year’s screenplay nominees, from worst to best, and I’ve done so with consideration of the completed movies rather than poring over the technicalities involved in how these Oscar categories ought to be handled. I haven’t read the actual screenplays or, in the case of the adapted category, the books they’re based on. Except in one or two cases involving specific details, I don’t know exactly which parts of the movies come from the screenwriter’s mind or from an author or the director or the actors’ ideas and maybe some ad-libbing. This list is very subjective, I’ll admit. My number one pick isn’t any more official in its bestness than the Oscar winners will be. I welcome discussion about where I’m “right” or “wrong,” but just so you know this is all just one man’s opinion.
10. Room
I do not get the love for this movie. It’s got a few things going for it, namely Brie Larson, but the story isn’t all that believable and the dialogue can be very annoying. Regarding the former, that’s from the novel, I guess, but again I’m just looking at these movies as they play out in the end, no matter the origins. And the way that the little boy escapes is just preposterous to me. As for his much-imitated pre-escape dialogue, that’s also surely from the book and even worse. It’s like Larson’s character was supposed to be heavily influenced by Margaret Wise Brown’s classic children’s book “Goodnight, Moon” and Yorgos Lanthimos’s film Dogtooth in her ideas about language. There’s a lot to accept here that might fit better in the wording, in novel or script, but doesn’t work at all on screen.
9. Straight Outta Compton
I’m not sure what this is doing in the original screenplay category, and I do like the movie plenty. It’s not that original, and not just because it’s based on a true story. Plus it really loses its edge and its steam in the second half. But maybe the script is intentionally supposed to start out great and full of integrity only to become more glossy and conventional because that’s how the characters evolve, too? If that’s on purpose, I’ll gladly move this to the #1 slot. It still wouldn’t make it the most enjoyable screenplay, just the smartest. Straight Outta Compton deserves points at least for being so in tune with black history and culture despite it having four credited writers, all of them white.
8. The Martian
If the Oscar for best adapted screenplay goes to the one that most improves upon its source material, this might be the champion. From what I hear, anyway. I haven’t read more than a snippet of Andy Weir’s science-heavy book. Still, I don’t think the end result is anything close to perfection, either. There should be a more focused perspective with this story, and also from what I hear the book does in fact get that right. Enough about the book, though. On paper, and I mean in the script not the book, it probably seems like a good idea to keep going back and forth between Mars and Earth to follow two separate narratives. But as executed, as well as Ridley Scott can do, it makes for a very disjointed movie. It is the best adapted space program propaganda, however.
7. The Big Short
If I accept the classification of this by our colleague Matt Patches as a documentary, then it’s a fine yet still very wordily informational script. As a narrative, however, it tells way too much more than it shows and for all the attempt to simplify the financial crisis for its audience it’s still extremely clunky, convoluted and oftentimes still very confusing. The cameos are clever but also too distracting to be as helpful as they’re intended. All of the main characters are just pieces to be moved around and fit a part of the puzzle of a story, and yet where the movie does try to give us more development of a human being (Steve Carell’s role) it’s a terrible idea, totally straying. The movie is flashy and fun, though, so it seems great.
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