Tuesday, August 19, 2008

Diablo Cody. One movie fluke?

Richard Kelly anyone? Nia Vardalos? Meet Diablo.

This evening I had a brief discussion with my brother over how there are certain films that you just lose interest in wanting to see, the kind of film that you make an effort to see, but after a year or two you give up - only to then catch it on HBO half a decade later. This got me thinking. I haven't seen Juno yet. Like, Little Miss Sunshine, I've lost any interest in the film. The "want" is cold and long dead. The spot of longing that one sometimes gets when you say "I must see that film" has long been filled by other films.

Then that got me thinking about Diablo Cody and how she's literally everywhere. EW even gave her a reoccurring column, which puts me at odds as to why I still get a subscription - but I digress.


Some people who make it huge on their first film, their "huge break" into the business - not in the style of a slow, progressive burst - but the kind that Hollywood loves to glamorize. I pray for my brother not to make it "HUGE" on his first film. That could easily spell doom (well, so long as he cashes his huge check and doesn't squander it Hammer style).

But yes, they usually seem to crash real hard after huge success like that.

Have people seen Southland Tales? Kelly was raked over the coals for that movie. Darko is hailed as a masterpiece yes (I don't agree but that's just me), but all his following films will be heavily scrutinized and blasted for not being "as good" as his big "hit" work.

Nia Vardalos, poor Nia Vardalos. Oh yeah "She wrote My Big Fat Greek Wedding, but didn't they try to make a TV show out of it?" Yep. Everything she will attempt that the media gets a sniff at will be brought up in the context of My Big Fat Greek Wedding.

Some writers can marginally escape this - for a time at least. Others get stuck in a rut where people are unable to compare your work to anything but the "huge" film that they've made. Look at M. Night Shyamalan, they're still comparing and marketing him as the person who wrote and directed The Sixth Sense. However, that he's still able to finance films after making The Village, The Lady in the Water, and now The Happening, I must commend him - so he may not apply in this case.


Juno could have just been a starting point in her career, but it could easily be a complete fluke that has propelled this woman into a spotlight, into a role that she will never have the ability to fill. When, or if, her next work fails, Hollywood will first abandon her, and then ask why she lost her "gift."

It will either be justice, or a shame.

I just don't know which it is.

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