One of the things that Mary Jane said when we workshopped Grandpa's Getaways was that I needed to decide what the tone of the piece should be. It was skating the line between serious and funny and so not quite succeeding at either. She also gave me homework to watch spy movies not just to help me decide, but to help me know what that decision would look like.
On the one hand there are films like Red, and the older Bond films, which I enjoy, but are very over the top. Riding the middle are films like Casino Royal and Skyfall which is still Bond and over the top, but so much more serious and real than any of the 70s Bond films. And at the serious end are films like Tinker Tailor Soldier Spy, and No Way Out, and Russia House that are serious Cold War spy films. Those later films, and the books that they're usually based on, are the films of my youth. So I decided if I'm going to do this I'd much rather do it seriously.
I haven't gotten so serious that the theme of the film is loyalty or betrayal or the kind of thing they usually are. My theme is still memory. It doesn't matter that Will's memories are generally inaccurate. They're all he's got left and he's entitled to them. But for the life he's remembering it's serious and it's real.
So I did another draft. I'm going to let it stew now for a week. Next Monday I need to email it to Mary Jane so that she has time to read it before class on Wednesday when we'll all be having individual meetings to discuss our scripts. If anyone has any thoughts or comments I'm very open to them. It's not wildly different from the last version I posted, but hopefully it will feel at least a little different to you. Let me know.
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