Oh, fuck you.

Watching Entourage is not the same as personal observation.

Screenwriters, except maybe for showrunners, by and large aren’t the people in charge, either.

I was hardly trying to give the whole industry a complete pass on everything ever. But sorry, mercmesh doesn’t know what he/she is talking about, and is making sweeping generalizations that are not only quite wrong (”Screenwriters are all a bunch of spoiled little rich bitch sycophants who are ruining movies!”), but really unfair to the vast majority of people who work in the industry.

I get annoyed sometimes at the ways that people assume, because I work in the film industry that therefore I must be some spoiled little ass-kisser who only wants to lead the glamorous life and isn’t worth a damn. Yeah, sorry, when you’re picking cigarette butts off parking lot pavement in the rain at 4am, then maybe you can tell me that I’m living in a cushy ivory tower and don’t understand the plight of the little people, which is why I’m single handedly ruining entertainment in this country.

I was avoiding any and all mention of this movie just because it gave me unidentifiable heebie jeebies and you quite eloquently put into words what bugged me about this.

On a different note, I thought the film of “Emma” did capture class issues and commentary on the gossipy nature of small town life very well. It helped me appreciate the wit of the book all the more.

I don’t know how accurate it was, but I very much liked the way that the young publisher fell in love with her books first, and then with her because of them. I’ve always found the best love stories involve some kind of ‘meeting of minds’ rather than doe-eyes across a crowded room. Like in the French film Amelie, where Amelie falls in love with a photo album, and Nino falls in love with cryptic messages and a treasure trail, before either of them set eyes on each other.

Opo, here’s the problem — yes, there are plenty of people working in film and television who didn’t get there by having money and connections. But those aren’t the people in charge.

The classmate I was talking about above will probably work her way up and become a showrunner one day. Yes, she will have worked her ass off to get there … but she also got that leg up by having rich parents and marrying a rock star, which freed her from having to actually scratch out a living like the rest of us were so she could concentrate on her career.

And let’s not even get into the age thing. Fortunately for me, I’ve been wearing sunscreen since I was 19, so I can probably pass for about 30 when I’m really 38. Because once a producer finds out how old I am, that’s the end of the meeting.

Regarding the whole man-as-mentor theme? She and her husband are presented as poets who respect each other’s work but aren’t exactly happily married. He doesn’t inspire all her creativity, and isn’t the sole cause of her depression. Though at a certain point in the movie the depression and marital troubles become a vicious circle.

Please stop. You have absolutely no fucking idea what you are talking about wrt the film industry. I am kind of getting tired of trying to explain why your generalizations are extremely wrong and stupid. But at the same time, I am also really tired of seeing people who listened to the commentary on a DVD one time try to pass themselves off as industry insiders.

Mnemosyne was talking about students in an MFA screenwriting program looking to get full-time writing gigs that would pay enough to make a good living. This is not something you can use to generalize about “the advantages of money and connections to get ahead in the film industry”. Most of the people I work with every day did not “come from money” and did not previously have connections within the industry. While I’d agree that it’s almost impossible if you’re really poor, don’t have access to a college education, have a family to support, etc, if you come from a middle class background, it’s really more about hard work and luck than having shitloads of money and insider connections.

What’s hard is getting a plum job straight out of school, if you opt to take the grad school path, which is just one of a great many possible ways to get into the industry.

You know how I got started working in film/tv? The bookstore I was working for to support myself through college closed, and we all got laid off. I ended up going on unemployment, and randomly found (via craigslist, not “connections”) a casual job doing filing and organizational stuff for a producer. For fun in my extra time, I agreed to come in for a week to help out on one of her projects. I worked my fucking ass off. By the end of the week, I was on the payroll. The rest is pretty much history. I hate to sound all “boostraps!” about it, but seriously, most people who work in film didn’t grow up in the lap of luxury, don’t lead glamorous lives, and are basically just like you except they know what a gaffer actually does.