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De Niro Seeks Science-Oriented Film Scripts

farrellj writes "According to this CBC story it seems that De Niro is looking for the next 'A Beautiful Mind, Memento or Good Will Hunting.' The script must have a scientist, mathematician or engineer as the lead charactor...And a finished script with synopsis and writer's resume must be in by Nov. 1. Submission info in the CBC story above. Now, who is writing the 'Cowboy Neal saves the world' script? "

14 of 341 comments (clear)

  1. Anyone remember this one? by grumpygrodyguy · · Score: 2, Interesting

    I think Deniro should try his hand at this one.

    Though Michael Douglas will be hard to surpass. Give the protagonist a Phd in computer science and this movie will be both current and relevant. Something most films are missing these days.

    --
    The government has a defect: it's potentially democratic. Corporations have no defect: they're pure tyrannies. -Chomsky
  2. DeNiro seeks OSCAR Vehicle by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 1, Interesting

    Thats really all this is. What do Beautiful Mind, Memento and Good Will Hunting have in common? They all cleaned up on Oscar night.

  3. Do the Feynman story by AxelTorvalds · · Score: 4, Interesting

    I could see De Niro doing a really good Feynman. Feynman was brilliant above and beyond the call of duty, had a fascinating life and was kind of quirky. I could see De Niro doing him pretty well, with that New York accent.

  4. Turing by 00_NOP · · Score: 4, Interesting

    Next year is the 60th anniversary of the most important battle in human history - Kursk.

    At every point in that battle the USSR's armed forces outwitted and out fought the Nazis. Now, that is because of the great skills and abilities of the Red Army and Red Airforce by 1943. But it is also because of the superior intelligence available to the allies as a whole - and one man, Alan Turing, is responsible for that.

    Kursk is little known and understood in the west - but it is worth stating this simple fact: it was the first time the Nazi blitzkreig was stopped in summer campaigning weather. It was a seminal event in human history that has been covered up by the cold war for too long.

    But better than that, it was the moment when scientific rationality (by which I mean the triumph of intelligence and not soime bizarre Stalinist idea of 'scientific socialism') triumphed over the will to power.

    There could be a great, epic, film here and I wish I could write it.

    1. Re:Turing by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 1, Interesting

      Actually Turing was persecuted and his life ended very sadly. Turing was homosexual, and had picked up a young (but not so young as to make Turing into a paedophile) man who robbed him. When he went to report the robbery the police decided that the fact that he had a young man to his house was more important to investigate than the fact he was robbed. The British government refused to assist him in his defense (his heroic code breaking was top secret back then). Turing was given "hormone therapy" which had horrible side effects, which combined with the shame, drove him to commit suicide. This was made into a Breaking the Code, a very good movie where Sir Derek Jacobi played Turing.

  5. Quake 3 - Shockwave Online Engine in 2.8mb.... by Komrade+S. · · Score: 2, Interesting

    ...got rejected AGAIN. For those who actually read things of value, visit the crazy bastards who made this thing here. Be warned that it is in alpha.

    --

    s200.org - visit it (me), love it (me).

  6. Flowers for Algernon by GuyMannDude · · Score: 3, Interesting

    Ha ha. Seriously, though, this might be a good time for a remake of that famous tale. The movie that exists ("Charly") is pretty laughable and dated in spots (like when he takes off for a cruise around the countryside on a motorcycle). And laboratory manipulation of living creatures is always in the news these days. Seems like the time is right for a well-done version movie version of that story. Can you imagine the power of a film that shows a good actor knowing that he's slipping back into his former self and being powerless to stop it. A good treatment could make a really chilling contemporary tragedy.

    GMD

  7. A Hawking film by GuyMannDude · · Score: 3, Interesting

    Why not just do a Hawking biography and be done with it?

    That could be a good film. I don't honestly know anything about his life story but 'getting to know him' and what he's accomplished through a movie might be a good way for people to stop thinking of him as that poor 'wheelchair guy' and see him as something more.

    GMD

  8. Alan Turing by x+mani+x · · Score: 5, Interesting

    Read this brief summary about Alan Turing's life.

    A serious, well written script documenting his incredible, tragic life would make A Beautiful Mind seem about as powerful as Pee-Wee's Big Adventure (not to knock Pee-Wee's Big Adventure - great movie, it's just no tour de force).

    1. Re:Alan Turing by Vertex+Shader · · Score: 2, Interesting

      Actually, the name of the move was "Breaking the Code". It's an excellent movie made in Britain with Jacobi as Turning. It's based on the book "Alan Turing: The Enigma" by Andrew Hodges and the play by Hugh Whitemore. Jacobi is definitely one of the most under rated actors living today, and his performance in "Breaking the Code" shows just how great he is. In movie he shows a man who really can think, unlike the shallow and unsatisfying performance Crowe gave in "A Beautiful Mind". Turning, who was homosexual in Britain during a time when homosexuality was considered illegal. He was arrested, trailed and found guilty of gross indecency. His reward for breaking the Enigma machine and turning the tide of World War Two was to undergo sex drug therapy. Eventually Turning took his own life by eating an apple laced with cyanide, and his role in history is gradually being forgotten.

  9. Re:It's just a gimmick by geoswan · · Score: 3, Interesting
    Films don't always fuck things up. In Infinity Mathew Broderick plays Richard Feynman when he was young.

    I'd happily pay to see De Niro playing an older Feynman. Did Feynman's role on the Challenger investigation have sufficient heroic elements? The poor guy was living with cancer during the investigation.

  10. My GOD, this is SUCH a SIMPLE answer by Zyrmfxl · · Score: 3, Interesting

    Want a pitch, a subject, and a title in one word? Okay...

    TESLA

    Most fascinating scientist in history, I think. Imagine Johnny Depp, in period costume, having a violent epileptic fit in Central Park, then half-consciously carving the diagram for the alternating current generator into the dirt with a stick. Then getting hounded by the government and lesser mortals the rest of his life, inventing everything of any consequence and getting no credit for it. Tragic story, Oscar material all the way.

    Read "Man out of Time," if you haven't. And shame be unto you, for not having read it yet.

    Potential tag lines: "The man who created the world," or "Never have so many owed so much... To one."

    Potential final statement, white words on black screen:

    "In 19XX, a federal appeals court ruled that Nikolai Tesla, and not Marconi, was the actual inventor of radio."

    (cross-fade)

    "The final Edison direct-current generator was taken offline in 19XX. No further experiment or trial in direct current residential voltage has ever been attemped."

    (cross-fade)

    "Fringe scientists continue to pursue Tesla's dream of providing free electricty to all peoples and places of the world via the Tesla Coil."

    (cross-fade)

    "The thousands of pages of handwritten notes produced throughout the final years of Tesla's life continue to be classified at the highest levels of secrecy ever assigned to any government document."

    (cross-fade)

    "It is extremely unlikely that any will ever be made public."

    --
    "Oh, well I'm sorry if you don't appreciate my random murders!" - Crow T. Robot,
  11. Re:Oh God by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 1, Interesting
    I'm sure they are wonderful to who ever hacks the pages, but they suck big time for people who use Internet Explorer

    Holy crap! I think somebody just had a realization that something they use might be an inferior product!
    Too bad you don't have the luxury of a free market where you can choose to use a better alternative!
    oh, wait...

  12. Re:Oh God by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 1, Interesting

    CSS was designed in order to allow the separation of the presentation of the content from the content itself. If you have ever worked on large web projects requiring different people to work on different areas (ie design, content, programming) you will have appreciated their beauty. And if you don't design for all browsers you shouldnt be designing at all.