These days, we see plenty of indie directors/writers who write/make a couple of smaller films, then getting hired by the likes of Marvel Studios, Warner Bros-DC, Lucasfilm, etc. Ryan Coogler made Fruitvale Station and then Creed before proceeding to make Black Panther. Rian Johnson gave us Brick, The Brothers Bloom and Looper and then zoomed off to the galaxy far far away and helmed Star Wars: The Last Jedi. The same can be said about Christopher Nolan and Taika Waititi. This isn’t a bad thing by any means. In fact, I love it when these “smaller” filmmakers with singular visions go on to make bigger, epic fantasy films. One would also guess that it’s a dream job for a lot of filmmakers.
However, the writers of the absolutely impeccable horror film, A Quiet Place, have other things in mind. In an interview with MovieWeb, the in-demand screenwriting writing duo — Scott Beck and Bryan Woods — discussed their recent trip to Lucasfilm and how they turned down the opportunity to pen Star Wars and Indiana Jones screenplays to focus on creating original ideas. Scott Beck said:
“We went into Lucasfilm in the wake of A Quiet Place and they wanted to talk to us about Indiana Jones and Star Wars. And we’re like, ‘We wanna talk to you about what is Star Wars before it was Star Wars? You guys have a responsibility to start a new franchise. That’s where our hearts have always been, just trying to create original ideas.
Without giving away too much it was simply ruminating on if we did an Indiana Jones movie, what would we want to see in Indiana Jones? Or if we did a Star Wars movie, what’s that chapter of the whole universe that we would want to see? So it very much was an open canvas talk. It started going down the line a little bit but, again, as Bryan said, it’s just not our DNA. We would rather create what the next ‘Indiana Jones’ could be.”
Admittedly I would love to see Beck and Woods write a screenplay for a Star Wars film and put their own unique twist on it. However, seeing as how we live in an era of reboots, remakes and sequels, writers with the mindset like Beck and Woods are exactly who we need right now.
