"Sideways" man visits the 'Dub

Well, there's no way around it. This website is slowly turning into one of those "This is how my day was..." personal blogs. I didn't want this to happen! The good news is that today, I did something cool...AND film-related! Jim Taylor, a screenwriter who had won an Academy Award for co-writing the movie "Sideways" with Alexander Payne, visited UNC-Wilmington to entertain our questions and give us some pointers.

I got to ask him if he thought that "Sideways," out of the four films he's written with Payne ("Citizen Ruth," "Election," and "About Schmidt" were the others), was the one screenplay he thought deserved an Oscar. He gave me some insight into how the Oscars work. Basically, he believes that it's good enough to be one of the five nominees honored by the Academy. The fact that they actually have to decide a winner who is better than the other four is just to get people interested in the ceremony and to watch it on television. Well, I will have to say that I was extremely interested at this year's ceremony, not only when "Sideways" took home Best Adapted Screenplay, but when "Eternal Sunshine of the Spotless Mind" won for Best Original Screenplay!

The lecture ended with Taylor showing his new short film, which he wrote and directed, entitled "The Lost Cause," about a Civil War buff trying to regain custody of his only son. Taylor has made a deal with Paramount to make the story into a feature-length that, like the short film, will be shot primarily in Wilmington, North Carolina! After the film ended, Lou Buttino, one of the Film Studies professors here, presented Taylor with a gift from the UNCW Film Department: a cheap merlot! (If anyone's seen "Sideways," you get the joke.)

Well, I'm off to see "Sin City." I'll tell you how it was on the next episode of Jump Cut. Have a great weekend!

"You always go in with a plan.
Then, you change your plan."
--Jim Taylor, on making movies