The sound and the fury: Quentin Tarantino threw a fit and filed suit when his script The Hateful Eight was leaked on the Internet. Too bad. He is one of the few filmmakers creating Westerns like his muses Budd Boetticher, Sergio Leone and Sam Peckinpah.
On the flip side, author Chris Enss (see profile in “Build Your Western Library”), shared that her book on Dora Hand, co-authored with Howard Kazanjian, Thunder Over the Prairie: The True Story of a Murder and a Manhunt by the Greatest Posse of All Time is in development with a famed creative trio of blockbusters, director Walter Hill, producer Frank Marshall and writing partner Kazanjian. Enss tells us that, at a recent script meeting, everyone was given a copy of True West to inspire the film’s authenticity and style.
Mongo rides again! In May, writer-director Seth McFarlane will release A Million Ways to Die in the West, the biggest Western comedy since Mel Brooks’s Blazing Saddles. Filmed in the Southwest, including Monument Valley (I promise, funnier than last year’s Lone Ranger) stars MacFarlane, Charlize Theron, Liam Neeson and Sarah Silverman, who will definitely not be mistaken for Gunsmoke’s “Miss Kitty.”
—Stuart Rosebrook
