Richard Shepard Tagged Articles at Cinematical

For years, critics have defined films in terms of their directors, but every so often someone comes out with a book or an article in defense of screenwriters. And a recent book argues for a brand new auteur theory putting screenwriters in the spotlight. Considered one of the world's greatest screenwriters, Jean-Claude Carrière's name appears on one current film, Goya's Ghosts (13 screens). It's one of over 100 produced screenplays he has written, and what's more, he has never had to turn director to protect the integrity of his work (he has one directorial credit, shared, for a 1986 film L'Unique that didn't exactly make or break his career). This is a guy who will never have to worry about his name in the history books. But let's take a closer look.

For one thing, Goya's Ghosts is messy and uneven. Then there's the fact that most of Carrière's films never find United States distribution. On top of that, the vast majority of his work is adaptations of novels. Finally, I think it's safe to say that his reputation rests on the fact that he generally works with acclaimed directors. To go one more, it's probably fair to say that the majority of his entire reputation rests on the six films he wrote with Luis Buñuel from 1967 to 1977. This is not to say that Carrière is a bad writer: on the contrary. Some of his films since Buñuel have been very good, notably Philip Kaufman's The Unbearable Lightness of Being (1988) and Jonathan Glazer's misunderstood Birth (2004). I'm using this case to point out the trickiness of ranking and cataloging screenwriters and their films. Certainly they deserve much more credit and respect than they get. But where do we start?

Above, you'll find the first three minutes of Richard Shepard's (The Matador) new film The Hunting Party, starring Richard Gere, Terrence Howard and young Jesse Eisenberg. In the flick, Gere plays a journalist who teams up with his old cameraman (Howard) and a TV exec's son (Eisenberg) to hunt down an infamous war criminal named The Fox -- who also happens to have a $5 million bounty on his head. In his review of the film, our own Jeffrey M. Anderson said The Hunting Party "wants to know why the U.S. has been unable to find certain outlaws, when just about any civilian with a passport, the price of a drink and a line of B.S. can do it. But instead of grousing or hand wringing, it becomes a spry, surprising and intelligent comedy." Personally, I loved Shepard's last flick, The Matador, and based on these first three minutes, it looks like the guy has finally found his groove, his style, and, along with the right scripts, some fantastic actors. Additionally, you can also listen to James' interview with Shepard here. The Hunting Party is now in theaters.

Since World War II spawned its share of war-themed movies, both direct and indirect, it's only natural that our era does the same, especially given that the Iraq War has gone on for several years now. A lot of movies over the past four or five years have dealt with the attacks in New York, soldiers in war, prisoners of war, and endless variations on these and other themes. Even the recent Western 3:10 to Yuma, hidden underneath its character-driven gun slinging, has a little something to say about the occupation. Most movies tackle their subject head-on, such as the numerous documentaries of the past few years and films like United 93 and World Trade Center as well as war films about other eras like Letters from Iwo Jima and Days of Glory. How refreshing, then, to see a movie like Richard Shepard's The Hunting Party, which has on its mind the topic of war criminals still at large. It wants to know why the U.S. has been unable to find certain outlaws, when just about any civilian with a passport, the price of a drink and a line of B.S. can do it. But instead of grousing or hand wringing, it becomes a spry, surprising and intelligent comedy.

The movie is told through the point of view of a TV news cameraman nicknamed Duck (Terrence Howard), who once worked together with reporter Simon Hunt (Richard Gere) in any Third World war zone worth covering. Their lives together were dangerous and exciting. They dodged explosions, drank in dive bars and romanced local girls. But when the tragedy got to be too much for Simon, he melted down on the air, effectively ending the relationship. Duck has since been promoted to a highly paid New York studio job, while Simon works for increasingly desperate TV stations so far off the radar that he eventually disappears. For the five-year anniversary of the end of the war in Bosnia, Duck, a polished TV anchorman (a perfectly cast James Brolin) and a network executive's son, Benjamin (Jesse Eisenberg), arrive to cover a routine press conference. Simon is also there, and he convinces Duck to help him cover the story of the decade: finding an infamous war criminal known as The Fox (Ljubomir Kerekes) with a $5 million bounty on his head.

How do you make a comedy about a hideous Civil War? Are TV journalists automatically 'sexier' than print journalists? How much time does a director have to devote to 'method hair'? What's it like filming in a Holiday Inn pockmarked with bullet holes? And is it easier, or harder, to make a movie with the suits from the studio an ocean away? Cinematical had the chance to speak with director and writer Richard Shepard about The Hunting Party, his follow-up to the Sundance breakthrough hit The Matador. The Hunting Party stars Richard Gere, Terrence Howard and Jesse Eisenberg as three journalists of wildly varying experience and wildly varying ethics who choose to search for a notorious Balkan war criminal -- but are they looking for the story, or for something more? Articulate, animated, and never ambivalent, Shepard spoke with Cinematical in San Francisco; you can download the interview right here.

Best known for the film Speed, Jan de Bont has signed on to direct another action-packed thrill-ride called Stopping Power. Pic will revolve around a single father on vacation with his daughter and girlfriend. When the RV they're traveling in gets hijacked, the father finds himself wrapped up in a high-speed police chase across town, forced to act as a decoy in the getaway car.

Damn, talk about a crappy situation: One minute you're enjoying some Wheat Thins in the back of your RV, and the next you're being chased by the cops, wanted for a crime you did not commit and your family is missing. Sure, it gets you out of cleaning the RV's septic (tank? pipe? bag?) for the day but, personally, I'd clean that bad boy with a toothpick if it meant I would avoid going to prison.

Du Bont is also behind such films as Twister, The Haunting and, most recently, Lara Croft Tomb Raider: Cradle of Life. Richard Shepard (The Matador) will be doing the rewrite off an original script penned by Eric Red. No word yet on the casting front, though I'm sure you will hear the name Keanu Reeves tossed around quite a bit. However, I could see Paul Walker landing this kind of gig.

The Weinstein Company bought the rights to Jeff Abbott's Panic just about the time it was published last summer, but it's only just now worked its way to the top of their to-be-made pile. The book is an incredibly Alias-esque thriller about Evan Casher, a young documentarian with a hot girlfriend and a promising career. Everything is going well until he goes to visit his mother and finds her murdered, and is nearly killed himself. It turns out - here comes the Alias part - that his entire life has been a lie, and that both of his parents (dad's missing) were secret agents of some sort. In order to stay alive, he apparently undergoes some sort of only-in-the-movies (and novels) transformation from film nerd to super-agent; it's a role that's obviously crying out for Matt Damon.

The screenplay is currently being written by Richard Regen, whose only IMDB credit is as an executive producer on the Barry Sonnenfeld TV show Secret Agent Man (hey, at least he's got some background with the subject matter), and The Matador's Richard Shepard has been tapped to direct. According to Shepard, the movie will be "a very stylish 1970s-type paranoid action thriller...Something that's smart and visually inventive." While that sounds quite tasty, I think I once heard someone say exactly the same thing about Remo Williams: The Adventure Begins, so it's probably best to just wait and see.