That’s right screenwriters; it’s already NaScreWeaThiInstFiTriMo again.
Get inspired. Get motivated. Get writing. Psych yourself up like anyone who attempts a desperate shortcut that promises immediate results like losing 20 pounds on an all-poutine-and-gravy diet or learning a foreign language in just five minutes by listening to someone mispronounce bonjour at a Tim Hortons in rural Quebec over and over again. You too can pen a screenplay for a weak third installment in a film trilogy in just a month. Think The Godfather: Part III or Spider-Man 3 or The Trip to Spain.
Okay, that Steve Coogan vehicle was delightful and casually aspirational and all kinds of charming and there probably was no actual screenplay to speak of in that shaggy comedic riff-fest but writing often relies on the rule of threes, and a third example eluded us off the cuff, since we’ve really got to crank this thing out like right now.
Sure, we could do more research into the subject matter, but we’ve got to pound out this 120-page screenplay in just a month and have got to get it wrapped up like ASAP. It took us a month just to gather all our mortgage prequalification documents, but that was business, and this is art and art is definitely more urgent because people are totally waiting on tenterhooks for your artistic contribution to the world.
It’s got to be for a truly crappy and underwhelming conclusion to an otherwise artistically impeccable trilogy that will go down in the annals of cinema. (Ha, ha, ha, annals. Wait, strike that. No, leave it in to pad the word count but add a note to edit it out later because seriously.) We’ve got to descend from operatic emoting over Fredo’s heartrending betrayal to Andy Garcia perfunctorily whacking dudes on horseback at a parade. We’ve got to go from Alfred Molina’s soulful, tormented Doc Ock to Thomas Hayden Church pissing away the last grains of goodwill from his revelatory turn in Sideways like sand passing through an hourglass.
How am I supposed to pen this timeless masterpiece when I have to work 13 hours a day and then moonlight as an Uber chauffeur just to keep up with my mortgage and utilities in today’s wintry economic climate and maybe tuck my kids in for the night if I’m lucky? How can I…
SERIOUSLY, WE’VE GOT TO WRITE THIS RIGHT NOW GODDAMNIT! Seriously, where is my Monster Triple Espresso, my Crunk Energy Drink with 10 percent of my daily requirement of B vitamins and a “proprietary energy blend” that prominently features guarana and ginseng? Where is my liquid cocaine? Doesn’t Postmates realize I can sue them if they fail to provide the service I pay for?
Listen, NaScreWeaThiInstFiTriMo is all about disappointing easy marks who expected more but should have known better. The first film was almost great, the second chapter was legitimately great, and the third is an abject failure of a blatant cash grab. Take the cannoli and get the hell out before it all gets as stale as a week-old bagel.
But look, I’ve failed at mostly everything: personal hygiene, maintaining friendships, dancing with anyone other than myself at my own wedding, critiquing restaurants on Yelp, and not completely failing. If failing has taught me one thing, it’s that you should redouble your efforts—just more recklessly, dramatically and futilely than ever before.
Hollywood might reject my idea for Magic Mike 3: Magic Mike in Space. But what does Hollywood know other than how to make billions of dollars from thoughtless popcorn movies featuring archers and rageaholic, green professors who thrash around demi-gods with little effort and somehow unrealistically attained tenure?
