Just like with Oscar ballots I'm weighting these with #1 as my top choice and so on down the list.
1. Drive - Written by Hossein Amini from the James Sallis novella
Bernie Rose: I used to produce movies, in the eighties. Kinda like action films, sexy stuff. One critic called them European. I thought they were shit.
2. Tinker Tailor Soldier Spy - Written by Bridget O'Connor and Peter Staughn from the John Le Carre novel
George Smiley: He's a fanatic. And the fanatic is always concealing a secret doubt.
3. Submarine - Written by Richard Ayoade from the Joe Dunthorne novel
Oliver: Jordana and I enjoyed an atavistic, glorious fortnight of lovemakin'; humiliatin' teachers and bullying the weak. I have already turned these moments into the Super-8 footage of memory.
4. Moneyball - Written by Aaron Sorkin and Steven Zallian, based on Michael Lewis's non-fiction book
Billy Beane: I asked you to do three.
Peter Brand: Yeah.
Billy Beane: To evaluate three players.
Peter Brand: Yeah.
Billy Beane: How many you'd do?
Peter Brand: Forty-seven.
Billy Beane: Okay.
Peter Brand: Actually, fifty-one. I don't know why I lied just then.
5. The Skin I Live In - Written by Pedro Almodovar, based on the novel by Thierry Jonquet
Marilia: The things the love of a mad man can do.
More Worthy Screenplays
All the action is in the original category this year. The bench for adapted is pretty thin. Ides of March had some killer monologues, and when The Descendants was good it was very good, but still, nothing else comes close to the ballot.
More 2011 Ballots
I was also a big fan of We Need to Talk about Kevin's script. I was cool on the film as a whole but there were several strong elements in it and the screenplay was one. Because the novel is really wordy and structured very differently, I actually don't think it's an easy adaptation, but I like how they visualized what was so verbal in the book. If there was one film, aside from Drive, that really exemplified the term 'language of cinema' it was this one.
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