CS Weekly Archive > From the Trenches > 9/12/08

Two for Two:
Righteous Kill's Russell Gewirtz

By david michael wharton

With the second script he ever wrote becoming his second produced screenplay, screenwriter Russell Gewirtz talks to CS Weekly about this weekend's Righteous Kill.

Two and a half years ago, CS Weekly interviewed writer Russell Gewirtz on the eve of the release of his first produced screenplay, Inside Man…which also happened to be the first screenplay he'd ever written. Now, the second screenplay he wrote is becoming his second to be produced: this weekend's crime thriller Righteous Kill. Not a bad record for someone who hadn't given any serious thought to writing as a profession until the idea for Inside Man came to him while on vacation in Brazil.

Righteous Kill stars Robert De Niro and Al Pacino as veteran cops investigating a series of murders and dealing with the baggage of too many years spent immersed in death and degradation. Here, two-for-two Gewirtz talks with CS Weekly about his love of twists, and why his late discovery of writing has become an ongoing passion.

While we endeavor to avoid specifics, the following article may contain minor spoilers for Righteous Kill, so proceed with caution.

Where did this idea come from?
Whenever I have a good idea for a movie, usually I have the set up and the beginning and what the ending is. I fill in everything in the middle. Inside Man was exactly that. Right at the end of Inside Man, this idea popped into my head about—I don't want to give too much away, but I knew how the movie would start and I knew how it would finish. I was inspired by another film that I'm not going to mention. There was a movie that came out about seven or eight years ago that did modest business and sort of disappeared. It wasn't all that good, but it had a nice, clever hook going on. I don't think anyone but me would see the similarity.

What was your hook into expanding the idea?
It's really about the storytelling device. Everything else serves that. The first draft I wrote, these two characters were almost the same guy. They had everything in common. A close friend of mine said, "You really need to differentiate these guys." By the next draft, that really became what the movie was about for me, about two cops who come from exactly the same place, who do the same job, and who ultimately turn into two extremely different people. The script analyzes two different ways to deal with all the stuff cops have to deal with.

Were the structural conceits of the opening confession tape and the ongoing therapy sessions something you started with or something that came along later?
That was always part of it. I think I'm a one-trick pony, because I did that in Inside Man and I'm doing it again. I like to play around with the idea that somebody's telling a story today about what happened before and you can sort of guide the audience's viewpoint of events through that.

Having done a third-act twist in Inside Man, were you conscious at all of not wanting to get boxed in as just a "twist writer"?
I think the problem is that that's where my inspiration always seems to come from. I will sit through a movie and watch paint dry for an hour and a half if at the end of it there's an "Oh my God" moment. That's what inspires me when I watch a film. So, when an idea like that comes into my head, that's what I follow. When studios come to me and say, "We have a movie about a guy who does this, blah blah blah, and then that happens," and they don't really know how it pays off in the end, very often I say, "Look, I'm not the guy for that type of storytelling." I do it backwards. I look for that moment at the end. Where do I start and how do I get there?

What is it about crime storytelling that keeps bringing you back to that genre?
I don't know. In general, those are the kind of movies I like to watch. Movies that are set in reality, with bizarre things happening in the real world. I love movies like Transformers and Pirates of the Caribbean, but I don't think I could write them. I don't get hit with ideas like that. Their characters are great, but they're not characters I know; they're not real-world characters. The Trump Heist project I wrote for Brett Ratner and Imagine, it's about janitors at Trump Tower, and then, you know, wealthy tenants. There's a dynamic I feel comfortable with. I'm generally writing about people who have their feet on the ground, go to work every day. I tend to stick in the real world, and in terms of getting movies made, that's going to tend to be crime stuff.

The script makes use of what I call the "a-ha flashback montage." Since so many movies have utilized this same storytelling technique, was there ever any concern about using it again here or is it just a necessary evil?
I actually really enjoy that part. My touchstone film is The Usual Suspects. I absolutely love that film, I've seen it a hundred times. To me it is almost flawless. They end with one of those where they throw back all the things where you looked one way and it turned out to be something else, so I don't really see that as a bad thing. Inside Man has a little bit of that; you read my script for Righteous Kill and there's a ton of it. It's not really on the screen. I'd say the finished-product movie is less about my ending and more about keeping you interested all the way through.

In the draft I read, the characters of Rooster (Pacino) and Turk (De Niro) are considerably younger than in the film. Did you have to make any changes to the script, since you now have two cops that are theoretically at a different point in their careers than the younger cops you wrote initially?
Not really. We thought about the casting for about five minutes and thought, "De Niro, we'll deal with this." The interesting thing is that what the movie is about is two cops who have been on the force too long and are screwed up by it, so all we really did was take two guys who had really been on the force too long. We changed a few lines about how long they'd been on the force, etc., but in my opinion it served the ultimate purpose of showing what are guys like who have been doing this for, now it's 30 years instead of 20.

Anything you learned during the Inside Man experience that you were able to carry over to Righteous Kill?
Not exactly. My experience on Inside Man was phenomenal. I got to work with and observe the best in the business. Spike Lee is a consummate professional. Whether you get along with him or not, he's a guy who wakes up at 4:30 in the morning, goes to the gym, and starts working at 6:30. Every single day we got every shot we needed, and he brought it in on time and under budget. Denzel Washington, Jodie Foster , Christopher Plummer, it's amazing. This was almost lightning striking twice. De Niro, Pacino, they've done it all. I've learned more lessons now that I've had two experiences.

So what have you taken away from both of your films that you'll apply to future projects?
At the end of the day, every single person working on a movie is a human being. Some you'll get along with; some you won't. Some know what they're doing; some don't. Some care; some don't. Until you're Steven Spielberg, who knows that every single person he's working with is a pro who's worked with him for 10 movies, you have to collaborate, you have to compromise. You have to accept that it's an imperfect process, and you have to be happy as long as the finished product is pleasing to an audience. Of course, like everybody else, I want the power. I'd like to direct one of these days, when I'm ready.

You came late to writing. Having done two movies now, what is it about writing that appeals to you?
I definitely have a passion for it. I've said this before: it's the one thing in the movie business that you can go ahead and do without getting anyone's consent or permission or cooperation. It costs literally zero money to write a movie. It's the only entry into the movie business that you can wake up one morning and decide to do. Even reaching the point where I'm at—yeah, I've increased my lifestyle, and to some extent I've become a prisoner of that, but that's a conscious choice. If I wanted to, I'd be free to wake up one day and do nothing and wake up the next and say I'm gonna write another movie. There's tremendous freedom being a writer, and I love it.

Do you keep any kind of regular writing schedule or is it whenever you have the time?
I wish [laughs]. It's really scattershot. I go through three different phases. There are times when I'm not writing at all. Like right now, I'm not working on anything for anyone, and I'm not focused on writing one of my own things. I have a house I bought that I'm renovating, so that saps all my creativity. There are times when you're working on something when you have to force yourself to sit down and do it. And then there are times, like with Inside Man and Righteous Kill, where I had the inspiration, the story stayed with me 24 hours a day, and I was constantly writing, even if I wasn't sitting at my computer. There'd be moments where I'd be in the shower and I'd grab the towel and run to my computer to write something down. Those are the best moments.

David Michael Wharton is the managing editor of CS Weekly and a contributing editor of Creative Screenwriting. In a suprising third-act twist, he will eventually be revealed to be a sled.


Righteous Kill courtesy Overture Films

From the Trenches
Working screenwriters discuss in their own words a particular aspect of screenwriting, from the mechanics of writing to the personal and professional impact that writing has had on their lives. > VIEW ARCHIVE

The Big Picture

Features that cover all aspects of screenwriting, from our "Seven Best" lists to analysis of old favorites and new classics. > VIEW ARCHIVE

Weekend Read
Film, book, web site and technology reviews from a writer’s perspective. How can these items help a writer on his or her journey, or make that journey more enjoyable? > VIEW ARCHIVE

DVD Review of the Day
DVD reviews from a writer’s point of view. What aspects of this script and features of this DVD illuminate the writing, development, and storytelling process? > VIEW ARCHIVE