James Ellroy and Hollywood

Scott Timberg at the LA Times has a cool overview of a favorite of mine, James Ellroy, covering the difficulties the writer has had with Hollywood…and vice versa. While LA Confidential did well, at least with the critics, others of Ellroy’s works just haven’t translated.

Only the most die-hard Ellroy fan resented that the film resembled his labyrinthine novel — with its dozens of characters, thick historical context and overlapping subplots — only slightly. It’s considered one of the finest films of the ’90s and one of the greatest film noirs since the genre’s 1950s heyday.

But since then, when it comes to movies, it’s been more crying than laughing for Ellroy fans.

Read the article at “Hollywood’s James Ellroy enigma”

A new film opens a week from today (April 11th), for the first time with a screenplay by Ellroy himself: Street Kings. Very interesting cast: Keanu Reeves, Forest Whitaker, Hugh Laurie, Chris Evans, Common, and The Game.

See also: James Ellroy at IMDB.