Edge of Tomorrow

So, five-and-a-half years ago, at work, I was tasked with summarizing the book All You Need is Kill as a two-page treatment for our Hollywood office. At the top of it, I wrote "Groundhog Day meets Starship Troopers."

And that little fragment is the most widely read and cited piece of writing I've ever put down, or ever will.

I saw the movie again with my co-workers, yesterday. They liked it. I still liked it. The book is better, of course. But it was very strange, thinking back to my meeting with producer Jason Hoffs in a little side room of the office soon after starting at Team Rocket, and being asked "Do you have any good ideas for movies [from the books you're acquiring]?" And I said something like, "Ideas for good movies?" and he said something like "No, good ideas for movies."

But as it turns out, they actually made a good movie anyway. And in Hollywood terms, six years from Whatcha got? to acclaimed tentpole release, but there it is.

Of course the story this weekend is that The Fault in Our Stars, which is being pitched as an underdog-type small movie will likely beat Edge of Tomorrow at the box office. Surely it will, but from my point of view, the movie based on the book that sold four million copies is hardly an underdog when up against the movie based on a book that sold a couple tens of thousands of copies. Of course EoT's nut is larger, given the type of film it is, and everyone is gunning for Cruise's star to finally finish falling. But we are selling many many copies of All You Need Is Kill in all editions, and I've benefitted materially from this success, even if my role was largely limited to that damned sentence fragment.

So I guess it is a good weekend.