From Wire Reports:

"Director Gus Van Sant is moving production of his latest film from Portland to New York. The movie, titled "Last Days" is a look at the Northwest's grunge music scene in the mid 1990s, with Michael Pitt starring as the lead singer of a Nirvana-like band."

BOOOOO! There go my dreams of being an extra in a Hollywood production. All I wanted was to be immortalized for all time on celluloid. Was that asking for so much, Gus, especially after I paid to see "Elephant" AND "Gerry"?

Overlooking my crushed hopes and the fact that Van Sant brutally stomped on my dreams with his ice cold jack boots, this is still a terrible decision. A film focused on the NW film scene by an NW director moved to NYC on the heels of a high-profile casting call in SE Portland? Talk about bad form. Gus, you just lost your NW cred. for a second time, bucko.

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I didn't make it to the second round of Project Greenlight. BOOOOO!

I'm not surprised but losing to screenplays like "The Good, the Bad and the Living Dead" and "My So Called Dysfunctiona Family" stings like a bee dipped in gasoline. On the other hand, the two scripts I gave glowing reviews didn't make the cut either.

If my lil' script had advanced, I'd probably be heaping praise on the contest. Since I lost, I obviously have no other recourse than to take lambaste it. The problem with Project Greenlight is that contestants review each other's scripts in the first stage. It's like allowing participants in a beauty contest to rate each other's cheekbones. An obvious strategy in both instances would be to trash as many other participants as possible while hoping they cut you a break. In short, PG is the online equivalent of a feeding frenzy.

Worse yet, any reviewer is going to have a hard time taking context and merit into consideration, especially given the partial circumstances. People tend to like what they like. One of the scripts I read was basically Blink 182 fan fiction. In it, a trio of 8th graders run around SoCal expressing their love for "the best band in the whole wide world!" For what it was, the script was good but I still had a hard time giving what I consider tripe a decent review.

I guess I can take comfort in the assumption that those that reviewed my script must have felt it was a threat to their own chances. PG's review forms allow a space for feedback which goes back to the author. The most common criticism my script received is "not much happens." I guess my reviewers never saw a little film called "Lost in Translation," which recently won an Oscar for you know what. Hrumph!

I played fair with other's screenplays while my little baby was torn apart by dingoes. I'm not sure if I want to participate in next year's contest, especially given the new registration fee. If I do, to quote Beavis, "the streets will flow with the [pages] of the nonbelievers!"