It has always bothered me that screenwriters are left out
of the credit for famous quotes. For instance "Here’s looking at you kid," or "Put
your lips together and blow," are almost always credited to the actors
or even referenced as the movie directed by "so and so." Even worse,
some movie theatre chains throw quotes from famous films up on screen prior
to the previews
and NEVER credit the screenwriter.
Where is the screenwriter?! Do you have any
feelings about this? Does the
Writers Guild of America take a position on this?
–Robert
Although I am not an official spokesperson for the WGA in any way, I can safely
say they’re against it. They’re probably even outraged. But in the whole pecking
order of guild priorities, it’s certainly quite low.
Personally, I feel it’s always wrong to quote an author without giving credit.
It’s also wrong to bring a four-year old to an R-rated movie, but it happens
so much I’ve given up being angry about it. For better or worse, I’ve become
complacent about a lot of things that used to really piss me off.
If you feel like becoming an activist for this issue, you might direct your
first missive to the good folks at National Cinema Network (www.ncninc.com),
the company that actually creates and markets most of those pre-show slides
you see. While you’re getting them to properly attribute their movie quotes,
would you also get them to make their jumbles harder? It’s a little insulting
to have to decode a famous movie star when given "M O T S A N K H."