NY Times has a nice piece on Aline Brosh McKenna, screenwriter of “the BlackBerry 3”:
McKenna’s solution to romantic-comedy fatigue is not to ironize the genre or make fun of its characters’ (and therefore its audience’s) quests for fulfillment, but to give them what they want: a great guy and a great job, a happy family and professional success. In “I Don’t Know How She Does It,” Pierce Brosnan may seem like a straightforward object of desire; in fact, as McKenna sees it, his character is especially seductive in that he alone recognizes the heroine’s talent. “He embodies the work recognition she hasn’t gotten until then,” McKenna said.
Because movie stars and directors are more visible, we rarely look at a screenwriter’s credits as being part of an overall package. It’s nice to see an article paying attention to more than just the movie headed to theaters next month.
McKenna’s produced films are thematically unified in much the way Kevin Smith’s or Woody Allen’s are — with the same type of protagonist answering the same category of question. Regardless of the director, her movies feel like her movies.
In failure, screenwriters are pigeon-holed. In success, they’re branded.