James Hrynyshyn is a freelance science journalist based in western North Carolina, where he tries to put degrees in marine biology and journalism to good use.
An editorial in the current edition of the journal Nature suggests we science types take advantage of the writers' strike. It does this under the headline "A quantum of solace," stolen from the next Bond flick. The headline's a stretch, and so is the editorial itself, but hey...
Here's the essential bit:
Scientists often complain that they can never change the way that science is portrayed in films, which seems as if the screenplays are written on a planet with different laws of physics. But, to quote an earlier Bond film, never say never. Indeed, today is a propitious time for such intervention. The Writers Guild of America has been on strike since 5 November. Its members want a better deal in relation to online and other relatively new distribution channels. And boredom among these picketing scribes may well be at an all-time high -- a recent update on the strike from The New York Times was headlined 'For Strikers, the Agony of Spare Time'.So all you scientists who just happen to work in the LA area, take heed: now's your chance to spare us all from another piece of dreck like The Core.What better moment to saunter down to your local picket line, gather up a couple of film and television writers, and introduce them to the fascinations of the scientific life? Buying them a round might not hurt either; some of them have taken a serious financial hit.
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Comments
Problem is, one of the major writers on The Core already had a Physics Degree.
He's got a hell of a good blog though. :)
Posted by: Left_Wing_Fox | January 31, 2008 12:39 PM
Wait, you mean actual writers were involved in that movie? No way!
Posted by: Moopheus | January 31, 2008 10:36 PM
So all you scientists who just happen to work in the LA area, take heed: now's your chance to spare us all from another piece of dreck like The Core.
I liked the Core. Science and Fiction in one! Also, it was nice to see scientists portrayed as not only highly educated, caring people, but also very civil, polite, and cooperative, ( at least to some degree! LOL).
Dave Briggs :~)
Posted by: Dave Briggs | February 1, 2008 10:20 AM