King of Hollywood

Chapter 88: Chapter 88: The Youngest Director Nominee@@novelbin@@

“I have never encountered such a situation where, when I try to describe someone, I actually don’t know where to start. This is a very peculiar person, also a very wonderful person, I have never had a conversation with him face to face, I always like to look for the characteristics of directors in their work. But this time is an exception, I watched his three films several times over and failed to find any connection between them, which is really surprising.

Simply put, it’s as if the three films were shot from three completely different perspectives, with absolutely no interference with one another. We know that many directors have their own style, and no matter what genre of film they make, one can usually find some traces of other works. But in ‘Memento’ you won’t see the slightest connection to ‘Lock, Stock and Two Smoking Barrels’, and similarly in ‘The Shawshank Redemption’ you won’t see the shadows of the first two films.

I often wonder what kind of person the youngest ever Oscar-nominated Best Director might be, his three works are like three completely unrelated people’s productions. When I got to know a bit about his background, I felt even more perplexed. Just two years ago, he was nothing but a debauched playboy—yes, in the literal sense. Adrian Cowell’s father, Geoffrey Cowell, had been the president of a company and died in a plane crash four years prior, sending Adrian spiraling into the bar scene. However, after two years of such a life, it was as if he suddenly woke up, picked up the director’s megaphone, and achieved astonishing results.

We all know that so far he has made three films, we also know he is Hollywood’s fresh and genius director, but I believe many people have probably overlooked how much time he spent on making films. According to my research, ‘Lock, Stock and Two Smoking Barrels’ started filming in June of ’90, and then the film participated in the Venice Film Festival in August; ‘Memento’ started filming in November of ’90, and then participated in the Berlin Film Festival in February of ’91; as for ‘The Shawshank Redemption’, it started filming in April of ’91, and although it wasn’t released until the end of October, post-production was already completed by the end of August!

God, no director has ever had such efficiency, right? In addition to that, all three films earned high box office revenue, and both ‘Memento’ and ‘The Shawshank Redemption’ received quite high acclaim, while ‘Lock, Stock and Two Smoking Barrels’ might not have been as acclaimed as the latter two films, its clever editing still won plenty of applause.

Frankly speaking, I hadn’t seen ‘The Shawshank Redemption’ before the Oscar nominations came out because of his previous two films, I thought this was another similar movie. Only now do I realize what I almost missed out on, this film reminded me of all the hardships I encountered when I was a junior reporter 8 years ago, if not for holding on to hope, I wouldn’t now be sitting in front of the typewriter typing these words for you. Can you believe it? He created this film in only 4 months or even less!

The theorem that quality is inversely proportional to speed doesn’t seem to apply to Adrian, at least I also know that before ‘The Shawshank Redemption’ was released, he had started production of his fourth film, and even invited Al Pacino to play the lead role; moreover, immediately after completing this new film, he started production on his fifth film… Can his energy never be exhausted?

This is too astonishing, two years ago a playboy who knew nothing, but two years later received an Oscar Best Director nomination, and within these two years, three of the four films he made were successful, how many people can achieve this?! Well, if you think that’s still not enough, according to the information I’ve got, many of last year’s high-grossing films were written by him, such as Warner’s ‘The Bodyguard’ or Universal’s ‘Scream,’ among others.

When I put all this information in front of myself, I zoned out for a full 5 minutes, I really can’t imagine what kind of person he is, how did he do all this? I think he shouldn’t be called a genius, he should be called a marvel, if possible, I hope he will accept my interview.”

— Haggis Painter, “The Washington Post”

With the announcement of the 64th Oscar nominations, Hollywood suddenly captured the public’s attention; this year’s Oscars unexpectedly nominated ‘Silence of the Lambs,’ a thriller-horror film, for 8 major awards, including Best Picture, Best Director, Best Actor, Best Actress, Best Adapted Screenplay, and others, and Judi Foster and Anthony Hopkins’s exquisite performances were thus universally favored by critics. Will Foster win Best Actress again? Can Hopkins win Best Actor with less than 30 minutes of screen time? These are all matters of great interest.

However, the strong presence of ‘Silence of the Lambs’ caught quite some attention but was not the most focused on; the most attention was on ‘The Shawshank Redemption’ and its director, Adrian Cowell!

‘The Shawshank Redemption’ was nominated for 8 major awards at this year’s Oscars, including Best Picture, Best Director, Best Actor, Best Supporting Actor, Best Adapted Screenplay, Best Original Score, Best Editing, and Best Cinematography! This is definitely an impressive achievement, and Adrian himself also received nominations for Best Director, Best Adapted Screenplay, and Best Editing. One can imagine how surprised people were. But what surprised them even more was Adrian’s personal history.

Before the report by Haggis Painter, the chief entertainment reporter for ‘The Washington Post’ came out, people’s impression of Adrian was just that of a prodigy director who produced three successful films—he did a good job of keeping a low profile in front of the media.

But after the Oscar nominations were announced, people discovered that this 24-year-old man had become the youngest Oscar-nominated Best Director candidate—unfortunately, the original youngest Best Director nominee, John Singleton who was twenty days younger than Adrian, was pushed out of the spot—in addition, he also received nominations for Best Adapted Screenplay and Best Editing, which was quite astonishing.

And after Painter’s report was released, this sense of astonishment was suddenly magnified countless times. A debauched playboy who frequented bars two years ago, suddenly took up the director’s megaphone and started directing, and produced three films in a row, not only did each movie sell well at the box office, the last one was nominated for 8 major Oscars just like ‘Silence of the Lambs,’ furthermore, he also wrote ‘The Bodyguard’ and ‘Scream,’ his filmmaking process is exceptionally short, his first two films also achieved success at the Venice Film Festival and the Berlin Film Festival, this… this is too magical, isn’t it? This is simply a fantasy novel!

Public interest in Adrian suddenly surged by scores of percentage points.

(Keep recommending~)