Do you have a spare $495? Don’t need to spend it on the things that the rest of us do, like food, and rent, and Criterion Collection Blu-Rays? Well, it turns out you can be the proud owner of a copy of an unpublished, unmade screenplay by the great Terrence Malick. A helpful reader (thanks!) pointed us towards an item on eBay that appears to be called “The English-Speaker,” and dated 20 October 1992, credited to one “Terry Malick.”
And while you might question the authenticity of the particular script floating around for sale on eBay, but the project is very real, albeit an old one about profound mental illness.
A blog devoted to the director reported that the script was about the famous psychoanalysis patient Anna O, who was really an Austrian-Jewish feminist named Bertha Pappenheim. Following the death of her father, she became a patient of Josef Breuer, and was featured as a case study in his book “Studies on Hysteria,” co-written with Freud. Among her symptoms were “absences” — a change in personality, accompanied by “profoundly melancholy phantasies…sometimes characterized by poetic beauty.” She also suffered from language disorders, able only to understand German, but speaking English, French or Italian.
We’ve passed the hat round here at The Playlist in the hope that we might be able to place a bid, but all that most of us have in our pockets are knives and lint, so we’ve come up short. Hopefully, whoever does pick it up will somehow persuade Malick to actually make the thing… Oh and if you do happen to pool your resources and buy it, be sure to scan it and send it to your friendly neighborhood Playlist who tipped you off to its existence in the first place.
The rights issue with The English-Speaker is more complicated than you've been led to believe. Before his falling out with Geisler and Roberdeau (who were underwriting development of English-Speaker out of pocket), they inherited the rights to the project (they outright own it, not just an option)… They've since had loads of financial trouble and refuse to sell the rights back to Malick, so don't expect to see it any time soon.
That said, thanks for the tip-off. Derf will be acquiring this script 🙂
You could try a kick-starter campaign. Ask around twitter for an invite.
Too late, sir. The original first draft (per the ebay seller's online store) and the auction draft have been purchased 🙂
Damn, that was fast. Don't forget to scan, save and fwd. 🙂
There are others out there.
When I was working for an international distribution company in the early 90's, we had a Malick script come through. It was more a curiosity at the time — everyone was very focused on locating the next "Total Recall' or "Basic Instinct." I don't recall the title but as I remember it was about 2 men (brothers perhaps), one wealthy and successful and one broke and homeless. At the time, I loved me some arty drama scripts (I was a big champion of "The Piano" which ultimately found a home elsewhere) but the Malick script was really on the nose and clumsy. If there was a great film there, it was in Malick's head and not on the page.
"it was in Malick's head and not on the page."
generally the case, no? Dude shoots thousands of miles of footage trying to express a deep-seated emotion he's got deep down inside.
So I tracked down the name of the Malick script that came through the office in the early 90's: "Countryman" (alternately titled "Hungry Heart")
Guess you don't have that one either, huh?