We Wrap Up Elmore Leonard with a Double Feature of Get Shorty (1995) and Be Cool (2005)

This week we wrap up Elmore Leonard month with a double feature of 1995’s Get Shorty and its sequel from 2005, Be Cool. These two are night and day as far as how they handle their respective book adaptations and once again we hear about how studio involvement changes a film into something completely different than it set out to be.

Barry Sonnenfeld’s Get Shorty nails the Elmore Leonard tone with its quick wit, effortless humor, and crime-laden story. Be Cool, however, takes that cache and throws it out the window. Director F. Gary Gray says that what we see on the screen is not the same film that he signed up to do—for one thing the original script’s R-rated content was pared down to an eventual PG-13. It’s another example of the importance of a script above all else.

We break both of these films down in this episode, and once again Mike has read the books on which they’re based, so he offers some great insights into just how far afield Be Cool went from the source material.

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