December 16: Happy Birthday Shane Black

https://lebeauleblog.com/2016/12/16/december-16-happy-birthday-shane-black-and-liv-ullmann/

Shane Black, who turns 55 today, has credits as a producer, director and actor, but he is best known for his accomplishments as a writer. His screenwriting credits include The Last Boy Scout, The Last Action Hero, The Long Kiss Goodnight, Kiss Kiss Bang Bang, and The Nice Guys. But all of these have similarities, to varying degrees, to the first script he wrote, shortly after he graduated from UCLA—an action film, with a fair amount of comedy, and with a pair of protagonists who bond as “buddies” over the course of the movie:
https://youtu.be/aKojFoPzQoQ

With Lethal Weapon, Black didn’t personally invent the modern “buddy movie,” but he certainly laid out a lot of the standard elements of the genre. Starting with Kiss Kiss Bang Bang he has moved into directing; he also directed Iron Man 3 and this year’s The Nice Guys. He is currently working on The Predator, a “re-imagining” of the franchise as opposed to a reboot; a rather fitting assignment since one of Black’s most significant acting roles was as Hawkins in the original Predator.