Simon van der Borgh on Movies That Changed Your Life: Jungle Book, The Great Escape, E.T.

Join screenwriter Stuart Wright as he dives into movies that changed your life with filmmaker Simon van der Borgh, in this engaging episode of 3 Films That Have Impacted Everything In Your Adult Life. Explore Jungle Book analysis, The Great Escape influence, and E.T. impact on his personal growth and cinema’s transformative power. Simon van der Borgh also discusses writing the book for screenwriters SCENE-WRITING FOR FILM AND TV

Movies That Changed Your Life  

Find out about how and why Simon van der Borgh wrote the book for screenwriters SCENE-WRITING FOR FILM AND TV  and the lasting impact of cinema with Stuart Wright’s movie podcast.  

[1:40] Writing a book for screenwriters SCENE-WRITING FOR FILM AND TV

[37:04] 3 Films That Have Impacted Everything In Your Adult Life

Jungle Book Analysis 

[37:54] Simon van der Borgh shares how he saw Jungle Book at a drive-in cinema when he was living in Australia. How, at the age of 7/8 he could not understand why Mowgli would go to the village and not hang out in the jungle with Baloo. And how The Bear Necessities still makes him smile today.

The Great Escape impact 

[45:40] Simon van der Borgh shares memories of watching The Great Escape and how it evokes the time his family returned to the UK, living on a farm in Sussex. Mum would drive Simon and his three brothers to the ABC in Horsham for an afternoon double bill. They would then go home and act out the films they had watched. That’s where he fell in love with projected movies: “[the] power of the cinema and of scenes and of action and character.”

E.T. Influence  

[51:55] Simon van der Borgh talks about watching E.T. with his grandmother. She was 81 and he was a recent graduate and had run away from the farm to be in the theatre in London. They shared her one bedroom flat in Earl’s Court. They connected in the dark, in the ABC in the Fulham Road. Looking back he says “any medium that can … move a quasi-Marxist and an 81-year-old posh-bird who's basically seen it all. That is the magic of cinema.”

Key Takeaways:  

- Discover how movies that changed your life shape personal and professional growth.

- Learn about how Simon van der Borgh how and why he wrote the book SCENE-WRITING FOR FILM AND TV

- Understand cinema’s transformative power through Jungle Book (1967), The Great Escape (1963), E.T. (1982)

 - Full show notes and transcript: 

About the Guest:  

Simon van der Borgh is screenwriter and author known for is known for Forgotten Men, Lemon and These Final Hours.

His book for screenwriters SCENE-WRITING FOR FILM AND TV is out now https://www.routledge.com/Scene-writing-for-Film-and-TV/vanderBorgh/p/book/9781032277554?srsltid=AfmBOor7cqzQDZWK-LWHh0AtUz2SNkScdto9eHYwznigf7t42V6PnsK3

Get Involved: 

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Credits:  

Intro/Outro music: *Rocking The Stew* by Tokyo Dragons (⁠https://www.instagram.com/slomaxster/⁠) 

Written, produced, and hosted by Stuart Wright for [Britflicks.com](⁠https://www.britflicks.com/britflicks-podcast/⁠)  
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