John Logan is Hollywood’s hottest scriptwriter of the moment, “a true author who creates from scratch in an era of sequels and adaptations… As with much in Hollywood, however, the honors mask a more complicated reality, [with Logan standing] on the shoulders of others who contributed material and either received no credit or have had to fight for recognition in a dog-eat-dog scramble for a place on the film. And his rise to the top – in which Mr. Logan was caught up in a spat over his contributions to The Last Samurai – appears to illustrate a cardinal rule of contemporary film writing: success depends on the fine art of positioning, as well as a way with words.”