Christopher Nolan (Memento)

The narrowest of all the races, this is the fourth of four categories to be decided by a single vote. Memento's main strength is its relatively unique structure, so its win in this category is not surprising given its strong overall performance in this group. Equally dependent on its script was The Royal Tenenbaums, so while the extreme closeness of the race here could probably not be predicted, it makes a lot of sense given the Best Picture results. With such a high amount of voting points concentrated on just two nominees, it makes sense that the remaining entrants in this category would see lower scores. The Lord of the Rings fared more poorly than it did in the film and direction categories, since it was more a triumph of design and execution rather than the existing text from which it was taken. Amélie's clever and elaborate romantic constructs carried it to fourth place, while David Lynch's fever dream of a re-constructed TV pilot was able to grab the fifth spot.

Top Five
Screenwriter(s)	Film	Total Points
Christopher Nolan	Memento	255
Wes Anderson and Owen Wilson	The Royal Tenenbaums	254
Fran Walsh, Phillipa Boyens and Peter Jackson	The Lord of the Rings: The Fellowship of the Ring	113
Guillaume Laurant	Amélie	111
David Lynch	Mulholland Drive	76

Candidates receiving first place votes
Screenwriter(s)	Film	Number of First Place Votes
Wes Anderson and Owen Wilson	The Royal Tenenbaums	6
Christopher Nolan	Memento	5
Guillaume Laurant	Amélie	2
Fran Walsh, Phillipa Boyens and Peter Jackson	The Lord of the Rings: The Fellowship of the Ring	1
Alejandro Amenábar	The Others	1
John Cameron Mitchell	Hedwig and the Angry Inch	1
Guillermo del Toro & Antonio Trashorras & David Munoz	The Devil's Backbone	1
Kendrew Lascelles	Focus	1
Pascal Bonitzer & Christine Laurent & Jacques Rivette	Va Savoir	1

Other screenplays receiving votes
Ken Nolan and Steve Zaillian (Black Hawk Down), Akiva Goldsman (A Beautiful Mind), Julian Fellowes (Gosford Park), Baz Luhrmann and Craig Pierce (Moulin Rouge!), Daniel Clowes and Terry Zwigoff (Ghost World), Joel and Ethan Coen (The Man Who Wasn't There), Dan Gerson and Andrew Stanton (Monsters, Inc.), Cameron Crowe (Vanilla Sky), Steven Spielberg (A.I. Artificial Intelligence), Ted Elliott, Terry Rossio, Joe Stillman and Roger S.H. Schulman (Monsters, Inc.), Kevin Smith (Jay and Silent Bob Strike Back), Stephen J. Rivele, Christopher Wilkinson, Eric Roth and Michael Mann (Ali), Michael Frost Beckner and David Arata (Spy Game), Helen Fielding, Andrew Davies and Richard Curtis (Bridget Jones's Diary), Emmanuelle Bernheim, François Ozon, Marcia Romano and Marina de Van (Under the Sand), Andrew Bovell (Lantana), Karen McCullah Lutz and Kirsten Smith (Legally Blonde), Ted Griffin (Ocean's 11), Richard Linklater (Waking Life), Sean Moynihan, Peter Farrelly and Bobby Farrelly (Shallow Hal), Brian Helgeland (A Knight's Tale), David Siegel (The Deep End), Jerry Komolowski and Mary Olson (The Pledge), Gerald Di Pego (Angel Eyes), Brad Kaaga ("O"), Louis Mellis and David Scinto (Sexy Beast, Alan Cumming and Jennifer Jason Leigh (The Anniversary Party), William Goldman (Hearts in Atlantis), David Mamet (Heist)