Here's a fun fact to learn and shout, gleaned from the bfi monograph on L.A. Confidential, by your pal and mine, Manohla Dargis.
It begins as an aside:
Paring away Ellroy's narrative liberates Hanson, freeing him to lavish attention on the characters, to burrow into their heads and into their scenes, so that what matters isn't only that Bud beats other men for a living but the self-contempt which ripples across his face when he does. Or that when Lynn first invites Bud into her bedroom--her own, not the one she keeps for the 'suckers'--the book on her end table is M.F.K. Fisher's How to Cook a Wolf.
But then there's a note:
The title serves the moment nicely on several levels, not only because Lynn is about to cook her wolf, but because the late M.F.K. Fisher, Californian and food pioneer, was a woman of terrific creativity, fortitude and independence. Hanson owns the rights to Fisher's collected works. [emphasis mine]
How weird is that, people? What sort of film could he wring from Fisher's writing, and who would play her? Remember, for every Wonder Boys or The Crimson Petal and the White on Hanson's CV, there's a Losin' It or an 8 Mile.