Benioff also wrote a draft of the Wolverine movie, which is being directed by Gavin Hood.
All roads lead back to Jake!
From the interview:
CS: Did you get a chance to spend some time with Jim Sheridan beforehand?
Benioff: I did and we were working together pretty intensively right up until the deadline, which was a great experience. I was working with Tobey Maguire, Jake Gyllenhaal and Natalie Portman and that was also a lot of fun. 
I wonder if Benioff was present for any improv - I know a lot of writers who would hate their words being messed with!
"It's tricky because obviously we all support the writers and the strike," Portman said, "but Jim's style of directing is that we improvise a lot. We're doing that and hoping that's not infringing on anything. We're not allowed to have any rewrites. Jim's in the Writers Guild, so he's obviously not doing any rewrites."
How cool would it be to observe Jake sitting around and improvising? I would love to see that part of the creative process.
It will be interesting to see how The Kite Runner performs at the movies. It has a built-in audience and some name recognition, so if it's good, I hope it escapes the Rendition fate. One of the things I loved most about Rendition was that Fatima and Khalid's story was in Arabic. It added to the authenticity and the drama, made you pay attention. And gave me a real appreciation for the beauty of Arabic. We should do a post on Rendition, which was just criminally ignored and criticized, IMO.
But back to the kites! In connection with the movie, Jake and other celebrities autographed kites to raise money for the Afghanistan Relief Organization:
I love Jake's exhortation to FLY. I don't love the kite's design, though. Happily, it looks like the kid in The Kite Runner has a nicer kite to fly.
