Biografia

Wrote a screenplay for Wolverine - L'immortale (2013) which Darren Aronofsky was set to direct. After Aronofsky's departure from the film, McQuarrie's screenplay was heavily rewritten and his name was removed from the credits.

He was hired by frequent collaborator Tom Cruise to do revisions to the screenplay for Mission: Impossible - Protocollo fantasma (2011). McQuarrie's work was originally given a shared 'written by' credit. This was evident in the first trailer for the movie. However, the Writer's Guild of America removed McQuarrie's name from any writing credit by the time the movie was released on December 16, 2011.

Had written considerable amount of dialog for the character Harold Longbaugh in the cult action film Le vie della violenza (2000). However, Benicio Del Toro suggested the "less is more" approach and had him cut down his lines.

Had done an uncredited rewrite of the screenplay for the sci-fi action film X-Men (2000). He chose not to have his name on the credits as he felt that the screenplay was mostly the vision of David Hayter.

Won the Independent Spirit Award for Best Screenplay in I soliti sospetti (1995).

Action to me is something very fun to shoot.

Oh my God, you look at all the uniforms in Star Wars, and it's all Nazi iconography.

I believe that as a writer and a director, you're only providing the skeleton of a character, and you're hiring actors to fill it out.

While I was a voracious moviegoer as a boy, I never put writing and films together in my mind.

A lot of books, if you take them at face value, they're just not gonna work as films.