Penguin July 3rd, 2009
The Guardian has an article by Paul Schrader (Taxi Driver) on the Exhaustion of Narrative.
Writers have always known there are a limited number of storylines. Christopher Booker’s Seven Basic Plots popularised the number seven, but others have argued for three, 20 and 36 basic plots – Rudyard Kipling said 69… That’s not what I mean by the “exhaustion of narrative”. What is new is the omnipresence and ubiquity of plot created by media proliferation. We are inundated by narrative. We are swimming in storylines.
[...]
What does it mean? For a storyteller, it means that’s it is increasingly difficult to get out in front of a viewer’s expectations. Almost every possible subject has not only been covered but covered exhaustively. How many hours of serial killer plot has the average viewer seen? Fifty? A hundred? He’s seen the basic plots, the permutations of those plotlines, the imitations of the permutations of those plotlines and the permutations of the imitations. How does a writer capture the imagination of a viewer seeped in serial killer plot? Make it even gorier? Done that. More perverse? Seen that. Serial killer with humour? Been there. As parody? Yawn.
[...]
The bar of originality has been raised. The media marketplace puts a premium on anything “new” or “fresh” and, at the same time, inundates its viewers with continual and competing narratives.
I’ve been wrestling with this issue of originality as I work on The Intern Project but I try not to get too caught up with it. Because it’s easy to make excuses that become barriers to the actual writing process.
You look at the latest blockbusters, Star Trek, Transformers 2. One is a great film, the other is trash. But neither of them are particularly original. But you can still make something entertaining.
This is also why it’s so important to watch a lot of films. See what’s been done already and see what’s entered the cultural narrative. Especially in the same genre that you’re writing in.
-Penguin
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Tags: Narrative, Paul Schrader, Screenwriting, Storytelling
Penguin June 29th, 2009
We just finished the first draft of the scene breakdown for The Intern Project. A scene breakdown is just a outline of every scene in the script focusing on who’s in it and what the central action is.
We had come up with the major story beats first, so we wrote up the breakdown for that. There was still a lot more stuff that we need to write to fill in all the gaps leading from beat to beat. So we just brainstormed for each episode, seeing what would be interesting or funny.
Then we started plugging the scenes that didn’t necessarily have to do with the overall plot into the scene breakdown. We were working over GoogleDocs, which made the process really hard. It was tough to see where the story was front heavy, back heavy, or just had holes.
Even though it took some time, we printed out the whole breakdown, cut it up into strips so we could move everything around physically. This was a great way to visually see how the story was progressing and what areas needed addressing.
We took notes and went back to the GoogleDoc and manually synced it to the strips. Then we went through and addressed all the notes we came up with.
This was the first time I’ve done a scene breakdown before and thought it was a great way to think through the entire script. Invariably, we started moving into some expanded scene breakdown territory with some of the more complicated scenes.
Now we’re going to go through and work on the expanded scene breakdown. This should take a few days, then we can finally get started on the script. We gave ourselves a deadline of July 7th, but I’m not sure if we’re going to be able to make it. It’s a lot of work between here and there.
I’ll keep you posted.
- Penguin
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Tags: Projects, The Intern Project
Penguin November 10th, 2008
Last night, I finished Save the Cat by Blake Snyder. I found this nifty tip on his blog.
The following can be used to help organize your logline or just focus your idea before you begin writing.
On the verge of a STASIS=DEATH moment, a FLAWED PROTAGONIST has a CATALYST and BREAKS INTO TWO with the B STORY; but when the MIDPOINT happens, he/she must learn the THEME STATED, before the ALL IS LOST, to defeat (or stop) the FLAWED ANTAGONIST (from getting away with his/her plan).
-Penguin
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Tags: Loglines, Screenwriting, Structure
Penguin September 4th, 2008
I was over at DVXUser the other day and read this comment:
Pick two or three dozen great screenplays and style copy them. What I mean by this is re-write them by hand–verbatim. This will help you see how the pros do it VIA YOUR OWN WRITING MECHANISM: your frontal cortex, your hand, your pen.
In 2004, after reading an article by Rob Tobin I did this exercise. I decided to make an investment in my writing career by “wasting” two months on style copying. Believe me, it works. The end result is that you take the best features of each script and create your own distinct style. Okay. Enough said.
- Kylekmd
I’ve never heard of this exercise before, but it kind of makes sense. I’m going to give it a try. I should really be reading more screenplays anyway, but find it hard to have that discipline. This will force me to sit down everyday and do some diligent homework.
If you’ve done this or know people who have, let me know how it went.
-Penguin
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Tags: DVXUser, Exercises, Screenwriting, Style
Penguin August 5th, 2008
I came across this document about story structure over at DVXuser. It’s basically a collection of notes from a variety of Truby, Vogler, Hauge, Snyder, Howard, Iglesias, Seth, Gulino, Williams, Marks & Chitlik.
It’s a great resource for any screenwriter. Not only does it go through the basics of story structure, it provides handy visuals and references. It has lists of virtues and vices, questions to ask your character, and common screenwriting vernacular. It even has a handy checklist to help you with your rewrites.
Download it.
-Penguin
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Tags: Character, Downloads, PDFs, Rewrites, Screenwriting, Structure
Penguin June 25th, 2008
Everything in movies is fake. That’s understandable considering the nature of the medium. But in order for a story to work, it needs to be believable. That’s where knowledge comes into play. This is especially true when you look at your premise.
Take Iron Man for example. The key to powered armor is energy. The solve this problem early on with the mini arc generator. They don’t even bother explaining how the arc generator works because if they did, all the engineers would be able to poke holes in it. Just by telling us, and then showing us that it generates massive amounts of energy is enough. We buy it.
Then you look at something like Untraceable. The premise is a killer who can’t be traced through the internet. Even basic understanding of how the internet works would show that it could never happen.
But “reality” is different in every movie. Something that could work in Star Wars may not work in Apollo 13 because they have different rules because they exist in different universes. Certain things like physics, math, etc, are still true because we accept them as universal. But there are aspects that we believe because we understand that Star Wars is a fantasy.
The moment your audience says, “No way!” with disdain, you’ve lost them. Any credibility you’ve built is out the window and they’ve written off the entire film. This is especially true with your premise. If no one will believe your premise, you’re fighting them the whole way.
So do your research. Make sure you stuff makes sense so your audience will believe the lie.
-Penguin
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Tags: Apollo 13, Audience, Research, Screenwriting, Star Wars, Untraceable
Penguin June 10th, 2008
I’m used to the whole concept of screenplay structure. You have 3 acts, hero’s journey etc. But what if there was an underlying formula that could tell if your script would be good or not? It seems like they’ve done just that. Created a formula for the blockbuster.
Dick Copaken and Nick Meaney created Epagogix, a neural net that guesses how much a movie will take in at the box office. The most interesting part about the article, is that even if the software can identify areas where a script can be improved, it still needs a writer to improve it. What else is interesting is that it doesn’t seem to care about structure at all. The software seems to care about details.
At the center is the creation of art is the question, “Is there a basic formula?”
“Beauty is no quality in things themselves,” the eighteenth-century Scottish philosopher David Hume wrote. “It exists merely in the mind which contemplates them; and each mind perceives a different beauty.”
But Hume had a Scottish counterpart, Lord Kames, and Lord Kames was equally convinced that traits like beauty, sublimity, and grandeur were indeed reducible to a rational system of rules and precepts. He devised principles of congruity, propriety, and perspicuity: an elevated subject, for instance, must be expressed in elevated language; sound and signification should be in concordance; a woman was most attractive when in distress; depicted misfortunes must never occur by chance.
Granted, there may or may not be a formula for the blockbuster. Even if there is, you still have to write it. But how can we use this knowledge to improve our writing? We watch great films and ask, what makes it great? We watch terrible films, and ask, what makes it suck? Most importantly, we live life so we can find those memorable moments. Build up our library of small stories that we can link together to make something great.
-Penguin
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Tags: Filmmaking, Money, Structure
Penguin May 15th, 2008
Filmmaker Magazine has an old but fantastic article on “development“.
The first half goes through and discusses the Hollywood system and how writers are undervalued. Granted, this was written in 1995, and having no experience in the system, I wouldn’t be able to say if it’s still accurate. But based on the way business moves, I would imagine it being about the same.
Towards the end, there are some great tips and guides on how to edit screenplays from a producer or director standpoint.
For the producer
- Treatments and outlines are usually a waste of time.
This applies to original spec scripts, not necessarily book adaptations or remakes. I know as a writer, I find a very general plot outline very helpful as a guide when I’m writing. But I try not to let it guide me too much. My final work ends up being fairly different from my outline. Her point is that the process of writing is a journey. Often times, as you flesh out ideas, the path and destination of the journey changes.
- First Drafts.
First drafts are the initial thoughts and ideas that the writer has put down on paper. The expectation shouldn’t be that it’s great, but a starting point. From the writing side, the first draft is usually the worst. Not because it’s the first thing that you’ve written, but because all those fresh and interesting ideas are no longer fresh or interesting. That’s because they’ve been written and you’ve read them a couple hundred times.
- Call the writer as soon as you’ve read the first draft, before you talk to anyone else about it.
The idea is to give the writer feedback right away. I know when I finish a draft I want SOMEONE to read it right away. Someone I can trust to be critical and point out the good and the bad.
- How to talk to writers.
Always give praise to the good things. Gush about it, because there are going to be plenty of things you’re going to tear down. This builds up the emotional quotient so they’ll push on with the script. Our egos are fragile, and as much as we like to think we can take it, it hurts when you tear into that one scene that we just absolutely LOVE.
- Editing the first draft.
I like my notes on the page, in the margins. When I go through and make my changes, I’m going to go through page by page. This helps me from having to refer to a separate sheet of notes. Comments about your initial thoughts, what you liked about it, what you didn’t like. But I like questions. Usually these questions arise because something in the script is confusing or something needs clarifying.
- Editing the second draft.
Talk through every scene with the writer. Find his motivations and intents. This may help you clarify your own thoughts. Also be sure to mark which parts are good and shouldn’t be changed. The tendency is to go and kill everything after this draft.
There are a few more tips, but I found these the most useful.
-Penguin
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Tags: Editing, Screenwriting
Penguin May 7th, 2008
John August has a fantastic post about learning how to write story structure:
My advice for you is to dedicate one day a week to disassembling good movies. Take existing films (and one-hour dramas) and break them down to cards. Think of yourself as an ordinary mechanic given the task of reverse-engineering a spaceship. Figure out what the pieces do, and why they were put together in that way.
Here are the questions you need to ask about each scene or sequence:
- As the audience, what am I expecting will happen next?
- What does the character want to do next?
- Is this a good moment to let the character achieve something, or knock him back?
- How long has it been since we checked in with other character and subplots?
- What would have happened if this scene had been cut? Or moved?
By asking these questions about other people’s movies, you can take some of the pressure off.
[...]
I think you can keep making breakthroughs in your writing, but only by challenging your preconceived limitations.
This is great advice for any novice/intermediate screenwriters. I know I’ve been struggling with the same question. Now to actually get to writing.
-Penguin
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Tags: John August, Screenwriting, Structure, Tips
