The Mind of a Madman | |
Reality BitesGood news: The industry is similar to a bank. If you want a loan
the bank needs to be guaranteed that you are worthy of an investment.
Bad news: The industry is worse than a bank. Why? Because breaking even or little profit in Hollywood is not good enough. You need to take someone else's money...albeit a ridiculous sum of money...and return a huge profit to become a legitimate player. It's just what it is. Why take a chance on your unconventional script, when I can spend money on a guaranteed (recycled) story and see immediate and large profits? My advice would be similar to what I'm trying to do. Cover all bases. Write your Hollywood scripts and your independent and very personal ones. Try to get the indies made yourself, and try to market the Hollywood ones for sale. A true writer writes. So get cracking and cover all your bases. - J. Lean and MeanI realize it's been a while since I last posted, but I can happily say I've been hard at work prepping for my next short film to be shot this Fall. The title is Repentance, and the logline is as follows:Logline: A mysterious wanderer seeks the confession of an old priest, whose ultimate secret turns out to be his greatest sin. The challenge for me will be to capture the visions that I see in my head on film. (Or in this case miniDV) Which leads me into what I'd like to talk about. Description. How much should we describe as writers without going over the top with our description? From my brief experience, I believe we should capture just enough to allow the reader a glimpse into the world of our story. Not so much that we lose sight of the story, but just enough that it allows the reader a freedom to add their own details to the mix. In short, readers are the directors of our stories. They should be left to feel as if they are the production designers of our words. Often times I'll use descriptive words to convey a mood. (i.e. the dark curtains, rather than the black curtains) Anything that will enhance the experience and thrust the reader into the atmosphere that we are trying to create, but will also allow them choices to expand upon what we have laid before them. Another example of too much description is the infamous direction of actors. There's nothing worse than a play by play description of what the actor should be doing on screen. Actors must feel as if they too are free to play and make creative choices when interpreting our words. A screenplay with too much direction (as in Alex pauses. Shrugs his shoulders. He squints at her for a moment. Takes a deep breath. "I don't know.") tends to drag and oftentimes can be simplified by the dialogue without the excess direction. So try to be lean when writing. Give just enough that the story moves forward at a nice clip, but provide enough that the reader understands the setting and is drawn in to the world of your story. This in another of the perennial battles we must face in the creation of a solid screenplay. But hey, nobody said it would be easy. Good luck, stay up, and keep writing. - J. The Beat SheetJust thought I'd take a minute to discuss a method that I find works for me when developing my plot structure. For anyone that's heard of a beat sheet, I use my own variation to flesh out the events in my story.I start out with a document highlighting the very basic of story concepts. The Beginning...if known, the End...if known, and I work from there. I step out everything in between these two ideas little by little, expanding the document with every action on its own separate line. Ex: Minority Report Pre-crime Arrest Jon Anderton sees his future - Murderer Set up by boss Anderton proves his innocence etc., etc. I'll add to each moment the more I begin to flesh out every concept. For instance, I ask myself, how does his boss set him up? When I come up with my solution, I step it out and add extra beats to the list. Pre-crime Arrest Jon Anderton sees his future - Murderer Turns out his boss erased ECHO/Minority Report Hired someone to lie about killing Anderton's son Anderton proves his innocence You get the idea. After I step out what I feel is a strong plot for my story, I mark the top of the list as Page 1 and the end of the list as Page 120. (or page 90 depending on my aspirations) From there, I mark the halfway point as Page 60. I then use this as a page count guide so that I don't stray too far from my goals. I even go a step further and break up the first half at the Page 30 mark, and the second half at the Page 90 mark...etc., etc. At this stage, I allow myself to include any dialogue that comes to mind. I don't want to stifle myself when creativity strikes. I often find myself writing what the subtext of the scene will be, allowing me to come up with the dialogue during the actual writing phase. Doing this allows me to fly through the writing process later on, having already done the bulk of the story work in the storyforming phase. I hope this makes sense. This technique has allowed me to develop several stories at once, knowing that upon completion, the screenplays will write themselves, so to speak. Try it if you ever feel stuck on a story. Let me know if it works for you. Good luck and keep writing. - J. { Last Page } { Page 2 of 4 } { Next Page } |
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