It surprises me, talking to folks who are new to screenwriting, how many of them don't have a movie in their head. If you don't see a film, how are you going to make anyone else see it? They are telling a story, not creating a film. This often becomes clear if you ask them - what is character y doing while x and z are talking here? Or some other detail about something they put in the room and then left alone. They aren't *seeing* the scene.
Of course, I've always imagined somewhat cinematically. Even my most abstract poems (with the exception of a couple of grad-school literary cut-up experiments) run in my head as a short film. And I can tell you what every detail of each frame looks like.
Then there's the other sticking point - once you have the movie in your head, knowing how much to put down on paper to evoke those images in another person's head. Most of us have been told enough times not to overwrite that it's less common to see an overly florid screenplay than one which chooses such generic descriptions/dialogue that they flatten out and the flavor of the imagined story is lost. You can do a lot with the flavor of the language, rather than endless description - something I learned from poetry.
Yes, the language of a screenplay is stripped down, basic and straight-forward. That doesn't mean it can't be evocative. Your hero can walk down a wet street, or they can splash through the wet grime of rain-slicked asphalt.
My signature on Triggerstreet is: "Don't tell me the moon is shining; show me the glint of light on broken glass..." (Chekhov) and it illustrated perfectly what I mean. The moon may be shining, but what we see is the glint of light...and that piece of glass can add to a threatening or a down-trodden tone, depending on context.
Every word matters, every word is a chance to evoke the movie you see, in your reader's head.
Showing posts with label writing process. Show all posts
Showing posts with label writing process. Show all posts
Creativity and Decisions
So, I have an idea. I think it's a really good idea. It falls into a sub-genre of thrillers I think of as daddy-daughter flicks, in which a father must rescue or revenge his little (often teenage) girl.
The problem I'm having is that I have an abundance of ideas about how to approach it.
I know who the main character is. I know who his antagonist and con-tagonists are. I know what the ending is, and I know everyone's motivations.
That still leaves me with a HUGE range of creative choices. I could write two or three complete screenplays based on these characters in this situation and have them be distinctly different.
The first dillemma: how much backstory do I front-load?
I could open with the scene of what happened to this man's daughter, showing just enough but leaving out some details that would be revealed later. The main character has suppressed parts of this event, but is also driven by it.
Or, flash back to it a few times as he encounters the individuals he's seeking revenge on, and as he remembers more. A little of this will happen regardless, because of the memory issue, but flashbacks are so tricky, perhaps they are best left alone. They seem natural to this storyline, but perhaps the audience will be more involved, and the structure will be simpler if I go with the first option.
Another approach: only hint at the event, dropping information through conversations and confrontations, without ever really showing it. I *could* even do this combined with the first option - showing very little in the opening scene, through the protag's faulty memory, and then hinting through the reactions of others that there was much more to the story
None of those are bad choices. Honestly, I love the third approach - not even showing the event, but teasing information about it through each scene, until we have a good idea - but never a 100% complete one...I'm just not sure my craft is strong enough to make that work on the page without being confusing. It's a problem I've had before.
The other major dramatic choice I'm making is between two basic approaches to the story. Make it a standard thriller-hunt type film like Taken? Or a mostly-single location psychological drama like The Negotiator and Albino Alligator?
The hunt has terrific possibilities for chase scenes, big set pieces, and lots of great cathartic torture them for info then blow them away moments. Basically, he knows where one of the people he's hunting for is, and uses them to get to the next one, leaving a trail of carnage and attracting the attention of the police. The pacing would be fast, and the story would be visceral.
The second option - have most of the people he's hunting gathered in one location, where he secures them and isolates them, then confronts each of them for information about the "truth" and the location/identity of the person who is really responsible for the bad thing that happened. Again, I lean toward this, but it's trickier to keep it interesting and tense.
Of course, I could actually write two screenplays...but since I've not written any (feature-length) scripts in a while, I think I'd better focus on just one!
The problem I'm having is that I have an abundance of ideas about how to approach it.
I know who the main character is. I know who his antagonist and con-tagonists are. I know what the ending is, and I know everyone's motivations.
That still leaves me with a HUGE range of creative choices. I could write two or three complete screenplays based on these characters in this situation and have them be distinctly different.
The first dillemma: how much backstory do I front-load?
I could open with the scene of what happened to this man's daughter, showing just enough but leaving out some details that would be revealed later. The main character has suppressed parts of this event, but is also driven by it.
Or, flash back to it a few times as he encounters the individuals he's seeking revenge on, and as he remembers more. A little of this will happen regardless, because of the memory issue, but flashbacks are so tricky, perhaps they are best left alone. They seem natural to this storyline, but perhaps the audience will be more involved, and the structure will be simpler if I go with the first option.
Another approach: only hint at the event, dropping information through conversations and confrontations, without ever really showing it. I *could* even do this combined with the first option - showing very little in the opening scene, through the protag's faulty memory, and then hinting through the reactions of others that there was much more to the story
None of those are bad choices. Honestly, I love the third approach - not even showing the event, but teasing information about it through each scene, until we have a good idea - but never a 100% complete one...I'm just not sure my craft is strong enough to make that work on the page without being confusing. It's a problem I've had before.
The other major dramatic choice I'm making is between two basic approaches to the story. Make it a standard thriller-hunt type film like Taken? Or a mostly-single location psychological drama like The Negotiator and Albino Alligator?
The hunt has terrific possibilities for chase scenes, big set pieces, and lots of great cathartic torture them for info then blow them away moments. Basically, he knows where one of the people he's hunting for is, and uses them to get to the next one, leaving a trail of carnage and attracting the attention of the police. The pacing would be fast, and the story would be visceral.
The second option - have most of the people he's hunting gathered in one location, where he secures them and isolates them, then confronts each of them for information about the "truth" and the location/identity of the person who is really responsible for the bad thing that happened. Again, I lean toward this, but it's trickier to keep it interesting and tense.
Of course, I could actually write two screenplays...but since I've not written any (feature-length) scripts in a while, I think I'd better focus on just one!
Freedom, Structure & Creativity
Recently, I stumbled on "another bored college student" blogging that she "really want(s) to write a screenplay," but she is
There's the popular-with-youngsters idea that free writing is truly creative, because it's free. If I read a novel and there are chapters that don't serve the overall purpose in some way, I get frustrated. In poetry, each stanza (each word) should be relevant and appropriate. Free writing is useful only in diaries and exercises - not for anything intended to be communicated to others.
But more than that is the complaint I came across often among poets when I was studying writing in college: that form and structure, that limits in general, were antithetical to creativity. In fact, the opposite is true. Limits engender creativity.
Interesting and original art typically comes from the streets, the poor, the oppressed. The people who have the most limits. People whose time, resources, and even daily activities are the most circumscribed.
Interesting and original art creates it's own form, where a form did not exist.
In grad school, I found that wrestling an unformed thought into the bindings of a sonnet, villanelle, or pantoum forced me to exercise my mind in a way that free form poetry does not. Giving it those limits forced me to be more careful with my phrases, and allowed me to play the language against the structure in ways that created meaning that is not possible in free verse. The form allows you to draw attention to specific words by their placement, and to tie one word or stanza to another - through the form - and create layers of meaning. You build layers, like a good wall (or a cake!), and repetition gives it strength. Or like passes of ink over a silkscreen, the color intensifying each time it's pushed through the form.
If you really want to write a screenplay, you want to write something that is identifiable as a movie. Movies have certain specific limits, and the limits of narrative in that medium also create opportunities for creativity. Where else can you have image and reaction? Where you have the complexities of visual storytelling possible in painting paired with the dynamism of movement? Where you can contrast an image or action with sound and create meaning from that? And yet, yes, it has to have a story. It has to have a beginning, middle, and an end. It has to make sense to others. And there's no point in having scenes that, well, don't have a point.
If you really want to write a screenplay, you also have to want to write something that reads well on the page. That does not ramble, that does not turn inward, and that does not waste time on anything that is not the movie. That is tight, and neat, with lots of white space.
If you really want to write a screenplay, you want to write something that moves, on the page. That the reading of it takes you on the journey - whether it's a stroll, a dance, or a hard run. The structure of the segments and scenes, of the short dialogue and brief descriptions are kinetic. Good screenplays use the limits of the medium to create an experience on the page that moves.
Creativity does not end with formula and structure. Creativity rejoices - because like water flowing in a river, it only gets to sing when it passes over the stones.
so used to free writing which is a better fit for novel writing. Screenplay writing is very specific and every scene needs to have a purpose and function to the pace and story as a whole. So by definition it's more of a formulaic writing than free flow writing. It sucks the creativity out of it.
There's the popular-with-youngsters idea that free writing is truly creative, because it's free. If I read a novel and there are chapters that don't serve the overall purpose in some way, I get frustrated. In poetry, each stanza (each word) should be relevant and appropriate. Free writing is useful only in diaries and exercises - not for anything intended to be communicated to others.
But more than that is the complaint I came across often among poets when I was studying writing in college: that form and structure, that limits in general, were antithetical to creativity. In fact, the opposite is true. Limits engender creativity.
Interesting and original art typically comes from the streets, the poor, the oppressed. The people who have the most limits. People whose time, resources, and even daily activities are the most circumscribed.
Interesting and original art creates it's own form, where a form did not exist.
In grad school, I found that wrestling an unformed thought into the bindings of a sonnet, villanelle, or pantoum forced me to exercise my mind in a way that free form poetry does not. Giving it those limits forced me to be more careful with my phrases, and allowed me to play the language against the structure in ways that created meaning that is not possible in free verse. The form allows you to draw attention to specific words by their placement, and to tie one word or stanza to another - through the form - and create layers of meaning. You build layers, like a good wall (or a cake!), and repetition gives it strength. Or like passes of ink over a silkscreen, the color intensifying each time it's pushed through the form.
If you really want to write a screenplay, you want to write something that is identifiable as a movie. Movies have certain specific limits, and the limits of narrative in that medium also create opportunities for creativity. Where else can you have image and reaction? Where you have the complexities of visual storytelling possible in painting paired with the dynamism of movement? Where you can contrast an image or action with sound and create meaning from that? And yet, yes, it has to have a story. It has to have a beginning, middle, and an end. It has to make sense to others. And there's no point in having scenes that, well, don't have a point.
If you really want to write a screenplay, you also have to want to write something that reads well on the page. That does not ramble, that does not turn inward, and that does not waste time on anything that is not the movie. That is tight, and neat, with lots of white space.
If you really want to write a screenplay, you want to write something that moves, on the page. That the reading of it takes you on the journey - whether it's a stroll, a dance, or a hard run. The structure of the segments and scenes, of the short dialogue and brief descriptions are kinetic. Good screenplays use the limits of the medium to create an experience on the page that moves.
Creativity does not end with formula and structure. Creativity rejoices - because like water flowing in a river, it only gets to sing when it passes over the stones.
Write Badly
Billy Mernitt, you have just knocked my favorite crutch away. My best excuse for procrastination. The reason I end up spinning in circles and efficiently avoiding forward progress on my screenplays (or any writing, really.) I don't have to get it "perfect."
According to Mr. Mernitt, who has every reason to know, it's not only OK to break the "rules" of screenwriting, sometimes it helps you achieve the one goal that is paramount for any screenwriter: make them empathize with the protagonist. Get them to feel. If it takes parentheticals, unfilmable asides about the character's internal thoughts and intentions, or lots of ellipses, then so be it.
Thinking about it, I am reminded of something I learned when studying poetry in college. It struck me while reading Sonnet: On the Sonnet by Keats. The Sonnet is a very structured form. Not the most difficult, but still fairly rigorous. (I laugh when people complain about screenplay form being too limiting.) In this sonnet, Keats breaks the rhythm in one line - and does so with the explicit intention of making the reader pause, of drawing attention to the one line.
I learned two things from that poem: 1) Let structure serve a meaningful function. The actual rhythm contributes to and/or echoes the content. 2) Drama and meaning can be derived from breaking the form - but there has to be a form there to break for that to work.
So I think my feeling about using such things as internal unfilmables, is that they should be used consciously. They should be placed in essential spots, to break the form a little, change the pace, make the reader stop and think. But to achieve that effect, the rest of the writing has to be fairly clean and straightforward.
I know the examples on Mr. Mernitt's blog include a script that seems to go beyond the selective use idea... but I also found it a difficult passage to read. Maybe it reads differently in context.
Have I come full circle? Have I just proposed something even more difficult than perfection - perfection with intentional flaws? Shhh. I don't care. I need to go write.
According to Mr. Mernitt, who has every reason to know, it's not only OK to break the "rules" of screenwriting, sometimes it helps you achieve the one goal that is paramount for any screenwriter: make them empathize with the protagonist. Get them to feel. If it takes parentheticals, unfilmable asides about the character's internal thoughts and intentions, or lots of ellipses, then so be it.
Thinking about it, I am reminded of something I learned when studying poetry in college. It struck me while reading Sonnet: On the Sonnet by Keats. The Sonnet is a very structured form. Not the most difficult, but still fairly rigorous. (I laugh when people complain about screenplay form being too limiting.) In this sonnet, Keats breaks the rhythm in one line - and does so with the explicit intention of making the reader pause, of drawing attention to the one line.
I learned two things from that poem: 1) Let structure serve a meaningful function. The actual rhythm contributes to and/or echoes the content. 2) Drama and meaning can be derived from breaking the form - but there has to be a form there to break for that to work.
So I think my feeling about using such things as internal unfilmables, is that they should be used consciously. They should be placed in essential spots, to break the form a little, change the pace, make the reader stop and think. But to achieve that effect, the rest of the writing has to be fairly clean and straightforward.
I know the examples on Mr. Mernitt's blog include a script that seems to go beyond the selective use idea... but I also found it a difficult passage to read. Maybe it reads differently in context.
Have I come full circle? Have I just proposed something even more difficult than perfection - perfection with intentional flaws? Shhh. I don't care. I need to go write.
Write What You Know
Imagination is a powerful tool. It can carry us into areas that no one before has ever conceived of, it can solve problems, it can pull beauty from nearly nothing. Imagination is essential to a writer. So why then, are new writers so often admonished to "write what you know?"
The truth is, for a writer who knows themselves, there is no contradiction.
Our imaginings are the product, just as everything else about us, of a combination of genetics and instinct with experience. It serves a function in our personal cognitive and social development (and in our development as a society, allowing humanity the diversity and adaptability that makes us so distinct from other species...even our ability to communicate with one another through language involves a level of abstraction that's greater than most species and thus an imagination to interpret - but that's another topic.)
In short, even the most grandiose or unusual imaginings are founded on things we know. But for most writers, imagination is not a problem. Those of us who are driven to create are more likely to have an active imagination that tends to wheel off in its own direction, that becomes it's own incentive to create. Thus, the admonition "write what you know" is a way to help ground our work.
It can function in the basic sense of knowing your material. Do research, character background studies, and know the reality behind the story.
It can function to encourage writers to experience life, to have a broader range to draw from.
But I think that the most useful and powerful function of writing what you know is specificity. The more specific and personal a work, the greater the likelihood that it will transcend itself and become universal.
It becomes "real" in ways we can't anticipate when we know that a brand of tennis shoes that were popular in a time a place our characters occupy, when we know that a certain carpet color is common to cheap motels built in the 80's, when we know how you hold a fishing line and how much room you need to cast a fly. Because when we know these things, our audience has a point of reference, and it becomes real to them.
Humans are social. We desire belonging, we are constantly (usually unconsciously) searching for connection. When a writer provides points of connection by giving specific, clear details, then the audience will join them.
It becomes "real" in ways that are surprising when we talk about our bi-racial friend who buys giant dubs to prove he's black while bragging about "sounding" white on the phone. Or about the dweeb who tells us for weeks how beautiful and sexy we are, turning up when we're out for coffee or at the grocery store, but the minute we say clearly that we're not interested pointedly calls us a fat bitch, and then whines because being a "nice guy" gets them nowhere. And the feeling of helplessness as we watch our mother on life support, surrounded by plastic tubes and wires that seem to hold a once-dynamic woman in stasis. The more specific you are about your experiences, the more likely you are to have people tell you they understand, and that it's "just like" something they've gone through.
So that feeling of helplessness gets attached to an image of an astronaut, so dependent on the tubes that connect her to life. Or the dweeb backs up their aggressive response to rejection with a knife. And bi-racial guy becomes a human raised in an alien environment. Focus on the specifics, and these situations will become familiar not only to us, but to an audience.
Thus, a writer must know themselves, so that when they do imagine flying, they can place the sensation of the rush as they dive through the air as something akin to riding a roller coaster. So that when feel a rush as they ride a roller coaster, they can think: this is what superman feels like when he's flying.
Know yourself. Pay attention. And then write what you know.
The truth is, for a writer who knows themselves, there is no contradiction.
Our imaginings are the product, just as everything else about us, of a combination of genetics and instinct with experience. It serves a function in our personal cognitive and social development (and in our development as a society, allowing humanity the diversity and adaptability that makes us so distinct from other species...even our ability to communicate with one another through language involves a level of abstraction that's greater than most species and thus an imagination to interpret - but that's another topic.)
In short, even the most grandiose or unusual imaginings are founded on things we know. But for most writers, imagination is not a problem. Those of us who are driven to create are more likely to have an active imagination that tends to wheel off in its own direction, that becomes it's own incentive to create. Thus, the admonition "write what you know" is a way to help ground our work.
It can function in the basic sense of knowing your material. Do research, character background studies, and know the reality behind the story.
It can function to encourage writers to experience life, to have a broader range to draw from.
But I think that the most useful and powerful function of writing what you know is specificity. The more specific and personal a work, the greater the likelihood that it will transcend itself and become universal.
It becomes "real" in ways we can't anticipate when we know that a brand of tennis shoes that were popular in a time a place our characters occupy, when we know that a certain carpet color is common to cheap motels built in the 80's, when we know how you hold a fishing line and how much room you need to cast a fly. Because when we know these things, our audience has a point of reference, and it becomes real to them.
Humans are social. We desire belonging, we are constantly (usually unconsciously) searching for connection. When a writer provides points of connection by giving specific, clear details, then the audience will join them.
It becomes "real" in ways that are surprising when we talk about our bi-racial friend who buys giant dubs to prove he's black while bragging about "sounding" white on the phone. Or about the dweeb who tells us for weeks how beautiful and sexy we are, turning up when we're out for coffee or at the grocery store, but the minute we say clearly that we're not interested pointedly calls us a fat bitch, and then whines because being a "nice guy" gets them nowhere. And the feeling of helplessness as we watch our mother on life support, surrounded by plastic tubes and wires that seem to hold a once-dynamic woman in stasis. The more specific you are about your experiences, the more likely you are to have people tell you they understand, and that it's "just like" something they've gone through.
So that feeling of helplessness gets attached to an image of an astronaut, so dependent on the tubes that connect her to life. Or the dweeb backs up their aggressive response to rejection with a knife. And bi-racial guy becomes a human raised in an alien environment. Focus on the specifics, and these situations will become familiar not only to us, but to an audience.
Thus, a writer must know themselves, so that when they do imagine flying, they can place the sensation of the rush as they dive through the air as something akin to riding a roller coaster. So that when feel a rush as they ride a roller coaster, they can think: this is what superman feels like when he's flying.
Know yourself. Pay attention. And then write what you know.
POV Character
I've recently been hearing and reading about the point of view character in screenplays. Now, my first assumption was that they meant protagonist. But no, the POV character is rarely the protagonist - it's the character who is telling the story, the one who wrote the memoir, or who represents the writer's perspective.
I'm having a little trouble getting my mind around how these characters function and how to develop them.
Joss Whedon refers to Serenity as "Mal's story as told by River." It's River's perspective on Mal and the other characters on the ship. Now, having pointed that out, I can see it (kinda) but I certainly didn't get that the first two times I watched the movie.
In Screenwriting is Storytelling by Kate Wright, she describes the POV character thusly:
...a character within the story who represents the writer's own point-of-view throughout the story and offers an understanding of what the story is about. The point-of-view character is crucial to the movie-making process because in order to understand the story as a movie on-screen, the audience must understand the transformation of the main character. If there is no point-of-view character who helps the audience define this transformation, the audience does not have a dramatic anchor for the story on-screen and consequently, does not know how to follow the inner emotional story.
She states that Titanic is from Rose's POV, The Fugitive uses the investigative team as a kind of Greek Chorus so they are the POV "character" along with Gerard. In Tootsie, it's Julie.
I don't know, I guess I always thought of the camera as the point of view, which guides the audience through the inner emotional as well as the outer story.
OK, I'm going to pick some movies and consider this.
Looking up on my wall at the movie posters -
Moulin Rouge! is Satine's story from Christian's POV.
Belle et la Bete - is it the Beast's story as told by Beauty? or vice verse? (I'm leaning toward the former)
Black Snake Moan - again, is it Rae's story as told by Lazarus, or vice verse? Or is it the Reverend telling the story about both of them?
Amelie - clearly Amelie' story, that's easy... and the fragile painter is clearly the POV character. He is used quite cleverly, his pointillist painting becoming more complete as the story comes together - also a nice reflection of the photo collection of the love interest - people who try to understand themselves by obsessing on images of strangers (as Amelie herself is.)
Blade Runner - Deckard's story... as told by Rachel? by the other detective? by Roy Batty? In a way, it could even be seen as Roy's story as told by Deckard. If we consider the POV character as expressing the writer's perspective on the story, then Roy seems to encompass this the best, though my instinct leans more toward the Olmos character even though his role is small.
Dead Again - Roman/Mike is definitely the protagonist. Grey Baker seems the POV character for Roman/Margaret storyline, but I have no idea who would be the POV for the present story. Pete?
Yeah, I'm nowhere near ready to use this device consciously.
I'm having a little trouble getting my mind around how these characters function and how to develop them.
Joss Whedon refers to Serenity as "Mal's story as told by River." It's River's perspective on Mal and the other characters on the ship. Now, having pointed that out, I can see it (kinda) but I certainly didn't get that the first two times I watched the movie.
In Screenwriting is Storytelling by Kate Wright, she describes the POV character thusly:
...a character within the story who represents the writer's own point-of-view throughout the story and offers an understanding of what the story is about. The point-of-view character is crucial to the movie-making process because in order to understand the story as a movie on-screen, the audience must understand the transformation of the main character. If there is no point-of-view character who helps the audience define this transformation, the audience does not have a dramatic anchor for the story on-screen and consequently, does not know how to follow the inner emotional story.
She states that Titanic is from Rose's POV, The Fugitive uses the investigative team as a kind of Greek Chorus so they are the POV "character" along with Gerard. In Tootsie, it's Julie.
I don't know, I guess I always thought of the camera as the point of view, which guides the audience through the inner emotional as well as the outer story.
OK, I'm going to pick some movies and consider this.
Looking up on my wall at the movie posters -
Moulin Rouge! is Satine's story from Christian's POV.
Belle et la Bete - is it the Beast's story as told by Beauty? or vice verse? (I'm leaning toward the former)
Black Snake Moan - again, is it Rae's story as told by Lazarus, or vice verse? Or is it the Reverend telling the story about both of them?
Amelie - clearly Amelie' story, that's easy... and the fragile painter is clearly the POV character. He is used quite cleverly, his pointillist painting becoming more complete as the story comes together - also a nice reflection of the photo collection of the love interest - people who try to understand themselves by obsessing on images of strangers (as Amelie herself is.)
Blade Runner - Deckard's story... as told by Rachel? by the other detective? by Roy Batty? In a way, it could even be seen as Roy's story as told by Deckard. If we consider the POV character as expressing the writer's perspective on the story, then Roy seems to encompass this the best, though my instinct leans more toward the Olmos character even though his role is small.
Dead Again - Roman/Mike is definitely the protagonist. Grey Baker seems the POV character for Roman/Margaret storyline, but I have no idea who would be the POV for the present story. Pete?
Yeah, I'm nowhere near ready to use this device consciously.
the collaborative process: sharing a vision
Well, after several e-mails back and forth with my writing partner, I was beginning to be frustrated with his lack of excitement about any of my (obviously, of course) brilliant ideas. I really loved making each of the three main characters a different example of how selfishness leads to loneliness. I had several wonderful visuals.
He wasn't seeing the story, so I outlined how each of the characters would relate to one another - so that the story would come out of that. He finally saw the story but said that it seemed like a RomCom without the com.
Well, yeah. That would be a romance. And horror films (not slasher movies) often have a strong romantic element.
He's not liking this, or my description of the protagonist as a hedonist driven by her passions - he says that indie films need something "extreme" and that violence, not sex is what tends to appeal to people.
It's with this comment that I realize the source of the problem.
He had said early on that he wanted something that could be the director's and writer's calling card. So I was thinking of the auteurs I love... Greenaway, Kieslowski, Vadim. Visual, sensual stories about the human soul and the intersections of pain and love.
He was thinking of Tarantino, Rodriguez, and Roth.
Doh!
So what do you do when your writing partner has such a vastly different vision than you? In this case, he's also the man with the production company and the potential to make this script into a film... so what I do is change my perspective and do my best to take up his vision. I can do violence.
I'll save my artsy-fartsy ideas for my own screenplays.
He wasn't seeing the story, so I outlined how each of the characters would relate to one another - so that the story would come out of that. He finally saw the story but said that it seemed like a RomCom without the com.
Well, yeah. That would be a romance. And horror films (not slasher movies) often have a strong romantic element.
He's not liking this, or my description of the protagonist as a hedonist driven by her passions - he says that indie films need something "extreme" and that violence, not sex is what tends to appeal to people.
It's with this comment that I realize the source of the problem.
He had said early on that he wanted something that could be the director's and writer's calling card. So I was thinking of the auteurs I love... Greenaway, Kieslowski, Vadim. Visual, sensual stories about the human soul and the intersections of pain and love.
He was thinking of Tarantino, Rodriguez, and Roth.
Doh!
So what do you do when your writing partner has such a vastly different vision than you? In this case, he's also the man with the production company and the potential to make this script into a film... so what I do is change my perspective and do my best to take up his vision. I can do violence.
I'll save my artsy-fartsy ideas for my own screenplays.
finding the spine
I'm working on a collaboration, as part of a dare on Triggerstreet - and I was fortunate to be paired with a writer who owns a small production company in Spain, and wants to write this as a possible feature for himself to produce.
So far, we've been bouncing back and forth some very general ideas. There is a Japanese myth that I wanted to use as the basis for a screenplay, and which I had some notes, characters, images, scenes developed for... but that idea was an epic fantasy, hardly suitable for a small indie. So, using the same myth (heck no I'm not telling), we looked at setting it in modern-day southern Spain.
I had a trio of characters at the center of my other idea, and I kept those same basic character relationships, but found myself wanting them to be very different other than that. I found a characteristic for the protagonist which lent itself to a good arc, and that told me what I needed from the other two in order for them to push that arc... but I was still lacking something that would make the idea gel.
I was lacking a thematic spine - the idea behind the story, which connects all of the characters and shapes the direction they all go as they come into conflict.
And it just came to me. A single emotional thread which runs through each of the three central characters and motivates them, and defines them. As I did that, more details about the characters, their relationships, and some of the major plot points clicked into place.
Which, again, is so very much like writing a poem. In a poem I might not have characters - but I would have different images or phrases, and it's when I find the common emotional thread that they all come into clear relationship to one another, both in harmony and in contrast.
Ah, that is so satisfying.
Now, assuming my writing partner digs my ideas, we have the basis for a powerful screenplay.
So far, we've been bouncing back and forth some very general ideas. There is a Japanese myth that I wanted to use as the basis for a screenplay, and which I had some notes, characters, images, scenes developed for... but that idea was an epic fantasy, hardly suitable for a small indie. So, using the same myth (heck no I'm not telling), we looked at setting it in modern-day southern Spain.
I had a trio of characters at the center of my other idea, and I kept those same basic character relationships, but found myself wanting them to be very different other than that. I found a characteristic for the protagonist which lent itself to a good arc, and that told me what I needed from the other two in order for them to push that arc... but I was still lacking something that would make the idea gel.
I was lacking a thematic spine - the idea behind the story, which connects all of the characters and shapes the direction they all go as they come into conflict.
And it just came to me. A single emotional thread which runs through each of the three central characters and motivates them, and defines them. As I did that, more details about the characters, their relationships, and some of the major plot points clicked into place.
Which, again, is so very much like writing a poem. In a poem I might not have characters - but I would have different images or phrases, and it's when I find the common emotional thread that they all come into clear relationship to one another, both in harmony and in contrast.
Ah, that is so satisfying.
Now, assuming my writing partner digs my ideas, we have the basis for a powerful screenplay.
Page One
I'm going to blather about my process, and talk too much about my story - because I'm working things out in my head.
Not long ago, I posted about the Script Frenzy writing project. I intended to participate, writing a new screenplay from scratch during the month of June.
Instead, I've gotten stuck on my rewrite of "From the Ashes," a script I wrote the first draft of three years ago and then lost, and found again. I love the imagery. I love the characters, and the protagonists arc. I love the theme... but I've realized that it's, well... boring.
I write my first draft by hand in a notebook, and as I type it up, I tweak it - solidifying the character's voices, improving action lines, smoothing out progression in scenes, adding transitions in or between scenes. As I was working through my hand-written draft, I realized that I had written the same two scenes over and over again, with tiny variations. There's no progress for the first 2/3 of the story - just tiny revelations about the characters. Not surprising, because when I wrote this - I was stuck myself, and the theme deals with my own issue. My own attempt to rise from the ashes. So I have a 70 page character study about two messed up people and one somewhat stable one who doesn't do much.
Great. Solid characters, but not a film. At least not one I would go see.
So I added a new opening with more on the backstory, because it's the protag's past which makes her present dillema so intense. But, well, it's backstory. So I took it out. Then added it back, and considered bringing more of that story into the present - making the two timelines overlap.
Backstory:
She was a model for a controversial fetish photographer, who was her husband. He was abusive, and that abuse became part of his art. She took it, because he was a "genius." Until she couldn't. Then he died - under circumstances she could have prevented but made the conscious choice not to.
Secondary character's backstory (not the antagonist, as the antagonist is herself): a kid, who, tries to show off for his mom who is a bit permissive and a little drunk at the time, has an accident which nearly kills him - and leaves him badly scarred, and (as we find out) epileptic.
The story opens with these two, a few years later, encountering one another. He's a teen and trying not to need his dad so much, mom is an absent parent - gone off to chase an adolescent dream. She is closed off and trying not to need anyone... but he latches on to her, and she finds herself befriending him. She needs to help him, but doesn't trust herself - worries that her baggage means that she'll do him more harm than good... but she also needs to redeem herself, and so, when she realizes the extent of his problems - rather than tell his father, she tries to "fix" things herself...
which is all I've really got for the first two acts.
So, next thing I do when I'm rewriting is to take all the scenes I have so far, write them on cards and shuffle them. I add new scenes, and take out scenes and set them aside. In reality, I do much of this in my head.
I've been writing poetry for nearly 30 years. My process with that is thus: I write it once on paper (sometimes, now, I do write it electronically.) Then, I write the whole thing again, simply transcribing it, making small tweaks. This may be on paper once more, or may be typing it into an e-doc. Same as I do with the screenplays. Next, I take every line and I put spaces between them, making them into separate entities. I may leave a few stanzas together, as I do sequences of scenes in a script - because I'm confident that the progression there is exactly as I want it. Then I shuffle. Sometimes a random re-arrangement gives new energy to tired lines, points to a new direction. Sometimes I end up putting things back much as they were. Sometimes I cut out most of it, keeping only a fraction of the original. And sometimes I add in a great deal more.
And often, I do all of that in my head - juggling images and lines. I've been doing it long enough that I can manage much of it that way, see the effect without actually executing it. (I do the same with recipes when I cook. I can taste how certain ingredients will effect one another before I put them in the pan together.)
So, while I haven't typed or written much in the last couple of weeks - I've stripped down and re-built this thing in my head several times. I scan the draft - and re-consider. Make a note or two. I've figured out which scenes contribute nothing new, and which are essential to the theme and the characters. Only a couple are essential to the plot, as thin as the plot is. I've merged two characters (in an already small cast.)
I decided I needed a strong subplot to liven things up.
I had the seed of one, but hadn't really brought it out - related to her modeling, rather than focusing on her as the widow of an abuser.
I looked at the logline again, and realized that the fact that she's a widow is nowhere near as interesting as the fact that she's a former fetish model. (Mentioning both makes it a bit clunky.) But if I call her that in the logline, I need to bring that element into play earlier.
And that's when the whole thing turned inside out.
I'm now switching my A story and my B story. Which means cutting way back on the boy, who I've written so many pages about. Simplifying his dilemma - so that I can focus on an entirely new dramatic conflict for my protagonist. One which is actually external. One which involves a real antagonist. And which externalizes the theme, so that the B story can be the internal struggle.
But that means I'm scrapping all but about ten scenes, and starting from scratch.
So it is: a page one re-write. Back to the outline. I hope to have the outline (an actual written one) complete by Friday, and "From the Ashes" will be my project for Script Frenzy.
Yes, I've talked a lot about my ideas. Am I worried someone might steal them? What, are you kidding? Because the story of a widowed fetish model and abuse victim and a troubled epileptic boy is so commercial? Even if I had the nearly 12,000 people reading this blog that I have as friends on my poetry profile - I doubt any of them would have the personal experience to elucidate those characters even if they wanted to. And I've not said anything about my new A plot, except that it ties back to the modeling.
Nah, this one's mine. It's personal. And now that I've found the key to making it a movie, I'm excited about it again, and making progress on paper and not just reconstructing in my head.
Not long ago, I posted about the Script Frenzy writing project. I intended to participate, writing a new screenplay from scratch during the month of June.
Instead, I've gotten stuck on my rewrite of "From the Ashes," a script I wrote the first draft of three years ago and then lost, and found again. I love the imagery. I love the characters, and the protagonists arc. I love the theme... but I've realized that it's, well... boring.
I write my first draft by hand in a notebook, and as I type it up, I tweak it - solidifying the character's voices, improving action lines, smoothing out progression in scenes, adding transitions in or between scenes. As I was working through my hand-written draft, I realized that I had written the same two scenes over and over again, with tiny variations. There's no progress for the first 2/3 of the story - just tiny revelations about the characters. Not surprising, because when I wrote this - I was stuck myself, and the theme deals with my own issue. My own attempt to rise from the ashes. So I have a 70 page character study about two messed up people and one somewhat stable one who doesn't do much.
Great. Solid characters, but not a film. At least not one I would go see.
So I added a new opening with more on the backstory, because it's the protag's past which makes her present dillema so intense. But, well, it's backstory. So I took it out. Then added it back, and considered bringing more of that story into the present - making the two timelines overlap.
Backstory:
She was a model for a controversial fetish photographer, who was her husband. He was abusive, and that abuse became part of his art. She took it, because he was a "genius." Until she couldn't. Then he died - under circumstances she could have prevented but made the conscious choice not to.
Secondary character's backstory (not the antagonist, as the antagonist is herself): a kid, who, tries to show off for his mom who is a bit permissive and a little drunk at the time, has an accident which nearly kills him - and leaves him badly scarred, and (as we find out) epileptic.
The story opens with these two, a few years later, encountering one another. He's a teen and trying not to need his dad so much, mom is an absent parent - gone off to chase an adolescent dream. She is closed off and trying not to need anyone... but he latches on to her, and she finds herself befriending him. She needs to help him, but doesn't trust herself - worries that her baggage means that she'll do him more harm than good... but she also needs to redeem herself, and so, when she realizes the extent of his problems - rather than tell his father, she tries to "fix" things herself...
which is all I've really got for the first two acts.
So, next thing I do when I'm rewriting is to take all the scenes I have so far, write them on cards and shuffle them. I add new scenes, and take out scenes and set them aside. In reality, I do much of this in my head.
I've been writing poetry for nearly 30 years. My process with that is thus: I write it once on paper (sometimes, now, I do write it electronically.) Then, I write the whole thing again, simply transcribing it, making small tweaks. This may be on paper once more, or may be typing it into an e-doc. Same as I do with the screenplays. Next, I take every line and I put spaces between them, making them into separate entities. I may leave a few stanzas together, as I do sequences of scenes in a script - because I'm confident that the progression there is exactly as I want it. Then I shuffle. Sometimes a random re-arrangement gives new energy to tired lines, points to a new direction. Sometimes I end up putting things back much as they were. Sometimes I cut out most of it, keeping only a fraction of the original. And sometimes I add in a great deal more.
And often, I do all of that in my head - juggling images and lines. I've been doing it long enough that I can manage much of it that way, see the effect without actually executing it. (I do the same with recipes when I cook. I can taste how certain ingredients will effect one another before I put them in the pan together.)
So, while I haven't typed or written much in the last couple of weeks - I've stripped down and re-built this thing in my head several times. I scan the draft - and re-consider. Make a note or two. I've figured out which scenes contribute nothing new, and which are essential to the theme and the characters. Only a couple are essential to the plot, as thin as the plot is. I've merged two characters (in an already small cast.)
I decided I needed a strong subplot to liven things up.
I had the seed of one, but hadn't really brought it out - related to her modeling, rather than focusing on her as the widow of an abuser.
I looked at the logline again, and realized that the fact that she's a widow is nowhere near as interesting as the fact that she's a former fetish model. (Mentioning both makes it a bit clunky.) But if I call her that in the logline, I need to bring that element into play earlier.
And that's when the whole thing turned inside out.
I'm now switching my A story and my B story. Which means cutting way back on the boy, who I've written so many pages about. Simplifying his dilemma - so that I can focus on an entirely new dramatic conflict for my protagonist. One which is actually external. One which involves a real antagonist. And which externalizes the theme, so that the B story can be the internal struggle.
But that means I'm scrapping all but about ten scenes, and starting from scratch.
So it is: a page one re-write. Back to the outline. I hope to have the outline (an actual written one) complete by Friday, and "From the Ashes" will be my project for Script Frenzy.
Yes, I've talked a lot about my ideas. Am I worried someone might steal them? What, are you kidding? Because the story of a widowed fetish model and abuse victim and a troubled epileptic boy is so commercial? Even if I had the nearly 12,000 people reading this blog that I have as friends on my poetry profile - I doubt any of them would have the personal experience to elucidate those characters even if they wanted to. And I've not said anything about my new A plot, except that it ties back to the modeling.
Nah, this one's mine. It's personal. And now that I've found the key to making it a movie, I'm excited about it again, and making progress on paper and not just reconstructing in my head.
Painting Pictures with Light and Words
Originally posted here
When you are writing the script, what is driving it? Is it character? Plot? Structure? Do you see the words in your head, hear the dialogue, know the characters as if you remember them like old friends (or enemies)?
Or do you see the movie, and set about describing it?
I was surprised in a recent thread on Triggerstreet, that I seem to be among the minority in being a visually driven screenwriter. People were talking about their technique, about what they begin with, how they develop the story - and among all of the comments, I was the only one who said I began with an image.
I'm sure there are others, but what I mean is this:
I start with an image. Every idea for a poem, or a screenplay, or novel, or anything I've attempted - starts with an image. Sometimes static, sometimes moving. I can describe every nuance of that image: the textures, the focus, the light.
From that image, I figure out what is happening, and to whom. The story and the characters come from the image.
As I outline, and write my scenes, I have an image of them in my head. Usually, from the original image, I get a series of other images.
For example:
one script (which is now taking a very different direction) began with the image of a large white cat with a red collar, sitting on the chest of a dead man in a snow-blanketed forest, looking him in the face. The man was asian, and had a moustache, which had frosted over from his breath - so I knew he had been alive recently, and yet he was quite pale and frozen.
other images that came up while outlining: a man with golden skin and a pretty (yes, pretty) face, dressed as a warrior, barechested - the sun shines behind him as he rides a large horse with a golden mantle, beside him is a rough-looking bearded man, and just behind - a boy on a pony with a banner, also in gold. Several yards behind are more mounted men.
A pale asian woman in white, with a red collar around her neck, walking around a battlefield among the dead - she bends to one man who is gasping for breath. He smiles slightly as she caresses his cheek, but then, as she brings her her lips close to his - panic flits across his face for a brief moment. She breathes in, and his eyes glaze over.
The golden man, sleeps in a sumptuous tent on the battlefield, on furs laid across a divan. Beside him is a morrocan-style table, sexagonal and elegantly carved. On the table rests a silver bowl filled with oranges. The pale woman stands a few feet from him, looking down on him. She reaches a hand cautiously toward his face, as though warming it at a fire, and holds it there. She edges closer, and grasps one of the oranges. As her hand closes on it, his hand closes on her wrist. He turns his head and opens his eyes to see who the orange thief is, and blinks in wonder. She pulls away and in three steps, disappears from sight - without disturbing the door to the tent or the guards posted outside.
When you have the film in your head, and write from that - describing what you see, then it's rare to write "unfilmables." And yet, with these purely visual scenes, I was able to learn about my characters, and see the potential story between them.
By seeing the scenes clearly, you also can find ways to hint at camera direction without spelling it out. For instance, the last scene might be scripted something like this (note, this is NOT from the actual script, I'm just winging it)
Rei sleeps in a sumptuous tent on the battlefield, on furs laid across a divan. Beside him is a morrocan-style table, sexagonal and elegantly carved. On the table rests a silver bowl filled with oranges.
Itsura stands a few feet from him, looking down on him. She reaches a hand cautiously toward his face, as though warming it at a fire, and holds it there.
She edges closer, and grasps one of the oranges.
As her hand closes on it, his hand closes on her wrist.
He turns his head and opens his eyes to see who the orange thief is, and blinks in wonder.
She pulls away and in three steps, disappears from sight - without disturbing the door to the tent or the guards posted outside.
-----
I threw some names on the characters, his derived from him being the king - and of the sun, hers similar to the Japanese word for frozen... but other than that, just broke up the paragraph of description in a way that suggests the shots as I see them in the film. It suggests that the camera is focused on him, lying on the divan, pulls back to show her nearby
Then the focus is on her, as she moves forward, and then a close shot on her hand and the oranges - and then his hand.
Then it pulls back to show his face, and back again to encompass both of them, closing with a shot of the tent doors, and the silhouettes of the guard.
Now, I'm certainly not saying this is the right way to write a screenplay... I'm still a novice, so I can't even say that it's a good way... but I read so many screenplays that have unfilmable scenes, or scenes where the action doesn't quite make sense - or where opportunities for visual themes are missed - and I wonder if the writer was seeing the movie.
Do you see the movie when you write? At what point do the images coalesce for you?
When you are writing the script, what is driving it? Is it character? Plot? Structure? Do you see the words in your head, hear the dialogue, know the characters as if you remember them like old friends (or enemies)?
Or do you see the movie, and set about describing it?
I was surprised in a recent thread on Triggerstreet, that I seem to be among the minority in being a visually driven screenwriter. People were talking about their technique, about what they begin with, how they develop the story - and among all of the comments, I was the only one who said I began with an image.
I'm sure there are others, but what I mean is this:
I start with an image. Every idea for a poem, or a screenplay, or novel, or anything I've attempted - starts with an image. Sometimes static, sometimes moving. I can describe every nuance of that image: the textures, the focus, the light.
From that image, I figure out what is happening, and to whom. The story and the characters come from the image.
As I outline, and write my scenes, I have an image of them in my head. Usually, from the original image, I get a series of other images.
For example:
one script (which is now taking a very different direction) began with the image of a large white cat with a red collar, sitting on the chest of a dead man in a snow-blanketed forest, looking him in the face. The man was asian, and had a moustache, which had frosted over from his breath - so I knew he had been alive recently, and yet he was quite pale and frozen.
other images that came up while outlining: a man with golden skin and a pretty (yes, pretty) face, dressed as a warrior, barechested - the sun shines behind him as he rides a large horse with a golden mantle, beside him is a rough-looking bearded man, and just behind - a boy on a pony with a banner, also in gold. Several yards behind are more mounted men.
A pale asian woman in white, with a red collar around her neck, walking around a battlefield among the dead - she bends to one man who is gasping for breath. He smiles slightly as she caresses his cheek, but then, as she brings her her lips close to his - panic flits across his face for a brief moment. She breathes in, and his eyes glaze over.
The golden man, sleeps in a sumptuous tent on the battlefield, on furs laid across a divan. Beside him is a morrocan-style table, sexagonal and elegantly carved. On the table rests a silver bowl filled with oranges. The pale woman stands a few feet from him, looking down on him. She reaches a hand cautiously toward his face, as though warming it at a fire, and holds it there. She edges closer, and grasps one of the oranges. As her hand closes on it, his hand closes on her wrist. He turns his head and opens his eyes to see who the orange thief is, and blinks in wonder. She pulls away and in three steps, disappears from sight - without disturbing the door to the tent or the guards posted outside.
When you have the film in your head, and write from that - describing what you see, then it's rare to write "unfilmables." And yet, with these purely visual scenes, I was able to learn about my characters, and see the potential story between them.
By seeing the scenes clearly, you also can find ways to hint at camera direction without spelling it out. For instance, the last scene might be scripted something like this (note, this is NOT from the actual script, I'm just winging it)
Rei sleeps in a sumptuous tent on the battlefield, on furs laid across a divan. Beside him is a morrocan-style table, sexagonal and elegantly carved. On the table rests a silver bowl filled with oranges.
Itsura stands a few feet from him, looking down on him. She reaches a hand cautiously toward his face, as though warming it at a fire, and holds it there.
She edges closer, and grasps one of the oranges.
As her hand closes on it, his hand closes on her wrist.
He turns his head and opens his eyes to see who the orange thief is, and blinks in wonder.
She pulls away and in three steps, disappears from sight - without disturbing the door to the tent or the guards posted outside.
-----
I threw some names on the characters, his derived from him being the king - and of the sun, hers similar to the Japanese word for frozen... but other than that, just broke up the paragraph of description in a way that suggests the shots as I see them in the film. It suggests that the camera is focused on him, lying on the divan, pulls back to show her nearby
Then the focus is on her, as she moves forward, and then a close shot on her hand and the oranges - and then his hand.
Then it pulls back to show his face, and back again to encompass both of them, closing with a shot of the tent doors, and the silhouettes of the guard.
Now, I'm certainly not saying this is the right way to write a screenplay... I'm still a novice, so I can't even say that it's a good way... but I read so many screenplays that have unfilmable scenes, or scenes where the action doesn't quite make sense - or where opportunities for visual themes are missed - and I wonder if the writer was seeing the movie.
Do you see the movie when you write? At what point do the images coalesce for you?
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