March 2012
30 posts
1 tag
Screenwriting Tip #919
Repeat after me: “I will write it now. I will fix it later.”
February 2012
31 posts
1 tag
Screenwriting Tip #918
In a horror script, the scariest possible version of your monster is the one that exists inside your audience’s heads. The one that actually appears on screen is just a consolation prize.
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Screenwriting Tip #917
Fuzzy on the concept of the “mid-point”? Here’s one way to do it: the mid-point is when your protagonist finds exactly what she was looking for, but it’s nothing like she imagined.
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Screenwriting Tip #916
Don’t set up an urgent goal, then show us the protagonist doing ordinary things for the remainder of Act One. Doing her laundry/taxes/regular job before the inciting incident is fine, and may help reveal character. After the inciting incident, it’s a waste of the audience’s time.
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Screenwriting Tip #915
Know what you like and don’t like — not what you think is a good film, but what you like — and be willing to defend it.
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Screenwriting Tip #914
Don’t write a twist that fakes out nobody except the audience, i.e. when the characters all know what really happened, but the audience is misled. It’s disrespectful to the audience and it disrupts the fourth wall.
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Screenwriting Tip #913
Characters who don’t want or need anything are dramatic dead weight. They may be funny or fun to write, but time spent with them is time taken away from the active characters.
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Screenwriting Tip #912
When should you slow the pacing down and focus on the small details? When the small details are vitally important to your protagonist.
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Screenwriting Tip #911
If given a choice of characters to identify with, the audience will choose the one who acts the most like them — at least, the way they believe themselves to be. That means the character that’s vulnerable, fair, humble, caring, hiding a secret or making the best of a bad situation. The most human character.
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Screenwriting Tip #910
The only cure for feeling bad about not writing is, well, writing. So sit down and do it.
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Screenwriting Tip #909
Don’t fight your influences — use them. If you want to emulate the style of your favorite screenwriter, go ahead. If you make it even halfway there, you’ll be halfway to writing like a professional screenwriter.
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Screenwriting Tip #908
Pure, unrepentant antiheroes are fun to write, but self-reflective ones are even better. If they know that what they’re doing is wrong, you get a free source of internal conflict.
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Screenwriting Tip #907
We can only ever know what the script chooses to tell us. If we never see a date or any indication of time, how can we know the story is set in the 1920s? If the protagonist never expresses her inner flaw or wound, how are we supposed to know what’s wrong with her?
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Screenwriting Tip #906
Your protagonist doesn’t have to get the best lines, the coolest moments or the funniest jokes, but she does have to get the most powerful emotional scenes.
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Screenwriting Tip #905
A novelist’s job is to translate the world. A screenwriter’s job is to translate the world into a movie.
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Screenwriting Tip #904
The role of the romantic interest is to challenge the protagonist and shock her out of her regular mental and emotional pattern.
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Screenwriting Tip #903
Conflict doesn’t always mean two people fighting. Create conflict in the minds of the audience by having one character know something the other doesn’t, or by letting the audience know something none of the characters know.
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Screenwriting Tip #902
When is it okay to stop the action to explain or describe an element of the scene to the reader? When they wouldn’t be able to visualize it otherwise, e.g. an exotic sport, a mutant creature, a completely alien landscape, etc.
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Screenwriting Tip #901
The best writing partner is somebody whose work you admire, envy and want to learn from. If they feel the same about you, even better.
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Screenwriting Tip #900
Never write timidly, like you’re apologizing for something. This is your world, your character, your story. Take control of it.
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Screenwriting Tip #899
Don’t just set up your playing pieces and then leave them there. Create uncertainty around a supporting character. Is she a rival or ally, friend or traitor?
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Screenwriting Tip #898
Target the reader’s senses in your action lines. Don’t just describe images to them — let them hear a busy market, smell the smoke from a bonfire, feel a loving touch on the protagonist’s cheek. Put the reader inside the film, not in a theater seat.
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Screenwriting Tip #897
Leave room in your outline for your characters to surprise you.
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Screenwriting Tip #896
Never repeat yourself. Specifically, never make your protagonist repeat the same emotional beat (realizing she’s in love, finding the true source of her strength, etc.). Phil in GROUNDHOG DAY may repeat scenes, but he never has the same epiphany twice.
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Screenwriting Tip #895
Consider making your scene structure mirror your story world — oblique and elliptical for a spy thriller or noir mystery, straightforward and to-the-point for a bubbly comedy, etc.
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Screenwriting Tip #894
Language is instant character. Your characters’ slang, shorthand and quirky turns-of-phrase aren’t just cool dialogue — they’re a way into their world.
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Screenwriting Tip #893
Real-life conversations go round and round in circles. Movie conversations do not. Unless you’re writing an indie or a courtroom drama, you don’t have the luxury of letting your characters learn things by talking about one particular topic at length.
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Screenwriting Tip #892
Screenplays are not theme-delivery vehicles. Theme, or “message”, is just framework — a set of motifs and a useful shortcut to structure. Your protagonist is your true message.
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Screenwriting Tip #891
One of the best ways to find logic problems is to go through your script and ask, “Why now?”. (An ancient evil awakens! Fine, but why now? The mentor betrays the protagonist to his enemies! Okay, but why now?)
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Script Notes Now Available
Way back in the mists of time, I used to run a script notes service called Hack Notes. It’s been out of commission for a while, but it’s now fully armed and operational once more. Behold:
Hacknotes.net
For those who don’t remember Hack Notes, here’s the deal:
1) You send me your script.
2) I read it twice and write 3-4 pages of detailed notes on how to improve it, and...