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-----------------------------
WE HAD WONDERED HOW THIS PREVIOUS CONTEST WINNER WAS DOING
Craig,
I'm elated to share with you that after rewriting my script based on your notes,
my script, "One Hand Clapping", was optioned by Humble Journey Films.
The
script caught their attention based on the announcement re your monthly
screenwriting contest.
Over the last year I have had the pleasure of working with Humble Journey's
Executive VP of Development on the script. I cannot overstate how beneficial
and rewarding this experience has been. It is reminiscent of the tutelage and
support you gave the script during our sessions.
Anyone who wants to learn this craft of ours needs to take advantage of your
services. Anyone who has learned the craft needs to have their script's final
polish honed by your insight and industry savvy advice.
Thanks,
Bill Williams
_____________
WRITING THE LENS AND LOSING CRUTCHES
By Judy Kellem
Writers in all forms will often launch into long explanations when told that
something in their material is confusing, hard to see, hard to follow or
obscure. They are often even indignant, unable to believe that what is in their
head has not been transmitted verbatim to their reader's brain and
will sometimes defensively lash out at the blank faced person who continues to
helplessly shrug, "Sorry it just doesn't make sense, I don't see it, you'll
have
to clarify".
It is hard, but in fact the writer must constantly remember and remind the self
that the WRITING MUST DO ALL the work.
That's the challenge of the craft.
People may love, hate, be left cold or full of inspiration by one's material
but
bottom line, they must at minimum get it. The task of the writer is to
communicate effectively and then let those pages go, for one cannot follow one's
work around the globe, tapping every reader on the shoulder to explain
what "was really meant."
In screenwriting the challenge is all the more daunting for screenplays are best
when the reader forgets they are even reading and believe that they are having
a
VISUAL EXPERIENCE. Just as a trained musician can "read" a piece of
music and
HEAR it as if strings were actually being plucked before them,
the screenwriter relies on their words to make someone WATCH a film reel
projected in their mind.
Though a musician can include a CD with their note filled pages, screenwriting
is different. In screenplay writing, THE WORD MUST STAND ALONE.
So when screenwriters include pictures, photos, manuals, diagrams and the like
to accompany their scripts, I always try to gently remind them that not only
is
it a sure sign of being a rookie, but that the whole point of showing off one's
ability as a screenwriter is to demonstrate how one can evoke imagery via
language. No crutches necessary. No explanations enclosed. The script speaks
for itself.
Your WRITING creates "filmic" images, gives us "cinematic" fantasies.
IT paints
the pictures, takes the photos, plays the music, shoots the lens in specific
directions. You prove your ability to handle the craft by letting dialogue and
description transport your reader into being an AUDIENCE who is wowed by what
they SEE.
THE PAGES of your script convey the reality. Case closed.
_____________________
SOMETIMES IT SIMPLY NEEDS A LITTLE BIT OF MAKEUP
by Craig Kellem
Recently, I worked on a project with a young writer
who now has something
substantial going in the big Hollywood arena. Her project
is terrific project,
she's acquired a first-rate agent in record time, and
he's shopping it big-time.
But, of course, there are always a few obstacles to
overcome before moving into
Malibu Colony next door to Matt Damon. Show business
can be tough. The problem
is that, although people are really liking the material,
they don't quite see it
as a "big enough movie."
Those familiar with Hollywood business culture will
undoubtedly groan at hearing
this, because it only echoes what they've undoubtedly
heard so many times
before.
What the heck does it mean, you ask? The theory goes
as follows: movies today,
more than ever, need big concepts (preferably pre-established "franchises" if
possible); need to be big star driven vehicles; and
need stories that are
larger-than-life in their scope, vista, cinematic possibility,
etc. In other
words, big is in, small is out. And heaven help you
trying to figure out how to
do this.
I was reminded of this kind of thinking recently after
watching a movie called
The In-Laws on TV. This was a "newer" version of the classic
movie, which now
starred a favorite of mine, Michael Douglas. The original
film was a charmer
about a con man whose offspring is marrying into a
nice Jewish family (Dad's an
anal retentive, New York dentist), and how this con
man charmingly sucks the
naive dentist into doing innocent "favors" for him (which enable
him to
perpetuate a scam) that escalates deliciously, inch
by inch, into increasingly
outrageous situations, that lead to disaster. (In fact
they both end up in front
of a firing squad in Central America). It's all done
for fun of course.
It's a character piece that works in spades.
The newer version was basically the same thing, except
that in the interest of
making it BIGGER, the film was overwhelmed by unneeded
techno-pizazz, and
bigger-than-life situations, which in my view pushed
it out of the all-important
reality orbit, and into schtick and gratuitous Hollywood
overindulgence.
Anyway my writer client had a dilemma, which was how
to take a perfectly
workable script, retain its integrity but to make it
appear to be, you guessed
it-- bigger, more, etc. We also wanted to make sure
that in accomplishing these
notes, that the script wouldn't have to be torn apart,
(which can be a
depressing prospect when something is working. But
notes that come with
adrenaline and real career promise often seem like
dictates to rebuild the
building ). I remember how many times I had seen writers
in Hollywood seemingly
stagger out of note sessions, dog-eared pages, abounding
and how they would
return with a crisp revision within weeks that satisfied
the customer but for
which they barely broke a sweat. The point is this--cosmetics
can be effective
on more places than one's face.
Here's what we did:
--created an earlier sense jeopardy for our hero. Easy
to do and effective.
--made situations that seemed ominous and threatening
a bit MORE ominous and
threatening. Bold lettering and harsher words can be
a writer's best friend.
--made the protagonist a little more isolated and seemingly
guilty. He already
was and it didn't hurt to turn up the heat.
--gave antagonist a slightly more lethal sense of beingness,
and did it earlier
-used more ominous sounding adjectives
-increased rhetoric re suspicion level
-created more situations where people seemed against
protag and made peripheral
characters in her life less friendly thus helping to
isolate her
-raised her level of fear
-start investigation of her earlier
-and yes, made big things a bit bigger but stayed in
the right orbit.
Please note that these simple changes were not done
cynically or in bad faith.
But they definitely were more COSMETIC in nature than
anything else, and went a
long way in not only giving the powers that be what
they wanted on a creative
level, but also satisfied the necessity in such situations
to give people in
power ego satisfaction. It never hurts to say yes.
The lesson here is pretty obvious: give the customer
what they want, but
sometimes you can do it and still retain what you honestly
believe is working.
I wish that some of the films that I've seen lately
could have adopted a similar
philosophy, and not be so grossly heavy-handed trying
to satisfy the myth that
bigger is always better.
__________________
CONSTRUCTIVE CRITICISM! (BITS AND PIECE S/SAMPLES OF
FEEDBACK WE'VE GIVEN TO OUR WRITERS)
*One hint, if I were you I'd make the adjustments that
you know are needed NOW
and THEN dig into other issues. Effective revisions
are often a WHITTLING DOWN
process where light is further shed as the piece becomes
healthier and things
become more and more obvious. First things first --go
from big to little. It's
too good a project not to do carefully.
* Almost any effective protagonist has to find his
way, himself, or whatever,
during the course of a script. A protagonist who's
got his act together from
the get-go may be a happy hombre, but he's not great
fodder for theatrical
exploration....Part and parcel to this, the experiences
and adventures along the
way must brim with more obstacles, jeopardy, challenges
the whole nine yards.
Often, (in the current version) these situations seem
simplistic and way too
easy. They need to be more clever and complex--bigger,
more dangerous
multifaceted challenges. And everything needs to be
more relatable and much more
EMOTIONAL. (The good news here is that the aforementioned
adjustments will make
a huge difference in your promising draft, stem to
stern). After all, writing a
script with an overly capable protagonist whose adventure
is too easy puts you
at a real disadvantage in terms of trying to be compelling
in your storytelling.
Creating a genuine underdog for whom we feel and admire,
but worry about, and
who is then confronted with climbing a mountain every
time he comes up for air,
has natural rooting currency and is always engaging
(and has been through the
ages).
*The project is dripping with evidence of talent and
potential. This is mostly
illustrated via your wonderful sense of humor and also
a good instinct in the
area of characters, character relationships and viable
situations. But there's
work to be done.
comedies need to be believable. This not only applies
to scenes, sequences and
situations but also to your players and the relationship
between them...I'm
suggesting to you on a macro level to give your story
and players a less
simplistic ambiance and instead provide a true dramatic
base that has
everything: a bitchin story with legitimate twists
and turns, real people,
pathos, drama, intrigue and lots and lots of good buddy
humor and other humor
all packed into one exciting vehicle. If you analyze
other good comedy dramas
(even really funny ones) you will usually find a serious
infrastructure that may
not be all that obvious but is incredibly necessary.
*Now whether or not your otherwise viable story is
all based on fact (that you
obtained from endless note-keeping, or whatever), matters
little. This is a
false argument because the TRUTH doesn't necessarily
have anything to do with
needed and workable theatricality. Writers who use
this argument to an extreme
are like writers to whom you give notes, who will point
out the one movie out of
five thousand that makes their flawed script seem "right" and
keeps it, in the
wake of this, mediocre. It's not about perfect sociological
accuracy, it's
about entertainment.
*Simply put, it can be too precarious a venture to
write a full script of things
like dreams, streams of consciousness, fantasies, etc
with little relief and
diversion . At some point, this can become too monotonous,
unrelatable, and
confusing. We need to relate to something tangible
along the way.
*The paradox here is the needs that you have with this
material are more
conducive to overall and, yes, conceptual/philosophical
conclusions, than
mathematically perfect, exact, finite "here's how to do this" kind
of notes. The
big stuff needs fixing first and that sometimes requires
macro changes and new
directions to come from you on the impetus of direction.
It's like the
difference between a trigonometry problem set, for
which there are exact methods
to reach prescribed answers, and a paper for say an
anthropology class where the
professor gives you conceptual notes about how you
can better shape your paper
to argue persuasively for your thesis, and you have
to figure out how to make
that happen. Screenwriting is art, not science.
*You have an often truly inspired but unmistakable "one note," "high
concept"
idea. In a nutshell, it's too relentless. It can become
monotonous, and
overdone. You never let up. If your justification is
that it's the "fault" of
the character ("that's how HE is"), the times we live in or
whatever--I say
better change things despite this. The solution is
to first REALIZE THIS and
then to cut down on its girth, and also to find other
elements to exploit,
especially in the soft arena/nuance/other shades of
life departments, in order
to give the script a sense of proportion and balance.
In a war movie for example
if the note was there's too much combat/killing, you
would need to add scenes
involving backstory, love issues, ironies and sidebars,
which would help in
giving things variety and breathing room.
*To write "bad people," we must find the visceral bad in ourselves
and go for it
100 percent. To write a tragic figure, we must locate
the pulsating fracture
in ourselves and find a way to blow it into fictitious
souls. Ultimately, all
theatrical writing is intended to generate emotional
relatability and feeling.
Audiences know when it's genuine.
*If you want to write screenplays for an American audience,
then you will
(unfortunately) have to either cut out your heartfelt
philosophical passages, or
else find other ways to convey them. Your writing,
it seems to me, would be
much better suited to a book. In literature you would
have the liberty to
philosophize and to offer long and detailed descriptions
of such things as the
nature of sleep, light, and soul. Film does not allow
the necessary room to
expound on such thoughts. Of course, you could always
try to find ways to show
those descriptions in other ways, perhaps through dialogue,
but you run a high
risk of testing the patience of an increasingly impatient
audience. Alas, long
passages are wonderful to read, but are not so fun
to watch being said onscreen.
**Don't stretch things out--comedy works better when
things are done FAST!!
*Ensemble pieces are notoriously hard to focus and
organize and, in the
hierarchy of difficult genres, this genre occupies
the top of the list. In this
genre, the writer often finds himself having many characters
to service,
multiple stories to invent and to somehow interconnect
them all. Instead of a
hard driving "high concept" idea or something more event based/story-like
and
linear, this arena skews more towards character and
character relationships that
must be supported by story trajectories which beg for
validity and spine. For
without the latter, things can get rough.
*First some
mundane (but very important points). As discussed, an essential
component of good screenwriting is the rule of thumb; "less is more." Your
script often feels overstated/over written/redundant/talking
heads. Too much
attention trying to say EVERYTHING and then some. As
a result, the pacing gets
thrown off course. It feels fat. One thing that might
help to keep things
moving would be the notion of getting into scenes as
late as you can and out as
early as possible. This practice can really help. So
can sweeping the script
for information that's repeated. With rare exception
we should only hear
something once. ("If, in the course of a screenplay Tom Dick and
Harry need to
be provided with the same info, tell Tom and when we
get to Dick and Harry,
let's assume that they've been told off camera.")
*No doubt that things are absolutely progressing nicely,
but as I'm sure you
realize, to write a professional script one has to
stretch to the max. There
are many fine, effective bits, moments, scenes but
there are other times where
things seem well intended but not well thought-out
enough or developed. It's so
easy for writers, particularly new ones, to feel satisfied
with a false sense of
something working, based on a smidgen of something
that does truly work rather
than making it happen across the board. Don't fool
yourself with resonating big
moments. It ALL needs to shine.
*To be honest, it's been years since I've seen either
film and they're both a
bit fuzzy in my mind, plus I'm not sure I'm totally
clear on what you mean by
wanting to incorporate these films into your own. I
gather from your questions
you mean, you just want to model your characters after
those in said movies?
That's a great thing to do, it's great to study how
other character treatments
have been done, how other writers have conveyed the
complexities and dynamics of
certain people in the script and handled the threads
of their relationships with
one another. So if you want to model your characters
and their ties with each
other after those shown in the film you mentioned,
it's a matter of close study,
of deconstructing how and why it is working in the
made films, then sitting down
with your own material to reshape the scenes and dialogue
to reflect what you've
taken from those other movies to nuance your own moments.
________________
Peter Layton realized a dream when his script was made
into a movie -- but his
story doesn't have a Hollywood end.
By Peter Layton
Special to The Province
------------------------------------------------------------------------
Every aspiring screenwriter dreams of his or her script
being made into a movie.
Realistically though, the odds against them are around
the Lotto 6/49 level.
Maybe I should buy a ticket then, because last year
a script I wrote was made
into a movie.
In the spring of 1995, I had an idea for a film: "What would you
do if you
accidentally killed somebody but by walking away, you'd
get away with it?
Called "A Lucky Shot", my story was about two American bear
hunters who
accidentally shoot and kill a B.C. game warden. While
both men fire, only one
bullet hits. Neither man knows who fired the fatal
round. Panicky and in shock,
one wants to turn himself in, the other just wants
to bury the body, get the
hell home, and pretend it never happened.
In the spring of '97, moving at the speed of procrastination,
I took "Lucky
Shot" to Shavick Entertainment, a local film company."Just
put it over there", I
was told. "Over there" was a mound of scripts uncomfortably
close to a large
wastepaper basket.
Six months later, out of the blue, I got The Call,
the one every screenwriter
fantasizes about. Shavick was interested and wanted
to film my script.
There'd be no need for drugs if you could bottle the
high I was on. I told
friends, family, co-workers, strangers waiting at bus
stops and became an
Instant Movie Writing Expert.
And Mr.Expert was kept busy, rewriting the beginning,
the ending and giving one
secondary character a sex change from male to female.
Then I was asked to put in
a nude scene. Uh...two men out in the bush? But, hey,
anything for my movie, so
the new female character was given a husband for an
unnecessary, awkwardly
plotted nude love scene.
Still, it wasn't until late '99 that Shavick producer
Brad van Arragon called to
say that "Lucky Shot" would definitely be made. Only now I'd
been traded.
"
Lucky Shot" was now a Mind's Eye Production, a company based in
Saskatchewan,
where it would be filmed. Uh...men hunting bears in
those thick Prairie forests?
Ah, who cares, they're making my movie!
Jennifer Beals, of "Flashdance" fame, would play the Game Warden
tracking down
Craig Sheffer ("A River Runs Through It") and Corey Haim ("The
Lost Boys"), the
two bear hunters. Gabrielle Anwar ("Scent of a Woman") was
cast as the fiancee
to Craig, sister to Cory. Both producer Keven Dewalt
and director Rob King
assured me that there would be no major story changes.
Except thank God, the
unnecessary, awkwardly plotted nude love scene. It
was now gone. I had to grin
when they gingerly told me this, as if I'd be all upset.
Despite 40-below winter weather, filming began in January
2000, at the resort
town of Waskesiu, north of Regina. Since I couldn't
be there, they would play
back filmed sequences over the phone. Listening to
the dialogue, I'd read my
script along with the actors saying the lines.
After three giddy, exciting, head-swelling weeks, filming
ended. While waiting
for the final version, I saw videotapes of interviews
and behind-the-scenes
action, shot by the local Regina CBC station. Gabrielle
Anwar won my heart
forever by remarking on how good the script was.
Gabrielle, dinner's on me, anytime. You too, Craig
Sheffer, and we could've done
it when he came to Vancouver to do another movie. Trying
hard to sound like a
casual fellow industry pro and not a psycho-stalker-killer,
I called their
production office, saying I'd really like to talk to "Mr.Sheffer" about
the
"
Lucky Shot" shoot.
He never called back. Maybe he never got my message.
More likely, he just didn't
want to listen to some writer babbling away about a
project he'd already
forgotten about. Truth is, if I was him, I wouldn't
have called me either.
Kevin DeWalt, the producer, e-mailed me to say that
the editing was almost
finished, that it looked great, and, oh yeah, they'd
change the title from
"
Lucky Shot" to "Without Malice".
"
Without Malice"? A legal term? What is this, a courtroom drama?
Maybe "Lucky
Shot" was a dopey title, but it was mine, damn it! Wasn't there
already a 1981
Paul Newman film called "Absence of Malice"? Aaaagh, those
butchers are wrecking
my movie! And they better not have cut out that beautiful
nude love scene I'd
worked so hard on!
OK, now I think I understand why Craig Sheffer never
called.
On Aug.4, 2000, a VHS copy of my move was FedExed to
me. Ripping the package
open, I shoved the tape into my VCR. I couldn't wait! "Without Malice" opens
with a surgery scene, so the credit I'd dreamed of
for so long, "Written by
Peter Layton," was over a man's orange-painted nipple.
I wouldn't care if my credit was over somebody's bare
moon hams hanging out a
car window, it was there, baby! It was there! And third
in line, right after the
producer and director, very cool.
Watching something on screen that's bubbled out of
your brain is very weird.
It's impossible to be objective. Usually when people
ask me what I thought of
it, I just say, "Well, the writing's great." But here's what
I really thought:
First, the look of the film was completely different
from how I'd imagined it,
all frozen white land instead of lush green forest.
While the weather gave the
movie a stark beauty, it changed what I wrote and what
was filmed.
In my script, a panicky hunter tosses his incriminating
rifle into a Lake. In
the movie, Craig Sheffer heaves it into a big snow
bank on the shore. He had no
choice: The lake was frozen concrete solid.
In my script, one hunter touches the dead warden with
his bare hands, leaving
fingerprints. In the movie, poor frozen Corey Haim
wore big thick gloves when he
did this. Later, an RCMP office tells him, "Your fingerprints were
on the body."
Must be a new prints-through-gloves technique.
Some scenes that were totally kick-ass in my mind just
strolled by on screen,
while others were far better than I'd ever hoped for.
The soundtrack featured a
sparse, haunting movie score, highlighting the trapped
desperation of the two
hunters. A bear attack and a logging truck accident
weren't as wild and intense
as I'd pictured but still believable, which is all
you can ask.
All in all, I was liking it, until the ending came. "What the heck
is this?" I
asked myself. They'd changed the ending. Trust me,
only the writer would notice
or care. But I was the writer, so yeah, it did bug
me. Still does.
I have no right to complain. Something I wrote was
actually made into a film.
Realistically, it shouldn't have happened and it may
never happen again.
So to all you aspiring screenwriters out there, don't
give up. Forget the odds,
believe in yourself, keep dreaming and working...unless
your scripts are better
than mine, in which case, go meditate on a mountaintop
for 20 years.
As of this writing, to my knowledge, "Without Malice" has not
been released or
aired yet anywhere. If you're interested, go on the
Net and Google up "Without
Malice". there are some press releases, a movie poster and 21 publicity
stills.
Or just invite me over for dinner. I'll bring the tape
and you can have a world
premiere in your living room.
------------------------------------------------------------------------
Peter Layton is a CBC-TV editor in Vancouver.
_______________________________________
VOICE OVER (V/O) VERSUS OFF STAGE (O/S)--WHICH TO CHOOSE.
O.S. - Off-Screen
V.O. - Voice Over
An "Extension" is a technical note placed directly to the right
of the Character
name that denotes HOW the character's voice will be
heard by the audience. An
Off-Screen voice can be heard from a character out
of the camera range, or from
another room altogether.
EXAMPLE:
Frankie pulls all the covers off of Julie. She sits
up in bed, pulls on a long
T-shirt, then swings her legs onto the floor and shuffles
off to the bathroom.
FRANKIE
(continuing)
You're welcome.
(beat)
Hey, how long you gonna be? I've
got a meeting and I need to shower.
JULIE (O.S.)
Twenty minutes.
Some writers use O.C. (off camera) in place of O.S. FYI, the "beat" used
above
simply denotes that Frankie pauses (perhaps formulating his next thought) before
uttering his next bit of dialogue.
Another common extension is V.O. That stands for Voice Over. Think of a V.O.
as
a narration, or a character speaking while s/he isn't in the scene. Or s/he
can
be in the scene, but also acting as narrator, reflecting on and describing
time
passing . This dialogue is recorded and then laid in over the scene when
editing.
FRANKIE (V.O.)
I knew I wasn't gonna get in that
shower for at least 45 minutes, so
I went for a run.
Our character Frankie is reminiscing (in V/O) about that morning while on a
boat.
Thanx to Mark Miller for this!
SCRIPTBLASTER has an incredibly vast data base of producers, agents, managers
and the like. They can zap your coverage or query directly into the hands of
many viable Hollywood producers, agents, managers etc. A unique feature is
that
the emails will be generated from your own personal email so industry
professionals will respond directly to you. (http://www.scriptblaster.com)
_______ ___________
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