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Breaking the Story

This version was saved 14 years, 10 months ago View current version     Page history
Saved by Steve
on May 26, 2009 at 8:29:48 am
 

 

This post is about how to create a story at a very broad level.

 

It's a collection of direct quotes culled from the last 3 years of my script-writing diary. At the moment, I've simply arranged it into sections and left it. My intention is work up and refine these notes on as 'as-I-need-them' basis. To start with, I'll be redrafting the notes onthe overview of how I want to write scripts.

 

Ultimately, what I want to create is a list of general principles, common problems and their solutions, and examples of how I write. The act and process of writing is personalised - varying greatly between writers. Ideally, this is all stuff that'll give me a leg up on the next script I write.

 

The sections in this post are:

 

 

-- My script-writing aims

--  Overview of my process (2007)

-- Tensions and Questions

-- Brainstorming 20 Questions (B20)

-- Creating a Structure

-- Essential Elements of a Story (organise)

-- The Pitch

 

 

 

 

CURRENTLY UNASSIGNED QUOTES

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Script-writing is an open ended situation. Use lateral thinking. Examine all the angles.

 

***

 

I’m coming to believe Subtext is vital to writing a good script. (a good script = a script I’m happy with)

 

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David Mamet, on what he's learned from writing for Hollywood: "Tell the story as straightforward as possible and play fair with the audience."

 

 

 

***

 

Another way of looking at storytelling in the movies* is that each phase of the film has a different 'energy' about it.

 

Taking War of the Worlds (2005) as an example (because that's where I first noticed this), you have four different types of energy in the story. The move from the normal domestic set up to the full on terror of the invasion is almost unnoticeable. The transition between the two happens in a bravura 15 minutes set piece involving lightning strikes and a stolen car. That full on terror of being pursued is sustained for what seems like a full hour. But then there is a noticeable gear change when Tim Robbins arrives in the film. All of the action becomes confined to a single location and the emotions darken towards paranoia and despair.

 

 

The trick, I think, is to be aware of the emotions and mood you're generating & how the audience feel about that.

 

*I think this applies much more to films than television because the film is designed to be watched in one uninterrupted burst, so you are more attuned to variations in tone and intensity.

 

***

From a talk by Dylan Horrocks:

1) You should reveal yourself, or truths about you, in a world you create.

 

2)

Worlds implicitly convey that self revelation. What that means is that even when you remove the characters and what they do from a story, the world that you're left with (its geography, population and history, for example) still convey themes and conflict.Worlds have meaning.

 

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Titles I've come up with that I think work: I think what they do is give a clue about what I think the hook is, and they use a pop-cultural phrase.

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