Pimpin' my wares all about the place now.
First up is Trigger Street , it's a peer review script submission site. When you sign up they give you 'homework' to read an review four scripts from other users, once you have done that, you may upload your script for review. It's a good way to ensure that you get feedback from people know what they're talking about as you have to be dedicated to stick with it. I'm not sure if I'm going to submit 'Jerusalem' as I think I'm as far as I'm going to go with that at the moment. Maybe a few of the short films. I'm primarily interested in seeing what other people are writing - to check out what I'm up against. I've been assigned to review a pretty cool script of a Tim Burton - y type film...it's very good (drat).
UK Screen - boy why didn't I know about this sooner? It's a great resource of film industry contacts. The search function alows you to browse all registered users which include everything from catering supplies, to actors, to lighting rig hire and more. You could set up an entire production from home. It also has a great forum with topic posts such as 'HORROR SCRIPT NEEDED FOR LOW BUDGET FEATURE' - yeah...that's what I want to see.
I've also been exploring the BBC's submission procedure for feature length scripts. They seem suprisingly open to everyone (well... it is the BBC I guess.) As long as you have a neat and tidy looking hardcopy of your script (not even formatted correctly) to send to them then they'll read the first ten pages and either bin it or put it on the 'to read' pile.
Not so straight forward is the Film Four submission process. Understanably they need to reduce the number of scripts they get and subsequently all have to come via a registered source. The vetting process is pretty thorough - but I think with a little ingenuity we'll be able to get our foot in the door. Their arcane submission form is a deterrent to most people, but if you make it through it's like you've passed some 'Golden Child' style test.
Sunday 18 October 2009
Tuesday 15 September 2009
Episode VII : The Phantom Seat Syndrome
The script is currently being read by someone who has the power to get this film made (let's call him Mr. B for now). Mr B has had it for a while and seems to be reading it veeery slowly. The first feedback was that he thought the title was good. A few days later he's just reached the end of act 2 and he seems to like it so far but with reservations about character progression. This dribble of information is killing me. I'd rather the quick sudden jerk of a plaster being torn off rather than this slow water torture, even if the feedback is positive. I'm constantly on the edge of my seat, even if I'm walking down the street I experience 'phantom seat syndrome' on which to be on the edge of. Fabricated psycological afflictions asside, I could really do with this limbo state to be over. Maybe I'm just to invested in what rationally I know has a very slight chance of actually going ahead.
How long does it take to read 100 pages? I've read loads of scripts in preparation of writing one, maybe I should get a job doing that.
I think I need to get back to the new script, get my mind off exciting possibilities and potential dissapointments.
How long does it take to read 100 pages? I've read loads of scripts in preparation of writing one, maybe I should get a job doing that.
I think I need to get back to the new script, get my mind off exciting possibilities and potential dissapointments.
Tuesday 1 September 2009
Locked in.
Internet's been playin' up recently so this is the first update for a while.
The script has been passed on to various producers and agents and also Warp films. It's just a matter of waiting now to see what they think. I've lined up some other places and people to send the first draft to if this first batch of contacts doesn't pan out.
I'm not sure just how long I should wait for a reply or any feedback from these people. I'm sure they're very busy and get scripts shoved in front of them on a daily basis. I'm not going to hold my breath - I'll give it a month or so.
If nothing comes of this, it's not quite a' square one' situation. There's always a possibility of private funding or indeed self funding. If it comes to that I'll have to reign in the script's excesses to reduce cost but this is the kind of film that would suit being shot on cheapo camcorders guerrilla style.
This limbo state I'm in, as the script gets thrown to the dogs, has allowed me to start a new project. I've spent a week or so weighing up the relative values of three different ideas I've wanted to do and have finally settled something quite odd, a bit of a challenge really. Bad Day On Jerusalem Hill weakest element was character I'd have to say - not that it really mattered, it was after all a action/horror movie - so this new idea is almost entirely about individuals in isolation. I'm calling it 'Locked' for the moment and hopefully will allow me to concentrate on an aspect of writing that I'm not entirely confident with. It's a multi stranded story in the style of Altman or PT Anderson with a good dose of Stephen King and 'Lost' thrown in aswell.
I'm going to aim for a steady five pages a day on this, nothing to ambitious. Hopefully the structure of having what is essentially a group of short stories will make the process faster. We'll see.
The script has been passed on to various producers and agents and also Warp films. It's just a matter of waiting now to see what they think. I've lined up some other places and people to send the first draft to if this first batch of contacts doesn't pan out.
I'm not sure just how long I should wait for a reply or any feedback from these people. I'm sure they're very busy and get scripts shoved in front of them on a daily basis. I'm not going to hold my breath - I'll give it a month or so.
If nothing comes of this, it's not quite a' square one' situation. There's always a possibility of private funding or indeed self funding. If it comes to that I'll have to reign in the script's excesses to reduce cost but this is the kind of film that would suit being shot on cheapo camcorders guerrilla style.
This limbo state I'm in, as the script gets thrown to the dogs, has allowed me to start a new project. I've spent a week or so weighing up the relative values of three different ideas I've wanted to do and have finally settled something quite odd, a bit of a challenge really. Bad Day On Jerusalem Hill weakest element was character I'd have to say - not that it really mattered, it was after all a action/horror movie - so this new idea is almost entirely about individuals in isolation. I'm calling it 'Locked' for the moment and hopefully will allow me to concentrate on an aspect of writing that I'm not entirely confident with. It's a multi stranded story in the style of Altman or PT Anderson with a good dose of Stephen King and 'Lost' thrown in aswell.
I'm going to aim for a steady five pages a day on this, nothing to ambitious. Hopefully the structure of having what is essentially a group of short stories will make the process faster. We'll see.
Monday 3 August 2009
End Of Act One
Well that's that then. Finished the script. Typed FINAL after the title on the file name just to press the message home. (Yeah I know it's not really going to be final but I can relax for a bit now at least)
After one last read through, an idiot check for spelling mistakes and grammatical errors, I realised that the script is actually pretty good. I'm quite proud of it to be honest for a first feature length effort. Considering it's quite a straight forward genre story there's quite a lot of unexpected scenarios in there, which over time, add up to give an unique feel. The light hearted opening gives way to much darker scenes later on then finally to bleakness without letting up on the action. Thrilling and depressing? Now that's a sales point right there. Put that on the poster.
Now of course comes the hard part as they say: getting it produced.
I'm not fully capable of judging how much a script will cost yet, but I guess BDOJH could be made quite cheaply - not micro budget but defineately small. Less than a million sterling. I just have to select who to pitch it to. First up is WARP-X who I've always had in mind when writing this story, but I absolutely intend to give this to every company I can possibly think of that would be interested in this kind of thing.
One possibility is to approach an agent who has a much better chance of getting the script seen. I've read that agents only consider signing writer's if they have at least three scripts ready to sell. Fair enough, they are taking a gamble when they commit to a writer but there is a down side to that - you have to write THREE SCRIPTS. Three good ones aswell. Considering how long it took me to do this one that task seems herculean.
Having said that, I've learnt a lot about constructing a story, about setting an outline, the peaks and troughs of narrative, what works and what shouldn't even get near a page. I'm going to start straight away on a new script (plot keywords: dildo, avatar of creation, chainsaw, morris minor, rebirth, brothel, schoolgirl) and I'm guessing it won't take so long now that my process has become a lot more refined.
As for Bad Day On Jerusalem Hill well I guess we're approaching the end of act one. We've set up ground work and the long second act of selling it is about to start. Hopefully we'll make it to the halfway mark, the important Point Of No Return, and get in to production, over come a few obstacles on the way, learn a little about ourselves and then BLAM! - third act twist: Jesus returns to Earth invoking the rapture and film-making becomes redundant.
Can't wait.
After one last read through, an idiot check for spelling mistakes and grammatical errors, I realised that the script is actually pretty good. I'm quite proud of it to be honest for a first feature length effort. Considering it's quite a straight forward genre story there's quite a lot of unexpected scenarios in there, which over time, add up to give an unique feel. The light hearted opening gives way to much darker scenes later on then finally to bleakness without letting up on the action. Thrilling and depressing? Now that's a sales point right there. Put that on the poster.
Now of course comes the hard part as they say: getting it produced.
I'm not fully capable of judging how much a script will cost yet, but I guess BDOJH could be made quite cheaply - not micro budget but defineately small. Less than a million sterling. I just have to select who to pitch it to. First up is WARP-X who I've always had in mind when writing this story, but I absolutely intend to give this to every company I can possibly think of that would be interested in this kind of thing.
One possibility is to approach an agent who has a much better chance of getting the script seen. I've read that agents only consider signing writer's if they have at least three scripts ready to sell. Fair enough, they are taking a gamble when they commit to a writer but there is a down side to that - you have to write THREE SCRIPTS. Three good ones aswell. Considering how long it took me to do this one that task seems herculean.
Having said that, I've learnt a lot about constructing a story, about setting an outline, the peaks and troughs of narrative, what works and what shouldn't even get near a page. I'm going to start straight away on a new script (plot keywords: dildo, avatar of creation, chainsaw, morris minor, rebirth, brothel, schoolgirl) and I'm guessing it won't take so long now that my process has become a lot more refined.
As for Bad Day On Jerusalem Hill well I guess we're approaching the end of act one. We've set up ground work and the long second act of selling it is about to start. Hopefully we'll make it to the halfway mark, the important Point Of No Return, and get in to production, over come a few obstacles on the way, learn a little about ourselves and then BLAM! - third act twist: Jesus returns to Earth invoking the rapture and film-making becomes redundant.
Can't wait.
Thursday 9 July 2009
Jeff Fahey and Daniel Baldwin in...'Urban Gauntlet'
It took me three days to write one sentence. One very important sentence. The shortest version of the script I could do. Not a tag line and not really a pitch, just a simple condensing of what the film is about. Boy was it hard.
It's important because it'll be the first thing that any prospective producer/financier is going to experience of the work, so it has to succinctly convey as much as possible about the story and get the reader's attention so that they want to continue reading the script itself.
The big problem i had was that my script when condensed in such as fashion sounds so utterly generic, and you know what it was always intended to be a traditional genre film so no real surprise there. It's always meant to have been about the execution of that traditional concept that set this story apart...not something you can easily get across in a one sentence precis.
This is what i came up with -
'An isolated community resorts to extreme measures to protect itself from people sent to help them.'
Quite simple you might think, but boy were there a lot of discarded one-liners.
To briefly recap the plot, 'Bad Day on Jerusalem Hill' is about our nerdy hero Lewis who is sent to remove graffiti from the notorious Jerusalem Hill housing estate as part of his community service - compulsory unpaid work as it's called. Here he meets up with Jordan who leads him to further criminal activity when they find a weed farm in one of the flats - they end up stealing a lot of cannabis. This sets in motion a chain of events that leads to the unfortunate death of one of the residents who then seek revenge. The entire community service team are pursued through Jerusalem, trapped and picked off one by one until the remaining survivors are forced to fight back. 'Who will survive and what will be left of them.'
So,let's break it down -
'An isolated community resorts to extreme measures to protect itself from people sent to help them.'
I think you get what this film is about straight away,you've seen this kind of thing before...'Wrong Turn', 'Deliverance', etc... an 'isolated community', cool okay we dig.
But here I've started with the community, not the people sent to clean up the graffiti who are the protagonists. This is to highlight that the script deals as much with the nominal 'bad guys' of the film as we do the heroes, something that is never really done in this kind of film.
Now we move on to 'resorts to extreme measures'. I think we all know what extreme measures implies but the fact that we qualify that with 'resorts' means that there's a definite sense that these people were provoked, perhaps they're not in the wrong.
But now it gets interesting ' from the people sent to help them.' This puts in question everything that's gone before. Is this isolated community justified in their retribution if the people they're after are meant to help them. If this whole scenario is has emerged from a benign beginning what could possibly have happened to make it go wrong. Violence, Intrigue, Community.
I went through dozens of permutations to arrive at that, including such atrocities as this -
A group of community service workers are sent to clean graffiti from the notorious Jerusalem Hill estate where a fatal accident triggers a relentless fight for survival as our heroes are pursued through an urban gauntlet.
'urban gauntlet'... fuck off mate.
It's important because it'll be the first thing that any prospective producer/financier is going to experience of the work, so it has to succinctly convey as much as possible about the story and get the reader's attention so that they want to continue reading the script itself.
The big problem i had was that my script when condensed in such as fashion sounds so utterly generic, and you know what it was always intended to be a traditional genre film so no real surprise there. It's always meant to have been about the execution of that traditional concept that set this story apart...not something you can easily get across in a one sentence precis.
This is what i came up with -
'An isolated community resorts to extreme measures to protect itself from people sent to help them.'
Quite simple you might think, but boy were there a lot of discarded one-liners.
To briefly recap the plot, 'Bad Day on Jerusalem Hill' is about our nerdy hero Lewis who is sent to remove graffiti from the notorious Jerusalem Hill housing estate as part of his community service - compulsory unpaid work as it's called. Here he meets up with Jordan who leads him to further criminal activity when they find a weed farm in one of the flats - they end up stealing a lot of cannabis. This sets in motion a chain of events that leads to the unfortunate death of one of the residents who then seek revenge. The entire community service team are pursued through Jerusalem, trapped and picked off one by one until the remaining survivors are forced to fight back. 'Who will survive and what will be left of them.'
So,let's break it down -
'An isolated community resorts to extreme measures to protect itself from people sent to help them.'
I think you get what this film is about straight away,you've seen this kind of thing before...'Wrong Turn', 'Deliverance', etc... an 'isolated community', cool okay we dig.
But here I've started with the community, not the people sent to clean up the graffiti who are the protagonists. This is to highlight that the script deals as much with the nominal 'bad guys' of the film as we do the heroes, something that is never really done in this kind of film.
Now we move on to 'resorts to extreme measures'. I think we all know what extreme measures implies but the fact that we qualify that with 'resorts' means that there's a definite sense that these people were provoked, perhaps they're not in the wrong.
But now it gets interesting ' from the people sent to help them.' This puts in question everything that's gone before. Is this isolated community justified in their retribution if the people they're after are meant to help them. If this whole scenario is has emerged from a benign beginning what could possibly have happened to make it go wrong. Violence, Intrigue, Community.
I went through dozens of permutations to arrive at that, including such atrocities as this -
A group of community service workers are sent to clean graffiti from the notorious Jerusalem Hill estate where a fatal accident triggers a relentless fight for survival as our heroes are pursued through an urban gauntlet.
'urban gauntlet'... fuck off mate.
Wednesday 1 July 2009
99 pages and a bitch ain't one
99 pages. Phew that was difficult.
A new slicker intro and general pruning of my rather wordy action sequences and I've managed to get it in under a hundred pages.
Things to do-
- I really want to do a reading with a few mates to get a feel of what the script sounds like out loud.
- Edit the script down further, maybe by amalgamating a couple of the characters.
- Get the script out. To actual people who actually deal with this kind of thing. So we can get this made.
One thing I've been thinking about is budget. There are a lot of characters in this script - it's no Magnolia - but having both sides of the story has upped the number of speaking parts. This is inevitably going to hike the cost. This coupled with quite a few locations and I can see the budget getting out of hand.
An idea I like, to reduce the overheads, is to make the central siege sequence the entire film. One location and a handful of actors. Of course it would be a very different movie but I'll keep it at the back of my mind just in case.
Another way of dropping costs would to be to shoot various elements simultaneously with extensive second unit activity. Luckily the story has several parallel sequences that can be filmed separately but concurrently. I'm not completely sure if two crews filming for a shorter time is cheaper than one main unit filming for longer... we shall see.
A new slicker intro and general pruning of my rather wordy action sequences and I've managed to get it in under a hundred pages.
Things to do-
- I really want to do a reading with a few mates to get a feel of what the script sounds like out loud.
- Edit the script down further, maybe by amalgamating a couple of the characters.
- Get the script out. To actual people who actually deal with this kind of thing. So we can get this made.
One thing I've been thinking about is budget. There are a lot of characters in this script - it's no Magnolia - but having both sides of the story has upped the number of speaking parts. This is inevitably going to hike the cost. This coupled with quite a few locations and I can see the budget getting out of hand.
An idea I like, to reduce the overheads, is to make the central siege sequence the entire film. One location and a handful of actors. Of course it would be a very different movie but I'll keep it at the back of my mind just in case.
Another way of dropping costs would to be to shoot various elements simultaneously with extensive second unit activity. Luckily the story has several parallel sequences that can be filmed separately but concurrently. I'm not completely sure if two crews filming for a shorter time is cheaper than one main unit filming for longer... we shall see.
Wednesday 24 June 2009
Good Bad Guys done well
I spent a while avoiding the script because I thought it was a bit shit, but on re-reading it recently I like it once more. There are still problems with the opening but the end is in sight now.
I'm having fun at the moment going through and tweaking each scene to give it 'a moment'. A 'LOL' moment - I've always liked it in films where you think 'why the hell did the film makers do that',those quirky little moments that don't really have much of an impact on the story as a whole but cumulatively give it a unique tone.
I made myself laugh when I added a line which reveals that a largely anonymous masked killer is named 'Baby'.
It works in the script, trust me.
I've been listening to a lot of Creative Screenwriting Magazine podcasts which have been inspiring me. They're very in depth and quite conversational QandA sessions with scriptwriters, mainly of big american movies like Star Trek and Watchmen and the like with a few smaller films thrown in there aswell. They're very informative as to the working pratices and pratical methods of crafting a story.
I in the latest one they were discussing the merits of having a good 'Bad Guy' in relation to the movie 30 Days Of Night.
This got me thinking about 'Jerusalem' which really doesn't have a main antagonist as such. Or rather the closest thing to that, is never a consistent threat in so far as he has no interaction with our heroes until the very end.
I panicked. Shit - there's no baddie in the film. I immediately started to devise ways to develop a viable antagonist - more structural re-writes - damn.
But then it came to me, I have a 'Bad Guy' already, I always have had in the form of my very own 'Overlook Hotel' the block of flats called 'Jerusalem' where the movie is set. All those incidents that get in our character's way are the building's doing. Not in the way that the hotel in the Shining becomes a character in itself, but more to do with social, political, survivalist, economic, architectural factors that it imposes on it's residents, it's practically given birth to them.
I've got a 'Bad Guy'.
Now that I've realised that guess what... more rewrites. I'm going to take advantage of the setting more and include the very structure of the place as as a key element.
I'm having fun at the moment going through and tweaking each scene to give it 'a moment'. A 'LOL' moment - I've always liked it in films where you think 'why the hell did the film makers do that',those quirky little moments that don't really have much of an impact on the story as a whole but cumulatively give it a unique tone.
I made myself laugh when I added a line which reveals that a largely anonymous masked killer is named 'Baby'.
It works in the script, trust me.
I've been listening to a lot of Creative Screenwriting Magazine podcasts which have been inspiring me. They're very in depth and quite conversational QandA sessions with scriptwriters, mainly of big american movies like Star Trek and Watchmen and the like with a few smaller films thrown in there aswell. They're very informative as to the working pratices and pratical methods of crafting a story.
I in the latest one they were discussing the merits of having a good 'Bad Guy' in relation to the movie 30 Days Of Night.
This got me thinking about 'Jerusalem' which really doesn't have a main antagonist as such. Or rather the closest thing to that, is never a consistent threat in so far as he has no interaction with our heroes until the very end.
I panicked. Shit - there's no baddie in the film. I immediately started to devise ways to develop a viable antagonist - more structural re-writes - damn.
But then it came to me, I have a 'Bad Guy' already, I always have had in the form of my very own 'Overlook Hotel' the block of flats called 'Jerusalem' where the movie is set. All those incidents that get in our character's way are the building's doing. Not in the way that the hotel in the Shining becomes a character in itself, but more to do with social, political, survivalist, economic, architectural factors that it imposes on it's residents, it's practically given birth to them.
I've got a 'Bad Guy'.
Now that I've realised that guess what... more rewrites. I'm going to take advantage of the setting more and include the very structure of the place as as a key element.
Tuesday 12 May 2009
no shift, no caps, no soapbox politics...
my shift key's not working, so no caps or question marks.
i've not updated this blog for a while because i haven't written anything. the reason /question mark/
well, i needed a break from the script also having finished the first draft it kinda felt like i'd finished the whole thing. for my next script i'll deny myself the finality of the last page and leave it hanging, maybe then it'll be easier to go back to.
so i've started writing again and put a whole little subplot back in which works better than i'd realised but this has brought it's own problems with it. the characters, the pieces on the chess board, aren't in the right place for the endgame. any attempt to move them seems contrived. this is quite fustrating as essentially the second half of the script works great, it's just getting these pawns to where they need to be to initiate the 'action' that's the problem.
it's just a centeral ten pages or so that are the problem,the new begining is so much better and i've always liked the conclusion... maybe if i just ram them together hard enough they'll stick.
i've not updated this blog for a while because i haven't written anything. the reason /question mark/
well, i needed a break from the script also having finished the first draft it kinda felt like i'd finished the whole thing. for my next script i'll deny myself the finality of the last page and leave it hanging, maybe then it'll be easier to go back to.
so i've started writing again and put a whole little subplot back in which works better than i'd realised but this has brought it's own problems with it. the characters, the pieces on the chess board, aren't in the right place for the endgame. any attempt to move them seems contrived. this is quite fustrating as essentially the second half of the script works great, it's just getting these pawns to where they need to be to initiate the 'action' that's the problem.
it's just a centeral ten pages or so that are the problem,the new begining is so much better and i've always liked the conclusion... maybe if i just ram them together hard enough they'll stick.
Monday 16 March 2009
Martyred for writing
I think I actually enjoy writing.
I read a few articles about writing where respected authors moan about going through the process. Some feel that the end result is the only good thing, others don't even like that despite having written masterpieces.
Of course a script is not a finished product until it is filmed, which means it can forever be process, you could indefinately be on a journey and Ulysees can forever have more brave tales. And so Jerusalem twists and reforms itself anew.
When you have a cool idea or even better, manage to implement that cool idea in to a serviceable form, it spurs you on and dialogue and narrative spill out before you uncontrollably and soon you have a whole new scenario you hadn't intended. Which means you have to retro fit everything else you've written to accommodate this new direction.
That's the point I'm at now. The bulk of my screenplay works, but I've recently set about retooling the first act (which is so much better now) and subsequently have to modify the later stages to fit in with this new start. There is a problem of balancing tone. We start out with quite a light hearted set up which gives way to quite violent action later. The audience needs to be eased into the later stages of the script and at the moment everything just seems to 'kick off' without warning. Some good scenes are going to have to sacrificed to keep things smooth.
I have to keep reminding myself that I'm trying to make a simple yet effective straight forward thriller/action movie. I want to write something that I can then feasibly then go and make. But when I watch films like 'Martyrs' I immediately think I should change direction and create something of such staggering beauty and vileness, something that will leave an indelible mark on film making as that film does. I of course have to learn to walk before I can run and walking's an Olympic sport so it can't be that bad. If I can make a decent genre script then I'll tackle something greater, but for now I'll content myself with smuggling a few 'mondo' moments in to a seemingly standard story.
One final problem I can anticipate is never knowing when I'm done.
EDIT: If you intend on watching 'Martyrs' make sure you know nothing more than what is contained in the teaser I linked to. This film goes places that are unexpected.
I read a few articles about writing where respected authors moan about going through the process. Some feel that the end result is the only good thing, others don't even like that despite having written masterpieces.
Of course a script is not a finished product until it is filmed, which means it can forever be process, you could indefinately be on a journey and Ulysees can forever have more brave tales. And so Jerusalem twists and reforms itself anew.
When you have a cool idea or even better, manage to implement that cool idea in to a serviceable form, it spurs you on and dialogue and narrative spill out before you uncontrollably and soon you have a whole new scenario you hadn't intended. Which means you have to retro fit everything else you've written to accommodate this new direction.
That's the point I'm at now. The bulk of my screenplay works, but I've recently set about retooling the first act (which is so much better now) and subsequently have to modify the later stages to fit in with this new start. There is a problem of balancing tone. We start out with quite a light hearted set up which gives way to quite violent action later. The audience needs to be eased into the later stages of the script and at the moment everything just seems to 'kick off' without warning. Some good scenes are going to have to sacrificed to keep things smooth.
I have to keep reminding myself that I'm trying to make a simple yet effective straight forward thriller/action movie. I want to write something that I can then feasibly then go and make. But when I watch films like 'Martyrs' I immediately think I should change direction and create something of such staggering beauty and vileness, something that will leave an indelible mark on film making as that film does. I of course have to learn to walk before I can run and walking's an Olympic sport so it can't be that bad. If I can make a decent genre script then I'll tackle something greater, but for now I'll content myself with smuggling a few 'mondo' moments in to a seemingly standard story.
One final problem I can anticipate is never knowing when I'm done.
EDIT: If you intend on watching 'Martyrs' make sure you know nothing more than what is contained in the teaser I linked to. This film goes places that are unexpected.
Wednesday 4 March 2009
Rewriting whilst rapelling down a building
I've got a pretty good idea what to do with the script now. Comments from various people all point towards what I'd suspected all along: the first act is too slow.
Or rather, too long. The script takes a while to get to the kicking off point and while there is plenty of incident in the first thirty pages most of it can easily be relocated to the second act. I've changed a character as well. Originally he was a very dark person who by dying instigates the 'Bad Day' of the title. He's a lot more funny now and doesn't cut up his girlfriend's corpse (ha!). Tiernan, for it is he, is now an amiable oaf who is still dispatched in much the same way he was before but now we have a lot more sympathy for him. Changing this character also modifies the the whole tone of the first half of the film: it's a lot more jokey now and a lot more fun which will contrast more with later events when things get a bit out of hand. Of everything I've written so far about forty pages have been excised from the first act, which is quite preposterous if you think about it. The rest of the script has stayed pretty much intact throughout but it's the set up which seems to be the hardest part to get right. My instinct is to give as much time to characters and atmosphere as possible - the lead role had at one point an entire thirty page backstory - but it's really not nesesary in this kind of film. Cut to the chase is now my mantra. Scenes start half way through and end early. If we need to round out a character it'll be done at the same time as they're rapelling down the side of the building (not that this actually happens in the film).
Another thing that's going to change is the emphasis on who the main character will be. At the moment it's a bit open as to who is the hero of the whole thing, it's the Magnolia of survival horror when it might be better if it where the Last Boy Scout of survival horror. From the start there's been a buddy movie dynamic between two of the characters - this will now take a more prominent role.
It's odd how many variations there have been to this story, there are innumerable ways to essentially tell the same basic tale. Tweaking things here and there can bring certain elements to the fore and totally skew the feel of the film in a different direction. I recently wanted to make it incredibly dark and add feral children in to the mix (still do) or maybe make it more hyper-kinetic like Run Lola Run.
Perhaps wisely I've settled on a more realistic slant, a kind of Shane Meadows type of film that just happens to become an out and out action-horror half way through.
The break I've had from writing has allowed me to come at the problems in the script with a fresh perspective, I can see what needs to be done and where to do it.
Or rather, too long. The script takes a while to get to the kicking off point and while there is plenty of incident in the first thirty pages most of it can easily be relocated to the second act. I've changed a character as well. Originally he was a very dark person who by dying instigates the 'Bad Day' of the title. He's a lot more funny now and doesn't cut up his girlfriend's corpse (ha!). Tiernan, for it is he, is now an amiable oaf who is still dispatched in much the same way he was before but now we have a lot more sympathy for him. Changing this character also modifies the the whole tone of the first half of the film: it's a lot more jokey now and a lot more fun which will contrast more with later events when things get a bit out of hand. Of everything I've written so far about forty pages have been excised from the first act, which is quite preposterous if you think about it. The rest of the script has stayed pretty much intact throughout but it's the set up which seems to be the hardest part to get right. My instinct is to give as much time to characters and atmosphere as possible - the lead role had at one point an entire thirty page backstory - but it's really not nesesary in this kind of film. Cut to the chase is now my mantra. Scenes start half way through and end early. If we need to round out a character it'll be done at the same time as they're rapelling down the side of the building (not that this actually happens in the film).
Another thing that's going to change is the emphasis on who the main character will be. At the moment it's a bit open as to who is the hero of the whole thing, it's the Magnolia of survival horror when it might be better if it where the Last Boy Scout of survival horror. From the start there's been a buddy movie dynamic between two of the characters - this will now take a more prominent role.
It's odd how many variations there have been to this story, there are innumerable ways to essentially tell the same basic tale. Tweaking things here and there can bring certain elements to the fore and totally skew the feel of the film in a different direction. I recently wanted to make it incredibly dark and add feral children in to the mix (still do) or maybe make it more hyper-kinetic like Run Lola Run.
Perhaps wisely I've settled on a more realistic slant, a kind of Shane Meadows type of film that just happens to become an out and out action-horror half way through.
The break I've had from writing has allowed me to come at the problems in the script with a fresh perspective, I can see what needs to be done and where to do it.
Tuesday 17 February 2009
Feedback
Tom, an old friend, horror fan and social worker (of some variety or other) is the first person to give feedback on the script.
He has some good points.
He sees it from the perspective of someone who works with underprivileged kids, or rather social misfit kids and his experiences in that field tie directly in to some of the aspects of the script. We went through the logic of the situation and he brought up some insightful comments to do with how the scenario would actually work in the real world, ie: not how it happens in the script.
He also knows his movies and his genre stuff in particular and he felt that sometimes I'd veered to much in to 'movie' territory.
There is a character in 'Jerusalem' that is basically a masked 'slasher'. A Jason Voorhees type called TAGGER. He doesn't last long and isn't in anyway the focus for the film but his inclusion does lead the script towards a more traditional horror movie. Tom is of the opinion that we should highlight the more Shane Meadows-y elements and give the film a more real world feel. He's probably right.
As I suspected the main criticism so far of the script is about the characters being under developed. This also is true. I think it's more the fact that some are better realised than others that makes the secondary characters seem weak.
Another thing that has been thrown up is that people can't tell who the main character is meant to be. That is great. You're really not meant to. There are several candidates for who's going to make it to the end of the movie but you're never really sure who's going to survive. Hopefully this adds tension. Also it could mean that the script lacks focus, I'll wait and see what everyone else thinks first before I dive back in to the script but already I've got a plethora of new ideas to work with.
He has some good points.
He sees it from the perspective of someone who works with underprivileged kids, or rather social misfit kids and his experiences in that field tie directly in to some of the aspects of the script. We went through the logic of the situation and he brought up some insightful comments to do with how the scenario would actually work in the real world, ie: not how it happens in the script.
He also knows his movies and his genre stuff in particular and he felt that sometimes I'd veered to much in to 'movie' territory.
There is a character in 'Jerusalem' that is basically a masked 'slasher'. A Jason Voorhees type called TAGGER. He doesn't last long and isn't in anyway the focus for the film but his inclusion does lead the script towards a more traditional horror movie. Tom is of the opinion that we should highlight the more Shane Meadows-y elements and give the film a more real world feel. He's probably right.
As I suspected the main criticism so far of the script is about the characters being under developed. This also is true. I think it's more the fact that some are better realised than others that makes the secondary characters seem weak.
Another thing that has been thrown up is that people can't tell who the main character is meant to be. That is great. You're really not meant to. There are several candidates for who's going to make it to the end of the movie but you're never really sure who's going to survive. Hopefully this adds tension. Also it could mean that the script lacks focus, I'll wait and see what everyone else thinks first before I dive back in to the script but already I've got a plethora of new ideas to work with.
Thursday 12 February 2009
Limbo
Dave printed up a few copies of the script which he has distributed to various pertinent people including our friend and part-time rock star Paul, whom we hope will eventually score the movie for us. That is if he even likes the script, of course. Why worry about the score so early?
One of the things we're aiming for to get this show on the road is to have a complete package to present to any studio/investors. This means that not only will we need to have a perfect script but also a marketing strategy, a solid vision for the production, the above mentioned score and any other resources we can muster to help the film whether it be in the form of actors, press links, funding, director...the whole shebang.
The script at the moment has on it's title page credits for writer (myself), producer (Dave) and Director (Damien Wasylkiw)
It's not enough just to bring a script to a studio and say 'We want to make this, where's my cash?' and hope they're blown away by the sheer awesomeness of the hundred or so pages in front of them. In fact we're not trying to sell a script, we want to sell a movie before it's even made. They have to believe that this is something they can get behind and if we demonstrate that 'Jerusalem' is something we can see through to completion and beyond in the most professional manner, then we have an advantage. I feel this is the best way to go forward, it's a lot easier to commit to something you know others believe in.
M. Night Shyamalan famously sent out the script for The Sixth Sense with a million dollar price tag attached to it. He was right to do so and it paid off.
'Bad Day On Jerusalem Hill' is not the Sixth Sense, it was never intended to be of that scope or... quality. It's a stripped down (although maybe not as stripped down as it needs to be yet) '70's style thriller working in the confines of an established genre with a few novel twists thrown in. But ultimately it's designed to be a money making, fun exploitation movie and any reassurance we can give that we intend to deliver on that, the better.
I intend to start pre-production before we've even finalised the script. I'll be applying my limited artistic skills to storyboarding a few key sequences, this added with the hundreds of location photos we have and extra scripts for webisodes and other support elements we have a sound base from which to launch our offensive on the cinema going public.
One of the things we're aiming for to get this show on the road is to have a complete package to present to any studio/investors. This means that not only will we need to have a perfect script but also a marketing strategy, a solid vision for the production, the above mentioned score and any other resources we can muster to help the film whether it be in the form of actors, press links, funding, director...the whole shebang.
The script at the moment has on it's title page credits for writer (myself), producer (Dave) and Director (Damien Wasylkiw)
It's not enough just to bring a script to a studio and say 'We want to make this, where's my cash?' and hope they're blown away by the sheer awesomeness of the hundred or so pages in front of them. In fact we're not trying to sell a script, we want to sell a movie before it's even made. They have to believe that this is something they can get behind and if we demonstrate that 'Jerusalem' is something we can see through to completion and beyond in the most professional manner, then we have an advantage. I feel this is the best way to go forward, it's a lot easier to commit to something you know others believe in.
M. Night Shyamalan famously sent out the script for The Sixth Sense with a million dollar price tag attached to it. He was right to do so and it paid off.
'Bad Day On Jerusalem Hill' is not the Sixth Sense, it was never intended to be of that scope or... quality. It's a stripped down (although maybe not as stripped down as it needs to be yet) '70's style thriller working in the confines of an established genre with a few novel twists thrown in. But ultimately it's designed to be a money making, fun exploitation movie and any reassurance we can give that we intend to deliver on that, the better.
I intend to start pre-production before we've even finalised the script. I'll be applying my limited artistic skills to storyboarding a few key sequences, this added with the hundreds of location photos we have and extra scripts for webisodes and other support elements we have a sound base from which to launch our offensive on the cinema going public.
Friday 6 February 2009
The End of Days
We're approaching the end.
A quick overhaul of the script with Dave brought up an interesting new way to present a scene adding a bit of humour. We also slipped a few 'social commentary' bits in to the script that had been left out for reasons of fluidity of story telling, but Dave found a way to reintegrate them with minimum fuss.
So thanks to Dave then.
I'm still a bit iffy about some of the dialogue, but we still have a long way still to sort it out.
The first draft (the real first draft) is looking good though. Good enough that we can send it to a few people we know in the buisness to get a rough idea as to what we should be doing with it.
I'll give them a few weeks to read it then I expect a complete and unrelenting barrage of critisism hurled this way. Of course that's a good thing. I'm not worried about getting negative critisism, it's more the prospect of having to follow up on any insightful comments I get and having to rewrite a script I've spent ages on. Sheesh. It's a lot of work.
It'll be good to get the thing out there and read by people, it almost feels like it's getting published.
In the mean time I'll be starting on a new script. I need to have a break from this one for a bit (although I doubt that I'll get the chance) and replenish my creativity - a new project seems like the best way to do that.
I've had a few ideas swilling round my skull for a while, some more concrete than others (have you tried swilling concrete...not fun), see which you think is best:
Laser Massacre at Nudey Beach:
A Cormanesque beach party/alien invasion movie with entirely nude cast.
Eat The Rich:
Surreal anti consumerist fable in the style of early Bunuel with a dash of Larry Cohen.
Perseverence:
Child goes on a killing spree to avenge the death of her mother...or does she? A road movie version of Get Carter with a mild supernatural twist.
The Retreat:
My long gestating hard sci-fi ghost story without ghosts. Like the Andromeda Strain meets 2001: a Space Odessey meets Ju-on... with an entirely nude cast. Except for the nudity.
I've just printed 'Bad Day On Jerusalem Hill' out so I can 'idiot check' it, then it's off in to the cold uncaring world for you little script. Come back safely.
A quick overhaul of the script with Dave brought up an interesting new way to present a scene adding a bit of humour. We also slipped a few 'social commentary' bits in to the script that had been left out for reasons of fluidity of story telling, but Dave found a way to reintegrate them with minimum fuss.
So thanks to Dave then.
I'm still a bit iffy about some of the dialogue, but we still have a long way still to sort it out.
The first draft (the real first draft) is looking good though. Good enough that we can send it to a few people we know in the buisness to get a rough idea as to what we should be doing with it.
I'll give them a few weeks to read it then I expect a complete and unrelenting barrage of critisism hurled this way. Of course that's a good thing. I'm not worried about getting negative critisism, it's more the prospect of having to follow up on any insightful comments I get and having to rewrite a script I've spent ages on. Sheesh. It's a lot of work.
It'll be good to get the thing out there and read by people, it almost feels like it's getting published.
In the mean time I'll be starting on a new script. I need to have a break from this one for a bit (although I doubt that I'll get the chance) and replenish my creativity - a new project seems like the best way to do that.
I've had a few ideas swilling round my skull for a while, some more concrete than others (have you tried swilling concrete...not fun), see which you think is best:
Laser Massacre at Nudey Beach:
A Cormanesque beach party/alien invasion movie with entirely nude cast.
Eat The Rich:
Surreal anti consumerist fable in the style of early Bunuel with a dash of Larry Cohen.
Perseverence:
Child goes on a killing spree to avenge the death of her mother...or does she? A road movie version of Get Carter with a mild supernatural twist.
The Retreat:
My long gestating hard sci-fi ghost story without ghosts. Like the Andromeda Strain meets 2001: a Space Odessey meets Ju-on... with an entirely nude cast. Except for the nudity.
I've just printed 'Bad Day On Jerusalem Hill' out so I can 'idiot check' it, then it's off in to the cold uncaring world for you little script. Come back safely.
Tuesday 3 February 2009
Hiro to zero and back again
I'm watching 'Heroes' which has just started it's 3rd (4th?) series, despite it being one of the worst shows broadcast. It's not bad just because of it's unrealised potential (the first series had so much promise) but also because it's just so poorly written. Inexcusably shit. The two head writers were recently fired which bodes well, but whoever picks up the reigns has to really learn to polish a turd.
Wouldn't that be fun?
Take an established franchise and mess stuff up?
I'm possibly the only person who actively enjoyed Rob Zombie's complete overhaul of 'Halloween' - way to make that movie your own Rob. He added his own auteur - ship to the basic Mike Myers story by making him trailer trash, to many people's annoyance.
Fincher got an equal amount of fan ire over Alien 3 when he killed all of the cast of the previous two films (and kudos to Wheadon for making a believable return for at least one of them).
Maybe I'm getting ahead of myself here (infact I am very much so) but I really want to mess up 'Jerusalem'. Okay - I haven't even locked down the first draft yet, but I'm already getting ideas as to where the follow up should go. I say follow up because I can see the next movie being a paraquel and a sequel and a prequel - and something else entirely. Much like between the first two Mad Max movies there was a nuclear war (plot twist or what?) we need a game changer for Jerusalem 2.
So I'm going to sow the seeds of a sequel in this current script. Not overtly, as it needs to stand on it's own with no loose threads, but I'll make reference at certain points throughout the story of a much larger thing going on behind the scenes. If the ideas ultimately never come to fruition none will be the wiser as it'll never impact your viewing pleasure, however if this second story is ever made I'll have already laid down the foundations for it. This convieniently solves a problem I was having with one of the main characters and specifically what her fate was to be or even if she should be written out.
Maxine you have a stay of execution and your very own after - credits sequence. Lucky you.
Wouldn't that be fun?
Take an established franchise and mess stuff up?
I'm possibly the only person who actively enjoyed Rob Zombie's complete overhaul of 'Halloween' - way to make that movie your own Rob. He added his own auteur - ship to the basic Mike Myers story by making him trailer trash, to many people's annoyance.
Fincher got an equal amount of fan ire over Alien 3 when he killed all of the cast of the previous two films (and kudos to Wheadon for making a believable return for at least one of them).
Maybe I'm getting ahead of myself here (infact I am very much so) but I really want to mess up 'Jerusalem'. Okay - I haven't even locked down the first draft yet, but I'm already getting ideas as to where the follow up should go. I say follow up because I can see the next movie being a paraquel and a sequel and a prequel - and something else entirely. Much like between the first two Mad Max movies there was a nuclear war (plot twist or what?) we need a game changer for Jerusalem 2.
So I'm going to sow the seeds of a sequel in this current script. Not overtly, as it needs to stand on it's own with no loose threads, but I'll make reference at certain points throughout the story of a much larger thing going on behind the scenes. If the ideas ultimately never come to fruition none will be the wiser as it'll never impact your viewing pleasure, however if this second story is ever made I'll have already laid down the foundations for it. This convieniently solves a problem I was having with one of the main characters and specifically what her fate was to be or even if she should be written out.
Maxine you have a stay of execution and your very own after - credits sequence. Lucky you.
Saturday 31 January 2009
Top tips for titles
Things I have learnt :
- Woody Allen once said that when writing a script, make sure to give all your characters short, simple names because you don't want to be typing Dr. Von Frakkenstein or Valror the Oppressor over and over again (not the examples he used).
With the invention of scriptwriting programs like the excellent (and free) Celtx, this is no longer a problem, they fill in the name as soon as you start typing. Feel free to call your characters Eduardo Estaban Sanchez Sanchez Hernadez the 3rd. Just make sure you don't give another character a name beginning with 'E' because the software will bring up all possible character names beginning with that letter as viable options.
So if you're like me and you've named prominent characters: Maxine, Malaki, Micky, Malaki's Father, Man 1, Man 2 and Maureen, you end up with a speedtype selection of names that goes off the bottom of the screen. Variety is what's needed. Just a little tip there.
- Never write alone. Yes write alone, by all means but as soon as you've finished writing a significant part get someone to check it. Unless you are indeed David Mamet then I suggest that you have someone to give your script to as it progresses so that can pick out the flaws as it goes. Hey maybe even David Mamet has someone he goes to that can point out some awful dialogue or a situation that is just a little bit to...well... as if it was in a movie.
You may find it harder to go back and change a script once it's finished and have to completely redo the thing structurally - if you modify it on the fly you become more adaptable.
Put off writing. Writing isn't just about putting the words down. Read all you can about your chosen subject and immerse yourself in the world of your story before you approach a blank page. This isn't procrastination. There's nothing more daunting than a blank page unless your head is brimming over with ideas, then the page doesn't look so blank after all.
Give yourself limitations. 6 people in a room. That's the old classic set up. Infinite variables are contained within that statement. Cube, Reservoir Dogs, 12 angry men (12 men in two rooms). The limits I've imposed on myself for 'Jerusalem' are ones of Reality (I tend towards the more fantastical by default), Genre (stick to a formula and maneuverer within it), 90 pages (I really want to make a tight movie).
What's in a title?
My script started out as 'Park Hill Has Eyes' for reasons explained in earlier posts. It does exactly what it says on the tin - obviously it had to change. It then became 'Steel City' a name given to Sheffield because of it's industrial background in making cutlery. Although inspired by Sheffield, I didn't want the place in the script to be associated with anywhere in particular so that had to go aswell.
But what to call the script? Is it important to name a script so early? You eventually have to get the title just right, it's one of the most important aspects of the film. It gives the audience an inkling of what's in store, or can be effectively be used to misguide them as with 'Fried Green Tomatoes At The Whistle Stop Cafe' (it's not the tomatoes you should be paying attention to, they are in fact a green herring).
As my script took form certain elements lead me to call the place where it's set 'Albion' as it became a kind of mirror to the rest of England. Briefly that's what it was called, but if I rented a movie called 'Albion' and there where no sword fights I'd be disappointed - so it changed to Jerusalem to invoke that jingoistic hymn (rather than the original poem) by William Blake. That fit the script perfectly and fed more ideas in to the screenplay itself. Great.
If I went to see a film at the cinema called 'Jerusalem' and it didn't have sword fights in it, I'd be very dissapointed.
Jerusalem survived quite a while as the title but had to go, I'm not a big fan of one word titles and I wanted to have a memorable name for my movie like 'Evil Dead' or 'Bring Me The Head Of Alfredo Garcia' or 'Last House On The Left'. Something that people would copy.
The Hills have Eyes, Night of the Living dead, Children Shouldn't Play with Dead Things. I like the roll those titles have. I like that '70's vibe.
'Bad Day On Jerusalem Hill' is what the script is called at the moment - it aludes to 'THHE', keeps the important Jerusalem part and completely understates the events within as 'a bad day'. Hell yeah it's a bad day, someone has a high pressure hose jammed in to their lungs.
Also it has a bit of beckoning mystery. Just what constututes a bad day? What is Jerusalem Hill?
For the moment I'm happy with this title, but I'm quite prepared for it to be changed by the time it gets released (I'll always refer to the film as if it will get made, no point reiterating "maybe's" and "perhaps'") in to something a bit more palateable like 'Defiance' (what a bad title) or 'Chav! The Movie'.
- Woody Allen once said that when writing a script, make sure to give all your characters short, simple names because you don't want to be typing Dr. Von Frakkenstein or Valror the Oppressor over and over again (not the examples he used).
With the invention of scriptwriting programs like the excellent (and free) Celtx, this is no longer a problem, they fill in the name as soon as you start typing. Feel free to call your characters Eduardo Estaban Sanchez Sanchez Hernadez the 3rd. Just make sure you don't give another character a name beginning with 'E' because the software will bring up all possible character names beginning with that letter as viable options.
So if you're like me and you've named prominent characters: Maxine, Malaki, Micky, Malaki's Father, Man 1, Man 2 and Maureen, you end up with a speedtype selection of names that goes off the bottom of the screen. Variety is what's needed. Just a little tip there.
- Never write alone. Yes write alone, by all means but as soon as you've finished writing a significant part get someone to check it. Unless you are indeed David Mamet then I suggest that you have someone to give your script to as it progresses so that can pick out the flaws as it goes. Hey maybe even David Mamet has someone he goes to that can point out some awful dialogue or a situation that is just a little bit to...well... as if it was in a movie.
You may find it harder to go back and change a script once it's finished and have to completely redo the thing structurally - if you modify it on the fly you become more adaptable.
Put off writing. Writing isn't just about putting the words down. Read all you can about your chosen subject and immerse yourself in the world of your story before you approach a blank page. This isn't procrastination. There's nothing more daunting than a blank page unless your head is brimming over with ideas, then the page doesn't look so blank after all.
Give yourself limitations. 6 people in a room. That's the old classic set up. Infinite variables are contained within that statement. Cube, Reservoir Dogs, 12 angry men (12 men in two rooms). The limits I've imposed on myself for 'Jerusalem' are ones of Reality (I tend towards the more fantastical by default), Genre (stick to a formula and maneuverer within it), 90 pages (I really want to make a tight movie).
What's in a title?
My script started out as 'Park Hill Has Eyes' for reasons explained in earlier posts. It does exactly what it says on the tin - obviously it had to change. It then became 'Steel City' a name given to Sheffield because of it's industrial background in making cutlery. Although inspired by Sheffield, I didn't want the place in the script to be associated with anywhere in particular so that had to go aswell.
But what to call the script? Is it important to name a script so early? You eventually have to get the title just right, it's one of the most important aspects of the film. It gives the audience an inkling of what's in store, or can be effectively be used to misguide them as with 'Fried Green Tomatoes At The Whistle Stop Cafe' (it's not the tomatoes you should be paying attention to, they are in fact a green herring).
As my script took form certain elements lead me to call the place where it's set 'Albion' as it became a kind of mirror to the rest of England. Briefly that's what it was called, but if I rented a movie called 'Albion' and there where no sword fights I'd be disappointed - so it changed to Jerusalem to invoke that jingoistic hymn (rather than the original poem) by William Blake. That fit the script perfectly and fed more ideas in to the screenplay itself. Great.
If I went to see a film at the cinema called 'Jerusalem' and it didn't have sword fights in it, I'd be very dissapointed.
Jerusalem survived quite a while as the title but had to go, I'm not a big fan of one word titles and I wanted to have a memorable name for my movie like 'Evil Dead' or 'Bring Me The Head Of Alfredo Garcia' or 'Last House On The Left'. Something that people would copy.
The Hills have Eyes, Night of the Living dead, Children Shouldn't Play with Dead Things. I like the roll those titles have. I like that '70's vibe.
'Bad Day On Jerusalem Hill' is what the script is called at the moment - it aludes to 'THHE', keeps the important Jerusalem part and completely understates the events within as 'a bad day'. Hell yeah it's a bad day, someone has a high pressure hose jammed in to their lungs.
Also it has a bit of beckoning mystery. Just what constututes a bad day? What is Jerusalem Hill?
For the moment I'm happy with this title, but I'm quite prepared for it to be changed by the time it gets released (I'll always refer to the film as if it will get made, no point reiterating "maybe's" and "perhaps'") in to something a bit more palateable like 'Defiance' (what a bad title) or 'Chav! The Movie'.
Friday 23 January 2009
RAMifications
Damn, missed the delivery guy who was bringing me 4gig of RAM...I could have written 200 times faster with that installed.
Things of note:
KCRW's The Treatment with Elvis Mitchell:
The best podcast there is (now that 1up Yours is dead). Intelligent interviews with a variety of film makers. 20mins of great chat with high profile directors, writers and actors. Make sure you catch Simon Pegg's dissertation on the
Ewok's guerrilla warfare. Download them quick because once they're gone their gone for good.
STRUCTURE:
When you start out writing you never want to play by the rules, but goddammit those rules really work.
the pen is mightier than the spork:
Screenwriter James Moran's blog. Amusing and insightful. He knows what he's talking about having written Dr.Who, Spooks, Severance (which is great) amongst many other things.
Mondo Movies podcast:
Ben and Dan give their almost expert opinions on the latest psycotronic movies and slip in a few golden oldies in there aswell. Great forum too.
Concerning Jerusalem:
I think I've cracked it by Jove. The answer to my writer's block was within the script all along, all the pieces were there I just needed to bring them together and get them chatting. Then run them over with a car.
Things of note:
KCRW's The Treatment with Elvis Mitchell:
The best podcast there is (now that 1up Yours is dead). Intelligent interviews with a variety of film makers. 20mins of great chat with high profile directors, writers and actors. Make sure you catch Simon Pegg's dissertation on the
Ewok's guerrilla warfare. Download them quick because once they're gone their gone for good.
STRUCTURE:
When you start out writing you never want to play by the rules, but goddammit those rules really work.
the pen is mightier than the spork:
Screenwriter James Moran's blog. Amusing and insightful. He knows what he's talking about having written Dr.Who, Spooks, Severance (which is great) amongst many other things.
Mondo Movies podcast:
Ben and Dan give their almost expert opinions on the latest psycotronic movies and slip in a few golden oldies in there aswell. Great forum too.
Concerning Jerusalem:
I think I've cracked it by Jove. The answer to my writer's block was within the script all along, all the pieces were there I just needed to bring them together and get them chatting. Then run them over with a car.
Wednesday 21 January 2009
They RUN!
Obviously the only way to learn to write a script is to read them. Just watching films isn't enough. Going through Scriptcrawler and looking at the early drafts of films is a great way to get a feel for things. It surprised me just how well written a lot of those generic Hollywood scripts are. I'm talking about films like Wild Wild West, Alien Resurrection and the like. Sure the eventual film might be garbage and this is inherited from the script, but the actual depiction of the scene on page is incredibly well done. Very precise. There's a lot to be learned from this kind of script. It still baffles me how you can fit so much in to just ninety minutes/ pages. Charlie's Angel's (the McG version) just whips through so much action it feels like it should be a mini series. On the other hand virtually nothing happens in Deliverance until half way through, then not a lot happens after that - and it's totally gripping. I'm trying hard to reign my script in to that magic page count, but can always see where more can be added to make a better film, it's just that there's no room for it.
As ever there's a temptation to veer towards cliche and stock characters - resist..RESIST!
Joss Wheadon ( a man whose talent I could never conceive of approaching) writes his scripts so visually that it's almost useless to hire a director.
The Script for 2001: A Space Odyssey however is virtually unreadable. The only reason I could picture it was because I was familiar with Clarke's (far superior) novel and Kubrick's polarizing movie.
Why didn't they just start with a storyboard?
Do we even need scripts?
How many variations do I have to come up with for:
The MOB apraoches LAQEESHA and SARAH.
Sarah clasps the younger girl's arm.
They RUN -
In my mind's cinema screen all scenes where a character RUNS look great, but how do you write that?
I've checked many scripts, watched interviews with writers, read screenwriters hints and tips...guess what they all say you should do? Write
They RUN
As ever there's a temptation to veer towards cliche and stock characters - resist..RESIST!
Joss Wheadon ( a man whose talent I could never conceive of approaching) writes his scripts so visually that it's almost useless to hire a director.
The Script for 2001: A Space Odyssey however is virtually unreadable. The only reason I could picture it was because I was familiar with Clarke's (far superior) novel and Kubrick's polarizing movie.
Why didn't they just start with a storyboard?
Do we even need scripts?
How many variations do I have to come up with for:
The MOB apraoches LAQEESHA and SARAH.
Sarah clasps the younger girl's arm.
SARAH
We have to leave now!
We have to leave now!
They RUN -
In my mind's cinema screen all scenes where a character RUNS look great, but how do you write that?
I've checked many scripts, watched interviews with writers, read screenwriters hints and tips...guess what they all say you should do? Write
They RUN
Monday 19 January 2009
inspirado
There's still one scene that just doesn't work and I can't think of anything to either fix it or replace it with.
I tried a variation of the famous Texas Chainsaw 'dinner' scene but with the blood going in instead of out - but it just seemed to obvious. Then I changed it to a Boogie Nights style drug deal scenario...and that was so much worse. Oh so much worse.
At the moment it's reverted back to a stripped down version of TCM again.
It's the only real sticking point in the script and is no coincidence that it kinda has to be a dialogue scene. Talk is hard to come up with...Maybe that's what I've got to do then: make the entire scene silent.... oh hang on...I'm on to something here... see you in a bit when I've finished the scene.
I tried a variation of the famous Texas Chainsaw 'dinner' scene but with the blood going in instead of out - but it just seemed to obvious. Then I changed it to a Boogie Nights style drug deal scenario...and that was so much worse. Oh so much worse.
At the moment it's reverted back to a stripped down version of TCM again.
It's the only real sticking point in the script and is no coincidence that it kinda has to be a dialogue scene. Talk is hard to come up with...Maybe that's what I've got to do then: make the entire scene silent.... oh hang on...I'm on to something here... see you in a bit when I've finished the scene.
Sunday 18 January 2009
My mouse is a scythe
Chop chop chop everything out.
Some of these characters don't half go on.
The key to writing a good script it would seem is to be able to unwrite stuff. Just hack away at useless exposition without loosing the essence but avoiding a swift cliche.
I've also isolated an entirely useless character. I'm not even sure what they were doing in there to start with to be honest.
Unless I can find a reason for MAXINE being in there she's for the chop, or rather she'll be swallowed up by the other characters. Absorbed like a weaker twin in the womb, they'll share her story DNA and become stronger characters. Or better still, a form of narrative Wendingo, the remaining protagonists will cannibalise her best lines and become richer for it.
She has a stay of execution for the moment however, but her chances are looking slim.
Some of these characters don't half go on.
The key to writing a good script it would seem is to be able to unwrite stuff. Just hack away at useless exposition without loosing the essence but avoiding a swift cliche.
I've also isolated an entirely useless character. I'm not even sure what they were doing in there to start with to be honest.
Unless I can find a reason for MAXINE being in there she's for the chop, or rather she'll be swallowed up by the other characters. Absorbed like a weaker twin in the womb, they'll share her story DNA and become stronger characters. Or better still, a form of narrative Wendingo, the remaining protagonists will cannibalise her best lines and become richer for it.
She has a stay of execution for the moment however, but her chances are looking slim.
Saturday 17 January 2009
dire logue
I read through the script in printed form for the first time. It's always good to actually see this thing you've been working on for six months in a format that is recognisably a script.
The structure works, it's pacy, there are some good characters and some great 'WTF?' moments. But one thing's for sure: I can't write dialogue. As a close friend pointed out, a lot of the time the characters are merely pointing out something we already know or are needlessly narrating the action.
A classic mistake.
So now I'm going sift through and remove all the 'Come on!' - 'Let's go!' - and the 'Hey it's that kid.' (yes we know it's that kid, we can see).
The old dictum of 'show don't tell' is an important one. A 'Follow me we need to get out of here!' is no substitute for a good 'Sarah yanks the girls arm, dragging her along behind as they FLEE'
Not that there's a lot of dialogue in this script anyway, which it would seem is a good thing as apparently dialogue heavy scripts and indeed the subsequent films are harder to sell to foreign markets. All that translating and subtitling takes a lot of money that most are unwilling to pay. A small independant genre film can recoup it's costs through foreign sales alone (here's looking at you Hush.)
A bit cynical perhaps? Well if my script 'Bad Day On Jerusalem Hill' was meant to be anything but an entertainment I would say so. But I want this to be a lean mean thriller with no time to hang around and chat and I want to make sure this reaches as many people as possible.
There are moments when the characters do have a fair bit to speak and these don't quite work just yet. I'm reluctant to make them sound 'preachy' but they are discussing the actual issues of the story and to sell that element short makes the characters seem stupid. It's a balancing act between making a point and making a character.
It's an iterative process I guess, and the script can only get better with rewrites.
I could just have someone walk in to the room with a gun to spice things up.
Thanks for the tip Joe Eszterhas.
The structure works, it's pacy, there are some good characters and some great 'WTF?' moments. But one thing's for sure: I can't write dialogue. As a close friend pointed out, a lot of the time the characters are merely pointing out something we already know or are needlessly narrating the action.
A classic mistake.
So now I'm going sift through and remove all the 'Come on!' - 'Let's go!' - and the 'Hey it's that kid.' (yes we know it's that kid, we can see).
The old dictum of 'show don't tell' is an important one. A 'Follow me we need to get out of here!' is no substitute for a good 'Sarah yanks the girls arm, dragging her along behind as they FLEE'
Not that there's a lot of dialogue in this script anyway, which it would seem is a good thing as apparently dialogue heavy scripts and indeed the subsequent films are harder to sell to foreign markets. All that translating and subtitling takes a lot of money that most are unwilling to pay. A small independant genre film can recoup it's costs through foreign sales alone (here's looking at you Hush.)
A bit cynical perhaps? Well if my script 'Bad Day On Jerusalem Hill' was meant to be anything but an entertainment I would say so. But I want this to be a lean mean thriller with no time to hang around and chat and I want to make sure this reaches as many people as possible.
There are moments when the characters do have a fair bit to speak and these don't quite work just yet. I'm reluctant to make them sound 'preachy' but they are discussing the actual issues of the story and to sell that element short makes the characters seem stupid. It's a balancing act between making a point and making a character.
It's an iterative process I guess, and the script can only get better with rewrites.
I could just have someone walk in to the room with a gun to spice things up.
Thanks for the tip Joe Eszterhas.
Friday 16 January 2009
Evenin' All.
Hopefully this will be a blog detailing the journey of a script from computer screen to silver screen (or a least straight to Daily Mail dvd free give-away).
Or indeed absolutely nowhere at all.
The name's Paul Huxley, hence the Depraved New World, I've been writing little bits of script here and there, short stories and intermittently make music videos and visuals and all kinds of audio visual nonsense more of which you can find here:
medlo.net
But let's not stray from the subject in hand.
I've wanted to make movies since a documentary called ' Good taste made Bad Taste' chronicling the production of Peter Jackson's ultra-low budget home made action/horror spectacular 'Bad Taste' was screened along side the film in question, many years ago on BBC 2.
If he can make a movie that good (and it is an amazing feat) on such a small budget, surely anyone can, right?
Well clearly not. It's hard even writing a script. That's the one thing you hear from all sceenwriters, good and bad - writing movies is difficult. A chore even. But it has to be done.
So here we are ten years later and I've just finished the first draft of my feature length script entitled for now: Bad Day On Jerusalem Hill.
I say first draft, it's gone through so many changes it feels like version twenty already and even when I get round to giving it to someone else to read, it will have changed even more - and I'll call that one the first draft too.
So, what's it about?
A group of people, in this case Compulsory Unpaid Workers (community service to you and I), come to clean the graffiti from a much overlooked block of flats called Jerusalem Hill. Initial reaction to these 'intruders' is not that welcoming but tolerant. Things go wrong when one of the residents is killed, almost accidentally, by one of the cleaners. This sparks of a series of reprisals from the dwellers of this superbly rundown estate and our bunch of heroes are hunted down through the angular concrete labyrinth.
That's it in it's most basic form. Yes it's Southern Comfort or even Deliverance but in an urban environment.
So why make something so obvious?
Many reasons and I'll try and explain a few:
1. It's easy.
Well that's what I thought when I started.
I'd been juggling with an ambitious hard sci-fi idea for a few years and found the actual writing of it a task I wasn't up to at that moment in time. It was just too 'out there' and convoluted and gimmicky and rapidly becoming the most expensive film ever concieved.Basically it had a form of time travel in it which is never easy to pull off. Considering that I'd planned it to be set in just one room, things got out of hand.
So I decided to make a traditional genre picture, something modern and straight forward with a formula that was easy to follow.
I'd never seen a 'Hills have eyes' style movie set in an urban environment before and living in Sheffield, England, I had a perfect location right infront of me. An isolated(ish) huge block of flats called Park Hill. So I opted for that survival horror hick sub-genre and 'Park Hill has Eyes' was born.
Obviously this was quite a naive thing to assume. Writing anything is difficult. If you want to make it good, then it's harder still.
2. It's Commercial
No way I'm going to sell my crazy M. Night Shyamalanesque tale of time traveling ghosts (ahem). Just not going to happen.
Some thing like 'Park Hill has Eyes' is an easier pitch and seeing as I'm going to actually want to make a film at some point in my life I felt it wise to go with an idea that people can sell.
Car chase? check
Boobs? check
Violence? check
A funny bit with a dog? check.
Here's your money Mr. Huxley.
3. I actually like those kinds of film.
I'm a big fan of ponderously slow movies scored by a single sustained note where the heroine must overcome her fear of the memory of her father in order to fully commit to her new husband.
I also like a massive horde of people relentlessly hunt down our fleeing hero through the night in order to murder him. So modern version of Southern Comfort in an urban setting? I'm in.
So there we go. The first entry of this blog. With any luck I'll keep it going on a weekly if not daily basis. I'll try and cover all subjects pertaining to script writing and then production (if we get that far) in this blog, and share with you my thoughts on the process and also what I've learned from my incalculably huge number of mistakes. Wouldn't it be great if if in a couple of years time that I could include a link on the DVD of 'Bad Day On Jerusalem Hill' to this blog. Here's hoping.
See you next time.
Long live the new flesh.
Hux.
Hopefully this will be a blog detailing the journey of a script from computer screen to silver screen (or a least straight to Daily Mail dvd free give-away).
Or indeed absolutely nowhere at all.
The name's Paul Huxley, hence the Depraved New World, I've been writing little bits of script here and there, short stories and intermittently make music videos and visuals and all kinds of audio visual nonsense more of which you can find here:
medlo.net
But let's not stray from the subject in hand.
I've wanted to make movies since a documentary called ' Good taste made Bad Taste' chronicling the production of Peter Jackson's ultra-low budget home made action/horror spectacular 'Bad Taste' was screened along side the film in question, many years ago on BBC 2.
If he can make a movie that good (and it is an amazing feat) on such a small budget, surely anyone can, right?
Well clearly not. It's hard even writing a script. That's the one thing you hear from all sceenwriters, good and bad - writing movies is difficult. A chore even. But it has to be done.
So here we are ten years later and I've just finished the first draft of my feature length script entitled for now: Bad Day On Jerusalem Hill.
I say first draft, it's gone through so many changes it feels like version twenty already and even when I get round to giving it to someone else to read, it will have changed even more - and I'll call that one the first draft too.
So, what's it about?
A group of people, in this case Compulsory Unpaid Workers (community service to you and I), come to clean the graffiti from a much overlooked block of flats called Jerusalem Hill. Initial reaction to these 'intruders' is not that welcoming but tolerant. Things go wrong when one of the residents is killed, almost accidentally, by one of the cleaners. This sparks of a series of reprisals from the dwellers of this superbly rundown estate and our bunch of heroes are hunted down through the angular concrete labyrinth.
That's it in it's most basic form. Yes it's Southern Comfort or even Deliverance but in an urban environment.
So why make something so obvious?
Many reasons and I'll try and explain a few:
1. It's easy.
Well that's what I thought when I started.
I'd been juggling with an ambitious hard sci-fi idea for a few years and found the actual writing of it a task I wasn't up to at that moment in time. It was just too 'out there' and convoluted and gimmicky and rapidly becoming the most expensive film ever concieved.Basically it had a form of time travel in it which is never easy to pull off. Considering that I'd planned it to be set in just one room, things got out of hand.
So I decided to make a traditional genre picture, something modern and straight forward with a formula that was easy to follow.
I'd never seen a 'Hills have eyes' style movie set in an urban environment before and living in Sheffield, England, I had a perfect location right infront of me. An isolated(ish) huge block of flats called Park Hill. So I opted for that survival horror hick sub-genre and 'Park Hill has Eyes' was born.
Obviously this was quite a naive thing to assume. Writing anything is difficult. If you want to make it good, then it's harder still.
2. It's Commercial
No way I'm going to sell my crazy M. Night Shyamalanesque tale of time traveling ghosts (ahem). Just not going to happen.
Some thing like 'Park Hill has Eyes' is an easier pitch and seeing as I'm going to actually want to make a film at some point in my life I felt it wise to go with an idea that people can sell.
Car chase? check
Boobs? check
Violence? check
A funny bit with a dog? check.
Here's your money Mr. Huxley.
3. I actually like those kinds of film.
I'm a big fan of ponderously slow movies scored by a single sustained note where the heroine must overcome her fear of the memory of her father in order to fully commit to her new husband.
I also like a massive horde of people relentlessly hunt down our fleeing hero through the night in order to murder him. So modern version of Southern Comfort in an urban setting? I'm in.
So there we go. The first entry of this blog. With any luck I'll keep it going on a weekly if not daily basis. I'll try and cover all subjects pertaining to script writing and then production (if we get that far) in this blog, and share with you my thoughts on the process and also what I've learned from my incalculably huge number of mistakes. Wouldn't it be great if if in a couple of years time that I could include a link on the DVD of 'Bad Day On Jerusalem Hill' to this blog. Here's hoping.
See you next time.
Long live the new flesh.
Hux.
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