Wisdom vs. Reality
Eyewitness
Fred Doleen wrote:
>
>
> What has kept me puzzled for some time is the incomprehensible reality that all
> the wonderful wisdom and advice about screenwriting comes, in the main, from people
> who haven't, de facto, delivered AND sold a creditable screenplay themselves.
>
> I'm referring to the array of books written on screenwriting by adroit writers
> with unquestionable expertise in the field of screenwriting and dramaturgy; the likes
> of Syd Field and Dr. Linda Seger. Or writers of story developing software - John
> Truby and the creators of Dramatica come to mind. And then there is the multitude
> of Script Consultants (some call them Script Doctors), who, for a substantial fee,
> tell you with their precision of judgment where you've gone wrong with your script.
>
> This raises the question, what is actually going on here? I mean, these
> experts obviously know in every detail how it should be done. They tell you how to
> develop the right kind of concept, grab the audience on page 1, amplify
> tension/conflict right up to page 115 (well structured, of course), have the right
> paradigm in place, create and develop three-dimensional characters, enhance the
> dialogue with zest - and so on it goes.
>
> Given this knowledge, commonsense would suggest that these people are clearly
> in the fortunate possession of a recipe for a blockbuster movie, with the ability to
> execute their screenplays immaculately.
>
> Hence, a sale of their creation to any studio in Hollywood should be a 'piece
> of cake', indeed, - But why is that not so?
>
> I don't have the answer - I wished I knew. However, this much I do know that
> this must be one of the toughest games there is (most of you will say "tell me about
> it"). And this brings me to the bottom line: What chances has a novice got, if the
> experts can't even make it?
>
> But then, there is always hope.
>
> fd
>
I suppose I could respond with the old saying,
"If you can't do, teach."
But, in reality, most of the people offering advice on this
newsgroup have either sold screenplays or have had lots of
nibbles. One can be an expert without having ever sold a
screenplay (by having read a lot and having tried a lot), and
one can sell a screenplay and not be an expert (by being lucky
and in the right place at the right time).
Selling a screenplay and being an expert on selling screenplays
are not the same things.
Eyewitness (Ed Lake)
wri...@wi.net
Bob Joesting
fddo...@tpgi.com.au (Fred Doleen) wrote:
> What has kept me puzzled for some time is the incomprehensible reality that all
>the wonderful wisdom and advice about screenwriting comes, in the main, from people
>who haven't, de facto, delivered AND sold a creditable screenplay themselves.
> I'm referring to the array of books written on screenwriting by adroit writers
>with unquestionable expertise in the field of screenwriting and dramaturgy; the likes
>of Syd Field and Dr. Linda Seger. Or writers of story developing software - John
>Truby and the creators of Dramatica come to mind. And then there is the multitude
>of Script Consultants (some call them Script Doctors), who, for a substantial fee,
>tell you with their precision of judgment where you've gone wrong with your script.
The truth seems to be that most of these people have
significant experience in either writing or rewriting
produced film or television.
> This raises the question, what is actually going on here? I mean, these
>experts obviously know in every detail how it should be done. They tell you how to
>develop the right kind of concept, grab the audience on page 1, amplify
>tension/conflict right up to page 115 (well structured, of course), have the right
>paradigm in place, create and develop three-dimensional characters, enhance the
>dialogue with zest - and so on it goes.
> Given this knowledge, commonsense would suggest that these people are clearly
>in the fortunate possession of a recipe for a blockbuster movie, with the ability to
>execute their screenplays immaculately.
> Hence, a sale of their creation to any studio in Hollywood should be a 'piece
>of cake', indeed, - But why is that not so?
Wrong. Most of these experts know what structure has
been successful, usually from looking at many films that
work and many that don't. By "films that work" I mean
both critically and box office. Knowing the best way to
tell a story is not the same thing as being able to
create and tell a story.
> I don't have the answer - I wished I knew. However, this much I do know that
>this must be one of the toughest games there is (most of you will say "tell me about
>it"). And this brings me to the bottom line: What chances has a novice got, if the
>experts can't even make it?
Don't make the assumption that these experts can't
make it. Some people are better at teaching than
doing. Some people enjoy doing something, others
enjoy teaching how it is done.
> But then, there is always hope.
Hope and persistence are very important. Don't
underestimate how much reading the experts can help.
When I want help in making my work better, I am
interested in someone who can teach me to write
better. There is much difference among writers
on what works to create a great screenplay. It
won't help me to hear some great writer tell me how
they do it if that way doesn't work for me.
Bob <joes...@pobox.com>
Edward Feit
Hi, Fred:
Here's an answer that may satisfy you. The ability to teach and the ability
to perform are not necessarily the same thing! One may know what needs to
be done, advise others and yet be unable to do it oneself.
One example comes to mind, Edward Galamian, the greatest violin teacher in
the world, now at the Julliard virtuoso school, the man who taught just
every great violinist including Itzhak Perlman, is not himself a concert
violinist. Nadia Boulanger who taught the greatest contemporary French
composers can't herself compose, in fact I know of only one of her
compositions that has ever been performed and that happened only once in a
commerative concert.
Another example, General Carl Von Clausewitz, the greatest writer on
military science, whose book, written at the time of Napoleon is still
required reading for today's officer candidates and is the only book read
by Hitler, Lenin and Churchill, as well as a whole host of world military
and political leaders kept at their side. Well, Clausewitz never, to my
knowledge, led an army to victory. His main function was as an active
junior and then field-grade officer and then as an instructor and not a
commander of the large forces her wrote about. Other cases of great
teachers and poor performers abound, and not only in screenwriting.
I rest my case.
Regards,
Edward
Fred Doleen <fddo...@tpgi.com.au> wrote in article
<33803e58...@qld-newshost.tpgi.com.au>...
Peter McDermott
In article <33803e58...@qld-newshost.tpgi.com.au>,
fddo...@tpgi.com.au (Fred Doleen) wrote:
>Hence, a sale of their creation to any studio in Hollywood should be a
>'piece of cake', indeed, - But why is that not so?
It's one thing to understand the principles that understand
why a painting is a masterpiece. It's another thing altogether
to have the talent and imagination to actually paint one yourself.
Remember the old truism, 'Those that can't do, teach.'
Film is much the same. It's my feeling that the really memorable
movies tend to be those that either transcend or break those
structural rules somehow anyway.
>I don't have the answer - I wished I knew. However, this much I do know
>that this must be one of the toughest games there is (most of you will say >"tell me about it"). And this brings me to the bottom line: What chances
>has a novice got, if the experts can't even make it?
Every single successful screenwriter at some point was in the position
of never having sold a thing. Now while some of them may have had better
contacts in the industry than the rest of us, at the end of the day,
the process is a fundamentally democratic one. If you can write a
great screenplay that will blow the socks off everybody, the chances
are that if you persevere, someone will eventually recognize that
and buy it.
Mysti Rubert
Gary,
I don't know from Seger, but I do know the difference
between *story structure* and the value of a particular premise.
Do you?
Mysti
--
http://www.earthlink.net/~mysti SITE MAY SOON CHANGE LOCATION!
"You've got to start having more faith in yourself
and less faith in people with imaginary degrees
in Watching Movies." -- Anubia
D. Keeton
Generally your best coaches were not the best players.
Fred Doleen <fddo...@tpgi.com.au> wrote in article
<33803e58...@qld-newshost.tpgi.com.au>...
> it"). And this brings me to the bottom line: What chances has a novice
got, if the
> experts can't even make it?
>
> But then, there is always hope.
>
> fd
>
>
>
Fred Doleen
What has kept me puzzled for some time is the incomprehensible reality that all
the wonderful wisdom and advice about screenwriting comes, in the main, from people
who haven't, de facto, delivered AND sold a creditable screenplay themselves.
I'm referring to the array of books written on screenwriting by adroit writers
with unquestionable expertise in the field of screenwriting and dramaturgy; the likes
of Syd Field and Dr. Linda Seger. Or writers of story developing software - John
Truby and the creators of Dramatica come to mind. And then there is the multitude
of Script Consultants (some call them Script Doctors), who, for a substantial fee,
tell you with their precision of judgment where you've gone wrong with your script.
This raises the question, what is actually going on here? I mean, these
experts obviously know in every detail how it should be done. They tell you how to
develop the right kind of concept, grab the audience on page 1, amplify
tension/conflict right up to page 115 (well structured, of course), have the right
paradigm in place, create and develop three-dimensional characters, enhance the
dialogue with zest - and so on it goes.
Given this knowledge, commonsense would suggest that these people are clearly
in the fortunate possession of a recipe for a blockbuster movie, with the ability to
execute their screenplays immaculately.
Hence, a sale of their creation to any studio in Hollywood should be a 'piece
of cake', indeed, - But why is that not so?
I don't have the answer - I wished I knew. However, this much I do know that
this must be one of the toughest games there is (most of you will say "tell me about
Gary Pollard
The danger is that at times having a "good" story structure screws up your premise.
"Witness" had to cop out at the end to obey the "rules". That's precisely why it sucked.
In life a man might get himself into a situation, that became tougher and tougher, more and more
intense, until .... he just moved to another district. But that's lousy "story structure".
My premise in my work might well be that film can reflect life, and that life doesn't fit into
those neat structures.
Besides, one man's "valued" premise is another man's garbage. Some like nihilism; some like God.
Neither is gonna intrinsically be a better film.
Gary
Mysti Rubert <myst...@netcom.com> wrote in article <338137...@netcom.com>...
Gary Pollard
If you feel that "Pather Panchali" would have been a better film had it played by the rules more
(after all the premise wouldn't change) we are never going to see eye to eye.
The reason I like it may well be the exact same things you see as flaws.
Gary Pollard
Peter
Peter McDermott <ne...@petermc.demon.co.uk> wrote in article <AFA699A2...@0.0.0.0>...
> In article <33803e58...@qld-newshost.tpgi.com.au>,
> fddo...@tpgi.com.au (Fred Doleen) wrote:
>
> >Hence, a sale of their creation to any studio in Hollywood should be a
> >'piece of cake', indeed, - But why is that not so?
>
> It's one thing to understand the principles that understand
> why a painting is a masterpiece. It's another thing altogether
> to have the talent and imagination to actually paint one yourself.
> Remember the old truism, 'Those that can't do, teach.'
>
Except the best painting teachers ARE painters, not those eunuchs known as critics.
> Film is much the same. It's my feeling that the really memorable
> movies tend to be those that either transcend or break those
> structural rules somehow anyway.
>
I agree wholeheartedly
Gary
Christopher Rants
In article <01bc64e4$81d0d800$3f0c55ca@garypoll>, "Gary Pollard"
<2001...@msn.com> wrote:
> The danger is that at times having a "good" story structure screws up
your premise.
>
> "Witness" had to cop out at the end to obey the "rules". That's
precisely why it sucked.
>
What?!?!?!
I personally don't think that your thesis here holds any water at all.
Not only was WITNESS a great film, there is no hint in my analysis that it
copped out anything to obey the "rules". Were there any dead ends? Or
did you just want a dead John Book?
If you are going to spout things like this, at least provide some justification.
--CR
meac...@****.com
Mysti Rubert wrote:
> Gary,
> I don't know from Seger, but I do know the difference
> between *story structure* and the value of a particular premise.
> Do you?
Yes Gary, I DO wish you'd get it right for once.
You carry on as though screenwriter and filmmakers should be allowed
to experiment with form and methodology and to use a broad range of
approaches to convey emotions, ideas, and impressions through
film.
Isn't it about time you learnt that there are a number of absolutes
abou film form and content, and the filmmakers who deviate from
these are not real filmmakers, and the audiences who enjoy such
films are not valid audiences.
I mean, look at that Andrei Tarkovsky, for example. Some of his films
have all sorts of images and moments in them which have nothing to
do with the story or the characters; they are simply the beginnings of
film anarchy. No wonder nobody admires or likes his work.
It's clear that what we need is a book of rules. And some way to make
rebellious free-thinking experimentalists tow the line. People like you,
Gary.
No wonder the only job you could get around here was as a ... err,
scriptwriter ...
Derek
Sarcasm may be the lowest form of wit, but it's a fine catharsis.
meac...@****.com
WJH wrote:
> Another benefit of "learning the rules", is that you have to know the
> rules, to successfully break the rules. Or something along those lines.
Err, yes but ... you can also break them BECAUSE you don't know them.
Or something along those lines.
Derek
Peter McDermott
>The danger is that at times having a "good" story structure screws
>up your premise.
>
>"Witness" had to cop out at the end to obey the "rules". That's
>precisely why it sucked.
>
>In life a man might get himself into a situation, that became
>tougher and tougher, more and more intense, until .... he just
>moved to another district. But that's lousy "story structure".
>
>My premise in my work might well be that film can reflect life,
>and that life doesn't fit into those neat structures.
>
>Besides, one man's "valued" premise is another man's garbage.
>Some like nihilism; some like God.
>
>Neither is gonna intrinsically be a better film.
>
>Gary
>
>Mysti Rubert <myst...@netcom.com> wrote in article
><338137...@netcom.com>...
>> Gary,
>>
>> I don't know from Seger, but I do know the difference
>> between *story structure* and the value of a particular premise.
>>
>> Do you?
>>
I've followed this thread with great interest, primarily because
I'm torn between both sides.
When I think about the sort of movies that I like best, I'm pretty
sure that the people _hadn't_ read any of those screenwriting books,
and they tend to be works that transcend the usual formal constraints
in some way.
On the other hand, when I tried writing in the past, my efforts
failed precisely because I don't believe I had any grasp of structure.
Re-reading what I wrote, it emulated life quite closely, but seemed
somehow unsatisfying.
When I recently completed the first draft of my first screenplay,
I still didn't know anything about structure consciously, but
having familiarized myself with the theory since, I can see that I
had actually internalized many of the basic principles and used
them without being aware of it.
Now, I think that there's a difference between the existence of
certain structural principles that underlie many successful stories,
and attempting to use those principles to plot by the numbers, a la
'Die Hard' and 'Speed'.
In an earlier post, Gary talked about the relationship of structure
to music, and argued that jazz was a form that played outside the
structures -- and in some senses, that may be true, but it seems to
me that it's more accurate to say that jazz musicians are keenly
aware of the structures and use them as their point of departure.
As they improvise, they might wander so far from that initial point
as to make it appear as though it isn't there, but it is. Those
musicians know exactly where it is and where they are in relation
to it. Which seems to me to be precisely the sort of control that
I'm seeking in my writing.
I can see how there might be a danger in reading such books where
a writer might think 'oh, I've got no plot point on page x. I've
got to fix that', but that attitude is really regarding structure
as formula, and the outcome is likely to be formulaic movies.
If you're smart though, and have a degree of self-confidence about
your writing, and a clear idea of what you want to say and how you
want to say it, an understanding of structure is surely just another
tool in the mastery of your craft, and one that would seem extremely
helpful when it comes to solving problems.
I think that it's a mistake to get too concerned about the relationship
between life and stories. The two are inevitably very different things,
so there will inevitably be very little correspondence between the two,
and often writers who insist on attempting naturalistic scripts end
up with something that is boring and unwatchable. I'm not a Tarentino
fan especially, but it seems to me that the very reason that he's as
successful as he is is because his films tend to use the structures
and forms of the classic Hollywood movie, and like a jazz musician,
uses them to get outside them and do something different, and the
audience is responding to that mixture of the familiar and the new.
Kirk...@aol.com
In article <c-2005970...@p05.hwts11.loop.net>,
c...@o.ner
(Christopher Rants) wrote:
>
> In article
<01bc64e4$81d0d800$3f0c55ca@garypoll>, "Gary Pollard"
>
<2001...@msn.com> wrote:
>
> >
The danger is that at times having a "good" story structure screws up
>
your premise.
> >
> > "Witness" had to cop out at the end to obey the
"rules". That's
> precisely why it sucked.
>
>
>
> What?!?!?!
>
> I personally don't think that your thesis here
holds any water at all.
>
> Not only was WITNESS a great film, there is
no hint in my analysis that it
> copped out anything to obey the
"rules". Were there any dead ends? Or
> did you just want a dead
John Book?
>
> If you are going to spout things like this, at least
provide some justification.
>
> --CR
Not to intrude too strongly, but maybe another view of the situation
is in order--
"Witness" does cop out. That doesn't make it a bad film, though. It just
really screws up what is otherwise a masterful piece of writing and
directing. Except for the "deux ex machina" ending, where the bad guy
with ABSOLUTELY NO REASON TO CHANGE HIS MIND does so, it works for me.
If there was anything in his prior character development to lead me to
the conclusion that his change of heart was even remotely possible,
I would be more forgiving. But there isn't, so "Witness" is guilty of
the copout.
2. All we have to go on is what ends up on the screen, so whether or not
you adhere to "rules" about how to write is irrelevant until what you
write shows up there. You can make and break rules all day long, and get
away with almost anything, if you take the audience along with you.
Kirkman
"Come, there is work...wild work to be done."
W.D. Richter
-------------------==== Posted via Deja News ====-----------------------
http://www.dejanews.com/ Search, Read, Post to Usenet
JoeRioux
About the issue of people who teach writing/author books on screenwriting
not selling screenplays...
I teach screenwriting and I've developed a workbook that I use in the
class.
I also rewrote another writer's screenplay and it's been funded to be
filmed. I also co-authored a screenplay (The Flight) that placed as a
semi-finalist in the 1996 Nicholls (I'm an uncredited co-author; Nicholls
does not accept co-authored scripts). I'm also working on a script with
an established actor.
I enjoy working with writers and helping them find their voice.
I believe there is a craft to writing that can be taught. I believe
having the imagination, persistence and ability to write commercial
fiction is a separate skill.
Bill Johnson
Essays on the Craft of Dramatic Writing!
http://www.teleport.com/~bjscript/index.htm
Ray Cochener
Edward Feit wrote:
>
> Hi, Fred:
>
> Here's an answer that may satisfy you. The ability to teach and the ability
> to perform are not necessarily the same thing! One may know what needs to
> be done, advise others and yet be unable to do it oneself.
>
> One example comes to mind, Edward Galamian, the greatest violin teacher in
> the world, now at the Julliard virtuoso school, the man who taught just
> every great violinist including Itzhak Perlman, is not himself a concert
> violinist. Nadia Boulanger who taught the greatest contemporary French
> composers can't herself compose, in fact I know of only one of her
> compositions that has ever been performed and that happened only once in a
> commerative concert.
>
> Another example, General Carl Von Clausewitz, the greatest writer on
> military science, whose book, written at the time of Napoleon is still
> required reading for today's officer candidates and is the only book read
> by Hitler, Lenin and Churchill, as well as a whole host of world military
> and political leaders kept at their side. Well, Clausewitz never, to my
> knowledge, led an army to victory. His main function was as an active
> junior and then field-grade officer and then as an instructor and not a
> commander of the large forces her wrote about. Other cases of great
> teachers and poor performers abound, and not only in screenwriting.
>
> I rest my case.
>
> Regards,
>
> Edward
>
> <33803e58...@qld-newshost.tpgi.com.au>...
> >
> >
> reality that all
> > the wonderful wisdom and advice about screenwriting comes, in the main,
> from people
> > who haven't, de facto, delivered AND sold a creditable screenplay
> themselves.
> >
Consider also that those who find it too easy to learn often have a
great difficulty trying to teach.
Which is why I could ace classes without taking notes, but could never
effectively tutor my clasmates in the material.
Gary Pollard
Bob
I both get suckered into buying, and grievously distrust, these books.
I just received Linda Seger's "Making a Good Script Great". Eagerly opened it. Eye immediately fell
on "Three Act Structure". And "beefing up that second act". Oh, shit. Suckered again.
I think one key to whether these books will do you any good is whether the films they like and use
as examples mean anything to you at all. Or whether you consider them among the greatest works of
art the cinema has produced. Seger's examples include mainly "Witness", African Queen" and
"Tootsie", "Jaws" "Star Wars" Back to the Future" and "Indiana Jones".
I'm sorry, but these films - with the exception of African Queen" are to me just fluff and pretty
empty minded fluff at that. "Witness" is a disgrace.
"The Incredible Lightness of Being", "Short Cuts" and "Ruby in Paradise" are there as examples of
flawed works. Every single one of them is a better movie, for me, than those in her "A-List".
"Dances with Wolves" better than "Incredible Lightness"? Not in my book. Yes, in Seger's.
We've had a long debate here in the relative merits or otherwise of "Leaving Las Vegas". It seems
to be conducted largely between those who might follow Seger and those who would not.
All I have to say is that if these books do not help to explain the films that are closer to YOUR
artistic view of the world, and exalt films you don't much like, you probably ain't gonna get much
from them. Or their rules, or structures, or formulas, or whatever you want to call them. Those
"rules seem suited best to Hollywood mainstream "entertainment". The cinema equivalent of a
Michael Jackson song.
I have never yet seen one of my own ten greatest movies in world cinema in ANY of these books.
Which indicates to m that exactly what I respond to in films is exactly what they do not.
Satyajit Ray's "Pather Panchali" not in the class of "Witness" or "The Fugitive"?
True, it's slow, it's languorous, it's maybe repetitious, it doesn't have an antagonist ...
... it's also a greater movie by far.
Gary
whatever
...and the people who taught the frist astronauts never went into space,
wither. But they did know enough about what to do and what to expect to
give the Gemini and Apollo mission riders something to think about so that
when they lit the rockets, they weren't flying blind.
I think your "analysis" needs a lot more thought. Or better yet, just
stop thinking and whining about that and go write a decent script. (And
BTW, not all good scripts get sold... another fact and reality of The
Biz.)
--CR
Gary Pollard
Well, there's tons of justification. None of which, of course someone who "objectively" loves the
film will accept.
But your comment about a dead John Book shows a certain naivete. Why is a dead John Book a
possibility? Because the film-makers MADE IT SO. At one point they considered only having one
killer turn up to search for him. They had ways to do so within the narrative structure. They
rejected it, because it would not be EXCITING ENOUGH..
Along the way of writing that script they rejected a great many things. They rejected the concept
of repression in the community ("Breaking the Waves" does it better). They deliberately and
consciously chose to water it down.
They claim to be providing a look at equal values. But not for one second are we able to feel that
Daniel offers a world view or a personality to rival John Book's. Early drafts were about the woman
more than the guy. Changed again, because he was the more typical "protagonist". Yet if one is
looking at Amish values why not have a protagonist that has them? It simply ain't punchy enough for
the formula.
The truth is that to a true pacifist, death as a result of your pacifism IS A VERY real
possibility. The film originated from a story about punks killing an Amish child. That raised too
many serious - and non entertaining - questions, so it was dropped. The punks appeared in the film,
but Book punched them out.
The death in the grain silo was a cop out too. Weir knew, as do I - having lived on a farm - that
grain silos don't work like that. He just decided that as the audience wouldn't know any better, it
was OK.
Gary
Christopher Rants <c...@o.ner> wrote in article <c-2005970...@p05.hwts11.loop.net>...
Gary Pollard
Derek
LOL
Gary
meaculpa@****.com wrote in article <5lsfk8$9...@ruby.hknet.com>...
> Mysti Rubert wrote:
>
> > Gary,
>
> > I don't know from Seger, but I do know the difference
> > between *story structure* and the value of a particular premise.
>
> > Do you?
>
Gary Pollard
My main point though was that once one starts judging work by those "structures" one cannot colour
outside the lines, and resents the work of those that do.
It's so common to see the great European movies described as having bad or no structure. Thereby
missing the point totally.
Stories with strong narrative drive may have to have a structure. But narrative is NOT the be all
and end all of movies.
O Henry's stories, facile as they are, have structure. But film can be about evocation, about mood,
about character. There are times when a strong narrative drive detracts from these other things.
One of my favourite films is Marguerite Duras' "India Song". I have never seen a better film about
memory and love. But it certainly isn't traditional narrative and it certainly isn't worse for not
being so. I wrote a drama where I wanted people to concentrate on other things - not the narrative
- so I deliberately gave the end of the story away in the first reel. (Sunset Boulevard did pretty
much the same)
My situation is rather the opposite of yours. I find I often wrote better when I had less knowledge
of these things. Now it's too easy to slip into the bad ways. It seems to me that almost EVERY film
I really love I love because it has fresh air in it. Because it has loose ends. Because it takes
time to go off on little diversions. All of which are sins in traditional "structure", or at least
that as depicted by banal writers. And most of the insights into film these books offer IS banal.
Gary
Mysti Rubert
Well, then, don't worry, because I don't anybody on this group
doing that. I (and I assume Nick and everyone here), judges the
effectiveness of whatever structure is used for a particular story,
just as they judge characterization, dialog, the "so what" factor
and all the other elements that go into a story.
Mysti
--
Mysti Rubert
Derek,
What exactly in my post leads you to characterize
my position with such gross inaccuracy?
For your information, my head is in the jaws of the Academy
and its fetid breath and pointy teeth imperil me at every turn.
I don't need any horse shit from any clever cyber-snipe
misrepresenting my position any more than I need any rusted-out
would-be guru patronizingly telling me that because ID4 made
40 potrillion dollars, it must be an effective story.
Argue the merits of your case and leave the misrepresentation
to the professionals, eh?
FYI, My position is now and always shall be:
all forms of human communication are organized around
structures which can be identified and described. Further,
understanding how such structures support power and
effectiveness in a story will make me a more powerful and
effective storyteller.
Blow the rest of it out your Funk and Wagnalls.
And I mean that in the nicest possible sense.
Mysti
> meaculpa@****.com wrote in article <5lsfk8$9...@ruby.hknet.com>...
> > Yes Gary, I DO wish you'd get it right for once.
> >
> > You carry on as though screenwriter and filmmakers should be allowed
> > to experiment with form and methodology and to use a broad range of
> > approaches to convey emotions, ideas, and impressions through
> > film.
> >
> > Isn't it about time you learnt that there are a number of absolutes
> > abou film form and content, and the filmmakers who deviate from
> > these are not real filmmakers, and the audiences who enjoy such
> > films are not valid audiences.
> >
> > I mean, look at that Andrei Tarkovsky, for example. Some of his films
> > have all sorts of images and moments in them which have nothing to
> > do with the story or the characters; they are simply the beginnings of
> > film anarchy. No wonder nobody admires or likes his work.
> >
> > It's clear that what we need is a book of rules. And some way to make
> > rebellious free-thinking experimentalists tow the line. People like you,
> > Gary.
> >
> > No wonder the only job you could get around here was as a ... err,
> > scriptwriter ...
> >
> > Derek
> >
> > Sarcasm may be the lowest form of wit, but it's a fine catharsis.
> >
--
Mysti Rubert
Billiam,
Thanks for the lovely introduction.
You have reminded me to curb my more intemperate
comments and focus on conversations that we will
all learn from.
Thanks, and welcome!
Mysti
Gary Pollard
Mysti
Mysti Rubert <myst...@netcom.com> wrote in article <33829F...@netcom.com>...
> Actually, the premise nor rules of effective structure required
> the cat-and-mouse-in-the-granary ending, they only required that
> Book leave Rachel's world, because as I saw it the premise was
> "no matter how much he might want to, a man of violent means
> can't live in a non-violent society" or something like that.
Well, you see, that's one problem I have with premises. If what a movie can offer you can be
watered down to one sentence, it probably should be. It's quite possible to begin a movie in the
basis of "Let's see how a group of travelling players lives in Greece over a thirty year span."
(The travelling players) Or let's take a look at the country and western world of Nashville. Now
you can say the premise is that Nashville is absurd. But the film is so much more than that. "Wings
of Desire" has a looseness that makes it a greater film than Hollywood angel movie for me.
To me, there's a plastic, visual, emotive, whatever quality to film that can at times over-ride all
story considerations. That's why to me "Badlands" and "Days of Heaven" are superb, although they
sure as hell aren't "driven" narratives.
> It's been a few years. I couldn't even BEGIN to guess at the
> premise of Unbearable Lightness of Being, no matter how groovy
> it was to watch.
I could REDUCE unbearable lightness to a one sentence premise if I thought it would help.(A man
believes that living life superficially is the best way, but then discovers that human emotions and
politics draw you in deeper). I don't like to though. It's similar to the way you sometimes see all
kinds of interesting and weird things happening in a life and then someone comes along says "male
menopause" and dismisses it all.
It's often the by-ways of a movie, or a novel that leads us, that interests me. If one is
interested in the US way, narrative driven, one may well not be open to other movies. I think the
best movie made in the past ten years is quite possibly Leos Carax's "Les Amants du Pont Neuf". I
just KNOW those heavily into structure won't like it. And it's not because it's not a good movie.
it's because it plays fast and loose with American middle of the road paradigms. Even "The Odyssey"
sucks in terms of three act structure.
>
> P.S. If that's the premise of a particular movie (art doesn't
> have to be neat), then of course that particular story would
> most likely have a very un-neat structure. I'm not sure what you
> mean by a body of work having a premise -- similar themes, sure,
> but I don't think the "premise" of Guernavaca (spelling?) is
> the same as the unfinished Harlequin (title?), know what I mean,
> Verne?
Well the life premise of Picasso in Guernica and Harlequin is human perception may transform the
world into an aesthetic object I guess. I think the premise of an entire oeuvre could be art ain't
neat. It could even be argued as a premise of "Trainspotting". I see so many of these things as
ink-blot staring. What one sees as the premise another may not.
Gary
Brevity
"Gary Pollard" <2001...@msn.com> wrote:
>Bob
>I both get suckered into buying, and grievously distrust, these books.
>I just received Linda Seger's "Making a Good Script Great". Eagerly opened it. Eye immediately fell
>on "Three Act Structure". And "beefing up that second act". Oh, shit. Suckered again.
Suckered? Nah. Maybe you just didn't do your homework. Face it, you
are a wild, outrageous, off the wall, point and shoot kind o' guy.
You don't play by the rules so why bother with any books or classes
that deal with the rules? There is nothing, by definition, wrong with
the rules, or with disobeying them. You know who you are, and you
also should have figured out by now who writes the books and to what
end. There is no book written telling you how to be an individual.
You have to write that one.
So stop complaining about the books and the films and the classes and
the rules, and about how you are being suckered. It make you sound
like all the other puny, unimaginative, wannabe complainers. It's
boring. Go, be creative. Be an individual. Make a film.
-Brevity
Mysti Rubert
Actually, the premise nor rules of effective structure required
the cat-and-mouse-in-the-granary ending, they only required that
Book leave Rachel's world, because as I saw it the premise was
"no matter how much he might want to, a man of violent means
can't live in a non-violent society" or something like that.
premise of Unbearable Lightness of Being, no matter how groovy
it was to watch.
That's the difference
between formula (oh hey, we need a chase here) and structure
(my premise is that you can't mix the worlds of violence and
non-violence, so these two people in love have to separate).
Thanks for explaining what you meant!
Mysti
P.S. If that's the premise of a particular movie (art doesn't
have to be neat), then of course that particular story would
most likely have a very un-neat structure. I'm not sure what you
mean by a body of work having a premise -- similar themes, sure,
but I don't think the "premise" of Guernavaca (spelling?) is
the same as the unfinished Harlequin (title?), know what I mean,
Verne?
Gary Pollard wrote:
>
> The danger is that at times having a "good" story structure screws up your premise.
>
> "Witness" had to cop out at the end to obey the "rules". That's precisely why it sucked.
>
> In life a man might get himself into a situation, that became tougher and tougher, more and more
> intense, until .... he just moved to another district. But that's lousy "story structure".
>
> My premise in my work might well be that film can reflect life, and that life doesn't fit into
> those neat structures.
>
> Besides, one man's "valued" premise is another man's garbage. Some like nihilism; some like God.
> Neither is gonna intrinsically be a better film.
>
> Gary
>
> Mysti Rubert <myst...@netcom.com> wrote in article <338137...@netcom.com>...
> > Gary,
> >
> > I don't know from Seger, but I do know the difference
> > between *story structure* and the value of a particular premise.
> >
> > Do you?
> >
> > Mysti
Bill Blum
Kirk...@aol.com wrote:
BIG SNIP
>Not to intrude too strongly, but maybe another view of the situation
>is in order--
>"Witness" does cop out. That doesn't make it a bad film, though. It just
>really screws up what is otherwise a masterful piece of writing and
>directing. Except for the "deux ex machina" ending, where the bad guy
>with ABSOLUTELY NO REASON TO CHANGE HIS MIND does so, it works for me.
>If there was anything in his prior character development to lead me to
>the conclusion that his change of heart was even remotely possible,
>I would be more forgiving. But there isn't, so "Witness" is guilty of
>the copout.
Forgive me for dropping in the middle, but I think you miss the
"theme" in WITNESS.
To witness is to see an event occur. In this instance, having all
those 'witnesses' made killing John Book a waste because it wouldn;t
change the situation. The bad was going to jail. He couldn't kill ALL
the 'witnesses' so he gave up. This brings the movie to a new level in
its theme fomr the boy being the only witness to a crime to the whole
community's 'bearing witness' preventing further bloodshed.
You don't think the Amish were chosen because they were convenient to
cheap, do you?
Bill
Peter McDermott
In article <01bc6584$58924280$5b0c55ca@garypoll>,
"Gary Pollard" <2001...@msn.com> wrote:
>My situation is rather the opposite of yours. I find I often wrote
>better when I had less knowledge of these things.
I see your point. I'm still not sure that my writing is actually
better -- but I am keeping the thing on track and getting stuff
finished because I've got a better grasp of how to solve my
structural problems.
I'm just not getting hung up about that 'do it by the numbers'
plot point x goes on page 13, character y goes through such
and such a change.
For me, it was something of a revelation to realize that people
constructed stories. I always felt that a story was like a
sculpture - it had it's own inherent nature and my job as a
writer was to let that get out. Realizing that if X doesn't
work, it might be because of a lack of tension and there are
strategies you can consciously use to increase of decrease that
was really very liberating.
>Now it's too easy to slip into the bad ways. It seems to me
>that almost EVERY film I really love I love because it has
>fresh air in it. Because it has loose ends. Because it takes
>time to go off on little diversions. All of which are sins
>in traditional "structure", or at least that as depicted by
>banal writers. And most of the insights into film these
>books offer IS banal.
I think that's absolutely true - but its true of any introductory
level self-help book as well. Such books, like most films I
suppose, aren't written to sell to that small number of
experienced writers who are looking to develop their craft.
They are aiming for the mass market -- everyone who has ever
dreamed of selling that million dollar screenplay. And the way
to hook most of those people is by giving them stuff they can
grasp quickly and easily. So yeah, I'm sure much of the content
*is* banal (he says, still only having read one) but that
really isn't much of a surprise to me. Rather than treating them
as holy writ, it makes much more sense to just take the bits
that you find useful in helping you solve particular problems.
That said, I'd recommend the only one that I have read to any
new screenwriter.
Raymond Frensham, Teach Yourself Screenwriting. Hodder and
Stoughton. A bargain at 6.99 UK pounds.
meac...@****.com
Mysti Rubert wrote:
> What exactly in my post leads you to characterize
> my position with such gross inaccuracy?\
Well, primarily the fact that I was, as I said, just being sarcastic and
referring to the occasional inferences/ implications, not necessarily
always yours, that there were some semi-rigid rules that people
ought to follow. But it wasn't meant to be taken too seriously.
I'm not sure that any of those little things, err...the :} things,
would have helpd.
> I don't need any horse shit from any clever cyber-snipe
> misrepresenting my position any more than I need any rusted-out
> would-be guru patronizingly telling me that because ID4 made
> 40 potrillion dollars, it must be an effective story.
Yeeeouch! Okay -- no more cyber-sniping misrepresentative horse shit.
(Well, I'll try, but ... )
> all forms of human communication are organized around
> structures which can be identified and described. Further,
> understanding how such structures support power and
> effectiveness in a story will make me a more powerful and
> effective storyteller.
Yes, in a sense you are correct, but there's also the big wide world, and while
I don't for a moment belittle the crux of what you are saying, I'm one of those
who believe that sometimes somebody just breaks free, runs wild with
an idea and does what they wish with it, with no reference internally or externally
to any structure and working entirely at a visceral level, and truly great things
happen. That's all I'm saying, that there's space for it all and I think one has to
allow their >academic< or >formal< understanding of story or structure limit
them only so far.
There is too, identifiable in this NG a mindset associated particularly with
the US style of filmmaking, beyond which there are many variations which
are very successful. No, this is not a nationalistic jibe or anything of the kind,
merely an observation about how the environment that different writers
work in can condition them to view things in a certain way. My point is that
for people who are working with a Hollywood future in mind there are
creative risks associated with confining one's definitions and >rule< (if I dare
use the word) to those which optimise the chances of a Hollywood career
only.
> Blow the rest of it out your Funk and Wagnalls.
> And I mean that in the nicest possible sense.
I'm sure you do ... well, no, I' not sure that you do, but it
doesn't bother me one iota if you don't. I'm not here to score
personal points against any individuals, only to chase the ball
on topics which I think are pertinent to writing, and there should
be space in there occasionally even for something as low as
sarcasm. I blame everything on that Pollard chap myself.
Derek
Mysti Rubert
Gary,
That's a concept, not a premise. And clarity and brevity
do not equal "watered down." As the gentleman said "I'd
have written a shorter letter, but I didn't have time."
Gary Pollard wrote:
> Well, you see, that's one problem I have with premises.
>If what a movie can offer you can be
> watered down to one sentence, it probably should be.
>It's quite possible to begin a movie in the
> basis of "Let's see how a group of travelling players
>lives in Greece over a thirty year span."
> (The travelling players) Or let's take a look at the country and
>western world of Nashville. Now
> you can say the premise is that Nashville is absurd.
>But the film is so much more than that.
Most good films are "much more" than their premises. The
premise is simply a unifying element, along with the central
dilemma and character arc.
> "Wings
> of Desire" has a looseness that makes it a greater film
>than Hollywood angel movie for me.
I'm a very great fan of Wings of Desire. I see a premise.
I also see three acts. So I guess we have nothing to argue about :)
> To me, there's a plastic, visual, emotive, whatever quality to film that can at times over-ride all
> story considerations. That's why to me "Badlands" and "Days of Heaven" are superb, although they
> sure as hell aren't "driven" narratives.
Once again, you are confounding the concept of structure with
"narrow definition of Hollywood classical structure."
> I could REDUCE unbearable lightness to a one sentence premise if I thought it would help.(A man
> believes that living life superficially is the best way, but then discovers that human emotions and
> politics draw you in deeper).
that's not a premise.
> I don't like to though. It's similar to the way you sometimes see all
> kinds of interesting and weird things happening in a life
>and then someone comes along says "male
> menopause" and dismisses it all.
Structure and understanding do not preclude magic, for me.
Mysti Rubert
I thought people were talking about the shift in tone
from, well, Witness, to the chase that ends in the grain
silo. I totally agree that the climax with the bad guy being
unable to kill all the *Witnesses* was not a bad thing, but
a good thing.
As Gloria Steinem should have noted, it's in the title.
Mysti
Christopher Rants wrote:
>
> In article <8641533...@dejanews.com>, Kirk...@aol.com wrote:
>
> >
> > "Witness" does cop out. That doesn't make it a bad film, though. It just
> > really screws up what is otherwise a masterful piece of writing and
> > directing. Except for the "deux ex machina" ending, where the bad guy
> > with ABSOLUTELY NO REASON TO CHANGE HIS MIND does so, it works for me.
> >
>
> Here I totally disagree... the bad guy had almost too many reason to
> change his mind... he was surrounded by witnesses and there was no way to
> "get rid" of all of them. He was caught, and realized the vendetta he was
> waging was completely a lost cause.
>
> > If there was anything in his prior character development to lead me to
> > the conclusion that his change of heart was even remotely possible,
> > I would be more forgiving. But there isn't, so "Witness" is guilty of
> > the copout.
>
> And there I think you need to go back to the beginning and see the
> interaction with the police lieutenant and see how he functioned with his
> family, with his men. You saw that he was indeed struggling with his
> morality, and it came to a head at the final battle.
>
> And as far as a "cop out"... read the original script. THAT was a copout
> and no character at all in the ending; it had the bad guy getting killed
> accidently by a kicking horse.
>
> --CR
Gary Pollard
Mysti
Mysti Rubert <myst...@netcom.com> wrote in article <3382A2...@netcom.com>...
>
> FYI, My position is now and always shall be:
> all forms of human communication are organized around
> structures which can be identified and described. Further,
> understanding how such structures support power and
> effectiveness in a story will make me a more powerful and
> effective storyteller.
>
Got it in one. You seem to believe that telling a STORY with pictures is the best and most worthy
aim of film.
Others believe that film no more needs to be restricted to story, and what serves, story than music
or painting or even literature (since modernism) does. I believe story may serve a film, but is not
necessary. Not vice versa.
If one accepts your apparent premise, that film is stories told with pictures (like comics really),
then your argument holds, but it seems to me that many of us don't even have an agreed-upon premise
for debate.
Gary
Mysti Rubert
Derek,
Thanks for clarifying. I clearly misread the intention of
your post.
Myti
Mysti Rubert
Yes, Gary, you are right. Story structure is irrelevant to the
non-story uses of film.
I'm not sure why you bothered arguing the finer points of story
structureif that's all you are trying to say.
Mysti
Christopher Rants
Nicolas A. Falacci
The currency in Hollywood is cliche. No matter how much everyone working in
Hollywood detests it ... cliche is the greenback of motion entertainment ...
no doubt.
But having a structure is not a degenerative element in films. Films have a
locked in structure in that they begin and stop. A beginning and an end. An
advanced concept of structure enables the writer to know what to do in the
middle of a piece. A organic sense of structure allows a writer to
understand how the characters create the story and how the story creates the
characters ... and that informs the structure ... like the stick that a vine
grows around.
Just babbling before the long weekend.
-Nick
================================================
Sent via The Vine - The Entertainment Industry Online
http://www.vine.org for information
Gary Pollard
Mysti
Well, essentially because even one IS doing story there are stories like "Hills Like White
Elephants" which would make excellent short films and do not fit in with most aspects of those
structures.
But more than that, to me one major issue is whether film needs to be DRIVEN by story, or whether
story may be ONE element in a film. The danger of Hollywood narrative is that it takes over to such
an extent all the interesting things are often cut out to serve it.
I can do, and have done, tightly plotted pieces of work that pretty much obey the rules. But even
of my own work, they are far from (a) my favourite, or (b) the best.
Gary
Mysti Rubert <myst...@netcom.com> wrote in article <338346...@netcom.com>...
Gary Pollard
Derek
meaculpa@****.com wrote in article <5lus70$r...@ruby.hknet.com>...
>
> There is too, identifiable in this NG a mindset associated particularly with
> the US style of filmmaking, beyond which there are many variations which
> are very successful. No, this is not a nationalistic jibe or anything of the kind,
> merely an observation about how the environment that different writers
> work in can condition them to view things in a certain way. My point is that
> for people who are working with a Hollywood future in mind there are
> creative risks associated with confining one's definitions and >rule< (if I dare
> use the word) to those which optimise the chances of a Hollywood career
> only.
>
I agree with this. That's the central point I try to get over. And, for those of us who don't want
to be "infected" it's sometimes pretty tough.
>
> I'm sure you do ... well, no, I' not sure that you do, but it
> doesn't bother me one iota if you don't. I'm not here to score
> personal points against any individuals, only to chase the ball
> on topics which I think are pertinent to writing, and there should
> be space in there occasionally even for something as low as
> sarcasm. I blame everything on that Pollard chap myself.
>
Yep, but I am a bit old to be an enfant terible and a bit young to be a crusty old vet. I'm working
on the latter though.
Gary
Gary Pollard
Brevity <abr...@juno.com> wrote in article <5lu5vr$9...@bolivia.earthlink.net>...
> "Gary Pollard" <2001...@msn.com> wrote:
>
> You know who you are, and you
> also should have figured out by now who writes the books and to what
> end. There is no book written telling you how to be an individual.
> You have to write that one.
>
> So stop complaining about the books and the films and the classes and
> the rules, and about how you are being suckered. It make you sound
> like all the other puny, unimaginative, wannabe complainers. It's
> boring. Go, be creative. Be an individual. Make a film.
>
> -Brevity
Here's a bit from my bio-filmography as published by the HK International Film Festival a couple of
years ago:
Born in Bristol, England in 1953, Gary Pollard came to Hong Kong in 1978, since which time he has
worked predominantly as a free-lance director for Radio Television Hong Kong.
His work as a director and producer during that period has included Educational Television, Public
Affairs, Documentary, and Drama.
From 1980 to the present he has written over forty drama scripts for Hong Kong television, as well
as short stories (several of which have been broadcast on BBC radio), and a novel set in Hong Kong,
A Distant Death.
In 1981, he also became the first expatriate director to have written and directed a Cantonese
drama for Hong Kong television, an episode of Under The Same Roof entitled A Double Life. He is the
only non-Chinese writer anywhere in the world to have regularly written and directed dramas for
broadcast in Cantonese.
In 1982 he began working on RTHK's English current affairs programmes, including Newsplus, Hong
Kong Now, Dollar Sense, In Sight, and the award-winning Here and Now as a producer/reporter, work
which he feels provided reliable background material for much of his writing in fiction and drama.
In 1991 he moved to Radio Television Hong Kong's Drama Department, where he was a major creative
force behind Hong Kong's first multilingual drama series, City Life, writing six of the seven
episodes and directing two.
He wrote three episodes of the 1992 Below the Lion Rock series, directed Wall of Glass, (Silver
Medal - Rehabilitation International Festival 1993) the first episode of Radio Television Hong
Kong's 1993 series dealing with the lives of the disabled, and has - most recently written three
episodes, directing two, of RTHK's new series of Affairs of the Heart.
In 1993 he wrote the screenplay for the feature film Young Offenders, a Hong Kong-Canada
co-production.
In 1991, the programme Legacy, written by him and directed by Elizabeth Wong Lo Tak, was voted Best
International TV Drama at the San Francisco Film Festival. Family, and Valentine's Day also
written by him, were awarded Certificates of Merit by the Chicago Film Festival in 1994 and 1995
respectively. Valentine's Day (Writer) and Still Life (Writer/Director), were both shown in the
1994 Hong Kong International Film Festival. The programme Living Space (Writer) was presented in
Film Festivals in Ankara and Szechuan.
He continues to write and direct drama and fiction, and is currently - with his company SCREENWORKS
- setting up new drama projects for film and television.
He is also the scriptwriter of RTHK's Mediawatch programme, an extra-mural lecturer in film at the
Hong Kong University, and a regular film and video critic for radio.
So you see, I've been there, done that.
And part of what I have found in the process is the pressure to conform placed on you by producers
who read half of one of these books once, or those who should know better but judge your work and
that of others by those rigid standards.
One problem is I am also a consumer of film, and a lover of it, and I am sick of being swamped by
this stuff from that angle too, even if I don't write it.
Gary
>
>
Mysti Rubert
From my perspective, studio-developed projects could use
better stories, not weaker ones :)
Seriously, I don't think most movies are DRIVEN by story
any more than most paintings are DRIVEN by composition.
Mysti
Brevity
"Gary Pollard" <2001...@msn.com> wrote:
>Here's a bit from my bio-filmography as published by the HK International Film Festival a couple of
>years ago:
<snipped>
Thanks for the resume. Makes all the complaining about being
"suckered" even less understandable.
-Brevity
Gary Pollard
Makes the snide comments about "wannabes" even less understandable too huh?
But as for being suckered, it happens to all of us.
I have read of major literary figures such as Saul Bellow who say even they can't resist this kind
of books.
In my view they are often about on the same level as How to Stop Smoking in 20 days, but you still
sometimes think they might have SOMETHING to offer you.
Gary
Brevity <abr...@juno.com> wrote in article <5m2vsd$6...@bolivia.earthlink.net>...
Gary Pollard
You seem to have missed this part:
"And part of what I have found in the process is the pressure to conform placed on you by producers
who read half of one of these books once, or those who should know better but judge your work and
that of others by those rigid standards. One problem is I am also a consumer of film, and a lover
of it, and I am sick of being swamped by this stuff from that angle too, even if I don't write it."
But let's talk a little about being suckered by form:
=======
The Unforgiven.
Will Munny: "I ain't like that no more."
The first time he said this, a story point creaks into place. Does anyone in the whole world doubt
for ONE SECOND second how the film is going to end?
The second time he says this, is it worth staying in the cinema? We're pretty sure by now.
The third time. Do they think we are morons?
The end of the film Well here's a big surprise. He IS like that. We'd never have guessed.
And I HAVE seen this very point given as an example of good structural writing.
Gary Pollard
Christopher
Christopher Rants <c...@o.ner> wrote in article <c-2205972...@p14.hwts05.loop.net>...
> In article <01bc6729$f8a34160$260c55ca@garypoll>, "Gary Pollard"
> <2001...@msn.com> wrote:
>
> snip
>
> > The Unforgiven.
> >
> > Will Munny: "I ain't like that no more."
> >
> > The first time he said this, a story point creaks into place. Does
> anyone in the whole world doubt
> > for ONE SECOND second how the film is going to end?
> >
> > The second time he says this, is it worth staying in the cinema? We're
> pretty sure by now.
> >
> > The third time. Do they think we are morons?
> >
>
> No. Just you.
>
Christopher, it is gratifying to know that you think Mr. Eastwood would go to all that expense for
me. He needn't have bothered. I'd have got the message if he had not telegraphed his intentions so
blatantly even once. It's the morons who like his approach I guess he was doing it for.
>
> > The end of the film Well here's a big surprise. He IS like that. We'd
> never have guessed.
> >
> > And I HAVE seen this very point given as an example of good structural
> writing.
> >
> Because it was. The "trick" of that movie was for us to sympathize with
> Muny, to want him to do the terrible things that we all see as being
> terrible, and justifiable. The whole point of the story was the struggle
> of a man (and the audience) against his primal instincts, balanced with
> the necessities of living in an ordered society. We wanted muny to act
> out, even though we knew that by him (and us, vicariously) doing so he's
> damned himself forever. It was a tragedy.
>
I look for more in art than "tricks" and telegraphing. Outside Hollywood I find more of what I
like.
> What did you want? For Muny to walk out into the street only to be gunned
> down by aliens, or better yet for the Chinese workers to rise up and all
> of a sudden for Hong Kong East? THAT would have been unexpected. And
> stupid. And not relevant to the story at all.
What I wanted was a movie that wasn't a foregone conclusion from about ten minutes into the film.
That's what so much of the inane telegraphing and the structure that so many Hollywood writers seem
to think makes a great work of art will never give you.
Gary
Christopher Rants
snip
> The Unforgiven.
>
> Will Munny: "I ain't like that no more."
>
> The first time he said this, a story point creaks into place. Does
anyone in the whole world doubt
> for ONE SECOND second how the film is going to end?
>
> The second time he says this, is it worth staying in the cinema? We're
pretty sure by now.
>
> The third time. Do they think we are morons?
>
No. Just you.
> The end of the film Well here's a big surprise. He IS like that. We'd
never have guessed.
>
> And I HAVE seen this very point given as an example of good structural
writing.
>
Because it was. The "trick" of that movie was for us to sympathize with
Muny, to want him to do the terrible things that we all see as being
terrible, and justifiable. The whole point of the story was the struggle
of a man (and the audience) against his primal instincts, balanced with
the necessities of living in an ordered society. We wanted muny to act
out, even though we knew that by him (and us, vicariously) doing so he's
damned himself forever. It was a tragedy.
What did you want? For Muny to walk out into the street only to be gunned
down by aliens, or better yet for the Chinese workers to rise up and all
of a sudden for Hong Kong East? THAT would have been unexpected. And
stupid. And not relevant to the story at all.
--CR
Kirk...@aol.com
In article <c-2105971...@p14.hwts16.loop.net>,
c...@o.ner
Apparently, I'm missing something here. I certainly hope so, if only
because I really want to like this film. It has everything I could want,
except an ending that makes sense.
Maybe the bed guy's interaction with others is something I missed. If so,
I've missed it both in the theater and several times in TV. Seeing him as
a guy with doubts about the morality of his actions, with an active
conscience, is just too far removed from his change of heart for it to
make sense.
I'll certainly look at this one again more carefully, because I love the
way it's shot, directed, scored, etc. I love it all except for that
damned ending where I feel cheated. Weir could have done more shots
of the farmers watching the bad guy, and of the bad guy seeing (feeling)
their eyes on him. We could be made to feel his doubt. We need to, in
order for us to imagine ourselves in a similar morally ambiguous position,
and for his giving up to make sense.
Oh, well. It's just a movie. It couldn't possibly have anything to do
with real life.
Joan Marie Shields
Christopher Rants <c...@o.ner> wrote:
>Because it was. The "trick" of that movie was for us to sympathize with
>Muny, to want him to do the terrible things that we all see as being
>terrible, and justifiable. The whole point of the story was the struggle
>of a man (and the audience) against his primal instincts, balanced with
>the necessities of living in an ordered society. We wanted muny to act
>out, even though we knew that by him (and us, vicariously) doing so he's
>damned himself forever. It was a tragedy.
For me, I thought the movie was about destroying the myth of the gunfighter,
namely Muny, only to rebuild it at the end. Maybe this was a way of
showing that beneath the myth there is a real person who, in extraordinary
circumstances, does the extraordinary and becomes myth but the man is still
beneath the myth. Kind of cyclic I thought.
The reality of the myth versus the myth - or am I being too metaphysical
here, I get confused when I fall into decontructionism and post-modernism...
joan
--
Joan Shields jshi...@uci.edu http://www.ags.uci.edu/~jshields
University of California - Irvine
School of Social Ecology Department of Environmental Analysis and Design
I do not purchase services or products from unsolicited e-mail advertisements.
Jim Bongard
IMHO he had no change of heart. He simply realized that he was in a no
win situation. There were too many witnesses. He couldn't shoot his way
out. It was just inevitable.
>
> I'll certainly look at this one again more carefully, because I love the
> way it's shot, directed, scored, etc. I love it all except for that
> damned ending where I feel cheated. Weir could have done more shots
> of the farmers watching the bad guy, and of the bad guy seeing (feeling)
> their eyes on him. We could be made to feel his doubt. We need to, in
> order for us to imagine ourselves in a similar morally ambiguous position,
> and for his giving up to make sense.
It made sense to me. He tried for quick money, tolerated murder to cover
it up when he still had a good chance to get away with the crime, and
gave up when the situation became hopeless.
It would have made no sense for him to do anything else. He was trapped.
The farmers were not going to let him get away. He had a limited number
of bullets. If he shot Rachel, they would have been on him immediately
and disarmed him. They were non-violent, but not fools.
>
> Oh, well. It's just a movie. It couldn't possibly have anything to do
> with real life.
It was a wonderful film. I'll remember the barn raising scene forever.
There was true visual storytelling. At the end of the scene I knew who
these people were and was saddened, because I knew John Book could be
happy there. I also knew that circumstances would never allow that to
happen. In my opinion, it was Harrison Ford's best work to date.
Jim Bongard
Christopher Rants
Joan --
I think you are dead-right on the THEMATIC. But the theme of the film was
different from the character sympathy and arc.
--CR
In article <5m4fuc$q...@news.service.uci.edu>, jshi...@rigel.oac.uci.edu
brett
In article <3385DA...@opus.corp.fedex.com>, jb8...@opus.corp.fedex.com
says...
((snip))
>IMHO he had no change of heart. He simply realized that he was in a no
>win situation. There were too many witnesses. He couldn't shoot his way
>out. It was just inevitable.
>
>>
>> I'll certainly look at this one again more carefully, because I love the
>> way it's shot, directed, scored, etc. I love it all except for that
>> damned ending where I feel cheated.
don't feel cheated, the first snippet (?) is 100% right. If the guy
was in a position to get away with it, and turned himself in due to
a change of heart, that would be different. the dude was caught, his
life was over, end o' story.
brett
Peter McDermott
In article <3385DA...@opus.corp.fedex.com>,
Jim Bongard <jb8...@opus.corp.fedex.com> wrote:
>> Oh, well. It's just a movie. It couldn't possibly have anything to do
>> with real life.
>
>It was a wonderful film. I'll remember the barn raising scene forever.
>There was true visual storytelling.
Indeed. Regardless of whether people found particular aspects
of the plot convincing or not, this was one of the most lyrical
scenes I've seen in *any* film, *ever*.
Sheer magic.
JALLEN115
Mysti writes:
>Seriously, I don't think most movies are DRIVEN by story
>any more than most paintings are DRIVEN by composition.
I'm not sure I understand your point. Film IS visual storytelling. The
story's the thing. A well crafted film does not stray from the story.
Everything from the visual narrative to the dialogue comments upon reacts
against or furthers the story. It is the spine of film. The analogy
between film and painting is off the mark. Story is to film as Subject is
to painting, not composition. The painter may choose a landscape to paint,
or a fruit bowl, or an abstraction. But after the subject matter is
chosen, the painter uses all of his/her tools to bring that subject into
being. Every brushstroke contributes to the rendering of the subject, the
painter's story.
Mysti Rubert
By story I was thinking story structure, not content.
Nice post! I think I agree with all of it!
Mysti
meac...@****.com
JALLEN115 wrote:
> Mysti writes:
> >Seriously, I don't think most movies are DRIVEN by story
> >any more than most paintings are DRIVEN by composition.
> I'm not sure I understand your point. Film IS visual storytelling. The
> story's the thing. A well crafted film does not stray from the story.
> Everything from the visual narrative to the dialogue comments upon reacts
> against or furthers the story.
I know this is going to earn me lots of hostile responses but I must agree
with Mysti and say that -- IMESHO -- movies are mostly driven more by
character than by story. An interesting story with hopeless or inappropriate
characters will not work. I think when we sit down to watch a film, the first thing that
engages us is the central character(s), then their predicament or situation,
then the story, or plot.
I also think a good movie can revolve around an extremely simple, or almost
non-existent story, if the character and his/her reactions are sufficiently
engaging. Besides which, surely the story is really dependent on who and what
your central character(s) is?
Take the work of any good filmmaker, be it Kubrick, Tarkovsky,
Lean, Scorsese, Campion, Jarmusch, whoever. (No, it's pointless
arguing about this selection ....) In every instance I don't see how
the story can become central to the movie. I'm NOT arguing that story
is irrelevant; I'm saying that characters and how they behave is what is
uppermost in the elements that determine whether or not we enjoy
a film, whether or not we watch it right through.
Which helps explain why I prefer the above to a Jean Claude Van Damme
film, for example, where the characters are shallow and pointless jerks
who serve no other purpose than to express what is intended to be an
interesting story.
The analogy
> between film and painting is off the mark. Story is to film as Subject is
> to painting, not composition.
Well, I would say that character is to film as subject is to painting. I'm one
of those who sees film as art first and entertainment second (heaven
forbid) and as a cultural means of expressing ideas integral and central to
the dilemmas that complicate the human condition. Film is about people,
about their ideas and feelings. All else follows.
I think.
Derek
Gary Pollard
What's the "subject" of a Pollock painting, a de Kooning, a Kandinsky?
The subject is sometimes the medium itself, the joy of working with the medium, what it may offer.
Film is NOT, for me, story dressed up prettily, a kind of moving comic. It can be a whole bunch of
elements of which story is just one.
That is precisely what much of the debate here has been about.
Gary
JALLEN115 <jall...@aol.com> wrote in article <19970528171...@ladder02.news.aol.com>...
> Mysti writes:
>
> >Seriously, I don't think most movies are DRIVEN by story
> >any more than most paintings are DRIVEN by composition.
>
> I'm not sure I understand your point. Film IS visual storytelling. The
> story's the thing. A well crafted film does not stray from the story.
> Everything from the visual narrative to the dialogue comments upon reacts
> against or furthers the story. It is the spine of film. The analogy
> between film and painting is off the mark. Story is to film as Subject is
meac...@****.com
JALLEN115 wrote:
> Mysti writes:
> >Seriously, I don't think most movies are DRIVEN by story
> >any more than most paintings are DRIVEN by composition.
> I'm not sure I understand your point. Film IS visual storytelling. The
> story's the thing. A well crafted film does not stray from the story.
> Everything from the visual narrative to the dialogue comments upon reacts
> against or furthers the story.
I know this is going to earn me lots of hostile responses but I must agree
with Mysti and say that -- IMESHO -- movies are mostly driven more by
character than by story. An interesting story with hopeless or inappropriate
characters will not work. I think when we sit down to watch a film, the first thing that
engages us is the central character(s), then their predicament or situation,
then the story, or plot.
I also think a good movie can revolve around an extremely simple, or almost
non-existent story, if the character and his/her reactions are sufficiently
engaging. Besides which, surely the story is really dependent on who and what
your central character(s) is?
Take the work of any good filmmaker, be it Kubrick, Tarkovsky,
Lean, Scorsese, Campion, Jarmusch, whoever. (No, it's pointless
arguing about this selection ....) In every instance I don't see how
the story can become central to the movie. I'm NOT arguing that story
is irrelevant; I'm saying that characters and how they behave is what is
uppermost in the elements that determine whether or not we enjoy
a film, whether or not we watch it right through.
Which helps explain why I prefer the above to a Jean Claude Van Damme
film, for example, where the characters are shallow and pointless jerks
who serve no other purpose than to express what is intended to be an
interesting story.
The analogy
> between film and painting is off the mark. Story is to film as Subject is
> to painting, not composition.
Well, I would say that character is to film as subject is to painting. I'm one
Peter McDermott
In article <5mi1dt$e...@ruby.hknet.com>,
meaculpa@****.com wrote:
>Take the work of any good filmmaker, be it Kubrick, Tarkovsky,
>Lean, Scorsese, Campion, Jarmusch, whoever. (No, it's pointless
>arguing about this selection ....) In every instance I don't see how
>the story can become central to the movie. I'm NOT arguing that story
>is irrelevant; I'm saying that characters and how they behave is what is
>uppermost in the elements that determine whether or not we enjoy
>a film, whether or not we watch it right through.
Surely this is a false dichotomy. Story is just characters in action.
If you've got crap characters, you'll have a crap story. Thinking of
either in isolation really doesn't make much sense to me.
Claudio Bianchini
Jim Bongard <jb8...@opus.corp.fedex.com> wrote:
>IMHO he had no change of heart. He simply realized that he was in a no
>win situation. There were too many witnesses. He couldn't shoot his way
>out. It was just inevitable.
He could kill himself, I dont know if that was the best way to end the
movie, but there is always a way to get out, suicide has been considered
the last chance, the final chance, as in "Romeo e Juliet", and they abused
of it.
JoeRioux
"My main point though was that once one starts judging work by those
"structures" one cannot colour
outside the lines, and resents the work of those that do. "
Gary,
I view/review stories through looking at their quality of movement. How
the storyteller sets the story into motion and sustains that movement in
a dramatic, fulfilling way, how the movement of the story affects the
story's audience in a moving, fulfilling way.
I don't start a review from the perspective of there being some set rule
about how to create that movement. But I've also found in studying
stories that inexperienced, struggling writers generally focus so much on
character and plot, the deeper movement of their story becomes fractured,
ignored, or violated. The result is a story that doesn't connect with an
audience -- move them.
I read scripts occassionally that have an artistic intent. I think it's
great when a writer can pull that off. But a badly written artistic
script can generally be found to have flaws in its movement that are
similar in principle to action stories that are badly structured.
I'm working now with a writer who wants to write a screenplay about the
nature of art and freedom. He's got the writing talent. I'm trying to
help him stay within the passion and depth of the story and recreate those
moments in his story in a way that they are moving and profound his
audience.
Bill Johnson
Essays on the Craft of Dramatic Writing!
http://www.teleport.com/~bjscript/index.htm
JoeRioux
"I also think a good movie can revolve around an extremely simple, or
almost
non-existent story, if the character and his/her reactions are
sufficiently
engaging. Besides which, surely the story is really dependent on who and
what
your central character(s) is?"
How does one know which character brings which story to life if one
doesn't understand the world of one's story? Put another way, how do you
know which characters don't belong in a particular story? Or which detail
of description? Or which line of dialogue? Or which plot action?
Creating a story is a process of both what one chooses to present to the
audience as well as what one leaves out, and the sequence one presents the
actions of a characters so they create a context and meaning for the
story's audience.
Ray Cochener
Unless it's a story about inanimate objects motivated by some
inexplicable outside force... but I don't think that would have too much
of an audience.
Gary Pollard
Bill
The approach I like to take is relatively organic.
If structure is inherent in the material I'd rather come to it by
"natural" processes, than by starting with that structure and getting
my first act done by page 17 (thanks, but no thanks, Lew Hunter).
But I feel that the danger with certain of these "structural" devices
is that they represent a certain view of the world, and the way
people (protagonists) move through the world. If what you are talking
about is in contradiction with that, there are dangers in trying to
stick to it.
Frankly, I believe that mainstream scriptwriting has rarely if ever
been worse than it is today. I really suspect that the
page-count/structures/formulae are part of the reason.
It's good that you seem to be trying to work within the needs of the
subject rather than the form.
I just finished reading Lew Hunter's book n writing today. The way he
shoe-horns an idea into the formula is depressing as hell to me. And
I KNOW I wouldn't like the work he's producing by doing so.
Gary
JoeRioux <joer...@aol.com> wrote in article
<19970604234...@ladder02.news.aol.com>...
Gary Pollard
Joe
JoeRioux <joer...@aol.com> wrote in article
<19970604235...@ladder02.news.aol.com>...
>
> How does one know which character brings which story to life if one
> doesn't understand the world of one's story? Put another way, how
do you
> know which characters don't belong in a particular story? Or which
detail
> of description? Or which line of dialogue? Or which plot action?
>
But a film does not have to be about story in the traditional sense.
Antonioni's latest is a film about a director walking around looking
for ideas for a film about love. The film is essentially a series of
meditations on human relationships developed from his old notebooks.
To me, it's a superb movie.
Sometimes, if one wants to deal with a subject from different angles,
the conventional story structure is NOT the way to go. If one is
bored to death by the predictability of "structure", it's not the way
to go either.
Gary
Mike Shields
In article <AFB46ECD...@petermc.demon.co.uk>,
ne...@petermc.demon.co.uk (Peter McDermott) wrote:
> In article <5mi1dt$e...@ruby.hknet.com>,
> meaculpa@****.com wrote:
>
> >Take the work of any good filmmaker, be it Kubrick, Tarkovsky,
> >Lean, Scorsese, Campion, Jarmusch, whoever. (No, it's pointless
> >arguing about this selection ....) In every instance I don't see how
> >the story can become central to the movie. I'm NOT arguing that story
> >is irrelevant; I'm saying that characters and how they behave is what is
> >uppermost in the elements that determine whether or not we enjoy
> >a film, whether or not we watch it right through.
>
> Surely this is a false dichotomy. Story is just characters in action.
> If you've got crap characters, you'll have a crap story. Thinking of
> either in isolation really doesn't make much sense to me.
Nick, have you chimed in with what seems to be your weekly
Characters=Story post yet? Or have you done that already for this thread?
Mike
"Not too many people know that I'm famous." - Mike Shields
I need $600,000 for a film. Serious inquiries only.
Read "About this Particular MacIntosh" available online near you!!!
On the Web at: http://www.atpm.com
"You can't write this stuff. It happens in real life." - Mike Shields
If everyone on the 'net sent a dollar...
"In the future, everyone will have their own Web Page." Mike Shields
ASGTPR #54
Mkword
Mike Shields writes
>Nick, have you chimed in with what seems to be your
>weekly Characters=Story post yet? Or have you done
>that already for this thread?
LOL!
I think I have created an Uberthread.
Hey ... it's no big secret. Ask any reader ... it's the characters
that keep you interested and invested in the story. It's the
characters and what's going to happen to them that keeps
the reader turning the pages.
-nick
JoeRioux
"But a film does not have to be about story in the traditional sense.
Antonioni's latest is a film about a director walking around looking
for ideas for a film about love. The film is essentially a series of
meditations on human relationships developed from his old notebooks.
To me, it's a superb movie.
Sometimes, if one wants to deal with a subject from different angles,
the conventional story structure is NOT the way to go. If one is
bored to death by the predictability of "structure", it's not the way
to go either.
Gary"
Gary,
That's why I talk about stories in terms of movement, both what the story
sets out to accomplish through the on-going process of anticipation,
resolution and fulfillment of its actions/characters/ideas, etc., and how
the storyteller designs their story to be "moving" to their audience in
some way.
I'm working now with a writer who wants to do an artistic film. We've
used the Elephant Man to talk about some story issues. In his writing,
I've finally got him to get to the issue at the heart of each scene in a
way that it can move his audience (as opposed to only being suggested by
characters staring off into the distance, etc.). But he still wants to
write toward that moment with "stuff." Well written stuff, but it creates
moments that not are meant to be moving themselves, but to set the stage
for what will be revealed to be moving. In contrast, scenes in the
Elephant Man revolve around a dramatic issue at their heart that is moving
and they deepen the impact of those moments through everything that
happens on the screen.
I thought the opening scene of Slingblade really illustrated the point,
the guy dragging the chair slooooowwwwllly across the floor. Created an
anticipation of the outcome of where he was going. Same kind of thing in
The Shadow Warrior, the messenger running down along the trench past,
past, past sleeping/sleepy troops. Created an anticipation of the message
itself.
Mike Shields
In article <19970606085...@ladder02.news.aol.com>, mkw...@aol.com
(Mkword) wrote:
This is why I say you should write a book. I'd buy a copy. Of course, I
don't think Gary would. And I know you said you'd never do that, but I can
dream, can't I?
Ellen Evans
Mike Shields wrote:
>
> In article <19970606085...@ladder02.news.aol.com>, mkw...@aol.com
> (Mkword) wrote:
>
> > Mike Shields writes
> >
> > >Nick, have you chimed in with what seems to be your
> > >weekly Characters=Story post yet? Or have you done
> > >that already for this thread?
> >
> > LOL!
> >
> > I think I have created an Uberthread.
> >
> > Hey ... it's no big secret. Ask any reader ... it's the characters
> > that keep you interested and invested in the story. It's the
> > characters and what's going to happen to them that keeps
> > the reader turning the pages.
> >
> > -nick
>
> This is why I say you should write a book.
You could call it The Screenplay Uberbook.
The introduction - a short paragraph explaining that screenwriting is a
difficult and complex process. The reader should not try to read the
entire book in one sitting. No person could absorb the information on
more than a page or two in any single day.
And then, on page 1, smack in the middle of the otherwise blank page:
character = story.
One page two: CHARACTER EQUALS STORY.
Page three: CHARACTER equals story.
Four: character EQUALS story.
And then, after a hundred or so pages, the finale. Only one gargantuan
letter filling each page, spelling out...
Perhaps there could be a poster that goes with it. Oh, and don't forget
the hypertext version. Click on character....
:-) :-) :-)
Paul
Bill
It's funny that I stumbled onto this thread while I'm between writing
screenplays. My concept of "story" vs. "character" needs to be expanded,
I think, before I can outline my next script.
My working definition of "story" has been what I call my "playerspeak"
(from the Altman movie) lexicon of starting off a new script with
"story" first like : "My movie is ...(I always start with that phrase)
'The Serpent and the Rainbow' meets 'Tin Cup'. "
Until I can utter this phrase, I have no catalyst. Thus, in my
vocabulary story equals "pitch" which is the starting point of the
infamous "high concept."
Then the next phrase I utter is "Why is it that?"
And continuing my "My movie is... catalyst in the last script I wrote:
"Why is it that no golfer has ever won the modern Grand Slam?"
And my story is an effort to answer my "Why is it that?" question after
my "playerspeak" catalyst.
I shun a lot of formula ideas, but they have helped me to create my own
lexicon.
So for me, those two exercises are my story, and the rest is character
development, in the sense that I try to make my characters true to their
nature and logical in their actions.
Paul
Gary Pollard
Paul
In terms of "conventional" stories, I am of the "character" mould
rather than the plot mould.
A woman's baby is kidnapped. She doesn't care. One story.
A woman's baby is kidnapped. She believes that the police can handle
it. Another story.
A woman's baby is kidnapped. She has a nervous breakdown and is
placed in an asylum. Another story.
A woman's baby is kidnapped. Except it wasn't. She murdered it
herself and is merely claiming it was kidnapped. Another story.
Which of these roads the story takes depends on her character.
Of course, there's little doubt to me that character is NOT important
in many blockbusting films. What we tend to get are rubber-stamp
protagonists about whom we know nothing. Look at some of the movies
out there and it's frightening how little you know about the
characters, if character is what you like. They're too often blank
slates waiting for the "star" to fill them up.
Gary
Paul <Win1...@webtv.net> wrote in article
<5nfe2f$73f$1...@newsd-105.bryant.webtv.net>...
B. Boren
On 10 Jun 1997, Gary Pollard wrote:
> in many blockbusting films. What we tend to get are rubber-stamp
> protagonists about whom we know nothing. Look at some of the movies
> out there and it's frightening how little you know about the
> characters, if character is what you like. They're too often blank
> slates waiting for the "star" to fill them up.
I have to site SPEED as the most blatant example of this I have
ever seen. Sandra Bullock's (sp) character, Annie, is never
given a single personal detail. We don't know her last name, or
even why she was on the bus. Perhaps she's supposed to be more
interesting because she's enigmatic? Hmm?
And whats the deal with doing SPEED 2 without Reeves? The studio
must have some kind of mental impairment. I'd have been likely to
go see a movie *like* SPEED 2 if it were a stand alone, but
knowing it's a sequel without the original hero who made it go,
I'll stay away. They should have just made it a new film.
It's like doing a LETHAL WEAPON without Riggs or a new DIE HARD
without John MacClaine. It's morally bankrupt! ;)
Ben
_
| |
| | Brannon "Ben" Boren
/~~~\ bran...@u.washington.edu
/ Rx \ University of Washington School of Pharmacy
(_______) http://weber.u.washington.edu/~brannonb
Jeff S Miholer
She's the common everywoman. Man riding bus.
Jeff "HD" Miholer
B. Boren (bran...@u.washington.edu) wrote:
: I have to site SPEED as the most blatant example of this I have
Didi S. DubelyeW
Paul wrote:
> My working definition of "story" has been what I call my "playerspeak"
> (from the Altman movie) lexicon of starting off a new script with
> "story" first like : "My movie is ...(I always start with that phrase)
> 'The Serpent and the Rainbow' meets 'Tin Cup'. "
>
> Until I can utter this phrase, I have no catalyst. Thus, in my
> vocabulary story equals "pitch" which is the starting point of the
> infamous "high concept."
>
> Then the next phrase I utter is "Why is it that?"
> And continuing my "My movie is... catalyst in the last script I wrote:
> "Why is it that no golfer has ever won the modern Grand Slam?"
>
> And my story is an effort to answer my "Why is it that?" question after
> my "playerspeak" catalyst.
>
> I shun a lot of formula ideas, but they have helped me to create my own
> lexicon.
>
> So for me, those two exercises are my story, and the rest is character
> development, in the sense that I try to make my characters true to their
> nature and logical in their actions.
Not to play semantics, Paul, but what you do,
I would call the premise. Oh, yeah and that
weird Hollywood cross-bred movie-creature!
My rep made me do it for one of my scripts he's
currently sending round to the studios. This script
is so out-of-the-ordinary that even he couldn't come up
with the Beastie *hurrah,hurrah!*. In the end,
he also preferred using my paragraph synopsis with
logline. (Yipppeee!)
The Beastie? What happens when The Fisher King meets
The Lawnmower Man in The Drop Zone? Yuck! That's the
closest I could approximate and damn, it tells you nearly
nothing. I remember once, a producer asked me to do that
cross-bred animal on a script of mine before he'd read it.
So I ripped the hair out from atop my head for days...
finally came up with something along the lines of: Cross
Frank Capra's It's a Wonderful Life with Jonathan Demme's
Something Wild. He then asked me to elaborate how I came up
with this strange beastie as he couldn't "see" it. I then
explained in three pages, what would have become much clearer
had he just taken the time to read the script or even merely
the synopsis!!!
I'm sure your "lexicon" works for you on a personal level,
but it irks me when a producer or other Industry individual
asks for this quick-speak, lazy lingo device to explain the
film's niche.
One of the problems is that every film brings a different
experience & emotional sensation to each person. You can
see that right here in this ng! So this Cross-bred Creature
often carries personally-derived baggage & doesn't
explain so much as give some sort of ambience, maybe. Yet, it
might not be the matching luggage, if you get my drift....
I know the intent is to show money-making potential. (Only
blockbusters really breed huge families, doncha know?)
It really muddies the waters in my humble POV. One has no clearer
idea of ANOTHER's screenplay through these blockbuster catch-
phrases in more instances than not. I still prefer pitching
a brief (50 words or less) paragraph with an intriguing logline.
Sorry. Did not expect to rant on so....
D
(Again, I was not intending to dismiss what Paul does as a personal
exercise, just Industry's reliance on this method of making an
Unknown Entity somehow more tantalizing by explaining it via other
Known Quanities.) Comments? I thank you for keeping flamethrowers
turned off.
remove NOSPAM when replying to e-mail address - prefer public
post for other's involvement.
anon...@pacbell.net
> B. Boren (bran...@u.washington.edu) wrote:
>
> : I have to site SPEED as the most blatant example of this I have
> : ever seen. Sandra Bullock's (sp) character, Annie, is never
> : given a single personal detail. We don't know her last name, or
> : even why she was on the bus. Perhaps she's supposed to be more
> : interesting because she's enigmatic? Hmm?
Actually, we do find out why she is on the bus.
She has had her license revoked for speeding! And she is pretty pissed off about it. She
tells us this in expository dialogue in the beginning, when she is yammering to the bus
driver.
Why do we need her last name?
meac...@****.com
anon...@pacbell.net wrote:
> She has had her license revoked for speeding! And she is pretty pissed off about it. She
> tells us this in expository dialogue in the beginning, when she is yammering to the bus
> driver.
> Why do we need her last name?
We don't.
But more to the point -- IMO -- why do we need expository dialogue?
Last night I watched Ron Howard's film Ransom, on video. (Don't ask why,
but sometimes I get in the mood to watch this sort of film.)
The opening scene was formulaic expository back-story (three words that
made me wince but I had to use them, and in that order, sorry).
Why is there a reluctance to let us discover characters ourselves simply
by observing their relevant behaviour and psychology as they go through
whatever thay go through. Isn't it more interesting?
I'm not trying to drag the poor old Hollywood formula horse out for
another whipping, honest, but is it really a pervasive imperative amongst
contemporary screenwriters to engage audiences in an expository
sequence before they feel comfortable that the audience will
understand the characters?
Or is this a lazy way of doing what might be more interestingly handled
if approahced with greater subtlety throughout the film, albeit using a more
challenging writing methodology?
(Somewhat rhetorical, the above ... just thoughts ...)
Derek
IAM102970
Gary Pollard writes:
>What's the "subject" of a Pollock painting, a de Kooning, a Kandinsky?
I don't think you understood my point clearly. Take Pollock's 'Pasiphae'
for example. At first glance it may seem to have little or no meaning
beyond the frantic energy of the brushstrokes to you, but upon closer
examination, there is a meaning, a narrative, behind every energetic
swirl. Start with the title of the work. It refers to the Cretan Queen who
gave birth to the minotaur. She is the painting's subject and she is
present in the painting. Not a clear figure, or a well defined or
illustrated figure, but then again Pollock's point was not illustrative it
was invocotive. Like all the Abstract Expressionists, Pollock worked from
the unconscious, and he chose mythic, totemic images with which to display
the unconscious process that, he believed, to be universal. I have often
heard Pollock's paintings referred to as a 'skin of signs'. Even his 'all
over' paintings reveal this same thread of purpose. To assume Pollock was
simply playing with the medium is to deny the most important aspect of his
work.
The same can be said of de Kooning's 'Excavation' where each tangled image
can be defined as part of the body. Ask yourself, "What's he excavating?"
The thread of his narrative begins with that question. And every stroke,
every recurved line begins to take on meaning. Its all about bodies. The
body of paint, of the world, and of ourselves. Read Kandinsky's
"Concerning the Spiritual in Art" and then re-evaluate his paintings. They
are not simply play, there is a point, a meaning, a story that links them
all. That is what defines any great artist, their body of work and the
truth that it speaks. The same could be said of Mark Rothko, or O'Keefe,
or Gorky.
>The subject is sometimes the medium itself, the joy of working with the
medium, >what it may offer.
'Art for Art's sake' is a fiction. Nothing artistically meaningful exists
without a narrative. Look at Bunuel's "Un Chien Andalou". Even in its
exquisite abstraction, there is a narrative, a base story that gives the
film its structure and its symbols meaning. Film is a language, it has a
lexicon. It has syntax. It is visual narrative. Even, more obscurely,
Moholy-Nagy's short 'Black, White, Gray', which would be considered by
many to be the height of cinematic abstraction (several composited angles
of his rotating metallic creation "Light-Space Requisite") has a hidden
narrative. There is method in all madness.
>Film is NOT, for me, story dressed up prettily, a kind of moving comic.
It can be a >whole bunch of
>elements of which story is just one.
Nor is it for me either. Again, that was not the point of the original
post. The point is that all elements of film RELATE to the telling of the
story. The subject, or theme, or story, or whatever is revealed in many
different ways. Through the dialogue, through the image, through lighting,
atmosphere, set design, costumes, any number of sources contribute to the
telling of the story. And that is the point. A well crafted film, novel,
painting, sculpture...ect. is centered around something, revolves around
some center of experience. And every brushstroke, every celluloid frame,
every word contributes to the telling of that story. The subject, the
narrative, the story IS the thing. It is simply...inescapable. It is our
nature.
>That is precisely what much of the debate here has been about.
Precisely. I respect your opinions and have enjoyed debating with you.
JALLEN115
Ellen Evans Wrote:
>Mike Shields wrote:
>
>> In article <19970606085...@ladder02.news.aol.com>,
mkw...@aol.com
> >(Mkword) wrote:
>>
> > Mike Shields writes
> >
> > >Nick, have you chimed in with what seems to be your
> > >weekly Characters=Story post yet? Or have you done
> > >that already for this thread?
> >
> > LOL!
> >
> > I think I have created an Uberthread.
> >
> > Hey ... it's no big secret. Ask any reader ... it's the characters
> > that keep you interested and invested in the story. It's the
> > characters and what's going to happen to them that keeps
> > the reader turning the pages.
I don't see how you can seperate the two elements, there is no story
without characters, but yet, there are no characters without a story. Put
simply the story IS the characters IN action. Its the chicken and the egg
debate repackaged. Which comes first? Who knows...but I do know, with a
moderate degree of certainty, that a pitch never began, "I've got this
great idea for a character for a movie". It just doesn't begin that way.
It begins with a STORY. I guess I answered my own question. So...there it
is.
Mkword
JALLEN writes:
>I do know, with a moderate degree of certainty,
>that a pitch never began, "I've got this great idea
>for a character for a movie". It just doesn't begin that way.
>It begins with a STORY.
Actually there are in infinite number of ways to begin
a pitch. Usually, though, they don't start with "I've got
this great idea for a movie."
More often than not ... the pitch leads with the character:
"We meet Frank Wells who is about to get on
a helicopter and ... "
"There's these women who live in this upper-class
suburb who have formed a witches' covenant and ..."
"Our hero is fresh off the plane from Vietnam ...
only 22 but his eyes showing a lot more age."
"We open up on a farmhouse. Inside is one man.
Smoking a cigarette. Watching the first light of
day glint off of police cars in the distance. He picks
up a rifle."
"When it comes to men, Tanya is the unluckiest
woman in the world. Until she meets Uri!"
See? Never discount the power of the character.
Characters are why we listen to a story.
Story=character
JALLEN115
Mkword Writes:
>JALLEN writes:
>Story=character
Again, this debate over character vs.story is nonsensical. A strong story
must exist for a character to be truly interesting. Indiana Jones is a
compelling character only in so far as he is involved in a story that
suits him. Put Indy in Welcome to my Dollhouse and he suddenly becomes far
less compelling (not that he's a great example of a fully formed
character, but you get my point). Put Jake Gittes in Singles, or Moses in
The Muppets Take Manhattan and the depth of the character dies. A story
can be character-driven, but a strong story must be present nonetheless.
Stuart A. Creque
In Article<19970611174...@ladder02.news.aol.com>, <iam1...@aol.com>
writes:
> 'Art for Art's sake' is a fiction. Nothing artistically meaningful exists
> without a narrative. Look at Bunuel's "Un Chien Andalou". Even in its
> exquisite abstraction, there is a narrative, a base story that gives the
> film its structure and its symbols meaning. Film is a language, it has a
> lexicon. It has syntax. It is visual narrative. Even, more obscurely,
> Moholy-Nagy's short 'Black, White, Gray', which would be considered by
> many to be the height of cinematic abstraction (several composited angles
> of his rotating metallic creation "Light-Space Requisite") has a hidden
> narrative. There is method in all madness.
I do not agree that "nothing artistically meaningful exists without a
narrative." Nothing meaningful exists without some form of communication, but
narrative is only one type of communication. Others are exposition and
argumentation.
I realize I am probably only objecting to your word choice and not your
underlying premise; however, since this thread is about stories and stories
are narrative, I think the distinction is important. They say every picture
tells a story, but I think it's more accurate to say that every picture tells
us something, whether story, fact, point of view, or emotion.
-- Stuart Creque
Mike Shields
In article <01bc7538$ab054940$100c55ca@garypoll>, "Gary Pollard"
<2001...@diespamdiemsn.com> wrote:
> Paul
>
> In terms of "conventional" stories, I am of the "character" mould
> rather than the plot mould.
>
> A woman's baby is kidnapped. She doesn't care. One story.
>
> A woman's baby is kidnapped. She believes that the police can handle
> it. Another story.
>
> A woman's baby is kidnapped. She has a nervous breakdown and is
> placed in an asylum. Another story.
>
> A woman's baby is kidnapped. Except it wasn't. She murdered it
> herself and is merely claiming it was kidnapped. Another story.
>
> Which of these roads the story takes depends on her character.
>
> Of course, there's little doubt to me that character is NOT important
> in many blockbusting films. What we tend to get are rubber-stamp
> protagonists about whom we know nothing. Look at some of the movies
> out there and it's frightening how little you know about the
> characters, if character is what you like. They're too often blank
> slates waiting for the "star" to fill them up.
>
Gary,
I think I now see what you're tryin' to get at in the other thread. It
seems that we have a lot in common. Character=Story, or as I like to say,
a story is about characters you care about. And I have to agree with your
last paragraph, as well. Isn't this why all we're seeing lately is John
Travolta, Nicholas Cage, and Bruce Willis? The producers feel that we know
about these guys goin' in, so we can simply forgive the lack of character
development, and wait for the next car/boat/plane chase/crash/explosion.
WriteTV
jall...@aol.com (JALLEN115) writes:
Nick didn't say "character vs. story." He said "character=story."
Character and story are like the two sides of your hand. One can't exist
without the other -- not without a lot of blood and gore, anyway.
Genia
Nospam
meaculpa@****.com wrote:
[snip]
>I'm not trying to drag the poor old Hollywood formula horse out for
>another whipping, honest, but is it really a pervasive imperative amongst
>contemporary screenwriters to engage audiences in an expository
>sequence before they feel comfortable that the audience will
>understand the characters?
I doubt that you can blame any of the how to books
for this. If anything, the suggested structure and
the other teachings in the books I have read will
discourage that kind of exposition before anything
interesting starts.
>Or is this a lazy way of doing what might be more interestingly handled
>if approahced with greater subtlety throughout the film, albeit using a more
>challenging writing methodology?
I suspect it is a combination of lazy writing and
the rush of making changes in the process of
development.
JALLEN115
Genia Wrote:
>Nick didn't say "character vs. story." He said "character=story."
>Character and story are like the two sides of your hand. One can't exist
>without the other -- not without a lot of blood and gore, anyway.
Exactly my point. That's why this debate is a non-debate. Character cannot
exist outside of story, but the story dominates. It dictates character
action. A compelling character is only as compelling as the situation
allows him to be (the Moses in Manhattan discussion). So, I guess, no,
character doesn't =story, story dictates character. I'm not exactly sure
of the benefit of such a debate anyway, since I agree in principle that
both elements must be strong to have a strong film, either implicitly or
explicitly.
S.R.C.
meac...@****.com
JALLEN115 wrote:
> Again, this debate over character vs.story is nonsensical. A strong story
> must exist for a character to be truly interesting.
[snipped]
>A story
> can be character-driven, but a strong story must be present nonetheless.
A really don't think it's a nonsensical debate, or that a strong story
is essential for a character to be interesting, although I'm sure there
is a broad range of definitions of what constitutes a strong story.
The pure story outline for Who's Afraid of Virginia Woolf probably
wouldn't make the film sound very interesting.
A Jean Claude Van Damme movie is -- at the risk of over-generalising --
a typical example of a film with what appears to be a strong story,
but nothing in the way of characters or character depth or character
meaning. A purely action and plot-driven story, and while some people
enjoy these, I find them utterly meaningless and completely unenjoyable.
My neurons aren't usually fired up in large numbers, but as I rack my brain
I can not think of a single film I like where a strong story is important and
where the characters do not reign supreme in making the film a good
film (for me). I find good stories absolutely character dependent, and I
certainly would never agree that a character needs a strong story to be
interesting as a chracter. Psychology, emotion, dilemma and need are
what give us interesting characters and a good story can only grow out
of these.
But I'm more than willing to learn of examples that prove me incorrect.
Derek
meac...@****.com
JALLEN115 wrote:
Goodness me, it gets worse.
> Exactly my point. That's why this debate is a non-debate. Character cannot
> exist outside of story, but the story dominates. It dictates character
> action.
If you put this the other way round, you're getting somewhere. Someone
who writes screenplays where story dictates character action is, IMHO,
writing what many people would consider to be a very low form of SP.
A compelling character is only as compelling as the situation
> allows him to be (the Moses in Manhattan discussion).
Wrong again. A compelling character is one with a rich and oftentimes
contradictory psychological make-up.
>So, I guess, no,
> character doesn't =story, story dictates character.
Give me a few examples of what you think are good films where story
dictates character. I'm genuinely open to persuasion on this. There
are bound to be some films which we'd both agree are good; find me one
where character is dictated by story.
>I'm not exactly sure
> of the benefit of such a debate anyway, since I agree in principle that
> both elements must be strong to have a strong film, either implicitly or
> explicitly.
I think it is a useful debate for anyone who is learning to fashion a screenplay
and who is having difficulty trying to find where it should go. My feeling is
that if they have good characters and know those character well enough,
then half the difficulty has been dealt with.
Derek
Didi S. DubelyeW
Derek:
It is important to note that the film you see on the screen (in your
example, RANSOM) is not the spec screenplay that was handed in
initially. Not a chance in Development Hell. So, don't blame the
screenwriter until you see the script. 9 times out of 10, Narration
is foisted upon the screenwriter by the folks who believe that "the
audience won't understand..." Spoon-feeding is assumed to be
paramount to bean-counting. I'm sure that nearly any script that
is purchased with VO Narration used as a writer's device, is done
so with the knowledge that it is well-done. After purchase,
all the cooks gather and throw in their favorite recipes. So,
I guess I'm blathering on to say, don't be like all the rest of the
critics who point their knobby fingers at the screenwriter for
all a film's ills. Read it, then weep.
D
meaculpa@****.com wrote:
> But more to the point -- IMO -- why do we need expository dialogue?
> Last night I watched Ron Howard's film Ransom, on video. (Don't ask why,
> but sometimes I get in the mood to watch this sort of film.)
> The opening scene was formulaic expository back-story (three words that
> made me wince but I had to use them, and in that order, sorry).
>
> Why is there a reluctance to let us discover characters ourselves simply
> by observing their relevant behaviour and psychology as they go through
> whatever thay go through. Isn't it more interesting?
>
> I'm not trying to drag the poor old Hollywood formula horse out for
> another whipping, honest, but is it really a pervasive imperative amongst
> contemporary screenwriters to engage audiences in an expository
> sequence before they feel comfortable that the audience will
> understand the characters?
> Or is this a lazy way of doing what might be more interestingly handled
> if approahced with greater subtlety throughout the film, albeit using a more
> challenging writing methodology?
>
Ray Cochener
Actualy, I would have to say that Van Damme plays a "stock" character-
a strong story is a situation in which people will learn more about
themselves. For the audience, this means that they lear more about the
character as well. Things come out under stress that do not come out in
idle conversation.
It is simply that Van Damme's character is always one where what we
discover is that he knows 101 ways to kill people without weaponry. If
you saw one of his movies without ever seeing any action movie, or
knowing anything about action, it would seem pretty deep as a
commmentary on man's capacity for violence.
But as "Kickass movie #2098" it just doesn't have the same impact.
Mkword
JALLEN writes:
<Something about a nonsensicle debate>
Hey ... I'm just responding to other comments.
Condemning a discussion as non-sensical is to
attempt to close down discussion.
>A strong story must exist for a character to be truly
>interesting. Indiana Jones is a compelling character
>only in so far as he is involved in a story that suits him.
I'd say you are wrong. Indiana Jones is a pretty amazing
character creation even without his first adventure.
But that's missing the point ... you can't have Raiders of the
Lost Ark without Indiana Jones.
>Put Indy in Welcome to my Dollhouse and he suddenly
>becomes far less compelling
What????
You *can't* put Indy in Welcome To The Dollhouse.
That movie is another story populated with other characters.
Oh well ....
meac...@****.com
Didi S. DubelyeW wrote:
> It is important to note that the film you see on the screen (in your
> example, RANSOM) is not the spec screenplay that was handed in
> initially.
[snipped]
> I guess I'm blathering on to say, don't be like all the rest of the
> critics who point their knobby fingers at the screenwriter for
> all a film's ills. Read it, then weep.
Indeed. Point noted.
To easily overlooked, I guess.
Derek
Ray Cochener
And more relevant to the question of narrative is the fact that film is
a temporal medium.
A sculpture can be an exposition. A book could be an analysis, or an
instruction manual, where skipping around is permitted. Temporally,
arguments tend to be short without narration- the average debate (non
political) lasts about 15 minutes per topic, and pictoral or artistic
repreentation of a debate is usually in a non-temporal medium- scales
are frequently used, or political cartoons which are a single frame.
It is the nature of the medium that highlights narration in film.
Ray Cochener
> must exist for a character to be truly interesting. Indiana Jones is a
> compelling character only in so far as he is involved in a story that
> less compelling (not that he's a great example of a fully formed
> character, but you get my point). Put Jake Gittes in Singles, or Moses in
> can be character-driven, but a strong story must be present nonetheless.
And the setting appropriate to the character. Indianna Jones would
frankly be bored to death in most dramatic pieces- he is a man of
action, and isn't about to sit around feeling trapped in a bad
situation- he'd walk out in the first act, jump a train, and look for
something to *do*. The man teaches college because it can finance his
archeology expiditions. If the colleg cut funding, he would probably
quit his job.
He would then, of course, look for a museum or other group to work for,
because he clearly could not stand selling off artifacts to finance his
explorations. It could be interesting to see him in a 1990's cutbacks
situation, realising that he is, to a degree, dependant upon the charity
of those who share his passion as an interest.
Gary Pollard
IAM102970 writes.
Gary Pollard writes:
[Gary]
Images are not story. Were this true, Pollock's paintings would be
meaningless do those who do not know the myth. I submit that they are
not. Frankly if you try to tell most painters, or even musicians,
that their work is story driven they will quite possibly intrude a
brush or a musical instrument into an area it's not meant to go.
The same can be said of de Kooning's 'Excavation' where each tangled
image
can be defined as part of the body. Ask yourself, "What's he
excavating?"
The thread of his narrative begins with that question. And every
stroke,
every recurved line begins to take on meaning. Its all about bodies.
The
body of paint, of the world, and of ourselves. Read Kandinsky's
"Concerning the Spiritual in Art" and then re-evaluate his paintings.
They
are not simply play, there is a point, a meaning, a story that links
them
all. That is what defines any great artist, their body of work and
the
truth that it speaks. The same could be said of Mark Rothko, or
O'Keefe,
or Gorky.
[Gary] Neither Kandinsky, nor for that matter Klee, the other great
spiritualist of art from around that time were particularly obsessed
with story. Remember "Taking a line for a walk"? One of the great
things about the unconscious it that it does NOT work according to
what our consciousness defines as Story. Try turning dreams into
films if you doubt that.
>The subject is sometimes the medium itself, the joy of working with
the
medium, >what it may offer.
'Art for Art's sake' is a fiction. Nothing artistically meaningful
exists
without a narrative.
[Gary] Well, saying there's joy in the medium is not necessarily
"Art for Art's Sake". You are making an unjustified logical leap
here. I am in total disagreement. Many contemporary composers and
painters totally deny the place of story in their work. Even
novelists have attempted to move away from it, or stretch it to
breaking point. Kundera being one. Many European film makers too
distrust the American narrative cinema's obsession with story. Check
out many interviews with Wim Wenders for one.
Look at Bunuel's "Un Chien Andalou". Even in its
exquisite abstraction, there is a narrative, a base story that gives
the
film its structure and its symbols meaning. Film is a language, it
has a
lexicon. It has syntax. It is visual narrative. Even, more obscurely,
Moholy-Nagy's short 'Black, White, Gray', which would be considered
by
many to be the height of cinematic abstraction (several composited
angles
of his rotating metallic creation "Light-Space Requisite") has a
hidden
narrative. There is method in all madness.
[Gary] To me this is seeing face in ink-blots. It is what it is, NOT
what we project onto it. And that's part of my distrust of the whole
thing. It is perhaps possible to impose a three act structure on a
pile of manure if you wish to.
>Film is NOT, for me, story dressed up prettily, a kind of moving
comic.
It can be a >whole bunch of
>elements of which story is just one.
Nor is it for me either. Again, that was not the point of the
original
post. The point is that all elements of film RELATE to the telling of
the
story.
[Gary] Only if you define, as you seem to, the concept of story so
broadly that it becomes practically meaningless. What you appear to
be doing is defining the concept of story "broadly" to then justify
the application of a NARROW concept of story to film. It's certinaly
difficult to claim there to be three acts, a protagonist and an
antagonist in Moholy Nagy's film. Or in Belson's Mandala films. Or in
Kandinsky or Pollock's paintings.
The subject, or theme, or story, or whatever is revealed in many
different ways. Through the dialogue, through the image, through
lighting,
atmosphere, set design, costumes, any number of sources contribute to
the
telling of the story. And that is the point. A well crafted film,
novel,
painting, sculpture...ect. is centered around something, revolves
around
some center of experience. And every brushstroke, every celluloid
frame,
every word contributes to the telling of that story. The subject, the
narrative, the story IS the thing. It is simply...inescapable. It is
our
nature.
[Gary] I don't agree. It is also our nature to enjoy the flickering
of flames in the fire, the rippling of water in a stream, clouds
across the sky. There is no story in steak and chips. Not always in
sex. I think you limit our nature too much. .
Gary
Gary Pollard
By that reasoning music or dance would have to be narrative.
It clearly is not necessarily so. In fact many musicians and dancers
get extremely irate if you insist on talking about their art in those
terms.
Gary
Ray Cochener <silv...@feist.com> wrote in article
<33A31E...@feist.com>...
JALLEN115
Mkword Writes:
>>Put Indy in Welcome to my Dollhouse and he suddenly
>>becomes far less compelling
>What????
>You *can't* put Indy in Welcome To The Dollhouse.
>That movie is another story populated with other characters.
>Oh well ....
The point is is that even the most interesting character is only
interesting within the framework of the story...Moses without the Exodus
is just some dude wandering around the desert. Character relies on story
as much as story relies on character. Neither can be judged more important
or superior b/c one cannot exist w/o the other.
Ellen Evans
Mkword wrote:
>
>
> >Put Indy in Welcome to my Dollhouse and he suddenly
> >becomes far less compelling
>
> What????
>
> You *can't* put Indy in Welcome To The Dollhouse.
> That movie is another story populated with other characters.
Plus it would make no sense for anybody to call Indiana Jones "weiner
dog."
Really, though, I think the distinction being made was that you might
(and probably should) know what GENRE you're writing in before you know
the characters.
Mkword
Ellen Evans writes:
>Really, though, I think the distinction being made was
>that you might (and probably should) know what GENRE
>you're writing in before you know the characters.
Sure. That's why it makes no sense for Indy to be in teenage
angst-ridden indie.
A writer might say they want to write a thriller ... or a comedy ... or an
action piece ... and their next step is to find/create those characters
that would create a story within that genre.
Character=story
Ee-gads ... I've said it again! : )
WriteTV
jall...@aol.com (JALLEN115) writes:
>Character relies on story
>as much as story relies on character. Neither can be judged more
important
>or superior b/c one cannot exist w/o the other.
Isn't this what Nick means when he says CHARACTER = STORY? Because the
reverse applies too -- STORY = CHARACTER.
Either way, both ways. You can't have one without the other. Well, not
if you want the script to work -- see the various discussions of The Lost
World, an apparently perfect example of story without character.
Genia