Quiz time. This is a two-part question. Quick—name a movie that is a few years old that is about a teenage girl who becomes pregnant? Need a hint? One of the key characters name in the film is Juno. Anyone? If you guessed the 2007 film Juno starring Ellen Page you got the first part of [...]
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Archive for January, 2011
Jan
18
2011
 
Movie Cloning (Dirty Rotten Scoundrels)Posted by: screenwritingfromiowa in Screenwriting From Iowa“A hero who has no faults probably doesn’t have much of a personality.” Dale Launer Therese Walsh Interview Before screenwriter Dale Launer hit it big with his first produced screenplay Ruthless People (1986) he wrote “about 1o screenplays of dubious quality” while paying the bills at a variety of jobs that included selling stereos, refinishing furniture, [...] It looks like 2011 is going to be the year of the clones. Not in terms of movies in the theaters (because that’s always the case), but in terms of my exploring the topic from a screenwriting perspective. “You don’t get to be a Hollywood hitmeister like (Michael) Bay — 200 Zillion Tickets Sold! — without [...] “I have read from cover to cover, books like Leonard Maltin Movie Guide, which contains thousands of plot, character, and movie ideas. I encourage my brain to try to mix these themes together in the hope that my mind will meld a new form. These process id called ‘bi-association.’ the joining together of two forms [...] “The aesthetics of film are 80 percent visual, 20 percent auditory…The best advice for writing film dialogue is don’t. Never write a line of dialogue when you can create a visual expression.” Robert McKee Story “The silent pictures were the purest form of cinema; the only thing they lacked was the sound of people talking [...] “Ultimately, it all comes down to one of the grand old rules of screenwriting: whenever possible – show, don’t tell.” Ray Morton Script magazine “IF YOU PRETEND THE CHARACTERS CANT SPEAK, AND WRITE A SILENT MOVIE, YOU WILL BE WRITING GREAT DRAMA. IF YOU DEPRIVE YOURSELF OF THE CRUTCH OF NARRATION, EXPOSITION,INDEED, OF SPEECH. YOU WILL BE FORGED TO WORK IN ANEW MEDIUM - TELLING THE STORY IN PICTURES (ALSO KNOWN AS SCREENWRITING). David Mamet Memo to The Unit writers [...] “I think boxing’s pretty dumb, and I’ve never been a boxing fan.” John G. Avildsen Oscar winning director of Rocky AFI lists the character Rocky Balboa on their all-time movie hero list at #7 and the film Rocky as the #4 most inspiring film of all time. Writer/actor Sylvester Stallone has understandably gotten plenty of [...]
Jan
14
2011
Emmy-Winning Writer Rick ClevelandPosted by: screenwritingfromiowa in Screenwriting From Iowa“I thought if (Harvey Pekar, American Splendor) could write comic books about real people maybe I could write plays about real people.” Rick Cleveland Though The West Wing won 27 Emmys in its seven year run it only collected one for best writing. Just one. And that one program, In Excelsis Deo, was written by [...]
Jan
14
2011
Aaron Sorkin on Theme, Intention & ObstaclesPosted by: screenwritingfromiowa in Screenwriting From IowaOne of the great things about listening and reading about writers talking about the writing process is you see how everyone’s approach is different. Some write in the morning, some at night, some write quickly in bursts and others methodically take their time. Rod Serling (The Twilight Zone) was very successful writing from theme, but [...]
Jan
14
2011
Movie Cloning (Avoiding Cliches)Posted by: screenwritingfromiowa in Screenwriting From Iowa“Yeah I think I know what my father meant when he sang about his lost highway…” Hank Williams Jr. All My Rowdy Friends (Have Settled Down) “You must break from cliché. You must ‘Give us the same thing…only different.’” Blake Snyder Save the Cat The movie Country Strong is no Tender Mercies. And there are [...] |
