Screenwriting From Iowa

“The key to a good action scene is reversals.”
                                           Shane Black
                                           Lethal Weapon 
William C. Martell [...]

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As far as I know Les Paul never wrote a screenplay. Though he does have an impressive list of IMDB credits including working on the soundtracks for Casino, Mona Lisa Smiles and last year’s Speed Racer. How many people rack up film credits when they are in their 90s?
A lot has been written and said [...]

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When you think of classic actions films a few of these might pop into your mind; Die Hard, Lethal Weapon, 48 Hrs., The Last Boy Scout, The Matrix. Those films all have at least on thing in common –they were produced by Joel Silver. Orphan currently in theater was also produced by Silver.  His first producing [...]

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“Grab the script to Die Hard. Sometimes the script goes as long as three pages without a single line of dialogue. It’s all action.”
                                                           William C. Martell 
You [...]

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Screenwriter William C. Martell in his book The Secrets of Action Screenwriting talks about the villain’s plan before he talks about the hero and how he plan’s on stopping the villain. Martell points out that there are two kinds of heroes in films which he calls “Superman Type”(Superman) and “Everyman Type” (Indiana Jones). Martell also [...]

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So I finally picked up a used copy  of WIlliam C. Martell’s book “The Secrets of Action Screenwriting” and I’ll spend a pulling quotes for you since it’s out of print.
“The most important element of an action film isn’t the hero, isn’t the sidekick, isn’t the dialogue, and isn’t the plot. The most important element [...]

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I found out a couple days ago that screenwriter and screenwriting instructor Blake Snyder died last Tuesday. I think his books “Save the Cat” and “Save the Cat Goes to the Movies” were two of the most refreshing book on screenwriting in the last ten years. It’s a sad loss because as he really seemed [...]

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“One thing I’ve learned is that if you really concentrate on something, your mind will get more creative.”
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Screenwriter Budd Schulberg’s death on Wednesday was followed on Thursday by writer/director John Hughes dying of a heart attack. Hughes may not have won an Oscar as Shulberg did but he certainly had a longer list of hit movies including;
Home Alone
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The classic Hollywood film On the Waterfront almost never came to be. It’s been said that ever great film has been turned down at least once and the Elia Kazan directed film starring Marlon Brando with a script by Budd Schulberg was no exception. 
“Darryl Zanuck turned us down at Twentieth Century-Fox. He told us no [...]

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