Cut To Creative

In response to:GENERAL - Discuss the Rich Tapestry of Screenwriting Life

2007-07-17T19:34:37+02:00

In regards to your first post, I don't feel I was speaking as a critic, I was more pointing out that innovative, often original ideas (of which I've heard Deja Vu has a few) are ofen crushed to death under the pressure to provide unnecessary 'commercial' elements.

As for being a writer, I'd agree, don't worry about originality or innovation, worry about telling a good story. If your story happens to be innovative, that's the cherry on the top.

Fair point, those are all quality films(I'm taking your word for it as I've only seen a handful of them), unfortunately, they're nearly all 2006 films that weren't released in the U.K. or Ireland until early this year due to indifferent distribution or the increasingly worrying obsession many studios have with chasing Oscars. Even Zodiac (sitting in the Paramount vault from October last year) was basically dumped because the studio wanted to campaign for Dreamgirls.

Of course, the much stated argument is that big expensive blockbusters pay for films like Zodiac and Venus, but increasingly it seems that they pay for big expensive blockbusters ones that don't make any money.

Boy are we off-topic on this thread.

In response to:GENERAL - Discuss the Rich Tapestry of Screenwriting Life

2007-07-17T14:45:56+02:00

But talking as a filmgoer/critic for a moment, and just for a moment. I'd say we've seen plenty of interesting films this year: The Lives of Others, Half-Nelson, Dans Paris, Ten Canoes, Climates, Days of Glory, Venus, Jindabyne, This Is England, Old Joy, Inland Empire, Babel, as well as Zodiac, of course. And there's more to come: we're only halfway through the year!

I'll wager only the last two had budgets exceeding £10m though.

In response to:GENERAL - Discuss the Rich Tapestry of Screenwriting Life

2007-07-17T14:33:06+02:00

I wasn't really talking as a film critic. Critics should always applaud originality, loudly. I was thinking more about how young and inexperienced writers (such as myself) might strive too hard to do something new and original when they can't even deliver the basics.

The screenplay for Deja Vu was reputedly bought for $5m. I'm sure that was precisely because it did put an 'innovative spin' on the usual stuff, most notably the car chase. Very entertaining hokum.

(I recommend the commentary on the DVD.)

In response to:GENERAL - Discuss the Rich Tapestry of Screenwriting Life

2007-07-16T19:47:00+02:00

I'd suggest the following points:

1) It's not so much a question of originality or freshness but rather putting innovative spins on the material. The problem is that to some people, innovation translates to 'lots of unconvincing computer generated special effects' and 'glib self-referential irony' in lieu of interesting characterisation and a half-decent story. I haven't seen Deja Vu (and have no real compulsion to) and would agree that Bruckheimer isn't the go-to guy for cerebral intellectual debate. It does however sound that the film is a further example of Bruckheimer punching above his featherweight sensibilities much like in Pearl Harbour and Black Hawk Down.

2) I'd agree with you, except that I really feel that the last decade or so has seen the almost complete collapse of the adult-skewing film in mainstream genre cinema. Aside from Zodiac (and possibly Fracture) this year has been noticeably atrocious for films aimed at those with an IQ above that of a toddler. I don't think people would mind a bit of philosophy with their fun, as long as they're actually having fun in the first place (as opposed to being blasted into submission by a Dolby Digital soundtrack).

In response to:GENERAL - Discuss the Rich Tapestry of Screenwriting Life

2007-07-15T23:34:00+02:00

I found this quote in a review of last year's DEJA VU.

" Yet Déjà Vu will never be mistaken for Primer. Bruckheimer and Scott have never had the patience for philosophical questions; they just want to find new ways to deliver the same old stuff." (Scott Tobias, The A.V. Club)

Two issues:
1) Isn't 'finding new ways to deliver the same old stuff' exactly what you want to be doing when writing genre material. 'Originality' is over-rated, better to be 'fresh.'

2) If you find what excites you about your idea is precisely the philosophical questions it raises, maybe you should forget about the mainstream. For a start, you're going to have to make do with a lower budget, a lot lower than the $70m they spent on Deja Vu, closer to the £7k Scott Caruth spent on Primer.

(Personally, I enjoyed both movies, by the way.)

In response to:STYLE - For Questions on Tone and Genre

2007-07-01T23:02:29+02:00

There was an item in the schedule for the workshop that didn't get covered on the day, namely, 'Plot vs Story.' Could you boys give us an idea of what we missed?

I often find that I make hard work of plotting my stories, very hard work. Then, occasionally, I catch the wind and, whoosh, I'm gone - sometimes in another direction altogether. On reflection, I'd say this 'wind' that filled my sails corresponded to some pattern, some pre-existing story type. Would this have anything to do with the 'Plot vs Story' issue?

(Most of the time, alas, I get pulled slowly, inexorably towards the rocks.)

In response to:TOOLS - A forum to nail all those writing puzzles

2007-06-23T00:04:16+02:00

Hello Christine,

great to have a fresh contributor,

I think you typed your e-mail address into the Site/URL box and didn't remove the tick in the Remember me box. Not sure how you get it removed, they may have to remove the whole post.

Needless to say I can't see anyone who visits the site misusing your e-mail address.

In response to:TOOLS - A forum to nail all those writing puzzles

2007-06-22T23:54:30+02:00

Absolutely, yeah.

As for your e-mail address, it is done. You cannot undo it. You are and shall forever be uncovered.

In response to:TOOLS - A forum to nail all those writing puzzles

2007-06-22T22:48:18+02:00

eeek - how come my email is up there? ! how do i delete that??

In response to:TOOLS - A forum to nail all those writing puzzles

2007-06-22T21:06:11+02:00

Oh - I'm lost most of the time!! BUt as you say its a compass we need for story telling not an in depth analysis, but then being able to tell a story does require some objectivity and self awareness. Getting to the core of a thing means we have to be able to look beyond the surface to ask what is actually happening here, what is this springing out of. Stories that don't have a clear sense of their source seem to end up going round and round at one level and never getting to the good stuff, they don't confront the truth of the story. when you are on the right stream of evolving a story the energy naturally flows - (so i'm told!) - it grows itself. And when you're not in the flow you get stuck like I am now!
speaking of which - I have a little stunted bonsai of a story that needs some fertilising so Im away

In response to:TOOLS - A forum to nail all those writing puzzles

2007-06-22T18:14:12+02:00

Hello, luv!

I don't know. I never meant to incite such a 'deep and meaningful' discussion. All I wanted was some clarification on Richard's 'growing the nugget' suggestions. But, in the absence of that, I struggled to my own (temporary) conclusion: that it's useful to sense our emotional connection with the original idea; not so much to learn about ourselves, as to provide a compass bearing for the journey that lies ahead, through the forest, across the ocean.

But it's true, all this could happen intuitively, you may never get lost along the way - lucky you! - and you may never have the need to ask yourself any such questions.

In response to:TOOLS - A forum to nail all those writing puzzles

2007-06-22T17:37:22+02:00

Hello Boys! I read your blogs with something that isn't quite fascination... more a curiosity what is going on in other peoples heads!
Re the point on why we want/ need/ feel driven to tell a particular story. I'm sure there are some stories which come about as purely commercial projects - right from conception but, traditionally a story has a resonance for us when it is a conundrum that we have inside ourselves and are trying to work out - externalise in some context or format. It is our own psyche struggling with a ball of knotted string and trying to unravel the mystery of it. Its theraputic displacement (!) - so much is hidden from us on a conscicous level that it isn't possible to deal with it directly so we may get our hero/heroine to go on the quest for understanding on our behalf. in dream therapy all characters ( and even objects) in a dream are aspects of ourselves - - maybe that is true in stories too - the light and dark, good and bad, antagonist / protagonist, the cigar and the chamber pot! I have been writing consiously about something that worries and vexes me greatly and I keep meeting in real life (dammit) - but in script I can get my characters to play out the different roles of the drama and get them to do things I personally wouldn't have the guts to do! But then I have to pull back and look at it from the dramatic perspective - is this going to work on a level that other people can relate to - how do I get the most dramatic impact into any given situation - still working on that one!
So the top layer is what excites/ stimulates/ gets you thinking/its the great "what if?" - on a deeper level it because it's something we need to resolve or make sense of within oursleves. We are personally challenged by that particular puzzle of human behaviour - but the context in which we set it & explore it can go from normal to extreme to bizarre !

In response to:TOOLS - A forum to nail all those writing puzzles

2007-06-22T15:04:46+02:00

Funny, too, how so many films are adaptations of novels or short stories; and then there's all those based on graphic novels, comic books, long newspaper articles.

In response to:TOOLS - A forum to nail all those writing puzzles

2007-06-22T14:28:14+02:00

They certainly do co-exist. I agree.

And you'd have to wonder why anyone who was exclusively interested in storytelling would ever choose to try to tell their stories through the medium of film. It must be the most tortuous, frustrating, mediated process of all. If it ever makes it to the screen, there'll have been at least two other people 'telling' your story - the director, the editor - and stacks more telling you how it could (and should) be improved.

In response to:TOOLS - A forum to nail all those writing puzzles

2007-06-22T13:50:37+02:00

There are many stories which are absolutely not suitable for telling in the film format. Tales in which the drama is mostly inside the main characters head, for instance, are better suited to the novel format. I'm working on a story which takes place almost entirely inside a barn, and that SCREAMS at me, it's a play (that's not the only reason it has to be a play, by the way, but it's one of the first to come to mind). All depends whether or not we're coming at this from the point of view of the storyteller, looking to tell a story in the best possible way. Or from the point of view of a film-maker who loves to make films and therefore sees a story as a component, much as an actor and a camera are also components. The two are very different. And yet, can they co-exist in the same person? Do we love to luxuriate in a terrific story told well, which happens to be written as a novel - or does it HAVE to be the moving image? I know, this is a site aimed at writing for cinema, and that's where my own emphasis lies, but the art of telling stories is older and bigger than the last 100 years.

In response to:TOOLS - A forum to nail all those writing puzzles

2007-06-21T17:00:00+02:00

If you're wearing skirts, you might as well be a hippy, Spence!

In response to:TOOLS - A forum to nail all those writing puzzles

2007-06-21T15:19:50+02:00

I wouldn't call it an emotional "attachment", more of an emotional connection or investment. Big difference, no?

Interesting. Is there really such a thing as a story best told as a screenplay? I never thought of it that way. For me, a screenplay is nothing more than a necessary stage on a story's journey into sound and image. It's a blueprint, a means to an end. I'm not even sure it's absolutely necessary. After all, there have been films made without proper scripts, good films and all.

(But don't get me wrong, I love the thrill of the writing the bullet, of EXT - RESERVOIR - NIGHT.)

In response to:TOOLS - A forum to nail all those writing puzzles

2007-06-21T10:20:29+02:00

I think anytime we ask questions of what we are writing and why we are writing it we will be in a good place. That questioning continuies all the way through to completion. We might never get the answers. Sometimes things just blow our skirts up ... and we don't know why. We know we like it and we hope others will too. When I look at my projects this 'past coming back to get you' theme is pretty prevalent ... I musta been well naughty. I think its a good thing to consider what ideas trigger an emotional response in us. Not just from a writing point of view but just as part of our own quest for 'self knowledge' .. I shoula been a hippy.

In response to:TOOLS - A forum to nail all those writing puzzles

2007-06-20T22:57:14+02:00

It didn't seem too controversial to me to suggest that, in the process of developing your new idea, it might be of value to identify the nature of the excitement it provokes in you, in terms of emotion.

But, hey, perhaps it is.

In response to:TOOLS - A forum to nail all those writing puzzles

2007-06-20T19:46:25+02:00

That's a pretty difficult process I think, one that's entirely subjective to the writer. I mean, personally I have 'what if?' ideas I've no interest in writing and then others I feel I have to write. It comes down to a lot of considerations more than just emotional attachment to a concept. I think it's more a spark that something in your head needs to be shared with people, on a basic level, like a good joke or anecdote, it's a story you want to share than can be best told in the form of a screenplay (then hopefully film).

In response to:TOOLS - A forum to nail all those writing puzzles

2007-06-20T16:58:13+02:00

... to note in what way the idea excites you, in terms of emotion, or sensation. If there's no emotion (or too many), then you've probably got a bit more spadework to do before you ready to jump in. Know what I mean?

Sorry, there's that truncated comment thing again. Agh!

In response to:TOOLS - A forum to nail all those writing puzzles

2007-06-20T16:55:23+02:00

Sure. But I wasn't talking about theme - which I agree has to emerge as the idea develops, not the other way around.

What I was suggesting was that, as part of this 'nugget' business, you should try to note

In response to:TOOLS - A forum to nail all those writing puzzles

2007-06-20T15:56:02+02:00

Yes no and sort of.
It's a kind of weird process. Heres another example I had a 'What if?' of - the locals of a small rural village threw folk into a big hole where they got ate up by some kick ass monster ... deep heavy shit man

Which in turn got me thinking about how rural and coastal towns that rely on summer trade for survival have this weird love hate relationship with the outside world. There is no real love lost. The locals see the out of towners as eejits easily parted with their money, often the outsiders are travelling for miles and having a wee laugh up their sleeve at the locals as well. So with that notion you exaggerate it up a 10 time sin the horrornumbercruncher and you get "a town of weirdos sacrificing tourists to some ancient creature in order to prosper supernaturally (all ripped off lovecraftian twaddle but so far i like it)Now the thing is this idea now appears to be about dependency how it can be a malignant thing etc etc But I'd never sit down and think I want to do a story about dependancy .. this one started with ... what if the locals here threw folk into a big hole where they got ate up ...
That make any sense??

In response to:TOOLS - A forum to nail all those writing puzzles

2007-06-20T12:43:52+02:00

Yes, that helps. Very interesting too. (you're not a sick puppy at all)

As soon as I wrote my question, I thought: I bet it'll turn out to be a matter of "it makes me laugh" or "it scares the bejesus outta me". And it did. Sounds like it's more a matter of asking 'how' or 'in what way' the idea excites you than 'why' it does: does it make you feel sensations of dread, or pity, or anger, amusement, righteousness, potency, hope, laughter, that kind of stuff? It's your emotional connection with the idea that will provide the surest compass bearing to your destination.

Yes? No? Sort of?

In response to:TOOLS - A forum to nail all those writing puzzles

2007-06-20T10:49:34+02:00

Well with me the usual answer lies in What excites me about the idea is usually also what scares me.
So in the case of 'Red Mist' what excited me was the idea that 'we in the present could be punished for what we were in the past.' It came about after a chance meeting with a school friend of mine .. here we go another ramble alert. My mate and I have been friends since school we don't see each other often maybe once a month but when we do we fall into the same rhythm of talking about films, books, tv, computer games (my wife always describes my phone chats with davy as two hours of infantile sh*te talk .. but what do they know!!) ANYHOOS we were in town one day and we ran into another school mate who we hadn't seen in a while he immediately referred to Davy by his school nick name .. a name I had given him. I felt a bit wick. What seemed funny nearly 20 years ago suddenly felt petty and sad and cruel. Now Davy wasn't bothered by the name, he had far worse for me. But it got me thinking "What if he was?" what if my nick name for him really messed his wee head up, we'd grown apart, he'd become some nutjob thirsting for vengeance. What if ... One rainy night he knocked on my door buck naked, skin scrawled with nicknames and a butchers knife in his hand. I would of course apologise to Davy tell him I didn't mean anything by it .. i was a kid .. everyone was doing it .. I'm all grown up now .. I have a good job ... a wife I love .. and davy would just stare blankly back at me grinning. Davy didn't care about any of that. Davy had become the sins and pain of the past personified and he was gonna kill me for who I was then not what I am now ..... that 'what if?' scared the Cr*(p out of me. It was the genesis for Kenneth. I already had a 'kid in a coma' killing people 'What if?' scenario but adding this concept of 'the past getting you in the future' really got me excited and fired up and the two became one. Does that help?

davy is alive and wel and living in secure accommodation ... lest i think it's secure they said that about michael myers ...

In response to:TOOLS - A forum to nail all those writing puzzles

2007-06-19T18:48:37+02:00

The Nugget

I like this business of identifying what it is that excites you about your idea, trying to establish why it excites you, using it as a compass bearing, but doesn't this process call for a certain amount of clear-eyed candour, doesn't it entail a certain amount of self-knowledge? I've already found it quite revealing, if not a little disturbing. Or maybe I'm going too far? So, I have a naive question for you: what does this thing look like? That's to say, what did you have in mind as an answer to the question 'why does this idea excite you'? Could you perhaps give me an example or two?

In response to:Whose is the story...?

2007-06-18T19:57:43+02:00

I agree.

In response to:Whose is the story...?

2007-06-18T19:51:03+02:00

It is.
And there isn't.
The first 'Body-
Snatchers' re-
make was better.
I'd like to see the bad films re-
made. That's to say, ones that could have been so much better. The ones that got away.

In response to:Whose is the story...?

2007-06-18T19:44:14+02:00

Sounds like a challenge.

Yeah, no point complaining about lousy remakes, they make business-sense (many make profit on dvd sales of the original film being re-released alone) even if they're nearly all terrible.

In response to:Whose is the story...?

2007-06-18T19:10:25+02:00

Yes, and apparently it will be sexier and there will be no dwarf. But it will get plenty of publicity from pundits complaining about remakes, guaranteed column inches there. Speaking of which, let's see if we can't continue this thread to the point where there is room for only one character per line! Or not.