Scriptwriting, its a tough business trying to write forty-five to ninety pages, depending on whether its film or television, of something that's good - or even brilliant. Then there's so much to consider - character, the whole structure, dialogue, scene structure, story arcs, the meaning behind it all! So, I thought today I'd share a few bits of advice on scriptwriting that I think are useful. First though, here's a quick little re-fresher from the American Film Institute that describes what a script is and how to format it, hosted by Sean Astin from Lord of the Rings.
1] Write it and finish it! Whilst doing some research for this, I came across Joss Whedon's Top Ten Writing Tips and the first one on the list was - finish the script. Although I don't think this is technically advice it is something that's worth repeating. As sitting down and starting, and then finishing a script can be difficult.
2] Write Three Pages a Day This is a nice idea for making sure you finish that script, bit by bit, and one I have always liked - though not yet managed to stick too. It's a simple plan - you sit down and write three pages of script a day, no matter what. The three pages don't have to great either - you can go back and revise it later - and if you can write more, that's great, but make sure you stick to the minimum. By doing this you should end up with thirty pages of script in ten days. So by the end of a month, you could have a first draft of a script.
3] Show don't tell This is a classic rule for screenwriting. It's important for two reasons. First of all television and film are visual mediums. Secondly, it also helps reduce the need for unnecessary dialogue and to much explaining. A great example of this I found in a book describes a scene between a girl about to leave home to be with her boyfriend, and her older brother who's trying to stop her. The writer wants to get across the idea that the girl is just a child really, and doesn't know what she's doing. So, in the first example of the scene the brother and sister argue and the brother tells her quite obviously - "You're just a kid. You're not old enough to understand." - sort of dialogue, which takes up a lot of the page. The second example, using the rule of showing not telling, shows the brother arguing with his sister in her bedroom - but this time the script describes the room, the soft toys on the shelves, the band posters on the wall and the old Barbie suitcase the girl packs her clothes in. All this tells us straight away that this girl is still just a kid, without her brother having to say it out loud. I've attempted to do this in one of my scripts. I have a character who's into history. How do I get this across? Have him reading historical novels and history books of course!
4] Formatting, grammar and spelling This is really two pieces of advice I've thrown in together, but both are important if you want to make your script clear and easy to read. First, checking grammar and spelling is an obvious one. It can be easy to forget to do this, for example I was a few minutes from a script competition deadline, sent off the script - and then remembered I had not re-read it, so I did not know if there was any redundant words or spelling mishaps the spell check had missed. Second, make sure you use the right format. There are different formats of script for different types of medium - television, radio and film. To find out what they are, go to Formatting your Script at the BBC Writersroom. 5] Read your script out loud This is a tip from an article called Screenwriting Tips from a Screenplay Contest Judge, written by Gordy Hoffman, who runs an American screenplay competition. His explains that dialouge can sound fine in your head, but as soon as you hear it out loud, you may feel like jumping in front of a bus - his analogy. So he suggests you either read your script out loud by ourself, or get your friends to read it. I once wrote a short radio piece for a community/university station, which had a line that sounded fine in my head, but sounded like an innuendeo when read out - as my friend kindly pointed out to me. So in future I intend to get my friends to read my scripts, as it sounds like good fun as well as a good re-writing exercise.
I have been writing this blog on and off for nearly nine months now, and it occurs to me that, when looking at film, I have mainly mentioned directors. Which is fine, after all directors are normally the main creative force behind a film. However, I thought it would be interesting, and only fair, to look at all the other fields too -such as SFX, lighting, camera crew, set design, costume etc. So as an experiment, I have done a quick search for 'famous film costume designers' and immediately I have come across Edith Head, who won eight Oscars for costume design.
The films she won Oscars for includes The Sting (1973) and two Audrey Hepburn films, Sabrina (1954) and Roman Holiday (1953). She was also nominated for Best Costume Design along with Hubert de Givenchy for another Audrey Hepburn film, Funny Face (1957), but it seems they lost - to who, I'll have to find out!
To see Edith Head in her element, check out the short piece below, where she talks about process of designing costumes for Audrey Hepburn in Roman Holiday:
Edith Head is very famous for her designs, but I somehow have seemed to miss her, even though I loved the costumes in Audrey Hepburn's films. I was also rather amused to discover on IMDb trivia that Edith Head was the inspiration for Edna Mode in Disney/Pixar's The Incredibles (2004) - that's why looked familiar!
Yet I never thought to look up who made those dresses, and have missed out on learning more about the wider film industry. So, in future, expect to find me writing about more than just the director, writer and actor roles in film and television.
First of all, let me say, that I have never seen Downton Abbey. I have heard the criticisms and I have heard the praise, but I honestly never bothered to actually sit and watch it proper. So even though Grand Hotel has been dubbed 'the Spanish Downton Abbey' I can't really compare it. I was just really intrigued, when I saw Grand Hotel's main characters Alicia and Julio, in the Radio Times next to their Downton counterparts Lady Mary and Matthew Crawley. They looked so much more interesting than our stiff-upper lip English characters.So, this evening I watched the first episode on Sky Arts 2.
So what is it all about? Well, the plot mainly revolves around Julio (the 'j' is pronounced as a 'h' in Spanish ) and his search for his missing sister, Cristina, who was a maid at the hotel and obviously knew some secret about the hotel owner, Dona Theresa. Arriving at the hotel, he is told she was fired as a thief, and not believing it, pretends to be a new waiter - as you do - so he can question the staff and sneak into Cristina's room. This leads him to having to pose as a guest at hotel, so he can talk to another guest, and meeting Alicia. Alicia, is one of Dona Theresa's three children, along with her drunk useless brother, and her well-married pregnant sister, who accidentally gets thrown down a flight of stairs. Alicia has problems too. It looks like she's going to have to marry the manager of the hotel, Diego, on her mother's insistence, because apparently Diego knows of her father's past sins and could ruin them - just a quick note, her father died suddenly and unexpectedly, which makes me think it'll turn out he was murdered, you heard it here first! Long story short, the episode ends with Alicia allowing Julio to stay and investigate for the next month, even though he tricked her into thinking he was a guest. Oh yes, and just before the credits a dead prostitute is found in the grounds of hotel. The same one who had who had been hanging around with the Alicia's drunk brother. Somehow I doubt that turned plot twist has turned up in Downton yet...
Meanwhile, the production values of the show are excellent. The hotel is as grand as its name, especially the exterior, and of course the cast are in lovely period costume. The only thing that rather surprised me was the dull skies in the exterior scenes. I had assumed that the whole thing would be set in blazing Spanish sunshine, but the tone is more of a slightly gloomy British day. Perhaps it's because its on the coast?
Nonetheless, I shall keeping Grand Hotel series linked on my television, and for those of you also interested in knowing more, here is a link to the trailer: Grand Hotel, Sky Arts 2 and you can also get the lowdown on the characters at the Radio Times online.
Was it just me or was the TV schedule last Halloween pretty pathetic All we really had to chose from was the Halloween version of Come Dine With Me and a documentary on Frankenstein - neither of which I watched. The best thing about the Halloween in fact for me, was Mark Gatiss returning with another brilliant documentary about horror films. Mark Gatiss did a three-part documentary called A History of Horror a year or two ago, which covered horror films in Hollywood and Britain, that I had really enjoyed. I found the programme was a fascinating watch, especially from a filmmakers perspective, and a very good introduction to the genre. So, I was very happy when I discovered he had done another documentary, Horror Europa, about European horror films.
The BBC has then proceeded to broadcast a couple of the films mentioned in the documentary - The Devil's Backbone (2001) by director Guillermo del Toro and The Bird with The Crystal Plumage (1970) by Dario Argento. Though not on Halloween of course. Which is ashamed since Horror Europa was broadcast on the 29th October, and it would have been a nice touch to have the horror films of the documentary shown on the most appropriate night of the year!
Anyway, so last week I saw The Devil's Backbone, which tells the tale of boy sent to an orphanage during the Spanish Civil War, who discovers their is a ghost in the building . It is an excellent film, which uses poetry and poetic language beautifully - but in my opinion not very scary. I think this is because, partly, I saw the ghost as only one layer of a slightly bigger, more complex human drama happening in the film. But also because during Horror Europa, Mark Gatiss commented on how the ghost was a 'tragic presence' - which made me feel the ghost was something to feel sad for, rather than be scared of.
As for The Bird with The Crystal Plumage, I intend to watch that today! In the meantime, I have stumbled across this useful video of Mark Gatiss demonstrating how to make edible, horror movie style fake blood. An important skill surely all horror filmmakers should have?
Yesterday was Ada Lovelace Day, is an annual event to raise awareness of women in the sciences. This includes engineers, technologists, scientists and mathematicians. To celebrate I have done a short list of some fictional female scientists from TV, that have hopefully been an inspiration to girls and guys who've watched the shows. The list is in no particular order, and covers a range of genres, though generally I have ended up picking characters I am familiar with and that are in science fiction. I have also decided to stick to characters where it has been made clear that they are scientists or have degrees within the shows - for example, I have not included T'Pol from Enterprise even though she was the Science Officer, as it is unclear which science she works in. I have also included links other articles on the web, mostly Wiki entries, about the listed characters professions, and the different sciences. 1] Colonel Sam Carter - Stargate series
Sam Carter was a theoretical astrophysicist, pilot and engineer, and one of the most intelligent female characters across the whole Stargate series. She was part of the original team along with Dr Jackson, Colonel O'Neill and Teal'c. 2] Dr Liz Shaw - Doctor Who
Liz Shaw was a scientist from Cambridge University who was recruited by UNIT. An expert on meteorites with degrees in medicine and physics, she assisted the Third Doctor whilst he was at UNIT until she resigned to continue her own research. 3] Abby Sciuto - NCIS
Abby is a Forensic Specialist working at NCIS. A kind, cheerful Goth, she is an expert in DNA analysis, ballistics and digital forensics. 4] Zoe Heriot - Doctor Who
Zoe was a scientist on board Space Station W3 when she met the Second Doctor. She is an astrophysicist, and a first class astrometricist with a degree in pure mathematics and a photographic memory. 5] Dr Amy Farrah Fowler - The Big Bang Theory
Amy is a neuroscientist, who does research into addiction. She was introduced to show as a dating website match found by Raj and Leonard for Sheldon, who she is very similar too. The actress who plays her, Mayim Bialik, actually has a real Ph.D in neuroscience.
For more inspiration check out this video of some young female scientists and engineers showing off their projects in America.
Whilst browsing through Empire this evening - looking for inspiration for tonight's blog post, as all I have been watching recently is How I Met Your Mother (he still hasn't met her yet...). I came across a trailer for an autobiographical film of Graham Chapman, which I think is set to be released in 2013. What makes it so unusual though and interesting though, is that the film is animated, by 14 different animation studios in fact!
Because, lets be honest, it is not often that an animated film comes out solely aimed at adults. True, over the last few years CGI films have managed to appeal everyone with successes such as Toy Story (1995), Ice Age (2002), WALL-E (2008) and Monsters Inc. (2001). As have some stop-motion films, such as Wallace and Gromit and The Curse of the Were-Rabbit (2005) and Chicken Run (2000). However, an animated film, aimed solely at an adult audience is a rare thing indeed. After all, when is the last time you saw a Disney film with a 15 certificate? Exactly. There are only two films, off the top of my head, that I think of can be considered as more for adults. First of all is The Simpsons Movie (2007). Now, technically that is a family movie, but The Simpsons does lean much more to the adult audience in its use of humour and issues. Quite a lot of the stuff in The Simpsons will go over kids heads.
The second, is the indie movie Sita Sings the Blues (2008). A beautiful film, completely animated by one woman, it would probably be best appreciated by adults.
Of course, I don't think these can be the only films. So out of curiosity I decided to do a quick search and see what others I could find. What I found was a top twenty list that reminded me how many excellent animated films there were out there for adults. I couldn't believe I had forgotten them, especially some of my most favourite films, Persepolis (2007) and Yellow Submarine (1968)!
Check out the full list of 20 Great Animated Movies for Adults here and please comment and tell me your favourite grown-up animated films.
