A Stupid Way to Fix Your Plot

Ever tire of watching the damsel in distress trip over her own feet while she's running from a guy with a machete? Well that's the first thing that came to mind when I saw Bill Martell's screenwriting tip today and it's the scene in my head every time I read a screenplay that relies on the stupidity of the good guy to set up a story or the stupidity of the bad guy to bring down the story. And happy coincidence? Rarely leaves me warm and fuzzy. Read "Dumbest Guy in the Room" today on Bill's Script Secrets site. If not, then at least read this quote:

If you have to make your protagonist or antagonist do something stupid to make your plot work, you're better off fixing your plot. Bill Martell

I Theme, You Theme, We All Theme

Watching the Golden Globes last night I realized that even though I saw a lot of films in 2011, I have plenty more to see before Oscar nominations are announced January 24th. Oh sure, I can catch up before February 26th when those naked golden men are handed out but it looks like I have missed out on another kind of golden award --- an opportunity that I didn't think about until I realized just how many films I saw in 2011.

I was looking over my own screenplay yesterday and feeling rather smug about my theme and I got to thinking about what the themes have been of films I've seen this year. Some were memorable because they were either that well done or were my favorite films. Pirates of the Caribbean: On Stranger Tides, for example, had a clear theme of redemption and atonement and even though critics didn't rave about this movie, it was my favorite of all the POTC films for one reason: the theme.

I really wish I had taken the time to think about and write down my personal take on the theme of each film I saw in 2011 while it was fresh in my viewing memory. Why? To ask my self, "what was the writer trying to say? Did he get to say it? Did it get lost in production?"

I'm not suggesting that theme should be in your face or that as screenwriters, we should consider every film a homework exercise but since theme is something I've been focusing on as a writer, it sure does seem like a no-brainer that I would have been paying more attention to it as a viewer. Sometimes, I just don't want to be a writer when I'm sitting with popcorn in my lap.

So, here's my proposal. I'm going through my list and trying to figure out the themes of the following films and your thoughts are welcome, solicited, and appreciated. (I did not include any 2011 films that I've seen in 2012 and yes Joyful Noise was seen in 2011, not 2012, because I was in the test audience.)

Oh, and before you start, I should warn you. When my brother was looking for a job, he moved in with me for the better part of 2011 and we had "bad movie days" where we purposely went and saw movies that we knew were terrible. Why? Same reason you slow down when you pass a car accident. (that explains "Drive Angry") And sometimes I take my nieces and nephews to kids' movies... and sometimes I go without them.

Okay, so you're giving me your input on theme. Ready? Go!

Arthur

Battle: Los Angeles

Captain America

Cars 2

Cowboys and Aliens

Crazy, Stupid, Love

Drive Angry

Gnomeo & Juliet

Green Lantern

I Am Number Four

J. Edgar

Joyful Noise

Just Go With It

Limitless

Midnight In Paris

No Strings Attached

Rango

The Big Year

The Green Hornet

The Help

The King’s Speech

The Rum Diary

Thor

Transformers: Dark of the Moon

Mister Popper’s Penguins

MoneyBall

Our Idiot Brother

Paul

Pirates of the Caribbean: On Stranger Tides

Rio

Season of the Witch

Super 8

There Be Dragons

Unknown

Xmen: First Class

Zookeeper

Challenge Accepted

Nope. I don't blog much anymore. I've fallen prey to the ease of social networks, my small in-home business, and writing schedule. Alas, nothing lasts forever. Or, it does but evolves?

Anyway...

Brett threw down a brass fastener or whatever it is screenwriters throw down to challenge one another (it's certainly not a gauntlet or a glove) and dared us to post the first ten verbs from our current projects. This is designed to give us a spark, kindle, or whatever kind of slap upside the keyboard we need to prevent apathy in our verb writing so here goes:

REFLECT

BARNGATES

SPOTS

SCRAMBLE

CUTS

ROCKETS

BUST

SAYS

EXPOSE

SLOSHES

Ouch. Work to be done. Next!

Thou Art Worthy

A project worthy of your extra $5.00 should you have any money left after you pay your bills, put gas in your car, tithe at church and retrieve your wallet from the kids who are pillaging it for summer swimming and movie money, Prodigy is a short film about a little girl's soaring imagination and how an honest love of music affects us, regardless of our individual talents.

The prospect of this film touches me in a very real and personal way. Music heals the soul and moves people like nothing else. When I was growing up, writing was my escape and my salvation but music was my counselor and best friend. Scary thought but I can tell you that in the depths of my childhood despair, it was music that brought me joy and the prospect of a bright future.

Hans Zimmer refers to music as the wings of a film. Try to imagine Star Wars without John Williams. Imagine Titanic without James Horner. Imagine Pirates of the Caribbean without Hans Zimmer. (Speaking of POTC, if you've not heard the Pirates of the Caribbean: On Stranger Tides soundtrack featuring Rodrigo y Gabriela, do it now! Track 4, The Pirate that Should Not Be, has heart racing Spanish guitar that brought tears to my eyes.)

I am, at present, playing the flute in an orchestra WAY ABOVE my skill level. I joined late with a borrowed instrument because mine is loaned out to my aunt so she can teach private lessons. I have two other flutes but they're not in any shape for stage. My music was incomplete and not entirely transposed into the correct key. I'd only had it a few days when I attended my ONE rehearsal that covered only the second act. Everyone in the room flew through the music like they'd been playing it their whole lives while I .. well, I was like a lost lamb in the rapid fire of key signature and time changes. It was pitiful.

And I loved EVERY. SINGLE. MINUTE!

We rehearse with the cast on Thursday. I am not qualified to be part of this production so I must work ten times harder than anyone else to be one tenth as good. Regardless of my talent or lack of talent, it is a glorious experience!

Music, my friends, expresses the inexpressible. I hope Lisa Ford gets all her funding for Prodigy. Judy Hyman, an Emmy award-winning violinist, is composing the score. I'm confident these two ladies can illustrate what music does for the soul much better than I can. It's not about talent.

I'm the proof.

The Incredible Disappearing Theme

One of my all time favorite lines comes from Sunset Boulevard. Betty Schaefer tells Joe Gillis that his screenplay is no good and explains that she believes pictures should say a little something. I, too, believe films should say a little something. Why else do we write? Because we have something to say.

Choose a film. Gone with the Wind. What does it say? A Beautiful Mind. What does it say? Ever see a film that doesn't say anything at all? Or maybe it said something but it was so vague or heavy handed or buried in explosions and car chases that you didn't hear what it was saying? Was that film any good? Yes? No? Maybe? Sort of?

Don't get me wrong. I am NOT pitching heavy handed message films. Recently I saw a comedy that was so beaten up by the message that it ruined what could have been a delightful film. Instead it was a mean spirited dismal mess. At one point in the film, my brother and I looked at each other and both asked the exact same question at the exact same time about the hero's journey. Not good.

On the other side of the coin, I took my son to a different film (which either lacked theme or I missed it) and as we left the theater, my 17 year old's comment was "well, that was pointless".

Often, when asked what a story is about, a writer will immediately mention the theme. That's because usually we writers are so anxious to get our points (message) across. Let's use It's A Wonderful Life as an example. Suppose I'm pitching it and I'm asked what it's about. I might say it's about how a man's humble life makes a gigantic difference to a great many people even though he believes his life was wasted . Pffft. Noooooo. That's the "say a little something" Betty Schaefer was talking about. That's not the story. The producer doesn't want to know what I have to say. He wants to know how I'm going to say it. A man thinking about suicide meets an angel and gets to see what the world would be like if he never existed. That's the story. Through that story I get to say that every life, no matter how seemingly thankless and without glory, has a butterfly effect on the world. That's the "say a little something".

Writers write theme. Writers teach theme. Writers study theme. Writers explore theme. Writers talk about theme. Writers overlap and combine themes. Some writers even confuse theme with tone when discussing theme but hey, I split infinitives now and then. Nobody's perfect. The point is that writers love theme! I know they write it. I know they do.

Yes, films need more than story and theme but I'm not on characters, timing, structure and all that other stuff today. I have a soap box to get on and there's a huge bottle of whine to go with my cheese sandwich. A big fat bone needs picking and I intend to pick it right here and right now.

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Okay. All done.

Any Man That Falls Behind

How well do you remember the pirate code from the first Pirates of the Caribbean film, Curse of the Black Pearl? Well, maybe I remember it a little too well.

Went to see Pirates of the Caribbean: On Stranger Tides yesterday with my brother and son even though it doesn't officially release until the 20th. Facebook held a free fan premier and after listening to the soundtrack, I jumped at the chance to take a familiar ride that I hoped was as fresh and new as the music. I was not disappointed.

Being searched at the door for cameras was unexpected but the moment they finished poking through my handbag and running a wand up my legs, I ditched my brother and son and made a mad run for my favorite seats. You know the ones. Right there behind the wheelchair spaces where you can prop your feet up on the rails? Well, I got 'em! Three seats. Right there. You betcha. I didn't wait in line three hours to crane my neck beside the exit sign. But did my men folk appreciate my considerate dash?

NO!

My son seemed offended and demanded an accounting of what I would have done had he texted me that he'd been detained at the door for having a knife in his pocket. What nerve. I assured him I had a plan. I took out my phone and sent him this sweet little message.

"See you in 141 minutes, son. Love ya."

Do You Know Where Your Children Are?

Remember those old public service announcements? It's ten o'clock. Do you know where your children are? Well, there's a phrase we use in screenwriting about not wanting to kill our babies which basically refers to our inability to let loose of an idea once we have committed it to paper. But therein lies the beauty of losing your final draft. You also lose all your babies and don't have to consciously kill the ones that don't work. They just die on their own.

When I switched computers and somehow deleted my final drafts and put a final draft date on a preliminary noodling-around-in-my-head outline of last year's Nicholl entry (color me stupid), I didn't kill my babies. I simply lost them all. That wasn't such a bad thing when I sat down to start over. I remembered every idea and, of course, I had all my note cards. But there was great freedom in not already being committed to any one course of action anymore. There was no chain reaction if I removed or revised something.

I've always know that's what a rewrite is supposed to be but have I ever really done it? I mean REALLY put it into practice and made the tough decisions? Probably not. This time, I had no choice.

I'm not going to pretend that this amended version of my screenplay is as good as the one I worked on for two years. Of course it's not. Or, at least it's not as good as my memory of the final draft since I don't actually have a final draft of it anywhere. But I do believe in some respects, the revision is a little better because I was absolved from killing my babies. They were already gone. The decision was already made for me so I could move on.

The cold reality here is that this version is not as polished as my other and doesn't read like a final draft to me. But I've learned much about me as a writer and as a storyteller and most importantly? The earth didn't fly off its axis when I sent out something I would normally be utterly humiliated to admit came from my pen. Instead, I'm confessing it on the world wide web in the hope that my fellow writers will learn what I did. Sometimes, teachable moments come disguised as ... oh, who am I kidding? I am never, ever doing that again!

It's Nicholl Season Again

So this may be the most embarrassing post I'll ever blog but..

I discovered a few weeks ago that I sent out a ROUGH DRAFT to the Nicholl Fellowship last year. Oh yeah. And when I say "rough", I mean escherichia coli of the eyeballs raw. And if you are the one or two friends who got my entry and were too kind to tell me it sucks, shame on you.

How did I wind up with a final draft date on a very preliminary outline-ish copy of my tinkering-around-in-my-head version of the story? Beats me. Cleaning out my files when I bought a new computer I guess. What a ditz.

On the up side, the Nicholl had the decency to dink me and I do have a printed copy of a near-final version that only semi-sucks so I may be able to get it in read-able condition before the deadline for the Nicholl this year. If not, well, it's not the end of the world because now that I've sent them my very worst, I've got no place to go but up.

Peas Porridge Hot

My brain will not back off and leave me to rest. Sleep is interrupted by scenes and settings and locations and character development. Sure, I get up in the middle of the night and hastily scribble notes but the holiday season is no time for any meaningful stretch of writing and then there is, well you know, life!

The creative portion of my brain wants to align the crookedness of a Babylonian world gone narcissistically wild by waving my magic pen and poof! No more injustice. Meanwhile, a very annoying logical segment of my brain is calculating the folly of pursuing unattainable goals. Fortunately, the creative brain often tells the logical brain to shut up and go see what's shakin' in the verbal memory neighborhood of the left temporal lobe. Those cells always need a visit from the logic fairy, particularly if I'm trying to spell "narcissistically" which, by the way, those irksome little guys are saying is not a real word.

What? Because yes, you are irksome. It's not a bad word. It just means... Oh. Right. You know what it means. Okay, I'll be with you in a minute. Let me just finish this.

No soul within my realm of daily acquaintance relates to the peculiarities of my tormented mind. They just think I'm nuts.

It is too a word. Is there no dictionary in there? Well send somebody to borrow one from the right temporal lobe.

Only a writer knows...

Duh. They're a bunch of liars. That's what creative cells do. They lie.

Only a writer knows what my brain puts me through.

Excuse me. Can't you see I'm talking here? No. I don't know what color his eyes are yet. Go ask somebody in the occipital lobe how to describe Paul Newman blue.

"Why do your eyeballs have muffin lids?" is not a question I want to answer with "Because I'm getting to know my character's idiosyncratic responses to cheese."

Wait. You know what? I like "Paul Newman blue". Let's run with that.

And then there are the migraines and cluster headaches which are not so much a result of a story plaguing my brain as they are my body's signals that (1) I have nerve damage from a teenage face injury (2) I no longer possess a uterus and (3) I really do need bifocals.

Huh? Tell them higher cognitive functions develop personality in the prefrontal cortex? What does that have to -- NO, I DID NOT SUSTAIN AN INJURY THERE!

Some of the most creative geniuses in the world have been lunatics. Is it any wonder that many writers endure a touch of real or perceived madness?

I know I yelled at you. I'm sorry. Sometimes those parietal lobe guys just blurt things out.

Folks, I'm under a lot of intercranial pressure here. I'll finish this later.

Nobody Knows Anything (or else I wouldn't plagiarize this title)

I blog so rarely now that I was stunned to see on Sitemeter that I still get regular visits. The most visited posts? The Death of the Protagonist posts and the Purpose of Battle Speeches posts. Many of these hits originate from college campuses. Geez, I hope these kids don't think I actually know something!

Can You Hear Me Now?

I've pretty much given up on trying to write in the library -- ANY library. I can't hear myself think. How's that for a tired old cliche'? But libraries are LOUD!

Borders or Starbucks is quieter than the public library. The place that once held silence so sacred that I was afraid to use my pencil eraser for fear of getting evicted is now louder than a McDonald's playground where, at least, you can drink an ice cold whatever while you're writing.

It must just be me. Nobody around me ever seems to mind all the chatter. People talk. LOUD. Using their outside voices. No, no, not just any outside voice either, I mean the "at Ranger stadium trying to be heard over drunk and screaming fans at the ALCS Yankee game five " outside voice. They joke with the librarians, argue about genealogy, talk about their degree requirements and all the while let their kids play hide and seek and shout across the aisles.

The kicker? If I covertly text on my phone to my ride that I'm ready to be picked up, I get a firm tap on my shoulder with a "take it outside, please." Really? The tapping on my touch phone is disturbing the dude with the iPod so loud that I can not only hear every word of his gangster rap through his ear phones, but I can also hear his ear drums rupturing like Jiffy Pop?

A silent place to read and write is so rare now that I think silence must no longer be golden. It must be something more precious, rare, and difficult to find. Silence must be -- silent.

This Is The Part Where We Blow Up!

Remember that? Buzz and Woody are strapped to a rocket and Woody thinks they're about to be blown to smithereens. And remember what Buzz Lightyear replies to Woody's wailing "this is the part where we blow up" line? NOT TODAY! Buzz has a plan. It's a great plan with a logical and attainable conclusion.

I need a Buzz Lightyear and instead I get the truth. What is the truth? Simply, that nobody will negate your anticipation of failure with a NOT TODAY and show you how to glide effortlessly from certain demise to your heart's desire. It just doesn't work that way.

Darn it.

To Book or Not to Book

Maybe.

Yesterday, I Was a Blog

Social networking is as great a form of escapism as any other but I don't learn much from Facebook or Twitter. Some of the best advice I've ever used has come from reading screenwriting blogs over the past few years. I'm not discounting the value of certain books. They are holding their own and even evolving onto phone applications, podcasts, and eReaders. Why can screenwriting blogs (good ones) not do the same? They are, instead, fading into the fabric of tired technology and I don't like it one bit.

A few really good blogs are still out there (thank you for hanging in there, Bill Martell) but with my read list shrinking, I feel like I'm watching my screenwriting parents divorce because "I'm finally adult enough to manage on my own now". Yeah, well, neither of my parents has ever really known me that well.

"Yesterday I was a dog. Today I'm a dog. Tomorrow I'll probably still be a dog. Sigh! There's so little hope for advancement." Snoopy

Counting Down

Today is July 12th and I just realized that Nicholl letters go out in less than three weeks. Wow. Time flies when you aren't obsessing!

Nothing To Do With Screenwriting

But hey, it's my blog so here's a video recorded by my nephew, Jude. Forgive the production value. He's eight years old. What's important here is (1) Jude is a future filmmaker and (2) my brother is a talented writer and performer.

Daring to Disbelieve

One of the latest posted Nicholl review comments:

“This is a simple story, fast-paced, entertaining, and a good read. The writer is capable and assured. Even when the story takes a loopy turn (or two), the writer presents these events so confidently and matter-of-factly that it's almost like he's daring us to doubt what we're being told.”

What I love is that this remark speaks of a writing style I particularly admire. This is a writer who knows his story so well that he simply watches it in his head and dictates that onto paper. He knows his characters. He knows their back stories. He's telling us just enough but if you asked, he could elaborate. There's just no need to. He doesn't worry about suspending disbelief or flowery prose because the story is what it is. He's not making it up as he goes along. It's a "this is my story and I'm sticking to it" style of writing. Wish I could read this screenplay!

A Level of Suckage That's Not Negotiable

Creative Screenwriting's podcast this week is with Jay and Mark Duplass about Cyrus. Funny stuff. Give it a listen. The best remarks are about the evolution of their creativity. My favorite line: a level of suckage that's not negotiable. Ha! That's what I think when I read things I wrote two and three years ago. Also, digital versions of Creative Screenwriting are now available. That's a temporary link until they get a permanent place.

Will the Real N1 Writer Please Stand Up?

New this year is the Facebook page for the Nicholl Fellowship in Screenwriting where we, entrants, are given access to a few reader comments. More than ever, the Nicholl folks are helping writers understand the fellowship selection process and answering our questions -- even those already answered on the Nicholl Fellowship in Screenwriting FAQ page.

The readers' comments are interesting and give us a little window of insight. This one likes strong prose while that one likes that a script isn't overwritten. One applauds how the writer forces the reader to feel something while another is impressed by the sharp dialogue.

Enlightening.

The replies to those posts, though, are usually the same: declarations of ownership. It reminds me of the people at ball games who watch for themselves on the jumbo tron and wave just in case. Out of 6000 plus screenplays, only 45-ish remarks are up so far and quarterfinal letters go out in about 40 days. Do the math.

Tell Me Something Good

I've often been told by other writers that the prevailing theme will reveal itself as the story progresses . Admittedly, I don't like to write unless I have something to say. Now and then that "something" will reproduce and give me a secondary "something" or morph into "something" entirely different. It may even experience a sort of thematic mitosis where the parent "something" splits into two equally important "something"s and I'm left deciding whether both "something"s are still a single story or two --- which is why I don't really believe that much in writer's block. There are just way too many "something"s duking it out in my head. And I'm terribly sorry but right now, the something is this: