Movie of the Moment

Random thoughts, general musings, that sort of thing

Maximum Z comic books, contest, creativeness, DC, editing, encouragement, exposition, goals, Guardians of the Galaxy, ideas, inspiration, loglines, Marvel Comics, Movie of the Moment, Nicholl Fellowship, old time radio, perseverance, productivity, rewrite, scenes, screenwriting, script, self-confidence, spec, story, storytelling, The Thin Man, westerns, writing , , ,
Nothing to do with today's post. I just love their chemistry.
Nothing to do with today’s post. I just love their chemistry.

-My western failed to make it through the first round of Scriptapalooza, which makes me 0 for 4 so far this year. I’m not counting the top 20 percent ranking for the Nicholl; that’s like getting Honorable Mention. At this point, I’ve pretty much written off its chances for Austin.

My problem was overconfidence in the script. I thought it was solid enough, but apparently not. It’s not the first time this has happened to me, but I’ll be more careful about it in the future.

I still believe in this script, which is why I’ve been so gung-ho about rewriting it. The past two weeks have been all about making it better. After completing the latest round of edits, it’s now 8 pages shorter, and still some further fine-tuning to do, which hopefully won’t add more than 2-3.

-Never realized how much my characters repeat things in dialogue. “I need you go to the store.” “The store? Why?” Must be the influence of listening to so much old-time radio. Cutting all of those probably amounted to at least half a page.

-I cut at least 5(!) separate situations where the Wilhelm Scream could be used.

-Had a great lunch-chat with one of my working writer pals yesterday. While he was very supportive and encouraging, he also reminded me of the almost insurmountable task of a new, unproven writer breaking in with a high-budget script.

“Your chances improve when you offer something that won’t cost a lot to make. A lot more people can get something made for under $5 million, rather than $50 million, let alone $100-200 million.”

As it should have, it got me thinking. Do I have any stories like that? It took the bike ride home and digging through some old flash drives to discover I did. Maybe about 5 or 6, all of them just a logline and not much else.

It’s a start.

-Movie of the Moment: GUARDIANS OF THE GALAXY (2014). Loved it. Great story, great characters (and their development). Maybe my only complaint was the bombardment of exposition in the first 20 minutes. Other than that, a lot of fun.

Biggest pleasant surprise: Dave Bautista as Drax.

Biggest almost-catastrophe: Adam Sandler as a potential voice for Rocket. Somebody thought this was a good idea?

It’s really impressive how much of an effort Marvel puts into their stories and characters. I sincerely hope DC and Warner Brothers can take a lesson from this.

Building up to what it all comes down to

Maximum Z antagonist, characters, goals, Godzilla, guidelines, hero, inciting incident, monsters, Movie of the Moment, Pacific Rim, payoff, plot, plot points, protagonist, San Francisco, scenes, screenwriting, script, story, storytelling, structure, subplot, Uncategorized, villain, writing
What he's holding represents what's at stake. Think about it.
What he’s holding represents what’s at stake. Hint: It’s not a rock

Time now for a very, very important question every writer needs to face:

Do you know how your story ends?

You come up with an idea, then proceeded to develop, shape, and organize all the stuff that happens in the middle, which eventually has led us to the where we find ourselves now: the big payoff. What the whole thing’s been about.

Everything your characters have been doing have been leading up to this. In theory, your first two acts have been about the protagonist’s world undergoing some drastic changes, how they dealt with it and now it looks like the bad guy’s going to win.

Which brings us to the grand finale that is Act Three, where our hero must somehow find a way to overcome these seemingly insurmountable odds, defeat the antagonist and hopefully come out of the experience a different person than the one they were way back when we first met them.

That being said, there’s still more to it.

-Your protagonist has a physical goal (what they want) and an emotional one (what they need). They can achieve both, just one or neither. Which applies to yours, and have you effectively steered the action to ensure that result? Can we see the changes they’ve undergone?

-Working with a subplot or three? If they haven’t wrapped up by now, better make sure to do it soon. Do you really want the reader to wonder “Hey! What happened to the part about ____?”

-Even a supporting character needs an arc to complete. Have you given each of them enough attention throughout the story to make this happen, and does their story wrap up in a convincingly believable way?

One of the most valuable lessons I’ve learned about putting a story together is that the central question (“Will the hero achieve their goal?”) is raised with the inciting incident around page 10, and each subsequent plot point raises it again, albeit with the stakes a little higher each time.

What happens in Act Three is where you show us how the central question is answered.

-And now, the much-heralded return of Movie of the Moment! This time, a way overdue look at GODZILLA (2014).

Wow. Everything PACIFIC RIM should have been. Instead of non-stop giant monster action, we get only glimpses as the focus is directed at the human aspect of the story. A much more effective approach.

While it’s not hard to suspend disbelief when it comes to a movie about giant monsters rampaging/duking it out in the downtown area of the city where I live, perhaps the most amazing piece of cinematic fiction (as observed by both K and myself) was in the background of one scene where a garage sign read “All-day parking $15”.

Now that’s make-believe.

Time once again for…

Maximum Z analysis, characters, cliches, Comedy Film Nerds, criticism, Graham Elwood, Movie of the Moment, screenwriting, script, story, The Lone Ranger, tone, westerns, writing
Okay, class. Who's got stuff to talk about?
Okay, class. Who’s got stuff to talk about?

…the much-anticipated Project Status Update!

So simple, anyone can do it in just two easy steps!

Here’s how it works:

1. What you’re currently working on
2. How it’s going

I’ll start the ball rolling.

1. A rewrite of my mystery spec.
2. I’m up to page 82, which places it in the latter half of Act 2. This includes the realization that my “page 75” plot point has changed, but still works.

See? No sweat. Give it a try.

And continuing with the theme of something not seen in a while…

-Movie of the Moment. THE LONE RANGER (2013). Yep. Finally.

It wasn’t terrible, but it wasn’t good either. My biggest complaint was that there was just way too much going on. I’m all for an epic western, but this felt like they were trying to jam in as many cliches as possible. They could have totally removed at least two supporting characters and the inane “1933 Tonto telling a story” scenes.

It really seemed like it couldn’t decide what kind of story it wanted to be. Slapstick comedy? Buddy picture? Drama with touches of gore? All these and more on display.

One of the first rules in screenwriting is to make the audience want to root for your main character, which unfortunately doesn’t happen here. I actually thought Armie Hammer was a good choice to play the part, but the material was all wrong. Yes, he’s adapting to the ways of the frontier, but for crying out loud, this is the LONE RANGER. You do not make him a naive doofus.

Regarding Johnny Depp as Tonto, Graham Elwood of the Comedy Film Nerds podcast summed it up perfectly: The name of the movie is THE LONE RANGER, not JACK SPARROW GOES WEST.

One can only hope that the failure of this film will not once again stop the resurgence of the western.

The value of face-to-face time

Maximum Z Bay Area Screenwriters, blog, characters, dialogue, Justin Sloan, Movie of the Moment, networking, Pacific Rim, screenwriting, The Last Starfighter, Writers Guild of America, writing, writing group , , ,
Coffee makes for a good 3rd part of this equation
Coffee makes for a good 3rd part of this equation

A few weeks ago, I’d read a post on Done Deal Pro from a writer who’d gone to Los Angeles to attend a Writers Guild function, but was now back home in the Bay Area.

Since I’m always looking to expand my network of fellow writers, especially ones that could be considered local, I contacted him and asked if he’d be interested in meeting.

Fortunately, he was. Coffee at the Ferry Building.

Since most of this summer has involved V being at work with me, she and I worked our way from my office to our designated meeting place.

I handed her my phone so she could play video games while Justin Sloan and I sat down to talk.

We exchanged backgrounds and career developments. He was especially intrigued about my results using the Black List.

Unfortunately, Justin had to get back to work so we had to cut things short, but he asked if he could read my script, and I offered to give feedback on his.  He also asked if he could send me some questions for his blog Bay Area Screenwriters. You can read those here, and I’ve added a link to it over on the blogroll.

It was great not only talking about writing, but also discussing the assorted experiences we’ve each had in relation to writing. Contests, writing groups, etc.

This is one of those experiences that can’t be duplicated via an online forum or instant messaging. Having an actual conversation with someone will hopefully be fulfilling for both parties.

So send those emails, set up those coffee chats, get out there and talk to people.

-Movie of the Moment: PACIFIC RIM (2013). What happened? This was supposed to be the big hit of the summer. No such luck. Instead, we got great special effects weighed down with forgettable characters and horrible dialogue. (Can’t people come up with something better than “Let’s do this!”?)

I will give del Toro and Beacham credit for coming up with an original story, but feel bad it was so poorly executed. There was no way this could lived up to all the hype. Scott Pilgrim, anyone?

Some notable disappointments: the Russian and Chinese pilots/robots were treated as throwaway characters, and were dispatched with way too quickly.
-the Australian guy with a huge chip on his shoulder seemed straight out of a studio note. “This guy should be a real asshole, but give him a dog so he’s semi-likeable.”
-the trailers featured most of the robot-monster action, leaving little to surprise us during the actual movie.

-THE LAST STARFIGHTER (1984). Hadn’t seen this in years.  Also watched it with V because I thought she might like it – she did. There are elements similar to DREAMSHIP. Not exactly the same, but definitely there.

The story by itself still holds up, even though the rest feels a little clunky, and Robert Preston’s fast-talking Harold Hill-type character always brightens up whatever scene he’s in.

Watching this on an HD screen makes it that much more obvious you’re looking at a film set, and the special effects, cutting-edge at the time, seem quaintly dated.

Should of known better

Maximum Z A Monster in Paris, animation, Movie of the Moment, proofreading, screenwriting, script, spelling, The Simpsons, writing

I admit it. I’m a fiend when it comes to spelling.

It drives me crazy when I’m reading somebody’s script and find a misspelled word, especially if it’s something used on an everyday basis.

I can understand making a mistake with a 25-cent word more likely to be found in the SATs, but ‘their’ instead of ‘there’? Or ‘lose’ and ‘loose’?

Yeah, spellcheck is a handy resource, but it doesn’t know what you’re trying to say.  You’re going to have to rely on that eye-brain connection to see you through.

Not the strongest speller? Consider an extra tab/window on your screen featuring Dictionary.com, just to be on the safe side.

Don’t trust yourself? Find somebody you do, making sure to offer some kind of reciprocation in gratitude.

The industry is always looking for a reason, no matter how insignificant, to say ‘no’ to your script. Maybe they’re willing to overlook one misspelling out of the whole thing, but you better have a kickass script to begin with.

The more mistakes they find (spelling and otherwise), the more likely your script is toast.

Misspelling not only makes your script look bad, it makes you look bad. It shows you may not be taking this as seriously as you should.

Just to put it in perspective: a friend sends you their script, but you find at least four spelling errors in the first 10 pages. The rest of it probably looks like this as well. Would you want to keep reading?

-Movie of the Moment – A MONSTER IN PARIS (2011) An absolute charmer of an animated film.  Take elements of BEAUTY AND THE BEAST, KING KONG and slapstick comedy, set it in 1910 Paris, add music, and this is what you get.