Theory
Key concepts
• Show, don’t tell
o Don’t say brad is a boring person who does the same thing every
day
o Show him following the exact same procedure
Not taking risks
Not having fun
Scenes are like miniature films.
o They need to be dynamic: have a
beginning (establishing ‘shot’)
middle (action)
end (punch line / exit).
Scenes are built around relations of power
o about what people want and need
o about what they say and what they actually think or feel.
Scenes are about sub-text.
o What do we really mean when we say something?
o How do we mask our feelings through
Expressions
Movements
Behaviours
o How do we express emotions without actually saying the words
Love
Anger
Threat
Apology
,Writing dialogue
Dialogue
When writing your dialogue think about
o what the character wants in any given scene
o how they might go about getting it.
Good dialogue is often
o not about what is said
o but rather about what is meant
Dialogue and intertextuality
Intertextuality
o Lines that appeal to the audience’s accumulated cultural
knowledge
Example
o Bad boys=“Y’know, you drive almost slow enough to drive Miss
Daisy.”
o Long Kiss Goodnight= Charly: First sign of trouble, honk the the
horn. Mitch: Yessum Miss Daisy, I be honkin’.
Lines vs conversations
Often, films are defined not by lines, but by conversations.
o Sideways and Heat have, at their hearts, a really good
conversation which anchors the film and offers the audience
verbal confirmation of the film’s visual themes.
In Sideways,
o the conversation between two damaged souls about wine, its
sensitivity and its lifespan, becomes a metaphor for the film’s
concerns with mid-life crisis, male sexuality, and creative
frustration.
In Collateral,
o the conversation between a cab driver and his passenger about a
photo is really about their work, and their relationships to other
people, and it strengthens the image of the photo which becomes a
symbolic part of the film’s mise-en-scene
Format
• Covered later
,Format and structure
General Format
• Font
• Setting/Slug lines
• Action
• Character
• Dialogue
Page numbers
• Top right
• Starting on the first page of the script (i.e. not the title page).
• Scene numbers are optional. Usually you would only add them at the end
once you know how many scenes you are going to have).
Font and spacing
• Always use Courier.
• Always 12pt.
• Use single spacing (not 1.5 or 2)
, Scene Heading / Slugline
Master heading
• All in Caps
• Leave 2 spaces before stating a new scene
• In or Out, Day or Night, there are only two ways to open a scene.
• EXT. or INT.
• If you are in a moving vehicle, then you might want to cut between the
two, there you would write I/E. CAR/HIGHWAY or TRAIN/COUNTRYSIDE
• The description of setting. Keep it simple: we just want to know where
the action takes place.
INT. COFFEE SHOP – DAY
Sub heading
• All in Caps
• Leave 2 spaces before stating a new scene
• If the character moves from room to room then each new space is a new
scene.
• Why?
• Producer needs to know how many interiors and exteriors
to budget for
INT. COFFEE SHOP, BATHROOM
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