Following is a series of “explorations” in screenwriting. I call them explorations because they’re not written in article or essay form, nor were they ever organized in book form. I call it a Blueprint.
Also, everything here is by no means original. I’ve blatantly pulled things from other books on screenwriting and have failed to give credit where credit is due. So if there are any issues please don’t hesitate to submit a comment and I’ll make corrections accordingly.
If my explorations in screenwriting were to ever be compiled in book form, the preface of the book would state clearly how I take a non-linear approach to a linear art form. As any writer knows, in any kind of fiction, an idea can come from anywhere: a word, a look, a theme, an event, a person, place, a scene, a dialog. So, for me, screenwriting is a holistic process. You can’t have one thing without the other. But all the things that go together to make a good story–a good screenplay–don’t happen in any particular order.
You’ve got characters walking around in front of a green screen. You’ve got a great location but haven’t a clue what its importance is to the story. And for me, I’ve got so much dialog going on in my head, well, it’s literally a cast of 1000s. Who are these people? Where are these voices coming from?
But, films are linear. They happen in time. They begin, go somewhere, and end. Of course, you can take an avant garde or experimental approach and not build a story at all or pay any attention to a clock ticking forward in time. I’m not interested in that kind of style, with one exception: Finding the Holy Grail of screenwriting, which is, “what is a story?”
Now, there’s plenty of exploration into structure. There is the stuff that holds the story together, and the stuff that makes up the story. There are rules and there are places to break rules. And, there are dozens of stories and dozens of ways to tell them.
I’m in keeping with the tradition of Hollywood, although the Independent film is increasingly becoming more attractive in its ability to tell stories Hollywood won’t touch, or introducing a ton of new talent that never found a home in Hollywood.
The traditional Hollywood film is under 2 hours. It has a beginning, middle and end–the traditional 3-act structure. A number of books on screenwriting go beyond 3-acts, and such a view is very useful. I’d say the more you are able to break it down the better off you are at putting it all together. Afterall, it’s a scene-by-scene and in some cases, frame-by-frame building process.
So, let the journey begin.
