Time is flying, isn't it? Now that you have completed your short story package, it is time to start contemplating your final project. Your mission is to write a treatment and outline of a feature-length story, complete with logline and character biographies / descriptions. This is no small task, so resist the temptation to procrastinate over these last few weeks.
Now, I don't expect you to come up with an Academy Award winning concept. A "B-movie" is fine. However, I do want to see that you have processed the process outlined in the movie we watched with Syd Field and from your reading throughout the course. The treatment does not need to be extensive. Think along the lines of coverage with the exception that it will be broken down into a three-act structure. Five pages is the maximum length (double spaced, 12 pt. font, Times New Roman or Courier).
YOUR FINAL PROJECT INCLUDES STORYBOARDS. THERE SHOULD BE A MINIMUM OF ONE PAGE PER ACT (use the templates you downloaded). These don't have to be fancy (although I know many of your are exceptional artists). Stick figures are fine so long as they convey the story/POV.
For homework:
- Write a draft of Act I for your final project, with storyboard, and bring it to class printed out. It should be about one page long. It should include character intros (in ALL CAPS the FIRST TIME ONLY) and give the reader (me!) an understanding of what the plot is.
- Ready Story, Structure and Genre.
- Choose a chapter in Adventures of the Screen Trade (yes, YOUR choice).
- Blog on both.
This is your last week of blogging! However-if you have failed to post previous blogs (worth 10 points each):
- You can receive 1/2 credit (5 points) for making up those posts between now and week 11 in the "Make-Up" section of the blog (above).
- You may choose additional chapters from either Story or Adventures in the Screen Trade and blog on them for extra-credit of 5 points each.
5 comments:
In reading structure and drama Mckee elaborates on all the different genre's and their conventionalism and complexities. I didn't realize how many genre's are out there, Mckee does comment on the fact that the choice of drama will determine the limitations that is possible within a story. It is our responsobility to master the genre's we choose ans its conventions, we have to ask ourselves what do the stories in my genre do? It is our job as writers to rise to the occasion creatively.
What another eye opening chapter form "Story". After reading this chapter on "Structure and Genre" I have come to the conclosion that I have been writing my treatment with out a foundation. I have made no consideration to the genre or the structure of genre of my story nor was I asked to. I have simply been asked to write. This is opposite methods we have been learning form Mckee and Goldman. Mckee ended this chapter on a point that hit home with me. He said : "Do notwrite something because a intellectual friend think it's socially important. Do not write something to you think will inspire critical praise in film quarterly. Be honest in your choice of genera, for of all the reasons for wanting to write, the only one that nurtures us through time is love of the work itself." I can not write simply to write.
I liked the chapter Structure and Genre, it broke down all the genres and subtitles (there were a lot!) and how to focus on one particular genre, which I thought was a good idea to have while you’re writing. In the process of writing, you tend to get jumbled up in all of your ideas or worse, stuck with no ideas, and then you can go back to that genre and look at that basic structure to help flow ideas and so on. I also agreed that a genre should be marketed correctly; I would be disappointed too if I started to watch a movie thinking it was a Murder Mystery and it turned out to be Maturation plot. Money wasted on disappointment, how sad.
I read Chapter 21 the Interviews, in the Adventures book. It was the chapter after he adapted his short story, Da Vinci, into a screenplay. It was a long chapter but it was worth it, since we read the short story and then the script, I was curious to read what the people he interviewed said. After reading the things Goldman realized after the interviews, like how a director could visually pull this off and how the actor will have to wear wings; I realized the scriptwriter doesn’t really have to be production savvy, I figured if you were in the field for twenty years then you would be around it enough to learn what everyone does and has to deal with. I know I would want to.
I am glad I have experience behind the camera and editing, so when I write my script I will have the finished product in mind, how I am going to shoot it and edit the footage. I think I will have a more rounded idea of were the script is going.
McKee’s Chapter on Structure and Genre opened my eyes further to what genre actually implies, in terms of tone and mood. Watching the film Adaptation, I understood Nicholas Cage’s reaction to the word “genre,” and how the word implied some sort of Hollywood limitation and expectation. He felt restricted just by using the word, thinking it reduced his work to a blurb easy to spout at coffee table parties. McKee meticulously points out how flawed that logic truly is, how it only reflect a writer’s inadequacies. Genre helps identify the structure in terms of plot points and character types, but it’s values can change and vary from story to story. Genre doesn’t shape the story, but defines the premise in such a way that it allows the writer to focus on the goals within a piece. Defining a genre doesn’t limit a piece, but instead opens it up to possibilities you may have not yet considered. By understanding genre, you’re able to understand better what is you’re trying to communicate and how to actually do it.
Goldman’s autobiography really helped me understand the frustration within the business, and how it can carry over into creativity. I did not understand, however, his gripe about re-imagining of Grand Hotel. To me, it came off as a little bitchy. I understand Goldman’s want to do something that hasn’t been achieved, but for Christ sakes, when you work in film, I think you should understand that’s near impossible for film. When he was going down his laundry list of other names and films that were coming out, he should’ve embraced it and joined the fray. Almost all entertainment is recycled from something else(the project itself was a remake) or inspired by other entertainment. Of course it sucks when you find out that you’re not as original as you once hoped, but I think he passed up a cornerstone in his own career by playing it safe and getting off the project entirely.
Who knew there could be so many genres? That's just crazy! I had never thought too much about exactly what genre I would like to pursue, only the story that needed to be told. Looks like I will have to do a lot of research so that I will know my genre and be informed when the time comes for me to write my big hit. I liked the analogy on Creative Limitation being in freedom within a circle of obstacles. That the creative muscle will atrophe without something to push against, therefore forcing us to place barriers that inspire directly in our path. I think school is a bit like that, only the obstacles sometimes just piss me off instead of inspire because I am just trying to finish the next project instead of put my heart into each one. I can handle deadlines, just not so many all at the same exact time. I look forward to utilizing genre to inspire the "rhyme scheme" of the storytelling poem I am about to write.
I read some pages in Ch. 2, about L.A. fear, money and beginnings. Beginnings would carry the most useful information for me, and also Endings, had I read it. A lot needs to happen in the first 15 minutes or the script can be lost. And I will not be moving back to L.A. anytime soon.
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