Scriptwriting Module reflection. te1054

Beginning the module at the start of the educational year I had never made a movie nor written a script in my life. I've always been full of idea's but never had the skills needed to turn them into films or proper stories and I've hugely enjoyed attaining those skills.

I have found the narrative theory aspects of the module to be the most interesting and the most useful to me. I've always been fascinated with how things work and how they're made and being given the tools needed to analyse films and scripts and break them down into their components and study how they fit together has been a massive boost to my writing abilities.

Studying Todorov, Propp and Strauss came easier to me than the rest of the module, particularly when breaking down 'The Spongebob Sqaurepants Movie' during our first assignment. The movie turned out to have a much more complex application of Todorov and Propp's theories than I had expected. However I ended up highly enjoying breaking down the film and the way the theories applied. It taught me a lot about how to alter and adjust the way different theories can be used to improve a film without limiting it.

Writing scripts themselves has proven more difficult, however learning proper research and character profiling technique has made this much easier than before, though during the third assignment I had less passion for my script idea's than I would have liked. However this was a good thing as the challenge of writing for a script you are not passionate about is likely to be a part of the industry and proper application of theory, idea and research still results in well written and thought out scripts, even if they lack passion.

The small exercises performed in and out of class; single character break downs, quick script analysis and short research tasks has been very useful in cementing the idea's and techniques in my head and teaching me how to apply these to my own ideas both quickly and more thoroughly.

The technical formatting of the script has also been very easy as it is constant, ordered and sensible and suits the way I work.

I have found some difficulty finding the passion to write the scripts I want, though I enjoy writing, writing a script is very thinned down compared to story writing in terms of what you write on the page and creating scripts that clearly tell the story with the limited information than be put into the script has been a little more difficult. From the second and third assignments I learned how important it was to consider the length of your story and how quickly an idea can be formed and represented in a script.

I used the 'Amelia the Acorn' short as a 60 second script and ran into the problem than my original idea for the story would have involved a script closer to 5-10 minutes in length.

Though I was able to re-tool the story to work in 60 seconds it was still difficult to achieve and I wasn't happy about doing so, so in future careful consideration of an idea and how well it scales to different film lengths is important.

I also had some difficulty with the researching, character profiling and mood board type tasks as, although I have learnt well the importance of these things, before I started I had never really used them before when writing or painting, and I still feel I have a lot to learn about how I am best creating my own mood boards and research profiles to suit the way I work and to improve my ideas.

Overall I feel I have been successful int his module, the work has been enjoyable and interesting to me and I feel I have picked up on many of the important elements of how to write a successful script and have created, what I feel, are examples of work that show that slow growing of my understanding. 

I still have some areas to improve my understanding and practices in but for now I feel greatly improved in my ability.

Basic Script writing guide

Before beginning to write a script it is important to start by deciding what it is you wish to write. A horror movie, a political statement, a simple one liner and jot down this idea in its basic form before you begin to develop it.
Development should be gradual, from the basic idea a synopsis or treatment should be formed and then developed into a rough screenplay. AT this stage correct formatting is not necessary.
Following your writing of the screenplay you should begin to look for feedback, preferably from those with film making and script writing experience themselves though almost any feedback is useful in some form. Use this feedback to inform your improving of the screenplay. A screenplay will rarely be perfect the first time you write it, and while it easy to write stories for oneself it is more difficult to write them for others, always remember you’re writing the story for an audience.
While scriptwriting joining workshops, seeking regular critique and working with others can be hugely helpful as writing is typically a very lonely enterprise. And the more you seek out others assistance and critique the more your story will come to be formed in a way that excites the people you are writing it for. This is especially true if you can find people who are fans of the type of story you are writing e.g if you are writing a horror movie then finding horror fans to critique the script will be more helpful than fans of romantic drama’s.

When creating your idea’s it can be helpful to surround yourself with mood boards, films and other media that is similar to the idea you wish to portray in your script. These things can act as a point of inspiration or comparison for your ideas. When writing a horror film is it going to be supernatural or a slasher, perhaps a mood board of famous serial killers and an evening of watching the golden era of slashers will help to inspire your ideas or assist you in refining them.
While you are writing your script carry a small notebook on you, every time you hear something or see something that you think could be useful to your script then write it down. It could be a potential filming location you would love to set your film in, it could just be a joke you overheard than you think would be great for setting the mood in a particular scene, it could be anything at all, but the more you have to work with the easier it will be to create an interesting, in depth, well thought out script.
However just because you think it would work in your script doesn’t guarantee that it will and learning to cut things from your script is as important as adding them in.

When creating your script it is important to remember the narrative structures of a film and what parts create highly memorable films.
Analysing the theories of Propp, Todorov and Strauss should help to give you a better idea of how to structure your story. Propp’s theories focused on character roles such as Hero, Princess and Villain. Todorov focused on the narrative sequence, beginning with equilibrium and strauss focused on the use of binary oppositions in film. However while these theories are all widely recognized as being at the heart of many films they are by no means rules to be followed to the letter and there are times where breaking away from these theories can result in a better story than if they were followed.
It can be useful to first write your idea and create an un-refined screenplay of the idea and then begin to apply these theories, it is much easier to trim a script down than it is to expand it.

When writing your script it is also important to research the genre and subject matter of your script, for example if creating a short about the struggles of an amateur band then researching the music industry, talking to friends or family who are part of small time bands and going to see local bands play at small venues will build your store of information to draw on when writing your script and allow you to create a more authentic story. Though you should never be afraid to apply a bit of artistic license where necessary. Artistic license should however be avoided as much as possible as though it is widely accepted that this is a necessary part of making any story entertaining it is usually glaringly obvious and immersion breaking when a story has departed from the reality of the subject it is portraying.

Once your idea is properly formed you should beginning to convert your screenplay into an industry standard script. Though there are no official guidelines on how to format your script there is an industry standard that most industry professionals are used to seeing, many will not even seriously read a script if it is not formatted in this style.
When formatted according to these standards it should be easy to see the length of your script one it is converted to a film as one page should roughly equal one minute of film.

Once you have reached the stage of having a fully formatted, completed script it is important to then go over the entire script again, ask friends or family to help you enact certain scenes you feel you may be unsure about, if possible ask friendly actors or film making societies to do this.
Re write any area’s that appear to be obviously weaker than the rest of the script, easy from out of nowhere magical solutions to characters problems should be avoided, as should overly complicating things. Constantly ask yourself, is this scene necessary? Does this character really need to say that? Could this problem be solved with a simpler solution? Why are my characters choosing to do this instead of that? It is important to cut out the unnecessary fluff, both to keep the film at an acceptable length and to ensure that the script is easy to follow and does not confuse the viewer.