In the continuing saga of Hitler having problems with stuff and losing his temper, this time he has some issues with the new Apple iPad that ruins his day.
- Bill
Saturday, January 30, 2010
Thursday, January 28, 2010
John Sayles on Matewan
Screenwriter (and director) John Sayles talks about his movie MATEWAN in this clip...
Sayles is one of my favorite writers. I discovered him through PIRANHA and THE HOWLING and many other fine films that seem to be horror movies but are actually much more. I tracked down his short stories and first novel, PRIDE OF THE BIMBOS, and loved BIMBOS so much that I bought up a bunch of paperback copies decades ago and gave them to friends. The novel is about a boy with divorced parents who lives with his father for one summer and learns what it means to be a man - typical coming of age story... except the kid's father plays on an exhibition baseball team kind of like the Harlem Globetrotters (which is basketball, I know) who play in drag. So, this boy learns about being a man by hanging around men dressed as women.
Since then I've bought all of Sayles novels and short story collections and seen all of his movies. One of the things I like about him is that he comes from blue collar roots and his films and stories are full of working people. That ends up making him kind of a Leftie, because he's all for worker's rights and unions... which is what MATEWAN was all about.
- Bill
Sayles is one of my favorite writers. I discovered him through PIRANHA and THE HOWLING and many other fine films that seem to be horror movies but are actually much more. I tracked down his short stories and first novel, PRIDE OF THE BIMBOS, and loved BIMBOS so much that I bought up a bunch of paperback copies decades ago and gave them to friends. The novel is about a boy with divorced parents who lives with his father for one summer and learns what it means to be a man - typical coming of age story... except the kid's father plays on an exhibition baseball team kind of like the Harlem Globetrotters (which is basketball, I know) who play in drag. So, this boy learns about being a man by hanging around men dressed as women.
Since then I've bought all of Sayles novels and short story collections and seen all of his movies. One of the things I like about him is that he comes from blue collar roots and his films and stories are full of working people. That ends up making him kind of a Leftie, because he's all for worker's rights and unions... which is what MATEWAN was all about.
- Bill
This Is The End!
Ever wonder what Bill Murray whispered at the end of LOST IN TRANSLATION? Well, NASA scientists using high tech sonic enchancing software have the answer!
- Bill
IMPORTANT UPDATE:
TODAY'S SCRIPT TIP: Man With A Plan - Your protagonist *always* needs a plan that the audience understands.
Yesterday's Dinner: Heart attack inducing Pastrami Sandwich at Togos - lotsa Pastrami!
Bicycle: No - but it was sunny and beautiful, so maybe tomorrow.
- Bill
TODAY'S SCRIPT TIP: Man With A Plan - Your protagonist *always* needs a plan that the audience understands.
Yesterday's Dinner: Heart attack inducing Pastrami Sandwich at Togos - lotsa Pastrami!
Bicycle: No - but it was sunny and beautiful, so maybe tomorrow.
Wednesday, January 27, 2010
Now That's Inspirational!
Having a bad day at the keyboard? Just got rejected... before you even pitched them the script? Did the one person you gave your script to completely hate it... at it was your mom? What you need is *inspiration*. Here is the most inspirational speech I have ever heard:
Wow... I'm inspired!
- Bill
IMPORTANT UPDATE:
TODAY'S SCRIPT TIP: Forging Characters - You have to put your character through hell.
Yesterday's Dinner: *Great* BBQ Chicken at this formica table Japanese place on Alameda in Burbank (near a Little Caesar's Pizza). Not only delicious, the presentation was way too beautiful for a neighborhood place.
Bicycle: No - Rained again.
Movies: BOOK OF ELI.
ALL SIX CLASSIC CLASSES!
Why break up a set? Get all of the Classic Classes on CD for one low price - and save on postage, too! SIX CDs packed with information! From IDEAS & CREATIVITY to WRITING INDIES to WRITING HORROR to the 2 part WRITING THRILLERS to GUERRILLA MARKETING. These classes used to sell for $15 - for a total of $120 with postage & handling. Buy the whole set and get 'em for only $70 including postage and handling (USA).
Wow... I'm inspired!
- Bill
TODAY'S SCRIPT TIP: Forging Characters - You have to put your character through hell.
Yesterday's Dinner: *Great* BBQ Chicken at this formica table Japanese place on Alameda in Burbank (near a Little Caesar's Pizza). Not only delicious, the presentation was way too beautiful for a neighborhood place.
Bicycle: No - Rained again.
Movies: BOOK OF ELI.
ALL SIX CLASSIC CLASSES!
Why break up a set? Get all of the Classic Classes on CD for one low price - and save on postage, too! SIX CDs packed with information! From IDEAS & CREATIVITY to WRITING INDIES to WRITING HORROR to the 2 part WRITING THRILLERS to GUERRILLA MARKETING. These classes used to sell for $15 - for a total of $120 with postage & handling. Buy the whole set and get 'em for only $70 including postage and handling (USA).
Monday, January 25, 2010
THE LAST OF SHEILA & THE VERDICT
Over the holidays it seemed like every time I watched a movie on DVD, the very next DVD I watched would have some similar story aspect. So this is the first of a few pairs of movies...
THE LAST OF SHEILA is one of my favorite films, and arguably the best mystery film ever made (and if you want to argue about it - head to the comments section!). Original Screenplay by Anthony Perkins (Norman Bates) and Stephen Sondheim (a bunch of Broadway musicals like WEST SIDE STORY) and directed by Herbert Ross. The plot is clever, the dialogue is clever and it’s a blast to watch. And it’s a movie industry story!
Egomaniacal and cruel big shot film producer James Coburn has a party at his mansion in the Hollywood Hills... where his drunk wife Sheila gets angry at something and staggers out of the house and down the winding road... where she is hit and killed by a hit & run driver - the police never discover who.
One year later, Coburn invites a group of Hollywood types to spend summer on his yacht in the Mediterranean playing games and soaking up the sun... all of them last saw him the night of Sheila’s death. They are...
Dyan Cannon as the big time agent who used to be fat - and this is a great performance - she *acts* fat, even though she’s hot. The role may have been written for a plump actress, but Cannon plays it as a recent Jenny Craig grad who just knows she’s going to put on all of the weight in the near future - she’s hitting on all of the men, and acting really insecure.
Raquel Welch as the hot movie star who is no longer in her 20s, but is still a star. But for how long? Welch will remind you of Julia Roberts today - at that strange age where you don’t know what’s going to happen to her career. She is recently married to...
Ian McShane as Welch’s Manager/Husband is great as a brawler, insecure, slice of beefcake. What is it about Welsh actors? Though this wasn’t the first film I ever saw him in, this was the first film I ever noticed him in.
James Mason is the once famous director who is now doing TV commercials and not liking it. Mason is always aloof but never mean - he’s also one of those actors who can deliver any line and make it sing. Here he’s floating along on some higher level than everyone else, but at the same time afraid he might not land a job directing Coburn’s next film.
Richard Benjamin is the screenwriter, who is broke and really needs a job. It’s strange to think that Benjamin was a star once - the *lead* in WESTWORLD - because he’s so unlike what we think of as a star today. When I first saw this film, I was a kid and wanted to be a screenwriter - so this was the perfect hero.
Joan Hackett, another forgotten star, plays Benjamin’s loyal wife - whose family has been in the film biz for generations and she has childhood memories of sitting on Mason’s lap. Hackett has family money and has been supporting Benjamin while he tries to sell a script. She says paying for everything isn’t a problem... but you can see on both of their faces that it really is.
So those are the guests on the cruise, and did I mention the games? On the first day of the cruise everyone is given a card with the name of a criminal on it, like “The Shoplifter” - none of the other players knows what criminal is on your card. When the yacht docks at some exotic locale, Coburn gives the group a clue, and then each of them scrambles to follow the clue to some other clue and find the Shoplifter’s Lair before everyone else. At the Shoplifter’s Lair is a clue with the identity of whoever holds The Shoplifter card. Once the person holding The Shoplifter card finds the Lair, the game is over and everyone else is a loser. There is a chart of who has won and lost each round in the yacht’s cabin, and the person who solves the most games is the ultimate winner (and may end up with a job on Coburn’s next film). If you have The Shoplifter card, you want to solve it before everyone else so that the game is over and you are the only winner of that round. A fun little game for rich Hollywood types to play, except - did I mention the cruel streak?
Each of the crimes on the cards are things a member of the group has actually been accused of. As is explained a bit later - Coburn wouldn’t give the actual shoplifter The Shoplifter card, because everyone would get angry and quit. So no one knows the cruel element of the game until enough games are played that the pattern appears. Oh, and one of the cards says Hit And Run Killer on it.
Okay, someone is murdered (or it wouldn’t be much of a movie) and the director and screenwriter partner up to solve the murder in kind of a Holmes & Watson kind of thing. The screenwriter, Benjamin, leading the investigation. The great thing about this film is that it completely plays fair - the audience can play along and solve the murder themselves. The clues are all there. In fact, the great thing about the ending when Benjamin and Mason are taking it clue-by-clue explaining who did it and how, is that they show you a clip from the movie you have already seen... and this time you notice the killer picking up the murder weapon! Before, you saw the exact same piece of film and didn’t notice it.
What is frightening is that Hollywood wants to remake this film... as a comedy! Huge mistake! The best way to remake this film - use the original screenplay and do not change a single word. Maybe hire a typist to change any anachronisms, but DO NOT HIRE A SCREENWRITER because they may change something that is already perfect.
Now, the reason why THE LAST OF SHEILA is like THE VERDICT is something that happens at the end of both movies, so now we’ll look at THE VERDICT and then I will put up the SPOILER warnings and discuss the endings.
THE VERDICT - not the Paul Newman film, the film from 1946 starring Sydney Greenstreet and Peter Lorre directed by Don Siegel (DIRTY HARRY, this was his first feature) and screenplay by Peter Milne. Okay, the reason why I bought this movie from Warner Bros Archive is that Siegel is one of my favorite directors and I haven’t seen the film in decades, and even then it was on the late-late show and I was half asleep. But the film holds up and is fun...
Greenstreet (from CASABLANCA) is a prosecutor with a conscience in Victorian England who sentences a man to death... and after they have hanged him some evidence surfaces that he was innocent. The government needs a scapegoat, so Greenstreet is fired in shame. Oh, and the evidence surfaced because the man who takes his job as prosecutor, George Coulouris (usually playing the villain - hey, and he’s the villain, here, too!) will do anything to get his job. Now Greenstreet is retired, hanging out with his artist friend Peter Lorre (also CASABLANCA) and working on his memoirs. After a party at Greenstreet’s house, one of the guests is found murdered the next morning and Coulouris leads the investigation. Lots of good suspects - the victim had all kinds of enemies, even Greenstreet himself has a motive of sorts... and Lorre was near the victim’s flat the night of rthe killing. But Coulouris is an idiot and can’t seem to follow all of the clues or suspects... so Greenstreet and Lorre team up to solve the case. If they find the killer before Coulouris, Greenstreet gets to make his replacement look like an idiot.
The film is fun, with these two guys bantering and bickering along the way, and Lorre getting to play a lady’s man who hooks up with a showgirl who may or may not be a suspect. This was one of those throw-away B movie the studios used to make, and I’ll bet no one involved would have ever thought in their wildest dreams that anyone would be talking about it today... or even think about it after 1946. But the film has a breezy Sherlock Holmes feel to it, and one hell of an ending...
SPOILERS SPOILERS SPOILERS SPOILERS
You know, the problem with discussing the ending of a mystery film is you end up talking about who the killer is, and that ruins the whole damned film! Though THE VERDICT is a trifle that only some crazed fan like me would ever want to watch, LAST OF SHEILA is a classic that may be remade, so you might want to watch that without know who the killer is. So - stop reading now and watch it.
SPOILERS SPOILERS SPOILERS SPOILERS
Okay, I’m going to give away who the killers are in both films. You have been warned.
SPOILERS SPOILERS SPOILERS SPOILERS
One of those film school/new screenwriter cliches along with “it was all a dream” is “the cop chasing the killer... who discovers he’s the killer” - and I frequently get that question: can the hero also be the villain? Aside from being confusing as all heck, what happens in those scenes where the hero and villain fight each other? Does the guy just punch himself? This is one of those ideas that new writers think is clever, but is almost impossible to make work on film. Sure, there’s FIGHT CLUB, but you’ll note that the character is split in two, so we have both Tyler Durden *and* Ed Norton’s character so that they can physically fight each other and argue and have dramatic scenes together... up until that twist end. And if the hero is the villain and he knows it - one side of his nature battling with the other side - the conflict ends up being entirely internal, and we can’t see it... unless we also split it as in JEKYLL AND HYDE. No matter what, we need to find some way to make the hero and the villain, the protagonist and antagonist, into two different people who can battle it out on screen (where we can see the battle).
This has nothing to do with “bad guy leads” - which is perfectly acceptable. Lots of movies have protagonists who are not nice people at all... like SCARFACE and those GODFATHER movies and my favorite film POINT BLANK. You can write a script about people who break the law or kill people or whatever. Not a problem.
But both THE VERDICT and LAST OF SHEILA have a workable version of the “cop chasing the killer... and the twist end is the cop is the killer”. Here’s how they work, in the event you want to do something like this...
The big problem with this sort of twist is that the audience identifies with the protagonist - they become the protagonist for the film - so when the protagonist reveals that they are not at all who you thought they were, the audience feels betrayed and hates your film. How both films get around this is by having a pair of lead characters - that Holmes and Watson thing - so that when one is revealed as being the bad guy, we are still able to identify with the other one... and the betrayal we feel is the same betrayal that other character feels, which intensifies our identification with them. In both cases it’s the genius Holmes-like character who is revealed to be the killer and the Watson-like character (who is easier for us to identify with) who figures it out at the end.
In LAST OF SHEILA, Richard Benjamin’s screenwriter is the Holmes-like character who figures it all out with the help of James Mason’s director... But Mason has one problem with Benjamin’s explanation and is playing around with forensic evidence and can’t get one piece to match... and realizes that the only other way it adds up is if Benjamin is the killer. So we have *partner* detectives for the entire film, and at the end the story passes the lead from the partners to *Mason*, so that we are identifying with him when it’s revealed that Benjamin is the killer.
In THE VERDICT, Sydney Greenstreet is the Holmes-like character who solves the crime with the help of Peter Lorre - who oddly enough is our main identification character. In one scene, we stick with Lorre as he pokes around for clues while Greenstreet is off screen. Again, they are partners until the end, where the audience splits off to follow Lorre as he finds those clues that lead to Greenstreet... and reveals him as the killer. So neither film betrays the audience, because they use partners.
The other thing both films have is a strong antagonist (who is not the killer). That gives the team someone to fight against, so that we can have physical struggle and dramatic scenes along the way. Conflict we can see. In LAST OF SHEILA, Coburn’s character is a complete jerk - and his cruelty lingers in scenes where he’s not on the screen. Because his cruel game is what leads to the murder, he is a great antagonist before the murder... and after. In THE VERDICT, Coulouris is such a back-stabbing evil politico, you *want* the partners to find the killer just to show him up. Every time they find a clue, Coulouris is there to battle them and threaten to jail them and throw his weight around. Because neither Lorre nor Mason can have a conflict with the actual killer during the story, we need an adversary to battle... and that means some antagonist who is not the killer. Coburn and Coulouris fit this perfectly. They are the antagonist until the very end of the movie where the killers are revealed.
So the three keys to “detective is the killer” plots are:
1) Partners, with the Watson character as our identification and the Holmes character as the killer.
2) A strong antagonist who is not the killer, but who the team can tangle with throughout the story giving us physical and dramatic conflict.
3) Killer revealed at the very end, after the baton has been passed to the Watson character.
Then, all you need is a story as clever as THE LAST OF SHEILA where the audience can play along and follow the clues...
- Bill
IMPORTANT UPDATE:
TODAY'S SCRIPT TIP: Watering Your Plants - and The Rule Of Three.
Yesterday's Dinner: Leftover lunch - Chicken Caesar Salad from my biz lunch at Sherman Oaks Galleria.
Pages: This blog entry and some poking around on one of the assignments.
THE LAST OF SHEILA is one of my favorite films, and arguably the best mystery film ever made (and if you want to argue about it - head to the comments section!). Original Screenplay by Anthony Perkins (Norman Bates) and Stephen Sondheim (a bunch of Broadway musicals like WEST SIDE STORY) and directed by Herbert Ross. The plot is clever, the dialogue is clever and it’s a blast to watch. And it’s a movie industry story!
Egomaniacal and cruel big shot film producer James Coburn has a party at his mansion in the Hollywood Hills... where his drunk wife Sheila gets angry at something and staggers out of the house and down the winding road... where she is hit and killed by a hit & run driver - the police never discover who.
One year later, Coburn invites a group of Hollywood types to spend summer on his yacht in the Mediterranean playing games and soaking up the sun... all of them last saw him the night of Sheila’s death. They are...
Dyan Cannon as the big time agent who used to be fat - and this is a great performance - she *acts* fat, even though she’s hot. The role may have been written for a plump actress, but Cannon plays it as a recent Jenny Craig grad who just knows she’s going to put on all of the weight in the near future - she’s hitting on all of the men, and acting really insecure.
Raquel Welch as the hot movie star who is no longer in her 20s, but is still a star. But for how long? Welch will remind you of Julia Roberts today - at that strange age where you don’t know what’s going to happen to her career. She is recently married to...
Ian McShane as Welch’s Manager/Husband is great as a brawler, insecure, slice of beefcake. What is it about Welsh actors? Though this wasn’t the first film I ever saw him in, this was the first film I ever noticed him in.
James Mason is the once famous director who is now doing TV commercials and not liking it. Mason is always aloof but never mean - he’s also one of those actors who can deliver any line and make it sing. Here he’s floating along on some higher level than everyone else, but at the same time afraid he might not land a job directing Coburn’s next film.
Richard Benjamin is the screenwriter, who is broke and really needs a job. It’s strange to think that Benjamin was a star once - the *lead* in WESTWORLD - because he’s so unlike what we think of as a star today. When I first saw this film, I was a kid and wanted to be a screenwriter - so this was the perfect hero.
Joan Hackett, another forgotten star, plays Benjamin’s loyal wife - whose family has been in the film biz for generations and she has childhood memories of sitting on Mason’s lap. Hackett has family money and has been supporting Benjamin while he tries to sell a script. She says paying for everything isn’t a problem... but you can see on both of their faces that it really is.
So those are the guests on the cruise, and did I mention the games? On the first day of the cruise everyone is given a card with the name of a criminal on it, like “The Shoplifter” - none of the other players knows what criminal is on your card. When the yacht docks at some exotic locale, Coburn gives the group a clue, and then each of them scrambles to follow the clue to some other clue and find the Shoplifter’s Lair before everyone else. At the Shoplifter’s Lair is a clue with the identity of whoever holds The Shoplifter card. Once the person holding The Shoplifter card finds the Lair, the game is over and everyone else is a loser. There is a chart of who has won and lost each round in the yacht’s cabin, and the person who solves the most games is the ultimate winner (and may end up with a job on Coburn’s next film). If you have The Shoplifter card, you want to solve it before everyone else so that the game is over and you are the only winner of that round. A fun little game for rich Hollywood types to play, except - did I mention the cruel streak?
Each of the crimes on the cards are things a member of the group has actually been accused of. As is explained a bit later - Coburn wouldn’t give the actual shoplifter The Shoplifter card, because everyone would get angry and quit. So no one knows the cruel element of the game until enough games are played that the pattern appears. Oh, and one of the cards says Hit And Run Killer on it.
Okay, someone is murdered (or it wouldn’t be much of a movie) and the director and screenwriter partner up to solve the murder in kind of a Holmes & Watson kind of thing. The screenwriter, Benjamin, leading the investigation. The great thing about this film is that it completely plays fair - the audience can play along and solve the murder themselves. The clues are all there. In fact, the great thing about the ending when Benjamin and Mason are taking it clue-by-clue explaining who did it and how, is that they show you a clip from the movie you have already seen... and this time you notice the killer picking up the murder weapon! Before, you saw the exact same piece of film and didn’t notice it.
What is frightening is that Hollywood wants to remake this film... as a comedy! Huge mistake! The best way to remake this film - use the original screenplay and do not change a single word. Maybe hire a typist to change any anachronisms, but DO NOT HIRE A SCREENWRITER because they may change something that is already perfect.
Now, the reason why THE LAST OF SHEILA is like THE VERDICT is something that happens at the end of both movies, so now we’ll look at THE VERDICT and then I will put up the SPOILER warnings and discuss the endings.
THE VERDICT - not the Paul Newman film, the film from 1946 starring Sydney Greenstreet and Peter Lorre directed by Don Siegel (DIRTY HARRY, this was his first feature) and screenplay by Peter Milne. Okay, the reason why I bought this movie from Warner Bros Archive is that Siegel is one of my favorite directors and I haven’t seen the film in decades, and even then it was on the late-late show and I was half asleep. But the film holds up and is fun...
Greenstreet (from CASABLANCA) is a prosecutor with a conscience in Victorian England who sentences a man to death... and after they have hanged him some evidence surfaces that he was innocent. The government needs a scapegoat, so Greenstreet is fired in shame. Oh, and the evidence surfaced because the man who takes his job as prosecutor, George Coulouris (usually playing the villain - hey, and he’s the villain, here, too!) will do anything to get his job. Now Greenstreet is retired, hanging out with his artist friend Peter Lorre (also CASABLANCA) and working on his memoirs. After a party at Greenstreet’s house, one of the guests is found murdered the next morning and Coulouris leads the investigation. Lots of good suspects - the victim had all kinds of enemies, even Greenstreet himself has a motive of sorts... and Lorre was near the victim’s flat the night of rthe killing. But Coulouris is an idiot and can’t seem to follow all of the clues or suspects... so Greenstreet and Lorre team up to solve the case. If they find the killer before Coulouris, Greenstreet gets to make his replacement look like an idiot.
The film is fun, with these two guys bantering and bickering along the way, and Lorre getting to play a lady’s man who hooks up with a showgirl who may or may not be a suspect. This was one of those throw-away B movie the studios used to make, and I’ll bet no one involved would have ever thought in their wildest dreams that anyone would be talking about it today... or even think about it after 1946. But the film has a breezy Sherlock Holmes feel to it, and one hell of an ending...
SPOILERS SPOILERS SPOILERS SPOILERS
You know, the problem with discussing the ending of a mystery film is you end up talking about who the killer is, and that ruins the whole damned film! Though THE VERDICT is a trifle that only some crazed fan like me would ever want to watch, LAST OF SHEILA is a classic that may be remade, so you might want to watch that without know who the killer is. So - stop reading now and watch it.
SPOILERS SPOILERS SPOILERS SPOILERS
Okay, I’m going to give away who the killers are in both films. You have been warned.
SPOILERS SPOILERS SPOILERS SPOILERS
One of those film school/new screenwriter cliches along with “it was all a dream” is “the cop chasing the killer... who discovers he’s the killer” - and I frequently get that question: can the hero also be the villain? Aside from being confusing as all heck, what happens in those scenes where the hero and villain fight each other? Does the guy just punch himself? This is one of those ideas that new writers think is clever, but is almost impossible to make work on film. Sure, there’s FIGHT CLUB, but you’ll note that the character is split in two, so we have both Tyler Durden *and* Ed Norton’s character so that they can physically fight each other and argue and have dramatic scenes together... up until that twist end. And if the hero is the villain and he knows it - one side of his nature battling with the other side - the conflict ends up being entirely internal, and we can’t see it... unless we also split it as in JEKYLL AND HYDE. No matter what, we need to find some way to make the hero and the villain, the protagonist and antagonist, into two different people who can battle it out on screen (where we can see the battle).
This has nothing to do with “bad guy leads” - which is perfectly acceptable. Lots of movies have protagonists who are not nice people at all... like SCARFACE and those GODFATHER movies and my favorite film POINT BLANK. You can write a script about people who break the law or kill people or whatever. Not a problem.
But both THE VERDICT and LAST OF SHEILA have a workable version of the “cop chasing the killer... and the twist end is the cop is the killer”. Here’s how they work, in the event you want to do something like this...
The big problem with this sort of twist is that the audience identifies with the protagonist - they become the protagonist for the film - so when the protagonist reveals that they are not at all who you thought they were, the audience feels betrayed and hates your film. How both films get around this is by having a pair of lead characters - that Holmes and Watson thing - so that when one is revealed as being the bad guy, we are still able to identify with the other one... and the betrayal we feel is the same betrayal that other character feels, which intensifies our identification with them. In both cases it’s the genius Holmes-like character who is revealed to be the killer and the Watson-like character (who is easier for us to identify with) who figures it out at the end.
In LAST OF SHEILA, Richard Benjamin’s screenwriter is the Holmes-like character who figures it all out with the help of James Mason’s director... But Mason has one problem with Benjamin’s explanation and is playing around with forensic evidence and can’t get one piece to match... and realizes that the only other way it adds up is if Benjamin is the killer. So we have *partner* detectives for the entire film, and at the end the story passes the lead from the partners to *Mason*, so that we are identifying with him when it’s revealed that Benjamin is the killer.
In THE VERDICT, Sydney Greenstreet is the Holmes-like character who solves the crime with the help of Peter Lorre - who oddly enough is our main identification character. In one scene, we stick with Lorre as he pokes around for clues while Greenstreet is off screen. Again, they are partners until the end, where the audience splits off to follow Lorre as he finds those clues that lead to Greenstreet... and reveals him as the killer. So neither film betrays the audience, because they use partners.
The other thing both films have is a strong antagonist (who is not the killer). That gives the team someone to fight against, so that we can have physical struggle and dramatic scenes along the way. Conflict we can see. In LAST OF SHEILA, Coburn’s character is a complete jerk - and his cruelty lingers in scenes where he’s not on the screen. Because his cruel game is what leads to the murder, he is a great antagonist before the murder... and after. In THE VERDICT, Coulouris is such a back-stabbing evil politico, you *want* the partners to find the killer just to show him up. Every time they find a clue, Coulouris is there to battle them and threaten to jail them and throw his weight around. Because neither Lorre nor Mason can have a conflict with the actual killer during the story, we need an adversary to battle... and that means some antagonist who is not the killer. Coburn and Coulouris fit this perfectly. They are the antagonist until the very end of the movie where the killers are revealed.
So the three keys to “detective is the killer” plots are:
1) Partners, with the Watson character as our identification and the Holmes character as the killer.
2) A strong antagonist who is not the killer, but who the team can tangle with throughout the story giving us physical and dramatic conflict.
3) Killer revealed at the very end, after the baton has been passed to the Watson character.
Then, all you need is a story as clever as THE LAST OF SHEILA where the audience can play along and follow the clues...
- Bill
TODAY'S SCRIPT TIP: Watering Your Plants - and The Rule Of Three.
Yesterday's Dinner: Leftover lunch - Chicken Caesar Salad from my biz lunch at Sherman Oaks Galleria.
Pages: This blog entry and some poking around on one of the assignments.
Friday, January 22, 2010
Conan's Expensive Jokes
Wednesday night... the return of the Masturbating Bear! Plus Conan spends as much of NBC's money as possible in his final week on the air...
And last night...
- Bill
IMPORTANT UPDATE:
TODAY'S SCRIPT TIP: Likeable Leads? - Are they required? And the mess of a movie that was SWING VOTE.
Yesterday's Dinner: Soylent Green.
Bicycle: Are you kidding? It's raining buckets!
ALL SIX CLASSIC CLASSES!
Why break up a set? Get all of the Classic Classes on CD for one low price - and save on postage, too! SIX CDs packed with information! From IDEAS & CREATIVITY to WRITING INDIES to WRITING HORROR to the 2 part WRITING THRILLERS to GUERRILLA MARKETING. These classes used to sell for $15 - for a total of $120 with postage & handling. Buy the whole set and get 'em for only $70 including postage and handling (USA).
And last night...
- Bill
TODAY'S SCRIPT TIP: Likeable Leads? - Are they required? And the mess of a movie that was SWING VOTE.
Yesterday's Dinner: Soylent Green.
Bicycle: Are you kidding? It's raining buckets!
ALL SIX CLASSIC CLASSES!
Why break up a set? Get all of the Classic Classes on CD for one low price - and save on postage, too! SIX CDs packed with information! From IDEAS & CREATIVITY to WRITING INDIES to WRITING HORROR to the 2 part WRITING THRILLERS to GUERRILLA MARKETING. These classes used to sell for $15 - for a total of $120 with postage & handling. Buy the whole set and get 'em for only $70 including postage and handling (USA).
Thursday, January 21, 2010
Wesley Strick - True Believer
Robert Downey jr is SHERLOCK HOLMES on screen right now, but years ago he co-starred in one of my favorite films you may have never heard of, TRUE BELIEVER. James Woods was the lead character, a larger than life lawyer who mostly defended drug dealers and almost never lost a case. Of course, he was an expert on legal technicalities. He gets a new law clerk (Downey) and a new case - an innocent kid accused of murder. Seems that it's more difficult to prove an innocent man is innocent than a guilty man.
I often use one of the lines from the movie to explain why that crap you see on screen is usually not the brilliance from the screenplay - their only witness is a paranoid mental patient who believes the telephone company killed JFK and says, "I suppose you don't know the phone company killed Kennedy because he was trying to b-break it up -- and they'll never let that happen. They control everything: what you say in the mouthpiece is never exactly what comes out the other end."
What you write in the script is never exactly what shows up on screen.
Here is an old interview with the great Wesley Strick on writing the screenplay for TRUE BELIEVER:
And, for a film you may never have heard of, it spun off into a TV show you also probably never heard of. Hits from the past, forgotten today.
- Bill
IMPORTANT UPDATE:
TODAY'S SCRIPT TIP: Why Write Fight Scenes? - and the good MATRIX movie.
Yesterday's Dinner: Baja Fresh - Mahi Mahi tacos (grilled), black beans, rice.
Movies: 44 CHEST - review to come.
I often use one of the lines from the movie to explain why that crap you see on screen is usually not the brilliance from the screenplay - their only witness is a paranoid mental patient who believes the telephone company killed JFK and says, "I suppose you don't know the phone company killed Kennedy because he was trying to b-break it up -- and they'll never let that happen. They control everything: what you say in the mouthpiece is never exactly what comes out the other end."
What you write in the script is never exactly what shows up on screen.
Here is an old interview with the great Wesley Strick on writing the screenplay for TRUE BELIEVER:
And, for a film you may never have heard of, it spun off into a TV show you also probably never heard of. Hits from the past, forgotten today.
- Bill
TODAY'S SCRIPT TIP: Why Write Fight Scenes? - and the good MATRIX movie.
Yesterday's Dinner: Baja Fresh - Mahi Mahi tacos (grilled), black beans, rice.
Movies: 44 CHEST - review to come.
Wednesday, January 20, 2010
Team Conan
I was a big fan of Conan's 12:30 show - his skits were hysterical. Sure, everyone wets themselves when Triumph crashes some party somewhere and starts asking all of the questions that no one should ask... but the Masturbating Bear and Pimpbot and The Year 2000 and that evil puppy and Abe Vigoda and Mr T and all of those other crazy skits were gold. When he took over the Tonight Show, the powers at NBC made him give up the skits they thought were too crass for 11:30... and I think the show has suffered because of it.
Now it seems Conan is getting the boot so that Jay can have the Tonight Show back... and here's what Jay had to say about that in 2004... when he announced his retirement:
The real tragedy of this whole thing - NBC has decided that the Masturbating Bear is their property (they did the same thing with Letterman when he left) and none of the skits created by Conan's writers for Conan's show can ever be used again by Conan. See, all of that stuff was "work for hire". Now, the pisser is that NBC has no plans to ever use any of that stuff - there is no 10pm Masturbating Bear Show in the works to replace Leno - so we will never see those skits again. They go into that RAIDERS OF THE LOST ARK storage facility... warehoused forever.
Those skits were written by TV writers... just as some script for a movie you might write as "work for hire" that you put your heart and soul into... but may get shelved forever. That's a pisser. Especially a pisser if you have worked hard on a script that's a work for hire, and the producer scraps your version of the story for some other version by some other writer that sucks. The sucks version gets made and your good version will never be seen by anyone. Studios sometimes have several different writers working on different versions of the same script, and then they pick the one they like and shelve the others. Frustrating. Too bad we can't at least keep our work and try to find another producer or studio... but a work for hire is a work for hire (even if it began with your pitch).
We will never see the Masturbating Bear again.
I'm going to miss him.
- Bill
IMPORTANT UPDATE:
TODAY'S SCRIPT TIP: Edgy Scripts - and four guys in two canoes.
Yesterday's Dinner: Panda Express.
Now it seems Conan is getting the boot so that Jay can have the Tonight Show back... and here's what Jay had to say about that in 2004... when he announced his retirement:
Jay's 2004 Announcement - watch more funny videos
The real tragedy of this whole thing - NBC has decided that the Masturbating Bear is their property (they did the same thing with Letterman when he left) and none of the skits created by Conan's writers for Conan's show can ever be used again by Conan. See, all of that stuff was "work for hire". Now, the pisser is that NBC has no plans to ever use any of that stuff - there is no 10pm Masturbating Bear Show in the works to replace Leno - so we will never see those skits again. They go into that RAIDERS OF THE LOST ARK storage facility... warehoused forever.
Those skits were written by TV writers... just as some script for a movie you might write as "work for hire" that you put your heart and soul into... but may get shelved forever. That's a pisser. Especially a pisser if you have worked hard on a script that's a work for hire, and the producer scraps your version of the story for some other version by some other writer that sucks. The sucks version gets made and your good version will never be seen by anyone. Studios sometimes have several different writers working on different versions of the same script, and then they pick the one they like and shelve the others. Frustrating. Too bad we can't at least keep our work and try to find another producer or studio... but a work for hire is a work for hire (even if it began with your pitch).
We will never see the Masturbating Bear again.
I'm going to miss him.
- Bill
TODAY'S SCRIPT TIP: Edgy Scripts - and four guys in two canoes.
Yesterday's Dinner: Panda Express.
Tuesday, January 19, 2010
That's Exploitation!
The last night I was in Northern California on my holiday visit, I had dinner and drinks and saw BITCH SLAP with my two oldest friends, Van and John. That almost didn’t happen. When I arrived in town those were the first two people I called - we often do New Year’s Eve together, and always see a bunch of holiday release films together and talk about those people we know who are no longer around and the great times we had when we were in our 20s... long ago. Got right through to John and we saw a bunch of movies (reviews are coming), but Van went right to voice mail... and his voice mail was filled. No way to leave a message. This concerned me a little, but I’d gotten a recent e-mail from Van so I knew he was alive and well... just hard to get in contact with, I guess.
Van is a character. The great thing about old friends is that you know what all of their issues are, have gotten mad at them a thousand times, and are now over it. Van is famous for being unreliable. Not in some serious way, he just gets side tracked sometimes. Also, he’s a dreamer... which is great when you are 20, kind of a problem when you are older. But no one on earth has a bigger heart, and when my life went to hell after NINJA BUSTERS fizzled and Wendy split, he gave me a job laying carpet and pointed out that there were other women in the world (mostly by example - you could drop Van into a Lesbian Convention and he’d convert some of them). But I can not count the number of times he’s been a no-show or ambled in hours late. Used to make me angry, now I just accept it. So, when I couldn’t get through to him I just figured it was the usual Van thing.
I kept calling and getting that full voice mail the whole time I was in the Bay Area, and John tried to call him with the same results. Finally I got an e-mail from him - hey, how come I hadn’t called him? All of this ended up being *my fault* - he had changed cell phone carrier, had a new number, and even *gave me his new number*. But I kept calling the old one, because I’m an idiot and it was on my cell phone. John was doing the same thing. Once I called the new number he had given me months before, he answered on the second ring. New Years Eve had passed and I was about to return home...
John and I had seen AVATAR in 3D without Van...
But BITCH SLAP was opening on Friday night in limited release! The perfect film for 3 guys who enjoy upper torso bundles of pleasure! I figured Friday might be crowded, and John was busy Saturday, so maybe Sunday? Sunday was a great day because the cast and writer would be in San Francisco that night! Except Van already had tickets for AVATAR on Sunday... so we last minute adjusted to Monday night. The next morning I would return to Los Angeles.
Van knows every single great hole-in-the-wall restaurant and bar in the Bay Area. When we were laying carpet, no matter what city the job was in, he knew the best place to get breakfast, lunch, and dinner. Van suggested we meet at this restaurant/bar called The Belltower which was a couple of blocks from the cinema. When I arrived, I recognized the place - we’d had breakfast there once and it was great. John arrived and we had a beer, and then Van showed. We had a great dinner, then went to the cinema...
The plot? Three hot chicks in the desert.
Directed by Rick Jacobson, who directed a couple of my movies and is a great guy - I may not agree with all of his artistic choices, but he *has* artistic choices and actually would listen to whatever I had to say. He wasn’t an asshole. After making a bunch of low budget films he moved to TV and directed a bunch of TV shows including HERCULES and XENA and now he’s a TV director.
He and one of the writers on XENA decided to bankroll their own film, made on the cheap, and the result is BITCH SLAP. The film uses all kinds of low budget tricks - most of the story takes place in a patch of desert in the middle of nowhere with a beat up old trailer and a windmill. Easy location to shoot at, and when things blow up and catch fire (which they do as the story goes on) probably easy to get permits and a fire marshal - not a burnable tree or scrub for miles in any direction.
The cast is also small: mostly the three women: Hel (Erin Cummings) who is all-business and dresses like a business woman. Camaro (America Olivo) who is the tough gal, just released from prison, who wears jeans and a tied off shirt. Trixie (Julia Voth) the stripper who appears to be all body and no brains, who is wearing a gold dress. The plot has them drive their vintage Thunderbird to this no-man’s land to find a buried treasure, and flashbacks fill in the details and provide plot twists. There are also two men who are part of the main cast, Gage (Michael Hurst) a gangster who has been skimming from legendary crime boss Pinky for years - and the buried treasure is that loot. He’s handcuffed in the trunk of the Thunderbird. And Deputy Fuchs (Ron Melendez) a cop who thinks the three gals might be in trouble and stops to help... and also becomes their prisoner - chained up in that old trailer. Five main characters, one main location, six breasts.
In a moment I’ll talk about some of the other money saving tricks they used - I’ll bet the budget was lower than you might guess - but first let’s talk about...
The review in the Los Angeles Times complained that BITCH SLAP was an exploitation film send up without the send up... and this made me scratch my head, because I never got the memo that it was a send up, and when you read the poster or publicity stuff (they had a great gimmick to make you see it more than once - collectable postcards for each of the characters in the film, and they gave away a different one every night) there was nothing about this being a send up... it was pretty much advertized as a fun exploitation film that *knows* it’s an exploitation film. Which makes it just an exploitation film.
Back in the drive in days, there were lots of exploitation films - made cheap and filled with things that would attract and audience. Lowest common denominator stuff like fast cars and topless women and machine guns. A studio film might have all of those things in a pretty story - and those things serviced the story. An exploitation film was *about* the exploitation stuff, with a flimsy story connecting the elements. Now, some exploitation films had *great* stories connecting the elements, and now those films are considered art. Tod Browning’s FREAKS is a great film, but where would it be without the promise of seeing a bunch of side show freaks? And the suggestion of side show freaks having sex with a hot blonde woman? Hey - I gotta see that!
And the drive in exploitation films offered the same sort of forbidden thrills. Hey, what really goes on in a women’s prison where they evil lesbian warden enjoys whipping the hot naked prisoners? Hey - I gotta see that!
One of the things I hate in studio films, I love in exploitation films: “kitchen sinking”. So many of those A.I.P. drive in films seemed like a grab bag of cool stuff threaded together into a film. So you might have custom hot rods and acrobats and some rock & roll band and a bikini beach party and dogs that do tricks and martial arts and a monster... all in the same movie! Hey - I gotta see that!
I’ve seen studio films that try to throw in a little bit of everything and end up with nothing, and the reason why is that the film is supposed to be about the story... and just ends up being about a little bit of everything. A mainstream studio film is all about the story, and even though it may have fast cars and hot women and a machine gun, it’s not ever about those things. Those things are elements of the story, not the story itself. The exploitation is in the background not the foreground.
Someone on a messageboard a couple of months ago was lamenting the 50s and 60s when Americans went to see foreign films... and even though that was before my time sitting in a cinema seat, I can tell you from conversations with those older than I am - they went to foreign films to see boobies. American films had no nudity at all - we still had censorship under the old system. But foreign films managed to sneak in nudity and the censors didn’t seem to care, maybe because the films were “cultural” and had subtitles and not everyone was going to flock to see them. Except a surprising number of normal middle class Americans saw a bunch of foreign films... often featuring nudity or lingerie or lots-a-cleavage. Thank you, Sophia Loren! Hey - I gotta see that!
Foreign films ended up being exploitation films! Just, with culture!
And that is the problem with the poor exploitation film - it has no culture. It is honest about its intentions. You may see a foreign film for culture... um, cleavage culture... but you see an exploitation film for the exploitation. We always complain that people these days go to the movies for the explosions and CGI - the exploitation elements. And it’s funny that I will hate TRANSFORMERS and then have an excited conversation with another film fan about that amazing street shoot out in HEAT. Okay, why isn’t HEAT an exploitation film? Why is a long shoot out in some B movie just stupid and a similar scene in HEAT complete genius? Well, it’s that HEAT isn’t just that shoot out (and the other great action scenes). But, isn’t there room in cinema for a film that *is* just about the shoot outs? A film that isn’t going to try and pass itself off as culture, and just be its sleazy self? A film that knows that one of the main reasons why you go to see HEAT or some big budget Hollywood movies is the exploitation elements? “You’ll believe a man can fly.” “From the moment they met it was murder.” Movies are all about sex and violence and exploitables... Heck, how many pages would be left in The Bible if we cut out all of the sex and violence?
And another issue with exploitation is - why is some low budget genre flick that is aiming for being a just fun time, not good enough for a theatrical release in art house cinemas in select cities, and have critics for the L.A. Times show up and review the film; but a film trying to be “so bad it’s good” gets shown and reviewed? Why does society say it’s okay to make fun of exploitation, but not just accept a movie that may not have stars but does have plenty of stuff that blows up... unless there is a star in it or a massive budget? Why is *studio exploitation* taken more seriously than low budget exploitation? If John Sayles’ PIRANHA was released today, would Variety even show up to review it... let alone call it the best film ever made about the Viet Nam War? If DEATH RACE 2000 were released today, would anyone take it seriously? Or would it just be dismissed and sent to video and never noticed or reviewed? We used to have genre distribs like Canon and New World that made low budget action films and got them into cinemas and reviewed and on the mainstream radar, so that those stars and directors and writers could cross over to studio films. Where do you think directors like Jonathan Demme and writers like John Sayles came from? Does the Los Angeles Times review direct to video films? Nope... Rick Jacobson may have directed a stack of movies, but this is probably his first film that has ever been reviewed in print. Because it’s trying to be bad!
So, we come to BITCH SLAP which is honest about its intentions - it just wants to be a Russ Meyer movie. It doesn’t want to be a *send up* of a 1960s exploitation movie, it wants to *be* a 1960s exploitation movie. Hey, what’s wrong with that? Why can’t the Los Angeles Times critic just judge it as an exploitation movie? When I saw the trailer, I said to myself, “Hey - I gotta see that!”
The film is what it is - good cheap exploitation. And though there’s lots of blood squibs, the level of violence is pretty tame for all of the machinegun fire. People get shot a zillion times and have little red dots on their clothes. And the sex? This film is one big tease! I don’t remember any nudity, though I do remember LOTS of cleavage and some simulated sex on a TV soap opera level. It just *seems* raw and nasty.
I mentioned the flashbacks, and they’re lots of fun. The movie opens with Trixie in her pretty party dress crawling through the burning wreckage of the trailer wondering how she came to be here, and we get a title card that says FOUR HOURS EARLIER and get a snippet of background, and then we go back to the wreckage for a minute or two of present day before we get a title card that says FOUR HOURS AND 8 MINUTES EARLIER... and that sets the tone for the flashbacks - they are frequent and often a little silly. I kept waiting for TWENTY YEARS EARLIER where the three girls are in the same crib awaiting diaper changes. This ends up being a great running gag that never seems to wear out its welcome.
The other thing is the split screen, which is over done on purpose... though not nearly as overdone as in the last OSS-117 movie. The thing I love and hate about Rick (director) is that he’s creative - in NIGHT HUNTER he did that shaky-cam thing in all of the action scenes, which I absolutely hated... even though Paul Greengrass swiped that technique a decade later for the second BOURNE movie. I loved what he did in BLACK THUNDER, though - he mounted the camera on a rig that allowed it to turn 360' (upside down) and slid the camera back and forth in the plane cockpit shots so that you could feel the plane banking and looping and doing all of the amazing dogfight stunts. That was genius! If the plane spun upside down in the dogfight, so did the cockpit shot of the pilot (our hero). So the split screen stuff in BITCH SLAP is cool 24-style stuff. It worked really well.
The film has some great confined cameos - characters whose roles are spread throughout the film but were probably shot out in a single day - by Kevin Sorbo and Lucy Lawless (that Hercules/Xena connection)... with a twist! Lucy plays Mother Superior in a funny flashback that reveals that one of the gals used to be a nun in a convent who was *very popular* with the other nuns... and Sorbo plays the head of a spy organization in a bunch of little scenes probably shot in a single day, because one of the gals is revealed to be a top secret undercover female version of James Bond.
Here’s the confined cameo twist - Sorbo isn’t just at one location, he’s all over the place... thanks to green screen. The majority of the flashbacks are green screen shots. Now, this is a low budget movie that can not afford great special effects, and all of the green screen shots have those outlines that make them look like green screen... except thanks to SIN CITY and all of those stylized comic book films, we no longer need perfect looking green screen and effects as long as we can used a stylized cartoony background. And that’s just what BITCH SLAP does - the flashbacks are not real looking at all, they look like SIN CITY, so any imperfection in green screen or even location plate disappears. A scene in Russia where Sorbo meets with spy-gal Hel at a train station has a stylized cartoon look that adds to the production value instead of subtracts from it. The movie has these great surreal flashbacks that seem arty.
One of the other tricks the film uses is the old doorway in the ground gag - from A BOY AND HIS DOG. When they finally find the treasure, it’s not just some trunk full of cash - it’s a vault that opens into the earth, and they climb down a ladder to some gangster version of that huge warehouse from the end of RAIDERS OF THE LOST ARK filled with just about anything someone could steal... including nukes and heavy artillery and all kinds of loot.
The film is good sleazy fun. I laughed several times. The problem with making a “So Bad It’s Good” movie is that often it just turns out bad. The key to is to keep it funny, so that we know you aren’t taking this seriously. BITCH SLAP has enough gags to keep us laughing, and is so over the top in many of its scenes that you know they aren’t taking this seriously. Exaggeration is funny - and this film gets laughs from seeing how complicated it can make its Mexican Standoffs, and how crass it can make its simulated sex scenes. But some of the dialogue is raw instead of clever, and the characters are so paper thin there’s no way to mine anything but surface gags from them (Trixie pole dancing with a shovel while they are supposed to be digging is her best character-related gag). I wish it had been more clever, but maybe I’m the only one in the audience who cared about that? The plot and much of the action is contrived to the point of “Oh, come on!” - often for no reason at all the girls will get into a fight - maybe that was supposed to be a gag that didn’t work so it just seemed like a bad movie thing. I know it seems silly to point out that they needed a better excuse for their exploitation scenes, but that would have made me think “Bad on purpose” for those contrived scenes instead of “Just bad”. And the end of the film is just bad no matter how you slice it - there is a twist that is so contrived and sledge-hammered in that I walked away liking the film less. And both of my friends jumped on the end, too - so it wasn’t just picky Bill. You have to play fair with plot twists, folks! Hey, I saw the color of her underwear and figured out the twist - but the character doesn’t seem to know about their own double cross in the scenes where they are pulling the double cross! Again, this is one of those things where the film isn’t as clever as it needs to be. But those story issues aside - a lot of fun for 90 minutes!
- Bill
IMPORTANT UPDATE:
TODAY'S SCRIPT TIP: Pigeon Holing Yourself - and the equally kinky practice of Self Branding.
Yesterday's Dinner: Chicken Caesar Salad at Fuddruckers.
ALL SIX CLASSIC CLASSES!
Why break up a set? Get all of the Classic Classes on CD for one low price - and save on postage, too! SIX CDs packed with information! From IDEAS & CREATIVITY to WRITING INDIES to WRITING HORROR to the 2 part WRITING THRILLERS to GUERRILLA MARKETING. These classes used to sell for $15 - for a total of $120 with postage & handling. Buy the whole set and get 'em for only $70 including postage and handling (USA).
Van is a character. The great thing about old friends is that you know what all of their issues are, have gotten mad at them a thousand times, and are now over it. Van is famous for being unreliable. Not in some serious way, he just gets side tracked sometimes. Also, he’s a dreamer... which is great when you are 20, kind of a problem when you are older. But no one on earth has a bigger heart, and when my life went to hell after NINJA BUSTERS fizzled and Wendy split, he gave me a job laying carpet and pointed out that there were other women in the world (mostly by example - you could drop Van into a Lesbian Convention and he’d convert some of them). But I can not count the number of times he’s been a no-show or ambled in hours late. Used to make me angry, now I just accept it. So, when I couldn’t get through to him I just figured it was the usual Van thing.
I kept calling and getting that full voice mail the whole time I was in the Bay Area, and John tried to call him with the same results. Finally I got an e-mail from him - hey, how come I hadn’t called him? All of this ended up being *my fault* - he had changed cell phone carrier, had a new number, and even *gave me his new number*. But I kept calling the old one, because I’m an idiot and it was on my cell phone. John was doing the same thing. Once I called the new number he had given me months before, he answered on the second ring. New Years Eve had passed and I was about to return home...
John and I had seen AVATAR in 3D without Van...
But BITCH SLAP was opening on Friday night in limited release! The perfect film for 3 guys who enjoy upper torso bundles of pleasure! I figured Friday might be crowded, and John was busy Saturday, so maybe Sunday? Sunday was a great day because the cast and writer would be in San Francisco that night! Except Van already had tickets for AVATAR on Sunday... so we last minute adjusted to Monday night. The next morning I would return to Los Angeles.
Van knows every single great hole-in-the-wall restaurant and bar in the Bay Area. When we were laying carpet, no matter what city the job was in, he knew the best place to get breakfast, lunch, and dinner. Van suggested we meet at this restaurant/bar called The Belltower which was a couple of blocks from the cinema. When I arrived, I recognized the place - we’d had breakfast there once and it was great. John arrived and we had a beer, and then Van showed. We had a great dinner, then went to the cinema...
BITCH SLAP!
The plot? Three hot chicks in the desert.
Directed by Rick Jacobson, who directed a couple of my movies and is a great guy - I may not agree with all of his artistic choices, but he *has* artistic choices and actually would listen to whatever I had to say. He wasn’t an asshole. After making a bunch of low budget films he moved to TV and directed a bunch of TV shows including HERCULES and XENA and now he’s a TV director.
He and one of the writers on XENA decided to bankroll their own film, made on the cheap, and the result is BITCH SLAP. The film uses all kinds of low budget tricks - most of the story takes place in a patch of desert in the middle of nowhere with a beat up old trailer and a windmill. Easy location to shoot at, and when things blow up and catch fire (which they do as the story goes on) probably easy to get permits and a fire marshal - not a burnable tree or scrub for miles in any direction.
The cast is also small: mostly the three women: Hel (Erin Cummings) who is all-business and dresses like a business woman. Camaro (America Olivo) who is the tough gal, just released from prison, who wears jeans and a tied off shirt. Trixie (Julia Voth) the stripper who appears to be all body and no brains, who is wearing a gold dress. The plot has them drive their vintage Thunderbird to this no-man’s land to find a buried treasure, and flashbacks fill in the details and provide plot twists. There are also two men who are part of the main cast, Gage (Michael Hurst) a gangster who has been skimming from legendary crime boss Pinky for years - and the buried treasure is that loot. He’s handcuffed in the trunk of the Thunderbird. And Deputy Fuchs (Ron Melendez) a cop who thinks the three gals might be in trouble and stops to help... and also becomes their prisoner - chained up in that old trailer. Five main characters, one main location, six breasts.
In a moment I’ll talk about some of the other money saving tricks they used - I’ll bet the budget was lower than you might guess - but first let’s talk about...
EXPLOITATION FOR FUN & PROFIT
The review in the Los Angeles Times complained that BITCH SLAP was an exploitation film send up without the send up... and this made me scratch my head, because I never got the memo that it was a send up, and when you read the poster or publicity stuff (they had a great gimmick to make you see it more than once - collectable postcards for each of the characters in the film, and they gave away a different one every night) there was nothing about this being a send up... it was pretty much advertized as a fun exploitation film that *knows* it’s an exploitation film. Which makes it just an exploitation film.
Back in the drive in days, there were lots of exploitation films - made cheap and filled with things that would attract and audience. Lowest common denominator stuff like fast cars and topless women and machine guns. A studio film might have all of those things in a pretty story - and those things serviced the story. An exploitation film was *about* the exploitation stuff, with a flimsy story connecting the elements. Now, some exploitation films had *great* stories connecting the elements, and now those films are considered art. Tod Browning’s FREAKS is a great film, but where would it be without the promise of seeing a bunch of side show freaks? And the suggestion of side show freaks having sex with a hot blonde woman? Hey - I gotta see that!
And the drive in exploitation films offered the same sort of forbidden thrills. Hey, what really goes on in a women’s prison where they evil lesbian warden enjoys whipping the hot naked prisoners? Hey - I gotta see that!
One of the things I hate in studio films, I love in exploitation films: “kitchen sinking”. So many of those A.I.P. drive in films seemed like a grab bag of cool stuff threaded together into a film. So you might have custom hot rods and acrobats and some rock & roll band and a bikini beach party and dogs that do tricks and martial arts and a monster... all in the same movie! Hey - I gotta see that!
I’ve seen studio films that try to throw in a little bit of everything and end up with nothing, and the reason why is that the film is supposed to be about the story... and just ends up being about a little bit of everything. A mainstream studio film is all about the story, and even though it may have fast cars and hot women and a machine gun, it’s not ever about those things. Those things are elements of the story, not the story itself. The exploitation is in the background not the foreground.
Someone on a messageboard a couple of months ago was lamenting the 50s and 60s when Americans went to see foreign films... and even though that was before my time sitting in a cinema seat, I can tell you from conversations with those older than I am - they went to foreign films to see boobies. American films had no nudity at all - we still had censorship under the old system. But foreign films managed to sneak in nudity and the censors didn’t seem to care, maybe because the films were “cultural” and had subtitles and not everyone was going to flock to see them. Except a surprising number of normal middle class Americans saw a bunch of foreign films... often featuring nudity or lingerie or lots-a-cleavage. Thank you, Sophia Loren! Hey - I gotta see that!
Foreign films ended up being exploitation films! Just, with culture!
And that is the problem with the poor exploitation film - it has no culture. It is honest about its intentions. You may see a foreign film for culture... um, cleavage culture... but you see an exploitation film for the exploitation. We always complain that people these days go to the movies for the explosions and CGI - the exploitation elements. And it’s funny that I will hate TRANSFORMERS and then have an excited conversation with another film fan about that amazing street shoot out in HEAT. Okay, why isn’t HEAT an exploitation film? Why is a long shoot out in some B movie just stupid and a similar scene in HEAT complete genius? Well, it’s that HEAT isn’t just that shoot out (and the other great action scenes). But, isn’t there room in cinema for a film that *is* just about the shoot outs? A film that isn’t going to try and pass itself off as culture, and just be its sleazy self? A film that knows that one of the main reasons why you go to see HEAT or some big budget Hollywood movies is the exploitation elements? “You’ll believe a man can fly.” “From the moment they met it was murder.” Movies are all about sex and violence and exploitables... Heck, how many pages would be left in The Bible if we cut out all of the sex and violence?
And another issue with exploitation is - why is some low budget genre flick that is aiming for being a just fun time, not good enough for a theatrical release in art house cinemas in select cities, and have critics for the L.A. Times show up and review the film; but a film trying to be “so bad it’s good” gets shown and reviewed? Why does society say it’s okay to make fun of exploitation, but not just accept a movie that may not have stars but does have plenty of stuff that blows up... unless there is a star in it or a massive budget? Why is *studio exploitation* taken more seriously than low budget exploitation? If John Sayles’ PIRANHA was released today, would Variety even show up to review it... let alone call it the best film ever made about the Viet Nam War? If DEATH RACE 2000 were released today, would anyone take it seriously? Or would it just be dismissed and sent to video and never noticed or reviewed? We used to have genre distribs like Canon and New World that made low budget action films and got them into cinemas and reviewed and on the mainstream radar, so that those stars and directors and writers could cross over to studio films. Where do you think directors like Jonathan Demme and writers like John Sayles came from? Does the Los Angeles Times review direct to video films? Nope... Rick Jacobson may have directed a stack of movies, but this is probably his first film that has ever been reviewed in print. Because it’s trying to be bad!
So, we come to BITCH SLAP which is honest about its intentions - it just wants to be a Russ Meyer movie. It doesn’t want to be a *send up* of a 1960s exploitation movie, it wants to *be* a 1960s exploitation movie. Hey, what’s wrong with that? Why can’t the Los Angeles Times critic just judge it as an exploitation movie? When I saw the trailer, I said to myself, “Hey - I gotta see that!”
CHEAP THRILLS
The film is what it is - good cheap exploitation. And though there’s lots of blood squibs, the level of violence is pretty tame for all of the machinegun fire. People get shot a zillion times and have little red dots on their clothes. And the sex? This film is one big tease! I don’t remember any nudity, though I do remember LOTS of cleavage and some simulated sex on a TV soap opera level. It just *seems* raw and nasty.
I mentioned the flashbacks, and they’re lots of fun. The movie opens with Trixie in her pretty party dress crawling through the burning wreckage of the trailer wondering how she came to be here, and we get a title card that says FOUR HOURS EARLIER and get a snippet of background, and then we go back to the wreckage for a minute or two of present day before we get a title card that says FOUR HOURS AND 8 MINUTES EARLIER... and that sets the tone for the flashbacks - they are frequent and often a little silly. I kept waiting for TWENTY YEARS EARLIER where the three girls are in the same crib awaiting diaper changes. This ends up being a great running gag that never seems to wear out its welcome.
The other thing is the split screen, which is over done on purpose... though not nearly as overdone as in the last OSS-117 movie. The thing I love and hate about Rick (director) is that he’s creative - in NIGHT HUNTER he did that shaky-cam thing in all of the action scenes, which I absolutely hated... even though Paul Greengrass swiped that technique a decade later for the second BOURNE movie. I loved what he did in BLACK THUNDER, though - he mounted the camera on a rig that allowed it to turn 360' (upside down) and slid the camera back and forth in the plane cockpit shots so that you could feel the plane banking and looping and doing all of the amazing dogfight stunts. That was genius! If the plane spun upside down in the dogfight, so did the cockpit shot of the pilot (our hero). So the split screen stuff in BITCH SLAP is cool 24-style stuff. It worked really well.
The film has some great confined cameos - characters whose roles are spread throughout the film but were probably shot out in a single day - by Kevin Sorbo and Lucy Lawless (that Hercules/Xena connection)... with a twist! Lucy plays Mother Superior in a funny flashback that reveals that one of the gals used to be a nun in a convent who was *very popular* with the other nuns... and Sorbo plays the head of a spy organization in a bunch of little scenes probably shot in a single day, because one of the gals is revealed to be a top secret undercover female version of James Bond.
Here’s the confined cameo twist - Sorbo isn’t just at one location, he’s all over the place... thanks to green screen. The majority of the flashbacks are green screen shots. Now, this is a low budget movie that can not afford great special effects, and all of the green screen shots have those outlines that make them look like green screen... except thanks to SIN CITY and all of those stylized comic book films, we no longer need perfect looking green screen and effects as long as we can used a stylized cartoony background. And that’s just what BITCH SLAP does - the flashbacks are not real looking at all, they look like SIN CITY, so any imperfection in green screen or even location plate disappears. A scene in Russia where Sorbo meets with spy-gal Hel at a train station has a stylized cartoon look that adds to the production value instead of subtracts from it. The movie has these great surreal flashbacks that seem arty.
One of the other tricks the film uses is the old doorway in the ground gag - from A BOY AND HIS DOG. When they finally find the treasure, it’s not just some trunk full of cash - it’s a vault that opens into the earth, and they climb down a ladder to some gangster version of that huge warehouse from the end of RAIDERS OF THE LOST ARK filled with just about anything someone could steal... including nukes and heavy artillery and all kinds of loot.
BUT, WHAT ABOUT THE STORY?
The film is good sleazy fun. I laughed several times. The problem with making a “So Bad It’s Good” movie is that often it just turns out bad. The key to is to keep it funny, so that we know you aren’t taking this seriously. BITCH SLAP has enough gags to keep us laughing, and is so over the top in many of its scenes that you know they aren’t taking this seriously. Exaggeration is funny - and this film gets laughs from seeing how complicated it can make its Mexican Standoffs, and how crass it can make its simulated sex scenes. But some of the dialogue is raw instead of clever, and the characters are so paper thin there’s no way to mine anything but surface gags from them (Trixie pole dancing with a shovel while they are supposed to be digging is her best character-related gag). I wish it had been more clever, but maybe I’m the only one in the audience who cared about that? The plot and much of the action is contrived to the point of “Oh, come on!” - often for no reason at all the girls will get into a fight - maybe that was supposed to be a gag that didn’t work so it just seemed like a bad movie thing. I know it seems silly to point out that they needed a better excuse for their exploitation scenes, but that would have made me think “Bad on purpose” for those contrived scenes instead of “Just bad”. And the end of the film is just bad no matter how you slice it - there is a twist that is so contrived and sledge-hammered in that I walked away liking the film less. And both of my friends jumped on the end, too - so it wasn’t just picky Bill. You have to play fair with plot twists, folks! Hey, I saw the color of her underwear and figured out the twist - but the character doesn’t seem to know about their own double cross in the scenes where they are pulling the double cross! Again, this is one of those things where the film isn’t as clever as it needs to be. But those story issues aside - a lot of fun for 90 minutes!
- Bill
TODAY'S SCRIPT TIP: Pigeon Holing Yourself - and the equally kinky practice of Self Branding.
Yesterday's Dinner: Chicken Caesar Salad at Fuddruckers.
ALL SIX CLASSIC CLASSES!
Why break up a set? Get all of the Classic Classes on CD for one low price - and save on postage, too! SIX CDs packed with information! From IDEAS & CREATIVITY to WRITING INDIES to WRITING HORROR to the 2 part WRITING THRILLERS to GUERRILLA MARKETING. These classes used to sell for $15 - for a total of $120 with postage & handling. Buy the whole set and get 'em for only $70 including postage and handling (USA).
Monday, January 18, 2010
Martin Scorsese - Golden Globes
Here's the clip montage and Scorsese's speech from last night's Golden Globes... brilliant (except for the commercial for SHUTTER ISLAND they stuck in there). Great iconic images, and his speech is all about giving the audience an experience.
- Bill
- Bill
Upcoming Nic Cage Movies...
Can't get enough of that KNOWING star? Well, he's got plenty of movies in the pipeline, and there is a whole blog devoted to his new projects...
Nic Cage Projects!
- Bill
IMPORTANT UPDATE:
TODAY'S SCRIPT TIP: Playing With Time Periods - and that little film film from last year that won all of the awards - SLUMDOG MILLIONAIRE.
Yesterday's Dinner: Fast food between raindrops - Carls Jr Big Carl burger. It was okay.
Nic Cage Projects!
- Bill
TODAY'S SCRIPT TIP: Playing With Time Periods - and that little film film from last year that won all of the awards - SLUMDOG MILLIONAIRE.
Yesterday's Dinner: Fast food between raindrops - Carls Jr Big Carl burger. It was okay.
Sunday, January 17, 2010
Golden Globe Winners!
FILM AWARDS
Best Picture, Drama
Avatar WINNER
The Hurt Locker
Inglourious Basterds
Precious
Up in the Air
Best Picture, Musical/Comedy
The Hangover WINNER
500 Days of Summer
It’s Complicated
Julie & Julia
Nine
Best Director
James Cameron, Avatar WINNER
Kathryn Bigelow, The Hurt Locker
Clint Eastwood, Invictus
Jason Reitman, Up in the Air
Quentin Tarantino, Inglourious Basterds
Best Actor, Musical/Comedy
Robert Downey, Jr., Sherlock Holmes WINNER
Matt Damon, The Informant!
Daniel Day-Lewis, Nine
Joseph Gordon-Levitt, 500 Days of Summer
Michael Stuhlbarg, A Serious Man
Best Actress, Musical/Comedy
Meryl Streep, Julie & Julia WINNER
Sandra Bullock, The Proposal
Marion Cotillard, Nine
Julia Roberts, Duplicity
Meryl Streep, It’s Complicated
Best Actress, Drama
Sandra Bullock, The Blind Side WINNER
Emily Blunt, The Young Victoria
Helen Mirren, The Last Station
Carey Mulligan, An Education
Gabourey Sidibe, Precious
Best Actor, Drama
Jeff Bridges, Crazy Heart WINNER
George Clooney, Up in the Air
Colin Firth, A Single Man
Morgan Freeman, Invictus
Tobey Maguire, Brothers
Film, Best Supporting Actress
Mo’Nique, Precious WINNER
Penelope Cruz, Nine
Vera Farmiga, Up in the Air
Anna Kendrick, Up in the Air
Julianne Moore, A Single Man
Best Supporting Actor
Christoph Waltz, Inglourious Basterds WINNER
Matt Damon, Invictus
Woody Harrelson, The Messenger
Christopher Plummer, The Last Station
Stanley Tucci, The Lovely Bones
Best Screenplay
Jason Reitman & Sheldon Turner, Up in the Air WINNER
Neill Blomkamp & Terri Tatchell, District 9
Mark Boal, The Hurt Locker
Nancy Meyers, It’s Complicated
Quentin Tarantino, Inglourious Basterds
Best Animated Film
Up WINNER
Cloudy With A Chance of Meatballs
Coraline
Fantastic Mr. Fox
The Princess & The Frog
Best Song
“The Weary Kind,” Crazy Heart WINNER
“Cinema Italiano,” Nine
“I Want to Come Home,” Everybody’s Fine
“I Will See You,” Avatar
“Winter,” Brothers
Best Score
Up WINNER
The Informant!
Avatar
A Single Man
Where the Wild Things Are
Best Foreign Language Film
The White Ribbon WINNER
Baria
Broken Embraces
The Maid
A Prophet
Cecil B. DeMille Award
Martin Scorsese
Best Picture, Drama
Avatar WINNER
The Hurt Locker
Inglourious Basterds
Precious
Up in the Air
Best Picture, Musical/Comedy
The Hangover WINNER
500 Days of Summer
It’s Complicated
Julie & Julia
Nine
Best Director
James Cameron, Avatar WINNER
Kathryn Bigelow, The Hurt Locker
Clint Eastwood, Invictus
Jason Reitman, Up in the Air
Quentin Tarantino, Inglourious Basterds
Best Actor, Musical/Comedy
Robert Downey, Jr., Sherlock Holmes WINNER
Matt Damon, The Informant!
Daniel Day-Lewis, Nine
Joseph Gordon-Levitt, 500 Days of Summer
Michael Stuhlbarg, A Serious Man
Best Actress, Musical/Comedy
Meryl Streep, Julie & Julia WINNER
Sandra Bullock, The Proposal
Marion Cotillard, Nine
Julia Roberts, Duplicity
Meryl Streep, It’s Complicated
Best Actress, Drama
Sandra Bullock, The Blind Side WINNER
Emily Blunt, The Young Victoria
Helen Mirren, The Last Station
Carey Mulligan, An Education
Gabourey Sidibe, Precious
Best Actor, Drama
Jeff Bridges, Crazy Heart WINNER
George Clooney, Up in the Air
Colin Firth, A Single Man
Morgan Freeman, Invictus
Tobey Maguire, Brothers
Film, Best Supporting Actress
Mo’Nique, Precious WINNER
Penelope Cruz, Nine
Vera Farmiga, Up in the Air
Anna Kendrick, Up in the Air
Julianne Moore, A Single Man
Best Supporting Actor
Christoph Waltz, Inglourious Basterds WINNER
Matt Damon, Invictus
Woody Harrelson, The Messenger
Christopher Plummer, The Last Station
Stanley Tucci, The Lovely Bones
Best Screenplay
Jason Reitman & Sheldon Turner, Up in the Air WINNER
Neill Blomkamp & Terri Tatchell, District 9
Mark Boal, The Hurt Locker
Nancy Meyers, It’s Complicated
Quentin Tarantino, Inglourious Basterds
Best Animated Film
Up WINNER
Cloudy With A Chance of Meatballs
Coraline
Fantastic Mr. Fox
The Princess & The Frog
Best Song
“The Weary Kind,” Crazy Heart WINNER
“Cinema Italiano,” Nine
“I Want to Come Home,” Everybody’s Fine
“I Will See You,” Avatar
“Winter,” Brothers
Best Score
Up WINNER
The Informant!
Avatar
A Single Man
Where the Wild Things Are
Best Foreign Language Film
The White Ribbon WINNER
Baria
Broken Embraces
The Maid
A Prophet
Cecil B. DeMille Award
Martin Scorsese
Saturday, January 16, 2010
MLK Post From 2008
In honor of Martin Luther King jr Day, here is a post I wrote two years ago...
Martin Luther King Day.
- Bill
Martin Luther King Day.
- Bill
Friday, January 15, 2010
Did James Cameron write AVATAR?
Here's a swell article from the LA Times about screenwriting credits...
Who Really Wrote AVATAR?
- Bill
Who Really Wrote AVATAR?
- Bill
Wednesday, January 13, 2010
WGA Awards - Nominee List...
Full List of 2010 WGA Awards Nominees in Movie:
Original Screenplay:
•"500 Days of Summer" - Scott Neustadter & Michael H. Weber
•"Avatar" - James Cameron
•"The Hangover" - Jon Lucas & Scott Moore
•"The Hurt Locker" - Mark Boal
•"A Serious Man" - Joel Coen & Ethan Coen
Adapted Screenplay:
•"Crazy Heart" - screenplay by Scott Cooper
•"Julie & Julia" - screenplay by Nora Ephron
•"Precious: Based on the Novel PUSH by Sapphire" - screenplay by Geoffrey Fletcher
•"Star Trek" - screenplay by Roberto Orci & Alex Kurtzman
•"Up in the Air" - screenplay by Jason Reitman and Sheldon Turner
Documentary Screenplay:
•"Against the Tide" - Richard Trank
•"Capitalism: A Love Story" - Michael Moore
•"The Cove" - Mark Monroe
•"Earth Days" - Robert Stone
•"Good Hair" - Chris Rock & Jeff Stilson and Lance Crouther and Chuck Sklar
•"Soundtrack for a Revolution" - Bill Guttentag & Dan Sturman
- Bill
IMPORTANT UPDATE:
TODAY'S SCRIPT TIP: Pick Up The Pace! - all about your screenplay's pacing - what makes a script fast paced?
Yesterday's Dinner: Fish & Chips & Guiness at The Belltower in San Francisco with old film friends. Food was great!
Movies: Then we went to see BITCH SLAP - and more on that later!
ALL SIX CLASSIC CLASSES!
Why break up a set? Get all of the Classic Classes on CD for one low price - and save on postage, too! SIX CDs packed with information! From IDEAS & CREATIVITY to WRITING INDIES to WRITING HORROR to the 2 part WRITING THRILLERS to GUERRILLA MARKETING. These classes used to sell for $15 - for a total of $120 with postage & handling. Buy the whole set and get 'em for only $70 including postage and handling (USA).
It's the big deal - You SAVE $50!!!!
Original Screenplay:
•"500 Days of Summer" - Scott Neustadter & Michael H. Weber
•"Avatar" - James Cameron
•"The Hangover" - Jon Lucas & Scott Moore
•"The Hurt Locker" - Mark Boal
•"A Serious Man" - Joel Coen & Ethan Coen
Adapted Screenplay:
•"Crazy Heart" - screenplay by Scott Cooper
•"Julie & Julia" - screenplay by Nora Ephron
•"Precious: Based on the Novel PUSH by Sapphire" - screenplay by Geoffrey Fletcher
•"Star Trek" - screenplay by Roberto Orci & Alex Kurtzman
•"Up in the Air" - screenplay by Jason Reitman and Sheldon Turner
Documentary Screenplay:
•"Against the Tide" - Richard Trank
•"Capitalism: A Love Story" - Michael Moore
•"The Cove" - Mark Monroe
•"Earth Days" - Robert Stone
•"Good Hair" - Chris Rock & Jeff Stilson and Lance Crouther and Chuck Sklar
•"Soundtrack for a Revolution" - Bill Guttentag & Dan Sturman
- Bill
TODAY'S SCRIPT TIP: Pick Up The Pace! - all about your screenplay's pacing - what makes a script fast paced?
Yesterday's Dinner: Fish & Chips & Guiness at The Belltower in San Francisco with old film friends. Food was great!
Movies: Then we went to see BITCH SLAP - and more on that later!
ALL SIX CLASSIC CLASSES!
Why break up a set? Get all of the Classic Classes on CD for one low price - and save on postage, too! SIX CDs packed with information! From IDEAS & CREATIVITY to WRITING INDIES to WRITING HORROR to the 2 part WRITING THRILLERS to GUERRILLA MARKETING. These classes used to sell for $15 - for a total of $120 with postage & handling. Buy the whole set and get 'em for only $70 including postage and handling (USA).
It's the big deal - You SAVE $50!!!!
Monday, January 11, 2010
Do Pretty Girls Fart?
Mythbusters did an unaired episode on whether pretty girls fart or not, and you will be disappointed to learn that they do.
Pretty girls are not perfect... and neither is anyone else. We all make mistakes. We are all learning. Even the smartest person in the world does dumb things sometimes, and doesn't know everything.
What does this have to do with screenwriting? (aside from - when you are on set stay away from Beyonce's butt)?
Hey, maybe your first draft sucks? Maybe your dialogue stinks? Maybe your characters are thin? Maybe you can’t seem to finish this script or this scene... and you feel like a failure. Maybe you give the script you think is perfect to some friends to read... and they all hate it.
Hey, no reason to beat yourself up. We all make mistakes! You don't look stupid when you write something that isn't perfect, you look just like the rest of us - you were learning. It was a first draft (or a tenth draft - some of us are slow learners). You know, there is no shame in *learning*, and you have to make mistakes in order to learn.
So, don't worry so much about looking like you may not have known something - nobody knows everything. We are all still learning. The first step in learning is to realize everyone makes mistakes, and no script is perfect. Be open to that criticism. Don’t be defensive about it, don’t be depressed by it. Everyone screws up! Everyone farts. If not, they explode - and that's even worse! You think farting in an elevator is bad, exploding is worse.
It’s a new year - time to make some new mistakes and learn from them.
And, stay away from Beyonce’s butt.
- Bill
IMPORTANT UPDATE:
TODAY'S SCRIPT TIP: Conflict Driven - how every story needs a conflict, and that conflict needs to make sense... even if your name is George Lucas.
Yesterday's Dinner: Final home cooked meal from mom before I return to LA - cornbread, scalloped potatoes, corn, chicken. Perfect!
SCRIPT SECRETS STORE
Top 10 Films About Underpants T Shirt: SALE $9.99
Pretty girls are not perfect... and neither is anyone else. We all make mistakes. We are all learning. Even the smartest person in the world does dumb things sometimes, and doesn't know everything.
What does this have to do with screenwriting? (aside from - when you are on set stay away from Beyonce's butt)?
Hey, maybe your first draft sucks? Maybe your dialogue stinks? Maybe your characters are thin? Maybe you can’t seem to finish this script or this scene... and you feel like a failure. Maybe you give the script you think is perfect to some friends to read... and they all hate it.
Hey, no reason to beat yourself up. We all make mistakes! You don't look stupid when you write something that isn't perfect, you look just like the rest of us - you were learning. It was a first draft (or a tenth draft - some of us are slow learners). You know, there is no shame in *learning*, and you have to make mistakes in order to learn.
So, don't worry so much about looking like you may not have known something - nobody knows everything. We are all still learning. The first step in learning is to realize everyone makes mistakes, and no script is perfect. Be open to that criticism. Don’t be defensive about it, don’t be depressed by it. Everyone screws up! Everyone farts. If not, they explode - and that's even worse! You think farting in an elevator is bad, exploding is worse.
It’s a new year - time to make some new mistakes and learn from them.
And, stay away from Beyonce’s butt.
- Bill
TODAY'S SCRIPT TIP: Conflict Driven - how every story needs a conflict, and that conflict needs to make sense... even if your name is George Lucas.
Yesterday's Dinner: Final home cooked meal from mom before I return to LA - cornbread, scalloped potatoes, corn, chicken. Perfect!
SCRIPT SECRETS STORE
Top 10 Films About Underpants T Shirt: SALE $9.99
Thursday, January 7, 2010
Bitch Slap!
Rick Jacobson directed 2 of my scripts, and he's one of... I guess it's *two*... directors I enjoyed working with. A couple of months ago I posted a car chase clip from BLACK THUNDER, and that was his work. He is a nice guy (kind of amazing on its own) who can take a low budget film and make the action scenes rock. Most of the other directors I've worked with just wanted to get the action scenes over with. They disliked them, didn't understand them, and the results are some really crappy and bland action scenes. Rick *cared* about the action scenes, and tried to make them the biggest scenes possible with the money they gave him. There is a massive action scene at the end of BLACK THUNDER that is filled with explosions and stunts shot for the movie (ie: not stock footage). He put the money on the screen, not in his pockets.
Well, Rick has a new film opening in cinemas on Friday - select cities, limited release - called BITCH SLAP! It seems to be a Russ Meyers homage of some sort. You may have seen one (or more) of the female leads interviewed on some of the off the beaten path cable talk shows - I saw them on some video game talk show a couple of weeks ago. I'll be seeing the film this weekend in San Francisco before heading back to Los Angeles. Here is the trailer...
That looks cool!
- Bill
IMPORTANT UPDATE:
TODAY'S SCRIPT TIP: Gag Reel - how to use "gags" and details to add depth and texture to your scenes, using THE 39 STEPS as example.
Yesterday's Dinner: Salad at La Scala in Walnut Creek, CA.
SCRIPT SECRETS STORE
Top 10 Films About Underpants T Shirt: SALE $9.99
Well, Rick has a new film opening in cinemas on Friday - select cities, limited release - called BITCH SLAP! It seems to be a Russ Meyers homage of some sort. You may have seen one (or more) of the female leads interviewed on some of the off the beaten path cable talk shows - I saw them on some video game talk show a couple of weeks ago. I'll be seeing the film this weekend in San Francisco before heading back to Los Angeles. Here is the trailer...
That looks cool!
- Bill
TODAY'S SCRIPT TIP: Gag Reel - how to use "gags" and details to add depth and texture to your scenes, using THE 39 STEPS as example.
Yesterday's Dinner: Salad at La Scala in Walnut Creek, CA.
SCRIPT SECRETS STORE
Top 10 Films About Underpants T Shirt: SALE $9.99
Wednesday, January 6, 2010
Portable Grindhouse
The strangest part of my so called career are the ripples. Over a decade ago, Roger Ebert talked to Gene Siskel about me on that little TV show they had. I'm quoted in a bunch of books. I now have four novelists who either thank me in their books or mention me on their blogs. And that danged Movies For Men Network in the UK keeps showing my movies every damned week! I've stopped posting them here because I'd have to list them every week, and after a while I stopped caring (I'm sure you stopped caring the first time I posted the airdates and times... but it's *my* blog, baby!)
But the latest thing is even more of a ripple...
More of an echo from events long ago...
A book about the rise and fall of movies on VHS, focusing on the cool box art, has an example of VHS box art on the back cover...
And it is from a movie I wrote!
Someone on a messageboard mentioned a B Movie blog that I'd never heard of, so I thought I'd check it out, and yesterday's blog entry was all about buying this new book on Amazon, and they had a scan of the cover, and one of my movies was on it! This is almost as good as when I was channel flipping and passed NIGHT HUNTER in Spenish on one of the L.A. Mexican channels! That was kind of surreal.
So, I have ordered my copy from Amazon (the picture is a link) and can't wait to see if any of the box art from my other films made the cut.
- Bill
IMPORTANT UPDATE:
TODAY'S SCRIPT TIP: Are Those Real? - levels of reality in your screenplay, and how to create the illusion of reality in your screenplay, and ADVENTURELAND.
Yesterday's Dinner: El Faro Burrito - it's a burrito bigger than my head! On Monument Blvd in Concord, CA.
SCRIPT SECRETS STORE
Top 10 Films About Underpants T Shirt: SALE $9.99
But the latest thing is even more of a ripple...
More of an echo from events long ago...
A book about the rise and fall of movies on VHS, focusing on the cool box art, has an example of VHS box art on the back cover...
And it is from a movie I wrote!
Someone on a messageboard mentioned a B Movie blog that I'd never heard of, so I thought I'd check it out, and yesterday's blog entry was all about buying this new book on Amazon, and they had a scan of the cover, and one of my movies was on it! This is almost as good as when I was channel flipping and passed NIGHT HUNTER in Spenish on one of the L.A. Mexican channels! That was kind of surreal.
So, I have ordered my copy from Amazon (the picture is a link) and can't wait to see if any of the box art from my other films made the cut.
- Bill
TODAY'S SCRIPT TIP: Are Those Real? - levels of reality in your screenplay, and how to create the illusion of reality in your screenplay, and ADVENTURELAND.
Yesterday's Dinner: El Faro Burrito - it's a burrito bigger than my head! On Monument Blvd in Concord, CA.
SCRIPT SECRETS STORE
Top 10 Films About Underpants T Shirt: SALE $9.99
Tuesday, January 5, 2010
Script Magazine - January Issue Is Out!
The new issue of Script Magazine is out now! It's the Awards Issue - all about the Oscar hopefuls and other best pictures!
Writers on Writing: A Single Man
Thankfully, each awards season brings a fresh voice, full of surprises for a familial industry. In 2009, that fresh voice belonged to someone already well-known to the family, though no one could have suspected his fashion savvy would translate so readily to screenwriting. Here Tom Ford talks about what drew him to the singular A Single Man.
Win, Place & Showbiz: Handicapping the Writing Awards for 2009
An Oscar®-season tradition, Bob Verini talks to the scribes in the running for the Academy’s coveted statue. But, with a dramatic change in the Best Picture category -- the noms have been increased from five to 10 -- the race for the golden guy is truly up in the air. As usual, Verini lays the odds on 2009’s writerly offerings.
Taking on Tyson
For the past decade, filmmaker James Toback has held the idea of a special project, a story so personal to him that it had to be done just right, his way, when ready. The long-awaited result? The critically acclaimed Tyson -- a revealing documentary of the polarizing and enigmatic figure that is Mike Tyson.
Script to Screen: The Road
Stage veteran Joe Penhall toned down some of the gore in Cormac McCarthy's post-apocalyptic novel The Road -- but only to keep it from getting boring. As director John Hillcoat and Penhall explain, their vision for the film was often debated but never questioned ... and both are eager to hear reaction from the audience and avid McCarthy fans.
Block Blocking
It happens to us all -- from the Oscar-winning writer to the aspirant. Writer's block is a cruel reality, but one that can be managed, according to the likes of Eric Roth, Simon Kinberg, and Stephen Susco. See if some of their tips, or the tips from some Script readers, will work for you.
Brothers: Where Art Thou?
Screenwriter David Benioff made two vows: He'd never do a remake and, after The Kite Runner, wouldn't revisit the subject of Afghanistan. He talks to Script about his new film Brothers, a remake of a Danish film about the war in Afghanistan.
The Agony of the Unproduced
Plenty of people make a living as screenwriters, but an important variable -- the screen variable -- can leave even those with a steady stream of writing gigs feeling less-than-accomplished. Read how a few writers have overcome the unproduced feeling.
Small Screen: Leverage
Showrunner John Rogers began his career on Cosby, a warm family sitcom that revolves around aging spouses. His current show centers on a family of a different sort -- a family of thieves. Find out how Rogers and his staff involve fans in the stories for Leverage's merry band.
New Media: Web Innovators
For most Web innovators, new-media projects have been high on experimentation and low on measurable results. But for BarretSwatek and Taryn Southern, the Internet has been a very stable place where both have found homes for their existing talents, and discovered talents they never knew they had.
Independents: Awards Driven
What can we learn from the winners of film festivals? Perhaps what drives each lauded story from Fade In to The End; or how each film’s engine differs from the others in competition? Bill Martell attends the 17th Annual Raindance Film Festival in London to find out.
10 Things a Rep Will Never Tell You
Do you really want to know? Are you sure? Because Jim Cirile, and a host of reps, are ready to tell you why neediness isn’t endearing, there’s no market for your masterpiece, if a script hasn’t sold yet it likely never will, and seven other daunting truths.
So, what subjects would you like me to cover in the new year? I'm about to start my article for the May issue, and have no idea what it will be about.
- Bill
IMPORTANT UPDATE:
TODAY'S SCRIPT TIP: What's The Plan, Man? - and planning your 2010 writing to get things done!
Yesterday's Dinner: Pizza. Frozen. Cardboard.
SCRIPT SECRETS STORE
Top 10 Films About Underpants T Shirt: SALE $9.99
Writers on Writing: A Single Man
Thankfully, each awards season brings a fresh voice, full of surprises for a familial industry. In 2009, that fresh voice belonged to someone already well-known to the family, though no one could have suspected his fashion savvy would translate so readily to screenwriting. Here Tom Ford talks about what drew him to the singular A Single Man.
Win, Place & Showbiz: Handicapping the Writing Awards for 2009
An Oscar®-season tradition, Bob Verini talks to the scribes in the running for the Academy’s coveted statue. But, with a dramatic change in the Best Picture category -- the noms have been increased from five to 10 -- the race for the golden guy is truly up in the air. As usual, Verini lays the odds on 2009’s writerly offerings.
Taking on Tyson
For the past decade, filmmaker James Toback has held the idea of a special project, a story so personal to him that it had to be done just right, his way, when ready. The long-awaited result? The critically acclaimed Tyson -- a revealing documentary of the polarizing and enigmatic figure that is Mike Tyson.
Script to Screen: The Road
Stage veteran Joe Penhall toned down some of the gore in Cormac McCarthy's post-apocalyptic novel The Road -- but only to keep it from getting boring. As director John Hillcoat and Penhall explain, their vision for the film was often debated but never questioned ... and both are eager to hear reaction from the audience and avid McCarthy fans.
Block Blocking
It happens to us all -- from the Oscar-winning writer to the aspirant. Writer's block is a cruel reality, but one that can be managed, according to the likes of Eric Roth, Simon Kinberg, and Stephen Susco. See if some of their tips, or the tips from some Script readers, will work for you.
Brothers: Where Art Thou?
Screenwriter David Benioff made two vows: He'd never do a remake and, after The Kite Runner, wouldn't revisit the subject of Afghanistan. He talks to Script about his new film Brothers, a remake of a Danish film about the war in Afghanistan.
The Agony of the Unproduced
Plenty of people make a living as screenwriters, but an important variable -- the screen variable -- can leave even those with a steady stream of writing gigs feeling less-than-accomplished. Read how a few writers have overcome the unproduced feeling.
Small Screen: Leverage
Showrunner John Rogers began his career on Cosby, a warm family sitcom that revolves around aging spouses. His current show centers on a family of a different sort -- a family of thieves. Find out how Rogers and his staff involve fans in the stories for Leverage's merry band.
New Media: Web Innovators
For most Web innovators, new-media projects have been high on experimentation and low on measurable results. But for BarretSwatek and Taryn Southern, the Internet has been a very stable place where both have found homes for their existing talents, and discovered talents they never knew they had.
Independents: Awards Driven
What can we learn from the winners of film festivals? Perhaps what drives each lauded story from Fade In to The End; or how each film’s engine differs from the others in competition? Bill Martell attends the 17th Annual Raindance Film Festival in London to find out.
10 Things a Rep Will Never Tell You
Do you really want to know? Are you sure? Because Jim Cirile, and a host of reps, are ready to tell you why neediness isn’t endearing, there’s no market for your masterpiece, if a script hasn’t sold yet it likely never will, and seven other daunting truths.
So, what subjects would you like me to cover in the new year? I'm about to start my article for the May issue, and have no idea what it will be about.
- Bill
TODAY'S SCRIPT TIP: What's The Plan, Man? - and planning your 2010 writing to get things done!
Yesterday's Dinner: Pizza. Frozen. Cardboard.
SCRIPT SECRETS STORE
Top 10 Films About Underpants T Shirt: SALE $9.99
Monday, January 4, 2010
New Script Tips
Today, Monday January 4th, starts two weeks of new Script Tips over on my website. Example films include MOON, ADVENTURELAND, AVATAR, and that Oscar contender YEAR ONE (plus many others). I'm hoping to fill out the rest of the month with page one rewrites on tips that haven't run since 2002.
This is the Script Secrets website's TENTH YEAR - and what began as a site that mostly existed as a way to call attention to my (still out of print) book, has become some sort of monster! We may hit 400 Script Tips this year... and I'm down to fewer than 50 tips in the "garage". If I get all of that stuff done, that will be 400 tips at about 2,000 words each (about a book chapter) for a total of about 10 screenwriting books (actually more than that). Free.
I can tell you that the new script tips will not end in two weeks, because I have already written some more new tips that will be scattered over the rest of the month... and hope to keep some new ones popping up in February and March. I may also put off the tip I was going to run tomorrow for a new tip I'm working on that will be a better blast off for the new year.
- Bill
IMPORTANT UPDATE:
TODAY'S SCRIPT TIP: That's Episodic! - and one of 2009's worst films: YEAR ONE.
Yesterday's Dinner: Three Brothers Chinese in Pleasant Hill - Shanghai Porkchops.
Bicycle: No - I'm home for the holidays without a cycle, but I walked a few miles to burn off some of this holiday weight.
SCRIPT SECRETS STORE
Top 10 Films About Underpants T Shirt: SALE $9.99
Movies: AVATAR - I saw AVATAR with a couple of old friends over the holidays... and everybody wants to know what I thought of it. We saw it in 3D but not in IMAX - I’m not really a fan of IMAX showings of movies not shot in that format - and the first thing I would say to anyone who hasn’t seen AVATAR yet but is planning on it, is to see it in 3D. I’ll get to the reason why in a minute. My friends - one is an award winning documentary film maker who actually won an award for a film he made last year, and the other is a theatre (stage) director in the San Francisco Bay Area (oh, and a produced playwright, too) - and both of them liked AVATAR more than I did. That doesn’t mean I disliked it, just that these two guys wanted to race out and buy a ticket for the next showing... and I thought I might see it again... sometime.
Wait... but what did I think of it? Well, someone at the New Years Eve party I went to asked me that, and here’s how I answered...
Story-wise, AVATAR isn’t anything new - it’s basically the same story as DANCES WITH WOLVES and THE FAST AND THE FURIOUS (which also co-starred Michelle Rodriguez). We have our young soldier going undercover to bring down an enemy. In F&F he hooks up with the enemy chief’s sister, in AVATAR he hooks up with the enemy chief’s daughter. In F&F there’s another member of the gang who does not accept him... until he proves himself, and in AVATAR it’s the chief’s daughter’s fiance who doesn’t accept him until he proves himself. In both films our undercover guy reaches a point where he isn’t sure what side he’s on - he’s left the reservation and gone native. In F&F the undercover guy has a foot in both camps until he realizes that he has to take down the enemy... but tries to find a way to do it without hurting his new friends too much. In AVATAR the undercover guy has a foot in both camps until he comes to realize his side is wrong... and he joins the enemy side to take down his own people. That’s more like DANCES WITH WOLVES. But the story follows the path created by other movies without ever veering too far into the jungle.
And the dialogue in AVATAR is just there to get it from one point to the next, nothing as cool and memorable as “You have to look with better eyes than that.” from THE ABYSS, but also nothing as awful as “Jack, this is where we first met!” from TITANIC... though the name of the planet and the mineral they are mining come damned close. Mostly the dialogue is just there. Sometimes it’s the most obvious thing to say, but it’s never just awful. I wish someone had been brought in to make it more clever, more memorable, more interesting... but we just get bland and average dialogue.
While they were rewriting the dialogue they could have taken care of some of those nagging little things like the military not firing a nice big missile in one of the end battles, but flying some sort of barge filled with pallets of C4 and just dumping them on the Navi stronghold. Sure, there was that line of dialogue about how missile guidance systems didn’t work in that region, but we fired missiles long distances and hit targets long before we had guidance systems... and the helicopter missiles seemed to work okay in that region. This stuff needed some work!
Same can be said for the characters - we kind of get the same major characters as in ALIENS, just taken from the other side. We have the Corporate Creep who will do anything to make sure the company makes a big old bag of money - Giovanni Ribisi playing the Paul Riser role. We have our gung-ho military guy who has all kinds of nice weapons for use in close encounters - Stephen Lang playing the Michael Biehn role. We have a scientist who starts out a company flunky and ends up saving the day - Dileep Rao playing the Lance Henrickson role (Dileep’s second scene stealing role after working for Sam Raimi in DRAG ME TO HELL). And we have the bad-ass babe soldier - Michelle Rodriguez from FAST AND THE FURIOUS playing the Jenette Goldstein role. Plus the guy who panics and the protective mother alien and, of course, Sigourney Weaver. Everybody does okay with what they are given, and even though we are often missing some character shading, each character serves their purpose and even has that little scene where they shine. Basically, “okay” but not “great”... so what the hell is good about AVATAR?
The world.
I have a Script Tip in rotation called “Take Us Someplace Cool” about the importance of taking the audience into an interesting world, whether it’s the world on con men or the world of wizards or that world in LORD OF THE RINGS... and this is where AVATAR gets bonus points. For two and a half hours you are not on Earth... you are in a very real alien world filled with all kinds of interesting details. It’s like watching a National Geographic special that takes you somewhere that humans have never seen before... maybe the bottom of the ocean. In fact, so many of the elements of this world look like things you would see on a voyage to the bottom of the sea... and Cameron has been down there... that I suspect that world was the main inspiration for “Pandora”.
The trailer, in 2D, made it look like a bunch of blue cartoons running around. Watching the movie in 3D I believed that these were living creatures. And there were a million different types of creatures and plants and birds and... well, it was like a travelogue - which is another mark in the plus column. We got to experience a world completely unlike our own - to be somewhere else for 2.5 hours. Complete escape.
That’s one of the things some writers may underestimate - creating that world that is a complete escape from reality. Many writers think that screenwriting is about the facts, about reality... but that’s what *journalism* is. Screenwriting, from Melies' magical silent films to Lang’s Mabuse spy films and METROPOLIS to STAR WARS and James Bond, movies are traditionally not reality. They give us larger than life stories and exciting fantasies. It’s “Let’s Pretend” on a mass scale. Kids play cops & robbers and cowboys & indians and all kinds of fantasy role-playing games... and movies offer the same thing without the wooden horses. Creating that world that provides an escape into an exciting fantasy world is *job one* for a screenwriter - and AVATAR’s fantasy world is rich in details... plus, just about everybody is nekkid except for a loin cloth and way too much neck jewelry on the women.
AVATAR is an *experience*.
That’s why you have to see it in 3D... it’s not so much a story as a chance to live in another world for 2.5 hours... and 3D makes that world seem as if it is all around you. You could reach out and touch it. None of the 3D is DR TONGUE”S HOUSE OF 3D BEEF with gotchas and paddle-balls zooming out of the screen, the 3D in AVATAR is just used to create depth. Took me a while to get used to it, but after a while the 3D was a natural part of being immersed in this world. Cinders from a fire float down on you. Seed pods float on aircurrents past your head.
I’m saving some of the AVATAR stuff for a new Script Tip, but here’s one of the things that was a stroke of genius: A big problem I have with story notes is that you are damned if you do and damned if you don’t - there is no “yes” in the word “notes”. If you don’t motivate a character to do something unusual, you will get a note about it. But if you *do* go to the trouble of creating a motivation for a character to do something that is “movie stupid” like going into that haunted house where the legend has it a dozen people were brutally killed, you’ll get the note “We don’t really need that, it’s a movie convention that high school kids go into the haunted house - no explanation required!” So you end up with more stupid unmotivated high school kids walking into a house where no one has ever walked out alive. I would rather have them motivated - and always make sure anything that a normal person would not do has some reason behind it. The audience may not go into that death house themselves, but when a character with some sort of *reason* goes inside, instead of thinking “They’re complete idiots” they think “That’s a mistake”. Hey, people make mistakes. You can still care about someone who makes a mistake... but someone who does something downright stupid? They deserve whatever happens to them.
So, a major element that allows us to understand why Jake Sully would want to keep going back to the Navi world and even turn against his own people... is that wheel chair. That’s one of the things that pulled me into that fantasy world and made the blue cartoons into *people*. When Sully can walk again as a Navi... and then starts *running* with his new Navi legs... it’s something I can completely understand. That was a great moment - a big emotional human moment (even though the dude was a blue alien at that point). When Sully keeps going back - even though the Navi world becomes less attractive - I completely believed it because he *had legs* as a Navi. He could walk, run, climb! And if you had to choose between a world where you could walk and a world where you were a physical person who could no longer be physical - which would you pick? Even though you may not personally turn against the humans invading the planet, you can *understand* why Sully might. The military guy promises if Sully helps bring down the Navis they will give him the best doctors available to try to get his legs working again... but as a Navi he already has legs right now. Making Jake Sully an injured soldier in a wheel chair is one of those little things that pays off big time.
There were *many* other great visual things in the film - places where a picture really was worth a thousand words. Easy for some writers to miss those things and focus on the bland dialogue. But the main thing that AVATAR has going for it - the reason why it seems some people may be seeing it again (it is the third fastest movie to make $300m domestic... and is just broke $1 *billion* worldwide) is the world it takes us into. That escape into an interesting place we have never seen before, filled with wonder and details and all of those things we watch National Geographic to experience. It’s a 2.5 hour vacation... and I suspect if I were to see it again I would notice all kinds of things about that planet that I missed the first time. It is a film rich in detail... and somebody *created* that world and those details.
Somebody *wrote* that.
- Bill
This is the Script Secrets website's TENTH YEAR - and what began as a site that mostly existed as a way to call attention to my (still out of print) book, has become some sort of monster! We may hit 400 Script Tips this year... and I'm down to fewer than 50 tips in the "garage". If I get all of that stuff done, that will be 400 tips at about 2,000 words each (about a book chapter) for a total of about 10 screenwriting books (actually more than that). Free.
I can tell you that the new script tips will not end in two weeks, because I have already written some more new tips that will be scattered over the rest of the month... and hope to keep some new ones popping up in February and March. I may also put off the tip I was going to run tomorrow for a new tip I'm working on that will be a better blast off for the new year.
- Bill
TODAY'S SCRIPT TIP: That's Episodic! - and one of 2009's worst films: YEAR ONE.
Yesterday's Dinner: Three Brothers Chinese in Pleasant Hill - Shanghai Porkchops.
Bicycle: No - I'm home for the holidays without a cycle, but I walked a few miles to burn off some of this holiday weight.
SCRIPT SECRETS STORE
Top 10 Films About Underpants T Shirt: SALE $9.99
Movies: AVATAR - I saw AVATAR with a couple of old friends over the holidays... and everybody wants to know what I thought of it. We saw it in 3D but not in IMAX - I’m not really a fan of IMAX showings of movies not shot in that format - and the first thing I would say to anyone who hasn’t seen AVATAR yet but is planning on it, is to see it in 3D. I’ll get to the reason why in a minute. My friends - one is an award winning documentary film maker who actually won an award for a film he made last year, and the other is a theatre (stage) director in the San Francisco Bay Area (oh, and a produced playwright, too) - and both of them liked AVATAR more than I did. That doesn’t mean I disliked it, just that these two guys wanted to race out and buy a ticket for the next showing... and I thought I might see it again... sometime.
Wait... but what did I think of it? Well, someone at the New Years Eve party I went to asked me that, and here’s how I answered...
Story-wise, AVATAR isn’t anything new - it’s basically the same story as DANCES WITH WOLVES and THE FAST AND THE FURIOUS (which also co-starred Michelle Rodriguez). We have our young soldier going undercover to bring down an enemy. In F&F he hooks up with the enemy chief’s sister, in AVATAR he hooks up with the enemy chief’s daughter. In F&F there’s another member of the gang who does not accept him... until he proves himself, and in AVATAR it’s the chief’s daughter’s fiance who doesn’t accept him until he proves himself. In both films our undercover guy reaches a point where he isn’t sure what side he’s on - he’s left the reservation and gone native. In F&F the undercover guy has a foot in both camps until he realizes that he has to take down the enemy... but tries to find a way to do it without hurting his new friends too much. In AVATAR the undercover guy has a foot in both camps until he comes to realize his side is wrong... and he joins the enemy side to take down his own people. That’s more like DANCES WITH WOLVES. But the story follows the path created by other movies without ever veering too far into the jungle.
And the dialogue in AVATAR is just there to get it from one point to the next, nothing as cool and memorable as “You have to look with better eyes than that.” from THE ABYSS, but also nothing as awful as “Jack, this is where we first met!” from TITANIC... though the name of the planet and the mineral they are mining come damned close. Mostly the dialogue is just there. Sometimes it’s the most obvious thing to say, but it’s never just awful. I wish someone had been brought in to make it more clever, more memorable, more interesting... but we just get bland and average dialogue.
While they were rewriting the dialogue they could have taken care of some of those nagging little things like the military not firing a nice big missile in one of the end battles, but flying some sort of barge filled with pallets of C4 and just dumping them on the Navi stronghold. Sure, there was that line of dialogue about how missile guidance systems didn’t work in that region, but we fired missiles long distances and hit targets long before we had guidance systems... and the helicopter missiles seemed to work okay in that region. This stuff needed some work!
Same can be said for the characters - we kind of get the same major characters as in ALIENS, just taken from the other side. We have the Corporate Creep who will do anything to make sure the company makes a big old bag of money - Giovanni Ribisi playing the Paul Riser role. We have our gung-ho military guy who has all kinds of nice weapons for use in close encounters - Stephen Lang playing the Michael Biehn role. We have a scientist who starts out a company flunky and ends up saving the day - Dileep Rao playing the Lance Henrickson role (Dileep’s second scene stealing role after working for Sam Raimi in DRAG ME TO HELL). And we have the bad-ass babe soldier - Michelle Rodriguez from FAST AND THE FURIOUS playing the Jenette Goldstein role. Plus the guy who panics and the protective mother alien and, of course, Sigourney Weaver. Everybody does okay with what they are given, and even though we are often missing some character shading, each character serves their purpose and even has that little scene where they shine. Basically, “okay” but not “great”... so what the hell is good about AVATAR?
The world.
I have a Script Tip in rotation called “Take Us Someplace Cool” about the importance of taking the audience into an interesting world, whether it’s the world on con men or the world of wizards or that world in LORD OF THE RINGS... and this is where AVATAR gets bonus points. For two and a half hours you are not on Earth... you are in a very real alien world filled with all kinds of interesting details. It’s like watching a National Geographic special that takes you somewhere that humans have never seen before... maybe the bottom of the ocean. In fact, so many of the elements of this world look like things you would see on a voyage to the bottom of the sea... and Cameron has been down there... that I suspect that world was the main inspiration for “Pandora”.
The trailer, in 2D, made it look like a bunch of blue cartoons running around. Watching the movie in 3D I believed that these were living creatures. And there were a million different types of creatures and plants and birds and... well, it was like a travelogue - which is another mark in the plus column. We got to experience a world completely unlike our own - to be somewhere else for 2.5 hours. Complete escape.
That’s one of the things some writers may underestimate - creating that world that is a complete escape from reality. Many writers think that screenwriting is about the facts, about reality... but that’s what *journalism* is. Screenwriting, from Melies' magical silent films to Lang’s Mabuse spy films and METROPOLIS to STAR WARS and James Bond, movies are traditionally not reality. They give us larger than life stories and exciting fantasies. It’s “Let’s Pretend” on a mass scale. Kids play cops & robbers and cowboys & indians and all kinds of fantasy role-playing games... and movies offer the same thing without the wooden horses. Creating that world that provides an escape into an exciting fantasy world is *job one* for a screenwriter - and AVATAR’s fantasy world is rich in details... plus, just about everybody is nekkid except for a loin cloth and way too much neck jewelry on the women.
AVATAR is an *experience*.
That’s why you have to see it in 3D... it’s not so much a story as a chance to live in another world for 2.5 hours... and 3D makes that world seem as if it is all around you. You could reach out and touch it. None of the 3D is DR TONGUE”S HOUSE OF 3D BEEF with gotchas and paddle-balls zooming out of the screen, the 3D in AVATAR is just used to create depth. Took me a while to get used to it, but after a while the 3D was a natural part of being immersed in this world. Cinders from a fire float down on you. Seed pods float on aircurrents past your head.
I’m saving some of the AVATAR stuff for a new Script Tip, but here’s one of the things that was a stroke of genius: A big problem I have with story notes is that you are damned if you do and damned if you don’t - there is no “yes” in the word “notes”. If you don’t motivate a character to do something unusual, you will get a note about it. But if you *do* go to the trouble of creating a motivation for a character to do something that is “movie stupid” like going into that haunted house where the legend has it a dozen people were brutally killed, you’ll get the note “We don’t really need that, it’s a movie convention that high school kids go into the haunted house - no explanation required!” So you end up with more stupid unmotivated high school kids walking into a house where no one has ever walked out alive. I would rather have them motivated - and always make sure anything that a normal person would not do has some reason behind it. The audience may not go into that death house themselves, but when a character with some sort of *reason* goes inside, instead of thinking “They’re complete idiots” they think “That’s a mistake”. Hey, people make mistakes. You can still care about someone who makes a mistake... but someone who does something downright stupid? They deserve whatever happens to them.
So, a major element that allows us to understand why Jake Sully would want to keep going back to the Navi world and even turn against his own people... is that wheel chair. That’s one of the things that pulled me into that fantasy world and made the blue cartoons into *people*. When Sully can walk again as a Navi... and then starts *running* with his new Navi legs... it’s something I can completely understand. That was a great moment - a big emotional human moment (even though the dude was a blue alien at that point). When Sully keeps going back - even though the Navi world becomes less attractive - I completely believed it because he *had legs* as a Navi. He could walk, run, climb! And if you had to choose between a world where you could walk and a world where you were a physical person who could no longer be physical - which would you pick? Even though you may not personally turn against the humans invading the planet, you can *understand* why Sully might. The military guy promises if Sully helps bring down the Navis they will give him the best doctors available to try to get his legs working again... but as a Navi he already has legs right now. Making Jake Sully an injured soldier in a wheel chair is one of those little things that pays off big time.
There were *many* other great visual things in the film - places where a picture really was worth a thousand words. Easy for some writers to miss those things and focus on the bland dialogue. But the main thing that AVATAR has going for it - the reason why it seems some people may be seeing it again (it is the third fastest movie to make $300m domestic... and is just broke $1 *billion* worldwide) is the world it takes us into. That escape into an interesting place we have never seen before, filled with wonder and details and all of those things we watch National Geographic to experience. It’s a 2.5 hour vacation... and I suspect if I were to see it again I would notice all kinds of things about that planet that I missed the first time. It is a film rich in detail... and somebody *created* that world and those details.
Somebody *wrote* that.
- Bill
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