Movie Trailer: “Argo” Screenplay by Chris Terrio, based on an article by Joshuah Bearman IMDB site Release Date: 12 October 2012 Comment Archive
Video Interview: Joss Whedon Via THR: “It’s all about figuring out just enough for everyone, because too much is going to throw people, and at the same time, you don’t want to leave anybody in the cold. It really is just hard work figuring out structurally how they’re going to matter,
TED Talk: J.J. Abrams — Part 2 Today Part 2 of J.J. Abrams 2007 TED Talk about the mystery box: My grandfather was the guy who got me into this sort of thing. He would also supply me with tools. He was this major encourager to make stuff and he got me a Super 8 camera
Screenwriting 101: Philip Dunne “If you get an idea in the middle of the night, it’s a good idea to get up and write it down, or it’s gone. There’s a famous story about a writer who always swore he got up and wrote his ideas down. He had a wonderful
Daily Dialogue — May 8, 2012 LATER. Travis and Betsy are in TIMES SQUARE, turning the corner from Broadway to 42nd Street. Travis carries the album under his arm. They approach the garish marquee of a large midtown porno theatre advertising “The Swedish Marriage Manual”. The box office is flanked on both sides by glass cages
Upcoming Screenwriting Master Class courses In April, we saw some wonderful successes in our SMC courses. In Pages I: The First Draft and Pages II: Rewriting Your Script, writers used those workshops to make great strides on their stories. In Prep: From Concept To Outline, that sold-out class generated some of the best constructive
“Brave”: A look at two key characters In a recent /Film article about the upcoming Pixar movie Brave, they included the studio’s descriptions of two key characters: King Fergus and Queen Elinor, the mother and father of the story’s Protagonist young Merida. If you read these descriptions carefully, you can get some sense of the
‘The Avengers’: Seven lessons of Marvel’s box-office success Although nobody may have predicted The Avengers would smash the record for opening weekend domestic B.O. with an eye-popping final total of $207M, one thing is always predictable: Whenever a movie does really, really well, or really, really poorly, we can expect to see articles like this one
Screen full-length documentaries online… for free! The Documentary Channel has a bunch of docs streaming on their website you can see online for free including Kurt Cobain: About A Son: Kurt Cobain: About A Son is an intimate and moving meditation on the late musician and artist Kurt Cobain, based on more than 25 hours of
TED Talk: J.J. Abrams — Part 1 TED Talk (Part 1): J.J. Abrams In 2007, J.J. Abrams (Alias, Lost, Super 8) gave a TED Talk. I’m sure many of you have seen it. However, like many great presentations, much of what could be valuable as a writer drifts away into the ether. So for
On Writing “Perhaps writing opens up a parallel universe into which, one by one, we’ll move all of our dearest memories and rearrange them as we please.” — André Aciman
Daily Dialogue — May 7, 2012 Rachel: You in television? Will: Am I in television? No. Everyone else is in television. I watch television. Rachel: Right, right. So you’re more in front of it than in it. Will: In it, yeah. Will (V.O.): It was torture. For five minutes I realized what life would
“The Avengers”: What did you think? Unless you’ve been living in a cave, you must be aware that The Avengers debuted in the United States and Canada this weekend, smashing the record for the biggest B.O. opening weekend ever with an astonishing $200.3M [estimated]. Combined with sales in international markets, the movie has
Star Wars Main Title Theme (Vocal Cover) From musician Nick McKaig: Notes on the recording: This is my tribute to the most amazing film composer ever to live, Mr. John Williams! The recording is 100% vocals and 100% my own voice, including over 90 tracks and more than 300 hours of production time. Vocals were recorded using
Screenwriting Advice From The Past: Action [Part 3] If you are a screenwriter, you should know about Anita Loos. Loos was one of the most influential writers in the early stages of American cinema, associated with 136 film projects per IMDB. Married to writer John Emerson, the pair wrote one of the first books on screenwriting in 1920:
Screenwriting News (4/30–5/6/12) Michael Arndt (Little Miss Sunshine) to rewrite “Catching Fire,” the sequel to the Hunger Games for Lionsgate. Henry Bromell (“Homeland”) to direct untitled Fellini project from his own script for Mad Chance Productions. Brandon Camp (Love Happens) sells untitled country & western music drama romance pitch to New Line. John
Daily Dialogue — May 6, 2012 EXT. MARSHLANDS — EARLY EVENING Mills sees Somerset coming and pulls Doe so that Doe stands. JOHN DOE (quietly, watching) Here he comes. MILLS (shouts to Somerset) What the fuck is going on? JOHN DOE (to Mills) I want you to know, I wish I could have lived like you do.
Daily Dialogue theme for next week: First date After a week’s worth of revelations [thanks to Alexander Gorelik for the suggestion], next week the theme is First Date! It’s an interesting suggestion by churnage, one I thought would be pretty easy to fill out, but then when I started to dredge through my movie memories, I
“Hey, writers: Are you enjoying your story?” So late last night I tweeted this: “Hey, writers: Are you enjoying your story?” Here are some responses I received: @anya_fennec: Very much @LordZoma: I’d be having more fun if I could figure out where all the animals are hiding. @PDwight1: Livin Large!! So Large!! @JulianRamos_: Sure am!
Written Interview: Brit Marling Interview via IndieWire with writer-actress Brit Marling (Another Earth, Sound of My Voice). Excerpts: I saw “Sound of My Voice” at Sundance over a year ago. What’s it like to be doing press for this film, so long after the fact? I really think that for some reason
Saturday Hot Links Back for another weekly installment of Saturday Hot Links! Today: We Remember “The Wire” Edition We start with a nod to you left-handers who deserve better. Mandate partners Joe Drake and Nathan Kahane start a new prod co: Good Universe. 20 years ago [April 29, 1992], the L.A.
Scene Description Spotlight: “Zombieland” One of the most important things a writer wants to do when they begin a script is establish the story’s tone — and this is nowhere more important than with a cross-genre movie. A great example is Zombieland (2009). Written by screenwriters Rhett Reese & Paul Wernick, the movie
Daily Dialogue — May 5, 2012 Gwen: Richard, just tell me what is going on! Larry comes down the stairs, dragging Bernie’s body by the leg. Larry: Look honey, Bernie’s dead, the guys that killed ’em are now after us, can we hide out at your place or what? Larry throws down Bernie’s
Writing Question: Tools for writers? Writer Ben O’Rourke and I were talking the other day, and he mentioned two new mind mapping apps: iThoughtsHD MindMeister Some people’s brains are wired to think visually, so it could be helpful to use mind mapping applications. For instance, here is a mind map of the story
