Reader Question: What is the market viability of a time travel screenplay?
An open forum question via email from JMay:
Hey, Scott. Long time reader, often commenter. Been busy for awhile, so I haven’t been contributing as much but still reading regularly. Question:
Is a Time Travel story that takes place mostly in the future a hard sell because it’s a “period” piece? I have a story that I’ve been researching for awhile and I think I really can nail it (outlining and prewriting process finished and promising). I know often you say WRITE A GOOD STORY and the rest will work itself out, but you also emphasize writing what’s marketable and selling.
Basically, I wrote two scripts (among others) that I felt were very strong, stand out stories. They have strong protagonists, emotional depth, and even plot. The feedback I’m getting confirms this, but I keep hearing that they are not marketable for various reasons (period piece, downer, war movie, etc). Part of my reason for starting the process on this script was to come up with something more marketable. I figured Time Travel would lead to an action thriller with explosions, set pieces, and the like, which it has. But, as much as I am passionate about writing it and feel it’s going to be great, I keep getting this feeling I might end up with a third script with “great writing but no marketability.”
Thoughts on Time Travel movies if given a fresh take?
JMay, first question: Do you really love the time travel story idea? I mean, really love it? So much that you can’t wait to type FADE IN, you see the story in your head, you hear the characters, the very thought of it gets your pulse racing?
If you’re anywhere near that level of passion for the project, there’s only one thing to do:
WRITE IT!
As much as I ‘preach’ marketability on GITS, a writer’s passion is equal in importance and depending upon the story perhaps even more important… because if that passion comes through on each printed page, that can totally sweep up a script reader.
Per the status of time travel movies just now in Hwood, I don’t think there’s been an edict sent down from on high declaring them fabula non grata. And if memory serves correct, there was a little movie last summer that had a time-travel element in it that seemed to do — [cough] $257M box office [cough] — all right for Paramount:
Interestingly Wikipedia lists 187 pages on time travel movies.
So let’s look at the evidence: (1) Star Trek, which had a time travel element in it, did gangbusters at the box office. (2) Hollywood has a long history of time travel movies.
No red light there.
Unless a GITS reader is the personal assistant of Elrond the Studio Exec and Clan Leader, and they report here that they heard directly from the Pointy-Eared One screaming at a Monday morning creative meeting, “Gawd, no more f***ing time travel movies!”…
I wouldn’t sweat it.
Besides unless you’ve come up with a story concept that is so obviously a commercial one — like The Hangover which is still in my estimation the single best concept for a movie I’ve heard in years — all other ideas exist in a gray area of “you hope so, but you just don’t know.” Again this is where your passion comes into play. If you have to write this script and as long as it’s not something obviously non-commercial — like a comedy about Nazi puppy killers — then I say write it.
Question to GITS readers: Have I ever told the story about my reaction when Tom Hanks’ ‘people’ told Burg & Myers about a story Tom loved that would eventually become the Academy Award-winning movie Forrest Gump? If not, let me know. It has some relevance to JMay’s underlying point about marketability. And also shows just how wrong I can be!
UPDATE: Okay, so in 1993, Burg & Myers had a meeting with Tom Hanks’ ‘people’ (in this case a development exec with Hanks’ production company). And the exec was telling us all the projects Tom had in development including one he was getting ready to shoot. “It’s about this guy who as a boy has polio, but then magically learns how to run really, really fast, so that he ends up being a star football player for the University of Alabama football team, then gets drafted and goes to Vietnam where he meets this guy Bubba who teaches Forrest — that’s the name of the Protagonist — about shrimp, but then Bubba gets killed, and Forrest gets a medal for saving the life of his superior officer Lt. Dan, who actually wants to die, then Forrest learns how to play ping-pong — really, really well — so he becomes like this ping pong champion in China, then he takes up jogging and everybody in the country gets crazy about jogging, and did I tell you he meets the President, actually two Presidents?”
I walked out of that meeting, turned to Andy, and said, “That is the stupidest f***ing idea for a movie I’ve ever heard.”
Which goes to show that you never really know whether you’ve come up with a great idea for a movie — unless you’ve come up with The Hangover.
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