Saturday Hot Links

The 131st installment of Saturday Hot Links.

Today: The Stax Records Soul Explosion Edition!

11 of God’s biggest hits at the box office.

Related: What Christians get wrong about Hell.

Related: What does heaven look like in movies [videos].

How paperbacks transformed the way Americans read.

Saturday Night Live celebrates its 40th anniversary with a TV special.

Artists have structurally different brains.

Richard Dreyfuss returns to Hollywood, but not to stay.

The surprising science of yawning.

The most beautiful movies of all time [video].

The memorable last words of literary characters.

Photographer uses Star Wars figurines to depict a day in the life of a stormtrooper.

Relate: Star Wars characters dancing to pop songs [video].

11 of the best customer service stories ever.

Jack White breaks record for world’s fastest studio-to-store record.

Here are 175 movies made by female filmmakers.

36 life-changing poems everyone should read.

Why the death of Gabriel Garcia Marquez is a loss for the world of film.

When will the Big One strike California.

Watch these films and learn about other cultures.

The original theme song to “Pokemon” performed as a soulful slow jam [video].

Hollywood’s highest paid executives: Who made bank, who sank in 2013.

New York Times launches mobile app, subscription service.

Tarantino supposedly doing a second draft of The Hateful Eight.

Powdered alcohol is coming to a liquor store near you.

Related: 10 things you might not know about wine.

1st quarter 2014: Movie ticket prices slid 5%.

April 20–26 is International Dark Sky Week, so check out these photos of what city nightscapes could look like.

Simon Kinberg talks ‘Star Wars’ spin-offs, Marvel crossovers and ‘Fantastic Four’ reboot.

5 perennial vegetables to plant once and enjoy forever.

Transcendence flopped, but more movies about singularity may be in the offing.

Men and women have very different nightmares.

Check out some of the projects on Steven Spielberg’s slate.

25 books every writer should read.

The Playlist: The 40 most anticipated films of this summer.

7 traits of successful entrepreneurs.

Watch the first 5 minutes of How to Train Your Dragon 2 [video].

9 ways music can improve your life.

Want to know how many characters died in your favorite movies? This website has the answers.

15 signs you’re a narcissist.

Screenwriter by day… go-go dancer by night.

8 writing strategies for people who say they can’t write.

David Foster Wallace estate opposes Jason Segel, Jesse Eisenberg movie.

12 discontinued Boy Scout merit badges.

Hollywood agencies shift TV toward indie film model.

21 wonderful words for wind.

Matt Weiner talks about Vincent Kartheiser, the star of my movie Alaska… er, I mean Mad Men.

My God, the new book publishing paradigm is like the Wild West leading to bizarre stories like this.

Screenwriter sued for making Henry James adaptation too personal.

This writer attended Robert McKee’s seminar and took copious — and colorful — notes.

The brainstorm that transforms teenagers into adults.

Highlights from Aaron Sorkin’s Tribeca Film Festival appearance.

Are you an intolerable intellectual.

The Steven Spielberg three step guide to rejection.

The most famous book set in each state.

8 tips on how to make a micro-budget action film.

Stephen Colbert says good-bye to Jon Stewart [video].

The 30 most evil movie computers.

You know you want it: A $1000 ice cream sundae.

20 things you didn’t know about E.T. the Extraterrestrial.

21 things you didn’t know about the movie Rushmore.

Tom Petty shares his secrets to songwriting: Honesty and timelessness.

Quentin Tarantino’s lawsuit against Gawker dismissed, but can be refiled… which I guess would be a sequel.

IYMI: Stephen Colbert appears on David Letterman… passing of the torch.

AT&T, Chernin Group invest $500M in over-the-top video venture.

The art of “creative sleep”: Stephen King on writing and wakeful dreaming.

TotalFilm: 50 greatest HBO characters.

This is a Coen brothers bit, right: Angry turkeys take their rage out on Minnesota motorists.

Slashercast: Weekly podcast about horror films.

8 foods you’ve been eating all wrong.

Lee Goldberg exposes fraudulent ‘writer’: James Strauss and his Fake Writing Credits.

Watch Jon Oliver drop by to see Jon Stewart and tell him how much better HBO is [video].

20 great debut films from female directors.

Can you really be left-brained or right-brained.

10 great overlooked films from the 70s.

With the World Cup approaching: GQ with the true fan’s guide to getting hooked on soccer.

Related: Latest kick-ass Nike soccer commercial [4 minute extended version].

Does the name Clyde Bruckman ring a bell? TheDissolve tells you why it should.

Wonder why they’re making a sequel to Mrs. Doubtfire? One big reason is because of this.

So “that scene” from the latest GOT episode gets a nice parody treatment… script-wise.

Paul McCartney to perform the last concert in Candlestick Park.

Not that we really need this, but Friday the 13th is being rebooted as a movie and becoming a TV series.

How Indiana Jones forced Hollywood to create the PG-13 rating.

9 words created by spelling other words backwards.

Nashville Film Festival award winners here.

10 hilarious anti-drug films you can watch right now [video].

5 reasons teenagers act the way they do.

What the movie Her tells us about ourselves: A conversation.

Find a new tune, damn it! Management complaining about unions… again.

Finally, these HBO Go ads are the best thing you will see this week: Awkwardness of watching sex scenes with your parents [videos].

Actually there is nothing better than watching Otis Redding performing “Try a Little Tenderness”.

Screenwriting Master Class tip of the week: Here is an opportunity to learn about two archetypes that are generally the most important characters in your story — Protagonist and Nemesis — in two upcoming Craft classes I’ll be offering in upcoming weeks:

April 28: Craft: Create a Compelling Protagonist

Making your Protagonist “sympathetic” or finding your Protagonist’s “flaw” is all well and good… if you want to write a surface level character. In this 1-week online screenwriting course, you will learn how to dig deep into a Protagonist to discover personality dynamics that can make a multidimensional lead character.

• See why the Protagonist represents the very soul of your story and how their psychological journey is the source of the script’s emotional meaning.
• Workshop your story’s Protagonist to uncover not only their unique persona, but also how their Want and Need define the narrative arc.

Seven lectures, forum feedback, insider tips, 90-minute teleconference, and the opportunity to workshop your story’s Protagonist [or Protagonists].

Plus if you’re a fan of the movies Bridesmaids, The Social Network and Up, we’ll be using those as our study scripts. They offer a diverse set of Protagonists and yet the approach we will study next week shows how a writer can craft such compelling and different lead characters.

May 12: Craft: Write a Worthy Nemesis

There is nothing like a well-drawn Nemesis to enliven a screenplay by functioning as a worthy foe to the Protagonist. In this 1-week online screenwriting course, you will discover key principles to help you craft a Nemesis who goes beyond the stereotypical Bad Guy to a living, breathing, and powerful antagonist figure.

• Learn how to think of the Nemesis as a projection of your Protagonist’s shadow and why this relationship is pivotal on so many narrative fronts.
• Use proven principles to workshop your Nemesis, discovering their world view, and learning how to embrace it when you write this character.

Seven lectures, forum feedback, insider tips, 90-minute teleconference, and the opportunity to workshop your story’s Nemesis [or Nemeses].

Plus we will be analyzing movies such as Jaws, Fatal Attraction, The Silence of the Lambs, The Apartment, One Flew Over the Cuckoo’s Nest, Die Hard and many others to delve into the subject matter.

You can take just one of the classes, but I crafted them to be partner courses with complimentary content. So register now:

Create a Compelling Protagonist (April 28)

Write a Worthy Nemesis (May 12)

As I always say, you don’t need to spend a dime to learn the craft of screenwriting. Watch movies. Read scripts. Write pages. That can get you where you need to go.

However I can speak with confidence that SMC courses can expedite your learning process, provide you with key principles and practices which elevate your writing, and give you insights into the business of Hollywood to help prepare you for working in the industry.

As always, I look forward to the opportunity to work with you.

Onward!