The GITS Club Treatment Challenge: How to write a treatment

So on Monday I posted an idea: The GITS Club Monthly Treatment Challenge:

Each month, we invite TGC members to write and submit a 2-page treatment of a story they plan to write or have written as a full-length movie screenplay. One treatment will be selected in a process to be determined by TGC membership and Mike. I will read that treatment, then post an analysis of it, just like I do when participants submit a story synopsis at Screenwriting Master Class. 

What’s the value? (1) Writing a treatment is a skill all aspiring screenwriters should master. Hopefully the process of writing them and resulting analysis will help. (2) Writing a treatment forces the writer to work out key plot points and dynamics in the story, thereby advancing their understanding of their story. (3) Feedback from me as well as TGC members and GITS readers can confirm areas of the story’s strengths and weaknesses, as well as provide ideas to improve it.

Folks responded well, so I say let’s give it a shot. 

How to write a treatment? Here are three posts that dig into the subject:

How do you write a professional story treatment.

What does a good treatment look like.

What is a treatment versus an outline.

The thing is just like there’s no one right way to write a script, there’s no one right way to write a treatment. For guidance, consider what two pros have to say about the subject. First screenwriter Ron Bass:

Everything I write is in three acts, and I actually start with three pieces of paper. I have some notion of where each act begins and ends before I get to this stage. I know my people and I know roughly about how many scenes each act should be. I start from the beginning and end of an act, working forwards and backwards toward the middle. I know that somewhere there’s going to be a moment of this, a moment of that, and it’s like a matrix. I don’t work with cards, just one page per act. When I finish three acts, I page budget. I want to know I can tell the story in a distance that’s appropriate. And I’m rarely more than ten pages off.

Then TV writer Lee Goldberg:

For a movie treatment, you’re selling the characters and their story. At this point, you’re trying to sell the broadstrokes…they can pay you to work out the rest. Write up a punchy over-view of what happens in the story, as if you were writing a review of a great movie (only minus the praise). You want to convey the style and tone of the movie. But don’t go into great detail. Keep it short, tight and punchy.And whatever you do, DON’T include camera shots or dialogue.

Don’t fixate on treatment format, because there isn’t one. Tell your story in the style that works best for you. Don’t worry about whether the character names are in capitals or not (it doesn’t matter). Concentrate on telling a strong story.

For The TGC Treatment Challenge, I’d say simply this:

* Title

* Logline

* Story synopsis

For the synopsis, I suggest spending the first third setting up characters and main plot conceit, the next third laying out the 4–6 key story dynamics / subplots that play out in Act Two, and the final third wrapping up how the story ends and what it means to the main characters, especially the Protagonist.

Nothing more than 2–3 pages.

To post on TGC, go here.

Time frame for this first run:

11/15–11/30: Interested participants write and post treatments on TGC. One treatment selected.

12/1–12/7: My week to read and analyze the treatment.

12/8–12/14: Post treatment and analysis on TGC and GITS for general review and feedback.

Good luck!