Why This is Good

There was something about the atmosphere in the theater last night, or I guess I should say this morning, that gave Eclipse a head start on seeming like it was going to be a great movie. At the theater I went to, every single screen was showing Eclipse. The place was crawling with women (and a few men) ranging in age from 7 to 50, wearing various forms of Team Edward or Team Jacob shirts, many simply emblazoned with pictures of Jacob’s famous abs (and that includes the men).

With my 15 year-old-sister-in-law in tow to make my 29 year-old self feel less weird for going, I settled in eagerly to watch the third installment in the Twilight series. My sister-in-law and I had just finished a marathon night of watching (for the third or fourth time) the first two movies, and for good measure, and my own professional need to analyze the success of the adaptation, reading (for the third or fourth time) the book that this movie was based on, as well as the new spin-off novella The Short Second Life of Bree Tanner.

We were pumped and ready when the movie began, and we were not disappointed. Of course the movie varied from the book, but as I explained in my first commentary on the first Twilight film, it did so in absolutely necessary and appropriate ways that didn’t take anything away from the story. Eclipse is probably the most visually dynamic, action-packed, and riveting of the four books, but even still it, like the other 3 takes place primarily in Bella’s bedroom, Jacob’s garage, or somewhere at school. As much action as there is, it’s incredibly dialogue-heavy.

All the books are filled with talking and thinking and feelings. The first about how much Bella loves Edward, and how good looking he is, the second about how much she misses Edward, and how good looking he was, the third about how conflicted she is over her feelings for both Edward and Jacob, and how good looking they are. These concepts work well for books aimed at teenage girls (and teenage girls at heart) but would make terribly boring films. So the writers make necessary changes to get the characters outside and moving. Eclipse did this wonderfully, and the resulting film was still true to its emotional, love triangle roots while packing in enough action to keep even those few poor men who weren’t there for Jacob’s muscles, satisfied.

When you strip away the trendiness and teeny-bopper aura surrounding this film, and lay aside your prejudices about not wanting to like something so many others do, what you’re left with is a great story. Of course it’s campy, and yes the vampires sparkle, which makes them seem a little lame, and it still suffers from some incredibly wooden dialogue and poorly delivered lines like its predecessors did (Sorry Dakota Fanning but I didn’t buy your “Decisions, decisions.”) But overall, I think it was a great movie, full of everything that makes a great movie.  It’s got romance, love triangles, and intense suspense and action. There are dozens of characters to relate to, all with understandable motivations and complex feelings based on fascinating backgrounds. The tension between many of the characters ups the intensity of the drama, and there is an incredible sense of danger, even to those of us who know how it’s going to turn out, that sustains the action and fighting sequences and will keep audiences on the edge of their seat, eagerly anticipating more than just the next shot of the shirtless werewolves.

Wherever you are on the Twilight spectrum, from a devoted Twi-hard who proudly wears their Team Edward shirt to the midnight showing of each new movie to someone who passionately detests the whole phenomenon as a writer, you must take into consideration why these books and films have become such a huge part of our culture and what about these stories elicits such strong emotion from audiences.  It’s rare that a series of books generates an entire subculture of true fans, rather than just people who enjoyed the story. Not since Harry Potter have books appealed so widely to teenagers and adults, and created cult followings that defied the conventions of pop culture.

For full disclosure, I’ll say that, as embarrassing as it is for this 29 year old who formerly considered herself to be a literary snob to admit, I fall much more in the Twi-hard category. I don’t own any Twilight-themed apparel, but I did pre-order my tickets for the midnight showing of Eclipse several months ago.

If you haven’t been paying attention to this craze, or, like I did, consider yourself too intellectual or sophisticated to buy something made for teenagers, I urge you to give it a try. Come to the sparkly side. It’s not all bad and if you leave your prejudices against liking something everyone else likes at the door, you might actually have fun. Because, there is always a reason why a story appeals to mass audiences and creates such fervor, and it’s all too easy to dismiss a popular movie by saying it simply appeals to the lowest common denominator. There’s more here than just teenagers (okay and adult women) with crushes on Robert Pattinson and Taylor Lautner. They worship these idols not just because they’re good looking, but because they’re Edward and Jacob. With or without those abs, the fans would have adored  any competent actor, because they are already so enamored of the stories.

But why? What can you as a writer learn from Stephenie Meyer’s enormous success? The stories are nothing groundbreaking. The writing is meant for teenagers and thus overly simplified, at times trite, and not even close to great literature. The story is nothing new, it’s just a creative twist on the classic star-crossed lovers and love triangle paradigm set in the familiar vampire genre. The books even make self-referential commentary on Romeo and Juliet and Wuthering Heights. But once again, this story model proves itself to be compelling, fascinating, with a timeless quality that resonates with readers and viewers.

I believe the success is due to several factors. The characters, the story and the genre. Whatever you think of K-Stew, read the books and you’ll love Bella. She is instantly relatable to anyone who’s ever felt like an outsider, and awkward new kid, or someone who just doesn’t fit in with everyone else. She’s clumsy, awkward, and uncomfortable in her own skin. She falls deeply and illogically in love at first sight, something most of us can relate to because it has either happened to us (probably as teenagers) or we hope it will. The stories are told from her perspective, so we live them through her. And that is the most important thing a writer-any writer, screen or page, can do. To make your audience relate to the character so much so that they feel that they are living the story with them, experiencing every emotion with the lead, is the ultimate way to elicit an emotional response in your audience. For more on how to do this check out my article:  Creating Heroes your audience will like, and Michael Hauge’s article: Desire.

One of the simplest things about a screenplay should be the act of beginning and ending it. Yet, I constantly see writers, especially those who haven’t heeded my warning to read lots of screenplays, begin and end their scripts incorrectly.

Beginning a script is very simple. It should always start with FADE IN: left justified, all on it’s own line. From there, start with your first scene heading and description. That’s all you need. Easy! And easy to remember as Fade In is the name of a screenwriting magazine.

Playwrights, novelists, and just writers with a flare for the dramatic tend to go nuts on the last page, instead of properly, formally adding a subdued, FADE OUT, or FADE TO BLACK, they emblazon the last page with giant versions of “The End” or “FIN.” Don’t do that, don’t get cutesy, it’s not needed.  If you like the whole effect of The End and feel a reader might mistake your FADE OUT. for a simple scene transition, go ahead and put it in, but stay in format. After you write FADE OUT., space down three lines and simply put THE END, underlined centered and in all caps of the same font size.

Though it’s true, as with all the formatting recommendations I will ever give you, that if your screenplay is the most brilliant, marketable, commercial, guaranteed-success that was ever penned (or typed I guess I should say), no one will care one tiny bit about whether you put FADE OUT. demurely in Courier 12 point  or THE END in bright pink size 96 Impact font, it’s still best to stick with the rules and try to appear professional.

Now that you know how to begin your script, you have no excuse for writer’s block or fear of the blank page. Go type FADE IN: and get started!

(O.S.), (O.C.) and (V.O.) are three acronyms you will see next to a character’s name above dialogue. There is a little confusion regarding them as I often see them misused, or more often, not used when they should be.

(O.C.) and (O.S.) are interchangeable. They mean Off Camera and Off Screen, respectively. Use these when a character isn’t seen but is heard. For example, if your scene takes place in the kitchen, and a character is calling out from a bedroom. We would hear them but not see them, because they are in another room, or off screen.

(V.O.) stands for Voice Over and is completely different. A voice over is narration that is generally not heard by the characters. A voice over narration might explain certain things to the audience as the film is opening, or alert them to details about a past event. You can easily tell whether dialogue is a voice over or just off camera by determining whether or not the characters can hear the dialogue being spoken. Of course, there are times when a film plays with these conventions, such as Stranger Than Fiction, where the character can hear what would really be a voice over. In that case you know it’s a voice over, because the narrator is not simply in another room or location off camera, they are not present in the scene.

I dislike parentheticals for many reasons. First of all, writers tend to overuse them to direct emotion. In my post on Don’t do the actor’s job, I explain that, unless it’s very unclear, you don’t need to tell an actor how to read a line. They’ll get it, and don’t appreciate being told something obvious. Actors are skilled in what they do and will take direction from the director when needed, but don’t need the writer indicating the emotion they should put behind each and every line. I hate seeing a script where each and every line has some adverb or adjective trying to control the way the line will be said.

The other use for parentheticals is to put action description into the dialogue. There is some controversy here and some coaches and writers will tell you this is a good thing and you should do it. I personally do not like to see action description crammed into the dialogue. There is an entirely separate, defined place for action description, and to me, it belongs in the action description paragraphs, not hidden within the dialogue in excessive parentheticals.

For example, I constantly see this:

MARY
Where did you find this?
(picks up a bottle of perfume)
This was my mother’s, but we lost it.

Instead, put the action description where it belongs, like this:

MARY
Where did you find this?

She picks up a bottle of perfume.

MARY
This was my mother’s, but we lost it.

Again, it’s not a hard and fast rule, but it is a style preference that I am very particular about. To me, it clutters up the dialogue, rushes important action, and makes the script harder to read. Putting the action on its own line where it belongs makes for a smoother, clearer read.

There are two instances when I think parentheticals are warranted. First is when you have a large group, and a character is speaking to a specific person within the group.

Like this:

INT. HOUSE-NIGHT

Birthday party in full swing. Guests mingle. Joe approaches a circle where Dustin, George, Amy and Mike are talking.

JOE
(to George)
What are you drinking?

This makes it clear that he’s addressing George, since he could have been talking to any one of the people in the circle.

The other time I feel using parentheticals is okay, is when you truly need to indicate to the actor how to read the line because it is entirely unclear in the context of the story and the character. It’s very rare that this is necessary, because even when sarcasm is in use, it’s quite rare that an actor couldn’t figure out what the character would mean and what tone they would put behind a line. But occasionally, it’s necessary. As a rule, limit parentheticals to only a few per script. Like three, in the entire script. Not three per page.

Margins, which may seem boring, are crucial for making your screenplay look professional. These formatting rules are not arbitrary, they’re in place to keep scripts consistent, so that, for the most part, they’ll read at a page per minute. If you tweak the margins, any reader will instantly notice. When you’re used to seeing the standard screenplay format, any slight deviation is instantly recognizable, and marks you as either an unprofessional amateur, or someone trying to cheat the system.
Any good screenwriting program will have these margins set automatically, but they will also allow you to change and adjust them, so make sure you keep yours in line with these guidelines. If you’re trying to write a script in Word, I sincerely pity you and hope you have a lot of patience. I wouldn’t recommend it, but if that’s all you can afford to do, there are ways to set the tabs and make it a little more automatic. Just google for some tips on how to do that.
Here are the official margins:

Scene headings and action description: 1.5” on the left, 1” on the right-about 6” wide.

Dialogue: 3” on the left, 2” on the right-about 3.5” wide.

Character names: 4” from the left

Parentheticals: 3.5” from the left (and on their own line!)

Top margin-1”

Bottom margin-1”

Okay so we have the whole INT./EXT. thing down. Now comes the rest of the slug line. From what I have seen there is definitely some confusion and controversy as to what is appropriate to include in a slug line. I see everything from INT. BAR-NIGHT to INT. DIMLY LIT DIVE BAR-BACK ROOM-LATE EVENING and every variation in between. Personally, I prefer the former, with the information about it being a dimly lit dive bar included in the action description. But I’m not right and there aren’t really hard and fast rules for this. I would caution you to trim down your slug lines to somewhere in between if you’re the type that’s inclined to include a ton of information in them. It’s hard to read a long slug line, and I don’t think a reader will spend that much time reading every word in it, they’re more likely to skim over the slug lines to get basic information, and may miss that it’s a dimly lit dive bar in their haste to read the action description and dialogue.

The other overlong slug lines I see are like this: INT. MARY’S HOUSE-MARY’S BEDROOM-CLOSET-NIGHT. I hate these because they’re pointless. Clearly we’re in Mary’s house if we’re in Mary’s bedroom’s closet. Why not just say INT. MARY’S CLOSET-NIGHT, or better yet, INT. CLOSET-NIGHT? You don’t need to specify the greater overall location that is the house each and every time the closet is mentioned. If you want to make the transition from outside to the closet seem less abrupt, include an establishing shot of the house before we move into the bedroom, but don’t try to accomplish this all via slug line.

The next scene heading sin that I personally dislike is the use of CONTINUOUS or IMMEDIATELY FOLLOWING or MOMENTS LATER as a time indication. To me, unless you state otherwise, the fact that one scene follows the next is implied. If the time has not changed, just leave off the time indication altogether, and don’t stick it back in until significant time has passed. It’s not mandatory, and it irks me to see INT. CLASSROOM-DAY followed by INT. CAFETERIA-DAY and then INT. LIBRARY-DAY, and EXT. PLAYGROUND-DAY, it gets redundant and unnecessary.

In fact, you can further condense the slug lines down to one word whenever possible. In my opinion, you only need to repeat the part of the slug line that has changed as you go from one scene to the next.

For example, if we’re in this school, instead of repeating the entire slug line from INT. to DAY in each new scene, start with INT. CLASSROOM-DAY, and then condense the subsequent slug lines down to just the element that has changed-CAFETERIA, LIBRARY. Only because we’re now moving to the outside, EXT. PLAYGROUND. Until the time changes, leave that off. It’s simple and clean, and still abundantly clear to the reader.

I’d like to take some time now to focus on the very basic elements of screenwriting-formatting. Format seems simple and straightforward, something you can learn in any book, or that Final Draft will just do for you, but it’s much more complex, and developing an understanding of the basics of formatting will help you learn how and where you can play with the rules to give your scripts their own unique style.

The first element of formatting is the slug line or scene heading. This is a simple, one liner that describes the scene. The slug line tells us whether we’re inside or outside, where we are, and what time of day it is.

A slug line is formatted like this: INT. PLACE-TIME or EXT. PLACE-TIME

That’s it. It shouldn’t be more complex than that. It’s so easy but often so misused and misunderstood.

A slug line starts with INT. or EXT. These are meant as basic cues to alert the crew as to whether the scene will be shot (or will need to look like it was shot) inside or outside. It helps with lighting, equipment, etc. It’s either going to be one or the other. I often see INT./EXT. used and I rarely feel that is necessary. Almost every single location on the face of the Earth is either inside or outside, and not both at the same time. There are probably a few exceptions, but most of the time I see writers use this when they just want to make one big scene with people moving in and out of locations, so the slugs should actually be more specific and change when the scene goes from inside to outside.

The other fun mistake writers make with INT./EXT. is this:

INT. INSIDE THE BAR-NIGHT

or

EXT. OUTSIDE JOE’S APARTMENT-DAY

Hopefully you all see the redundancy in these slugs. Since interior means inside, there’s no need to then state that we are inside, and the same goes for exterior/outside.

When reading a screenplay for a client, I often find myself utterly confused by the barrage of new characters introduced in the first few pages. Since I’m being paid to comment on and analyze their script, I diligently take notes on each new name, description, and role, and refer back when it gets confusing. The problem is that a reader assigned 50 scripts, whose task it is to find a gem, not help you improve your writing, isn’t going to go to the trouble of doing this. If they get confused and lost in your menagerie of creatively named characters, they’ll just forget it, give you a big fat pass, and move on to the next script in the stack.

So while it may seem like silly minutiae, how and when you introduce your characters is an important element to consider. Here are my tips for doing it properly, avoiding confusion, and making the reader’s life easier:

-Introduce characters one at a time. Particularly if you have several “main” characters. Give each one their own, distinct opening action. Spend a half a page, or at the very least, a full paragraph before you introduce the next major character. Don’t string together a long list of names and descriptions all in one block of action description and expect anyone to keep it straight. Even if your story requires that multiple characters be introduced in rapid succession in some sort of group setting, like a party, a classroom, an office or a poker game, do it one at a time, so the reader can learn each person’s name and traits in turn.

-Introduce characters performing action. No one should just be sitting, standing, or walking. Introduce the character as he or she is doing something distinct and memorable. If your female lead is introduced while fielding a phone call, typing up an email, and busily signing documents thrown at her by her assistant, and the supporting friend character is introduced while filing her nails with her feet up on the couch watching TV, we’ll be able to remember and distinguish the two because their actions are so distinct and contrasting.

-Give them different names. As someone with a unique name myself, it helps me to remember characters who have different, distinct, and appropriate names. Not everyone needs to be named Tallulah or Xavier, but the names need to be varied. You can’t have an entire cast of characters with names pulled from the most popular names of 1993 list. A cast full of Michael, Chris, Jessica, Ashley, Sarah, Josh, Samantha, Emily and Tyler all sound too similar. Give some characters normal, realistic names-some can be named Mike or Brittany, as long as the others are named something more odd, like Misty, Queenie or Brenton. Give some characters quirky nicknames, or unique, out of fashion names.  Give other characters descriptive, memorable names that help us associate them with one of their dominant traits, like Red, Doc, or Captain.

-Don’t name every character. The most confusing thing you can do is to give every single bit part a full first and last name. If a waitress is only going to be in one scene in your film, her name is Waitress, it is not Cheryl Adams. If a character is going to appear in a minor speaking role two or three times, a first name will suffice. Even the major players don’t really need last names most of the time. Unless it’s a very important part of the story or will come up at a crucial moment, I don’t think anyone but maybe your lead needs a last name at all. It’s just one more thing for the reader to remember, and it doesn’t matter a single bit to the story 99% of the time. In most scripts I read, the last name is never mentioned after the initial introduction, so it clearly doesn’t matter to the story.

-Don’t give characters names starting with the same letter, sound, or number of syllables. Your reader will be confused if your two leads are named Dylan and Damian, Ashley and Allistair, or Monique and Martin. Two names that sound similar, like Bob and Rob, Will and Bill, Sarah and Sharon, can get really confusing. Ideally, no two characters names should start with the same letter. At the very least, no two main characters should have similar names.

-Use baby name websites and books for unique ideas on character names. This site is awesome, it lets you search by letter (so you avoid characters with the same sound), popularity, and meaning. It also has a section with tips for writers naming characters.

Many of us go into the world of screenwriting because we love film, television, writing, or all of the above. The love of film and story is a great motivator and a wonderful dream to pursue, but, I caution all new screenwriters to make sure you know more than just screenwriting. If all you know is film and writing, what will you write about?
Broaden your experiences in college, and in your careers. Don’t just take writing and film classes, and don’t only intern or work for a studio. While those experiences are valuable and important to your writing career, it’s equally important that you live, travel, study and work in many different industries. The more experience you have in different parts of life, the richer and more exciting your writing will be. Few successful films are about the industry itself (though they exist-see Adaptation, Sunset Boulevard, Swimming with Sharks, etc.) but are about other things. So take a pottery class and a world history class. Volunteer at a homeless shelter or a retirement home. Work in an office, a fast-food place or a bank, not just at Blockbuster or your local movie theater. Don’t spend all your free time reading scripts and watching films. Watch documentaries, go outside and watch the sunset, and read any and every different type of book you can. Learn about as many different things as possible, and your writing will reflect your broad knowledge of the world, not your intense study of cinema.