Writing Movies For Fun And Profit! (32 page)

The Alpha Monster, Spike, pounces on Josh. He didn’t get on the boat. And in midpounce, in slow motion: Pierre knocks him into the sea. The Evil Monsters are all gone.

As the sun comes up, the survivors come out of hiding. The surviving snowbirds say, “Well, we’re certainly never coming back here again.” The locals say, “You know what? That’s okay.”

And it looks like Josh is gonna stay here on the island — with his new girl. Well, not new — they’ve known each other for 20 years …

The camera cranes up, and we see that all of the destruction wreaked by the monsters took out most of the corporate CHAIN STORES. The Jamba Juice, the Coffee Bean … they’re all wrecked, while most of the old structures are STILL INTACT. Except for some rubble and a few fires, Main Street looks like it might have looked a hundred years ago.

FADE OUT.

THE END

Your heart is racing and your legs are burning as you LEAP from the burning rope bridge to the hatch of SPACESHIP 44-7. “Well done, my young friend,” shouts Professor Kirby as he slams the hatch behind you, “I thought I’d lost you forever to Zo-Kochal and his henchmen!” The THUNK-THUNK-THUNK of arrows hitting the hull of the ship echos through the chamber as the ship’s jade/magnetic engine kicks in and your stomach drops.

You catch a glimpse out the porthole—below you, the Nasca Lines, stretching out in sun-bleached stone for as far as the eye can see. Eagles, tortoises, shapes that only can truly be understood from a mile above. “You were right all along,” adds the professor. “No one believed that these really were landing strips for these spacecraft, until your wonderful book report—the same one that brought you to my attention and started us off on this adventure.”

“Thanks, Professor,” you say as your hand meets his for a hearty handshake, “but I think my next report might be even more controversial: the one about where we’re going!”

“If you’ve learned anything about the Space Incas, my young friend,” says the professor with a wink, “you know that a better question might be—
when
are we going?”

Your laughter is interrupted when your cell phone buzzes in your pocket. You answer it and hear the familiar voice of Gary, the vice president of production at the studio.

“Hey, my young friend!” Gary from the studio yells over the din of jade spinning in the engines. “We’ve all been over the last draft of your book report about the Nasca Lines and how they’re landing strips for Inca spacecraft, and we’ve decided we need some FRESH EYES.”

You hang up the phone, stunned, gasping for breath, and yes:
YOU ARE FIRED.

Turn to page 59.

THE CREDITS AT THE END OF A MOVIE—and what they mean. (If you write movies, you should know this stuff.)

DIRECTED BY:
The movie is “their vision.” They are in charge of EVERY creative decision on set. They are the captain of the ship. Even when the person who hired the DIRECTOR (the STUDIO) wants something done on set, they can’t just say, “I want Lindsay Lohan to bowl here.” The STUDIO has to tell the DIRECTOR to say, “I want Lindsay Lohan to bowl here.” Then the DIRECTOR makes Lindsay bowl, or they’re fired.

WRITTEN BY:
Low man on the totem pole. Often not even allowed on set. Even if the movie you wrote is YOUR life story, when THE STUDIO, THE DIRECTOR, or LINDSAY LOHAN tells you to write a bowling scene—you better write a bowling scene. Or they’ll hire some new guys to write your life story.

PRODUCED BY:
Usually the one who hired EVERYBODY. The star, the DIRECTOR, the writers. After shooting begins, they remain on set as creative consultant—a VOICE-IN-THE-MIX. However, they are the VOICE-IN-THE-MIX-WHO-MUST-BE-LISTENED-TO. They usually sit by the monitors, watching every take (either knitting or Googling showbiz gossip, depending on their age and sex). When they see something they want to change, they tell the director. The DIRECTOR has to either do it, talk them out of it, or quit.

EXECUTIVE PRODUCERS:
Tricky one to define. Technically, they are THE BOSS. The EP is usually the one who got the ball rolling on the project, conceiving it, finding the source material, hiring the DIRECTOR and/or star and even the other producers. Some EPs oversee every aspect of every single production. And there are EPs on the
Night at the Museum
movies we never even met. Never even met.

DIRECTOR OF PHOTOGRAPHY:
He decides how the movie is going to be filmed— the camera angles, the lenses. He conceives the lighting of the movie. Either the DIRECTOR tells the DP what he wants or the DP tells the DIRECTOR what he’s going to do.

PRODUCTION DESIGNER:
Creates the look of the movie, from the design of the set to the design of the hair, wardrobe, everything. They usually have to PITCH their looks to the producer and the DIRECTOR, through blueprints and designs.
Because without their approval, the production designer doesn’t get the money to BUILD anything.

EDITOR:
Takes the footage and puts it together into a movie. They usually do a pass themselves, then the DIRECTOR comes in and reedits it with them, until the DIRECTOR thinks it’s perfect, then the STUDIO comes in and either HATES the cut and reedits it (sometimes firing the editor) or LOVES the cut and wants it to be an hour shorter.

COSTUME DESIGNER:
Designs the costumes, then is in charge of the costume department. But everything has to be approved by the DIRECTOR, STUDIO, and sometimes the MOVIE STARS.

MAKEUP AND HAIR DESIGNER:
Designs the looks of the makeup and hair and then is in charge of all the makeup and hair people during shooting.

MUSIC BY:
Wrote the original score for the sound track.

CO-PRODUCER:
Usually a line producer, in charge of the budget. Also the “bad cop” in charge of hiring and firing people. The co-producer usually has an actual OFFICE, in the production office in Hollywood or Burbank, while the producers are miles way, at their swanky offices in Beverly Hills, and the executive producer is in Cannes or Monte Carlo or jet-setting around with Al Gore. Sometimes the co-producer has done more actual WORK on a movie than all of the producers and executive producers combined.

CASTING BY:
The casting agent SUGGESTS what stars should be in the movie, arranges the auditions, brings in the actors who they think are right for the part for the DIRECTORS and producers to see, and then arranges their deals and becomes the schedule liaison with the talent. But the DIRECTOR and producers are the ones who ACTUALLY make the casting decisions. Sometimes the casting director’s job is to just DO WHAT THE DIRECTOR SAYS: get who they tell them to get.

CAST:
The actors in the movie. Arranged by the size of their role or sometimes— for political reasons—in order of appearance.

At this point in the credits, there’s sometimes a card that says something like:

A SUCH-AND-SUCH PRODUCTION

That is the PRODUCER’S PRODUCTION COMPANY.

UNIT PRODUCTION MANAGER:
Sort of a line producer, but their job is 100 percent to oversee the COSTS of a film: they look at the budgets, make sure every department is staying on budget, and walk around on the set looking tense and staring at their watch. They make sure everyone fills out their cost reports and that those cost reports are accurate and UNDER budget. The GOOD UPMs are real ball busters, and everyone hates them. Except the producer.

FIRST ASSISTANT DIRECTOR:
Probably the most important person on set. If the DIRECTOR is Tom Hanks in
Saving Private Ryan,
“The First,” or 1st AD, is Tom Sizemore. The DIRECTOR mumbles something about “moving on to the next setup”—the 1st GETS IT DONE. They crack the whip, stay on schedule, and communicate every idea from every department to EVERYONE ELSE. They make sure that everyone knows what’s going on. They have heart attacks early, and everyone on set but the DIRECTOR HATES THEM. (If they’re any good.)

MUSIC SUPERVISOR:
They select and license music (find out who to pay for music and then pay for it) for the movie. Good ones can MAKE a movie. They are walking music libraries—the good ones LOVE EVERY KIND OF MUSIC and know so much about music they are borderline autistic.

FIRST ASSISTANT EDITOR:
The editor will spend months, even YEARS in a dark room watching the same footage over and over. He will come to hate the film. He will come to fear the editing room. Everyone will yell at him when things aren’t going well and take the credit when the movie looks good. The editor is Frodo Baggins. The movie is the RING OF DOOM. And the FIRST ASSISTANT EDITOR is their Samwise Gamgee. He will be the editor’s only friend, their support, their confessor. He will manage the editor’s materials, get them coffee, and fill out all of the paperwork. Editing is a lonely job. It takes two.

CAMERA OPERATOR:
The guy who PHYSICALLY moves, points, and operates the camera. Some DPs are camera operators. Some are not and hire a CAMERA OPERATOR to shoot the movie for them. The DP tells them where to put the camera, how to move it, what lens to use. The camera op does it. Needless to say, all camera ops strive to become DPs. DPs try to CRUSH that desire out of them so that they will always work for them.

And here’s a relatively new credit in the camera department that will be coming up more and more:

STEREOGRAPHER:
Now that many films are in 3-D, you need a person on set responsible for JUST THAT ASPECT of the film—the “stereo” of the two lenses creating the depth. This person sits at a 3-D monitor with 3-D glasses on much of the day, fiddling with the beam splitter and making little adjustments to the shot. Love looking at trippy stuff in 3-D? This might be the job for you.

PRODUCTION SOUND MIXER:
They sit by the sound equipment mixing board— LISTENING. They makes sure the right mikes are on and that all of them work during the take. Sometimes they MIX the sound as the scene is playing, turning one actor’s mike up and another one’s down as the scene goes along— DJ-ing. But no one told them to do that, and in the final mix, everyone ignores the “LIVE MIX” the PSM did on set.

SCRIPT SUPERVISOR:
Sits at a monitor, script in hand, and makes sure that the words coming out of the actors’ mouths are the same ones written down in the
script. Sometimes they also help check continuity: “He was holding his cigarette in his left hand, not his right.” Or “The writer says they’re about to go visit Batman, but Batman died three scenes ago.”

SUPERVISING ART DIRECTOR:
Makes sure that the set construction team, the set decoration team, and the art department all know what one another are doing. And that the director and producer know what they’re doing, and like what they’re doing. And that they’re ALL keeping under budget.

GAFFER:
Head of the electrical department. He’s in charge of the electrical generators, the lights, the cables, and all the guys who move all that stuff around. When the DP wants to move a light, the gaffer does it—or, more correctly said: TELLS SOMEONE UNDER HIM TO DO IT. He wires the lights, moves the wires. If it plugs in—DON’T TOUCH IT unless the gaffer told you to.

KEY GRIP:
In charge of the grip department. Head grip. The grip bossman. He tells all the other grips what to do.

GRIPS:
Work with the lighting and camera department, putting stuff where it’s supposed to be and battening it down. If at first you have trouble telling the difference between the surly, tattooed anarchist electricians and the surly, tattooed anarchist grips, just remember: that grips don’t get to plug anything in. And they get hammers.

DOLLY GRIP:
The train tracks that they put a camera on, to move smoothly across a room (for a dramatic push-in) or to follow a stagecoach and a bunch of Apaches across Monument Valley for a stagecoach chase—that’s the dolly. The track has to be perfectly smooth and perfectly level. And who lays the track? Hard-drinking Irishmen, like in the olden days? The dudes in charge of laying down the track, pushing the camera along the track, and then packing the track up again are called dolly grips. And some of them are hard-drinking Irishmen, yes.

CRANE OPERATOR:
Operates the big CRANE that the camera is on, for fancy swooping overhead shots.

SET DECORATOR:
Puts all of the finishing decorations on the set: the glassware on the tables, the throw rugs, the pillows, the paintings.

IF IT’S BUILT INTO THE SET: It’s set design.

IF IT’S PLACED ON SET: It’s set dec.

IF AN ACTOR PICKS IT UP DURING THE SCENE: It’s a prop.

PROPERTY MASTER:
In charge of all the props for a film. (“Prop” is short for “property.”) They buy them, rent them, build them, and sometimes design them (under the oversight of the DIRECTOR, PRODUCER, and PRODUCTION DESIGNER). The prop master and their crew is always on set: they hand the actors the props right before they shoot and take them away right after the shot is done, so that the props are safe. If there are GUNS in the movie, they make
sure the guns are fake or unloaded, and they show the actors and the 1st AD that the guns are safe or unloaded before they EVER hand an actor a gun. Every time.

COSTUME SUPERVISOR:
They make sure that the costume department is under budget and has all of the costumes it needs—including costumes for EXTRAS and DOUBLES of costumes that might get damaged or wet in scenes. They do a breakdown of every scene in the movie—who’s in it and what they are wearing.
VFX SUPERVISOR:
Supervises the VFX (Visual Effects). The ones that are done LIVE (EXPLOSIONS and stuff) and the CG ones. They make sure that the right people are hired to achieve the special effects, to pull off the VISION of the DIRECTOR (and the STUDIO and the studio’s MARKETING DEPARTMENT). They make sure that the right people are on the job and that they are doing it on schedule and under budget.