Writing Movies For Fun And Profit! (7 page)
Read Writing Movies For Fun And Profit! Online
Authors: Thomas Lennon,Robert B Garant
•
Trim any long speeches
. Go watch one of your favorite movies. You’ll notice—there
AREN’T many long speeches
. The longest speech in
Star Wars
is Leia’s “Help me, Obi-Wan Kenobi” speech. It’s only about 1½ minutes.
And it’s ALL THE PLOT YOU NEED for all three
Star Wars
films
. In
Casablanca,
Rick’s longest speech is his “You’re getting on that plane” speech. It’s about 1½ minutes. If your screenplay has any speeches longer than 1½ minutes, make sure they are better than Humphrey Bogart’s “You’re getting on that plane” speech. If you have TWO speeches that long—
cut one entirely
.
Then, when there’s nothing left to cut and your script is
still
115 pages … CUT ANOTHER FIVE PAGES. We do a thing we call
WORD TETRIS:
go through your script, and take out WORDS that make one line of action or dialogue into two lines.
Change:
“Bob takes his hand from his pocket for Tom to shake. Tom shakes it.”
To:
“Bob offers his hand to Tom, who shakes it.”
If you go through an entire script doing this, you can cut
FIVE PAGES from your script without cutting a single thing
!
2. Make sure your script is formatted correctly.
There is a standard format for screenplays (as well as a standard format for SITCOMS, ONE-HOUR DRAMAS, etc.). Here’s what a standard script looks like.
note where the TRANSITIONS, SCENE HEADINGS, CHARACTERS, ACTION, DIALOGUE, and PARENTHETICALS go.
Transitions go here, like this:
FADE IN:
Then you write your SCENE HEADING, describing where the next scene is taking place. Like:
EXT. [
exterior
] A SEEDY BROTHEL — CAIRO — NIGHT
INT. [
interior
] SEEDY BROTHEL — CONTINUOUS
you write the action here. Keep your action to the point. No one wants to read long paragraphs of slow, superdetailed description. Save that for your romance novel:
RICK (mid-40s) enters.
RICK
Rick’s dialogue goes here.
Rick looks out the window, bored with this scene.
RICK (CONT’D)
(to himself)
I thought this was a brothel. When is something interesting going to happen?
CUT TO:
EXT. [
ESTABLISHING SHOT
] THE PENTAGON — DAY
INT. THE PENTAGON — CONTINUOUS
Several HIGH-LEVEL GENERALS stand around a map.
GENERAL SMITH
(furious)
Get me Rick Manderson — pronto!
The General’s attaché, TIFFANY (20), blond and VERY stacked, picks up the phone and dials.
CUT TO:
INT. SEEDY BROTHEL — CONTINUOUS
Rick answers the phone.
RICK
Moshi moshi?
TIFFANY (O.S. [
off screen
])
Please hold for General Smith.
INTERCUT:
INT. THE PENTAGON — CONTINUOUS
GENERAL SMITH
(into phone)
Where the hell are you, Rick?
RICK
Where the hell do you think I am? I’m in a seedy brothel in Cairo. The same one where you and I …
He trails off. OFF HIS LOOK, we …
DISSOLVE TO:
FLASHBACK:
EXT. CESSNA — HIGH ABOVE THE ATLANTIC—1967
INT. CESSNA — CONTINUOUS
“Come Fly with Me” plays. A strapping, shirtless YOUNG RICK (18 years old) flies the plane, sitting in a YOUNG GENERAL SMITH’S lap.
DISSOLVE BACK TO:
INT. SEEDY BROTHEL — PRESENT DAY
Rick wipes a tear from his eye.
etc., etc.
Some studios have formats they REQUIRE you to use. Their requirements are varied and
very
technically specific. Some studios want you to double-space the line before the SCENE HEADING. Some have specific MARGINS and headings for you to use.
For example, 20TH CENTURY FOX requires this layout:
Under the Document menu, choose Page Layout.
In the
Margins
tab you will see your top and bottom margin options. These must be set at:
Top 1.12” (For the Mac) 1.13” (For a PC)
Bottom 1.00”
Header and Footer Margins should both be .50”.
In the
Options
tab you will see your line spacing options. This must be set at
normal
.
Under the Format menu, choose Elements …
In the
Font
tab, make sure all fonts are set to Courier 12.
In the
Paragraph
tab, you need to check each of the elements by going down the list on the left and checking the margins (or “indents”) on the right.
Element |
|
|
General |
|
|
Scene Heading |
|
|
Action |
|
|
Character |
|
|
Parenthetical |
|
|
Dialogue |
|
|
Transition |
|
|
Shot |
|
|
Please note that the latest versions of Final Draft … have slightly different defaults than earlier versions. For the most part they have shifted the margins by ¼” on the left and adjusted the right so that the actual measurement is the same.
The following newer Final Draft defaults are also acceptable under Fox format.
Note that you are allowed to change the dialogue element to the more generous 4” measurement if you wish.
Element |
|
|
General |
|
|
Scene Heading |
|
|
Action |
|
|
Character |
|
|
Parenthetical |
|
|
Dialogue |
|
|
Transition |
|
|
Shot |
|
|
Under the Document menu, choose More & Continueds.
For the Dialogue breaks options please check mark the following:
Bottom of page for the (MORE) label.
Top of next page for the (CONTINUED) label
(upper caps preferred).
For the Scene breaks options please check mark the following:
Bottom of the page for the (CONTINUED) label.
Top of next page for the CONTINUED: label
CONTINUED (#)—
(This function will do a page count for a scene.)
Title Page
The preferred font is Courier. Use 24 point size for the title and 12 point for the rest of the page.
WARNER BROS. has a few rules of its own:
WARNER BROS. STANDARD SCRIPT FORMAT
Stage direction and shot headings
(also known as slug lines) have a margin of 1.7” on the left and 1.1” on the right. Remember
TWO BLANK LINES PRECEDE EACH SHOT HEADING.
Dialogue
has a left margin of 2.7” and a right margin of 2.4”.
Character names over dialogue
have a left margin of 4.1”.
Parenthetical direction
within dialogue has a left margin of 3.4” and a right margin of 3.1”
Scene/shot numbers:
When a script is numbered in preproduction, the left number is placed 1.0” from the left edge of the page and the right scene number is placed 7.4” from the left edge of the page.
Top page margin
is .5” (3 single lines) before the page number. A single blank line separates the page number from the body of the script, which begins with either a CONTINUED: or a new shot heading/slug line.
Bottom page margin
is at least .5” (3 single lines) following the (CONTINUED) or the end of a scene.
Total page length
is a maximum of 60 lines, including page number and CONTINUEDs (but not including the 3 line margin at the top and bottom of the page).
Paper size
is 8.5” wide and 11” long.
Font
is 12-point Courier New.
Etc., etc.
It’s complicated, right? That’s why you should …
GET A SAMPLE SCRIPT FROM THE STUDIO
.
Ask your reps to get it for you. AND (advice of the obvious):
MAKE YOUR SCRIPT LOOK LIKE THE ONE YOU GOT FROM THAT STUDIO
.
Again, the best formatting software, as we’ve said, is:
Final Draft! www.finaldraft.com
See
Chapter 1
, “Getting Started in Hollywood.” You should have bought Final Draft by now. We can’t stress it enough. This software is a NECESSITY. If you are serious about writing a screenplay—BUY IT. Online is the easiest way to buy it. Do it. Now. We’ll wait for you.
• • •
See! Final Draft practically formats your script for you. You can set it to whatever format you’re writing—SCREENPLAY, WARNER BROS. SCREENPLAY, SITCOM—you name it. It has spell check, it can add footers and headers, it can mark your REVISIONS in different colors to keep track of which set of REVISIONS you’re on. It will even REGISTER your script with the WGA for you.
3. Make sure your title page is correct, has the right date, and is formatted correctly.
EVERY script needs a TITLE PAGE. It comes before page 1 of the script.
It should look like this:
THE NAME OF YOUR MOVIE
(goes here. We usually write it in a slightly larger font.)
by
(you put your name here)
&
(If you have a partner, put their name here)
(If your script is based on some other property — a book, comic book, or something — you write that here)
Based on some book, by some dude.
Revisions by
(The names of the douchebags who rewrite your script will go here, in the order that they were hired.)
Current revisions by
(The name of the douchebag who’s
currently
rewriting your script will go here
.)
(The date you turned in the draft goes here. Change this date, with each subsequent draft. KEEP THIS ACCURATE AND UP-TO-DATE, or finding which draft you’re working on will be very confusing.)
some people put their
Name
and
Address
and
Phone Number
(or those of your REPS. We never dothat. Usually the STUDIO will put their name and a COPYRIGHT LAW statement here, when it reprints your script.)
Again, FINAL DRAFT will do this for you. That’s—
Final Draft! www.finaldraft.com
4. Spell-check your script.
This may seem obvious, but DO IT. Then DO IT AGAIN. Typos, even small ones, make your script and YOU look unprofessional. We proofread our script several times—then we
always
PAY someone to proof it again. We pay him about $100. It’s worth it.
Oh, and “it’s” is
always
a contraction of “it is.” You’d be surprised how often this comes up.
5. Fact-check your script.
Make SURE all of your references are CORRECT. If one mistake glares out to someone who’s reading it (“The Battle of Waterloo wasn’t in 1820! Who are these morons?!?”), that might be the ONE THING that makes the person PUT YOUR SCRIPT DOWN before finishing it, the straw that broke the camel’s screenplay. Mistakes make you look dumb. Check all your dates, name spellings, geography, state capitals, famous quotes, song lyrics, “timely references” in a period piece—anything that’s from the REAL WORLD better be 100 percent right. Do it. Fact-check. Get on Google, get on Wikipedia, or go to the public library.
*