Yes it's true EVERYONE has a screenplay. How will yours be different?

Ok, let's talk film. I want to talk today about something that is dear to my heart that I don't talk of often. This site is meant to talk about the craft of film, so let's talk screenwriting. How do you become a screenwriter if you want to be one? Well you'll be unhappy to know that becoming a screenwriter is kinda like winning the lottery. Why? Because everyone wants to be one. There is a lot of money involved with selling a script. You make around 500,000 for a good script.

I almost sold a screenplay to Dreamworks five years ago and it was a great experience. The one thing, the secret that no one will tell you, is that you HAVE TO, get detached with what you are writing and DO NOT fall in love with your script. I think that's biggest mistake I made. I got too emotionally attached to my script. When my deal fell through, I never wrote another script again. The other thing is, its not gonna take one script to do this. It's gonna take five to ten scripts to get any recognition at all. So if you're writing your first screenplay, don't fall in love with it too much, just make it as good as you can, then walk away.

Writing is never finished, only abandoned. So my best advice for the beginning screenwriter, is just don't look back, get that first rough draft done. Don't go back and rewrite until the end. If you write everything right away, you'll never make it through.

Don't keep any secrets from the audience. Good scripts lay it all on the line right away. If you want to wait for the second act to reveal your character is gay or something. Say it right away. If you wait until the right moment to reveal something, you will only have that. But if you say it right away, that can lead to other discoveries that may surprise even you.

Be honest. You have to write about your own experiences for it to be at all interesting. If you write about a 40 year old spy and you're only 21, it will show in your writing.

I think the best advice out there is to write personal and from the heart. You can't fail when you do that.

Anyway, Hancock is getting terrible reviews and it opens tomorrow. Will Smith is still a huge box office draw. I think people will show up in droves anyway even if the film is sub par. The film clocks in at only one hour and 30 minutes. Now if you know anything about summer blockbusters. Most blockbusters run two hours or over. This film Hancock had to go back and do reshoots. A combination of being 1 and a half hours, which is the length for a comedy or short drama, not an action flick says to me that they had little to actually show the audience. And that's pretty sad. Yes this is the summer.




Yes the summer is for throw away films. But man, how cool is it to watch a good film that sticks with you.

Well I am kinda sick today filmfans, got some kind of bug. Makes me more babblely if you have not noticed.

Until Tomorrow, let's talk film!