The myth about screenwriting is that it’s the only profession that truly matters to our generation. Admittedly, my karma ran over this dogma. For the past dozen years or so, I’ve pounded the streets, the keyboard and my head against the wall searching for the skeleton key of the great American screenplay. I found that writing a script is easy, but writing a good one is hard. What follows is a short list of precious nuggets that I’ve managed to unearth, so far. What you do with them will be of more than passing interest to us all.

It’s important to know, right from the get-go, that screenwriting is not brain surgery. Arnold, Chevy, Sylvester and Macaulay are not breaking down the doors at the Mensa Society looking for scripts. This is not to say that William Goldman (Maverick), Jim Cameron (True Lies) and Lawrence Kasdan (Wyatt Earp) are a bunch of witless boobs. It’s just that movies like; Getting Even with Dad, In the Army now and North were not written by rocket scientists. However, I should also add that: Smarter people than you and me have also failed.

Nobody reads scripts in Hollywood, they read “coverage.” When a screenplay is submitted to a producer, s/he sends it out to a professional reader who writes up a synopsis about it and gives it an opinion. On average, a studio reader will read about 5 scripts a day. Obviously, not every screenplay gets a “fair read” due to the sheer volume of material that has to be covered. Certain factors enter into the elimination process, the first one being screenplay format. The rules are simple, but are written in stone and haven’t changed since the advent of the “talkies” in the early 30’s. If the script isn’t presented in the exact right form, it tells the reader that the writer doesn’t know what they’re doing. No matter how good the story, it simply gets thrown back on the heap. The format bible of the industry is a manual called, THE COMPLETE GUIDE TO STANDARD SCRIPT FORMATS by Cole/Haag, CMC Publishing, Hollywood, CA @$16.95.

The biggest problem most people have with writing is trying to get a seemingly monumental idea to play out on paper. Our mind’s eye develops concepts in a fourth dimensional way. Mental images come bundled with a mixed bag of physio-psycho-sensory attachments: childhood memories, sexual fantasies and other deeply seeded, emotional depth charges are all jumbled together. You get this idea: “Hey, wouldn’t it be really cool if my blind character woke up one day and could suddenly skywalk… it would be like when I jumped off the garage roof that time and for a few seconds there, it was like the first time I touched Belinda Glucowski’s dot-dot-dot!” But when we go to write it, our billion-dollar brainstorm exudes all the titillating excitement of non-dairy creamer.

Writing is rewriting. The best way to look at it is study the Napoleonic War Plan. Asked about his strategy to conquer Italy in 1798, Napoleon Bonaparte said, “First we get there, then we see what happens.” Don’t try to be too creative, imaginative or thoughtful… you’ll lock up. Nothing written will ever be as grand as the perception of greatness of the ideas in our head. Just write it down and see what happens. You’re going to rewrite it anyway.

A good actor can enter a room and do seventeen pages of dialogue with a look. The formula of one script page equal to a minute of screen time holds true. To get a sense of this, try holding your breath for a minute. When you think you’re about to run out of oxygen… that’s 3/4’s of a page. Another reason you should never…ever… give an actor more than a mouthful to say is that they’re not rocket scientists either.

A story that doesn’t have conflict is not a story. Get your hero up a tree, throw rocks at him, throw bigger rocks at him, then get him down. The basis of all drama is the rocks that we throw. We’re interested in the O.J. Simpson trial for the same reasons we watch a Harrison Ford movie. There is great struggle, all kinds of obstacles to overcome and life and death hangs in the balance. Like Jack Benny once said, “if it’s always interesting, it’s always good.” Conflict makes things interesting.

Unlike a book, where a reader can stop and go whenever, films are a forced march through two hours. Setting up your story is major crucial. Think about your favorite movie, what happens in the first ten minutes? We are introduced to the main character and find out what the story is going to be about. Script readers are always complaining that so many screenplays start out with five pages of a man shaving or a woman going shopping. Who cares? Samuel Goldwyn said it a long time ago, “Audiences don’t go to movies to see other people’s kitchens.” Get us into the story quickly.

It’s not uncommon to be standing on line in a grocery store in L.A. and see somebody in front of you shuffling through 3×5 cards. Chances are they’re probably a writer (and who isn’t?) working out a storyline. 3×5 cards are one of the most effective methods for visualizing a screenplay before starting the writing. They work the same way storyboards do for a director because they allow you to develop a flow. Write each scene on a separate card. I sometimes even write each “beat” of a scene on a separate card. Then start shuffling them around, it’s like working clay, sooner or later something will take shape. Carry them with you everywhere, especially when you’re standing in line at the grocery store.

This is arguably the most valuable piece of advice in the writing game. I once sat in on a pitch session at Zucker Brothers (Airplane, Ghost, Naked Gun) with a bunch of successfully produced writers including Dale Laurner (Ruthless People, Dirty Rotten Scoundrels). It was one of those times when the gods gave me the words. I was witty, clever and funny, banging out one liners in a room full of comedy writers. I was pitching a script idea that I was working on, one of the writers asked me how my story ended. I told them that I didn’t know. There was a noticeable pall in the room… like I’d passed a little gas… and they knew it. It took me a couple of years to figure out what they were talking about. The best films are those that constantly advance the story towards a satisfying conclusion. You don’t necessarily need to know the exact details but you need to know how your story ends. The ending holds the context for your entire movie. Once you know where you’re going, then point your story towards that star.

A “Log Line” is that little squib next to the movie title in the TV GUIDE that briefly tells you what it’s about. This is a very important tool for writers because it focuses you on the key elements of your story. Here are three examples of actual log lines for the movie, Thelma Louise:

The other thing you should know about log lines is that if you’re ever asked by a producer, agent, director or star to tell your story… they want it in 25 words or less. Remember the movie, The Player… “Manchurian Candidate meets Ghost” “Out of Africa meets Pretty Woman”… they weren’t kidding.

And the number one thing you should know about writing screenplays:

This is actually the sign over Ray Bradbury’s computer (only a little more graphically stated!). Basically, our left brain is the logical side of our head. It does the math, drives the car, keeps us from walking in front of traffic. The right brain can’t balance a checkbook, drives too fast and wants to expose our innermost secrets to the outside world through music, art and screenplays. When the stuff we write comes out looking like ca-ca… it’s old lefty that tells us that we’re stupid pieces of no-talent scum. It’s only trying to protect us, trying to get us to stop. It is not logical to be creative because we’re taking incongruent ideas and mashing them together. The left brain is doing its job by beating on our already low self-esteem. That’s why so many artists and writers are drunks, addicts and crazy… they’re half out of their minds. All stories are contrived, if you want to write, you have to get past the illogical side of the creative process. And the fear. Screenwriting is not brain surgery. You can do it.

Author of the article is a paper writer from Canada. He writes different tips for “pay for essay” service called Paper Leaf. Today it’s very important to use all the writing tips and tools to make your writing quality better.

WhitneyD