The Academy of Film Writing | Go Big Or Stay Home

by seemaxrun | 05-18-2012

I found this at Letters of Note. Visit them AFTER you read this: In March of 1962, acclaimed author John Steinbeck wrote the following letter to Edith Mirrielees — a lady who, as his professor of creative writing at Stanford 40 years previous, had been an enormous influence on his development as a writer and, he later claimed, one of the few things he respected about the university. His fantastic, insightful letter later featured in the paperback edition of Mirrielees’s book, Story Writing. (Source: Story Writing; Image: John . . . . . .

Bad Sex

by seemaxrun | 05-17-2012

What do Philip Roth, Steven King, Haruki Murakami and Jonathan Franzen share in common? They’ve all been nominated for Literary Review’s Bad Sex In Fiction Award. When you write a sex scene, you want readers’ pulses to jump – and not because they are laughing so hard they are about to pee themselves. Or as “dude” commenting on Nerve.com put it, “I actually bookmarked the page so I could show it to my friends and laugh at it.” Want to avoid that particular blunder? Sign up for the online screenwriting class The Sex Scene coming in July . . . . . .

The Well

by seemaxrun | 05-15-2012

So I have been thinking about this thing, The Well. That is what I call the place where stories come from, where energy comes from, where writing comes from, the place you draw from. It sounds a little melodramatic, calling it The Well. Or fairy tale. But it is the best name I have come up with so far and The Rock just sounded stupid. Every once in a while a writer of mine goes on burn out. I don’t usually know what is going on, going in, I just know something is really wrong. . . . . . .

The Syd Field Model; Or, How to ...

by seemaxrun | 05-08-2012

Syd Field came up with the 30/60/30 model years ago and being the only guy to come up with a description of structure, his structure concept stuck. It was in all the books. It was in all the lectures. It’s used pretty regularly in film circles to this day to estimate where in the course of a script a story event is happening. For example, if a studio exec asks you where something is happening in the course of a story during a pitch, the studio exec is basing page count on the Field model and the question, . . . . . .

poetry mayhem

by seemaxrun | 04-26-2012

If you look at us, we’re an odd threesome to be hitting a poetry slam. I disdain poetry. Except for Bukowski. Mostly I think poets are emotional masturbators. Drew, well I suspect Drew’s sneaking around to music clubs doing open mic night but not poetry clubs. Michael is the one who might do a poetry slam. But if he has he hasn’t told his filmmaker brethren about it. [We are all filmmakers. But, as filmmakers, we are supposed to be above "art" on one plane, and all about "art" on another. We live in a weird place, we filmmakers.] . . . . . .

Artificial Action

by seemaxrun | 04-20-2012

Artificial action occurs when there is action described in scene description — which creates the illusion action is happening in a script — but it’s not real action. This includes “looking.” Which is just eyes in a character’s head being pointed in some direction and maybe then pointing in another, without a character moving from a stationary position. Or can just be scene description attempting to create an emotion or visual by saying a character “looks” this way. Turning. Which, if overused, is merely a stationary character shifting the direction his or her body is facing. . . . . . .

False Starts

by seemaxrun | 04-13-2012

False starts happen when instead of action launching in a story, there are several scenes leading up to that action that don’t launch action, the scenes are simply there to say, Action is going to happen, so here is a scene to say action is going to happen, and another to say action is going to happen – while the action never actually happens. Imagine two gun fighters standing in a bar, saying, Okay noon tomorrow we meet. Then noon tomorrow they meet and say, Okay, at twilight we meet. Then at twilight, they . . . . . .

3Pages Winners!

by seemaxrun | 04-07-2012

Congratulations to 3pages winners Brent Hartinger for Dead Enders and Rick Gershman for Rick Goes to the Doctor. The competition was fierce, the decisions were difficult, the bloodshed will be remembered for decades — okay maybe not by you, but we have the scars to prove it, and all of our decisions are final. Thank you to everyone who entered the competition and made those decisions so difficult. And – Big congratulations to the winners Brent and Rick. Yay yay yay! 3Pages winners win a 2012 class from AFW: 2012 class . . . . . .

Screenwriting Tip O’ The Day

by seemaxrun | 04-03-2012

Consider the following cast of characters: Mary, Mary Lou, Marissa, Marcy, and Marisol. How about this cast: An, Anwu, Anwei, Anawei, and Anweiller. Let’s try another one: Bob, Bub, Bubba, Bubba Jr., and Bubbaloo. Let’s try a scene: INT. BUBALOO’S BUNKHOUSE – NIGHT Marisol stares out the window while Marcy sips a martini, Mary files her nails, and Mary Lou flirts up Bubbaloo. Bob is in the corner arm wrestling Bub. Bubba is watching while Bubba Jr. throws a log on the fire. Nobody notices Marcy slip out the door. Now, . . . . . .

3Pages is Closed

by seemaxrun | 04-01-2012

3Pages just closed for submissions. All in all it has been a fun competition, though it didn’t really start feeling like a competition or very exciting till the final days, when suddenly it was crunch time and the deadline was looming and it started to feel real and more exciting. That is on my end. I do not know about your end. There were some glitches. My server host decided to bottom out on me and get cranky during the competition, which caused some mail and submission glitches. [My host is so fired. Hopefully everyone made it . . . . . .