Writing the short film 3th - Part 11

way and also tell the story. There are exceptions to this “rule,” of course— many of them comedies, or experimental films or videos. All the same, if you are interested in making narrative films, it’s useful to learn the ground rules before you take to the air. ON CHARACTER AS HABITUAL BEHAVIOR As we have noted, Aristotle referred to character as habitual action. You are what you ordinarily do—that is, until you do something you don’t ordinarily do, which is what makes for drama. To be believable, the character’s capacity for out-of-the-ordinary behavior needs to have been glimpsed by the audi- ence—even if not recognized for what it is—at some point in the story before it appears full blown. (If your aim is to create cartoon characters in a live- action world, believability of behavior doesn’t matter as much.) For example, in the outline above, Icarus ordinarily obeys his father without question, if sullenly, until the moment in the flight when he realizes that Daedalus is no longer in command, that he can do as he chooses. His out-of-the-ordinary behavior in disregarding Daedalus’s warnings would make sense to us as an audience, because we have witnessed for ourselves earlier signs of rebel- liousness. In Cocteau’s sense, the logic of it has been “proven” to us. It is the “movement of spirit or psyche,” as Aristotle calls dramatic action, that produces a character’s behavior. In any of the dramatic forms, the inner life of a character has to be expressed in what that character does, as well as in the way he or she does it. In a good screenplay, both dialogue and physi- cal action flow from a character’s dramatic action (or want or need). ANOTHER ADAPTATION, WITH DAEDALUS AS HERO Now we shall work from the same source material as before (the myth) but in a very different way, using Daedalus as our main character. We’ll answer the seven questions briefly, as a step toward writing a bare-bones synopsis of the projected script, which is for a live-action, realistic film of 15 to 18 min- utes, set during the time of the American Civil War. The synopsis is a useful tool, one required by many teachers as a first step in writing any screen- play—a kind of trial balloon. It is also useful for an initial class discussion of a student’s work. Widely used in the industry, it is often required in appli- cations for foundation grants, and many writers prefer it to a story outline. Here are the questions and our answers: Who is the protagonist? Mark Dedalus, a captain in the Union army, in civil- ian life an architect. (We have changed the spelling of his family name to reflect the fact that in our story he is an American.) 60 Writing the Short Film Ch05.qxd 9/27/04 6:04 PM Page 60 Who or what is the antagonist? Dedalus has been captured by Confederate troops and is being held prisoner under close guard. Therefore, the prison and his captors are the antagonists. What is the protagonist’s situation at the beginning of the script? The time is 1862, early in the Civil War. Dedalus believes that his captors won’t hold him much longer in the great, old house that serves as makeshift military head- quarters for the area, but that they will send him on to a prisoner-of-war camp. Meanwhile, he gathers whatever information he can on their move- ments in long hours spent at the window and by the door. He shares a small room at the top of the house with a boy who is awaiting court-martial—and most likely death by firing squad—for having fallen asleep while on sentry duty. What event or occasion serves as catalyst? Dedalus accidentally cuts his hand on the sharp edge of his cot’s metal bedspring and finds that one of the coils has pulled away a little from the frame. He succeeds in working it free and begins to fashion himself a tool. What is the protagonist’s dramatic action? To escape to the Union lines, at any cost, with the information he has gathered. What is the antagonist’s dramatic action? To prevent any prisoner’s escape, by killing him if necessary. Do you have any images or ideas, however unformed, as to the climax? The ending? During the two men’s descent down the high outside wall of the mansion, footsteps can be heard approaching in the yard below. The youth loses his nerve and freezes. The climax comes as Dedalus has to decide whether to waste precious minutes trying to talk him down or to leave him and go on. The ending could be Dedalus running toward the woods beyond the house; he slows and looks back to see his cell mate still frozen on the wall. He hesitates (a close shot here), then heads off into the darkness of the woods. How is the protagonist’s action resolved? He succeeds in escaping prison with the information. We assume he will get to Union lines. The synopsis that follows is a distillation of this information into a couple of paragraphs. Just south of the Mason-Dixon Line, 1862. Union Captain Mark Dedalus is being held prisoner in an old mansion used as a mil- itary headquarters by the Confederate Army. He is determined to escape back to Union lines with valuable information he has gathered. A skilled craftsman, he fashions a tool from a bedspring coil and sets to work on the frame of the barred window. But the major obstacle to a successful escape turns out to be not the guards or their prison but his cellmate, a terrified Southern youth who is awaiting court-martial, and probably death, for Telling the Dramatic Story 61 Ch05.qxd 9/27/04 6:04 PM Page 61 falling asleep on sentry duty. His only chance to live is to escape with Dedalus—who reluctantly agrees to take him along. At night, Dedalus and the boy remove the barred frame from the window and drop a rope made of twisted sheets down the side of the house. Dedalus quickly descends and waits for the boy, who starts down but freezes when he hears footsteps somewhere in the yard below. Dedalus gestures him on, but the boy can’t move. The footsteps fade, and Dedalus sets off at a run for the deep woods beyond, turning at one point to look back at the fig- ure on the wall. In a moment, and with a curse, he continues on. This story outline and synopsis bear a strong family resemblance to a number of feature films in the escape genre, particularly Robert Bresson’s A Man Escapes and Don Siegel’s Escape From Alcatraz (said by Siegel, in fact, to have been heavily influenced by A Man Escapes). However, this story is set apart by its setting, the specific moral dilemma faced by the protagonist dur- ing the escape, and the ambivalence of the outcome. The main challenges in writing the script would be twofold: developing each character fully enough in a short time, and exploring the relationship of Dedalus and the Icarus figure. ADAPTATIONS OF MYTHS AND FAIRY TALES Some contemporary adaptations of myths and fairy tales done by students working collaboratively in workshops given by coauthor Pat Cooper include the following: 1. A teenager in a bright red jacket wends her way with a bagful of groceries to her grandmother’s apartment through a shadowy labyrinth of burnt-out inner-city streets. The wolf is a drug dealer hanging out on a corner, but this Red Riding Hood turns out to be wily and fierce and gets the better of him with a few well-placed kicks. 2. Goldilocks is a talented unknown singer, the three bears a group of up-and-coming pop musicians. 3. Icarus is an arrogant, adept, but reckless hang glider, and Daedalus is his instructor. 4. In an adaptation of “Bluebeard,” the heroine is a young schoolteacher who makes the mistake of marrying a smooth but dangerous wheeler-dealer in slum properties. Adaptations of fairy tales, particularly, tend toward the melodramatic, and that can be a good part of the fun of doing them. 62 Writing the Short Film Ch05.qxd 9/27/04 6:04 PM Page 62 NINTH ASSIGNMENT: FINDING A MYTH OR FAIRY TALE TO ADAPT Find yourself at least two good collections of myths or fairy tales, and pick a tale you’d like to work on. After you’ve located it, make at least two pho- tocopies of several versions of the story—one to keep as a clean copy, the other to mark up as you work on your outline. In addition, photocopy any other material that interests you, such as illustrations or observations by the book’s editor. At this point it is better to have too much material rather than too little, as you can’t tell which bits and pieces of information may prove useful in writing your outline. While collections of myths or fairy tales intended for children can be good sources, depending on the audience you want to reach, they are often heav- ily expurgated or simplified. Adults, not children, were the original audience for most folktales; for earlier versions, it would make sense to consult more scholarly collections, like LaRousse’s Mythology, an unexpurgated Grimm’s Fairy Tales, or a good encyclopedia such as the Encyclopedia Britannica. Researching and locating the right myth or fairy tale can take a good deal of time, but it is important to choose a story that is personally meaningful, one that you will enjoy working on. It is also important that this assignment not be rushed. TENTH ASSIGNMENT: GETTING STARTED Consider the character in the story who appeals to you, the one with whom you can most readily identify. In writing narrative of any kind—except farce or parody, where one doesn’t necessarily have to identify with the main character or characters—identification is really more important than whether you approve of the character. One often identifies with characters or finds them appealing even if one doesn’t approve of them (Richard III, for example). When you have decided, take that character as your protagonist. Now think about whether you would like the script to take place in the pres- ent, at some period in history that particularly interests you, or in the myth- ical time in which it was originally set. If you can’t decide at the moment, choose the last option, at least for your first rough draft. For this next part of the assignment, you will need two or three different- colored pens. Mark on one of your photocopies the events, images, and remarks on characters or setting that seem essential to the story you want to tell. Then, using a different color, mark material you think you will probably want. Last of all, in a third color, mark anything that seems problematic but intrigues you. At this point, it makes sense to look back over the seven questions listed earlier in this chapter, as well as the answers we gave to them. By now, you Telling the Dramatic Story 63 Ch05.qxd 9/27/04 6:04 PM Page 63 should be ready to try answering these questions for your own project. Write as clearly and simply as you can, unless you are planning to do a detailed story outline in place of a first-draft script, as discussed earlier; in that case, you can overwrite and revise, as we did with the outline for “Icarus’s Flight.” Either way, the question-and-answer process may take you as much time to complete as the actual writing of your story outline, but it will be time well spent. When you’ve completed the answers, some sort of feed- back—from a class session, your teacher, or informed friends—would be helpful before continuing. It is especially important that the dramatic action of your main character be clear and make sense to your audience as well as to you. ELEVENTH ASSIGNMENT: WRITING THE STORY OUTLINE Now take up pencil and paper, or go to your computer, and write down the steps of your outline, the spine of your story. Revise at least twice before handing it in or showing it to anyone, giving yourself enough time between each revision to develop some sort of detachment about the writing. As for criticism, listen and take note but use only what works for you. NOTES 1. Rust Hills, Writing in General and the Short Story in Particular (New York: Houghton Mifflin, 1977), 4. 2. Aristotle, Poetics, ed. Francis Fergusson, trans. and introduction by S. H. Butcher (New York: Hill and Wang, 1961), 62. 3. Ibid., 72. 4. Ibid., 87. 5. Quoted in John Brady, The Craft of the Screenwriter (New York: Simon & Schuster, 1981), 115, 116. 6. David Lodge, The Art of Fiction (New York: Viking, 1993). 64 Writing the Short Film Ch05.qxd 9/27/04 6:04 PM Page 64 6 WRITING AN ORIGINAL SHORT SCREENPLAY Narrative is the art closest to the ordinary daily operation of the human mind. People find the meaning of their lives in the idea of sequence, in conflict, in metaphor and in moral. People think and make judgments from the confidence of narrative; anyone, at any age, is able to tell the story of his or her life with authority. E. L. DOCTOROW At this point, if you have faithfully done the exercises and assignments laid out in previous chapters, you will have learned, among other things, how to write and revise both character description and location description in format; how to use offscreen sound to create mood and evoke offscreen events; how to begin to develop a character; how to gather and transform material for an adaptation; and how to do a story outline for a short screenplay to be written using that material. What follows is a discussion of ways in which character can be revealed in speech, and ways in which speech can be used to further a character’s dra- matic action. In good screenplay writing, dialogue is as much a form of behavior as any physical action; it is also a form of dramatic action. FINDING A CHARACTER’S VOICE Here is part of another scene from Chinatown. Two characters talk in the scene, each with a very different way of speaking. If you haven’t seen the film or read any of the drafts of the script, you won’t know the context—but you should be able to hear two very individual voices and to follow what is going 65 Ch06.qxd 9/27/04 6:05 PM Page 65 on in a general way. (Note that Evelyn is called YOUNG WOMAN until she identifies herself; this is a subterfuge used to make sure that the reader, like Gittes himself, doesn’t anticipate the surprise that is about to be sprung.) The scene takes place in the outer office of Jake Gittes’ suite. He has just burst in on his associates, told them an off-color joke before they can stop him, and is “laughing his ass off.” He looks up and sees a stunning young woman watching him. She asks Gittes if they’ve met and, ever the wise guy, he says no, they haven’t—he would have remembered. YOUNG WOMAN That’s what I thought. You see, I’m Mrs. Evelyn Mulwray—you know, Mr. Mulwray’s wife? Gittes is staggered. He glances down at the newspaper. GITTES Not that Mulwray? EVELYN Yes, that Mulwray, Mr. Gittes. And since you agree with me we’ve never met, you must also agree that I haven’t hired you to do anything—certainly not spy on my husband. I see you like publicity, Mr. Gittes. Well, you’re going to get it— GITTES Now wait a minute, Mrs. Mulwray— She’s walked past him toward the door. He stops her. GITTES (continuing) —there’s some misunderstanding here. It’s not going to do any good to get tough with me— Evelyn flashes a cold smile. EVELYN I don’t get tough with anybody, Mr. Gittes. My lawyer does. Evelyn starts out the door and Gittes starts after her. This time he’s stopped by the gray-haired man who has also come out of his office and up behind him. 66 Writing the Short Film Ch06.qxd 9/27/04 6:05 PM Page 66 . of fairy tales, particularly, tend toward the melodramatic, and that can be a good part of the fun of doing them. 62 Writing the Short Film Ch05.qxd 9/27/04. story is set apart by its setting, the specific moral dilemma faced by the protagonist dur- ing the escape, and the ambivalence of the outcome. The main challenges