Monthly Archives: August 2019

Reveal – ing your Reveals

The reveal is handled differently from the book in the film Notes on a Scandal

How and when do you reveal that big secret in your story? All at once? Through smaller increments and surprises?

In his book, Your Screenplay Sucks, William M. Akers stresses the importance of placing the reveals at the right place. He uses an example provided by UCLA’s screenwriting programme head, William Froug, about an old man feeding pigeons from a park bench. Should the old man dump the whole bag of crumbs on the grass right away, or scatter a few at a time to keep the pigeons interested longer?

“Placing a big reveal later on in the story, and hinting at it by sprinkling breadcrumbs earlier, is the better option.”

The book upon which the film Notes From a Scandal is based starts with a big scene in which it is revealed that the Cate Blanchett character has had an affair with one of her students. The book handles this information as the inciting incident. It’s a heck of a start to the story, but it does give away the biggest secret right away. The film version handles this differently, revealing the news a little later. It keeps the audience on a string and loads up the reveal with more punch.

In Butch Cassidy and the Sundance Kid, screenwriter, William Goldman, saves the small surprise that Butch is from New Jersey until the movie is well under way. He later offers an even bigger reveal when the men are about to hit the payroll guards in Bolivia. During the face-off with a bunch of rough-looking bandits, Butch tells Sundance that he’s never shot anyone before. It’s not a good time to let your partner-in-crime know about your lack of experience, but it is a hugely impactful moment for the audience.

Imagine, if you will, if Goldman had started the story by having Butch introduce himself to Sundance with, ”Hi there. My name’s Robert Leroy Parker. I’m really from New Jersey. I’ve never shot anyone in my life before!”

That would be pretty lame, right? Luckily, the screenwriter knew better!

Summary

Withholding crucial information for as long as possible, and releasing it as a well-structured reveal at a dramatically heightened moment, makes for keener audience interest and improves the quality of your story.

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Complete Story ~ essential ingredients

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Complete story:Tom Cruise in The Edge of Tomorrow — In Edge of Tomorrow the complete story arises as a result of the A and B lines coming together at the climax.

In his book, Save the Cat, Blake Snyder offers us this piece of invaluable advice on writing a complete story: “Keep in mind the only reason for storytelling, and why the A and B stories must cross throughout: It’s to show the true reason for the journey is not getting the tangible goal, but learning the spiritual lesson that can only be found through the B Story!”

This is what the tale is really about: learning the spiritual or moral lesson that allows the hero to overcome the obstacles that life and the antagonist throw his way.

Let’s backtrack a bit.

At the inciting incident, the hero is given a wake-up call. A bump disturbs his trajectory through the ordinary world. His first response is usually an incorrect one. In Edge of Tomorrow, Tom Cruise is told he is to go to the warfront to film the allied invasion. His response is to try and blackmail the General in order to force him to reverse his decision. Not a good call.

“In a complete story the A and B narrative strands criss-cross each other at crucial moments.”

The first turning point represents the true start of the story. It also sets the outer goal. Tom Cruise is killed, but gets covered by the blue blood of the Alpha Mimic, which causes him to return to relive the day. His response upon finding himself back at square one, however, is to try and talk the Master Sergeant into letting him call his superiors. Lesson still not learnt.

By the midpoint, Cruise finally realises why he keeps returning to the same event, over and over again. He has to team up with the Angel of Verdun and defeat the Mimics by killing their leader, the Omega. Our reluctant protagonist has gone from unwilling participant to motivated Hero. Here, the outer and inner stories fuse to produce a single and clear purpose—a plan to save the world from the invading Mimics—even if it means sacrificing oneself to do it.

By the second and final turning point, his recurring efforts are in danger of stalling—a blood transfusion will rob him of his ability to relive the day, just as it did the Angel of Verdun’s. And while he is at first reluctant to sacrifice her to this permanent-death scenario, he realises that he has no choice but to risk it if he is to have any hope of defeating the Mimics. This represents a step up in growth and is a perfect illustration of the A and B stories supporting each other.

The inciting incident, the first turning point, the midpoint, and the second turning point, then, present the writer with the perfect opportunity of fusing the Hero’s transformational arc to his pursuit of the outer goal.

Summary

The B Story underpins the A story. It is the transformational arc the hero undergoes in order to acquire the true goal.

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Creative Writing — Art and Craft

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Stavros Halvatzis on Creative writing — On creative writing.

Those who have taught creative writing, specifically the novel or short story, will remember being asked, at some time or another, that pertinent but most difficult of all questions: What constitutes good writing?

The question is pertinent because that’s what teachers of the craft purport to teach. It is difficult because people have been trying to provide a definitive answer to it since first picking up chisels and quills.

Here’s my take.

The First Layer: Spirit, Ethos

I like to separate the craft into three areas. The first concerns learning about the spirit or ethos of the times, and our view of it.

It concerns sharpening our powers of observation, being aware of contemporary ideas, ideals, and issues, bringing compassion to our social critiques, and learning to address old themes in new ways while acknowledging the value of the old in the new.

These insights stem from our level of maturity. They can not be hurried.

The Second Layer: Story Structure

The second area concerns the structure of stories.

“A study of creative writing that lacks awareness of the layers that make up the craft is like a rudderless ship loaded with treasure but destined to meander endlessly at sea.”

Does your tale have a beginning, middle, and end? Are the turning points, pinches, midpoint, climax, resolution, and so on, crafted in a way that encourages interest, suspense, and surprise? If not your story may lack a specific direction.

The Third Layer: Words and Sentences

The third layer has to do with mastering the craft at the micro level. Are we using vocabulary and figures of speech appropriate to our subject? Are we creating powerful textures, pictures and sounds with our words—using all five senses to do so?

Words with an Anglo-Saxon origin, for example, are grittier and more tactile, depending on the context, than their Latin counterparts—so, ‘gut’ instead of ‘stomach’, and so on. Are we using short snappy sentences or long and mellifluous ones? All of this affects how the reader experiences our story.

In my opinion, these three layers make up the craft of writing. Together they give rise to the individual ‘voice’ of the writer. Incorporating this approach when writing a new novel or screenplay increases its chances of success.

Summary

Excellence in creative writing involves mastering the three layers rooted in the micro and macro levels of the craft. Together they give rise to the ‘voice’ of the author.

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New Story Ideas — how to find them

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Jurassic world is a new story idea from a great concept — Jurassic World is the latest blockbuster stemming from what was a new story idea rooted in genetic cloning.

New Story Techniques

How does one generate new and exciting ideas for one’s stories? Here are some suggestions:

Use personal experience to spark new and authentic story ideas. Personal experience helps to add verisimilitude and uniqueness to any piece of creative writing because it is based on first-hand knowledge of real-life situations.

Keep a file of blog, newspaper and magazine articles and stories; also, short notes on television documentaries and programs that have caught your eye. Use them to kick-start your thinking on a related subject.

Use a notebook or digital device to document interesting bits of conversation, behaviour, dreams, personal encounters.

Explore new ideas by brainstorming a subject with friends. Free-associate root aspects of that subject by introducing nouns and verbs not usually associated with it. Note the new relationships that emerge. Those may spark new ways of looking at old ideas.

Ask that powerful idea-generating question: ’What if…’. Combine it with an unexpected or opposing idea. If, for example, your subject is about genetic cloning, you could start by asking: What if the DNA of prehistoric animals was found trapped in millions-of-years-old resin and used to bring Jurassic era animals back to life?

“New story ideas are all around us. We just have to know how to spot them.”

Mind-map a subject or idea by writing down its core meaning in the middle of a blank page or screen. Create a series of related ideas in bubbles around that core idea and draw links from one to the other. Link unrelated ideas together and see what that sparks.
When writing a scene, make it multilayered by filtering it through all five of your senses: sight, smell, hearing, taste, touch. Note the dominate sense operating within the scene, then replay it in your imagination, using a different sense. Note how it changes your approach to writing the scene.

Summary

There are many ways to generate new story ideas. Personal experience, keeping a file, brainstorming with others and asking the what-if question, are just some of them.

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