Schellhardt Laura. Screenwriting for Dummies
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The Poetics provide a clear roadmap for any writer. Before you sit down to
the page, you may find it helpful to glance through them individually to clar-
ify story choices that you’ve already made. How do the categories work
together? Where do they overlap? Have you been thorough in your research?
They will help you later when you’ve completed a first draft and face the
daunting task of rewriting. I have them pasted above my computer screen for
just that moment. They remind me that I need only tackle one component at
a time as I go back through with my red pen. Also, if your writing falters, it
usually means that you don’t know enough about one of these elements, and
it’s time to return to your backstory. When the Poetics are fully realized, your
screenplay will sing.
What’s It All About? Writing a
Nutshell Synopsis
The nutshell synopsis is one of the great ironies of screenwriting. You spend
months, if not years, developing your idea, researching your backstory,
embellishing your characters, and identifying a tone. Then, you’re asked to
condense all that information into five sentences or less. It sounds crazy,
but it’s an exercise that pinpoints the crucial moments in your story while
preparing you for the demands of the Hollywood scene, which includes pitch-
ing your idea to executives in a few minutes or less.
A synopsis is a short description of your screenplay that highlights the main
characters and the journey they go on, with particular attention to conflict
and resolution. A nutshell synopsis is a shorter version of the same, generally
running from three to five sentences in length. Neither form of synopsis
includes dialogue, unless absolutely necessary.
A treatment is longer than a synopsis and narrative in nature. It’s part synopsis
and part short story. It runs anywhere from 4 to 20 pages in length, depending
on the scope of your film, and it describes each act of your script in chronolog-
ical order. It also does not include dialogue, unless that exchange is pivotal to
the story.
The ability to tell a story effectively in a short amount of time is a skill that
most successful screenwriters have turned into an art form. In Hollywood,
time is money, so you won’t be given enough time to say everything that you
know about your script. If you’ve done your job, it would take hours to tell,
and you’re probably going to get 5 minutes. So start thinking now about what
details you would keep.
It might help to break the idea down into five concrete sentences. I’ve included
some examples of opening phrases to get you started. The element you’re
trying to emphasize is in boldface at the start of each phrase.
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Character: My story is about a (insert character type here) in (insert
location here).
Goal: S/he wants more than anything to find (insert hope/ dream/ pas-
sion here).
Journey: Her/His journey begins when (initial event here) and s/he
decides to (character action here).
Conflict: S/he runs into trouble when/with (insert conflict or conflicts
here), which s/he tackles by (character action here).
Resolution: The story ends when (insert event here), and s/he discovers
that (insert conclusion here).
You can alter and rearrange these sentences in many different ways to suit
your particular screenplay. You may abandon the sentence structure alto-
gether and come up with phrases of your own. However, the elements that
I’m choosing to emphasize create the spine of most stories, and you’ll proba-
bly want to include them in any synopsis you construct.
After you’ve devised a paragraph of five sentences, try telling your story in
three. Now try one. It may seem impossible, but when you’re through, you’ll
know exactly what your script is about.
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Chapter 5: Unpacking Your Idea
Turning your synopsis into a movie trailer
Here’s a quick and fun way to vamp up your nut-
shell synopsis. Movie trailers are a film com-
pany’s best bet for drawing an audience into the
theater. They generally employ a combination of
vibrant music, quick flashes of action, and a
dynamic announcer to rope people in. Imagine
that your film is about to be released, and you’re
in charge of marketing it. Using your synopsis
as a guide, construct a movie trailer that will
dazzle the public and send them to the box
office with money in hand. You might also con-
sider the perfect tagline for your film’s poster.
What one phrase could draw audiences to your
movie in droves?
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Chapter 6
Plot Part I: Beginnings
In This Chapter
Making your opening images great
Planting your story’s conflict
Structuring your first moments
Glancing through successful film openings
P
lot and character are the pillars of all great stories. Without a solid plot,
nothing happens in your screenplay; without compelling characters,
things happen, but no one cares. So which pillar do you construct first?
Well, consider that most people approach stories by inquiring, “What’s that
story about?” Then consider the question that you’ll be asked most often by
friends, family, future agents, and producers when they discover that you’re
writing a script: “What’s your story about?” Finally, consider the question
that you’ll ask yourself when you reach a stumbling point and can’t seem to
generate any pages: “What’s my story about?”
Yes, it’s the same question, but, more importantly, it’s the first question you’re
likely to encounter at every stage of a new draft. Sure, people will inquire who
you’re writing about, but they’ll probably do so after you’ve supplied a synop-
sis. And if you look toward the five minutes you get to convince the Hollywood
heavyweights of your script’s worth, you’d better have a dynamic plot ready to
rope them in quickly. And how do you construct such a plot? It’s a challenging
process that begins . . . well, with your beginning. This chapter concentrates on
crafting an opening for your story that will entice readers and audiences alike
to remain in their seats.
Enhancing Your Opening Images
Close your eyes. You’re sitting in a darkened theater, staring at the screen. At
first, nothing happens. Perhaps some images dart past as the credits role.
Finally, the screen flickers to life. You’re about to watch the opening sequence
of your film. What do you see?
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The first ten minutes of every movie determine what an audience expects
from the remaining two hours. A story’s setup determines, in large part, how
your story will unfold. And if it doesn’t suggest the movie to come, it should.
Here are a few things a strong opening should do:
Introduce your main character(s)
Establish a routine or pattern of life
Suggest a conflict that may break that routine or pattern
Introduce your subplots and suggest their conflicts
Set the tone and style of the piece
Suggest a villain or opposing force in the story
Suggest something important at risk
Raise a compelling question
These eight components comprise the rules of your screenplay. By rules, I
mean that these components provide the boundaries or structure within
which your action occurs. If the movie starts as a horror flick, it shouldn’t
switch to a light comedy halfway through; if I spend the first 20 minutes get-
ting to know one young man, I’ll watch for him throughout the remainder of
the film. You may want to think of these rules as the game plan upon which
your audience forms expectations about the ensuing action. You will fulfill or
thwart those expectations as you go, and quite often, you’ll do both. So you’ve
got a lot riding on those first moments. How do you construct them to speak
volumes in an efficient way? Much like a three-dimensional puzzle, you build
it piece by moving piece.
Person, place, or thing: What do
you want to present first?
You can’t establish all eight components at once, it’s too confusing. However,
you can determine the primary element of your opening — in other words,
where your audience should look first. You’ll probably want to know who’s
on the screen, where they are, and how each scene looks when the film starts
to roll, so consider the following elements in advance.
The people
Movies are always about people. Even if you focus on a historical event, you’ll
be tracking how that event affected a person or group of people. For example,
the movie Titanic, though centered around a great historical tragedy, primar-
ily depicts one couple’s budding romance. The audience witnesses the fear,
horror, and hope of the event through them.
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Unless you’re constructing a documentary, which relies more on facts than
fiction, you’ll know in advance from whose eyes your audience will experi-
ence the story. So decide whether your script revolves around
One person
A small group of people
A community or nation
Several communities or nations
Because your film probably consists of a plot and at least one subplot, you’ll
want to determine the subject(s) of each.
A subplot is a smaller storyline that supports the film’s main plot. It generally
comes equipped with its own set of characters, conflicts, and actions.
The characters in a subplot may or may not be moving toward the same
objective(s).
By determining your film’s subject, you soon pinpoint its scope, be it an epic
adventure of warring nations (Lord of the Rings), an intimate family affair
(You Can Count On Me), or something in between (Malcolm X). You choose
initial images that suggest that scope.
The location(s)
In a stage play, confining your story to a small number of locales is often ben-
eficial. Movies, however, can lead audiences anywhere: from the office lobby
to the city street to the cafe to the cafe’s storeroom to a phone booth in the
cafe’s storeroom. A screenwriter has no limit to where he or she can go. So
let me first distinguish between location and location. Sound crazy? It’s not,
I promise. You can define the word in two distinct ways:
Physical locations: The site-specific locale of each scene, where every
moment takes place
Esoteric locations: The contrasting worlds your script unites — be it
social/political spheres or the internal world of a character
The physical locations will take care of themselves as you write, and they
may become overwhelming when considered in advance. Esoteric locations
are more important and more manageable. They help both writer and audi-
ence understand the story’s larger themes. They suggest locations that a
writer might periodically return to, images that frame the action like posts
in a fence. For example, the number of physical locations in Mel Gibson’s
Braveheart is staggering. The writer jumps from tavern to alley to glen to
lake to dungeon to battlefield and back again. Yet the movie’s core depicts
two distinct worlds at war — the working-class Scotsmen and the controlling
British aristocracy. More specifically, the film unites the main character’s
world with that of the English villain after he destroys Gibson’s young wife
in the opening sequence.
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Eventually, you’ll need to consider your budget when deciding upon elements
like location. Small-budget films can’t usually afford a surplus of location
shifting, so if you’re writing for a smaller production company, you’ll want to
limit your landscape a bit. However, when you’re first creating a story, I sug-
gest dreaming large. Go where the story seems to want to go; you can always
scale back later.
Your use of time
It’s crazy to suggest that you’ll know exactly where your story’s going at the
start of a first draft. You probably won’t. And you don’t need to — not yet.
But consider how much time your story intends to span because it will affect
your opening sequences. You’ll also want to know if your plot moves chrono-
logically forward, or if you intend to jump between past, present, and future. I
describe dramatic time clocks in Chapter 5, but suffice it to say that scripts
spanning generations unfold differently than those spanning a few days or, in
the case of films like My Dinner With André, those spanning a single
evening.
You’ll want to alert your audience early to the time choice you’ve made.
How? If you’re writing an epic historical drama, the first image may be of a
city that’s been destroyed in war. If you’re writing an intimate family affair,
you may begin with shots of various characters going about their morning
routines. If your movie propels the audience ever forward, the audience will
assume that you’ll continue that trend. If you plan to jump around, you may
follow a scene set today with a scene set in 1945. You may allow a character
to reference time travel or muse about the future. You can employ a flashback
right away. You can solve the problem in numerous ways, but remember, an
audience will assume that your plot will be current and chronological unless
you tell it otherwise.
How do you suggest alternate time periods? If you’re writing a period piece,
you might let the costumes, a description of the city, and the type of vehicles
present or absent orient your audience, or you may precede the action with
a caption reading, “Italy, 1886.” If you’re inventing a time period, as the Star
Wars trilogy does, find a way to alert the audience that it’s about to enter a
strange place and a strange time. Star Wars launches each movie with an
informative prologue that scrolls through space. Whatever technique you
employ in the first 10 to 20 pages, you can use it again later because the
audience will be prepared.
The atmosphere
Layer in the atmosphere or tone of your story. Some films do so immediately.
Five minutes into the movie Jaws, the audience knows that it’s watching a
horror film. Waiting for Guffman introduces its mock-umentary tone right
away with interviews of highly exaggerated character types. Some films do
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this gradually. Rear Window begins pleasantly enough, but it soon becomes
clear that the protagonist is witnessing a murder. From that point on, the sus-
pense is palpable.
The stakes
The stakes of a story refer to what’s at risk in any situation. If your story’s
about a bus full of people, nothing in that scenario is immediately intriguing.
If you tell me a bomb’s on the bus, I’m interested. If you tell me that the bus is
carrying someone’s grandmother, several teenagers, as well as a main charac-
ter I relate to, I’m suddenly invested in their safety. Now, something’s at stake.
That storyline became the box office hit Speed.
The stakes in a film can be anything the audience roots for or worries about.
If the stakes prevent the audience from leaving until after the concluding
scene, you’ve done your job.
Conflict: What’s wrong with your story?
If your opening shots don’t grab an audience’s attention, you’ll have an even
harder time gaining their interest later. You don’t have to shock or horrify the
audience to do grab their attention; you can seduce, con, humor, or badger
them into watching —but for heaven’s sake, do something.
After the first five steps are in place (see the section “Person, place, or thing:
What do you want to present first?” earlier in this chapter), conflict becomes
the key ingredient. Conflict sparks action. Conflict raises questions, and the
audience’s desire to answer those questions creates tension. Keep two things
in mind: You have limited time, and you’re writing about the most compelling
time in your characters’ lives. If they’ve experienced these conflicts before,
they’ll know how to behave, and your story is over. The encounter you’re
dramatizing is different; it will change lives. So most screenwriters start as
close to that struggle as possible. Generally, the opening sequence does one
of two things:
It provides a brief look at the story’s platform. Your characters, like
most human beings, have a routine — a “normal” way of life. And what’s
crazy for you and me might be this character’s average day. Even if she
never does the same thing twice, that ability to not repeat herself
becomes her routine or her platform. Movies that begin with a clear
routine provide a suggestion of how the characters may act when that
sense of normalcy is disturbed. Harry Potter begins his journey as an
orphan being raised by hideous relatives. This is his routine until he
receives a letter informing him that he’s a wizard. American Beauty
spends a full half an hour detailing the main character’s rough family life
and mundane job, so that the audience feels a sense of relief when that
platform shifts.
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It starts the story mid-conflict. These movies plunge the audience into
the action at the point of attack. Everything is questionable — who the
script’s about, what’s just gone wrong, how it will affect everything else.
Although this method is a great way to jumpstart your film, you still
need to convey how life looked prior to the conflict so that the audience
knows what’s been lost. You simply give viewers that information later.
Lord of the Rings and Star Wars are examples of this method. Both
films begin with a narration that launches the audience into a new world
on the brink of war.
The platform of a story refers to a generally safe and stable way of life that
exists prior to a life-altering event. The platform may be comprised of habits,
job schedules, points of view, everyday routines, political or international
stability, and anything a character might take for granted as secure. The point
of attack then refers to the event or the moment in the script where the plat-
form falls apart.
Possible ways to begin your story
There is no one way to start your script. The subject matter you’ve chosen to
convey and the genre you’re working within determine your opening. However,
several trends are common in opening techniques, and one just may work for
you. Many movies convey their choice of opening in one of five ways:
Action: Start your movie with a chase scene, or a fight, or a feat of
extreme risk. If you toss your audience immediately into action, they’ll
lean forward immediately, if only to follow what’s going on. Virtually
every James Bond film begins this way — Casino Royale, in particular.
A long first scene: These openings firmly establish the initial event,
detailing it from various angles and, sometimes, points of view. The
Untouchables is an example of such a beginning.
Fleeting moments: These openings move through an average day or the
initial conflict quickly, often concentrating on the more intimate details
of each scene. They may also bounce between locales and characters.
The Big Chill opens this way.
A narrator: Here, a main character talks the audience through the open-
ing sequence, pointing out key details or secrets, perhaps introducing
characters along the way. American Beauty and Ferris Bueller’s Day
Off begin this way.
A montage: A montage is a series of shots strung together in rapid suc-
cession, generally underscored with music and often without dialogue.
The opening sequence of Juno begins this way.
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You’ll discover other techniques as you watch and read screenplays, but
most of them fall within one of these categories. Again, there is no one way
to start a story, and I’d be the last person to suggest that you should follow
a set formula. Sometimes, the best technique is to visualize a scene, write it
down quickly, and return to polish it later. I address the opening components
in this way to make the process manageable and to provide examples of
proven opening techniques. The subject of your first sequence, the location,
the atmosphere, and time frames — these are simply categories waiting to be
embellished with your details. Together, they help you provide a lot of infor-
mation in an efficient manner and raise at least one question compelling
enough to keep audience members in their seats.
Tracking Success: Three Compelling (and
Contrasting) Movie Beginnings
Everyone’s tastes in movies differ, so, frequently, the best way to discover
how you want your script to look is to study the movies that compel or repel
you. After you’re aware of what a great opening should do (see the preceding
sections), look at the movies you love. How do they set up the action? What
information do they immediately transfer to the audience? What images do
they use to present that information? Any movie that fails to pull you in fails
because the writer neglected one or more of those components. The success-
ful beginnings pack as much as they can into a small amount of time.
With so many strong films to choose from, I had a hard time narrowing the
focus down to three. However, three it is. I’ve chosen these scripts to give
you a sense of different ways to launch equally enticing stories. You can
obtain all these screenplays online or through the library, so you can track
how the images look both on the screen and on the page.
I encourage you to read these scripts as well as see the films. Doing so will
help you later when you envision the beginning you want but aren’t sure how
to lay it out on the page. I track some of these movies through Chapters 7 and
8 as well to give you a sense of how the writers keep the tension mounting
and ultimately conclude each tale. For now, see what you can discover from
their opening scenes.
The Untouchables
Brian DePalma’s movie, written by David Mamet, is a perfect example of the
mid-conflict beginning. The first three shots set up the villain, the conflict,
and the unlikely hero in rapid succession. Here’s how they look:
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