How to explain quantum mechanics
One of the more common challenges faced by a screenwriter is how to explain a difficult concept that’s important to your plot. For instance, in Jurassic Park, we need to understand how the dinosaurs came to be living on that island, so that when they start running amok, we’ll feel like we’re grounded in some sense of reality.
I haven’t read Michael Crichton’s novel for Jurassic Park, but if it’s anything like his others, I suspect he spent five or more pages detailing the cloning process in exhaustive detail. You can get away with that in a book. If a reader becomes bored, she can skim ahead a few paragraphs until the story begins again. But the movie viewer is hostage,1 forced to endure whatever information is presented, whether interesting or not.
Since the boring bits of a movie are generally the first things to get trimmed out in an edit, these crucial explanatory moments are likely to get dropped unless they’re written extremely carefully, in the (often misguided) theory that no information is better than boring information. So let’s look at some Best Practices when explaining something in a script.
Keep it short. No, even shorter than that.
As the writer, you may know exactly how the Thessalactan Grid enables transdimensional travel, and why there’s a 34-second delay before the Quantifier engages. I’m sure it’s fascinating and well-reasoned. But the audience doesn’t care. Or, more precisely, the audience doesn’t need to care, because all that really matters to them is how the hero is going to get off the space station before it blows up.
HERO
How does it work?
SCIENTIST WOMAN
It creates a well in time-space that bends…
HERO
WHICH BUTTON DO I PUSH?!
Give them a guide…
While the cliché of a wise old man (think Obi-Wan or Gandalf) is rightly avoided,2 there are smart ways to use a supporting character as explainer-of-things.
For starters, make sure the character has a function beyond exposition. The Day After Tomorrow was frustrating on many levels, but I liked that Dennis Quaid was both hero and explainer. (You could say the same about Jeff Goldblum in just about every movie.) A villain is another classic choice: since he knows what he’s trying to do, he’ll likely have a concise way of explaining it. Just avoid mustache-twirling, and “before I kill you, let me just explain…”
When possible, let the hero pursue the Answer Man, rather than vice-versa. Nothing screams exposition more than a character showing up simply to explain something. If getting an answer is an explicit goal for your hero, we at least have a sense of forward progress.
…or just let the characters figure it out for themselves
No one teaches Spider-Man how to use his powers. A large chunk of the first movie is spent watching Peter Parker explore his strength and web-shooting prowess. Similarly — but less successfully — the hero of Jumper finds he’s able to teleport, and receives no training or guidance until quite late in the movie.3
If characters need to learn something for themselves, try to build situations that are both organic and progressive: you want to build upon simple, relatable discoveries. A great recent example is the videogame Portal (from the Orange Box
In screenplay terms, this means letting the characters experiment. The first Narnia movie would have played very differently if the children had landed in the snowy woods without any sense of how to get back; the quest to return home would have felt obligatory. By letting them cross back and forth, the movie silently sets up its rule system, and lets the story chart a different path.
Take away the questions
Often, the best way to answer questions is to remove them from consideration. For instance, the make-believe science of precognition in Minority Report raised a huge number of causality issues, which you could easily spend the whole movie trying to address.
But it was meant to be a thriller, not a head-scratcher, so I added a scene in which a skeptic (Witwer) catches a glass ball just as it rolls off a table.
KNOTT
Why did you catch that?
WITWER
Because it was going to fall.
FLETCHER
You’re certain?
WITWER
Yes.
JAD
But it didn’t fall. You caught it.
Witwer smiles a little, starting to catch on.
JAD (CONT’D)
The fact that you prevented it from happening doesn’t change the fact that it was going to happen.
WITWER
It’s the same with the murders.
FLETCHER
The precogs are showing us what’s going to happen unless we stop it.
Like time travel, foreknowledge of the future is always going to involve paradoxes and gotchas. But by showing it as something visual and physical, we’ve preempted endless questions about the physics and ethics of their legal system. While we’ll learn more about how it works (by meeting the precogs), the ontological overhead has been reduced to a ball rolling across a table.
It’s like…
Such similes and metaphors can be a screenwriter’s best friends. How do you explain a margin call? “It’s like you’ve been buying stock with a credit card, and suddenly you have to pay the bill.” How are you going to catch the subatomic weapon? “Picture a net, but made of magnetic waves.” Does a clone have a soul? “Absolutely. It’s an identical twin, just born later.” Or, “No. It’s like a bad photocopy.”
Roll tape
Speaking of clones, in David Koepp’s script for Jurassic Park, he packaged all the how-we-did-it information in an animated film strip. In Dodgeball, the rules of the game are established in a black-and-white educational film about the history of the sport. And in Lost, the Dharma Initiative’s training films provide both crucial information (”keep entering the code”) and intriguing clues about what’s really going on.
Obviously, it’s not always possible or appropriate for your characters to stop what they’re doing to watch a film. But if it makes sense in context, it’s worth considering. Just keep it entertaining, and brief.
“Entertaining and brief” is good advice no matter which method you choose for presenting difficult information. Done artfully, the reader should never sense that he’s being told anything. It was just story. To that end, avoid scenes which could be summarized, “Hero learns…” That’s a tip-off that your character is listening rather seeking, observing rather than participating. “Discovering” is an action. So are “confronting,” “exploring,” and “testing.” Put your characters to work, and the audience will never realize they’re getting an explanation.
- More specifically, someone watching a movie in a theater is hostage. On video, there’s nothing to stop a viewer from zipping ahead during dull explanations. ↩
- One of the appeals of the Captain Marvel mythology is that the first thing Billy Batson’s wizardly mentor does is die. ↩
- The lack of any instructor or context-setting becomes a real problem once the villains are introduced. Poor Samuel L. Jackson is forced to announce his motivations, but they’re so nonsensical that we’re forced to conclude he’s either (a) lying or (b) bat-shit crazy. ↩
- The game is worth it just for the developer commentary. And the cake. ↩
Articles
March 10th, 2008 at 5:02 pm
Hi there,
the asshole who wrote UNTRACEABLE should read your post…
Thanks for the wisdom, dimo.
March 10th, 2008 at 5:11 pm
Very interesting post. It’s a bit sad that “the audience doesn’t need to care, because all that really matters to them is how the hero is going to get off the space station before it blows up” because at least a few of us are intrigued by thought-provoking movies – but as a general statement I suppose you’re right.
Another alternative, which you sort of addressed with Lost and Jurassic Park, is to make the explanation entertaining and integrate it into the plot as much as possible. We watch movies to be entertained and to experience emotions so as long as we get to do that through the information and explanations I don’t think they should be seen as problem.
As long as I’m entertained by it, an explanation could last throughout the entire movie.
March 10th, 2008 at 5:20 pm
Thank you for a very enlightening and useful post. One question, did you like the way they explained how dinosaurs came to life again in the movie Jurassic Park? It was not clear to me if you did or not. I know I liked it….very picturesque, concise and memorable.
March 10th, 2008 at 5:31 pm
“Put your characters to work, and the audience will never realize they’re getting an explanation.”
That pretty much summarizes how Lost provides ‘answers’. A lot of viewers seem to not be very adept at sensing when answers are being told. They expect someone to come on screen and blabber everything for pure expositional purposes. Your example with the Dharma videos was perfect.
Carlo
March 10th, 2008 at 5:59 pm
First, I have to say Portal has the funniest writing I have beheld, in any medium, in 2007.
This was a great article. I’m glad you put to words the funny smell of “The Hero Learns” scenes. Just last night I gutted a few from a treatment.
For an example of a film heavy on science, check out “Primer.” I went to an engineering school, and I still got lost in theory, but I was entertained throughout.
March 10th, 2008 at 6:09 pm
If theater goes are hostages, then does that mean that anyone who likes a movie is merely suffering from Stockholm Syndrome? That we become complicit in the very crime — the theft of time — being committed against us?
Anyways, having read both of Crichton’s JP and LW novels, he does go into great detail on the how… and his science, I have to say, is vastly more interesting than his action.
and speaking of Crichton, only he would find a way to take a story about a complex case of reverse sexual harrassment, and make it really about virtual reality filekeeping (DISCLOSURE).
March 10th, 2008 at 6:15 pm
The cake is a lie…
March 10th, 2008 at 7:04 pm
MUSTACHE TWIRLING!!! — Yes! :)
I actually read the ball scene in Minority Report repeatedly just because it was incredible. But I wasn’t thinking, “My God, what a great way to do exposition.” I was thinking, “Look how much story was in that sentence.” Partly because he didn’t dumb it down for Me The Audience… he had to use really small words for Mr. Bad Guy.
Andreas – You’ll definitely want to watch “Primer” if you haven’t seen it yet. Fantastically conceived ultra-low time machine. It lives off of explanation rather than momentum and does a great job.
-s
March 10th, 2008 at 7:22 pm
I was recently watching the special features for Terminator 1 and James Cameron talked about exactly this. The Kyle Reese character has to explain SO MUCH to the audience – what the terminator is, why it’s there, why he’s there, how they got there, what the future’s like, who john is, and so on – but it’s almost all done in the middle of a car chase or some other action or is vital knowledge before Sarah will trust him/move on.
I think that’s a great example, although Cameron describes it better
March 10th, 2008 at 7:25 pm
@dimonel:
Untraceable has three credited writers, including one who is a friend (and reader of this board). It’s bad form to rebuke a writer, particularly when you’re unsure who wrote what.
Jumper was written by one friend, and directed by another. In pointing out where the movie stumbled for me, I’m not calling them hacks. I’m saying the movie didn’t work, and here’s an example of how.
@Einar:
I liked the Jurassic Park film strip. I haven’t seen the movie since it came out, but the fact that I still remember that part is a good sign.
@sandofsky:
I’m a giant fan of Primer, and I regret not mentioning it more while doing press for The Nines. It was deranged and inspiring.
@Richard:
The cake is real. Why would I believe some grafitti on a dirty wall? The voice is honest, except when the testing protocols require her to lie.
March 10th, 2008 at 7:57 pm
Doesnt this fit into a more general point of exposition? Not just explaining science and theories, but all exposition. When the hero has to find out where the bad guy is, you dont have someone just explain it to them. You have him figure it out, search it out, discover it.
Of course, you can then go the Austin Powers route and flip it on its head, call a character ‘Basil Exposition’ and make it abundantly clear that all he is there to do is move the story along.
March 10th, 2008 at 8:09 pm
John, it’s posts like this that are the reason I keep coming back to your blog. .
As for Jumper, I thought the idea was better than the execution. Perhaps having too many cooks in the kitchen. I also can’t help but think that the studio was pushing for certain elements, and they simply didn’t work. I do think Jumper is an excellent case study for a screenwriter to figure out where the script went wrong and why.
And I love how you just slipped in that you were one of the uncredited writers on Minority Report. So even the great Scott Frank gets rewritten, too. I don’t know if that’s comforting or depressing.
March 10th, 2008 at 9:09 pm
“For starters, make sure the character has a function beyond exposition.” Like Woody Harrelson in There Will be Blood? Seems like he was on the screen exactly long enough to be Basil Exposition.
March 10th, 2008 at 10:26 pm
On the DVD bonus features for Michael Crichton’s Timeline, someone affectionately termed this, “learning it with sugar.” The movie of Timeline condenses 100+ pages of static explanations into about two or three screen pages—and the characters are constantly in motion as they talk about it. If memory serves, the characters get only part of the explanation before they jump and the rest after they jump, so the audience gets to marvel at the time travel scenery before and after each bite from the information sandwich.
Mmmmmm, makes it taste yummy!
March 11th, 2008 at 12:32 am
SPOILER!?!?
March 11th, 2008 at 12:32 am
Best example has to be Kyle Reese on the mechanics of time travel in THE TERMINATOR: “I didn’t build the fucking thing!”
March 11th, 2008 at 1:43 am
It’s been a while since I read the book, but I remember Crichton handling the “how to make dinosaurs” topic pretty well. The book’s first act is a mystery novel, and by the time we get to the big reveal, we (and the Doctors) already have most of the pieces.
Sure, there’s still a lot of science to absorb. But asking for a Michael Crichton novel without science is like asking for Star Wars without the spaceships and ray-guns.
March 11th, 2008 at 2:24 am
It’s interesting to see that bit of Minority Report as exposition for the premise of the movie – I’d never thought about it like that, and it works that way. I always focused on the problem of Witwer catching the ball – which means that it was never going to fall, and which has some fairly mad causality implications for the precog-crime prevention idea. But as you say, it’s a thriller, not a philosophy text.
March 11th, 2008 at 2:29 am
Please remove my bad words. i regret and apologize to your friends.
March 11th, 2008 at 3:00 am
Not to derail but I think it’s awesome that in the example you posted, Jad (Steve Harris) was the one with the best lines in that scene (”But it didn’t fall…” and “The fact that you prevented it from happening…”). Anderton (Tom Cruise) ended up saying them in the movie — did it just make more sense for him, character-wise, to “explain” precognition?
March 11th, 2008 at 3:34 am
Great post. Another technique for exposition I see often is explaining it to the new guy.
In Blade, there’s that girl that Blade rescues and he’s gotta explain the whole vampire world and hunting them to her. In X-Men, they explain the school and the team to Wolverine who is new to the group. In Minority Report, there was Witwer who asks the questions about the precogs.
It seems to be the most common way I’ve seen for exposition when you have to explain a whole world to the audience like in science fiction. It gets the job done quickly and usually is unnoticed by the audience when done well.
That was a great scene in Minority Report by the way.
March 11th, 2008 at 6:22 am
The best thing I learned from my screenwriting teacher is the phrase “use exposition as ammunition,” meaning it’s best to have your characters use exposition to prove a point. Another less elegant exposition technique I’ve seen is filling your scene with idiots. In Superman, Lex Luthor has two moronic sidekicks who, as well as supplying comic relief, need to have everything explained to them.
March 11th, 2008 at 7:45 am
One of my favorite examples of this is from “Back to the Future” (which can get away with it, i think, also because of the pacing and the fact it’s a comedy).
When Doc Brown explains time travel to Marty, “The Flux Capacitor! It’s what makes time travel possible!”
And that’s it. No more explanation, we just accept that time travel is now possible because of this weird-looking device. Absolutely love it!
March 11th, 2008 at 8:41 am
@Peter: Excellent, I was thinking the same thing. And towards the end of the film, when Marty is lined up and about to race towards the lightning bolt in the Delorean, he proclaims “Flux capacitor is….Fluxing.” That is by far one of the best lines in science-fiction.
March 11th, 2008 at 8:42 am
Saw Thank You For Smoking last night & laughed…
CIGARETTE PRODUCT PLACEMENT REP: But if they’re smoking in space, wouldn’t they explode from all the oxygen?
HOLLYWOOD AGENT: Oh its no problem… one line of dialogue, you know… (rolls his hands in the air) thank God we invented the… whatever device.
March 11th, 2008 at 9:20 am
What a great post! I agree with everything you said, and actually, I’m even a bit further over on the scale. For me, the video in the middle of Jurassic park forced me to reconsider my suspension of disbelief, after I’d already bought into dinosaurs with the amber and the labcoats. Treefrogs was too much. At that point, “Nature finds a way” was my creed, and “treefrog DNA did it” felt so implausible, I stopped connecting emotionally.
For me, it’s a question of trusting your characters, rather than trusting the audience. If a character needs to know something to complete his or her objectives, guess what? They’ll find out, and it’ll be on screen. In Minority Report, Danny needed to know how precocnition worked, because he was investigating the system. in your very first example, our hero needed to know which button to push, and he pushed aside all obstacles, including the actual reasons why, in pursuit of his objective. If the characters don’t need the information, and the characters in Jurassic Park benefitted not at all from their deep understanding of tree frog gene mapping, then it really doesn’t need to be in the story, does it?
On the other hand, if the characters need to find that information, than the information becomes a goal and a point of contention, and is wreathed in excitement and emotional tension.
Them’s my two cents!
March 11th, 2008 at 10:26 am
Your blogging instincts are sometimes uncannily aligned with my own frustration du jour: I spent my entire morning shower trying to figure out how a high school biology teacher can explain evolution in less than 3 pages, and then I saw your entry. Not that I’ve had any epiphanies (yet), but it’s still strangely comforting.
March 11th, 2008 at 11:10 am
Thanks for the excellent advice. I’ve been trying to figure out better ways for the mentor in my screenplay to explain the situation rather than have 4 pages of “Here’s how our planet works” dialog. Kudos Mr. August.
And Peter, the flux capacitor is no doubt the greatest invention in Sci Fi comedy.
March 11th, 2008 at 11:27 am
Great post — but I must say the best advice is Never Explain! The mark of bad sci-fi is when the scientist/general/hero “explains” exactly how the doomsday device/alien/time machine works. Because it cannot work in reality, we’re taken out of the movie with the realization of its fakery, rather than being carried along by that willing suspension stuff.
The Force was a wonderful concept. Then Lucas ruined everything with is “midichlorians” nonsense. So, a simple blood test will determine who is a Jedi? Fascinating…
March 11th, 2008 at 11:54 am
Excellent post, John. Thanks.
March 11th, 2008 at 12:07 pm
I always loved the garden/greenhouse scene in Minority Report. The old woman basically just gives non stop exposition without much dialogue from Cruise. You don’t really notice it because the woman is just so bizarre, Cruise has been poisoned, and the plants in the greenhouse are really strange. Not sure if Frank intentionally wrote it that way or if it just came about later on.
March 11th, 2008 at 1:30 pm
My own recollection of the first time I saw the explanation scene in Jurassic Park (mind you I was only thirteen so it might be mistaken) was that I was DYING to find out what was actually going on on the island. I think I pretty much would have agreed to ANY explanation the writer would have given me, however weird. I think that is an important point about exposition. You can get away with some pretty choppy writing if you get the audience to ask the questions that will give you the chance to voice the answer you need to address. All the instances of “well-wasn’t-that-convenient-for-someone-to-say-exactly-that” that I can think of, are scenes where characters start explaining things that I, as an audience member, haven’t questioned.
March 11th, 2008 at 2:13 pm
Jonathan Richters: I loved that scene in MR too… I think exposition can be easily absorbed if there is something not quite right in a scene. I’m trying to think of other examples but coming up at a loss right now.
Very cool to find out you wrote the ball scene in MR, John.
I’m half and half over the video in Jurassic Park. I think I was 13 when I saw that at the cinema, and it stuck in my head as being a cool way of giving us information — but I’ve seen that film a bunch of times since and it grates a little on me more each time.
March 11th, 2008 at 3:28 pm
I believe less is more with regards to answering questions. Really, if it’s not vital to the plot, a little mystery is fine with me. You just accept it.
For instance, in regards to superhero movies a pet peeve of mine is that they all start with an “origin” cliche. Who cares how he got his powers? Show me a day in the life of this hero that is a compelling story. Perhaps you can hint at his origin, but why show it? Don’t fit his whole life into one movie.
March 11th, 2008 at 7:38 pm
The amazing part about the Jurassic Park exposition video was everything else that was going on. Remember, it wasn’t just a video, it was one of the many elements of the tour. Seeing the reactions of the different characters as the science lab rotated towards us was awesome. Shock, awe, amazement. As they move into the cars, there’s more awesomeness. And then everything goes wrong. It’s fantastic.
March 11th, 2008 at 8:48 pm
I think a film that is an absolute gem when it comes examples of exposition is Children of Men. The story is in the background, in a good way. You see the LCD screens on the vehicles and as billboards and you automatically get how far in the future it is. You see the bombings and the police shakeups, the protests and the people’s faces, and you get the state of the world — no explanation needed. The visual cues draw you in.
“Why can’t women have babies?” “Genetic testing, something in the water, who knows?” Simple as that. Any arcane explanation would have diminished the potency of that aspect of the plot, in my opinion.
March 11th, 2008 at 11:19 pm
I loved this post. Another way it was put to me was to have characters need to have the information, so as to create a matter of conflict (and then perhaps resulting in action or plot development) in receiving the information. I find this to be one of the harder aspects of screenwriting.
The Minority Report scene is beautiful. As Hannah pointed out, I never noticed or looked at it as an exposition scene. I was distracted by the simplicity of the ball. Look at the pretty birdie! Now we take a picture.
I had/have no problem with the Jurassic Park cartoon video, then again I was about 14 when I saw it. I don’t think that would change with rewatching; I suspended my belief before I seeing the movie when I knew dinosaurs would be involved.
Never seen Primer, but it’s on my Netflix right… now.
In response to Aaron’s last comment: the first thing that came to my mind was The Incredibles. Although, I didn’t mind the background story in Spiderman. Actually I found the scenes where Peter Parker discover his abilities to be quite charming.
Portal is a work of genius on so many levels. Not since the Curse of Monkey Island have I played a game that made me laugh out loud. You know a game holds a special place in the gaming world’s heart when fellow nerds do cover versions of Still Alive and post it on YouTube.
March 11th, 2008 at 11:41 pm
@ H.I. Beane: Have you seen the special features on the DVD? They go into painstaking detail about the choices they made and how they created the environment (not to mention the politics of it all). News flashes on TV naturally stating the date, run-down districts contrasted against fancy technology, a police state reflected by people herded like sheep while close by there are giant Quietus billboards… Children of Men is a great example.
March 12th, 2008 at 7:42 am
Very good blog, John. I like to see this kind of thing dissected. My big problem with SciFi/Fantasy these days is that the writers/directors/producers/caterers aren’t sticking to the universe they create. When you write SciFi or Fantasy, or any script for that matter, you have to create the laws of your universe, your fable, your campfire story, and hold to them. Breaking them defeats the narrative purpose and cheapens the power of storytelling.
Having said that, it is possible to pull the wool over an audiences’ eyes. For example, if E. T. is able to telepathically lift five adolescent males and their bikes all the way to the bald spot on the mountain so he can go home, why can’t he lift himself at the beginning of the film to outrun the clumsy, Ford-driving scientists, thus missing his flight?? Well, at that point in the movie we don’t know what he can and cannot do, so what we don’t know doesn’t hurt us until we think back on it, if we do at all.
Create the laws of your universe, and stick to them. That goes for filmmaking technique as well. Watched the Criterion release of The Last Emperor the other night and for one scene and one scene only, Pu Yi has a voice over, as if telling his story to the prison governor. Nowhere else does that happen in the film, only O’Toole as Reginald Johnston has voice over. So why break the spell, then never return to it? It’s just sloppy and obviously forced onto them because they felt no one would clearly understand that part of the film without it.
Another example: The Two Towers – there is one “Star Wars” (actually Kurosawa) wipe across the screen to transition scenes… but no others anywhere else in all three LOTR films. Why? Why chose that moment to use a scene transition that never appears again and in fact is just gimmicky?
If you’re going to break the laws of your narrative universe, then do it big, so that new laws are established that will mean something to the story and characters.
Thus Spake Zarathustra… such as he is.
March 12th, 2008 at 9:08 am
The “Back to the Future” Flux Capacitor is really just a cheap knock-off of the Oscillation Overthruster from “Buckaroo Banzai.” I just had to get that off my chest.
John Carpenter’s “They Live” and “Big Trouble in Little China,” Alex Cox’s “Repo Man,” and David Cronenberg’s “Videodrome” all reveal explanations of what’s going on in their weird worlds in interesting ways. BTiLC has some of my favorite bits of non-explanation, such as:
Jack Burton: What is that stuff? Egg Shen: It is black blood of earth. Jack Burton: You mean oil? Egg Shen: No, I mean black blood of earth.
And, the build montage (from Robo’s POV) in “Robocop” was, I thought, a reasonable way to get in some exposition, but still keep things interesting.
March 12th, 2008 at 4:27 pm
Just wanted to say thanks. I was stuck on why I was having pacing issues in my script, and your post totally helped. I even came up with a great line that will one day be part of some montage of great quotes… maybe. Keep up the good work!
March 12th, 2008 at 10:52 pm
Wonderful post. There are many movies who could benefit from your advice.
March 13th, 2008 at 2:14 am
There is a scene at the end of Memento where the Joe Pantoliano character spends literally five minutes reciting the backstory and explaining motivations to the Guy Pearce character (due to the short term memory device). This film is widely regarded as a cult classic and, in fact, still ranks at #27 on IMDB’s all time top 250 yet it does exactly what you say films shouldn’t do. What’s the difference here?
With regard to Jumper and Untraceable I have a question which opens up a wider issue, namely: How do scripts that don’t work still get made into films? I have seen Jumper. To me it is a commendably ambitious yet obviously and ridiculously flawed script in too many ways that matter but there it is, up on the big screen complete with international marketing budgets and worldwide event premieres. Most novice screenwriters have seen a film (no doubt many) and thought: ‘If I had written and sent out that script all I would have received back was a bundle of “no thanks, but best wishes for your career” notes’.
So, please, help me out here. Why am I struggling against time and money (like most new writers) for months on end trying to make sure my scripts fall within the academic rules and generally accepted wisdoms when scripts that haven’t are released as movies literally every week?! How are scripts that don’t work (and just plain bad scripts) made into films and, most importantly, why?
Does nobody notice? Does nobdy care? Or can nobody holding the cheques and green light buttons actually see that the scripts in their hands don’t work?
Please?
March 13th, 2008 at 4:55 am
John,
Crichton’s novels are a great example for writers looking into technical exposition. Crichton has a knack for maintaining the speed of his narrative while giving the audience technical or scientific information. His last novel “State of Fear” being the exception – it had didactic passages that felt like he was on a pulpit and neglecting his narrative. As a novelist he has often been accused of writing the novel for the adaptation – novels built for the movies.
Tom Clancy adaptations would be tougher as he can spend enormous amounts of time delving into the technical aspects of the weapons, tactics etc.
Good post.
March 13th, 2008 at 8:49 am
I wish this post had been read in advance when they were putting together the script for THE DA VINCI CODE. What worked in novel form was indescribably boring as a movie.
March 13th, 2008 at 11:18 am
I agree with everything in this post but for this one observation…
“As the writer, you may know exactly how the Thessalactan Grid enables transdimensional travel, and why there’s a 34-second delay before the Quantifier engages. I’m sure it’s fascinating and well-reasoned. But the audience doesn’t care.”
One thing I think that FAR too many professional storytellers just don’t seem to get often enough is that the audience most certainly DOES care.
Don’t kid yourself about that. Yes, getting across why “there’s a 34-second delay before the Quantifier engages” in a way that doesn’t ruin the pace, and actually engages and entertains your audience, can be an exceptionally tough challenge, and you’ve enumerated several strategies for tackling the problem – BUT…
Telling yourself that “the audience doesn’t care” is absolutely not a damn thing more THAN AN EXCUSE, and it’s a bad one.
Anyone working, in particular in sci-fi, should keep repeating the mantra…
The audience DOES care. The audience DOES care. The audience DOES care.
…as many times as it takes to sink in.
There’s a difference between sci-fi and fantasy, and it’s a difference all too many professionals unfamiliar with working in those genres seem to miss (or possibly simply choose to forget).
Fantasy uses magic, and magic is SUPPOSED to be “beyond the human ken”, mysterious, impenetrable. That’s part of its draw. Well written magic sticks to consistent “rules”, but you’re not supposed to know exactly what’s spewing out of the end of a wizard’s wand, or what an invisibility ring is doing to photons within the visible light range.
Sci-fi however, uses technology, and technology is NOT supposed to be “beyond the human ken”. At the very least the audience should be left with the impression that with the same training and/or knowledge of the characters, they too could understand how the technology works. That’s part of sci-fi’s draw, it gives the impression of being possible “some day in the future” when it’s pulled off correctly.
If you find yourself in the position where you can’t explain “why there’s a 34-second delay before the Quantifier engages”, in an entertaining and engaging manner, then DUMP the g.d. “Thessalactan Grid” altogether, and come up with something easier to work with, or don’t even get into it in the first place, but DON’T kid yourself about the “audience not caring”.
That’s an excuse, it’s a bad one, and practically the definition of lazy writing. It’s right up there with the other horrible SF excuse I’ve heard all too often in response to “Well how can they do that?” – “I don’t know! They’re aliens, and aliens can do that, o.k.?” Both those attitudes are a recipe for a guaranteed CR@PFEST. So repeat it until it sticks…
The audience DOES care. The audience DOES care. The audience DOES care.
March 13th, 2008 at 12:30 pm
Andre Gayle, that question has fascinated me to no end: “How are scripts that don’t work, (and just plain bad scripts) made into films and, most importantly, why?” I’ve made a study of it… and I have 3 theories:
1- Rube Goldberg is your writing partner. — And you can’t fire him. Each screenplay you sell will be rewritten 3 times. Once by the director’s vision. Once by the editor… and once by the composer. You can’t see a bad film and assume that you’ve seen the screenplay. Usually you haven’t. In fact I would argue, that if a group of people devoted more than a million dollars, and more than a year of their life to someone’s vision on paper, you can usually assume that somewhere ‘upstream’ a writer did a pretty damn good job.
2- You can only write Stairway to Heaven once. Robert Plant was part of a team that at one time made an unparalleled work of art. It was a group effort… and it was GOLD. Next year he will complete another piece. And we’ll all rush to invest as producers, because we’ve seen what he can do. When it is done, it will be a lot of things… it WILL be written to completion… it WILL be professionally recorded… but we’re all going to think the same thing… “Its not Stairway to Heaven”. Now go look at what David Webb Peoples has done, and tell me you won’t automatically and blindly back his next script. (You see… its tempting isn’t it?)
3-High concepts are often tall enough to hide a yard full of dog crap. When I saw Jumper… I walked out HAPPY. The two other Sci-Fi writers I went with were at least content. One reason: I didn’t go there to see story… I went there to see concept. And sure enough… it looked an sounded very cool when the guy teleported underwater. Two thirds of the Earth is covered with the stuff… and no one’s ever done it!? Thank you! DVD will be on my shelf. I imagine you’d be just as disappointed if you went to see Goodfellas for the Light-sabers. (I digress.) You can pick on films like: Jumper, The One, or Next, but they’re doing something that’s a really really important, and very very cool part of your job: Having a great concept first. So I think if your script has 2 pounds of rubbish in it… but you drop a 50 pound high-concept on the other side of the balance… people who love film, or the genre, will often look at the 50 pounder. (And sometimes not even see the crap.)
Apologies for the college term paper. I really love how organic and undefinable the reasons films get made are… it means there’s no final system keeping you out.
-Synthian
March 13th, 2008 at 4:45 pm
The best exposition often seems to have a “have your cake and eat it too” quality to it. Look at Being John Malkovich. The use of the employee-orientation video as an expositional device is first and foremost hilarious, but its absurdity gives a gentle yet deserved finger to movies like Jurassic park, AND it manages to present the exposition itself in an utterly clear and complete way. Which makes for joy at the movies.
March 14th, 2008 at 4:00 am
Hey Synthian,
Glad to see I’m not the only writer troubled/baffled by this ‘phenomena’. I understand the points you raise in your post but let me answer them like this:
It’s true that when a script reaches ‘downstream’ it would have gone through many iterations, and neccessarily so, after all, we’re not writing novels here. But if a good script has turned into a bad script at the point of principal photography how is it that no-one has been able to see and/or understand that before they commit it to film? The 2002 film ‘They’ is a classic example of this.
I don’t normally choose to see a movie based on who it was written by. I don’t think most cinema-goers (industry peeps included) see films for this reason either and, as such, a screenwriter’s past works wouldn’t influence my decision to see his/her future works. More often than not I have no idea who has written a film when I go to see it.
Jumper looked great but that still doesn’t change the fact that if I had written that script I would have been running into industry brick walls at every single turn. I am so certain of that. I’m glad you mentioned ‘Next’, I’ve seen it and it’s exactly, 100%, the type of film I’m talking about!! The mind numbingly flawed logic and shattering plot holes were so obtrusive in this film it completely took me out of the story altogether. No doubt it was the main reason ‘Next’ was such a huge flop (but nobody could see that going in?) It was like having an elephant sitting on your chest and being told not to worry about the crushed internal organs, just enjoy being up close to an elephant. How I would have loved to have been a fly on the wall in the development meetings to watch grown, seemingly intelligent, apparently industry professional people literally talk around the fact that nothing, nothing, nothing in that script worked or made any sense. Whatever concept it had was drowned in a tar pit of horrendously fudged causality.
Or, like I postulated, maybe they really didn’t know. While there maybe no final system keeping me, or any of us, out it would seem that writing a great script counts for increasingly less and less. For most of us, especially those of us internationally based, that’s our only way in…..
March 14th, 2008 at 1:00 pm
I wish I would have read this before I wrote my fantasy epic spec. Time for a new draft!
March 15th, 2008 at 12:27 am
Hey Andre, Hope I’m not abusing the post here (sure John will smack me if I do.) 1- I know, but… well… no. (RE: If a good script has turned into a bad script by the point of principal photography how is it that no-one has been able to see that?) Some people see it happening, and feel compromised… yes. BUT, there’s just as likely to be someone clapping their hands giddily as the film becomes more craptastic. (In a music studio we take orders from producers and refer to this act as “turning up the suck knobâ€?.) It’s a collaborative medium, and that means COMPROMISE. So in basic math, the person most likely to experience the most compromise by the end, is the originator. If you haven’t seen Ted Elliott & Terry Rossio’s DejaVu… try and read it first. The thing that’s projected onto the page is very different from the thing projected onto the screen. I think I’m paraphrasing a William Goldman when I say: The question will never be whether or not you can write better than what’s on the screen. The question will always be, can you write so incredibly well, that after 200 people spend 2 years contributing to it… that it will still be watchable? 2- TRUE. But you’re asking about how bad scripts get made… and the producers that pick them up often have a very good idea what that writer’s done. I myself once said, “If I had the capitol, I’d option Victor Salva’s next script just because he wrote Powder.â€? His next script was Jeepers Creepers.
3- Ok, I just can’t go on that specific trip with you. I wasn’t bagging on Next, and I certainly wouldn’t snub it, (cause I didn’t read it.) I’m just saying it was a very cool concept… with a cool name. Did you read John Hensleigh’s script? I understand what you’re saying… and you may be right. (You may have to blow minds with a couple perfect scripts before you have the right to yell, “And I want Samuel L. Jackson to have electric nunchucks and be the teleporting witch-hunt-police!�) Hell, you ARE right… But, I dare say, if you write in a voice like John Hensleigh’s (Next, Armageddon) you’ll be able to sell scripts about things as boring as board games, with no mental real estate, and ridiculously unfamiliar names like… Jumanji.
I wouldn’t place much concern on being from the UK. I get my ass kicked every year by Brits. Shakespeare in Love was awesome. And Tom Stopppard is God.
There’s nothing wrong with a perfect script being your only way in. That’s fine! You were going to work it till it was perfect anyway! Anything less says that: The only reason you were polishing your draft to perfection was because “they� required you to. In which case you’re doomed, because I can guarantee you, your competition will do it… because I’m it. �
-Synthian
March 15th, 2008 at 4:30 am
Hello again Synthian,
Like you, I hope John doesn’t mind if we carry on a semi-personal conversation here. At least it was borne out of his original blog entry and it really is a topic worthy of discussion.
I have to say, I just don’t go along with the notion that if you have already written a couple of great scripts to successful films the standard by which your subsequent script is judged falls as an inverse proportion. Or, at least, it shouldn’t. To what end would that serve? Screenwriters don’t have followings or fanbases. Recording artists can get away with delivering poor 3rd or 4th albums because by then they will have built up a devoted fanbase that will buy into them and their images no matter what. Successful actors can get away with making poor films (some continually so) because they have fanbases that will follow them to the next film no matter what. Writers can only be judged on the work in hand, surely? A poor script is a poor script no matter who it was written by, no? Hypothetically speaking, how does me having two previously successful, well received scripts help my poor third script be successful in any way? If it’s poor it’s poor and nobody would go to watch it because ‘it was wriiten by Andre Gayle and I enjoyed watch the films of his last two scripts’.
I guess what I’m trying to say is that nobody, not writers, re-writers, directors, producers or actors, goes into a project wanting to make a bad film. But, and this is the crux of the issue for most new writers trying to break in, it’s obvious that a film doesn’t have to be ‘good’ to be successful. It’s such an important distinction and it’s where the double standard for new versus established wirters comes into play. Van Helsing was written, produced and directed by the same person, Stephen Sommers, so I can be sure that what he had written ended up on the screen near verbatim and, I’m sorry, it’s as poor a script as I’ve seen. Didn’t stop it making $300mil worldwide though. Sometimes it doesn’t work. Tarantino has written some great films (I adore Pulp Fiction). I read AND watched Death Proof and it became obvious that only Tarantino could get away with such a pretentious, self indulgent mess. It was a flop but with a budget of around $30mil you know somebody was still getting paid, right? As poor a script as it was somebody still committed $30mil to it……?! The gamble just didn’t pay off here.
When the most important thing about films today IS NOT the script those of us who don’t have an Armageddon to our names are in an increasingly impossible battle.
The stories around the writers of films like American Beauty and Juno give rise to a lot of hope but it all seems no more designed than the method by which I pick my lottery numbers but, like you and most others reading these blogs, I’m not about to give up.
By the way, I’ve written a couple of magazine articles about subjects brought up here you may find interesting (particularly in relation to UK films which is a WHOLE ‘nother story!) You can find them at: http://www.dontmagazine.com/#/5/just-do-it/ and http://www.dontmagazine.com/#/6/andre-gayle/
for the first article click the arrow above Tarantino’s gun to turn the page. Good chatting.
March 15th, 2008 at 3:56 pm
Andre, I love how at the very end of your post you go ‘By the way, I’ve written a couple of magazine articles about subjects brought up here you may find interesting…’ which I did take the trouble to read. I sorta wished I hadn’t, because I have to reply.
Your article on the UK film scene demonstrates a tabloid understanding of the UK film industry as a whole. The UK Film Council (with whom you seem to have an axe to grind) are not the be all and end all of the UK film industry. There’s far more independent script development money available elsewhere and this industry is more healthier now than for years in terms of actual activity. Also, they are not the only financier in town and if you did know anything about studio output, you’d find the curious statistic that roughly 10% of every movie theatrically released breaks even which is about the same as the UK Film Council, only they also have a remit to support more risky, cultural projects like ‘Bullet Boy’. Every studio relies on it’s major tent pole movies to bring home the bacon. So the two are not so disimilar. UK Film Council has to do commercial too.
For the record, ‘Sunshine’ was not financed with UK money alone. I think Mr Fox Searchlight stumped up for a big chunk of that. Also, before you might ask, I don’t work for the UK Film Council.
So thanks for misrepresenting my local industry on the international stage (c’mon John , everyone reads your blog). The rest of the world should know, it’s not as Andre paints his picture. Yes, it’s bloody frustrating getting rejection letters whilst watching films on the big screen and thinking ‘I can do better’, Andre. We all do that. It’s part of what gets us started. But what’s the use being bitter about it? It’s not a lottery. It just takes one damn good script, a compelling story, potential for it to break through. And networking. And more writing. And learning. And more writing. If you’re any good, you’ll get there. This industry flatly does not make sense and if you try and figure it out, you’ll go mad. Just accept it and laugh it off. It’s only a movie (always remember John Brosnan saying that).
By the way, ‘Grow Your Own’ was a much different project when it got the green light from how it actually ended up on screen. If you ever come across the writers, you should ask them what happened. The reason it got picked out of the pile was because it’s about ‘difference’ and had a universal theme. Unfortunately it also got buried in film politics. They don’t refer to movie productions as runaway trains for nothing!
Apologies to John if this is off topic (hell… IT IS).
Happy writing. It’s the only thing that matters.
March 16th, 2008 at 1:13 am
Good points. We’re shredding whole forests of digital trees here by anyone’s standards. :) Here’s my email: Poking@TheHelplessRetards.com Connect up and I’ll flow back through there.
-With near disgusting faith in the divine power of magical scripts.- -Synthian
March 16th, 2008 at 2:42 am
Many thanks for this post. I come to your blog as a Crime Fiction Writer and a trained scientist who has spent far too many years as both a university lecturer and technical trainer in the Pharma Industry.
And I have just spent the best part of three hours trying to create a cunning method of telling my readers about how professional counterfeiters work with inks, paper quality and specialist codings to produce fake pharma packaging on fake high value prescription medicines; -without giving a lecture [ too easy] -without making my ‘guide’ sound like your least favourite school teacher -whilst building it into the action line of a thriller and not kill the power of the emotional impact of the revelation at that time - without the VISUAL benefit of cinematography - whilst remembering to Show not Tell through the impact of these fakes on the characters – and how to layer in the technical aspects.
It does not get easier.
I need all the help I can find. Many thanks for your timely post.:-)
March 16th, 2008 at 12:52 pm
In my experience explaining quantum physics to an audience is easy…explaining it to an executive, now that’s a whole other story.
March 16th, 2008 at 3:33 pm
“While the cliché of a wise old man (think Obi-Wan or Gandalf) is rightly avoided,2 there are smart ways to use a supporting character as explainer-of-things.”
There are pitfalls to this device as well. The bad version of this character has been nicknamed “Morris The Explainer.” He pops up at just the right moment to deliver All The Answers in one long speech.
Do you remember him in the elevator in Vanilla Sky?
March 16th, 2008 at 8:14 pm
Whoa, Whoa, WHOA!!! You were a writer on Minority Report, one of my all-time favorite films?!! Awesome. And that moment in particular is one that I’ve often admired. (I also use the greenhouse scene with Iris as an example of Midpoint with my students.) Too cool. Another great expositional scene is in Raiders of the Lost Ark, when Indy and his museum curator explain the details of the ark to the two government agents who have arrived at the University asking about Dr. Abner Ravenwood, Indy’s mentor. Looking at it for the 100th time, you start to ask how the hell they’d know all that and you wonder if Lucas came up with the concept of the head piece to the staff of Ra and the map room and all that by himself or through research… but the first time around you’re too busy learning about some really cool concepts to notice.
thanks John,
Dan.
p.s. I’ve got a pic of you on my new blog, if that’s okay? From the paramount gate.
March 17th, 2008 at 4:56 pm
Dave in DC: “Never Explain! The mark of bad sci-fi is when the scientist/general/hero ‘explains’ exactly how the doomsday device/alien/time machine works.”
Without which, “Primer” wouldn’t have worked (so far as it does). The characters explain their time machine quite thoroughly, but because the explanation is so baffling, we don’t realize the implications until later, around the time the characters do. It uses that confusion to generate suspense (which can be unfair to the audience, I think). The explanation also gives the garage geeks something to technobabble about, showing their character.
Andre Gayle: “There is a scene at the end of Memento where the Joe Pantoliano character spends literally five minutes reciting the backstory…. What’s the difference here?”
The difference is: Teddy really is lying.
March 17th, 2008 at 7:22 pm
John,
Interesting topic. Thanks for the insight. While I agree with you in most cases, I think that today’s audiences are much more intelligent and technical than audiences of previous decades. People who follow shows like CSI or NCIS have a better understanding of the technologies involved and I’d argue that brushing off the audience by dodging explanations has become more difficult today than it maybe was 20 years ago. Watch an episode of Quincy and then watch and episode of CSI. I think that there is a huge difference in the amount of detail that is explored. I don’t think that this is because of the topic…because the topics of forensics is the same in Quincy and CSI. I think that the difference is a much more technical audience that exists today.
Side comment…Star Trek audiences are probably a bitch to write for.
March 18th, 2008 at 3:23 am
Mike,
Try not to misrepresent my article on the UK film indusstry. You have your opinion, I have mine. Don’t think that you have to belittle my opinion because yours differs. It shows a real lack of class. The article itself is backed up by researched facts and statistics that are clearly laid out. If they are wrong, prove it.
You’re absolutely right. I do have an axe to grind with the UK Film Council. As everybody in the UK should. Because we (everybody who has ever bought a lottery ticket) are paying for the UKFC and, as such, it’s absolutely our right. It’s the ‘everybody’ that provides them with the tens of millions of pounds they use to fund these films that the ‘everybody’ consistenly do not ever want to watch. The public are positively unaware that they are the ones who are subsidizing this long succession of flops yet the UKFC is very secretive about the results of the the money they invest on our behalf and has been for too long (for obvious reasons). If ‘Grown Your Own’ turned into a turkey by the time filming began then the responsibility still lies with the UKFC, no? It goes back to a point I made in an earlier post here.
I also don’t agree that more ‘activity’ (very diplomatically put) equals ‘healthier’. In industry terms, a lot of films made that don’t make any money is not any better than a few films made that don’t make money (the prop buildings on the Universal back-lot). And while I apparently don’t know anything about the studio system I can still just about figure out that if a studio like Warner Bros can release at least one (usually more) billion dollar grossing films like Harry Potter each year among the 10% that break even or better, it can afford to take chances on smaller, more niche projects (as most studios do). The UKFC can’t. The highest grossing UKFC funded film for 2006 took only £6mil ($12mil worldwide). It’s there in black and white. Unfortunately the UKFC is not bound by the money it generates on the films it makes. All it has to do is spend the money that we (the UK public) provide it through the National Lottery. Also, if you can find the part of it’s remit where it says the UKFC has to ’support risky, cultural projects’ please copy it and send it to me at andre@bulldoghome.com because that is news to me.
I also clearly state that the UKFC DOES NOT encompass the entire UK film industry but is symptomatic of how the industry as a whole operates and I give examples of other projects that haven’t come through the UKFC but garnered exactly the same miniscule results using the same mentality. Again, it’s there in black and white.
In the future if you are going to belittle and misrepresent something in order to make yourself seem like the ‘balanced, intelligent point of view’ try and do it about something that people can’t simply click on and read for themselves.
To John August and anybody else who enjoys sensible, on topic debates (Synthian), forgive me.
March 18th, 2008 at 8:02 am
Mike Tully,
I would have to disagree with you. I think the audience that DOES care are the hardcore sci-fi freaks (meant in the most respectful way). I don’t know anything about you but I would think it safe to assume you are in that category.
If the film were being made to hit that specific niche, and that niche only, then I think you’d be right. HOWEVER, as you know, films are made to appeal to as wide an audience as possible. With that in mind, I would guess that if you were explaining in detail “why there’s a 34-second delay before the Quantifier engages”, 50%, if not more, of the audience wouldn’t even understand anyways. This is why they get bored, and this is why they don’t care.
You’ve got to consider every single person who comes to see your movie, not just the tech geek sitting in the third row who gets off on star trek because it “makes sense”.
March 18th, 2008 at 10:31 am
Andre
As you so clearly state that you have an axe to grind, I hardly believe that this makes you the best judge of UKFC output and why they make the decisions they do. They can speak for themselves. I just find your article a bit unbalanced, unfactual and from the point of view of someone who obviously has several drawers full of rejection letters. Lord knows, we all have them. So it goes.
I can only come from my viewpoint of the experience I’ve had of the industry here in the UK. On reading the article you wrote and drawing on my experience, I find your article to be wrong and biased because of your rejections, so I pointed it out. I have no want to publish my own article. I can’t be arsed grandstanding.
Anyway, this is a storm in a small teacup. I’m sure John and the American readers are frightfully bored with this, as am I. Suffice to say, your article is just an opinion. There are others less negative.
Happy writing.
March 18th, 2008 at 1:18 pm
mike, if you are bored, don’t bother posting. What I have written is backed up with listed facts and statistics. Like I said, if it’s ‘unfactual’ prove it. Dont throw toys out of the pram and say ‘it’s unfactual because I said so’. I never wrote I was ‘the best (or the right) judge’ and I set out the context to my opinion at the very beginning (did you even read the thing?) I have been rejected by the UKFC (as was clearly stated in the piece), as most people who apply are. The basis of my ‘axe’ was should I feel slighted by an organization who’s judgement is so clearly wrong almost all the time (with our money).
I wasn’t writing a report for a newspaper, it was a feature article for a magazine. Who’s point of view would you have expected? And, forgive my ‘grandstanding’. I didn’t realize that if a company pays you to write for their magazine it was called ‘grandstanding’ now. In my day they just called it ‘work’.
March 18th, 2008 at 1:58 pm
Andre
I don’t have the luxury of having a website where I can post (as in your case) my gross misunderstanding of the UK film industry. You’re a writer. You got rejected. You wrote an article bleating on about how you got shafted. Well boo hoo. Most other writers might have just carried on, but you have to write this article, stick it on a web site and point out to the whole world how shafted you got by the big nasty people with all the money. If that’s not grandstanding, I don’t know what is. The fact that you got paid for the article just again proves that there’s a sucker born every minute and good for you, I hope it helped pay your mortgage/drug habit of choice/toy soldier collection.
Your ‘facts’ are merely public domain theatrical box office takings that you then somehow use to justify the success/failures of films you name in your article. You haven’t bothered to take into account the DVD, terrestrial, satellite, cable, download etc sales to judge these films ’successes’ but have relied on a tabloid, knee jerk reaction in judging the perceived success of a film by it’s box office which really is inaccurate and I hate to say it but I will – amateurish and demonstrates a total misunderstanding of how this industry operates.
You also completely ignored the fact that ‘Sunshine’ wasn’t a ‘British’ film. It was part financed by the US, the same way any Bond film is but actually employs a heck of a lot of UK talent to make it. That’s what matters, not the idea that something is ‘British’ or not. We’re damn good at making films and we should get away from this parochial notion.
I also find it funny that you use a quote from Alex Cox to back your case up, a man who hasn’t made a profitable or watchable film in a long time. How does that work? I bet he’s glad that the UKFC didn’t have a commercial remit else his last effort wouldn’t have happened. Kinda makes your argument fold in on itself like a small black hole and implode, huh?
…See what I did there John? I turned this back to the original theme – quantum mechanics (okay, almost – nip picking cosmology fans) ;)
Honestly, just learn to suck it up and move on, Andre. There’s no use writing articles about it. It’s just sad and does you more harm than good.
March 18th, 2008 at 3:13 pm
I have to agree with Steve, at least to some extent.
Sometimes the audience cares, sometimes they don’t. It depends on many things, the tone of the movie, the context of the concept, whether the rest of the movie works and makes you not care if it’s explained.
In a movie with great dialogue, acting, plot, action, etc., the audience won’t care if something is explained.
The flux capacitor isn’t explained at all. And yet, people love Back to the Future and nobody complains that the movie suffered for lack of explanation.
In a movie that has other problems, the audience’s minds wander and they will nitpick things and fail to suspend their disbelief. Or a movie may simply require the explanation because that’s what works for the movie. There is soft scifi versus hard scifi.
There’s no hard and fast rule of never explain or always explain – based on the rest of the script, the writer should be able to figure out when it’s needed and when it’s not.
March 18th, 2008 at 3:18 pm
I didn’t bring it up, cretin. You did. You commented on it, I responded. You seem to have this notion up your arse that I somehow ‘have’ this magical website, populated it with other articles and features with the sole purpose of having a place to ’stick’ my article. If nobody is interested in publishing your opinions don’t pout because they are interested in publishing mine. But to publish mine would be to have been suckered, right? And you ‘wouldn’t want yours published’ because you are, presumably, ‘above that’? Above having your work published?! Just how arrogant/stupid are you, anyway?
I mentioned DVD, Cable, TV sales in the piece, explictly, as well as Airline sales (you forgot that one). I mean, the thing has been up and printed for months already. It’s not like I could go back and amend it with each new ‘point’ you bring up! Like most self important, nightmarishly amateur mouthpieces who can’t grasp the simple mechanics of making an argument you didn’t read the article properly and then make your witless points on things that I had already explained in the piece. I plainly explained WHY I chose to focus on box office in the first instance, idiot. Did you just choose to ignore that as well or are you just hoping to fire off enough arrows to see if any hit? If your experiences with the UK industry are different then fantastic. Mine are as stated. I’ve worked in this industry in one form or another for over a decade. I’ve written about what I’ve observed and how I feel about it. I pitched it to the editor and he printed it. What the hell is wrong with that? Many others I’ve talked to feel the same. Many don’t. What rational people do not do is stamp their feet like some feckless child, raising unsubstantiated and/or unsupported objections as though what they are really afraid of is washing the dirty linen in public. What is typical of your type is that if someone else independently comes to a similiar conclusion you seek to catergorize them in the same way. Funny that. Only you can be right, huh? You seem determinded to cast me as a bitter man, rejection letters bowing the floor of my attic, firing off attack pieces in all directions, conveniently ignoring the other article I linked to about a completely unrelated subject within film. If it works for your ego then cool and don’t let the fact that I was also paid for that one, and many others, impact on that at all, ok?
Notwithstanding, I have integrity enough to place a question mark above the funding for ‘Sunshine’. It is quite possible I missed a portion of foreign investment. I will check it aagin. But while I’m at it, let me give you a newsflash, superstar, it’s not people like you that will create a successful industry it will be those same tabloid readers you’re so keen to insult who go to the cinema in their millions every weekend, spending their money watching, all too often, everything but the UK films offered to them by the industry.
March 18th, 2008 at 4:29 pm
I regret the use of some of the terms in my previous post and I apologise for them. I enjoy reasoned debate, in fact I encourage it. What I find frustrating is when someone misrepresents what I have written and uses that misrepresentaion as a basis for their counter argument. It’s a crass way to try and ‘win’ and i’m afraid my incredulity got the better of me. So, while certainly I don’t want to take back any of the sentiments I will take back the use of the terms cretin, idiot, etc.
March 19th, 2008 at 9:10 am
Is this really the best place for this argument? I doubt anyone cares any more except for you two. I wonder if John even knows this is still going on…
March 20th, 2008 at 3:04 am
Let me give you some friendly advice, mike. Don’t use a blog to go after somebody who writes for a living. Writers love to write, it would seem like a simple thing to understand. I posted my email address a couple of post back if this isn’t the ‘best place’. If you actually read the piece first and have the capacity to be constructive I will certainly answer.
Which ‘two’?
March 20th, 2008 at 4:11 am
um… Andre… I’m the original ‘mike’ who posted up in reply to your article. I’m not mike no.69 but I agree, this is a bore.
Andre, I also write for a living. I’ve been in this industry 20 years. I’ve seen a lot. But this isn’t a cock waving exercise. I’ve got no wish to correspond with you. We have a difference of opinion, obviously and come from different perspectives. Let’s leave it at that.
March 20th, 2008 at 8:44 pm
Although I agree 100% with the original post, I’m wondering if it is entirely true. (Yes, that does mean that I suspect that I’m wrong too)
You mention that the audience doesn’t care how a device works, but with the trend for shows like CSI, surely there is a trend where the audience is expecting to have the science of the hunt explained to them?
The Jurassic Park snippet is a great example. The film-makers HAD to explain how it was possible for dinosaurs to exist in the modern day, because the audience truly cared. If the audience didn’t care, they could have skipped the entire scene. (And I was bothered that it didn’t explain how they had prehistoric extinct plants as well … when the main character had just commented on how it was impossible to have those plants a few moments earlier!)
Perhaps this is a golden opportunity for film marketers, who are struggling trying to get the web to tie in with the rest of their marketing efforts. The film makers can have websites for the geeks who truly care about the technology to have happy, long-winded debates .. a great opportunity for cross-platform media.
Perhaps Arthur C Clarke’s death truly means the death of hard sci-fi. He was famous for including orbital calculations with one of his stories (Jupiter Five) to demonstrate how it was technically plausible.
A webpage is the perfect place for those orbital calculations …
Mac
March 21st, 2008 at 4:02 am
The audience has to believe in your story world and explaining is part of it. Beating them over the head with the clumsy club of explaining perhaps isn’t. Being clever and natural about it within the story is. If you’re in the world of CSI, you’d expect some sort of cool explaining moment, it’s a hard tech kinda show, the same moments as how House explains why his patient doesn’t have Lupus (again) and it’s really something else whilst insulting everyone in the room along the way. These shows are nothing without those moments.
I think audiences do care how it works. If you don’t show them or intimate it, the story world becomes unbelievable. But then you will find films that are wholly ridiculous, such as the upcoming ‘Speed Racer’ where it seems that anything goes. So I guess some people like to switch their brains off.
Maybe it’s ultimately one of those decisions you make as a writer or film maker that determines the sort of film maker you’re going to be, one that stays within the story world or one that breaks it.
March 21st, 2008 at 9:48 am
Re: Mike Tully (#46)-
I think you’ve misunderstood John’s point.
It’s not that you don’t need to figure out how stuff works – that WOULD be lazy writing, and I agree that “Because they’re aliens, whatever!” is oftena bad sign.
However, Jurassic Park doesn’t need to explain molecular biology, errors in DNA replication as sources of mutation, gene therapy through foreign vectors, and spell out the genome of both the dinosaurs and frogs involved, in order to have you understand what’s going on. I think that’s closer to what John’s getting at.
You’re right, we do care how a given [whatever] works. I think John would agree. But we only care insofar as it goes with the story. That doesn’t mean that the [whatever] only needs to cover story functions (a la Flux Capacitor) – you can make detailed, researched, plausible [whatever] (a la Sunshine), but we only need to know some of those details.
Plotholes are just that – plotholes. They are apparent, and annoying, because they disturb the plot. Horror movies are the most frequent victim of these expository plotholes: In THE EYE (remake and original), we’re never told why the cornea transplants which allow the heroine to see ghosts also lets her hear and talk to them. Because the entire movie is about this premise, it’s a plothole. Because all of E.T. is about him escaping The Cold-Hearted Scientists, the fact that his abilities to escape them are inconsistent, is another.
The details of Jurassic Park’s genetics, isn’t (even though they don’t stand up to even the most basic genetic analysis).
March 26th, 2008 at 4:23 am
I love your reference to Answer Man. To my students, I refer to to him as her – and her name is Madame Exposition :o)
May 5th, 2008 at 9:48 pm
I must see if I can use html tags.
May 7th, 2008 at 2:48 pm
The best guide device in a movie–ever!–is the eponymous Hitchhiker’s Guide to the Galaxy. What you said about making the guide transparent is thrown right out in this movie, but it just works. In 30 second segments that cut into the story, the Guide does a masterful job of explaining how things like the infinite improbability drive actually work in a hilarious way, “without all that mucking about in hyperspace”.