Handling repeating sequences
I’m writing a screenplay with a dream sequence that repeats itself identically three times in the script. It’s about half a page long. Should I repeat it word for word in the screenplay? I’m afraid writing “Fred has the same dream as before” won’t recreate the feeling for the reader, but writing the same thing three times feels weird.
– Joe
New York
Do neither of the above. Rather, think about the audience sitting in the theater watching your movie. Are you actually showing them exactly the same dream sequence? If so, that sounds pointless and boring.
Much more likely — and more interesting — is that the audience is getting some new information in the subsequent dream sequences, details that would push the story forward. Something would have changed, and it’s those changes you need to show on the page.
INT. DENTIST’S OFFICE – DAY [DREAM SEQUENCE]
Once again, the spinning drill bears down on Tom. Same whine. Same panic.
But this time, our attention shifts to the man behind the dentist’s mask -- who isn’t a man at all, but rather
A GRAY-SKINNED ALIEN.
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December 10th, 2009 at 5:33 pm
“Billy Madison” has a repeated dream sequence, albeit with slightly different twists every time.
December 10th, 2009 at 5:34 pm
Gah, that’s “Happy Gilmore” with the repeated dreams. Adam Sandler movies all seem alike to me.
December 10th, 2009 at 6:11 pm
There’s also a repeated sequence in Scott Frank’s The Lookout that I think would be worth reading over. It’s not only important in establishing the character but later adds subtext to the plot as a whole.
December 10th, 2009 at 6:45 pm
In “Duplicity”, Clive Owen and Julie Roberts repeat the same exact conversation four times but each time it happens it changes what we know about the story.
December 10th, 2009 at 10:54 pm
In case it wasn’t obvious, if you’re repeating a dream sequence exactly as it was shown earlier in the movie, just… don’t.
December 10th, 2009 at 11:12 pm
I’m playing with a repeated sequence now.
It is fairly common in the old detective story or in films like ‘The Sixth Sense’. At the end of the film, the audience gets a montage re-showing some earlier scenes .. but now they can spot all the clues that they overlooked.
I was hoping to write it in the same format that ‘The Sixth Sense’ used – but the draft I have doesn’t have the multiple repeated snippets of scenes. It repeats only the shooting, marking it as ‘FLASHBACK’.
It’s curious that he didn’t have the rest of the repeated scenes in the script – I can’t imagine the film making much sense without them. (It would have given me a sense that they just changed the rules at the end, rather than showing me how I missed all the obvious clues throughout the film)
Mac
December 11th, 2009 at 12:28 am
In case it wasn’t obvious, if you’re trying to write in the key of M. Night Shamayalan, just… don’t.
December 11th, 2009 at 12:54 am
50 First Dates. :)
… but the one’s you should be taking pointers from are Groundhog Day, Flatliners, and Back to the Future II.
December 11th, 2009 at 6:38 am
THANK YOU.
December 11th, 2009 at 9:50 am
Great examples. The key with all of them is that something changes when the scene is repeated, as everyone’s mentioned above. Some are more successful than others. The strongest will be those where the device is essential to the narrative and actually moves the narrative forward.
December 11th, 2009 at 10:30 am
Great answer, John. Of course, my baseline for dream sequences that consistently reveal more information is a terrible Lifetime original movie–but yes, check out all of those movies listed above.
I think the important thing here is to have a mythology already worked out, so the final “dream reveal” doesn’t seem forced or fake. You want the dream sequence to feel organic to the story–not some tacked on explanation.
December 11th, 2009 at 12:04 pm
If the repeated sequence schtick is germane, you can get away with a subtle trick of lighting or focus instead. That is, each time you want to show something else, instead of doing a close shot on something to shove it in the audience’s face, you could set it up that something is slightly more in focus than other things, or slightly better lit. It would be a very subtle visual instead. The linkage would be that whatever we’re seeing was already telegraphed to us.
Such as, a prescription drug was just mentioned as being given to a character and during the flashback each time there was a pill bottle, but right after the prescription issue being introduced, that flashback shows the bottle slightly less fuzzy.
It’s a variant of what they do for memory flashes in NCIS and it works for them, but they do a tight shot on the important items.
December 11th, 2009 at 7:22 pm
Most dream sequences fail miserably. Writers don’t account for how dreams play out. Things are amorphous and constantly changing. You don’t experience hard and fast worlds and surfaces. You wouldn’t even see something for more than a few seconds. It would have changed into something else.
Films aren’t very good at capturing this type of experience. I don’t think I’ve ever seen a good dream sequence, except in comedies where you allow that they’re just being silly.
Sometimes single images are flashed from dreams, and that seems more effective. Clues from dreams work better than “sequences” unless you’re really going to go all out and break new ground.
It goes without saying that repeating something in a movie should be done with changes, more revealed info to the audience. Or what’s the point?
December 11th, 2009 at 8:17 pm
Seems like you can get away with some measure of verbatim repetition (if only visual) — a line or two, as in the example. But not a half-page. More like Aronofsky’s “hip-hop” montages.
December 12th, 2009 at 9:00 am
i like to mention nlp as a tool for learning screenwriting. It seems most successful genuises has feats/choices/personalities in common-as details in successful done actions towards a core goal.
I`m learning time is very relative in the different settings time is being presented to the persons, and some choices are not to be proceeded with. Some places reffered to cut a darling.
Micael bay says a movie is thousands of pieces. And some of those pieces are just not your movie. Sometimes it`s go, or that fatal; no go at all for your movie.
Point is, most cool movies comes from someones life and are rooted in passion. Live a big life with the right passion, and life will probably land secrets at you. I wouldnt dare mention sticky danger ever again. Thanks for the post. Great. And finally merry christmas to every hard working script writer on the globe. Good luck to you. from bjorn
December 12th, 2009 at 1:06 pm
My thoughts:
Repeat it word for word. If the audience is seeing the same thing three times in a play that has more than that going on, it will seem uncanny. And it should–it’s a dream, right?
December 12th, 2009 at 7:22 pm
The Haruhi “Endless August” saga, anyone?
8 f/&$king episodes, practically same script, all episodes drawn and animated again, very little new info per episode…
It was painful to watch that… PAINFUL!!!
December 13th, 2009 at 1:22 pm
premium rule in writing anything from screenplays to greeting cards..everything must move the story forward. Well, maybe not greeting cards.
December 13th, 2009 at 1:51 pm
One way to vary it is to simply make it a different length.
Maybe we see the whole sequence the first time, but only quicker, more critical parts of it in later sequences.
Or the opposite. You see a flash of it, and then the next time, it lasts a little longer, showing a little more.
(And greeting cards DO have to move the story forward, but only one beat.)
December 13th, 2009 at 11:22 pm
Structure and story are not the same thing. While a clever structure may be fascinating for a screenwriter -or any other kind of artist for that matter-, what the public really wants is substance: a good story. Don’t mistake one for the other.
The Sixth Sense. Clever twist, didn’t see that coming -well, actually many people did, but anyway-. First time you watch the film, you enjoy it, but once you know what’s really going on there… most of its ‘rewatch’ potential is gone.
Memento. The structure is more cleverly integrated with the plot and the narration than The Sixth Sense, and the story is better, but still not all that good, rather common noir. If you add the fact that the weird structure alienated a good number of the viewers, then you can easily see why it stayed just a cult film, although critics and film buffs seem to love it, I’d say because if its very obvious structure and its clever use of it. But common folk doesn’t care all that much for formal cleverness.
Groundhog Day. A very obvious structure, actually, and a plot that’s quite predictable. Still, a joy to watch over and over, because it is a great story of… redemption? personal growth? Whatever. A good story, and if the Bill Murray character went through similar kind of trials and troubles and learned the same lessons without being in a time loop, it would still be a very enjoyable film to watch.
In Groundhog Day I really liked the scenes involving the homeless guy, and how no matter how the Bill Murray character tried to help him, he would still die. That made Murray understand he couldn’t outsmart whatever put him in the timeloop, that he would need to surrender his ego. I don’t remember any reference to the homeless guy in the last repetition of the day. I saw the film a couple of years ago, but I remember missing any reference to him in the last day. Did I overlook something? It would be great to see how Murray decided to deal with him, knowing that he was going to die anyway. That would really round the film for me.
December 14th, 2009 at 12:18 pm
“Most dream sequences fail miserably. Writers don’t account for how dreams play out. Things are amorphous and constantly changing. You don’t experience hard and fast worlds and surfaces. You wouldn’t even see something for more than a few seconds. It would have changed into something else.
Films aren’t very good at capturing this type of experience. I don’t think I’ve ever seen a good dream sequence, except in comedies where you allow that they’re just being silly.”
That’s a very good point. I was trying to think movies with dream sequences that worked, and I could only come up with three that came anywhere near really conveying the quality of a nightmare – THE EXORCIST, WILD STRAWBERRIES and LOS OLVIDADOS. They couldn’t get the amorphous aspect – I guess you’d need very good CGI for that – but they all had the sense of the ground constantly shifting under the protagonists’ feet.
December 15th, 2009 at 9:09 am
Whoops, forgot about a big one – Polanski’s ROSEMARY’S BABY also has a great dream sequence. His MACBETH also has a nifty one.
December 15th, 2009 at 9:15 am
And just to drag it back on topic, there’s an old British anthology horror film called DEAD OF NIGHT that used a repeated sequence to unsettling effect – same footage. But the repeated sequence was at the end of the movie, so it may be the exception that proves the rule – it ended the narrative rather than being in the middle somewhere, which probably wouldn’t have worked.
December 17th, 2009 at 8:03 pm
“paprika” go see it.
December 18th, 2009 at 12:26 pm
and i can
t see "waking life" mentioned. in it he wakes up on and off and nobody dont really know who is awake or not. lots of examples of dreaming in that one.February 2nd, 2010 at 10:19 am
To the people talking about the difficulty of replicating dream sequences in films – one example that I feel did a very very good job of capturing the way our minds present things to us was in “Minority Report”. Granted, these where memories and not dreams, but I feel that the way they translated what is seen in the mind’s eye to the screen felt very accurate.