John August

QandA

11-year old film fan

Education, QandA

I have an 11-and-a-half-year old who seems to watch movies
and TV shows more as a writer or director rather than as a viewer. She’ll second-guess
the plot,
for example; and also sometimes think that shots should be made in a certain
way. Do you have any suggestions for such a young aspiring filmmaker?

–Wordwitch

First off, kudos for recognizing her interest. By far the most helpful thing
a parent can do is to encourage their kids to explore what they like, and to
appreciate what they’re able to create. Her talent is like a tiny flame. It’s
your job to keep supplying the kindling she needs to burn, but avoid the temptation
to throw on too much too soon. You risk overwhelming her if she’s not ready
to move on to more sophisticated things.

If she has a favorite TV show, try taping an episode, then transcribing it
together. She’ll probably be fascinated to see what scenes look like when they’re
written down on paper. She may have ideas for her own scenes that are better
than the originals.

Likewise, you might help her find some fan fiction on the internet for her
favorite shows or movies. A lot of fan fiction is terribly written – and some
of it is very X-rated, so you’ll want to pre-screen – but if it inspires her
to write her own, fantastic.

If you happen to have a Mac and a DV video camera, iMovie is a no-brainer.
She can make little movies to her heart’s content, especially if you’re willing
to help when asked.

If she’s more interested in the design side of things, like costumes and sets,
try to get her involved with a children’s playhouse, or even a local community
theater. There are lots of jobs she could probably do, even at her age. Personal
bias, but I don’t think enough kids learn how to hammer or sew these days.

And keep in mind that her school district might have special drama or creative
writing programs. Ask her if she’d like to join one. Just remember: always
support, but never push. At some point, all kids rebel against their parents,
and if they associate you too strongly with the activity that gives them happiness,
there’s a chance they might walk away from it altogether.

The essentials of adaptation

Adaptation, QandA

From the perspective of a screenwriter, what is essential in creating an adapted
script? Is it possible to keep the true essence and theme of a piece of literature
when translated to film? Can literary techniques be directly transformed into
cinematic terms? Should the two even be compared?

–Jeremy Vandiver

Sure. Books and movies should be compared, if only to understand what each
does well.

Using words alone, a good book manages to evoke images and emotions in the
reader that add up to a coherent story. The best writing makes a reader feel
like he’s seeing, hearing and touching what the character experiences, putting
you "in his shoes." Of all the literary tools available to the writer,
the most valuable may be insight. The novelist can choose to tell the reader
what the character is thinking, or fill in extra details, or sketch out relationships,
that have nothing to do with the current scene. In fact, the novel doesn’t
need to have "scenes" at all. Moments and observations can float
freely in space and time, arranged in whatever order best suits the story.

A movie — and by movie I mean what’s actually projected on the big screen
— has basically the same goals as a novel. It wants to transport the viewer
into a different place and time, making him feel like what he’s seeing and
hearing is real. A movie has many advantages over a novel. Not only are there
concrete visuals, but you hear the characters speak and watch them fight.
It’s an exaggeration to say that a picture is worth a thousand words, but it
would be very hard to capture the essence of THE MATRIX’s bullet-time on paper
without having seen if first, or the feeling of a John Williams soundtrack.
But this efficiency comes at a cost. With rare, art-house exceptions, movies
have scenes. The viewer is seeing and
hearing something that is taking place at a specific time and location. Movies
move relentlessly forward at 32-frames
per second, and the viewer cannot choose to stop and think about something,
or flip back a few pages to catch something he missed.

Most importantly, movies lack insight. Aside from an occasional voice-over
or narrator intrusion (done recently, and effectively, by AMELIE and Y TU MAMA
TAMBIEN), a movie can’t communicate anything to the viewer beyond what is seen
and heard. Since a movie can’t flat-out tell you what the hero is thinking,
it has to be very specific with its images and sounds to let you know what’s
going on inside a character’s head.

Now for the terrifying truth: a screenplay is the worst of both worlds. It’s
a work of literature that has to conform to all the limitations of a movie,
yet without any of cinema’s special abilities. That above all else is why screenwriting
is so hard.

In terms of adaptation, the screenwriter has to look for ways to take ideas
that "float" in a novel and tie them down to specific moments, locations
and times. Sometimes this means simply repurposing internal thoughts as dialogue,
but more often it involves a fundamental rethinking of the structure, storyline
and characters to achieve the goal.

I think one reason that many adaptations rely on voice-over is that the filmmakers
never found a way to externalize the essence of the novel they were adapting.
Instead of making a movie that could stand on its own, they created the cinematic
equivalent of a book-on-tape. To me, these movies always "feel" written,
a huge limitation.

Was Go written on-the-fly?

Go, QandA

While listening to Doug Liman and Steven Mirrione’s
commentary track on the GO DVD,
they went through numerous scenes that weren’t in your original screenplay,
but rather scenes they had you write in production.
I was wondering what percentage of a film would you say is original material,
and what percentage is threaded during the filming process? Have you ever had
to rewrite a scene you loved with something you felt was lesser for the purpose?

–Brian

This is yet another example of why writers should always be on the commentary
track.

What’s unusual about GO is how little did change from the first script to
the final movie. It’s pretty easy to see what scenes were
new and old by looking at the deleted scenes on the DVD. We went back and reshot
several parts, including
the "branching-off" scene at the supermarket and the finale in Gaines’
apartment. On paper, I much prefer the Gaines’ apartment sequence as
originally scripted. I thought it was smarter and much more in keeping with
the spirit of the movie.
Unfortunately, it just didn’t turn out very well when we filmed it, which is
why we went back and did the simpler version that’s in the movie now.

The other
changes made during filming mostly involved production issues, such as
the names of the hotels we were using, or legal clearance problems. (For
example, Confederated Products was originally American Products, but we
couldn’t get permission to use that name.)

Do writers have a say in the music?

Charlie's Angels, QandA

Once your screenplay
has been sold, do you (the writer) have any say in the music that is used?

–Joel Norn

Almost never.
The music in a movie is ultimately the decision of the director and a contentious
committee that includes the composer, the music supervisor, the editor, the
producer, the studio, and the soundtrack representative. Sometimes the writer
will be included in that group, but rarely, because the problem is usually
too many opinions, not too few.
An exception is when a very specific song needs to be used for a scene.
For example, in CHARLIE’S ANGELS, a scene opens with Tom Green’s character
singing "Angel
of Morning" while making breakfast, and that was always in the script.