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SCREENWRITING 101 - "A Top Screenwriting Class!" Get it 1/2 OFF! Limited Time! Professional Instructor! http://www.4screenwriters.com/screen_101.html =================================================================== >>>>>>>>>>>>>>> SCREENWRITERSUTOPIA.COM =================================================================== --------------> THE ULTIMATE SCREENWRITING EXPERIENCE --------------> Serving Screenwriters Since 1996 --------------> ----------------------------------- --------------> Going out to over 40,000 screenwriters! --------------> ----------------------------------- --------------> THIS IS NOT SPAM - You have signed up for this e-newsletter --------------> If you feel this is a mistake you can remove yourself via the --------------> link at the BOTTOM of this email. Thank you! =================================================================== + SCRIPT SWAP - FREE Service from SU Can't get the right people to read your script? Now you can. http://www.script-swap.com ======================== TOC =========================== ---> Screenwriter's Monthly Newsletter: JUNE ======================================================== > June 13th 2006 (1) OLD SCHOOL to NEW SCHOOL: A New Take on Screenwriting Manuals (2) Newswire: Latest Script Deals (3) CRAFT: Making Screenplays Vertical (4) A Screenwriting Life: Paddy Chayefsky (5) FADE OUT ====================== END TOC ====================== /===================== SPONSOR =====================\ *$75 COVERAGE SPECIAL FOR NEW CUSTOMERS FROM HOLLYWOODLITSALES.COM **We helped one movie get made. Why can't yours be next? Our experienced readers--the same folks who read for the studios and agencies--will read and evaluate your script and write it up in a coverage report. They'll give you the good, the bad, and the ugly and suggestions on how to make your script pop off the page. If it meets their strict guidelines, we'll alert the industry about your material. Remember, this is a referral-based business. Submit online today (secure server) since this introductory special won't last forever. Info and samples at: http://www.hollywoodlitsales.com/coverage/75special.shtml *Can't be combined with other offers. Online only with credit card. Rush service available for extra charge. ** "Can't Be Heaven" with Ralph Macchio. Produced by Joel Zwick who directed "My Big Fat Greek Wedding." IMDB: http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0168563/ /==================================================\ (1)===================================================== OLD SCHOOL to NEW SCHOOL: A New Take on Screenwriting Manuals ===================================================== by Chris Wehner The art and craft of screenwriting is constantly changing, always in motion. The motion picture evolves constantly, forever will, into what unknown future we can only guess at. How is technology affecting the screenwriter and how has it already affected the screenplay form? The shooting script for Cellular (due out in theaters in September) dated September 2nd 2003 written by Larry Cohen with revisions by J. Mackey Gruber and Eric Bress, contains something I haven’t seen or noticed before in a screenplay, actual references to special effects for sound, such as: SFX: BZZZZZZZZTT!! SFX: HONK-HONK!! SUDDENLY -- SFX: RYAN’S PHONE BEGINS BEEPING It appears no longer is it good enough to simply mention the sound or underline it, you now make it a special effect. (Note to beginner screenwriters, I'm joking.) And, of course, we’ve all seen screenwriters make references to computer generated special effects in their scripts, that’s been going on for years. I could care less about those happenings, what interests me is how modern screenwriting is starting to challenge the classical structure and its paradigm. Screenplays such as Pulp Fiction, The Usual Suspects, Memento, Run Lola Run, 21 Grams, Mulholland Drive, Vanilla Sky, Magnolia, The Player, American Beauty, Training Day, Lost in Translation, defy the classical (Old School) teachings on structure, conflict, and even sometimes drama and characterization. As a screenwriter or soon to be screenwriter, you might be thinking about purchasing your first book on screenwriting or adding to that small collection scattered about on your bookshelf, and on the floor next to your desk. So, what books should you be considering? Which ones can keep you in step with the ever-changing craft of screenwriting? What books can help you stay in the game; because the game is always changing my friends. Well, I have some suggestions. It’s time to consider something besides the Old School approach to screenwriting. The books that I’m about to categorize as Old School were the books I first read in the early 1990s when I started writing. They are good books, great books, and today still offer plenty to the screenwriter, just not enough anymore. These books are quickly becoming dinosaurs in their presentation of structure, theme, and even characterization. The Old School books have three main problems as far as the modern screenwriter is concerned: Read More: http://www.screenwritersutopia.com/modules.php?name=Content&pa=showpage&pid=2717 /===================== SPONSOR =====================\ ScriptShark.com - Sell your screenplay with the most renowned writer discovery service available. Services start at just $29.99! http://www.scriptshark.com /==================================================\ (2)===================================================== NEWSWIRE: Latest Script Deals... ===================================================== · Former Entertainment Exec Breaking Writers Via Website · Latest Script Deals · Writer's Cramp: ASK THE DUST · Amateur's script attracts the best · A New Style? http://www.screenwritersutopia.com/modules.php?name=News_Archive (3)===================================================== CRAFT: Making Screenplays Vertical ===================================================== By Charles Deemer Hollywood loves buzzwords, and one of the latest is "vertical," as in make your screenplays vertical. Like many buzzwords, this one is based on a fundamental truism: it is easier to read a manuscript that is "vertical" with lots of white space on the page than one that has great text density. You know this yourself. Remember your college days when you were cramming for an exam? What was easier to read, the long dense paragraph that took most of a book's page -- or the airy open text written in short paragraphs? The latter. This is because the eye could race down the page, in a kind of vertical reading style, rather than plodding across the page horizontally. For quick reading, for skimming, the page that invites vertical eye movement is far more friendly to the harried reader. Now who is going to read your screenplay the first time around? A harried reader, believe me. Readers are over-worked and under-paid. Trust me, I've been one. They also get paid by the script. Does this invite a slow, careful reading? Of course not. Their job is to fill out a form about the story -- called coverage -- and the more quickly they can read a script, the happier they are. Screenplays that invite vertical reading are loved by readers. In contrast, text-dense scripts requiring horizontal reading start out with one or two strikes against them. More: http://www.screenwritersutopia.com/modules.php?name=Content&pa=showpage&pid=2698 /===================== POLL =====================\ Scariest Film of All Time? Alien(s) The Exorcist Gigli The Ring The Shining Phantasm Event Horizon Friday 13th Halloween Jaws Les Diaboliques Psycho To vote: http://www.screenwritersutopia.com/modules.php?name=Surveys&op=results&pollID=25 \===================================================/ (4)===================================================== A Screenwriting Life: Ronald Bass ===================================================== Playwright/scenarist Paddy Chayefsky originally harbored dreams of becoming a comedian, but turned to writing while convalescing from a war wound. He began writing for television in the early 1950s. For a time, Chayefsky was pigeonholed early on as a specialist in "kitchen sink" drama, but was eventually best-known for his TV drama, "Marty", which took off as a TV drama in 1953 that it was expanded by Chayefsky into a 1955 film. He made the transition to film with his dark 1971 farce "The Hospital", which won him another Oscar. Five years later, he skewered the world of TV journalism with his screenplay for "Network" (1976), introducing the now-legendary mantra "I'm mad as hell, and I'm not going to take it any more." Chayefsky's last screenplay was the 1980 adaptation of his own novel "Altered States". So unhappy was he with finished film that he had his name removed from the screen credits. Chayefsky died shortly afterward. Read More: http://www.screenwritersutopia.com/modules.php?name=ScribeContent&pa=showpage&pid=2684 (6)==================================================================== FADE OUT ==================================================================== Editor-n-chief / Chris Wehner Want to get reviewed? Send us book, article, video, or dvd: Screenwriters 2139 North 12th Street #10 Box 9010 Grand Junction, CO 81501 We try to answer all of our e-mail, so drop us a line: Website: http://www.screenwritersutopia.com E-mail: staff@screenwritersutopia.com Want to ADVERTISE? editor@screenwritersutopia.com Contents may not be reprinted without written permission. You are, however, welcome to forward this e-mail to whomever you wish. All letters, comments and reviews sent to Screenwriters in any manner are assumed intended for publication, unless stated otherwise. == CUT and Print == |
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June15, 2006 - 2006 Screenwriting Showcase Awards! >> |
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