“
I think I’m always so much more happy with books and movies and stuff. I think I get more excited about well-done representations of life than life itself.
- Celine
”
”
Richard Linklater (Before Sunrise & Before Sunset: Two Screenplays)
“
So much of what I see reminds me of something I read in a book, when shouldn't it be the other way around?
”
”
Nora Ephron
“
Just because my dreams are different than yours, it doesn't mean they're unimportant.
”
”
Greta Gerwig (Little Women: The Screenplay)
“
I won't do this movie because I don't believe the love story," she told Selznick. "The heroine is an intellectual woman, and an intellectual woman simply can't fall in love so deeply.
”
”
Ingrid Bergman
“
Ezekiel 25:17. "The path of the righteous man is beset on all sides by the inequities of the selfish and the tyranny of evil men. Blessed is he who, in the name of charity and good will, shepherds the weak through the valley of the darkness. For he is truly his brother's keeper and the finder of lost children. And I will strike down upon thee with great vengeance and furious anger those who attempt to poison and destroy my brothers. And you will know I am the Lord when I lay my vengeance upon you." I been sayin' that shit for years. And if you ever heard it, it meant your ass. I never really questioned what it meant. I thought it was just a cold-blooded thing to say to a motherfucker before you popped a cap in his ass. But I saw some shit this mornin' made me think twice. Now I'm thinkin': it could mean you're the evil man. And I'm the righteous man. And Mr. .45 here, he's the shepherd protecting my righteous ass in the valley of darkness. Or it could be you're the righteous man and I'm the shepherd and it's the world that's evil and selfish. I'd like that. But that shit ain't the truth. The truth is you're the weak. And I'm the tyranny of evil men. But I'm tryin, Ringo. I'm tryin' real hard to be the shepherd.
he became the shepherd instead of the vengeance.
Jules Winnfield- Samuel L. Jackson
”
”
Quentin Tarantino (Pulp Fiction: A Quentin Tarantino Screenplay)
“
Still, these days when I daydream about the movie, I don't think about the big picture. It's more fun for me to think of little things that would add to the movie. I like to think the powers that be would let me amuse myself with some small things in order to shut me up while they re-write the screenplay to turn Kvothe into a lesbian, shape-changing unicorn.
”
”
Patrick Rothfuss
“
I'm thinking about the top five all-time greatest movie kisses. I can't believe I haven't made that list.
And I'm thinking about a screenplay I want to write. I have a hunch it'll be the first good movie I've ever written.
This one will be about a girl.
I don't know how I ever tried to write my story without her.
”
”
Melissa Keil (Life in Outer Space)
“
What will you do?"
"Oh, hell, I'll write a novel about writing the screenplay and making the movie."
"What are you going to call it?"
"Hollywood."
"Hollywood?"
"Yes...
”
”
Charles Bukowski (Hollywood)
“
A movie: tells the story; of a person(s); in the pursuit of an Objective(s); in the face of Opposition(s); with someone to talk to; with an underlying theme, in a clearly defined genre; with an emotionally satisfying resolution. Does yours?
”
”
Dan J. Decker (ANATOMY OF A SCREENPLAY THIRD EDITION)
“
I ask Laurie if it's possible to get trained fish. Lindsay says this is how we know I've never produced a movie.
”
”
Emma Thompson (The Sense and Sensibility Screenplay and Diaries: Bringing Jane Austen's Novel to Film)
“
The world is what you make of it, friend. If it doesn't fit, you make alterations.
”
”
Lawrence Kasdan (Silverado: The Screenplay)
“
Paparazzi arrived for Hugh [Grant]. We had to stand under a tree and smile for them.
Photographer: 'Hugh, could you look less -- um --'
Hugh: 'Pained?
”
”
Emma Thompson (The Sense and Sensibility Screenplay and Diaries: Bringing Jane Austen's Novel to Film)
“
……, but as I am a scholar I feel obliged to document what it is like here, most of the time, between the dramatic climaxes. In truth it is like this: You cannot imagine how time can be so still. It hangs. It weighs, and yet there is so little of it. It goes so slowly and it is so scarce. If I was writing this scene it would last a full 15 minutes. I would lie here and you would sit there.
”
”
Margaret Edson (Wit)
“
If every minute of time elapsed on the screen equals in length of time every other minute, and obviously it does, and if time on the screen equals importance to the audience, that is, one minute of screen time gives equal weight to the emotional, dramatic, narrative, and every other aspect of experiencing a movie as every other minute, and it does, then we know something important we need to know about screenplays.
”
”
Dan J. Decker (ANATOMY OF A SCREENPLAY THIRD EDITION)
“
That’s the greatest miracle, and ultimately the only one: that you awaken from the dream of separation and become a different kind of person. People are constantly concerning themselves with what they do: have I achieved enough, written the greatest screenplay, formed the most powerful company? But the world will not be saved by another great novel, great movie, or great business venture. It will only be saved by the appearance of great people.
”
”
Marianne Williamson (Return to Love)
“
In a movie, people only talk when they want something. If your characters are not pursuing their needs in the scene, they are invariably talking about the movie they are in.
”
”
Dan J. Decker (ANATOMY OF A SCREENPLAY THIRD EDITION)
“
For as long as I can remember I always wanted to be a gangster.
”
”
Nicholas Pileggi (Goodfellas: Screenplay)
“
At our noblest we announce to the darkness that we will not be diminished by the brevity of our lives.
”
”
Cormac McCarthy (The Counselor (Movie Tie-in Edition): A Screenplay (Vintage International))
“
Jane reminds us that God is in his heaven, the monarch on his throne and the pelvis firmly beneath the ribcage. Apparently rock and roll liberated the pelvis and it hasn't been the same since.
”
”
Emma Thompson (The Sense and Sensibility Screenplay and Diaries: Bringing Jane Austen's Novel to Film)
“
Hugh Laurie (playing Mr. Palmer) felt the line 'Don't palm all your abuses [of language upon me]' was possibly too rude. 'It's in the book,' I said. He didn't hit me.
”
”
Emma Thompson (The Sense and Sensibility Screenplay and Diaries: Bringing Jane Austen's Novel to Film)
“
I seem finally to have stopped worrying about Elinor, and age. She seems now to be perfectly normal -- about twenty-five, a witty control freak. I like her but I can see how she would drive you mad. She's just the sort of person you'd want to get drunk, just to make her giggling and silly.
”
”
Emma Thompson (The Sense and Sensibility Screenplay and Diaries: Bringing Jane Austen's Novel to Film)
“
Life is like that...sometimes you have to peel off the bitterness in order to get to the part that is sweet.
”
”
Ken Poirot
“
(Golden Globe acceptance speech in the style of Jane Austen's letters):
"Four A.M. Having just returned from an evening at the Golden Spheres, which despite the inconveniences of heat, noise and overcrowding, was not without its pleasures. Thankfully, there were no dogs and no children. The gowns were middling. There was a good deal of shouting and behavior verging on the profligate, however, people were very free with their compliments and I made several new acquaintances. Miss Lindsay Doran, of Mirage, wherever that might be, who is largely responsible for my presence here, an enchanting companion about whom too much good cannot be said. Mr. Ang Lee, of foreign extraction, who most unexpectedly apppeared to understand me better than I undersand myself. Mr. James Schamus, a copiously erudite gentleman, and Miss Kate Winslet, beautiful in both countenance and spirit. Mr. Pat Doyle, a composer and a Scot, who displayed the kind of wild behavior one has lernt to expect from that race. Mr. Mark Canton, an energetic person with a ready smile who, as I understand it, owes me a vast deal of money. Miss Lisa Henson -- a lovely girl, and Mr. Gareth Wigan -- a lovely boy. I attempted to converse with Mr. Sydney Pollack, but his charms and wisdom are so generally pleasing that it proved impossible to get within ten feet of him. The room was full of interesting activitiy until eleven P.M. when it emptied rather suddenly. The lateness of the hour is due therefore not to the dance, but to the waiting, in a long line for horseless vehicles of unconscionable size. The modern world has clearly done nothing for transport.
P.S. Managed to avoid the hoyden Emily Tomkins who has purloined my creation and added things of her own. Nefarious creature."
"With gratitude and apologies to Miss Austen, thank you.
”
”
Emma Thompson (The Sense and Sensibility Screenplay and Diaries: Bringing Jane Austen's Novel to Film)
“
KAUFMAN
Sir, what if a writer is attempting to create a story where nothing much happens, where people don't change, they don't have any epiphanies. They struggle and are frustrated and nothing is resolved. More a reflection of the real world —
MCKEE
The real world?
KAUFMAN
Yes, sir.
MCKEE
The real fucking world? First of all, you write a screenplay without Conflict or Crisis, you'll bore your audience to tears. Secondly: nothing happens in the world? Are you out of your fucking mind? People are murdered every day! There's genocide, war, corruption! Every fucking day somewhere in the world somebody sacrifices his life to save someone else! Every fucking day someone somewhere makes a conscious decision to destroy someone else! People find love! People lose it! For Christ's sake! A child watches her mother beaten to death on the steps of a church! Someone goes hungry! Somebody else betrays his best friend for a woman! If you can't find that stuff in life, then you, my friend, don't know CRAP about life! And WHY THE FUCK are you wasting my two precious hours with your movie? I don't have any use for it! I don't have any bloody use for it!
KAUFMAN
Okay, thanks.
”
”
Charlie Kaufman (Adaptation.: The Shooting Script)
“
(On period costume posture coaching:)
"We all stand about like parboiled spaghetti being straightened out.
”
”
Emma Thompson (The Sense and Sensibility Screenplay and Diaries: Bringing Jane Austen's Novel to Film)
“
Sense and Sensibility signs litter Devon -- arrows with S & S on. Whenever Ang [Lee] sees a B & B sign he thinks it's for another movie.
”
”
Emma Thompson (The Sense and Sensibility Screenplay and Diaries: Bringing Jane Austen's Novel to Film)
“
Lindsay [Doran] goes round the table and introduces everyone -- making it clear that I am present in the capacity of writer rather than actress, therefore no one has to be too nice to me.
”
”
Emma Thompson (The Sense and Sensibility Screenplay and Diaries: Bringing Jane Austen's Novel to Film)
“
Our first point of discussion is the hunt. (...) My idea is to start the film with an image of the vixen locked out of her lair which has been plugged up. Her terror as she's pursued across the country. This is a big deal. It means training a fox from birth or dressing up a dog to look like a fox. Or hiring David Attenbrorough, who probably knows a few foxes well enough to ask a favour.
”
”
Emma Thompson (The Sense and Sensibility Screenplay and Diaries: Bringing Jane Austen's Novel to Film)
“
We've hired the calmest babies in the world to play the hysterical Thomas. One did finally start to cry but stopped every time Chris [Newman (assistant director)] yelled 'Action'. ... Babies smiled all afternoon. Buddhist babies. They didn't cry once. We, however, were all in tears by 5 p.m.
”
”
Emma Thompson (The Sense and Sensibility Screenplay and Diaries: Bringing Jane Austen's Novel to Film)
“
Edward finds Elinor crying for her dead father, offers her his handkerchief and their love story commences. Ang [Lee] very anxious that we think about what we want to do. I'm very anxious not to do anything and certainly not to think about it.
”
”
Emma Thompson (The Sense and Sensibility Screenplay and Diaries: Bringing Jane Austen's Novel to Film)
“
[Over breakfast] We discussed the 'novelisation' question. This is where the studio pay someone to novelise my script and sell it as Sense and Sensibility. I've said if this happens I will hang myself. Revolting notion. Beyond revolting.
Lindsay [Doran] said that the executive she had discussed it with had said 'as a human being I agree with you -- but ...' I laughed until my porridge was cool enough to swallow.
”
”
Emma Thompson (The Sense and Sensibility Screenplay and Diaries: Bringing Jane Austen's Novel to Film)
“
When you write screenplays that don’t get made, you lose your sense of humor about the bad movies that do get made
”
”
John Irving (The Last Chairlift)
“
Difficult for actors to extemporise in nineteenth-century English. Except for Robert Hardy and Elizabeth Spriggs, who speak that way anyway.
”
”
Emma Thompson (The Sense and Sensibility Screenplay and Diaries: Bringing Jane Austen's Novel to Film)
“
If my 'mind' don't mind, I don't mind.
”
”
Amit Kalantri
“
Shooting Willoughby carrying Marianne up the path. ... Male strength -- the desire to be cradled again? ... I'd love someone to pick me up and carry me off. Frightening. Lindsay assures me I'd start to fidget after a while. She's such a comfort.
”
”
Emma Thompson (The Sense and Sensibility Screenplay and Diaries: Bringing Jane Austen's Novel to Film)
“
The fire alarm went off. Fire engines came racing; we all rushed out on the gravel drive, everyone thinking it was us. In fact, one of the elderly residents of Saltram had left a pan on the oven in her flat. Apparently this happens all the time. The tenant in question is appearing as an extra -- playing one of the cooks.
”
”
Emma Thompson (The Sense and Sensibility Screenplay and Diaries: Bringing Jane Austen's Novel to Film)
“
But the thing I remember most about the screening in October twenty years ago was the moment Julian grasped my hand that had gone numb on the armrest separating our seats. He did this because in the book Julian Wells lived but in the movie's new scenario he had to die. He had to be punished for all of his sins. That's what the movie demanded. (Later, as a screenwriter, I learned it's what all movies demanded.) When this scene occurred, in the last ten minutes, Julian looked at me in the darkness, stunned. "I died," he whispered. "They killed me off." I waited a bit before sighing, "But you're still here." Julian turned back to the screen and soon the movie ended, the credits rolling over the palm trees as I (improbably) take Blair back to my college while Roy Orbison wails a song about how life fades away.
”
”
Bret Easton Ellis (Imperial Bedrooms)
“
Press conference [on the movie Carrington] yielded the usual crop of daftness. I've been asked if I related personally to Carrington's tortured relationship with sex and replied that no, not really, I'd had a very pleasant time since I was fifteen. This elicited very disapproving copy from the Brits ... No wonder people think we don't have sex in England.
”
”
Emma Thompson (The Sense and Sensibility Screenplay and Diaries: Bringing Jane Austen's Novel to Film)
“
(Read the screenplay for the movie, “Up!” and the movie “Gone Girl” - to see what economical writing looks like).
”
”
Usher Morgan (Lessons from the Set: A DIY Filmmaking Guide to Your First Feature Film, from Script to Theaters)
“
Why does Kubrick always chill our blood, and make us huddled up scared stiff with eyes wide shut? Because even dead he's still "Shinnying" with his old hand and his eye-catching plots.
”
”
Ana Claudia Antunes (The Mysterious Murder of Marilyn Monroe)
“
If the director himself writes the script or screenplay of the drama, movie etc., the direction becomes perfect because he already imagined each shot nicely in his brain while writing the screenplay!
”
”
Ziaul Haque
“
I gave her the remote and she chose a channel showing Inglourious Basterds. She said the title was spelled that way because Tarantino had misspelled it in a leaked screenplay and then insisted he’d done it on purpose.
”
”
Naoise Dolan (Exciting Times)
“
I keep saying it and saying it. They publish your novel, they make your screenplay—these books and movies go away. You take your bad reviews with the good ones, or you win an Oscar; whatever happens, it doesn’t stay. But
”
”
John Irving (The Last Chairlift)
“
Shooting Willoughby carrying Marianne up the path. They did it four times. 'Faster,' said Ang [Lee]. They do it twice more. 'Don't pant so much,' said Ang. Greg [Wise (playing Willoughby)], to his great credit, didn't scream.
”
”
Emma Thompson (The Sense and Sensibility Screenplay and Diaries: Bringing Jane Austen's Novel to Film)
“
When you write about your life as a screenplay, it’s as if you’re watching someone else’s life; it’s not your life, and you’re not living it. You’re only seeing what the characters do, your character included. And screenplays are written in the present tense—as if nothing has already happened, as if everything is unfolding in the present. I’m only saying this is how it started—how I began to see my life as an unmade movie. The way it began was almost natural. INT.
”
”
John Irving (The Last Chairlift)
“
Empathy is something you must create when the hero is introduced. Making your hero a victim in the middle of the movie or showing him becoming kind and loving may make your story richer, but it doesn’t create empathy and identification.
”
”
Michael Hauge (Selling Your Story in 60 Seconds: The Guaranteed Way to Get Your Screenplay or Novel Read)
“
This is what cinema is all about. Images, sound, whatever, are what we use to construct a way which is cinema, which is supposed to produce effects, not only in our eyes and ears, but in our "mental" movie theater in which image and sound already are there. There is a kind of on-going movie all the time, in which the movie that we see comes in and mixes, and the perception of all these images and sound proposed to us in a typical film narration piles up in our memory with other images, other associations of images, other films, but other mental images we have, they pre-exist. So a new image in a film titillates or excites another mental image already there or emotions that we have so when you propose something to watch and hear, it goes, it works. It's like we have sleeping emotions in us all the time, half-sleeping, so one specific image or the combination of one image and sound, or the way of putting things together, like two images one after another, what we call montage, editing - these things ring a bell. These half-asleep feelings just wake up because of that - that is what it is about. This is not to make a film and say: "Okay, let's get a deal, let's tell the story, let's have a good actress, good-bye, not bad," and we go home and we eat. What I am dealing with is the effects, the perception, and the subsidiary effects of my work as proposals, as an open field, so that you can get there things you always wanted to feel and maybe didn't know how to express, imagine, watch, observe, whatever. This is so far away from the strong screenplay, the beautiful movie, etc., that sometimes I don't know what I should discuss. You understand, this is really fighting for that "Seventh Art" which is making films.
”
”
Agnès Varda (Agnes Varda: Interviews)
“
Watch movies. Read screenplays. Let them be your guide. […] Yes, McKee has been able to break down how the popular screenplay has worked. He has identified key qualities that many commercially successful screenplays share, he has codified a language that has been adopted by creative executives in both film and television. So there might be something of tangible value to be gained by interacting with his material, either in book form or at one of the seminars.
But for someone who wants to be an artist, a creator, an architect of an original vision, the best book to read on screenwriting is no book on screenwriting. The best seminar is no seminar at all.
To me, the writer wants to get as many outside voices OUT of his/her head as possible. Experts win by getting us to be dependent on their view of the world. They win when they get to frame the discussion, when they get to tell you there’s a right way and a wrong way to think about the game, whatever the game is. Because that makes you dependent on them. If they have the secret rules, then you need them if you want to
get ahead.
The truth is, you don’t.
If you love and want to make movies about issues of social import, get your hands on Paddy Chayefsky’s screenplay for Network. Read it. Then watch the movie. Then read it again.
If you love and want to make big blockbusters that also have great artistic merit, do the same thing with Lawrence Kasdan’s Raiders Of The Lost Ark screenplay and the movie made from it.
Think about how the screenplays made you feel. And how the movies built from these screenplays did or didn’t hit you the same way. […] This sounds basic, right? That’s because it is basic. And it’s true. All the information you need is the movies and screenplays you love. And in the books you’ve read and the relationships you’ve had and your ability to use those things.
”
”
Brian Koppelman
“
I have completed and uncompleted screenplays, but they both fall into the category of “unsold.” I’ve seen quite a few movies where the screenplays seemed to be in the “uncompleted” category yet still got sold and made into movies, so I generally refer too all screenplays as “sold” or “unsold.” But that’s just my own filing system.
”
”
Gary Reilly (Ticket To Hollywood (Asphalt Warrior, #2))
“
Someone might ask, if the dynamic of innovation consists of schema and revision, where does true originality come from? Is there no single work we can point to as the ultimate source of this or that new storrytelling strategy? I'm inclined to say there is no such source. Artists working in mass art forms find originality by revising schemas in circulation, or by revising ones that have fallen into disuse.
”
”
David Bordwell (Reinventing Hollywood: How 1940s Filmmakers Changed Movie Storytelling)
“
Although well played by Billy Zane, Cal in the screenplay is one of the weakest part of the design, and would have been a more effective rival if he were more seductive, a better match for Rose, real competition for Jack, and not such an obvious monster. Then it would have been a real contest, and not a one-sided match between the most attractive young man in the universe and a leering, abusive cad with a bag of money in one hand and a pistol in the other.
”
”
Christopher Vogler (The Writers Journey: Mythic Structure for Writers, 2nd Edition)
“
There are many self-proclaimed “screenwriting gurus”—though how you get to be a “guru” of something you’ve never actually done is beyond us. Screenplays are like blueprints. A guy who’s drawn up a lot of blueprints that have never actually been made into buildings is not an “architecture guru,” he’s an “unemployed douchebag.” A guy who talks about screen-writing but who’s never sold a screenplay is not a “screenwriting guru,” he’s a “lecture circuit bullshit artist.” From now on, that’s what we’ll call them.
”
”
Thomas Lennon (Writing Movies for Fun and Profit: How We Made a Billion Dollars at the Box Office and You Can, Too!)
“
Stupid Screenwriter Tricks - However clever we think we are, sometimes we go too far in our enthusiasm. We are creative people and think everyone will get it - well, they don't. Stunts don't work. Lame attempts to get attention don't work. Here are some other don'ts: Don't package yourself in a big crate and mail yourself to William Morris. Don't take out a full-page advertisement in Variety with your picture and phone number with the slogan: Will Write for Food. Don't have your picture taken with a cut-out photo of your favorite movie star and send to him autographed with the phrase: We should be in business together! And whatever you do, don't threaten to leap off the Hollywood sign as leverage to get someone to read your screenplay. It's been done, babe, it's been done.
”
”
Blake Snyder (Save the Cat: The Last Book on Screenwriting You'll Ever Need)
“
I was always bad at reading scripts. Back then, I’d be offered millions of dollars to do movies and barely crack the first few pages. I’m embarrassed to admit that now, given that these days I’m writing scripts myself and it’s like pulling teeth to get actors to respond. Maybe they feel how I used to feel: that in a life of fun and fame and money, reading a script, no matter the size of the number attached, feels all too much like school.
The universe will teach you, though. All those years I was too this, too that, to read a script, but last year I wrote a screenplay for myself and was trying get it made until I realized that I was too old to play the part. Most fifty-three-year-olds have worked their shit out already, so I needed to hire a thirty-year-old. The one I chose took weeks and weeks to respond, and I couldn’t believe how rude his behavior was.
”
”
Matthew Perry (Friends, Lovers, and the Big Terrible Thing)
“
Give the Audience Something to Cheer For Austin Madison is an animator and story artist for such Pixar movies as Ratatouille, WALL-E, Toy Story 3, Brave, and others. In a revealing presentation Madison outlined the 7-step process that all Pixar movies follow. 1. Once there was a ___. 3 [A protagonist/ hero with a goal is the most important element of a story.] 2. Every day he ___. [The hero’s world must be in balance in the first act.] 3. Until one day ___. [A compelling story introduces conflict. The hero’s goal faces a challenge.] 4. Because of that ___. [This step is critical and separates a blockbuster from an average story. A compelling story isn’t made up of random scenes that are loosely tied together. Each scene has one nugget of information that compels the next scene.] 5. Because of that ___. 6. Until finally ____. [The climax reveals the triumph of good over evil.] 7. Ever since then ___. [The moral of the story.] The steps are meant to immerse an audience into a hero’s journey and give the audience someone to cheer for. This process is used in all forms of storytelling: journalism, screenplays, books, presentations, speeches. Madison uses a classic hero/ villain movie to show how the process plays out—Star Wars. Here’s the story of Luke Skywalker. Once there was a farm boy who wanted to be a pilot. Every day he helped on the farm. Until one day his family is killed. Because of that he joins legendary Jedi Obi-Wan Kenobi. Because of that he hires the smuggler Han Solo to take him to Alderaan. Until finally Luke reaches his goal and becomes a starfighter pilot and saves the day. Ever since then Luke’s been on the path to be a Jedi knight. Like millions of others, I was impressed with Malala’s Nobel Peace prize–winning acceptance speech. While I appreciated the beauty and power of her words, it wasn’t until I did the research for this book that I fully understood why Malala’s words inspired me. Malala’s speech perfectly follows Pixar’s 7-step storytelling process. I doubt that she did this intentionally, but it demonstrates once again the theme in this book—there’s a difference between a story, a good story, and a story that sparks movements.
”
”
Carmine Gallo (The Storyteller's Secret: From TED Speakers to Business Legends, Why Some Ideas Catch On and Others Don't)
“
Twenty years? No kidding: twenty years? It’s hard to believe. Twenty years ago, I was—well, I was much younger. My parents were still alive. Two of my grandchildren had not yet been born, and another one, now in college, was an infant. Twenty years ago I didn’t own a cell phone. I didn’t know what quinoa was and I doubt if I had ever tasted kale. There had recently been a war. Now we refer to that one as the First Gulf War, but back then, mercifully, we didn’t know there would be another. Maybe a lot of us weren’t even thinking about the future then. But I was. And I’m a writer. I wrote The Giver on a big machine that had recently taken the place of my much-loved typewriter, and after I printed the pages, very noisily, I had to tear them apart, one by one, at the perforated edges. (When I referred to it as my computer, someone more knowledgeable pointed out that my machine was not a computer. It was a dedicated word processor. “Oh, okay then,” I said, as if I understood the difference.) As I carefully separated those two hundred or so pages, I glanced again at the words on them. I could see that I had written a complete book. It had all the elements of the seventeen or so books I had written before, the same things students of writing list on school quizzes: characters, plot, setting, tension, climax. (Though I didn’t reply as he had hoped to a student who emailed me some years later with the request “Please list all the similes and metaphors in The Giver,” I’m sure it contained those as well.) I had typed THE END after the intentionally ambiguous final paragraphs. But I was aware that this book was different from the many I had already written. My editor, when I gave him the manuscript, realized the same thing. If I had drawn a cartoon of him reading those pages, it would have had a text balloon over his head. The text would have said, simply: Gulp. But that was twenty years ago. If I had written The Giver this year, there would have been no gulp. Maybe a yawn, at most. Ho-hum. In so many recent dystopian novels (and there are exactly that: so many), societies battle and characters die hideously and whole civilizations crumble. None of that in The Giver. It was introspective. Quiet. Short on action. “Introspective, quiet, and short on action” translates to “tough to film.” Katniss Everdeen gets to kill off countless adolescent competitors in various ways during The Hunger Games; that’s exciting movie fare. It sells popcorn. Jonas, riding a bike and musing about his future? Not so much. Although the film rights to The Giver were snapped up early on, it moved forward in spurts and stops for years, as screenplay after screenplay—none of them by me—was
”
”
Lois Lowry (The Giver (Giver Quartet Book 1))
“
- Do you have books?
- books on what? books on comets?
- anything ... comets, gravity, black holes...
- Yeah, I've got Shakespeare, some Henry Miller and some screenplays. Dude, I'm a fucking actor
- Anything about quantum physics?
- Yeah, that's right up my alley
- Some actors read ...
”
”
coherence
“
The narrative rigor of writing screenplays to a precise length, with story beats at all the right places has, I believe, made me a better novel writer. I feel very comfortable with the rhythms of the modern Hollywood movie, a sequence of storytelling expectations so many of us have internalized to the point that they can be deemed presumed knowledge in one's reader. It makes world building so much easier than it must have been for, say, Ray Bradbury, or even P K Dick. I feel quite comfortable straying from the narrative melody in my work, now, confident I can find my way home again, or can make my hat my home, story-wise, and that's something I tie in large measure to my screenwriting experience.
”
”
Ruuf Wangersen (The Pleasure Model Repairman)
“
Movie Adaptation of William March’s THE BAD SEED 1956: Produced by Warner Bros. Directed by Mervyn LeRoy. Starring Nancy Kelly, Patty McCormack, and Eileen Heckart. Screenplay by John Lee Mahin. Academy Award nominee for Best Actress, Best Actress in a Supporting Role (both McCormack and Heckart were nominated), and Best Cinematography, Black-and-White.
”
”
William March (The Bad Seed)
“
Why are you so into Pinot?” 2 Maya asks. In the next 60 seconds of the movie, the character of Miles Raymond tells a story which would set off a boom in sales of Pinot Noir. It’s a hard grape to grow. It’s thin-skinned, temperamental, ripens early. It’s not a survivor like Cabernet, which can just grow anywhere and thrive even when it’s neglected. No, Pinot needs constant care and attention. In fact it can only grow in these really specific, tucked away corners of the world. And only the most patient and nurturing of growers can do it, really. Only somebody who really takes the time to understand Pinot’s potential can coax it into its fullest expression. Its flavors are the most haunting and brilliant and thrilling and subtle and ancient on the planet. Miles is describing himself in the dialogue and using Pinot as a metaphor for his personality. In this one scene moviegoers projected themselves on the character, feeling his longing and his quest to be understood. Sideways was a hit and won an Oscar for Best Adapted Screenplay. It also launched a movement, turning the misunderstood Pinot Noir into the must-have wine of the year. In less than one year after the movie’s 2004 fall release date, sales of Pinot Noir had risen 18 percent. Winemakers began to grow more of the grape to meet demand. In California alone 70,000 tons of Pinot Noir grapes were harvested and crushed in 2004. Within two years the volume had topped 100,000 tons. Today California wine growers crush more than 250,000 tons of Pinot Noir each year. Interestingly, the Japanese version of the movie did not have the same “Sideways Effect” on wine sales. One reason is that the featured grape is Cabernet, a varietal already popular in Japan. But even more critical and relevant to the discussion on storytelling is that Japanese audiences didn’t see the “porch scene” because there wasn’t one. The scene was not included in the movie. No story, no emotional attachment to a particular varietal. You see, the movie Sideways didn’t launch a movement in Pinot Noir; the story that Miles told triggered the boom. In 60 seconds Maya fell in love with Miles and millions of Americans fell in love with an expensive wine they knew little about.
”
”
Carmine Gallo (The Storyteller's Secret: From TED Speakers to Business Legends, Why Some Ideas Catch On and Others Don't)
“
The movie producer and all-around mensch Stuart Cornfeld once told me that in a good screenplay, every structural unit needs to do two things: (1) be entertaining in its own right and (2) advance the story in a non-trivial way.
”
”
George Saunders (A Swim in a Pond in the Rain: In Which Four Russians Give a Master Class on Writing, Reading, and Life)
“
When clients want to add a bunch of confusion to their marketing message, I ask them to consider the ramifications of doing so if they were writing a screenplay. I mean, what if The Bourne Identity were a movie about a spy named Jason Bourne searching for his true identity but it also included scenes of Bourne trying to lose weight, marry a girl, pass the bar exam, win on Jeopardy, and adopt a cat? The audience would lose interest. When storytellers bombard people with too much information, the audience is forced to burn too many calories organizing the data. As a result, they daydream, walk out of the theater, or in the case of digital marketing, click to another site without placing an order. Why do so many brands create noise rather than music? It’s because they don’t realize they are creating noise. They actually think people are interested in the random information they’re doling out. This is why we need a filter. The essence of branding is to create simple, relevant messages we can repeat over and over so that we “brand” ourselves into the public consciousness.
”
”
Donald Miller (Building a StoryBrand: Clarify Your Message So Customers Will Listen)
“
Movies are mixture of three things,
1) Real History or science or subject happened ,
2) Imagination and Domination - To show that I am the king or I am the queen - So imagination along with showcasing or dominating attitude,
3) Mixture of lies and mysteries - Because no one knows the actual truth,
All movies in all languages are under these 3 factors,
And objectives for Movie/ Arts/ Entertainment Industries
1) Business i e Money,
2) Winning attitude - That my story or my written script should dominate the world and peoples mind for generations to come i e sublime message or sustainability goals through arts or in non sense / pseudo scientific manner - New world order,
So if you are idiot consider movies as reality and live in fantasy, if you are moderate then comment or give opinion about movies such that it is a sustainability goal or new world order - So that you can make fun of the movie and producers will make fun of you by box office collections,
If you are smart watch any movies or arts you like but do not comment much, but keep it in your mind - Use it as a tool to understand the producer, director, screenplay writer, casts mind and understand the situation why that movie or art was created or for what reason, what was the motive and all, so that definetley you can do a lot of research not only about art but also about business mind set,
And finally if you are Intelligent, watch anything you like, comment anything as you wise and go and take a nap and wake up next morning as if nothing happened - Simply do not even care,
But If you have mercy heart, use all of your intelligence and apply wherever you wish (For me Science), for you might be art, sport, politics, etc, so wherever you wish, apply there and reap the benefits - so that you will be example for millions and also have social dimension where your application also somehow benefits the common or society
”
”
Ganapathy K Siddharth Vijayaraghavan
“
Not a single scene, situation, idea, or image that was in that screenplay was in my script for Django Unchained. Yet... the essence of what Floyd was trying to accomplish in that script, an epic western with a black heroic cowboy at its center, was the very heart of what I was trying to accomplish with Django Unchained.
But even more influential than any one script was having a man trying to be a screenwriter living in my house. Him writing, him talking about his script, me reading it, made me consider for the first time writing movies. The reason I knew how to even format a screenplay was from reading Floyd's screenplays. It would be a long read—from that year of 1978 to me completing my first feature length screenplay -True Romance- in September 1987.
But due to Floyd's inspiration I tried writing screenplays. I usually never got that far. I think thirty was by far the furthest I ever got. But I tried. And eventually succeeded.
”
”
Quentin Tarantino (Cinema Speculation)
“
love and honesty are the path to redemption and fulfillment, anything else leads ultimately to tragedy.
”
”
Michael Hauge (Writing Screenplays That Sell: The Complete Guide to Turning Story Concepts into Movie and Television Deals)
“
To understand movie credibility, you must realize that movies are false on the surface but true underneath. Real life, on the other hand, is believable on the surface but unbelievable underneath
”
”
Michael Hauge (Writing Screenplays That Sell: The Complete Guide to Turning Story Concepts into Movie and Television Deals)
“
The sexuality of the character I played in Dog Day Afternoon is a complex thing. What I interpreted from the screenplay was that he is a man with a wife and kids who also happens to be in an affair with a person who identifies as a woman, and who today we would understand is transgender. But knowing this about him didn’t excite me or bother me; it didn’t make the role seem any more appealing or risky. Though I may be a kid who started in the South Bronx, I had been living in the Village since my teens. I had friends, roommates, and colleagues who were attracted to different people than I was attracted to, and none of that was ever rebellious or groundbreaking or unusual. It just was.
Perhaps at the time of Dog Day Afternoon it was an uncommon thing to have a main character in a Hollywood movie who was gay or queer, and who was treated as heroic or worthy of an audience’s affection—even if he did rob banks. But you have to understand that none of that enters into my consideration. I am an actor portraying a character in a film. I am playing the part because I think I can bring something to the role. As far as I was concerned, Dog Day Afternoon was just cool, a continuation of the work I had been doing my whole life. It was inevitable that an audience would have certain feelings about me because of the choices I made, and the slings and arrows were going to keep coming either way. I try to stay away from things that are controversial, and I find myself in controversies anyway. If people think that I helped to advance a particular issue of representation, that’s fine. If there is credit or blame to go around, I don’t feel entitled to any of it. All I know is, I play a role to find as much humanity as there is that I can portray.
”
”
Al Pacino (Sonny Boy: A Memoir)
“
The Tantric view is that there is already a complete Buddha dormant within each of us, but we’ve individually and collectively become addicted to horror movies that we mistake for documentaries. From this perspective, our whole society is caught up in a kind of shared horror story, imagining ourselves as zombie consumers rather than empowered citizens: afraid, insecure, incapable beings who have no choice but to wander through life grasping after fleeting pleasures, needlessly competing with each other instead of collaborating, isolating ourselves from the plight of those whose stories we don’t understand. Because our whole society is both constructing and watching this shared screenplay simultaneously, the physical world begins to take on the qualities of this horror movie, and it becomes more and more difficult to distinguish the theater of our experience from the screen of our own projections.
”
”
Ethan Nichtern (The Road Home: A Contemporary Exploration of the Buddhist Path)
“
Chinese learners of English, all of whom were rated as having achieved a high degree of communicative proficiency, Ding (2007) tracks the role that the rote learning of huge quantities of text played in their linguistic accomplishments. As the abstract reports, ‘The interviewees regarded text memorization and imitation as the most effective methods of learning English. They had been initially forced to use these methods but gradually came to appreciate them’ (ibid.: 271). What they memorized, as part of their conventional schooling, was entire coursebooks (New Concept English by Louis Alexander, in one case) as well as the screenplays of whole films: ‘Some of them said that when they speak English, lines from movies often naturally pop out, making others think of their English as natural and
”
”
Scott Thornbury (Big Questions in ELT)
“
Thinking about him requires so little effort that she can do it while performing mindless activities. Soaping the dishes, replaiting Clare Kelley's hair, drying the dishes. The part of her brain that plays his ongoing reel is unconnected to the neurons and synapses that control things like conscious thought and logic. Ben turning to her at a party. Ben turning to her. Ben turning. What human being deserves to be the nucleus of such high esteem? Certainly not Benjamin, middle name Hal, last name Allen. Five-nine in boots. Who has a car that doesn't start on cold mornings, an unfinished screenplay, a law degree he doesn't use, a romantic's tendency to save movie stubs, and a mannered, unsmiling wife.
”
”
Marie-Helene Bertino (2 A.M. at The Cat's Pajamas)
“
I don't object to the proliferation of the 'f-bomb' in screenplays because the adjective is vulgar but because it is unimaginative.
”
”
Ron Brackin
“
There were many people killed in that movie, but everyone worries about the horse. It was the same on the set. When the head arrived, it upset crew members who are animal lovers, who like little doggies. What they didn’t know is that we got the head from a pet food manufacturer who slaughters two hundred horses a day just to feed those little doggies.
”
”
Jenny M. Jones (Annotated Godfather: The Complete Screenplay with Commentary on Every Scene, Interviews, and Little-Known Facts)
“
When you begin a new story, your job is to envision, to try to glimpse stuff that doesn't as yet exist. That's what writing is, going out to meet the ghosts of the future. Not out of the past, not the ones that are dead and buried. Ghosts of the future, those who don't exist yet.
”
”
Cédric Klapisch (screenplay writer); spoken by Xavier Rousseau in Casse-tête Chinois (Chinese Puzzle
“
Again, I stuffed down the grief and opened the door wide to denial. I may have looked okay on the outside, but inside I was an ugly hot mess.
”
”
Betts Keating (My Movie Memoir Screenplay Novel (and other disjointed storytelling techniques): A story of motherhood, injury, stressful relocations, money troubles, grief and faith.)
“
I knew I was never going to write a screenplay, or a book, or direct a movie. I felt like I was never going to be anything more than what everyone presumed I would be. Nothing I did mattered. Never did. Never would. And I’d been completely naïve in assuming otherwise, but hoping and dreaming had never seemed such a bad thing
”
”
C.J. Roberts (Captive in the Dark (The Dark Duet, #1))
“
The biggest takeaway from my long-distance relationship with Floyd Byars was that I optioned an original screenplay he had co-written with his writing partner, Laurie.
Another takeaway was a case of crabs picked up on our only vacation together in Zihuatanejo, Mexico.
I noticed a crab in my eyelashes when I was in the airplane bathroom on my way back to JFK. I feared these little critters might be other places as well, so I spent the next four hours squirming in my seat, itchy and miserable. On the taxi ride home, I made the driver stop at an all-night pharmacy so I could buy a bottle of Kwell.
But despite the footsies and the crabs, I liked the premise of his (their) Making Mr. Right script.
”
”
Susan Seidelman (Desperately Seeking Something: A Memoir About Movies, Mothers, and Material Girls)
“
I’d seen every movie Charlie Yates had ever written, and I’d read every one of his screenplays—produced or unproduced—that I could get my hands on, printing them off the internet and lovingly binding them with brass brads before alphabetizing them on their own dedicated shelf on my bookcase. And I didn’t just read them. I highlighted them. Annotated them. Covered them with Post-its and exclamation points. No question it was good. Charlie Yates couldn’t write a bad screenplay if you threatened to take all his awards away
”
”
Katherine Center (The Rom-Commers)
“
Writing a clean, lean, simple story is one of the hardest things in the world to do. When stories are first born, they’re always big and complicated, but simple stories are more powerful and meaningful. Think of Blaise Pascal’s famous postscript: “I’m sorry for writing such a long letter, but I didn’t have the time to write a shorter one.” Writers are always inclined to make their stories bigger and more complicated than anyone else wants them to be. Luckily, there are gatekeepers to cut us off at the pass. Editors chop novels down to size. Theater directors chop out scenes that don’t work. Producers slice the fat out of screenplays. They take sprawling, complicated messes and find the lean, simple story hiding inside. Ghostbusters was sold to the studio in the form of a forty-page treatment. It was set in the future. New York had been under siege by ghosts for years. There were dozens of teams of competing ghostbusters. Our heroes were tired and bored with their job when the story began. The Marshmallow Man showed up on page 20. The budget would have been bigger than any movie ever made, and far more than anybody was willing to spend. So why did the studio buy it? Because it liked one image: a bunch of guys who live in a firehouse slide down a pole and hop in an old-fashioned ambulance, then go out to catch ghosts. So the studio stripped away all the other stuff, put that image in the middle of the story, spent the first half gradually moving us from a normal world gradually that moment, and spent the second half creating a heroic payoff to that situation. That’s it. That’s all they had time to do. A few years after the success of Ghostbusters, one of the writers/stars of that movie, Harold Ramis, found himself on the other side of the fence. He wanted to direct a script called Groundhog Day, written by first-time screenwriter Danny Rubin. This was a very similar situation: In the first draft of that movie, the weatherman had already repeated the same day 3,650,000 times before the movie began! Everybody loved the script, so Rubin had his pick of directors, but most of them told him up front they wanted him to rewrite the story to begin with the origin of the situation. Ramis won the bidding war by promising Rubin he would stick to the in medias res version. Guess what happened? By the time the movie made it to the screen, Ramis had broken his promise. The final movie spends the first half getting the weatherman into the situation and the second half creating the most heroic payoff.
”
”
Matt Bird (The Secrets of Story: Innovative Tools for Perfecting Your Fiction and Captivating Readers)
“
You’ve written a surprising large number of screenplays –
– Have I?
… but they’ve all been adaptations.
Yes.
Why are there no original Stoppard screenplays?
I’ve never felt like that about film. I wanted to start… I wanted to be a writer, I wanted to start writing for the stage at a time when the stage was particularly interesting in the British theatre… I’ve had as many ideas for a play as I’ve written, you know, I don’t have a bottom drawer of half-baked ideas and half-finished plays. I’ve just used everything. I just wanted to work in the theatre and that’s what I did. I’m trying to sort of… understand something in myself, it’s as though I don’t want to waste my idea on a movie. I think there’s an element of that. Because there’s no question about it, unless you are… I can’t, I can’t imagine a circumstance in which a writer is properly in control of his script in the world of movies. Well, I can imagine one way - you pay for the film and that’s that. But as long as there’s a paymaster… You never… You never, you never quite… You don’t quite have the final vote, the decisive vote on things. There are situations, there have been situations where… I mean Shakespeare In Love, for example was, you know… yeah, pretty much, I mean I wrote it on the back of an earlier script called Shakespeare In Love and in the final stages of that movie I was arguing, you know, with the producer about… well, just a phrase or two. And this happened with television too with BBC/ HBO, I did a thing called Parade’s End. I end up arguing trying to persuade them to keep something which, which is generally felt by other people to be difficult to understand. And I’m saying ‘No, it’s not difficult to understand, honestly.’ And they’re saying: ‘Well, it is for our audience –’ or whatever. That kind of thing wont happen, I don’t think that kind of thing would ever happen, at least in the theatre that I work in, the London theatre, the British theatre.
”
”
Tom Stoppard
“
Many writers—and I read more than five hundred scripts a year—do not realize that a screenplay is a selling document. When they’re writing a screenplay, they’re not writing a movie. They’re writing a script, material that’s going to be read, not seen. And it’s the reading experience that will determine whether the movie gets made or not.
”
”
Syd Field (Selling a Screenplay: The Screenwriter's Guide to Hollywood)
“
and the ones they like are the ones where they can say, yes, that’s a movie. They can see it. Even if parts of it need work; maybe some of the jokes don’t work, maybe some of the characters are a little cliché, maybe some of the stuff is a little repetitive. But if you can see the movie, there’s a chance it might get made, even if they have
”
”
Syd Field (Selling a Screenplay: The Screenwriter's Guide to Hollywood)
“
The Three-film Version (with New Line): ‘I will go to my grave saying that the crafting of those three screenplays was one of the most underappreciated screenwriting efforts ever undertaken,’ declares Ken Kamins proudly. ‘You are writing what is essentially a single ten-hour script, which you have to divide into three movies. You have to set up things in movie one that may not play out till movie three. And you’re burdened with having to explain the world to the neophyte.
”
”
Ian Nathan (Anything You Can Imagine: Peter Jackson and the Making of Middle-earth)
“
I'm mad as hell, and I'm not going to take this anymore!
”
”
Paddy Chayefsky (Network [Screenplay])
“
A mix of local news, world news, and shocking headlines coupled with experience and real life scenarios coated with imagination and intimate thoughts... the ones you can't say aloud = BOOKS
”
”
Niedria Kenny (Order in the Courtroom: The Tale of a Texas Poker Player)
“
-You know those days when you get the mean reds?
-The mean reds? You mean like the blues?
-No. The blues are because you're getting fat and maybe it's been raining too long, you're just sad that's all. The mean reds are horrible. Suddenly you're afraid and you don't know what you're afraid of. Do you ever get that feeling?
”
”
George Axelrod (Breakfast at Tiffanys - screenplay)
“
Then the cops come... That to me means all of the movie with all of this absurdity culminates to an absurdity that is so grounded it's actually real. It shows you that all of these other choices are not that crazy anymore. No matter whether or not the audience bought any of the decisions I've made--they could've viewed the brain transplants or the hypnotizing as ridiculous and fantastical--they have to acknowledge that the cop car showing up is a real threat to Chris's life. And maybe that makes them go back and reevaluate whether the other decisions were that far-fetched after all.
”
”
Jordan Peele (Get Out: The Complete Annotated Screenplay)
“
And the reason I started crying was because I realized how big and insurmountable seeming systemic racism is. It involves so many different perpetrators, it involves us, the victims, and it comes in so many different forms... A big part of the Sunken Place, to me, is the silencing of our voice, the silencing of our screams, what we as a culture did to Colin Kaepernick for using his voice, the silencing of that voice, or the attempted silencing of that voice. And the beauty of what many great civil rights leaders, specifically Martin Luther King Jr., taught us is that our voice is the weapon we have against violence, against oppression, against hatred. So, the silencing of that voice, it comes in prison, it comes in athletes, it comes in the lack of representation of Black people in horror movies, and any part of this industry.
”
”
Jordan Peele (Get Out: The Complete Annotated Screenplay)
“
But I was stuck for a long time by myself at Abraham Lincoln's portrait, standing in the middle of the huge hall as people moved all around me with mostly children. I felt as if time had stopped as I watched Lincoln, facing him, while watching the woman’s back as she was looking out the window. I felt wronged, so much like Truman from the movie, standing there in the middle of the museum alone. I was wondering what would Abraham Lincoln do if he realized he was the slave in his own cotton fields, being robbed by evil thieves, nazis.
I had taken numerous photos of Martina from behind, as well as silhouettes of her shadow. I remember standing there, watching as she stood in front of the window; it was almost as if she was admiring the view of the mountains from our new home, as I did take such pictures of her, with a very similar composition to that of the female depicted in the iconic Lincoln portrait looking outwards from the window. I hadn't realized how many photographs I snapped of Martina with her back turned towards me while we travelled to picturesque places. Fernanda and I walked side-by-side in utter silence, admiring painting after painting of Dali's, without exchanging a single word. Meanwhile, Luis and Martina had got lost somewhere in the museum. When I finally found her, she was taking pictures outside of the Rainy Cadillac. We both felt something was amiss without having to say it, as Fernanda knew things I didn't and vice versa. We couldn't bring ourselves to discuss it though, not because we lacked any legal authority between me and Martina, but because neither Fernanda or myself had much parental authority over the young lady. It felt like when our marriages and divorces had dissolved, it was almost as if our parenting didn't matter anymore. It was as if I were unwittingly part of a secret screenplay, like Jim Carrey's character in The Truman Show, living in a fabricated reality made solely for him. I was beginning to feel a strange nauseous feeling, as if someone was trying to force something surreal down my throat, as if I were living something not of this world, making me want to vomit onto the painted canvas of the personalised image crafted just for me. I couldn't help but wonder if Fernanda felt the same way, if she was aware of the magnitude of what was happening, or if, just like me, she was completely oblivious, occasionally getting flashes of truth or reality for a moment or two. I took some amazing photographs of her in Port Lligat in Dali's yard in the port, and in Cap Creus, but I'd rather not even try to describe them—they were almost like Dali's paintings which make all sense now. As if all the pieces are coming together. She was walking by the water and I was walking a bit further up on the same beach on pebbles, parallel to each other as we walked away from Dali's house in the port. I looked towards her and there were two boats flipped over on the two sides of my view.
I told her: “Run, Bunny! Run!
”
”
Tomas Adam Nyapi (BARCELONA MARIJUANA MAFIA)
“
Part Two consists of the creation, development, and construction of an actual original screenplay, built from scratch.
”
”
Jeff Kitchen (Writing a Great Movie: Key Tools for Successful Screenwriting)
“
It’s a beautiful thing to be in Hollywood... the feeling of it... that classical glamour never dies.” She walked to the closet and back to the bed. “The actress lives a beautiful life once at a certain level... when her sink has a view and her phone calls aren’t rejections anymore, but producers, offices, playhouses in London, a director pitching his sacred screenplay. The food gets healthier, people around you are more positive... driving in traffic is even different because your car is nice, and the music you normally hate sounds different when life works... when you get the furniture you want... And mentors pass down movie posters from their mentors—so Hepburn never really dies. You keep it in your home... there’s room for everything... I treasure letters from other artists... studio invitations... Being a woman in Hollywood is entirely different than a man’s experience. All the time, by everyone, for everything, a woman is wanted... dinners... so many dinners... so many scripts lying around the room, in the sun... the people you have yet to meet... it’s not about fame—I do not care for the public praise... but what is truly compelling is when you make it big, you finally understand why there are palm trees in this city... Los Angeles suddenly turns on. Like a bulb you thought disliked you and would never light. But it lights. Of course, one must put the cocktail down, leave the house, and make more movies. But this is to say, the after hours are nice. When the camera is off and I return home, I get to love what is left.
”
”
Kristian Ventura (A Happy Ghost)
“
You speak so many bloody languages, and you never want to talk.
”
”
Anthony Minghella (The English Patient: A Screenplay)
“
[from 'Blade Runner 2049' review in 'Cut The Kink'] Here, in a reversal of 'The Force Awakens,' Harrison Ford survives and Gosling, his surrogate son, dies. The last shot of the film shows baby-boomer Ford creepily watching his daughter, a maker of memory implants, through a glass partition. Somehow, this generic version of the female has become the creator and repository of false memories, a scrapbooker of all the unnecessary backstories that have been weighing down screenplays since the original 'Blade Runner' came out. At one point we meet some official Hollywood-movie Tribal Scavengers, followed later by some official Hollywood-movie Meaningless Revolutionaries. Since at least the Matrix movies, such figures have heralded a revolution that never comes, though President Donald Sutherland did get trampled to death by rebels in 'The Hunger Games: Mockingjay, Part 2.
”
”
A.S. Hamrah (The Earth Dies Streaming)
ANGELIA BEAUMONT (We Bare Bears The Movie : ScreenPlay)
“
Stuart Gibbs is the author of Belly Up, Poached, Spy School, Spy Camp, Evil Spy School, and Space Case. He has also written the screenplays for movies like See Spot Run and Repli-Kate, worked on a whole bunch of animated films, developed TV shows for Nickelodeon, Disney Channel, ABC, and Fox, and researched capybaras (the world’s largest rodents.). He lives with his wife and children in Los Angeles.
”
”
Stuart Gibbs (Space Case (Moon Base Alpha, #1))
“
The main reason I’m writing is that I’ve finished the screenplay for my next film, and I’ve been thinking about you a lot. This character, this woman I’ve been writing about for the past year and a half, is someone that I couldn’t picture in my head without thinking of you. I guess, in a lot of ways, I wrote this character with you in mind. And I don’t know what your situation is right now, how interested you are in acting, but I think you’d be perfect for the part. I’m lining up financing, though after Paramount basically killed my last movie with all their bullshit, I think I’ll be going the independent route again. So there won’t be much money, but I hope you’ll consider it. I’ve attached it so you can read it if you’d like, and I’d love to get your thoughts on it and I would love it even more if the two of us could team up again. I would like to get that same feeling of excitement that I had when I was doing Date Due, and you played a huge role in that happening. Write me if you can,
”
”
Kevin Wilson (The Family Fang)
“
When writing a novel, the only real constraint is how far you want to go with your ideas. With movie scripts, you have time and budgetary constraints. For example, if your screenplay is set entirely at night, you've just doubled the cost of the movie. Novels can indulge all five senses, but Film is a visual medium that usurps the novelist's tool of narration through voice-over to add depth and perspective.
”
”
Stewart Stafford
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♪ Go, Teen Titans, go Go, Teen Titans, go ♪ Go, Teen Titans, go Go, go, go, go, go ♪ T-double-E-N-T-I-T-A-N-S ♪ We the real heroes Takin' down the big menace ♪ Teen Titan flows ♪ Teen Titan knows ♪ Where there's real trouble, baby ♪ Teen Titans go ♪ Go, Teen Titans, go Go, Teen Titans, go Ugh. Morons. ♪ Beast Boy I can turn straight up into an animal ♪ Animal? ♪ Animal? ♪ Yes, any animal ♪ Boom, pow Yeah, I'm a kitten now Aw! ♪ Check out my kitten meow ♪ The star, the fire The live, the wire ♪ The alien princess in my alien attire ♪ The energy blasts The supersonic speed ♪ Is she down with the Titans? ♪ Oh, the yes indeed ♪ Booyah, booyah Go my cannon blaster ♪ Cyborg, whoo, baby Mr. High Tech Master ♪ What, what, what? ♪ Mr. Meatball Disaster ♪ What, what, what? ♪ Mr. Boom Boom Blaster ♪ Teen Teen Titans The Titans, the Teen Titans ♪ Teen Teen Titans The Titans, the Teen Titans ♪ Teen Teen Titans The Titans, the Teen Titans ♪ Teen Teen Titans The Titans, the Teen Titans ♪ Boom with the smoke bombs and birdarangs ♪ Bow staff hittin' steady Doin' my thang ♪ Robin, Robin, the leader Robin, Robin, in charge ♪ Show 'em your baby hands! ♪ No Robin, Robin's are large Nah, but for real, man. Those some super-small baby hands. No, they're not. Whatever. Just keep going, just keep going! ♪ Go, Teen Titans, go Go, Teen Titans, go ♪ Go, Teen Titans, go Go, Teen Titans, go ♪ Raven is here to drop it On you even harder ♪ There's no darker than me I'm as dark as can be ♪ Check it Azarath Metrion Zinthos ♪ Teleportin', magical powers We adios ♪ Teen Teen Titans The Titans, the Teen Titans ♪ Teen Teen Titans, the Titans The Teen Titans ♪ Teen Titans Go! ♪
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Meredith Day (Teen Titans Go! To The Movies: Screenplay)
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Screenplays for most Hollywood movies are now available online (usually at no cost, at sites like scriptstork.com, script-o-rama.com, simplyscripts.com, scriptcity.com, and dailyscript.com) or in printed or published form (at thewritersstore.com and sites such as scriptshack.com and scriptcity.com).
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Michael Hauge (Writing Screenplays That Sell: The Complete Guide to Turning Story Concepts into Movie and Television Deals)
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did you lose your mind all of the sudden or was it a slow, gradual process?
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Richard LaGravenese (The Fisher King: The Book of the Film (The Applause Screenplay Series))
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You honor me by bringing Death to my front door.
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Darek Kolstad, Shay Hatten. Chris Collins, Marc Abrams