Saturday, April 05, 2003
Lesson 5: Just Because It Happened, Doesn't Make It Interesting
This is the first part of what will probably be a multiple part essay on ‘true stories,” and the traps beginning screenwriters fall into telling them.
Here’s the first rule of true story telling:
Just because it happened, doesn’t make it interesting.
Your cat dying is not interesting. Sad, yes. Heartbreaking..to you, maybe. To others…probably not.
Your cat getting run over by the President of the United States, pretty interesting.
Your cat getting run over by the President of the United States, causing an international incident which forces you to abandon your identity, go undercover and join forces with a cryptic yet beautiful martial artist. And you have a mysterious flu that may or may not kill you in 24 hours: yup, probably a movie.
So that’s the first reality test: Would you pay 10 dollars to see this scene from your life in a movie? If not, don’t put it in. Or: if not, tart it up as one of my friends says, until it is.
Tomorrow: the dead cat story done as a viable Indy Movie pitch.
This is the first part of what will probably be a multiple part essay on ‘true stories,” and the traps beginning screenwriters fall into telling them.
Here’s the first rule of true story telling:
Just because it happened, doesn’t make it interesting.
Your cat dying is not interesting. Sad, yes. Heartbreaking..to you, maybe. To others…probably not.
Your cat getting run over by the President of the United States, pretty interesting.
Your cat getting run over by the President of the United States, causing an international incident which forces you to abandon your identity, go undercover and join forces with a cryptic yet beautiful martial artist. And you have a mysterious flu that may or may not kill you in 24 hours: yup, probably a movie.
So that’s the first reality test: Would you pay 10 dollars to see this scene from your life in a movie? If not, don’t put it in. Or: if not, tart it up as one of my friends says, until it is.
Tomorrow: the dead cat story done as a viable Indy Movie pitch.
