Hello.
Well, before I get started, I'm 17 and I'm living in Canada, currently. Though I applied and got into Western University and UofT for film studies [and York for an undeclared major], I decided to take a year off before heading to University, in order to decide on a career that's more.. viable. However, I still love film and I'm hoping to maintain and work upon this passion as I get older.
So I started off simply; with a love for movies. I'm getting to be an avid fan and moving past the typical Tarantino and Scorscese films to less known, yet just as influential films. I hope to amass a large collection of movies throughout my life. Two close friends took a comtech class in High School and produced a few shorts, but considering the limited funding and education they are nothing particularly spectacular. But still, they got into a local film contest.
Anyways, since we all have a passion for film, we're getting more out there. Since I also love writing and reading as well, I've started drafting a screenplay. I've read one or two novels and what makes movies work, and a few guides on writing screenplays. We're part of a local film club, and we're going to volunteer on set of a few short films by fairly prominent indie directors in a month. We're also going up to Toronto soon to talk to some film professors at York and to the Ontario Arts Council.
What's all this leading too? Well, I need some advice on writing my first official screenplay. Like I said, I love writing and I'm not too bad at it. I got a 90% in AP English last semester, and I've been around the top of most writing oriented classes. However, I have a few issues. Firstly, I have a trouble with plot. My writing tends to become extremely psychoanalytical, metaphorical and overtly symbolic which just comes out as pretentious fluff: for example,
"I don’t know if this was a single experience or just pieces patched together from different variants of the ultimately same routine; if it happened to me or if it happened to one of the others, or if it wasn’t a damned hallucination in itself. What I do remember is waking up weeping and laughing and bleeding and feeling like I just took three shots of Middle Eastern warfare. Dull, blurry flashes of light and sounds and colors and taste danced intoxicated in the shelter of my peripheral vision; phantasms without the strength to be comprehensible yet still being able to escape the admittedly feeble grasps of whatever sentience remained. No, that’s not right, hallucinations don’t have strength. They have whatever substance you give them. Either the stuff was working its way out of my system or reality had been warped for just long enough to allow whatever subconscious self preservation instinct I had left to dilute them into less formidable forms. And by formidable I mean things with claws and fangs and hallowed breath and deities that feed on the unachieved mental and spiritual and physical possibilities and notions of a nation whored out to itself sustained by the steady saline ‘drip, drip, drip’ of our commercialized society. Things that aren’t meant to be seen by man; thins that install a sense of terror and wonder and ecstasy and lust and just a plethora of every emotion tangible and intangible being exposed to the cold dank light of the darkness held within and without society."
Anyways, even though this story is about a drug addict and its meant to be confusing and complicated to represent the random, dispatched thoughts running through his deteriorating brain, you can see my point. No real plot or establishment of characters.
However, in the screenplay I'm writing, I've taken some advice from other places. Its a lot more character oriented, and the fact that its a screenplay allows me to focus more on dialogue; which I tend to lack skills in. I'm going to read some good children's novels, because I was told that that is good to see simple plot structure at its best.
So basically, this is just an introduction. I have a few questions; how can I get over this sort of pseudo-intellectual dribble in my writing? Also, can I post a plot outline for my screenplay in here, or is there too much risk? I have a few questions about it, namely a few holes here and there and scenes to stay away from.
Also, should I seriously read some screenwriting guides and other screenplays and download Celtix and train a bit with that before I begin writing? Or should I just go for it and work my way from there. I was also wondering if I should watch a few more films; I have some culturally defining Kubrick, Hitchcock and Coenn still on my to-watch list, and should I read some of the novels that I have on my too-read list first before starting my story, in order to not necessarily glean new ideas, but to have a solid base in the story-telling medium.
And another final problem; when I'm writing, I find that my stories sometimes tend to reflect plots seen in other stories. For example, I wrote a short narrative about a war veteran who takes drugs to experience a recurring hallucination, and when his world starts to crumble apart and everyone begins committing apparant suicide, he needs to find the heart of his hallucination in order to come to peace with himself. About halfway through, I realized an eerie similarity to Jacob's Ladder.
So, if you got through all of that, I applaud you. Thank you for your time and for your advice; what I really need is some unbiased, educated criticism from a reliable source. So I hope to be posting here more often.
Well, before I get started, I'm 17 and I'm living in Canada, currently. Though I applied and got into Western University and UofT for film studies [and York for an undeclared major], I decided to take a year off before heading to University, in order to decide on a career that's more.. viable. However, I still love film and I'm hoping to maintain and work upon this passion as I get older.
So I started off simply; with a love for movies. I'm getting to be an avid fan and moving past the typical Tarantino and Scorscese films to less known, yet just as influential films. I hope to amass a large collection of movies throughout my life. Two close friends took a comtech class in High School and produced a few shorts, but considering the limited funding and education they are nothing particularly spectacular. But still, they got into a local film contest.
Anyways, since we all have a passion for film, we're getting more out there. Since I also love writing and reading as well, I've started drafting a screenplay. I've read one or two novels and what makes movies work, and a few guides on writing screenplays. We're part of a local film club, and we're going to volunteer on set of a few short films by fairly prominent indie directors in a month. We're also going up to Toronto soon to talk to some film professors at York and to the Ontario Arts Council.
What's all this leading too? Well, I need some advice on writing my first official screenplay. Like I said, I love writing and I'm not too bad at it. I got a 90% in AP English last semester, and I've been around the top of most writing oriented classes. However, I have a few issues. Firstly, I have a trouble with plot. My writing tends to become extremely psychoanalytical, metaphorical and overtly symbolic which just comes out as pretentious fluff: for example,
"I don’t know if this was a single experience or just pieces patched together from different variants of the ultimately same routine; if it happened to me or if it happened to one of the others, or if it wasn’t a damned hallucination in itself. What I do remember is waking up weeping and laughing and bleeding and feeling like I just took three shots of Middle Eastern warfare. Dull, blurry flashes of light and sounds and colors and taste danced intoxicated in the shelter of my peripheral vision; phantasms without the strength to be comprehensible yet still being able to escape the admittedly feeble grasps of whatever sentience remained. No, that’s not right, hallucinations don’t have strength. They have whatever substance you give them. Either the stuff was working its way out of my system or reality had been warped for just long enough to allow whatever subconscious self preservation instinct I had left to dilute them into less formidable forms. And by formidable I mean things with claws and fangs and hallowed breath and deities that feed on the unachieved mental and spiritual and physical possibilities and notions of a nation whored out to itself sustained by the steady saline ‘drip, drip, drip’ of our commercialized society. Things that aren’t meant to be seen by man; thins that install a sense of terror and wonder and ecstasy and lust and just a plethora of every emotion tangible and intangible being exposed to the cold dank light of the darkness held within and without society."
Anyways, even though this story is about a drug addict and its meant to be confusing and complicated to represent the random, dispatched thoughts running through his deteriorating brain, you can see my point. No real plot or establishment of characters.
However, in the screenplay I'm writing, I've taken some advice from other places. Its a lot more character oriented, and the fact that its a screenplay allows me to focus more on dialogue; which I tend to lack skills in. I'm going to read some good children's novels, because I was told that that is good to see simple plot structure at its best.
So basically, this is just an introduction. I have a few questions; how can I get over this sort of pseudo-intellectual dribble in my writing? Also, can I post a plot outline for my screenplay in here, or is there too much risk? I have a few questions about it, namely a few holes here and there and scenes to stay away from.
Also, should I seriously read some screenwriting guides and other screenplays and download Celtix and train a bit with that before I begin writing? Or should I just go for it and work my way from there. I was also wondering if I should watch a few more films; I have some culturally defining Kubrick, Hitchcock and Coenn still on my to-watch list, and should I read some of the novels that I have on my too-read list first before starting my story, in order to not necessarily glean new ideas, but to have a solid base in the story-telling medium.
And another final problem; when I'm writing, I find that my stories sometimes tend to reflect plots seen in other stories. For example, I wrote a short narrative about a war veteran who takes drugs to experience a recurring hallucination, and when his world starts to crumble apart and everyone begins committing apparant suicide, he needs to find the heart of his hallucination in order to come to peace with himself. About halfway through, I realized an eerie similarity to Jacob's Ladder.
So, if you got through all of that, I applaud you. Thank you for your time and for your advice; what I really need is some unbiased, educated criticism from a reliable source. So I hope to be posting here more often.
(Like when you arrive in Paris and all your luggage ends up left in the states, and a hot french gal kidnaps you to her Paris apartment; or crossing the English channel just when the English transportation system goes on strike and you have to sleep in the Dover train station overnight on a wooden bench-- in winter; oh man, weird stuff happens). The absolute best hotel I slept in was super super cheap, right across the street from the Rome strain station-- run by an Italian family, a room with wall paper, the italian mom would act almost like a second mother, you could smell the pasta cooking in her kitchen-- super cheap, and i would not have traded that stay for a seven star Radisson hotel in Rome! And the next day crossing the street in Rome I run into someone I befriended on the train way back in Niece, go figure. Isn't life weird? Yeah I am getting the travel bug-- I have a sabbatical this next year, thinking of the Greek island of Santorini (ever since seeing the movie Summer Lovers, a great romantic comedy), which also figures into the setting for a romantic comedy I have in mind to write after my current horror screenplay. Hehe, tax deductible research trip?