Screenwriting help- Horror/Torutre-How far is to far?

H

Horrorwriter

New member
*WARNING GRAPHIC CONTENT*

Hi Everyone,

I'm fairly new to screen writing. I'm working on a screenplay that is based on true events. The script is based on a certain serial killer who abducted women and sexually tortured them. The problem I am encountering is that production companies seem to be fine with normal violence but I have not seen to many movies with sexual violence in them.

I am wondering what I can do to get around this without harming the integrity of the story. The serial killer I am basing the script on would do horrible things such as penetration with foreign objects, electrocuting nipples, etc. really gruesome stuff. I am wondering if anyone has any suggestions to depict these events in a tasteful manner? I know that may sound strange, but I do not intend this to be a porn film or even a torture porn film (such as hostel). I am trying to tell a story that really happened.

I am also wondering if because the forms of torture are real methods that the person used (there have been numerous books documenting it) if producers would understand that this is not just violence for violence sake and that there is a real story here? or would they simply discard it as being way to violent. I understand that there is a very big difference between normal violence (i.e. slashing someone up) and sexual violence (rape, etc.) and that there is a strong stigma attached to it.

If anyone can provide me with some help/ideas on this I would greatly appreciate it! Thanks!
 
Either you show the implement but not its use.
Or you have the detectives or someone working on the case say it, either in breifing another officer or being briefed, or speaking of it personally because they're horrified by it too.

In other words, just don't show the act itself. If you feel you have to show something, cut away soon.

7 is often thought of as an incredibly violent movie. But there's almost no actual violence in it. Its always the aftermath.

One character in 7 is made to wear a knife as as phallus and have sex with people against his will. They don't show it. You don't hear it. You hear about it in a visceral and traumatic way in that characters interrogation. Maybe the show the apparatus but can't remember.

Of course the only way this won't work is if in your true life events the cops didn't discover any of the bodies or find any of the evidence until it was all done and over.

As a litmus test. Ask if the act itself furthers the story or changes someone's character development or is it the aftermath of the act.

If a character is raped and is there after afraid of sex, there's no reason to show the rape. Her terror before hand and traumatization afterward will do.

If there is a moment in the act itself that say, changes the killer, its the moment he realizes he has to hunt down red heads named suzie because of the way his current victim screams or something, then maybe you need to show it.

Porn, musicals, and action movies all suffer from the same structural challenge. By in large the plot is there just to prop up the musical numbers, sex scenes, or action sequences. So if you are machinating in the plot to create a horrific torture scene then you are probably making Gorno, or Torture Porn. But if you have to have a torture scene to fascillitate the story moving forward then probably not and you also probably don't have to show much.

You can create dread a lot of ways other than explicitness.
 
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Jack Daniel Stanley said:
7 is often thought of as an incredibly violent movie. But there's almost no actual violence in it. Its always the aftermath.

One character in 7 is made to wear a knife as as phallus and have sex with people against his will. They don't show it. You don't hear it. You hear about it in a visceral and traumatic way in that characters interrogation. Maybe the show the apparatus but can't remember.
Click to expand...

Yes, they show a picture of it strapped to a "model" in a Polaroid, but you never see it in action. The interrogation scene was enough! :zombie_smiley:

Great movie.

I always find that the best scenes are the ones that leave it up to your imagination. The torture scene in Reservoir Dogs did it for me.

Much worse than anything in Hostel. IMHO

Mike
 
It comes down to this ...

write it as you feel best depicts the horror; the diabolical killer, and the terrorfied victims, and all the acts and toys and zappers you can muster. In the end, it will be the director and the actors that decide how to best interpret and shoot the scene/s.

Just tell it with honesty. Don't set out to shock, but rather to tell a good story. It will all work out.

a

www.alexwhitmer.wordpress.com

www.guerro.wordpress.com
 
I think what he's asking about is more content than interpretation.

True if you have a mugging scene, you might write that the victim is stabbed and then one director might show the knife going in repeatedly and another cut to the paramedics bandaging the wound when the mugger first wields the knife ...

But ... you can write the production into a corner where they have to show it or not, or ask for a rewrite. So I think it's still worth thinking about.

And it definitely will affect the tone of the screenplay on a read.

In Se7en, Fincher could have chosen to show the knife phallus thing in operation, but he didn't have to because of the dialouge scene. If there was no dialogue scene, then what would there be? The screerwriter still has to decide whether he writes
1) a scene showing the device in action
2) visual clues pre or post scene that let us know what will happen or just happened
or
3) dialogue that describes it, as in Se7en.
or something I'm not thinking of.

I don't think it s a matter of interpreting the scenes, as much as content.
 
Jack Daniel Stanley said:
In Se7en, Fincher could have chosen to show the knife phallus thing in operation, but he didn't have to because of the dialouge scene.
Click to expand...
Not to mention, he would have had to deal with an X rating. A lot of movies will end up having to cut a scene, or just part of a scene, to get an R instead of an NC17. Sometimes the line is so small.
 
All the content is there, as you pointed out. Visual clues and supporting dialogue.

In the end, much depends on who picks up the project, it's budget, and all the creative talent that will have input. The scene/s will be interpreted, changed, deleted, or followed verbatum.

Producer A will come up with a very differnt film than producer B. Same blueprint, different interpretation.

Your job is to write as you see fit, keeping in mind its content may offend some hollywood script readers, and may be poo-pooed by several. But somewhere out there is a producer willing to take it on, make what he or she feels are needed changes, and go forward with the film. At this point, you are out of the equation anyways. If anything, set out to get yourself noticed as not afraid to tackle difficul material. It's no fun writing safe.

a

www.alexwhitmer.wordpress.com
 
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Capt Quirk said:
I don't know about that. Hostel actually made me squirm.
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Not me. The acting was so bad in the beginning that it took me completely out of it...

Besides, I've sat in on surgeries so the gore fest was no big deal. Different yes, but not "squirm" worthy.

It's the unknown that really makes my imagination squirm. :thumbsup:

Mike
 
Surgery is nothing, the people are usually sedated. However, in Hostel, after they had taken the torch to that girl, and the hero had to cut her hanging eye off... yeah, it creeped me out a bit.
 
The imagination is a powerful thing. Tarantino discovered it with the ear cutting scene in Reservoir Dogs. He shot it two ways, showing the action and cutting away from it. He found that cutting away from it and letting the mind fill in the blanks was much more horrific. I tend to agree. You can watch Hostel and end up squirming but end up dismissing the violence as being gratuitous. On the other hand, if the mind is left to fill in the blanks it'll will invariably come up with something worse.

We used a scene with a character getting his head bashed in on a toilet. You don't see the actual "hit" which is covered by the wall. You see the blood and solid material splash down and cover the lower part of the toilet, then you see the lifeless body fall. The crunching sound effects sell the shot. I personally think it worked much better than actually showing the "hit".

The scene was written this way:

INT. MEN’S ROOM - NIGHT
Rivera enters the men’s room. His FOOTSTEPS ECHO in the empty room. He chooses the center stall and closes the door. We hear his PANTS DROP behind the closed door. Rivera starts HUMMING a song.

We hear a THUMP. Rivera stops humming immediately.

RIVERA
Is that you, Smitty?
There is no answer. And the men’s room seems unnaturally quiet.

RIVERA
(continuing)
Is someone there?
(long pause)
Jeez, you’re jumpy.

He starts HUMMING, but there is a note of panic just beneath the surface.
Again, the THUMP.

RIVERA
(continuing; scared)
Who’s there? Stop ****ing around, man. This ain’t funny.

CLOSE ON
Rivera’s face. He bends down to pull up his pants. Something suddenly BANGS against the stall wall. Rivera almost pulls a muscle pulling up his pants. We see the terror in his eyes.

RIVERA
(continuing)
NOT FUNNY, MAN!

Suddenly Rivera is down! We hear a CRUNCH as his head hits the toilet.

ANGLE ON
Rivera as something pulls him under the stall. A pool of blood marks the path.

WIDE ANGLE FROM OUTSIDE THE STALL
We hear some POUNDING and CRUNCHING. We see the monster’s boots and Rivera, down on his knees, trying to support himself with his arm. The beating continues as a puddle of blood begins flowing out from under the stall.
 
Blaine said:
The imagination is a powerful thing. Tarantino discovered it with the ear cutting scene in Reservoir Dogs. He shot it two ways, showing the action and cutting away from it. He found that cutting away from it and letting the mind fill in the blanks was much more horrific. I tend to agree. You can watch Hostel and end up squirming but end up dismissing the violence as being gratuitous. On the other hand, if the mind is left to fill in the blanks it'll will invariably come up with something worse.
Click to expand...
Exactly the RD scene that I referred to earlier.:thumbsup:
 
Capt Quirk said:
Surgery is nothing, the people are usually sedated. However, in Hostel, after they had taken the torch to that girl, and the hero had to cut her hanging eye off... yeah, it creeped me out a bit.
Click to expand...
Yah, but the eye looked so fake to me that once again it took me out of it.

Some things are better left to the imagination.
Different strokes for different folks though...

Cheers,

Mike
 
Horrorwriter said:
*WARNING GRAPHIC CONTENT*

Hi Everyone,

I'm fairly new to screen writing. I'm working on a screenplay that is based on true events. The script is based on a certain serial killer who abducted women and sexually tortured them.

If anyone can provide me with some help/ideas on this I would greatly appreciate it! Thanks!
Click to expand...

This already sounds cheap and exploitive. I suggest breaking the maxim of "show don't tell" and instead use "Tell don't show".
For example a detective is reviewing crime scene photos and making jaded comments about the killer's MO.
The brutality of the killer's actions is only relevant to the extent it reveals clues or crucial story points. Brutality for the sake of shock value or even adherence to the reality is weak and a hallmark of poor writing and something tells me you're capable of something better.
 
And the Shining and Hostel both fall under that category.

And Poe and Lovecraft could (arguably) be given the same label.

And sometimes "horror writer" / filmmaker Cronenberg has had films at your beloved Cannes and cameoed in Clive Barker movies

and hmmm ... "horror writer" / filmmaker [SIZE=-1]Guillermo Del Toro won best screenplay at Cannes.[/SIZE]
 
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Jack Daniel Stanley said:
And the Shining and Hostel both fall under that category.

And Poe and Lovecraft could (arguably) be given the same label.

And Cronenberg has had films at your beloved Cannes and cameoed in Clive Barker movies.
Click to expand...

I only stated a fact, neither meant as judgmental or derisive. I only said it since "Horrorwriter" may only be interested in the more exploitative-level of cinema, rather than the "erudite" (TM) tradition brianluce seems to imply he should follow.
There's a lot of money in Lions-Gate films, and there's nothing wrong with someone trying to make money... now, if he started touting it as neo-art or included some pretentious premise about... never mind.
Fact: The term "Horror" when chosen specifically for a representative title for an individual, likely (and by that I mean holding a probability greater than 50%) implies that particular individual would be more interested in catering towards the traditionalist horror films. Nothing wrong with that at all.
Fact 2: Cronenberg stopped making horror films a LONG time ago.
Fact 3: Lovecraft had a large vocabulary and an obsession with Poe. Neither equates quality.
 
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To the initial poster, if erudite/'deep' yet gruesome screenplays are what you're interested in creating, you must deal with either psychological issues, social commentary, or both (both is better). What I would recommend (as I have used in various screen/stageplays) is to create a juxtaposition between two very different worlds: stark harsh realism (where you can show the "sick torture" in all its nasty detail), and romanticized worlds, where dialog and situations are completely removed from realism and placed instead into that old-fashioned literature and poetry. The interplay, (or perhaps counterpoint) between these two "worlds" will create an interesting and dynamic balance, which is far more likely to interact with the audience on an emotional level than an exploitative torture-porno. Run with it, and tell us how it turns out.
 
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