First Draft and Rewrites

So my first draft is finished and I'm proud of the work I've done. A first draft is never a miracle one hit wonder, I must rewrite and revise. Through rewriting, a story gets its charm. As much as I'd like to believe that writing a perfect first draft is possible, I must accept that it is not. I'm not a Mozart of story telling nor am I even quite good at English to begin with. Apparently Amaedus lies about Mozart writing "perfect first drafts" and that he in fact made many changes... so this gives me hope.

So there are rewrites. Rewriting allows an average man like myself to put work where pure talent lacks. In any field, of any form. Example has shown that working hard can put you ahead of those who are naturally more able (Gattaca, anyone?) Athletes can overcome each other by cutting back on snacks and fast food- which always made me wonder, why are so many Olympic Athletes sponsored in McDonald's commercials?

Then there is time. Can I rewrite 90 pages in two weeks? Of course I can, I can do anything I set my mind too. Will I have enough time to rewrite 90 pages in two weeks? Well that's a question I can't quite answer. Of course I have the time, but my personality, my attitude, all determine the time I put towards rewriting a feature length screenplay.

I need time to sleep, time to eat, time to be outside, underwater, any place besides being in front of a computer screen. Do you feel like that sometimes? I do. Maybe it's a neuro-imbalance because there are times when I am in the zone and can work for hours without a problem, I even enjoy it! Then there are other times when I can't even open the file to start working in. Half the battle is starting it and opening up the file, so maybe I should.

Another one of my problems I face this term is my Film and Video Senior Project. I may not have spent everyday working on my feature length script, but I do spend at least a little bit of time each day screenwriting for something. I've been working very hard to rewrite my senior project script. In the past seven weeks I've rewritten it nearly three times from scratch. I must lock that script down as soon as possible because I am filming it during winter break.

I also find that it is hard for me to work on more than one story at a time. The days I work on my Film and Video Script are not the days when I usually work on my Feature Length Screenplay. It's like I enter a certain mindset for one story and If i try to switch to the other one right away, It's hard to imagine the other story when the previous one was so fresh in my mind.

I'll try to put in more of an effort on both scripts. My goal is to lock the short script first so focus better on the other, much longer one.

Finishing Draft 1 and Learning to Crank

Before entering my summer break of two weeks, I was required to write up to my midpoint. I completed roughly 47 pages was hitting the plot points on time page-wise. My story has got character and situations and choices to make. The ingredients are there and It's up to me on how to cook them. In under two weeks I will be writing the last half of my story, another fifty or so pages. I'll have to crank them out and ensure the best quality I can manage within the frame of time.

Learning to crank out a lot of pages (while maintaining a dignified quality) will be a goal of sorts. I do not want to just go in and start typing away. It isn't that easy, but the time I take to think, and the time I take to process those thoughts into useful, applicable information will have to be quicker, and my focus will have to be stronger. I don't think I'll have the time to take three hours to write a few pages and take plenty of breaks. Those days are over (for awhile) and for now I must work.

Looking at my last post it would seem I was in a dark place. It's funny because I don't remember it being that bad. Just a lot of things to do all within a short frame of time. It's the busy life and I'm starting to feel used to it. I was still able to get plenty of sleep and am managing my time well. Who knows? Maybe I'll start to enjoy it and feel welcome to the challenge.

This term I'm locking a senior project script, finishing this feature length script, taking a commercial making class and I have three fun electives on the side. My time will definitely be one thing I need to stay on top of. If i let anything go, then I will have to pay for it later. I'll have to pay with my sleep.

So enough chatter, it's time for me to work.

Act 1 and Seeing the Wall

So I haven't hit the writers block wall yet but I can see it coming. I'm on that road we call writing and up ahead on the writer's gps is a traffic block, a section of the road where my vehicle of story will be stuck. I can see it coming yet I haven't planned an alternate route.

Is it strange to suddenly have an awesome focus on my progress with my senior project script? Or am I just getting excited about one thing to avoid another? I think I just asked the same question twice when I already know the answer. Obviously.

Anyway, 25 pages are done and the story has slowed down. The genre is uncertain (on the page, but not in my mind) and I feel the music O listen to while writing it has had a large effect on it's meaning and tone. If these things are true then should I be in control, or am I just choosing not too. I just finished principal photography on a short film we're making for my junior-class project. I'm excited to see where they take the footage in the post stages but not looking forward to seeing my own mistakes.

I don't have the drive or the passion to put 110% into my feature length script, but I really want to make it a good one. Screenwriting to me is as important as film making.  I'm not showing a hundred pages at the senior show, though, but only 15 minutes or so. Is my mind ready to handle a 90-minute story? Should I be reading Shakespeare or the Old Testament to fully understand the limited combinations of story and how I can adapt one with my own unique twist? Probably. My drive for this script will come soon but I fear as I grow closer to senior project, my motivation will diminish.

Good writing is all about rewriting. I took this class to challenge my abilities with staying on top of my work and next term will prove that. To grow as a screenwriter and to become a greater story teller is important to me. I see the wall however and I don't look forward to climbing over it. Plus rewriting is gonna be tedious, I can't wait. Screenwriters have got to be crazy to want to do all this work, but really is there any other choice? I guess it's just something i'll have to do.

Redesigning Treatments and Sparking an Intro

My treatment, as it seems, is headed in the right direction. There is a lot of work to be done and my close-minded thinking has been expanded a little more. I looked over my treatment many times and made it work the best I can. It was going well and it did work, but it was only enough for a first act. When writing, I've always been a fan of keeping things moving along fairly quickly. Many scenes that happen very fast to push the story along. It's what's required in this day and age. I apparently did just that but it only amounted to a third of the script. My story is even bigger than I could have imagined. My big resolution is just the starting point for the rest of the movie. Thinking now, it would make sense because In any mobster or gangster film, the timeline spans many years and many conflicts, passing through family generations even. Goodfellas did it, and so did Blow (which isn't really a mob story but you know what i mean) My story doesn't just stop with my character standing up to his uncle, that's just when it starts to get good. All my major plot points before are now minor ones, and my final climax is just the first turning point. Like a really long fuse, it burns quickly and moves closer and closer to that barrel of gun powder, or anything else explosive. Like a story, it's on a trajectory and the audience will know where it's headed. That explosion could possibly be literal, but whatever it is, I'm certain that in my script, we'll see even bigger and greater conflicts than previously imagined.

So I've finished my act one intro and while it is still very rough, I did proof read a couple times and make many changes. I'm proud of what I have done and with where this story is going. It is also moving very quickly as predicted. The tone as it seems is light-hearted and cute. The dynamic between newly weds I feel will be fun to watch but it is not overbearing or too dialog heavy. The feeling of a looming danger is real and drives the characters to make decisions and push the story along. I feel I've introduced all of the main characters except the Sister, and the Uncle. I feel it will be okay to reveal them later as they serve a large part of story that drives the rest of the film.

Separating Parties and Setting Destinations

So I've lined out the progression of my story with seven, story twisting scenes. The Main Character and his Wife are on their own path. This path follows the seven stepping stones that I've made up to progress through a 3 act structure. This may be a real technique or not, but I'm using it, and I like the way it looks. Act 1 has two main parts, Act 2 has three, and Act 3 has two main parts again. It's symmetric (2|3|2) and it seems like it'll make sense. Each of these parts will be the big scenes and everything in between is just stuff to get me from one major situation to another.

The Antagonist, a Sicilian Mafia boss, along with his gang follow their own story path. This runs parallel to the Husband and Wife and they too have seven major scenes. It's not actually parallel as these two lines intersect, and so we have conflict. These characters, while important, are not the main aspect of the story, they only help drive it. They will most definitely have less screen time and be used in many situations as comical inserts, rather than be viewed as scary, mafia-born foes which they appear to be.

When creating these seven major story blocks and their conflicting intersections, I started first with a title for each scene. Like a chapter in the book, I wanted that one phrase to be strong enough in my mind, that I am able to expand it. The first scene is very clear in my mind and that is good. It'll amount to about five pages or so and be the substance of my Act 1 intro. It's titled "Beautiful Day" It sounds soothing, but for my main characters, it certainly is not.

Developing Characters

Rather then developing a treatment first, I've decided to figure out who my characters are and complete their character bios first. So who are my characters? Well, I don't quite know, and like Frankenstein, it's still a work in progress.

Since my story deals a lot with a character's emerging past and making the best of a bad situation, I've found that doing the character bios first would allow me to write a more effective treatment later. I want my character(s) to revisit their past in an interesting way, and I want their decisions to be directly branched off of that. Where they go and how they behave will all be connected to their own personal biographies.

Developing quirks, tone of voice and other notable aspects of a character, I feel, will emerge as I begin to write. I know that I have a foggy idea of how I'd like my characters to behave and to give them each a concrete personality so early in my story's development, will only weigh down their possibilities later. That being said, I've decided to hold off on the specifics for now. I also believe that making a girl sound like a real girl will be one of my biggest challenges. I think I know how they act, but let's face it, I only think that I'm right. Left and right they tell me so, it happens all the time.