Story. Screenplay. Sale.
A structural overview of A Room with a View (Ruth Prawer Jhabvala, 1985). Without any doubt, this is one of the finest literary adaptations and a timeless romantic movie. The film launched the careers of actors Daniel Day Lewis and Helena Bonham Carter, while it was a first major hit in a string of successful … Read more
Right after learning the principles of structure, it will be hard to apply them to your own work immediately. Better is to consolidate your understanding by applying it to films you know, by watching them and identifying the key turning points. A breakdown in scenes or plot points is an excellent start. To help you … Read more
A structural overview of The Shawshank Redemption (Frank Darabont, 1994). It was nominated for seven Academy Awards: Best Picture, Best Actor (Morgan Freeman), Best Adapted Screenplay, Best Cinematography, Best Editing, Best Original Score, and Best Sound – but it failed to win a single Oscar. This film has an interesting structure because of its unusual … Read more
A structural overview of Michael Clayton (Tony Gilroy, 2007) in 8 Sequences. When I watched the film during its theatrical release, I thoroughly enjoyed it. Because of the relatively low budget (an estimated USD$25m) for its production values, Tony Gilroy was able to make some brave non-commercial decisions with his screen story. This didn’t go … Read more
When talking about story structure, many people talk about where exactly in the story the structural element needs to happen. Often this is expressed in terms of a page number, or even a percentage of the film’s total duration. I would prefer to leave such quantification aside for a moment and rather look into what … Read more