Comments on: The Timid Screenwriter (2) https://www.thestorydepartment.com/the-timid-screenwriter-2/ Story. Screenplay. Sale. Wed, 07 Jul 2010 00:04:11 +0000 hourly 1 By: David Di Muro https://www.thestorydepartment.com/the-timid-screenwriter-2/#comment-714 Wed, 07 Jul 2010 00:04:11 +0000 https://thestorydepartment.com/?p=11636#comment-714 Pontification does not make a good script.

I have read a few scripts that open with a WHITE or BLACK screen and a voice over. The voice will tend to ramble on about some, supposedly, deeply philosophical concept. Then for 120 (or maybe 240) pages scenes play out without any structure, leading nowhere. A climatic scene is dropped in where the protagonist dies. We are then presented with the WHITE or BLACK screen again and the voice over concludes the “philosophical” discourse.

STOP KILLING YOUR PROTAGONIST AND STOP TRYING TO MAKE A POINT.

Entertain your audience. Layer the theme, plots and subtext. Let your audience meet you half-way and they can make up their own mind as to what the moral is.

Anyone else experience this type of writing? Is it some kind of mental virus writers need to flush out?

]]> By: Ed Love https://www.thestorydepartment.com/the-timid-screenwriter-2/#comment-713 Tue, 06 Jul 2010 02:31:55 +0000 https://thestorydepartment.com/?p=11636#comment-713 Thanks again for sharing these wonderful articles. Full of superb reminders!

]]>