Screen writing 2

We had our second lecture on screen writing with Steve Coombes, and he focused on Dialogue and Character. He used scenes from 'When Harry met Sally' and 'Full Metal Jacket', as these films included scenes that were very prominent. 


Dialogue
- Pulp fiction 'Gold watch scene' - very detailed, keeps the audience   interested
- if the dialogue doesn't move the story, change/ cut it
- to on the nose dialogue is bad
- to formal dialogue is bad
- Don't have every character sounding the same. Talk as their character would
- Don't get to artistic with dialogue
- Shape dialogue to character's personality
- Read dialogue out loud, then think of who would play them, the read out loud again
- Do't be to grammatical
- Don't make it to real
- Don't do long speeches unless you can't avoid them
- Unless for a good reason, don't give a character more than three        lines of dialogue
- Be aware of accents - little touch
- Sometimes worth paying attention to syntax
- Don't give to much information
- Don't fill in plots the audience hasn't seen yet
- Don't make a character a mouthpiece of your own belief
- 'Greed is good' - Wall Street - grabs audience attention, due to          greed usually being seen as bad
- The Denial - 'I'm not in love' - What is most interesting about            characters is what they don't know about themselves
- Set-up dialogue like a joke - Set-up, distraction, punch line
- What insults/ swears can your character use
- Anger leads to great dialogue

Character
- If you know someone well, you can predict them in situations and predict their actions
- You know someone if you know their flaws, behaviour, peculiarities etc
- Know your characters as well as you know your friends
- Characters are like imaginary friends/ enemies
- Films about perfect people (Jesus/ Superman) is difficult
- Characters are better looking up than looking down eg servants laughing at masters
- Characters can have tells (giveaways) when you write them
- If you can do a tell for a character early on, you have nailed that character
- Melodrama is when the characters are in the wrong situations
- Drama - all the characters are right
Seeing what character does next is better for building character than backstory
- You can have hubris with conscious or unconscious actions
- If you end up making a character who is a monster, put a bigger monster next door, so audience will be on the smaller monster's side
- Rom Coms - Women choose, men display
- If you are a character and don't think, how do you know you are?
- Make the characters make choices
- Character should be like suspension bridge - forces pulling in opposite directions, and gets you somewhere - what makes them tense