You're never more than 200 metres from a rat or whatever it is. And yet the tube is the only time I'm ever aware of them. I don't really get what they live on in the tube. There's plenty of stuff to feast on left on trains but probably not on platforms yet when they think nobody is looming they scurry up. One got very close but when it realised I'd spied him it backed off. It nestled against the blue and yellow generator at the back of the platform. And then with it's back to wall it sussed out what was going on. Eventually it realised I wasn't going anywhere so it retreated further.
I wonder how far they travel. At liverpool street when I stand at my spot by the first video projector so as to get the quick exit you need onto to the Northern line, there's always a rat on the tracks. Sometimes two.
I presume they're the same ones and that they don't stray far from where they are. But maybe I'm wrong. Maybe rats travel the lines, commuting from Liverpool street to chancery lane. Or migrating all the way to Shepherd's bush over weeks. It's just there are so many and by the projector is such a good spot someone is always picking it up.
Is the rats of the underground a good kids story. I loved the rats of nimh as a kid. I think rats can be likeable. And these rats are small and likeable really. And there are plenty of perils for
Them to deal with.
So where should they be from
London Bridge
Elephant and Castle
Lambeth North
Angel
Mornington Crescent
Borough
Bethnal Green
Warren Street
Euston Square
Pimlico
Thursday, 17 February 2011
Tools not rules
I realised something yesterday. A friend of mine was asking if I adhered to the 3 act structure. It felt a slightly weird question 'of course I do, what do you take me for?' and then he asked me if I felt restrained by it.
And I realised that it was a very long time since I'd felt that. When I first read Story I railed against it but while he overdoes it he doesn't seem much more than obvious now. I feel almost as perplexed as if you asked a footballer if he feels constrained by the fact he can't use his hands. It's a pretty fundamental part of the job.
So what's changed? Well first I think my aspirations have changed. I would like to make broadly commercial fare, mostly in the romantic comedy genre, rather than paradigm shifting works of art.
Secondly and this is probably the cause of 1 - I've discovered screenwriting is hard. Writing a scene is often easy. An intriguing and entertaining 1st act can be put together without too much difficulty. But a 90 page screenplay which works coherently as a whole and ends in a way that fulfil the promise of the premise? That's really hard.
And now I fully appreciate this fact I'm looking for things to help me. If you're struggling to put something together in a coherent way it's not a hindrance to try and get it to fit a 3 act structure it's a massive boon.
I think the book that switched my attitude to it (because I used to be dismissive of it) was the theoretically even more prescriptive Screenwriting: The Sequence Approach, which talks not just about 3 acts but 8 sequences.
Its introduction talked about tools (dramatic irony, exposition as ammunition etc.) and then it just talks through a bunch of films and look at how you could break them down into 8 sequences.
It admits that some films have more sequences than 8 so it starts from the premise that it's just a tool. And what it does is make you do a bunch of short films each with setups, tension and payoffs. And it is by the far the easiest way of dealing with drift in 2nd acts that I know.
So there you go a plug for the sequence approach and an appreciation that I'm now an unquestioning adherent to the rules. And it's made life easier.
And I realised that it was a very long time since I'd felt that. When I first read Story I railed against it but while he overdoes it he doesn't seem much more than obvious now. I feel almost as perplexed as if you asked a footballer if he feels constrained by the fact he can't use his hands. It's a pretty fundamental part of the job.
So what's changed? Well first I think my aspirations have changed. I would like to make broadly commercial fare, mostly in the romantic comedy genre, rather than paradigm shifting works of art.
Secondly and this is probably the cause of 1 - I've discovered screenwriting is hard. Writing a scene is often easy. An intriguing and entertaining 1st act can be put together without too much difficulty. But a 90 page screenplay which works coherently as a whole and ends in a way that fulfil the promise of the premise? That's really hard.
And now I fully appreciate this fact I'm looking for things to help me. If you're struggling to put something together in a coherent way it's not a hindrance to try and get it to fit a 3 act structure it's a massive boon.
I think the book that switched my attitude to it (because I used to be dismissive of it) was the theoretically even more prescriptive Screenwriting: The Sequence Approach, which talks not just about 3 acts but 8 sequences.
Its introduction talked about tools (dramatic irony, exposition as ammunition etc.) and then it just talks through a bunch of films and look at how you could break them down into 8 sequences.
It admits that some films have more sequences than 8 so it starts from the premise that it's just a tool. And what it does is make you do a bunch of short films each with setups, tension and payoffs. And it is by the far the easiest way of dealing with drift in 2nd acts that I know.
So there you go a plug for the sequence approach and an appreciation that I'm now an unquestioning adherent to the rules. And it's made life easier.
About Valentine's Today
There are two girls facing opposite each other on the tube. I wasn't quite sure if they were talking to each other or not. It was like they were Locking eyes and nothing was coming out. Then one touched up her lipstick and sat back.
It must have been the angle. They're both looking down now. Alone in thoughts on Valentine's Day
As am I.
But I've got About Today by the National and it's much more beautiful than Valentine's. There are other days which will make me feel more alone. Days that deserve it
It must have been the angle. They're both looking down now. Alone in thoughts on Valentine's Day
As am I.
But I've got About Today by the National and it's much more beautiful than Valentine's. There are other days which will make me feel more alone. Days that deserve it
Battle Los Angeles
Battle Los Angeles- is Los angeles the best selling place globally to set it?
I just wonder if exec reckon it would Be the best place for it but actually worldwide other cities capture the imagination more. I was thinking Paris.
I tried to type to quickly and had verge wet city come out. I like it. I'm not sure what it means but its sounds are just right.
I just wonder if exec reckon it would Be the best place for it but actually worldwide other cities capture the imagination more. I was thinking Paris.
I tried to type to quickly and had verge wet city come out. I like it. I'm not sure what it means but its sounds are just right.
Brighton Rock
Wanting to like a film is an interesting phenomenon. It's a better thing to do then wanting to dislike a film which is just unnecessary negativism. But it becomes like a solipsistic version of when you recommend a film to others. You're really keen for them to enjoy it and you're not fully concentrating because of that.
I was really keen to like Brighton Rock. Because it was British. Because it felt like an underdog piece when up against the American Oscar run, the King's speech juggernaut and even the star power of Never Let Me Go. Because it just seemed so unfair that the film came out now and will get buried under the competition when it would have done well in October.
So I almost don't know how I feel about it. There's a part of me that thinks it's a fantastic film and yet I have no courage in my conviction.
It is slightly overdirected. But often done so expertly, visual, tense and beautiful.
There are some extraordinary clunkers of dialogue and scenes which fizz or leave you feeling your insides tighten.
There is a clunky Catholicism that never feels anything more than an add on. The sense that Pinky is going to hell and knows it, just trying to put off the inevitable, is palpable. Yet none of the scenes or conversations about catholicism feel authentic. When you compare it to Of Gods and Men it's laughable.
Yet I remember how I felt in the last scene at the dread and sadness I felt at what was about to happen and the true ambiguity I felt about what I think would be better to have felt. And I definitely feel I was watching a film that had me, that had got under my skin and made me really care about a character who doesn't exist.
Rose is the defintion of pathetic. Both definitions. You want to shake her and put her to rights for being so stupid, so blind, so hooked into a false destructive belief in romance (it was an interesting choice of film for Valentine's day) and half the time you're ready to give her up because frankly she deserves it.
And yet you want to protect her, a girl broken down by her mousy downtrodden life and given a chance to be a romantic heroine. Someone who if you can get her out of there she can live. She might one day thrive.
Which is more than can be said for pinky. It's pretty common for gangster flicks to get you routing for a criminal to escape. It's a little more to have you half routing for a boy who seems to pump cold malice through his system.
You hope for his redemption. You hope for his escape. You hope that when his friend claims that he's doing something honourable with Rose he's right. That speaking into a record player that he hates her is the conflicts of a scared and damaged soul. Not just a simple malice.
But you know you're kidding yourself. You're copying Rose in giving him strengths he doesn't possess. And you know that Rose would probably drive you to, if not the hate he feels, but a disgust at her total projection and detachment from the reality he's desperately trying to manage.
They are two really strong performances. Tragic youthful romance made more tragic by the presumption on her part that tragic youthful romance is a magnificent thing rather than pathetic drisly miserable.
So yes I think it's a film which deserves more attention then it's getting. And I hope the people who made it are recognised as talent who should be allowed to do tales of such scope again. And that the distributor have learnt not to try and go toe to toe with the Fox Searchlights of this world.
Two postscripts: I loved the backdrop of fights between mods and rockers. It worked brilliantly.
A lot of the big films of the last year seem to be about young people. This may be the first time I've started to consistently see films about people younger than me.
I was really keen to like Brighton Rock. Because it was British. Because it felt like an underdog piece when up against the American Oscar run, the King's speech juggernaut and even the star power of Never Let Me Go. Because it just seemed so unfair that the film came out now and will get buried under the competition when it would have done well in October.
So I almost don't know how I feel about it. There's a part of me that thinks it's a fantastic film and yet I have no courage in my conviction.
It is slightly overdirected. But often done so expertly, visual, tense and beautiful.
There are some extraordinary clunkers of dialogue and scenes which fizz or leave you feeling your insides tighten.
There is a clunky Catholicism that never feels anything more than an add on. The sense that Pinky is going to hell and knows it, just trying to put off the inevitable, is palpable. Yet none of the scenes or conversations about catholicism feel authentic. When you compare it to Of Gods and Men it's laughable.
Yet I remember how I felt in the last scene at the dread and sadness I felt at what was about to happen and the true ambiguity I felt about what I think would be better to have felt. And I definitely feel I was watching a film that had me, that had got under my skin and made me really care about a character who doesn't exist.
Rose is the defintion of pathetic. Both definitions. You want to shake her and put her to rights for being so stupid, so blind, so hooked into a false destructive belief in romance (it was an interesting choice of film for Valentine's day) and half the time you're ready to give her up because frankly she deserves it.
And yet you want to protect her, a girl broken down by her mousy downtrodden life and given a chance to be a romantic heroine. Someone who if you can get her out of there she can live. She might one day thrive.
Which is more than can be said for pinky. It's pretty common for gangster flicks to get you routing for a criminal to escape. It's a little more to have you half routing for a boy who seems to pump cold malice through his system.
You hope for his redemption. You hope for his escape. You hope that when his friend claims that he's doing something honourable with Rose he's right. That speaking into a record player that he hates her is the conflicts of a scared and damaged soul. Not just a simple malice.
But you know you're kidding yourself. You're copying Rose in giving him strengths he doesn't possess. And you know that Rose would probably drive you to, if not the hate he feels, but a disgust at her total projection and detachment from the reality he's desperately trying to manage.
They are two really strong performances. Tragic youthful romance made more tragic by the presumption on her part that tragic youthful romance is a magnificent thing rather than pathetic drisly miserable.
So yes I think it's a film which deserves more attention then it's getting. And I hope the people who made it are recognised as talent who should be allowed to do tales of such scope again. And that the distributor have learnt not to try and go toe to toe with the Fox Searchlights of this world.
Two postscripts: I loved the backdrop of fights between mods and rockers. It worked brilliantly.
A lot of the big films of the last year seem to be about young people. This may be the first time I've started to consistently see films about people younger than me.
Friends in films
Most films where the protagonist isn't taken completely away from their world, have minor supporting characters who are 'the friends'
The friends are not the cause of the protagonists problems. Jeremy Renner in The town is not a friend in the sense I'm talking here. He's clearly an antagonist.
Friends aren't the cause of the problems in the protaganist's life. Nor are they the solution.
They are there for a number of reasons. To add comic relief. To act as confidants when otherwise dilemmas would be too internalized. To show other sides of a lead's character. In TV they often have counterpoint stories which act as a foil or contrast to the lead's story.
And sometimes they're there because you feel a need to make it clear that the lead has friends. I've just written a scene which essentially does this. I've never had much else I've wanted them to do so they get a scene like this. It's like those dreadful scenes in Bridget Jones with the friends but at least they're essentially a Greek chorus of her neuroses.
It's a romantic comedy which I'm trying to have each lead relatively equally focused on. Yet the lack of real friends for Lois, the female lead, makes it feel lopsided. She has some sort of sidekicks but the point of them is that they're not her friends. They're younger.
Her friends are starting to drift into a different life stage (her best friend Beth has a kid). So from a plot point of view she has sidekicks in Vicky and Tabitha but they are not confidants in the same way that Seb is for Toby.
So the way I see it there a three possibilities:
Don't worry about it. Make the script lean and get people along for the ride so they don't stop and go where are Lois's friends
Have the scene but make it very funny and watchable
Make sure Lois has a genuine friend and thread her through so she has an important role to play.
The friends are not the cause of the protagonists problems. Jeremy Renner in The town is not a friend in the sense I'm talking here. He's clearly an antagonist.
Friends aren't the cause of the problems in the protaganist's life. Nor are they the solution.
They are there for a number of reasons. To add comic relief. To act as confidants when otherwise dilemmas would be too internalized. To show other sides of a lead's character. In TV they often have counterpoint stories which act as a foil or contrast to the lead's story.
And sometimes they're there because you feel a need to make it clear that the lead has friends. I've just written a scene which essentially does this. I've never had much else I've wanted them to do so they get a scene like this. It's like those dreadful scenes in Bridget Jones with the friends but at least they're essentially a Greek chorus of her neuroses.
It's a romantic comedy which I'm trying to have each lead relatively equally focused on. Yet the lack of real friends for Lois, the female lead, makes it feel lopsided. She has some sort of sidekicks but the point of them is that they're not her friends. They're younger.
Her friends are starting to drift into a different life stage (her best friend Beth has a kid). So from a plot point of view she has sidekicks in Vicky and Tabitha but they are not confidants in the same way that Seb is for Toby.
So the way I see it there a three possibilities:
Don't worry about it. Make the script lean and get people along for the ride so they don't stop and go where are Lois's friends
Have the scene but make it very funny and watchable
Make sure Lois has a genuine friend and thread her through so she has an important role to play.
My Commonplace Book
ommonplace book
I'm reading an excellent book on where ideas come from. I read it in very small chunks every night before I go to bed. There are so many interesting ideas in there that I prefer only to have a few pages at a time so I can soak it up.
But one thing I read last night that really interested me was this very popular enlightenment habit which was called a commonplace book. It was a book with all the thoughts they had on everything.
It was based on the important presumptions that thoughts are fleeting. That many good and useful thoughts would be useful later on but lost to the world if you didn't write them down.
Moreover you have no idea whether it's useful at the time. Thoughts are muddled. The devastating simplicity of evolution didn't come in a Eureka moment to Darwin (despite him later developing a narrative around the inspiration Malthus was meant to give him) but by just keeping on going, making notes, re reading the notes. Keeping working, keeping thinking.
And it seems worth doing for those with less grandiose ambitions then discovering the origins of mankind.
I've been vaguely doing it already. The notes function on my phone is very handy for this kind of withering. But the difference is I'm going to post it.
Two reasons for that: one the tagging systems is a useful filing system. And the ability to link back or add comments can keep it all connected
And of course there's a chance someone will read it and either find something useful for their own purposes or leave their own thought which will help the process.
I've realised that I've never written anything I'm proud of where a significant element wasn't suggested by someone else. So please let me steal more ideas from you.
I'm reading an excellent book on where ideas come from. I read it in very small chunks every night before I go to bed. There are so many interesting ideas in there that I prefer only to have a few pages at a time so I can soak it up.
But one thing I read last night that really interested me was this very popular enlightenment habit which was called a commonplace book. It was a book with all the thoughts they had on everything.
It was based on the important presumptions that thoughts are fleeting. That many good and useful thoughts would be useful later on but lost to the world if you didn't write them down.
Moreover you have no idea whether it's useful at the time. Thoughts are muddled. The devastating simplicity of evolution didn't come in a Eureka moment to Darwin (despite him later developing a narrative around the inspiration Malthus was meant to give him) but by just keeping on going, making notes, re reading the notes. Keeping working, keeping thinking.
And it seems worth doing for those with less grandiose ambitions then discovering the origins of mankind.
I've been vaguely doing it already. The notes function on my phone is very handy for this kind of withering. But the difference is I'm going to post it.
Two reasons for that: one the tagging systems is a useful filing system. And the ability to link back or add comments can keep it all connected
And of course there's a chance someone will read it and either find something useful for their own purposes or leave their own thought which will help the process.
I've realised that I've never written anything I'm proud of where a significant element wasn't suggested by someone else. So please let me steal more ideas from you.
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