Time to Write

Started my internship in London and thankfully they give me downtime to write my feature. With the treatment done, I'm now getting going. It's been hard with juggling writing the blind musical for calling the shots and trying to write Chris's brain child of "The Hangover in Poland". It's great though, finally having the chance to show my writing skills as that's my main goal for my future career and my final year.

Feature Treatment Done

Finally...almost three weeks behind and a total readjustment.... I've finished my feature length treatment of the Worry Dolls. First I made an outline of what I wanted (all based off of the short and some ideas I dropped from the original short script) and then today used that to write the treatment. What helped was the synopsis of Midnight Cowboy. Some of the flashbacks made the story very odd and I wanted to double check what they meant in Jon Voight's dream. They were clearly explained in the synopsis which gave me the idea of how to write the treatment. It's a calm explanation of how you are going to do things, then while writing the script, add the crazy, creative touches that make your feature your own.

RIP Ratzo.

TOTAL REWRITE

Well... sort of.
I made a finished draft of the Worry Dolls short and I sent it to friends and family. The reviews were mixed, and I'm not surprised at all. In fact, I really didn't like it, and was hoping that either

a.) Everyone would love it.

b.) Someone would tell me exactly how to fix it to make it perfect.

I just had to break down the script to exactly what I wanted. There was so much I wanted to express...

1.) A mixture of a beautiful, bizarre world that was childlike that is clashing with the dull, boring world.

2.) The worry dolls to be in Will's life until a point, and then Will had to grow.

3.) The sense that Will's job was torture from the boredom.

4.) Someone from Will's job is horrific to him. Trying to put him in his place and bringing him down into the real world.

5.) A happy outcome where Will loses the Worry Dolls, but gains a girl who is like minded.

To include this and more, would be so hard to fit into a ten minute film. Even as I was writing the feature, I thought it was long winded in the way it was presented.
So I stuck to the Amelie narrative of jumping from facts, the the character's interests, to surrealism and try to connect it all. A lot of time got chopped to changing the narrative to Will presenting all the information. I cut the dating show scene, it's good but for another movie. And so it is only Will presenting the narration, which works great as he's more irreverent and more outgoing in this version then his down-trodden, Eyore, version.

Phew....

Short Version of Will and the Worry Dolls is Finished

After finding a new structure to my script, I decided it'd help to write the short first, and then keep building up on it for the feature. It helps a lot more then to write the feature and take away from it for the short. For the short, you can start off really simple and then keep adding to it for the feature but you have more of a visual outline with the short written.
Now I'm going to give it to friends and family to read over. Also Rich Warren who works at South West Screen and Jeremy Routeledge who works at Calling the Shots to help edit the short to make it "festival" worthy. This will be crucial if I want people to be interested in the feature.

Changing the Structure

Finally figured out the easiest solution to telling my story in WILL AND THE WORRY DOLLS. Before it was a normal structure of telling the story. Now, I'm having segments of it told by Will who is the narrator. The easiest way I've had explaining the story and certain jokes is when I tell it in the third person. This is also used in most of my favorite movies or tv shows, such as Amelie, DEXTER, and Annie Hall. I wanted to have two narrators to make it a bit funnier and different. So while one is telling the story, another one keeps butting in to ruin it. I thought the best scenario to do this (and easiest way to end the film with Will finding a girlfriend) is by having Will go on one of those cheesy dating shows that give each person a chance to explain who they are. Then the woman chooses their DVD to learn more. That way, I can explain a lot of things about Will, and then he can talk about why he's on such a smarmy dating show to the owner. The owner is a bit like Gob Bluth from Arrested Development. He has no soul and doesn't care. So it's a good contrast between the sensitive Will telling his life story, and the Gob Bluth character who keeps interrupting with the reality. With that structure, I feel I can just connect the dots for the feature script.

Having this mental block was a good lesson on ways to fix it. The easiest one for me is some physical activity. Hiking around Bristol did the trick and I was away from the computer for a bit.
Phew...

THIS IS EXACTLY WHAT I'M GOING TO RECREATE

Half Way Through My Transcript

My brain is fried. The biggest problem I have is I can't decide what I want to do with this film. I know I want it to be a comedy with substance that's odd. I want it to be a mixture between Amelie and Office Space. I want the central character's world to be like Amelie, so exciting and a almost a drug in his dreams. Then when he has to wake up, he's stuck to the most boring life in the world. Ultimately he's not going to make his real world exciting if he doesn't spend time on it.
What I keep doing is adding random subplots to see if they lead anywhere and it changes too much each time.
First it was a love interest that changes him. Then it was his job being so annoying. I've added an element where he finally tries being on his own, and he becomes a drunk. Then I've added a new friend in my latest draft.

So I have half a movie in my head really. I just don't know how to bring it all together at the moment. It's so frustrating trying to fill in the gaps when you see the key points in your head and just want it to work itself out.

Tomorrow will be spent trying to lighten the story up to be comedic and figure out the middle.

Back from Belgium

After an AMAZING trip to Belgium I'm back and starting to do work for my final year. My whole idea for my final year is to write a feature film script and then strip it down to a fifteen minute movie. Then that way I have a short film to submit to festivals and a spec script to go with it if people enjoy the film. That way I've made a spec script which could get picked up for a feature and I'd be prepared. Now the hard time, writing the feature. I've started to read the Guerilla Guide to Film Making and it's given me great advice on how to write my script. I used to just write tons of dialgoue and see where it ended up. Obviously that didn't help me tell a story but a jumble of scenes put together. The most useful thing to do is keep writing more pages of the same story, adding more details. From a one page synopsis, to two pages, to four, then ten, then a twenty page treatment. That's where I'm at for the moment, about five pages in.