18

The Writing of the Script

Here we arrive at the chapter that might have stood at the beginning of this book. Because everything that precedes it is really part and parcel of the writing of the script.

There is no short cut to this final objective, just as there is no system to beat roulette. In order to know how to write a script, the reader must first acquire a knowledge of the craft.

It would have been useless at the beginning to explain that the screenplay contains dialogue and descriptions of the things to be filmed. It would have been premature to divulge merely technical facts, for instance, that the shooting script has an average length of 120–150 pages in which the shots are numbered consecutively. Although this knowledge is necessary, it would not have sufficed; for the reader would not have known what to write in those 1-20-150 pages, nor how to subdivide the scene into set-ups, nor what to say in dialogue and what objects to describe in the visual representation. Any book about motion picture writing that is limited to the explanation of technical facts will fail in all vital respects.

Motion picture writing is not only a creative art, but also a craft. Whether we like it or not, this is a fact to which we must reconcile ourselves. It means that nobody — no matter how great his talent or even genius — can get along without having intuitive or conscious knowledge of structural elements; it means also that somebody with little talent but adequate knowledge may turn out satisfactory scripts — particularly if they are adaptations of novels or plays. The outstanding talent will be resentful of this fact, whereas the less gifted writer will be grateful for a medium which permits him to achieve success as an artisan without the need of being an artist. Hollywood was often suspicious of the great artists without knowledge; it prefers the artisans with knowledge.

Art cannot be taught, but technique is less abstract and can be conveyed by one person to another. No amount of teaching will make Mr. X a second Leonardo da Vinci, but even Leonardo da Vinci had to learn throughout his life. And the later plays of Shakespeare were more expertly crafted than his earlier ones. The creative power of the mind has never been fully analyzed. It has never been proven with certainty which qualities cause the imaginative power. Creative imagination cannot be taught, nor can it be learned. But knowledge and technique can be acquired by the creator. And even the greatest work of art of an inspired genius consists of creative ideas which are brought into form by his experience or knowledge or technique.

Thus there is a difference between “having ideas” and “writing the script.” No sure method exists to coax ideas from a reluctant brain. And yet most professional writers have their own idiosyncrasies to break the dams of inspiration, whether candlelight, or a favorite tobacco, or a particular desk. Yet all these peculiarities go to show that inspiration can be trained to come forth by certain customary adjuncts or at definite hours. The writer who waits for inspiration to strike him like a thunderbolt, at any time of night or day, will soon fail to experience the divine spark. But the creator who goes to his desk at the same hour, patiently offering himself up to the sublime visitation, will gradually do his most inspired work during those fixed periods. Whether he works best in the morning or after midnight does not matter; it is the regularity that invites the spontaneous. Indeed, most productive writers have done a daily amount of work. Beyond that, there is no rule which would bring equally good results for all writers.

Inspiration is not altogether the flash of lightning out of a clear blue sky that it is often assumed to be. Intense concentration on a problem may lead to its continuation by the unconscious. After having been processed beneath our conscious thoughts, the solution may surface “spontaneously.” In this sense our mind is like a computer into which we have fed certain questions. Personally, I have found it beneficial to concentrate on a problem before going to sleep. The next morning, what had seemed insoluble before is suddenly clear. There is wisdom in the saying that one should “sleep on it” before making a decision.

Maurice Maeterlinck, a man whose creations earned him a Nobel Prize once told me: “To have ideas is paradise — to work them out is hell.”

Nobody can conceive the script directly in its ultimate form. It must be gradually developed since one cannot overlook the entire body in the beginning. Novelists like Balzac or Zola can extend their material through many volumes. But dramatic writing must be very precise. We cannot afford to proceed accidentally, since the developments must be focused to achieve a compact intensity.

Instead of writing haphazardly, we must adhere to the method in which we develop the story. Instead of beginning with the final screenplay, we must proceed from a rough structure through various stages to the ultimate form. This is painstaking work, unwelcome to the impatient creative mind. But the great sculptors had to work months and months before anything like a human figure would take shape in the stone.

Practically speaking, there are three principal stages of development: the outline, the treatment, and the screenplay (or shooting script).

First, we must realize the advantages of the gradual development. From stage to stage, unsafe elements can be eliminated or corrected. Additional material can be added. The leaps from stage to stage are smaller; consequently, they make smaller demands on the imaginative power. By slowing up the process of fixation, we are sure to obtain a smoother and more natural narration. If we do not have to jump to distant conclusions, we can find safe conclusions. In building the script gradually, we may find details which might otherwise escape our attention. We must be sure that no mistake has slipped by. As a matter of fact, it may be advisable to go backward and write a synopsis of an already finished screenplay because the more elaborate form may contain seductive attractions which might be exposed as illusions if the narration were reduced to its essentials.

Since the slow development contains so many advantages, we cannot go wrong if we subdivide the transition into additional stepping stones. We may begin with an outline of about 6 pages which we can develop into a treatment of about 30 pages. Thereafter we can proceed to a continuity of about 60–100 pages from which we derive the screenplay with a length of about 120–150 pages. This screenplay is to be elaborated to the finished shooting script.

It might be expected that an impulsive writer would be disgusted with such calculated methods of construction and creation. He might feel that it is preferable to write spontaneously instead of making abstract detours. He might feel that a scene which flows immediately from his pen or typewriter is more realistic and more true to life than one which has been turned back and forth by his creative and by his critical thoughts. He might feel that the intuitive impression is preferable to the structural effect.

It is possible to write a short story in one fortunate streak of creative power. But no literary work of any extent can be executed without considerable work on the structural elements previous to the actual writing. The author who begins to write the script by conceiving fresh and vivid dialogue may find to his surprise that the scene which was very realistic, sounds distorted, false, and unbelievable in the entirety of the picture.

Great artists are not those who think that they have sufficient talent to proceed without knowledge, but those who have so completely mastered craft that they do not seem to have to grapple with this problem. Great writers have a conscious or unconscious knowledge of structural requirements.

Only through correct placement does the single scene become truthful, logical, and realistic. Blood can never circulate in a mutilated body. And there is even more to the perfect dramatic construction than just the fact that it is correct and contains no mistakes. It is as if music originated from the symphonic combination of all parts. It is as if the story came to life.

The Outline

Before the writer starts to develop a story, he must know what it is about. Offhand, so obvious a statement appears to be superfluous. And yet, just try to remember how often you left a movie house without really knowing what the story was all about.

It is of the utmost importance, therefore, that you should question all the aspects and ramifications of your material. Sometimes the initial exploration can make you aware that this is not what you actually meant to tell. You have time for correction: a basic shift in emphasis may set matters straight and give you the desired results.

The outline states the salient facts of the forthcoming screenplay. It need not yet contain all the facts; but those that are given should suffice to describe a full and complete story, without holes or creaky developments. Some of the missing elements may be inserted later, provided their absence raises no crucial questions; other facts may be altered in the subsequent development. But the importance of the primary layout cannot be overestimated. It is as if you were a builder selecting a lot and surveying its size, shape, grading. The ground you stand on will decisively predestine the building you have in mind.

The Adaptation

The material you set out to adapt may be before you in different forms. Whether it is a conglomeration of your own ideas, memories, and inventions, or whether it is a novel or a stage play that you wish to transform — the approach in all these cases is alike: you must first reduce the existing material to a simple and clear line.

If you are adapting an original story of your own, you may have had the idea in mind for some time. During the period of gestation, related but fragmented scenes or events clustered around the kernel. Once you have started to work them out, you may begin by giving your imagination free rein. At the same time, you may jot down realistic notes about the locale of your story, about the job or profession of your characters, their hobbies and tastes, their neighbors. Though you may not be able to use more than a fraction of such information, it may be most helpful in creating real people and events, instead of cardboard characters and contrived plots.

From this wealth of material, the basic outline has to be selected. The skeleton has to be recognized before the script is fleshed out for the big screen or television.

Similarly, any completed book or drama must first be condensed to its basic facts and then redeveloped. There is no easier or more direct way of adapting a novel or a play to motion pictures than to reduce it to those elements from which the novelist or dramatist started to develop the story into a novel or into a play respectively. It is not feasible simply to cut or rearrange the material, nor is it possible to photograph entire scenes from the novel or from the play. Since the physical characteristics of the different forms have different requirements, the very same scene may be inexpressive if it is not properly integrated into another form. The smooth continuity may be completely disrupted by false transformation, one which does not go back to the facts of the material.

In the early days of motion pictures the transformations of novels or plays produced the most horrid violations of the author’s work. These brutal distortions caused a reaction of disgust on the part of the audience. Today, the transformation seems to have swung to the other extreme: producers are ambitious to be as loyal to the original work as possible. But this is not always beneficial to the picture or to the author. Many an author would be better off if his work were changed considerably; as long as the meaning and the essence of his story are reproduced, it is in his interest that such liberties be taken with his work as will result in the best possible transformation to the screen. In the introduction to Sidney Howard’s Dodsworth, Sinclair Lewis said: “Actually, portions and sometimes all of a dramatization are valuable precisely as they depart from the detail of the original fiction.”

Extreme, stubborn loyalty to the original material may be harmful; the writer who proceeds to copy diligently entire blocks of the material into the new form may find that, regardless of his fidelity, the adaptation gains an entirely new spirit and fails to do justice to the original. In other instances, an adaptation which represents a less literal transformation is much more faithful to the original.

When I adapted The Bridge of San Luis Rey (1944) to the screen, Thornton Wilder kept urging me to depart from the text of his Pulitzer Prize novel. Since the motion picture had its own form, he said, I would do him no service by adhering too faithfully to scenes conceived to be read rather than spoken. And in a letter to John Ford he wrote, “It is your own work which to a large extent has shown me the degree to which a motion picture has its own way of telling a story and brought me to see the extent that a picture may, and must, take extensive liberties with the text of a novel or a play.”

It might be best to understand the process of transformation by this example which the director Lewis Milestone told me: “If you want to produce a rose, you will not take the flower and put it into the earth. This will not result in another rose. Instead you will take the seed and stick it into the soil. From it will grow another rose.” Similarly, you cannot transplant entire scenes from a play or from a novel to the picture; they will fade. It is better to speak of transformation than of adaptation, because adaptation sounds more like shortening, cutting, and rearranging. But transformation means to extract the content from one form and pour it into another.

Adapting a great and enduring masterpiece for modem audiences often requires deft compromises. Dated conventions and stilted expressions may unnecessarily mar the vital impact of the content. Writer-director Anthony Minghella aptly described his technique for adapting Michael Ondajtee’s novel The English Patient for the screen (1996) as putting the camera on a (magic) flying carpet.

The Treatment

The treatment tells the full story, but not yet in fully crystallized scenes. Just as the motion picture occupies an intermediate area between the novel and the stage play, the treatment may be considered a narrative description of the future script.

There is no prescribed length for the treatment. It may be as short as 30 pages or extend over 200 pages. Jean Paul Sartre once wrote a film treatment of 800 pages. As far as I know, nobody ever reduced it to a practical screenplay length.

The treatment is an elaboration of the outline. It may contain rudimentary scenes or full dialogue. Often, inconsistencies or unforeseen difficulties become apparent in this further development. Many producers prefer to see a treatment rather than let the writer go directly into screenplay. Since the material is still in a more or less fluid state, it is an opportune moment for correction. All further progress does not so much concern the basic development of the content as its presentation and expression in motion picture terms.

We may have started out from an outline which did not contain all the facts of the story. Since the treatment demands the full information, additional facts have to be added in order to tell the complete story. The creative process is a continuous series of choices; the average executive does not reach as many decisions in the course of a busy day as the dreamy artist.

But gradually the areas of the creator’s free will decrease. As soon as a limited number of facts is established, others are automatically created; they exist although the writer may not have paid any attention to them; sometimes they are even unwelcome to him. He may be concerned only with certain facets of his main characterizations while being inclined to overlook others. But these others will contribute to the play of forces as the story develops. Sometimes, the writer is only interested in the relation between two people, but if other relations exist between one of them and others, these other persons automatically come into a relation with the second person of the first combination.

Fortunetellers have made this calculation one of their essential means of predicting the future. Without resorting to supernatural aides, without looking into crystal balls, without evoking spirits from the other world, they can predict with reasonable certainty some of the developments that will arise from a few known premises. Certain characters in certain circumstances will act and interreact in a certain manner. A married couple who at the beginning combine affinity and repulsion will progress through various stages until they divorce or until they have become adapted to each other; both cases amount to adjustment. We all know old marriage partners who have become so similar to each other that they are almost alike. On the other hand, 90 per cent of all divorce suits might have been predicted at the marriage ceremony by a person who knew sufficient facts to realize that affinity was inferior to repulsion.

Similarly, the writer in the beginning of his work should practice some fortunetelling with regard to his story. For he must be aware that from a certain point on, it is not he who tells the story, but the story which tells itself. After he has established a number of facts, these facts will exert their power, and all that remains to the writer is to listen to these demands and carefully feel along the path which the story demands. If he starts out from certain premises and would like to get to an end which is incompatible with these premises, he will find that his story has just as much energy and willpower as he himself possesses. In the process of working, he will be more and more sidetracked and led away from his original goal to the goal which his story tells.

He will be surprised time after time when he arrives at results and situations which were neither planned nor desired by him. No matter how much work he wastes afterwards, he will not be able to bend the story to his desires.

This occurrence is very frequent. The outline, because of its vagueness, may tell a story which seems plausible. But as the writer develops the story with more and more details, he finds that the outline was full of impossible developments and that other developments have to take their place if the story is to be probable. He arrives at what the story wanted to tell and not at what he wanted to tell. Very often the screenplay is so different that it must be abandoned because it does not correspond to the original idea. In other instances it may be only one characterization which had seemed perfectly interesting and which then turns out to be ridiculous. It is not the writer’s development which is wrong, since he may have followed the lines prescribed by the story with great diligence; it is the fault of the facts which were badly chosen in the beginning. All further patchwork and building-up will not help. Sometimes it only serves to make the characterizations most absurd, like the police sergeant who was intended as a sympathetic hero but ended up as a ridiculous idiot. It is often attempted to smooth out these adverse results, but no amount of pretty speeches and no amount of nice gestures can help. Sometimes it is desirable to make one character unsympathetic and another one sympathetic. But the facts of the story may be such that our sympathy falls with the wrong person, while we have nothing but contempt for the one who is supposed to be sympathetic. It happens frequently in pictures where the story demands that the hero gets the girl in the end although he has played a most inane part throughout the picture. Towards the end the writers begin to ask themselves, How can he be made a hero despite the fact that he had made a fool of himself all along?

This, however, must not be confused with a definite change of a person from good to bad, or vice versa. Such a change is a fact of the story and not a violation of the story which tells itself. Nor should the conception of the story which tells itself be confused with the story which “telegraphs its ending.” In the first case, the story tells itself to the author, whereas in the second case the story tells itself to the audience. Of course, if the audience could know all the facts the author knows, they would have the same knowledge about later developments as he must have. But the knowledge of all the facts is only gradually exposed to the audience, while the author knows them before he starts to tell the story. In a good story, the audience is unable to predict the outcome, not because the story is unpredictable, but because the spectator lacks the knowledge of all the details making such a prediction possible.

In order to choose the right facts, we must recognize the nature and quality of those which are accepted. For this it is necessary to observe them without any illusions as to their outward appearance. The inexperienced writer may become enthusiastic over an idea, only to discover after a long period of work that this idea has no possibilities of development. The unsuspecting writer may be charmed by the quality of a scene, by the excellence of a characterization, by the loveliness of a feeling, by the originality of a twist. He will make his story a series of such wonderful material, and then he is greatly surprised if the whole thing put together doesn’t work.

As his experience grows, he will begin to look at the facts with more detachment. He will dismantle them of their outward appearance, considering only their inner qualities, for he knows that the specific form in which they appear — no matter how tempting and brilliant it is — has only a momentary effect, which vanishes in the progress of the structure. There, whether desirable or undesirable, only the true nature and the essential qualities of the facts come into play.

We should endeavor to consider the material from the abstract point of view of the dramatic structure. Instead of the beauties of a love affair, we should think of it as an intention which is or is not prevented. Instead of considering the excitement of an automobile accident, we should try to find out its appearance as a dramatic cause or goal or motive. Instead of enjoying a humorous situation, we should ask whether it is connected with a progression, for jokes alone do not make good pictures. Only after we have seen through the flesh to the bones of the dramatic body are we able to recognize whether the story can live, or if it must break down.

It is not easy to X-ray the material in this manner, but it is absolutely necessary. For the material does not betray its merits and mistakes except through the abstract consideration of the elements reduced to the structural necessities. It may be almost impossible to understand what is wrong with a certain part of the story if you do not look at it from the abstract point of view. In doing this, the understanding becomes very simple: the variety of developments can be understood as motives, intentions, goals, difficulties. The impenetrable maze of happenings becomes transparent in terms of lines. And these lines betray their qualities almost graphically. We can see whether there is a main intention and where it starts and where it ends. We can see when the difficulty in the way of the main intention arises and where it ends. We can see where the climax takes place, where the goal is reached; we can see whether the counterintention is pointed to the same goal or not, we can see whether the subintentions have unity of purpose or whether they are separate main intentions, we can see whether the motivation is dependent upon the motive, whether the graduation is faulty, and whether an auxiliary goal reaches beyond the main goal.

By this simple process, the virtues and faults of the material appear very clearly. At this point it is not too late to remedy the flaws. By questioning every aspect of the material, the writer will be prepared to answer the questions which the producer or director is likely to ask later.

The writer can also perceive in the treatment where the elements are diffuse. Older moviegoers will remember the days when the operator in the projection booth would fuss with the lenses of the projector in order to focus the picture on the screen. The audience would boo and yell until the objects became clear. It would be unthinkable to force people to watch an entire picture, the faces and objects of which are diffuse. But they are often forced to watch pictures with a diffuse story and with a dramatic construction which is out of focus.

The focusing of the story material is comparatively easy. Sometimes it is sufficient to change some of the characteristics of a person in order to create powerful affinity or repulsion. Sometimes it is sufficient to prevent characterizations from clashing which have no adequate reason for conflict. It is easy to recognize that people with affinity who are united cannot possibly struggle. They can easily be separated. Then the intentions should be carefully investigated. In the South, people say, “I aim to go home.” Or “I aim to buy a gun.” This “aiming” is nothing but an intention. The interesting part is that the dialect—which everywhere has the best feeling for essential language — expresses the fact that an intention “aims” at a goal. Now this aim may be diffuse; it may not hit the bull’s-eye.

The diffusion of the material makes the story sluggish or ineffectual. It is impossible for any powerful situations to arise from such a story. Through the process of focusing we “aim” the intentions at the right goal. It is interesting to notice with how little effort most stories could be improved considerably by this simple process.

In this way the material becomes precise and powerful. So the last thing to be considered is the distribution, for it may be that long portions do not advance the story while others may be overcrowded. In order to achieve perfect distribution, we must first contemplate the beginning of the main intention and the beginning of the difficulty, the location of the climax, and the location of the main goal with respect to the end of the story. After we are satisfied that they are distributed effectively, we can consider the distribution of the auxiliary goals. They let us clearly foresee which parts of the story are going to be dull and slow and which parts will be confusing and overcrowded. If the distribution appears to be uneven, we still have time for correction.

The novel is essentially a narrative which the author can condense into scenes at will. The screenwriter, starting with the descriptive outline, gradually crystallizes the material into the scenes required by the motion picture language.

If we visualize the story as a line, the scenes appear as blocks or rectangles separated by intervals. What is contained in these scenes must be expressive enough to convey what took place during the mute intervals. The scenes can be compared to cornerstones holding up the story, backward and forward. Or a writer enamored of his work might think of his scenes as “pearls” and imply the string that holds them together.

The novelist can fill the gaps between scenes by descriptive or explanatory sentences. The more ingenuity the screenwriter applies in implying gradual developments, the more compelling and rapid becomes his sequence of scenes. For that reason, he will rarely open the picture with the “beginning” of the story. Instead, he will start at a crucial point and gradually inform the spectator as to what preceded it. For instance, he is not duty-bound to dramatize how two partners became enemies. He can begin by showing one partner setting out to punish the other one for treacherous embezzlement. Or a former relationship can be projected in the first minute, when an escaped convict arrives to confront a pal who has turned stool-pigeon.

A persistent difficulty arises frequently when boy meets girl. As thrilling as falling in love may be for the involved couple, it is a tedious process for the innocent bystander. Nevertheless, it taxes our credulity when the writer introduces boy to girl, and in the next scene we are asked to believe that they fell in love forthwith. One of the solutions practiced by experienced writers is to imply a prior acquaintance or even a prolonged relationship which is picked up at the point where it becomes intensified or disturbed.

Obviously, this makes the story interesting right from the start. But throughout the picture a good writer will strive to dramatize only the highlights of implied developments, whereas the pedestrian scripter is liable to spell out tedious progressions and then be forced to skip climactic happenings, because he does not have enough time left for their dramatization.

The Screenplay

The screenplay completes the task of expression in terms of scenes.

If the story has been developed carefully up to this point, the writing of the screenplay is no radical departure from the previous stages, but merely a final crystallization of the material.

The last elimination of narrative passages may require further changes of the story. Since the literary technique can no longer be relied upon, we must be sure that all information necessary to the understanding of the story is contained in scenes. We must so employ the means of expression at the disposal of the motion picture as to convey all the facts of the story to the audience.

To achieve this purpose, we must make use of dialogue, noise, action, sets, props, objects, music. We must ask, Is everything clear to the audience? Thereafter we must investigate whether we have repeated ourselves. If so, the superfluous information must be eliminated. The space which is available to the motion picture is desperately short. Utmost economy is essential; this economy has the added advantage of creating more powerful situations. If two scenes are used to express two developments, we should ask if both these developments could be expressed in one scene that is more revealing. We have seen that many elements reveal information about one another; therefore we shall have to decide which one can be exposed most advantageously. In almost every instance, we can ask, Should we expose the motive or the intention or the goal? How shall we handle the division of knowledge between actors and audience? At what moment is a certain bit of information most effective? Shall we arouse curiosity or suspense? Shall we make use of a misunderstanding? Shall we cause contrasting anticipations, expectancy or surprise, fear or hope, disappointment or relief? To explore all the possible variations of constructing a story is indeed an interesting and intriguing task.

Furthermore, the sequence of scenes should be examined with regard to variation, change, or contrast. If the author wants to give his audience comedy or tragedy or excitement, he soon realizes that he will attain his end better by an occasional interruption of the mood rather than through a steady following of the same trend. Not only is this necessary because contrast highlights the extremes, but also because the psychology of the audience demands this variation. If a tragic story contains no moments of comic relief, the spectators may laugh unexpectedly during serious scenes just to find release from their aroused emotions. On the other hand, the truly great comedians insert touching and earnest moments into their stories, because the continuous connection of one joke to another may soon destroy a funny mood.

From the point of view of the story mechanics, it is desirable that the meetings of the main characters, who are likely to be united in many scenes, should be more or less evenly distributed. They should not be combined in many consecutive scenes and then sink into oblivion for a long time. Moreover, if at all possible, every main character should have at least one scene with every other main character so as to bring out their respective characteristics to the fullest extent.

Since the scenes are separated by lapses of time, connection of scenes is a particular problem of the screenplay. We have seen that the intentions carry the main burden of connection insofar as they arouse our anticipation and cause the forward movement. In many instances, however, we may want to add connecting elements. For instance, somebody wants to deliver a briefcase. Obviously, the delivery is an intention, but, in addition, by its simple appearance in many scenes, such an object can effectively act as connection. Or we may end a scene with a specific object and begin the new scene with the same object. We may even end with a close-up of an actor’s face and begin with the same close-up in another place. However, we must take care that the transition from one shot to the other is held together by an intention.

Not all scenes need equally strong connection. We may collect blocks of scenes which are especially strongly connected. Between the blocks of scenes we may need less direct connection; we can compare these to the chapters of a novel. However, this is only a comparison and not a parallel, since the form of a novel is different. And for the same reason we cannot see why a motion picture story should be divided into multiple acts like the full-length stage play, although this conception persists among many screenwriters. The division into acts is a characteristic of the theatre determined by its physical form, whereas the motion picture, which does not have this characteristic, requires no such division.

The Shooting Script

The shooting script contains all the technical descriptions necessary for the director, the editor, the cameraman, the art director, the production manager, and the musical director. Although it is likely that the director has collaborated on previous stages of development, the shooting script is predominantly his responsibility.

The director will indicate the kind of shots which will render justice to the means of expression or to the combination of means capable of revealing information at a certain time. He will also indicate where the set-up is to be changed. These set-ups are numbered consecutively. After giving the kind of set-up, the director mentions what is to be seen in the field of the camera. These indications must be clear enough to inform the art director of the kind of set needed, the prop man of the props required, the assistant director of actors and extras needed, the cameraman of the camera angle and also of the lighting, the musical director of incidental music, and the sound engineer of the need for mixing or dubbing which should be known before the recording. The editor works from the shooting script in assembling the different shots into one consecutive picture.

At this stage the pressures of impending production make themselves felt. To estimate the running time of the finished picture, the script is often given to an expert who is familiar with the director’s pace. It may be found that the script is substantially too long. So the writer, with bleeding heart, has to cut scenes and effects which by themselves are good and valuable; it is better, though, to do it at this stage than to find them subsequently on the cutting room floor.

Not infrequently it is felt during rehearsals that a scene does not play as well as it looked on paper; then the writer may be asked to rework it. And just when he thinks that he has at last a perfect shooting script, unexpected overruns in the budget may require a belt- and script-tightening. The sickness of an actor or a stretch of bad weather can enforce rewrites beyond anyone’s wish or control. To the last shooting day, the words on the paper remain more eradicable than the images and sounds on the celluloid.

Nor is the final wrap-up the end of the changes to which the script is subjected. During post-production there may be cuts, or additional lines may be dubbed in; sometimes a scene is transposed. And finally there comes the evening of the first preview, sometimes a rather traumatic experience.

The audience sees the picture for the first time. Their reactions are often very unexpected. They may laugh in the wrong places or, in a comedy, anticipate a laugh too soon. They may get restive or bored in what had appeared to be a taut sequence. Finally, the preview cards filled out by the spectators on leaving often reveal additional reactions.

Thereupon the stage of experimentation begins: a scene is cut here, a long sequence shortened there. But there is no end to the bewilderment: a long scene is not long because of its running time, or because nothing is said, or because nothing happens, but because of some structural deficiencies. There may be other long scenes where nothing happens, yet they may be intensely dramatic, as for instance: the silence of a person who has just received some traumatic news. Sometimes retakes become necessary; or cutting may improve faults. But at so late a stage, there is no essential remedy or way of correction. Therefore it is all the more important to subject the screenplay to a thorough examination before it goes into production.

Analysis

Whereas creation is a process of building up, analysis means the dissection of more or less finished material.

Comparatively few people believe themselves capable of creating a story; but nearly everyone assumes the ability to criticize. Unlike criticism, analysis is not a reaction based on personal taste. As the reverse of the creative process, it requires an equal understanding of the dramatic elements.

The first step in the analysis of a screenplay is to recognize the individual factors in the material. While criticism judges the film as a whole, analysis peels out the single elements, evaluates them, and thereby enables us to render a diagnosis which is the sum of our judgment of all the parts.

Analysis is used for many different purposes. One of them is to guide our choice of material as discussed before. Another one is to find mistakes for purposes of correction. This analysis for correction takes place at practically every stage in the development of the script.

To avoid confusion, we must realize that the symptom is not identical with the disease. A doctor who wants to cure a patient will not try to stop his fever, but will rather endeavor to eliminate the cause of the fever. Even though someone feels pain in his eye, the pain may not be caused by the eye but by a tooth. A good tailor may not alter a coat where it appears to be faulty, but he will lift the shoulders and thereby automatically eliminate the fault in the waist. Likewise, it is seldom possible to correct the mistake in a motion picture script at the place where it becomes apparent. This may merely be the symptom, not the cause. The actual deficiency will frequently be found in a different place. Let us remember the chapter concerning selection of information, where it was shown that the very same scene may achieve an entirely different meaning by changing previous information relative to the scene. Therefore correction may be necessary, not in the scene which seems unsatisfactory, but in previous scenes. Almost all pictures which grow dull or boring toward the end can be corrected, not by changing the second half, but by improving the first.

It is generally assumed that analysis of the script is only practiced by story editors, producers, executives, rewriters or script-doctors. In fact, many people are inclined to distinguish between analytical minds and persons with creative power. Many artists despise analytical or critical people. But this is unjust, since the artist needs a certain amount of analytical perception. The truly great artists are not a prey to uncontrolled and unbridled creative talent. More often than not, their greatness is a result of both qualities.

In order to develop a story, we must interrupt the progress of creation at various stages and pause to analyze the existing material, not only to discover its faults, but also to find the future steps to which the story will force us. We might call this analysis for development. And this is in no way destructive criticism, but something which is most creative. It is as if the creator paused to see in which direction the story is progressing. It is as if the creator were listening to a story which tells itself.

This analysis can be compared to the perspective sketching of an artist. In order to check the exactitude of his perspective, he can extend the lines of the bodies to the horizon where they have to meet in two fixed points. In the same way the writer should attempt to extend the lines of his story to the end. This will help him to perceive where the story leads.

Once you possess sufficient knowledge, the process of analysis is actually very simple. You merely have to ask questions. And the story gives the answers to these questions. Thereby the almost hopeless task of evaluating an impenetrable entanglement of story elements is reduced to finding a number of simple answers to simple questions. Once the writer knows the nature of his material, he can develop those elements which are important while suppressing those which are less substantial. In this way the story takes on a clear and shapely form and through simplification facilitates understanding for the writer as well as for his prospective listeners. It may show up the falseness of a situation which otherwise might not become apparent until the author starts writing the dialogue, which may sound silly — simply because the situation is impossible.

Our knowledge of the dramatic laws teaches us what questions to ask. Where does the main-intention begin? Is the motive equal to the strength of the main-intention? Does the content of the story satisfy a latent hunger of the audience? How are the auxiliary goals distributed? How much information does the spectator need to understand a certain development?

Instead of giving a complete list of questions to be asked, it is preferable to give a list of the most common mistakes from which the questions necessary for analysis can easily be derived. In looking over this list of possible mistakes we recognize how difficult it is to make a perfect motion picture and how often everybody is bound to fail, at least in some respects. Whoever is without fault, shall throw the first stone.

Mistakes in Regard to Content of the Story:

1. Lack of recognizable content.

2. No relation to the audience’s interests at a certain time.

3. Cost in no proportion to appeal.

Mistakes in Regard to Identification:

Mistakes in Regard to Probability:

Mistakes in Regard to Understandability:

Mistakes in Regard to Forward Movement:

Mistakes in Regard to Suspense:

Mistakes in Regard to Anticipation:

Mistakes in Regard to Main-intention and Sub-intention:

Mistakes in Regard to Disturbance and Adjustment:

Mistakes in Regard to Characterization:

Mistakes in Regard to the Selection of Information:

Mistakes in Regard to Division of Knowledge:

Mistakes in Regard to Place and Time:

Mistakes in Regard to Enlargement and Composition:

Mistakes in Regard to the Means of Expression:

Mistakes in Regard to Space: