Sleep Vacation?

I’m way behind on this script due to all kinds of things: Some quick page one rewrites on a couple of scripts going out, a rewrite on an assignment, some work that had to be done on another project, a couple of articles for Script magazine, general laziness, a two week period where I got an invite to a screening almost every night - and I went to sit-com tapings on the other nights, a bunch of crazy errands, and a complete lack of sleep. If you read the blog, you know that I’ve always had sleep problems - I’m often up late, or doing something, and add to that I’m a light sleeper. Paul Schrader made a film called LIGHT SLEEPER with Willem Defoe - I’ll watch anything that Paul Schrader makes, even though a large percentage of his films don’t work at all. He has tone problems. But he’s always interesting, and since I’ve always had sleep problems and always been a light sleeper I went to see Schrader’s film. Maybe even at a late late show.




The thing about being a light sleeper is that some noise will wake me up in the middle of the night - and I have no idea what that noise is. The noise happened while I was asleep. Might have been a police helicopter chasing a suspect on the 101, might have been a sonic boom, might have been someone in my building dropping something heavy... like the safe they stole from the jewelry shop which lead to that police chase on the 101. I have new neighbors on my left side, and they had a couple of late parties that didn’t bother me as much as their early morning leaving-for-work door slamming loud conversations. A pair of young guys probably trying to break into show biz, but I think they work as salesmen or something - they wear ties. After the door slamming, they have a conversation (loud) as they walk down the hall... past my apartment. I can hear them through the damned walls! But it’s not just them, it’s all kinds of things that wake me up... and sometimes it’s just me. I have this bad habit of staying up later and later - there are some movies I’m watching for a project and I maybe I can squeeze in one movie before I fall asleep? (“The plot is wafer thin!”) Then, when I wake up after not enough sleep, I realize I have this damned script to write, so I shower and shave and grab the laptop and get to work.... and kind of drag myself through the day without getting much done because I’m exhausted.

So I decided to take two days, get out of town, just me and the laptop and that script. No distractions. No DVD player and no DVDs. Nothing except the script. Get two days worth of momentum going and then just keep going until I’m finished. Force myself to focus by removing distractions. I book a hotel, I book a flight, I pack only the script material and nothing else. (Okay, clothes.)

Working vacation.

Funny - I don’t have any other kind. I take my work with me wherever I go, and even though I plan every year to *always* take Sundays off, last Sunday I was trying to get some pages written on this script... and that was Easter! I end up working 7 days a week... except I’m often so tired that it’s hard to call it work. Over the Christmas holidays? I wrote a script in a couple of weeks, plus did all of the normal holiday stuff.

So going out of town to get some work done is really nothing new. I hop my flight, take a taxi to the hotel and check in, grab dinner. I find a good rib joint and get barbeque sauce over most of my body as I eat a huge plate of ribs, a baked potato with the works (including actual bacon - and kind of Canadian bacon at that, not much fat), some corn, some slaw, some corn bread... and a couple of beers. By the time the cute waitress came back to ask if I wanted desert I was almost asleep on my plate. No desert tonight - tomorrow I’m a typing demon! I have done some outline work on the plane and I am prepared to write a stack of electronic pages! I head back to the hotel, wash my hands and face (those moist towels they give you just make you presentable to the public)... but it was too early to go to sleep. I’m on a two day *vacation*, right? So I walk back to a jazz joint I’d passed on the way to the rib joint and went in and listen to four guys play music... and have a couple more beers. When I was almost asleep, I walk back to the hotel... and read a book for a while. When I thought it was late enough to go to sleep, I get into bed with the TV on and eventually fall asleep...

Woke up the next morning, still tired - but I have a script to write! Instead of going back to sleep (which my body is begging for) I shower and shave and grab the laptop and head to a cool little indie coffee shop on some side street that I found while looking for a Starbucks. Tried to write, but was just tired. Exhausted. I basically dragged myself through the day, switched coffee shops halfway through the day - but the walk between didn’t get my blood flowing as much as it made me just want to lay down and go to sleep on the sidewalk. I actually get a page or two done, but the plan was 7.5-10 pages, and 5 pages is my normal quota... that I haven’t made on a new script since Christmas (when I was doing 7.5 on most days). I *need* to get pages done. I *need* to get some momentum going on this script so I can get to FADE OUT.

My dinner that night was a big salad, steak, garlic bread, another baked potato (no bacon), and a slice of chocolate cake. I think the last time I had cake was my birthday... but the picture in the desert menu looked delicious and the cake itself delivered on the photo. As I ate the cake, my eyes wanted to close - but I fought it. I will enjoy eating this cake, dammit! It’s *early* - children aren’t even in bed at this hour! Went back to the hotel... and was going to grab my laptop and go back out and work... but I was too tired. I thought about *forcing myself* to work, but that’s what I always do... and maybe that’s not the answer. I mean, when I’m exhausted like this forcing myself to work just means sitting and staring at the laptop screen with Movie Magic open. Not much actual work getting done. So I thought I might take a nap and then go out later and grab a beer somewhere and drag along the laptop...

12 hours later I woke up.

Maybe I needed to sleep? The thing is, I was still tired. Not groggy from oversleeping, I was tired enough to go back to sleep for a while. But, check out time was approaching. I considered staying an extra day, but I suspect changing my flight would cost me a fortune - so I packed and left - a couple of hours before my flight to sit in that indie coffee shop and do some work before grabbing a taxi to the airport. Even though I felt like I needed more sleep, I also felt much much better than the previous day. I *needed* that sleep. I actually got some pages done - though not as many as I wanted - and felt pretty good by the time I needed to get to the airport and have the TSA touch my junk.

But all of this made me wonder if I should use some of those air miles from my various journeys to take a monthly sleep vacation. Go somewhere - no computer, no notebooks, no work to do... maybe just my Kindle - check into a hotel, spend 2 days reading and sleeping, then head home. And if I feel like sleeping 12 hours plus? Just do it. Yes, I can sleep at home... if I had any willpower to ignore all of those distractions. And funny how sleeping in that hotel room allowed my brain to not worry that maybe that sound was the phone or someone buzzing at the front door or something that I needed to wake up for. Even though I’m a light sleeper, I managed to sleep through whatever noise there was in the hotel. Maybe my subconscious knows that whatever happens in the hotel isn’t really my problem. There’s a Do Not Disturb thing stuck in the mag-key slot, so there’s little chance that knocking is on *my* door (though once in a hotel someone knocked on my door in the middle of the night and it was a hot woman in a slinky dress who wanted to know if I was Mr. Walpurgus... I reluctantly told her it was the wrong room... probably couldn’t have afforded her, anyway... I always wonder if “Walpurgus” had already paid for her with a credit card, so maybe I could have pretended and gotten away with it? I mean, after it’s over she can’t exactly take it back, right?) - but the phone in a hotel room isn’t going to ring unless it’s some emergency and I’ve slept through check out or something. My brain knows it’s safe to click from Light Sleep Mode to Light Coma Mode. At home, some part of my brain worries that the phone *might* ring while I’m asleep.

Hmmm, maybe I should actually force myself to take Sundays off? Actually do the long bike ride to no fixed destination I always have planned? Even though I’m behind on this script - and just about everything else I need to do - maybe a day off every week will make all of the other days more productive?

And I’m also considering taking a sleep vacation... right after I finish this damned script!

PS: In an example of being both lazy and driven - this blog entry is about 7 pages of writing that *could* have been on that script I need to get finished!

- Bill
IMPORTANT UPDATE:
TODAY'S SCRIPT TIP: They Gave It All Away In The Trailer! - and the remake of LAST HOUSE ON THE LEFT.
Dinner: L&L Hawaiian BBQ
Pages: Still trying to dive back into this script!
Bicycle: Yes - rode against the wind for a while.
Movies: FAST FIVE.

Erik Bork at Alameda Writers Group - May 7th

I've spoken at the Alameda Writers Group a couple of times, and they asked if I would help them get the word out about a FREE lecture by Emmy Award Winning screenwriter Erik Bork (BAND OF BROTHERS, FROM THE EARTH TO THE MOON, etc). So here it is...

EMMY AND GOLDEN GLOBE WINNER ERIK BORK TO SPEAK FREE
ALAMEDA WRITERS GROUP SATURDAY MAY 7 AT 10:00 AM
GLENDALE PUBLIC LIBRARY AUDITORIUM
222 EAST HARVARD STREET, GLENDALE 91204

ERIK BORK is best known for his Emmy and Golden Globe-winning work as a writer-producer on the HBO miniseries BAND OF BROTHERS and FROM THE EARTH TO THE MOON. He has also sold multiple pitches for original series – and written pilots – for NBC and Fox, worked as a writer-producer on staff of drama series for Warner Bros. TV and Twentieth TV, and written features on assignment for Playtone, Steven Spielberg, Universal Pictures, HBO and TNT. He’s represented by Creative Artists Agency.

Erik did classes last year at the Screenwriting Conference in Santa Fe - where I still have open seats in *my* class this year. Info on how to sign up for that...




The Screenwriting Conference at Santa Fe - May 27th - 31st, 2011.

Okay, now I'm going to go back to working on this script...

- Bill

Do You Know The Way To Santa Fe?

I'll be teaching at the Screenwriting Conference in Santa Fe again this year, and becuase I've postponed my Los Angeles class - this may end up being the only class I teach this year. And it's only a month and a half away!





I'm sure I mentioned before that Santa Fe and the Raindance Film Festival are the reasons why I taught classes in the first place. Both called at about the same time a decade ago and asked if I wanted to teach a class for them, and I told both that I didn't teach classes, and both said: Come out out and try it, you'll like it! I've always been terrible at public speaking, so I thought it might be a good idea to deal with that - so I said yes to both.

Santa Fe was great, and that first year I basically just did a class based on my book Secrets Of Action Screenwriting. I've gone back several times over the years, and was there last year with Josh Olson - who will not read your fucking screenplay (except he read portions of his student's screenplays as part of his class). The great thing about Santa Fe is that Larry tries to keep it Working Professional Writers as teachers. So your teacher may be an Emmy Winner or and Oscar Nominee like Josh or some dude with a bunch of awful action films that play every week on the UK's version of Spike TV like me. But he tries to avoid that thing other conferences do where it's a bunch of Script Gurus with consulting services who have never sold a script telling you how to write... while plugging their own services. At Santa Fe, you learn from people who do it for a living.

And there's access. I mentioned in my blog entries last year that I went out to dinner with a group of students every night I was there - and so did almost everyone else. I was also in the hotel bar every night with some of teh other teachers and many students - and we talked screenwriting. I answered a bunch of questions from people who were not in my class - which is cool because you may get a different answer from me than from one of the other pros (we all have different experiences). Though I'm pretty easy to talk to at someplace like Expo, I've done events where we were kept separate from the students the whole time. Expo is kind of like that - one year at the "mixer" party that students paid money to attend, all of the teachers were in the "VIP room" upstairs. I felt guilty and went down to hang out with the students. Santa Fe - no walls, no separations. There's always a "mega panel" with all of the instructors answering student's questions, and students and teachers eat lunch in the hotel restaurant together - sit at my table if you want.

So this year I'm back in Santa Fe, and in addition to my 3 day class where I tear apart your first ten pages and go through all of the elements of writing (this year we're going to look at concepts, too) - I'm doing a short class based on the *revised* Secrets Of Action Screenwriting book. Kind of a flashback to that first class I did in Santa Fe a decade ago.

If you're interested in taking my class, there are still a couple of seats available, check it out!

The Screenwriting Conference at Santa Fe - May 27th - 31st, 2011.

Here is last year's blog entry on my adventures:
Santa Fe 2010.

- Bill
IMPORTANT UPDATE:
TODAY'S SCRIPT TIP: Self Discipline - not as much fun as self bondage...
Dinner: City Wok - Tomato Beef
Pages: No sleep yesterday, so no pages written.
Bicycle: Yes, short ride.

Lancelot Link Thursday

Lancelot Link Thursday! For those of you who think they need to remake John Landis' movie SCHLOCK! with modern special effects, here are some articles about screenwriting and the biz plus some fun stuff that may be of interest to you. Brought to you by that suave and sophisticated secret agent...



Here are five cool links plus this week's car chase...

1) Frank Sinatra *IS* Dirty Harry! and other films that never were!

2) Cinemacon: What will this summer's flops be - from people who have seen more of the films than anyone!

3) Movie Barcode - great films turned into skinny lines of information.

4) Brain Garfield (DEATH WISH) on Don Westlake (POINT BLANK, THE HOT ROCK).

5) Screenwriting news from The Onion.

6) This week's car chase is from NO PROBLEM! a 1975 comedy that's kind of a riff on THE TROUBLE WITH HARRY...



- Bill

IMPORTANT UPDATE:
TODAY'S SCRIPT TIP: Revealing - which is not about turning an adult cow back into the baby cow.
Dinner: Burger, onion rings & Barney's Beanery.
Pages: Still trying to dive back into this script after working on 2 others for a week... and struggling.
Bicycle: No - had a screening to go to.

Kids! Get Off My Lawn!

This is probably because I’m officially an old man, but I wonder why kids don’t seem to care about anything but themselves anymore. And, I’m fairly sure I was one of these kids once - but also fairly sure I had slightly better manners.

It's been cool in Los Angeles lately - after a couple of days of 80', we've gone back to winter for some reason. I’m sitting in a Starbucks by the door and a whole flock of really loud kids enter - school just let out, I guess - and as soon as I think “indoor voices please” the kids manage to click the door to “stay open mode” and don’t close it, just stand in line with the door open and the overhead fly fan going crazy and cold air blowing in. After a few moments of the door open next to me, I get up and close it.

Cut to: same girls, same door... on their way out. Again, they click the door to “stay open mode” and again no one closes it. Now, this happens all of the time - and it’s not only kids - there are many adults who also leave the damned door open. But this time I decide to step outside before closing the door and ask the kids to please come back and close the door that they opened...

And they yelled at me. So I yelled back that they opened the door, they need to close it. And they yelled some more and called me names. Um, these are like 12 year old girls. They called me things I wouldn’t call my worst enemy.

Door: still open.

But here’s the question - what do you do now to get these people to close the door? I can continue to close doors for strangers for the rest of my life, but I didn’t open these doors, and it’s not my responsibility to close them. And If I don’t close them, it just trickles down to someone else like me who also did not open the door. If none of us closes the door, it gets cold inside Starbucks and we all suffer and eventually some employee who should be making your drink has to get out from behind the counter and close the door. Then, your drink is late - and maybe you are late for a meeting - and maybe because you are late you get fired or don’t get the job or some other terrible thing. Yes, I’m kind of making mountains out of molehills, but how many times in your life have things gone wrong because your timing was off by a minute? And, even though I’m specifically talking about closing doors, here, there are lots of other things that are just like this - where people just don’t care and cut across three lanes of freeway traffic to make their exit because they forgot to merge over... and cause a ten car pile up? These little things are really big things.

The person who opens the door should also shut it.

We are all human. We have all left some door open somewhere. I’m sure the reason why I stuck my head out the door and asked these kids to come back and close the door is because they did this *twice* in the space of 5 minutes... and didn’t notice and didn’t care. So, I’m imagining hundreds of doors all over Los Angeles left open by this group of 12 year old girls. And they have learned that this is okay, and will keep leaving doors open all of their lives - billions of open doors that others have to close!

Poliely asking did not work.
Demanding did not work.
What *does* work?

The door was sill open.

I closed it on my way back inside.

Sometimes, you just have to do it yourself... even if it's not your responsibility. You can complain about things that are wrong, or you can work to change them.

- Bill
IMPORTANT UPDATE:
TODAY'S SCRIPT TIP: Revealing - which is not about turning an adult cow back into the baby cow.
Dinner: Burger, onion rings & Barney's Beanery.
Pages: Still trying to dive back into this script after working on 2 others for a week... and struggling.
Bicycle: No - had a screening to go to.

RIP: Sidney Lumet

Great director of urban dramas, often dealing with police or criminal activities. He will be missed.



- Bill

Lancelot Link Thursday

Lancelot Link Thursday! For those of you who want to see a movie about a gorilla who goes to live in the mist of New York City, here are some articles about screenwriting and the biz plus some fun stuff that may be of interest to you. Brought to you by that suave and sophisticated secret agent...



Here are three cool links plus this week's car chase...

1) Larry Cohen comments on Eastwood's J. Edgar Hoover movie.

2) How NOT To Deal With Critics! - thanks to Harry Connolly

3) Greatest Query Letter Ever! "A magic unicorn who poops glitter and controls zombies."

4) And today's car chase...



CORVETTE SUMMER is the movie Mark Hammill made right after STAR WARS and everyone was sure it would be a huge hit... it was not.

- Bill

Rewrite Weekend

So, one of my circling projects is an older screenplay that some new folks are interested in. On Thursday I got a phone call that things were heating up and there would be some rewrite notes coming to me soon by e-mail, and if I might be able to do a quick rewrite over the weekend before it’s submitted that would be great.

By Friday evening, when I left to go to the movies with my friends - no e-mail.

Well, I made an executive decision - I had a basic idea of what the rewrite notes would be, and I also knew what *I* wanted to do to improve the script (and give it a better chance), so I thought I’d do a rewrite over the weekend anyway, and if their notes popped up I would work those in. I could wait (and do nothing) or work (and get things accomplished). I think human nature is to wait for the notes, but that's probably a mistake.

The two major things in this rewrite - a core change to match the demographics of the market which did not favor the sex of the lead character. Though there was some talk about giving every character a sex change - men turned to women and women turned to men, like in the second version of THE MALTESE FALCON - they decided it made more sense to keep everyone the same sex and just take the focus from the lead character and shift it two the two secondary leads of the opposite sex. The story stays the same, we just shift point of view - and that completely works in this story.

The other major thing was the ending. A dozen years ago when this was about to be made (and then fell apart at the last minute) that producer gave me some notes including a “Producer’s Twist”... and that screwed up the end of the script, and I’d have to rewrite the last 20 or so pages. You know how a plot twist isn’t something that *changes* the story, it merely reveals something that was already part of the story? THE SIXTH SENSE is a great example - that twist at the end isn’t a change at all, and when you view the film again you realize that the information revealed in that twist was *always* there - in every scene since page 7 - and you just hadn’t noticed it. (Or, maybe you had - some people claim they figured it out early). But a twist is something that has been set up and is part of the story all along, but revealed later. And once it is revealed, you go “Of course! It was there all along! How could I have missed it!” A “Producer’s Twist” doesn’t work that way at all - it’s some twist that was never set up, never part of the story - just tacked on at the end. Imagine if at the end of WITNESS there was this twist that Harrison Ford had been dead since getting shot in the parking lot and the Amish kid says in the last 5 minutes that he sees dead people... like Harrison. You watch the film again and there’s *nothing* that would ever make you think Harrison is dead - he interacts with everyone and dances in the barn, etc. It’s a complete tack-on. That would be a “Producer’s Twist” - they think they are being clever by adding an extra twist - and usually not just a twist that isn’t set up, but often makes no sense at all. Then you have to go off and type it up.

So, that producer a dozen years ago had come up with a “Producer’s Twist” to make the hero into the villain at the end... but the villain is also still the villain, so there’s just this extra unexplained villain at the end and no good guy at all. It just ruined the whole script, and the twist was completely unmotivated, and we ended up with no likeable characters by the end. So I had rewritten the last 20-25 pages to try to make it suck less and make slightly more sense, but I always hated that twist.

Okay, here’s the thing - technology has changed in the past dozen years. Back then a brand new desk top computer might have a 2GB hard drive... the laptop I’m typing this on has 500GBs! So storage was a premium, and all of my scripts were on floppies. Because floppies were not cheap, I didn’t have a disk for each draft - I’d just copy over the old draft with the new draft. Any cool scenes that got cut I’d save on another floppy - never know when I might find some use for them later. But when I did the rewrite that ruined this script a dozen years ago - I saved it over the good version. Now, somewhere there is a hard copy of that good version - but it would take me forever to find... easier to just figure out how to fix the end and remove that “Producer’s Twist” than find the old version on paper and *retype it*.

Again - another reason why it would be easy for me to do nothing. Hey, instead of working, I cvan just wait for the notes and do nothing! There are always good excuses not to work, we have to fight them. Nothing ever gets done if we allow all of those good reasons not to work to get in the way of working.

So, Saturday I did a marathon writing day - and by 1:25am (Sunday) I had rewritten the first 69 pages of the script, not only shifting the POV so that another character was the lead, but writing the big scenes that made that character into the lead and adding some new suspense scenes that I really liked... but Sunday would be the big day - those last 20 pages or so, plus the pages that came before them.

Sunday I was originally going to go to this paperback book show way the hell out in the west valley, but most of the writers I wanted to see were not going to be there... so I decided to skip it and finish the rewrite.

One of the things I had done in Saturday’s rewrite was to create a whole new suspense element that threaded throughout the screenplay - and paid off in some of Sunday’s early scenes. Another thing I had to deal with was intensifying a scene that created a domino reaction in Sunday’s pages. Plus the POV change stuff. Some of the characters who died before made it to the end this time around - and that had to be set up... and some of the characters who made it until the end last time died this time around (so they wouldn’t be there to do some of the story/plot things that had to be done, and some other character would have to do those things... and those characters would have to be changed to be the kind of people who would do those things - and that’s a major character overhaul that changes everything. Almost every line of their dialogue and almost every action had to be changed.

When I broke for dunch (between dinner and lunch - maybe “linner” sounds better?) I sat down with those last 22 pages (printed out) and figured out how the new ending would work. Some of the scenes could be salvaged, just with different characters in them (since the other folks were dead). Some new scenes had to be written. But the biggest thing was that the *order* of the scenes was completely different. Oh, and since the POV shift thing - a different character was the “hero” and a different character was the “love interest” and one of these characters had not survived before! But the romantic thing had to be wrapped up differently. I scribbled notes on the pages, along with arrows and cross outs and name changes... and by the time I had finished by dunch I knew what the last 20 pages or so would look like... now all I had to do is write them! Easy... not!

Just after midnight on Sunday (technically Monday) I had the rewrite finished. I did a final read through, caught 3 typos, made a decision to leave an iffy line of description, and e-mailed a copy for them to read first thing Monday morning.

I am happy with it - mostly due to some new suspense scenes I wrote Saturday that are "Hitchcockian". This thing is like WAIT UNTIL DARK and REBECCA and SPIRAL STAIRCASE and STRANGERS ON A TRAIN all rolled into one...

But the moral of the story? Sometimes you have to do an enormous amount of work in a limited amount of time and you can’t wait for inspiration - you have to learn to inspire yourself. For me, the hardest part is getting started. Once I get going, I get into the story and characters and get excited about figuring out how to fix that next scene. But I have to push myself for a while - and write even though I’d rather do something else (anything else). You have to learn how to give yourself that push - and get enough momentum going that you get into that writing groove... even though you may not feel like it. Screenwriting is a job where you might have plenty of time to write the first few drafts and then some insane deadline to do the rewrite they are actually going to film. In this case, most of the “work” was getting myself off my lazy butt and into that rewrite. I could have done some work on Friday, but thought I’d just wait for the notes... and mostly goofed off all day!

Today I’m “goofing off” writing this, when I’m supposed to be working on another script project. It’s easy to lose the momentum and watch the latest YouTube video where Hitler has problems with Rebecca Black’s FRIDAY song and blows his top... but we have to self-motivate and get those pages done! Especially if we have plenty of time to write that first draft.

- Bill
IMPORTANT UPDATE:
TODAY'S SCRIPT TIP: Be Indispensible - what makes you a good employee at your day job makes you a good writer.
Dinner: Subway - tuna melt.
Pages: Didn't make my 5 pages on Monday, but did some work over the weekend.
Bicycle: New bike - hardly ridden! It's been raining every day in Los Angeles. Monday it didn't rain, but was cloudy and muddy. Plan to ride Tuesday.
Movies: LIMITLESS and LINCOLN LAWYER and 2 others in the cinema we'll discuss later... when they are released.

Lancelot Link Thursday

Lancelot Link Thursday! For those of you who wonder if there's a movie on the Planet Of The Apes that ends with Cornelius discovering a monkey version of the Statue Of Liberty buried on the beach, here are some articles about screenwriting and the biz plus some fun stuff that may be of interest to you. Brought to you by that suave and sophisticated secret agent...



Here are five cool links plus this week's car chase...

1) Fans vs. Suits and the fate of the film biz.

2) Ben Hecht's CASINO ROYALE?

3) Simpsons Jokes Per Episode Chart.

4) Famous Objects From Classic Movies Game.

5) First review of THE BEAVER!

5) This is the first car chase I have ever posted starring Chuck Norris... I know - this brings my masculinity into question. But there is a fruit cart!



Also, probably the only car chase where the driver is wearing a *sweater vest*!

- Bill

Do It Yourself!

My article in the current issue of Script Magazine is about my project to make my own film for pocket change later this year. We've come to a point where you really can make your own movie or TV series for an affordable amount of money... and I'm going to do that, and maybe crash and burn and look like an idiot.

My friend Carlos, who took my big 2 day class the first time I did it in the USA has been writing screenplays over the years and decided to make his own web series. He has shot his first two episodes and posted them... and one of his actresses was nominated for an award for her work in the series!

Here's a link to the show: LAS TUNDAS OF THE VALLEY. Check it out!

This ties in to yesterday's blog entry about the Get Off Your Ass And Do Something pill - Carlos took that pill and now has a webseries.

- Bill

Women's Day (not to be confused with DAY OF THE WOMAN)

One of my favorite directors had breasts.

Before Kathryn Bigelow directed a bunch of kick ass action movies, there was a hot actress from the early 1930s who played babes, but seemed more interested in edgy roles and ended up in some great crime films like THEY DRIVE BY NIGHT playing the femme fatale. She was versatile, and could play almost any role - from innocent sweethearts to mean bitches to vulnerable blind girls and *anything* in between. After starring in a bunch of great films where she stole the show from stars like Humphrey Bogart and Richard Widmark and Edward G. Robinson, at the end of the 1940s she decided to take control of her career and *did not* re-sign with Warner Brothers. She was smart and ambitious... but also no longer in her 20s.

Someone's video valentine to Lupino from YouTube. You can see how versatile she was be all of the different "looks" she had:



She starred in one of my favorite movies (THEY DRIVE BY NIGHT) - I have the original poster folded up in a box somewhere. If you haven't seen this one, check it out. The story's about a couple of long-haul truckers, George Raft and Humphrey Bogart, just trying to earn a living. Bogart's the family man, and (SPOLIER!!!) about a third of the way into the movie gets into a horrible truck crash and gets his arm ripped off - spends the rest of the movie with only one arm. Raft stumbles into Noir territory when he manages a trucking company owned by Lupino's husband... and she is not happily married. There's a cool murder-by-automatic-garage-door-opener (really!). Here's a scene where Raft is torn between the nice girl he loves and manipulative Lupino:

THEY DRIVE BY NIGHT (1940)



Okay, Lupino's experiment being a non-contract player star isn't going exactly as planned - she's getting less work for less money. But she's smart. She starts writing screenplays - and selling them. The director of one of her screenplays NOT WANTED (1949) - about baby snatching - gets sick... and Lupino jumps in and finishes the film. And does a great job. This leads to work as a director - though mostly on B crime films. Except, that's what she's good at. She knows how to film action and suspense and make a film that really kicks ass! So she's now a triple threat - she is writing action films like PRIVATE HELL 36 (directed by the great Don Siegel) and directing great action and thriller films like THE HITCHHIKER and still acting in movies like:

WOMEN'S PRISON (1955)



Okay, before WOMEN'S PRISON she starred in this next one, directed by the great Nicholas Ray, where she plays a blind woman who kind of redeems a *very* violent cop. Oh, and when Ray got sick, Lupino took over and directed until he was back on his feet. This is one of my favorite films, with a great Bernard Herrmann score. The YouTube clips can not be embedded, but click on the links and check them out.

ON DANGEROUS GROUND (1952)

Trailer for ON DANGEROUS GROUND.

Scene from ON DANGEROUS GROUND with blind Lupino and violent cop Robert Ryan meeting for the first time. Oh, her brother is the killer he's chasing - and he tends to shoot first, and when the alleged perp is dead, read them their rights. So, this ain't gonna be a smooth romance.

Next, here's a clip from a movie she co-wrote with her husband (Collier Young) and directed 100% of, that is a great example of a contained thriller that doesn't seem contained. A ton of suspense is generated when two guys on a fishing trip pick up a hitchhiker who may or may not be a psycho killer on the run. The film is mostly 3 guys either in a car or at a camp site out in the middle of nowhere. There's an insane suspense scene at a campsite in the middle of nowhere - the psycho killer has a gun on the two guys... as they wait for him to fall asleep so they can escape. But is he really asleep? Or just pretending?

THE HITCHHIKER (1953)



Lupino has 8 screenwriting credits on IMDB and 41 movies or TV series she directed. Usually multiple episodes of the TV shows (9 episodes of THRILLER, 8 episodes of HAVE GUN WILL TRAVEL, etc.) She is the only woman to direct a TWILIGHT ZONE episode (THE MASKS) and directed a bunch of TV episode for action shows like THE FUGITIVE and THE UNTOUCHABLES... and GILLIGAN'S ISLAND! But where I fell in love with her as a director - the Boris Karloff Presents THRILLER show, where she was one of the "staff directors" in rotation. This show was like the HITCHCOCK PRESENTS show (in fact, shared many of the same key crew members and was shot at the same studio for the same company). When I was a kid, the show was re-run in the afternoon after I got home from school, and was just great stuff. My favorite episode was GUILLOTINE, based on a short story by Cornell Woolrich and directed by Ida Lupino. Your head will explode from the suspense!

Period France: Man convicted of murdering the husband of some babe he was sleeping with is waiting for his execution day, by guillotine. There is an unwritten law that if the executioner dies, all of the people he was supposed to kill that day are pardoned. There's no back up executioner, and you can't just let a janitor do it. So our killer-hero has the hot babe whose husband he killed, seduce the executioner and poison him the night before the execution. But the executioner is a big man, and instead of dying, he's just sick. Terminally sick, but heading to the prison to do his job before he dies! And the episode cuts between the executioner struggling to make his appointment with our killer-hero... and the killer-hero getting his last meal and the guards testing the guillotine on heads of cabbage and the killer-hero telling the priest he expects a miracle. The suspense just keeps building until you can't stand it anymore. When I was a kid, I immedeately wanted to know who wrote that story and who directed that episode.

And the answers were Cornell Woolrich, and the great director Ida Lupino... who happened to be a woman.

Direceted 41 movies and TV series (multiple episodes). She died in 1995.

- Bill

Class Movie Suggestions

For the first time in about 5 years I'm doing my class in the USA (Los Angeles) and will use my new "Thematic" method to break down 5 films in the class - I have selected 3 films, but need 2 more.

What I am looking for are recent popular films (made within the past 10 years) that I can use as examples of theme. What are your suggestions?

- Bill

SCRIPT SECRETS: THE BIG IDEA is an INTENSIVE two day course - screenwriting stripped of the theoretical nonsense! This is the "classic class" - starting with finding an amazing idea - the kind that makes producers salivate! Then we'll go step-by-step from blank page to the big screen and show you how to create great characters from that idea, plus solid techniques to improve your dialogue, create lean-mean-evocative description, flesh out your story and improve screenwriting abilities! Plus a section on selling your script!

April 16 & 17, 2011
Burbank Airport Marriott - Producer's Room.

Click For More Info.

- Bill

IMPORTANT UPDATE:
TODAY'S SCRIPT TIP: Emotional Openings and those NARNIA movies.
Dinner: Leftover Chinese food.
Pages: Poked around on a spec when I should have been working on this rewrite (assignment).
Bicycle: New bike, not much riding. Weather is the major reason - it's cold, has been rainy, and I had a cross-town meeting. Hard to get back on the bike when you are freezing.

Please Stop Dying!

RIP: Jane Russell.

Some of my favorites:



HIS KIND OF WOMAN (1951) opposite Robert Mitchum, directed by the great John Farrow. Odd crime film that takes place in a Baja resort where gangster Raymond Burr is trying to force ultra-cool gambler Mitchum to get back into the United States without the law finding out about it. Mitchum's in love with singer Russell - but is she part of the scheme or not? Kind of breezy, loose plot that almost feels like a comedy at times.



MACAO (1952) again opposite Robert Mitchum with the great Josef Von Sterberg directing. Again, Russell plays a singer - this time on a ship to Macao where she has a night club gig. Mitchum is living in exile in Macao and his only way back to the USA is to take down a crime syndicate... which owns the night club Russell is singing in. And this is one of the William Bendix/Mitchum movies.

DARKER THAN AMBER (1970) based on a John D. MacDonald novel, with Rod Taylor playing Travis McGee and Thedore Bikel playing Meyer and Robert Clouse (ENTER THE DRAGON) directing. Russell plays The Alabama Tigress - a neighbor of McGee's who was a man in the books... but she plays the role perfectly even though she's a woman. This film is not on DVD, and hard to find anywhere without being cut down to nada. It's one of those kick-ass action flicks from the 70s that was neutered for TV... and the theatrical version seems not to exist any more.

But those are the movies of Jane Russell's that *I* love, she's best known for:




THE OUTLAW (1943) - the risque western directed by Howard Hughes about Pat Garrett starring Janes Russell's boobs (the poster shows her with cleavage reclined in hay... almost offering a roll in it) - she plays Billy The Kid's girlfriend.




THE PALEFACE (1948) - quasi remake of the Keaton short starring Bob Hope, with Russell playing Calamity Jane.

GENTLEMEN PREFER BLONDES (1953) with that other pair, Marilyn Monroe, as a pair of singers who leave their boring lives behind to become sensations in Paris... and find love along the way. Plus the sequel - GENTLEMEN MARRY BRUNETES with Jeane Crain instead of Marilyn.

The other RIP is Gary Winick, producer of a bunch of films and founder of InDigEnt films - which made indie films on digital formats for pocket change with biog name stars who just wanted to act in a movie where they weren't replaced by CGI every other scene. He produced and directed TADPOLE with Sigorney Weaver and Bebe Neuwirth and Ron Rifkin and John Ritter at a cost of $250k - and if you haven't seen it, it's a great little film! He made TAPE and PERSONAL VELOCITY and PIECES OF APRIL and many others - and even though I don't like everything he produced, he gave a voice to filmmakers who we would never have heard of without InDigEnt. As a director he made 13 GOING ON 30 and CHARLOTTE'S WEB and LETTERS TO JULIET and many others. He was 49 years old - too young to die. But he leaves behind many cool indie films. He'll be missed.

- Bill

Who *Should* Have Won?

Here are the nominees and the winners... but who should have won?

BEST PICTURE
127 Hours
Black Swan
The Fighter
Inception
The Kids Are All Right
WINNER: The King’s Speech
The Social Network
Toy Story 3
True Grit
Winter’s Bone

BEST ORIGINAL SCREENPLAY
Another Year, written by Mike Leigh
The Fighter, Screenplay by Scott Silver and Paul Tamasy & Eric Johnson; 
Story by Keith Dorrington & Paul Tamasy & Eric Johnson
Inception, written by Christopher Nolan
The Kids Are All Right, written by Lisa Cholodenko & Stuart Blumberg
WINNER: The King’s Speech, Screenplay by David Seidler

BEST ADAPTED SCREENPLAY
127 Hours, Screenplay by Danny Boyle & Simon Beaufoy
WINNER: The Social Network, Screenplay by Aaron Sorkin
Toy Story 3, Screenplay by Michael Arndt; Story by John Lasseter, Andrew Stanton and Lee Unkrich
True Grit, written for the screen by Joel Coen & Ethan Coen
Winter’s Bone, adapted for the screen by Debra Granik & Anne Rosellini

BEST ACTOR
Javier Bardem, Biutiful
Jeff Bridges, True Grit
Jesse Eisenberg, The Social Network
WINNER: Colin Firth, The King’s Speech
James Franco, 127 Hours

BEST ACTRESS
Annette Bening, The Kids Are All Right
Nicole Kidman, Rabbit Hole
Jennifer Lawrence, Winter’s Bone
WINNER: Natalie Portman, Black Swan
Michelle Williams, Blue Valentine

BEST DIRECTOR
Darren Aronofsky, Black Swan
Joel & Ethan Coen, True Grit
David Fincher, The Social Network
WINNER: Tom Hooper, The King’s Speech
David O. Russell, The Fighter

BEST SUPPORTING ACTOR
WINNER: Christian Bale, The Fighter
John Hawkes, Winter’s Bone
Jeremy Renner, The Town
Mark Ruffalo, The Kids Are All Right
Geoffrey Rush, The King’s Speech

BEST SUPPORTING ACTRESS
Amy Adams, The Fighter
Helena Bonham Carter, The King’s Speech
WINNER: Melissa Leo, The Fighter
Hailee Steinfeld, True Grit
Jacki Weaver, Animal Kingdom

BEST CINEMATOGRAPHY
Black Swan, Matthew Libatique
WINNER: Inception, Wally Pfister
The King’s Speech, Danny Cohen
The Social Network, Jeff Cronenweth
True Grit, Roger Deakins

BEST ART DIRECTION
WINNER: Alice in Wonderland, Robert Stromberg, Karen O’Hara
Happy Potter and the Deathly Hallows — Part 1, Stuart Craig, Stephenie McMillan
Inception, Guy Hendrix Dyas, Larry Dias, Doug Mowat
The King’s Speech, Eve Stewart, Judy Farr
True Grit, Jess Gonchor, Nancy Haigh

BEST EDITING
127 Hours, Jon Harris
Black Swan, Andrew Weisblum
The Fighter, Pamela Martin
The King’s Speech, Tariq Anwar
WINNER: The Social Network, Angus Wall and Kirk Baxter

BEST VISUAL EFFECTS
Alice in Wonderland, Ken Ralston, David Schaub, Carey Villegas and Sean Phillips
Harry Potter and the Deathly Hallows — Part 1, Tim Burke, John Richardson, Christian Manz and Nicolas Aithadi
Hereafter, Michael Owens, Bryan Grill, Stephan Trojanski and Joe Farrell
WINNER: Inception, Paul Franklin, Chris Corbould, Andrew Lockley and Peter Bebb
Iron Man 2, Janek Sirrs, Ben Snow, Ged Wright and Daniel Sudick

BEST COSTUME DESIGN
WINNER: Alice in Wonderland, Colleen Atwood
I Am Love, Antonella Cannarozzi
The King’s Speech, Jenny Beaven
The Tempest, Sandy Powell
True Grit, Mary Zophres

BEST MAKEUP
Barney’s Version, Adrien Morot
The Way Back, Eduoard F. Henriques, Gregory Funk, Yolanda Toussieng
WINNER: The Wolfman, Rick Baker and Dave Elsey

BEST SOUND EDITING
WINNER: Inception, Richard King
Toy Story 3, Tom Myers and Michael Silvers
TRON: Legacy, Gwendolyn Yates Whittle and Addison Teague
True Grit, Skip Lievsay and Craig Berkey
Unstoppable, Mark P. Stoeckinger

BEST SOUND MIXING
WINNER: Inception, Lora Hirschberg, Gary A. Rizzo, and Ed Novick
The King’s Speech, Paul Hamblin, Martin Jensen, and John Midgley
Salt, Jeffrey J. Haboush, Greg P. Russell, Scott Millan, and William Sarokin
The Social Network, Ren Klyce, David Parker, Michael Semanick, and Mark Weingarten
True Grit, Skip Lievsay, Craig Berkey, Greg Orloff, and Peter F. Kurland

BEST ORIGINAL SCORE
127 Hours, A.R. Rahman
How to Train Your Dragon, John Powell
Inception, Hans Zimmer
The King’s Speech, Alexandre Desplat
WINNER: The Social Network, Trent Reznor and Atticus Ross

BEST SONG
“Coming Home,” Country Strong, Tom Douglas, Troy Verges and Hillary Lindsey
“I See the Light,” Tangled, Alan Menken, Glenn Slater
“If I Rise,” 127 Hours, A.R. Rahman, Dido, Rollo Armstrong
WINNER: “We Belong Together,” Toy Story 3, Randy Newman

BEST FOREIGN LANGUAGE FILM
Hors la Loi (Outside the Law) (Algeria)
Incendies (Canada)
WINNER: In a Better World (Denmark)
Dogtooth (Greece)
Biutiful (Mexico)

BEST ANIMATED FILM
How to Train Your Dragon
The Illusionist
WINNER: Toy Story 3

BEST DOCUMENTARY
Exit Through the Gift Shop, Banksy and Jaimie D’Cruz
Gasland, Josh Fox and Trish Adlesic
WINNER: Inside Job, Charles Ferguson and Audrey Marrs
Restrepo, Tim Hetherington and Sebastian Junger
Waste Land, Lucy Walker and Angus Aynley

BEST LIVE-ACTION SHORT
The Confession, Tanel Toom
The Crush, Michael Creagh
WINNER: God of Love, Luke Matheny
Na Wewe, Ivan Goldschmidt
Wish 143, Ian Barnes and Samantha Waite

BEST DOCUMENTARY SHORT
Killing in the Name
Poster Girl
WINNER: Strangers No More, Karen Goodman and Kirk Simon
Sun Come Up, Jennifer Redfearn and Tim Metzger
The Warriors of Qiugang, Ruby Yang and Thomas Lenno

BEST ANIMATED SHORT
Day & Night, Teddy Newton
The Gruffalo, Jakob Schuh and Max Lang
Let’s Pollute, Geefwee Boedoe
WINNER: The Lost Thing, Shaun Tan and Andrew Ruhemann
Madagascar, Carnet de Voyage (Madagascar, a Journey Diary), Bastien Dubois

So, who got robbed?

- Bill

Lancelot Link Thursday

Lancelot Link Thursday! For those of you who think 12 MONKEYS would have been better with an additional monkey, here are some articles about screenwriting and the biz that may be of interest to you. Brought to you by that suave and sophisticated secret agent...



Here are five cool links plus this week's car chase...

1) 5 Hollywood Secrets That Explain Why Movies Suck! (you already knew one of them)

2) How to *Guarentee* your sit-com gets cancelled!

3) Oscar Winning Screenwriter Vs. Scientology - also tons of backstory on Paul Haggis.

4) 11 Biggest Movie Flops Of All Time - I didn't write *any* of them!

5) Aaron Sorkin on Screenwriting.

6) And today's car chase...



Okay, it's a boat chase... but I'm slowly easing you into accepting the Big Wheel Chase clip I have.

- Bill
IMPORTANT UPDATE:
TODAY'S SCRIPT TIP: When The Hero Runs Out Of Time and a couple of Denzel films.
Dinner: Airport food.
Pages: Travel day.

Script Secrets Class: Los Angeles

It's been almost 5 years since I last did my 2 day class in the USA! I've been busy writing, but done it in London and Hong Kong and Denmark. But now I'm bringing it back to Los Angeles...

SCRIPT SECRETS: THE BIG IDEA is an INTENSIVE two day course - screenwriting stripped of the theoretical nonsense! This is the "classic class" - starting with finding an amazing million dollar idea - the kind that makes producers salivate! Learn brainstorming techniques, how to tell the difference between a movie idea and a book or stage play idea. The basics of high concept. And how to kick-start your imagination.

This class is jam-packed with techniques to create great film ideas, then I'll take you step-by-step from black page to the big screen and show you how to create great characters from that idea. Learn how high concept can be *your* personal story. How to find theme within the concept. How to create amazing high concept scenes that actually *explore character*, plus solid techniques to improve your dialogue, create lean-mean-evocative description, flesh out your story and improve screenwriting abilities! Plus a section on selling your script!

Now with The Thematic - the most powerful screenwriting tool I've ever created! Start with a story idea or a character, and it will take you step-by-step, finding the perfect supporting characters, amazing dramatic scenes, dialogue that works on more than one level, actions that show emotional conflict, and more. Thematic uses your story's theme to generate the other elements of the story, creating the template for a tightly focused character and theme based screenplay. This is not a machine or a formula, but a unique way to look at writing your screenplay.

For 2011 we'll be using the movie GHOST as our primary example, with clips from that film as well as NORTH BY NORTHWEST, THE MATRIX, AIRPLANE, THE BIG SLEEP and DILLINGER.

April 16 & 17, 2011
Burbank Airport Marriott - Producer's Room.
Register TODAY!
Only $249

Click For More Info.

Yes, this is spammish - sorry! I finally booked the hotel and wanted to get the word out to people who have asked about the class.

- Bill

Lancelot Link Thursday

Either 1 day late or 6 days early! Lancelot Link Thursday! For those of you who wonder why your waitress has hairy legs... and a hairy back, here are some articles about screenwriting and the biz that may be of interest to you. Brought to you by that suave and sophisticated secret agent's waiter brother...



Here are five cool links plus this week's car chase...

1) Movie Posters for remakes we wish were true!

2) The Coen Brothers Screenwriting Secrets Revealed!

3) Real James Bond era Spy Gadgets!

4) Time Out's 100 Best British Films - with an upset! The BFI's #1 film is pushed to #2 by another thriller!

5) What if David Lynch directed the Superbowl?

6) This week's Car Chase is from a Luc Besson movie...



I watched this film on VHS back in the day and thought it was crazy... but fun. Wonder what else this guy has made?

- Bill
IMPORTANT UPDATE:
TODAY'S SCRIPT TIP: How To Study A Screenplay .
Dinner: Fish & Chips at what has to be the last remaining H. Salt Esq - in NoHo. Place ain't cheap! Greasy fast food - over $10.
Pages: Yes - a great scene yesterday. Still way behind, but you will cry every 15 minutes when reading this script!

Chain Gang Escape

Almost three years ago (beginning of May 2008) I bought a bicycle and began riding again. Though there were many reasons, the main one was because I was fat and not in great health. I needed to get some regular exercise, and riding a bike from coffee shop to coffee shop not only kept the blood circulating, it was also a great way to think about the next scene while I was cycling there. I have lost weight, am in better health, and know how to quickly put my bike on the front rack of a city bus without tearing my hand off...

But Saturday, someone else was riding my bike - it was stolen.

The real pisser is that I had just changed the rear tire and tube - and that’s a bitch to do. Had I known the bike was going to be stolen, I would have left it as it.

So I have to buy a new bike.

The pisser is that the bike was locked, at a public place where it shouldn’t have been stolen, and there were other, better, bikes parked nearby that were not stolen. My friend Mark had his bike parked next to mine, and they didn’t steal his.

Sometimes life is like that. I may have blogged about my general bad luck in the past - a couple of years ago I was standing with some other folks in line to get into a screening and a bird pooped on my head. Just me. No one else got pooped on. Now, maybe I slighted this bird sometime in the past, who knows. But when something like that happens, even though you know it’s completely random, you begin to buy into those bird conspiracy theories. To feel like you’re getting screwed and everyone else is not (well, they don’t have bird poop on *their* heads). But the reality is just that bird poop happens. It’s not personal. Best to just shake it off and keep going.

I talked to my friend Mark about the bike theft - and he’s had several stolen as well. Sometimes you can have the greatest lock in the world, and they use freon to freeze it and smash it and steal your bike. You can’t kick yourself for not having a better lock, and you can’t go around blaming everyone for your missing bike... and you can’t be paranoid that evil bike thieves are following you everywhere just waiting to get your new bike. Just have to pick yourself up, dust yourself off, and get back to your life.

The good news is: soon I will have a new bike.

- Bill

Avoid TV in the UK Today...

Wow - it's playing all week! They still have the synopsis wrong, but the film sucks - so who would ever notice?




- Bill

RIP: John Barry

He wrote the music for almost all of the James Bond movies, BORN FREE, MIDNIGHT COWBOY, IPCRESS FILE, ZULU, PETULIA, THE LAST VALLEY, WALKABOUT, ROBIN & MARION, THE DEEP, SOMEWHERE IN TIME, BODY HEAT, FRANCES, JAGGED EDGE, OUT OF AFRICA, DANCES WITH WOLVES, and maybe 100 more! His scores could be lush and romantic or jazzy and cool or strange and haunting or just about anything else. One of the greats.



My favorite cut from the GOLDFINGER score...



So, there was this time when music was on vinyl... and I collected soundtracks, including everything from John Barry I could get my hands on. Here's the strange part - my parents, lower middle class folks who went to the drive in to see movies, owned a bunch of film scores. I think back then, because everything was album oriented, if you liked the theme *song* from BORN FREE you went out and bought the album and got the whole score - and my mom might put on the record while she did housework or cooked dinner and listened to the symphonic parts as well as that hit song. So "normal people" might own some sound tracks - my folks owned a bunch of Henry Mancini stuff because he did music for some of their favorite movies. I grew up listening to ELEPHANT WALK and BREAKFAST AT TIFFANY'S and CASINO ROYALE.

Here's John Barry's OUT OF AFRICA...



The great part of searching YouTube for all of these clips is that I got to listen to the music all over again... and relive some memories. My soundtrack collection began with YOU'RE A BIG BOY NOW because the Lovin' Spoonful did the music, but as a James Bond fan I probably bought GOLDFINGER next. I had the MIDNIGHT COWBOY score before ever seeing the movie, because it was rated X.

MIDNIGHT COWBOY...



When searching for SOMEWHERE IN TIME, I came upon a clip of the big scene and it floored me all over again. This film is kind of slow for today, but a big romance with some amazing scenes that stick with you. It's one of those films that "remembers well" - it may drag a bit while you are watching it, but a couple of days later you'll still be thinking about the penny scene.

Here's the main theme for SOMEWHERE IN TIME:



One of my favorite films, one that influences my writing, is BODY HEAT... and it has a John Barry Score:



So, when I started working at the movie theater there was this guy named Dave who was a big movie fan, and we'd sometimes go to this record store in San Francisco that specialized in sound tracks. Though you could find a good selection of sound tracks in any normal record store out in the suburbs where I lived - and even in the record section of department stores like Sears and Pennys - they probably didn't have any records from 1960s movies... and this place in San Francisco had *everything*. They only carried sound tracks. And they had all kinds of "cut outs" at discount prices. I bought PETULIA there, and still have it.

Here's PETULIA:



Maybe once a month Dave and I would go across the bridge and dig around in the store and buy some stuff we couldn't get anywhere else. The place was run by a couple of Gay guys who were human encyclopedias of film music. You could name any film and they'd tell you who did the score plus some back story. They had a service for regular customers - they had a copy of everything in their collection, and if the music either wasn't on vinyl or was impossible to find, they'd make you a tape for $1 (or something). They also had customer cards with your wish list, and if something came in used that was on your list, they'd hold it and call you. If I'd had more money I would have had a better collection - but I ended up with maybe fifty or sixty sound tracks, including...

BORN FREE:



And here's one of my favorite movies and favorite scores, THE IPCRESS FILE...



Another movie that starred Michael Caine and had a great John Barry score, ZULU:



Here's another sound track I owned on vinyl for *years* before I was able to see the film, a british sex comedy called THE KNACK:



DANCES WITH WOLVES:



Another great Michael Caine movie that you've never heard of - THE LAST VALLEY - a cool epic written and directed by novelist James Clavell about the 30 Years War, and a valley that both sides decide is off limits - a place of peace in the middle of the war:



Something strange happened and department stores like Sears and Pennys cut their music departments down to only the most popular music. And even the record stores like Tower began pruning their sound track sections down to what I call the Krappy K-tel Kompilations: those collections of *songs* from some movie. Fewer soundtracks. More *songs*. The big change came with BATMAN - great score by Danny Elfman - but Warner Bros released an album of Prince music "inspired by" the movie. I think one or two songs might have been used as background, and the rest was never in the film. The Krappy K-tel Kompilation had taken over, and a movie soundtrack might just be a bunchof pop tunes that were never in the movie! The movie was just a way to sell the music. But "normal people" weren't buying soundtracks at all. The only one they'd buy from that point until now was TITANIC. Soundtracks are pretty much dead... so you may not be familiar with John Barry or his work, except for the James Bond stuff.

John Barry will be missed in a strange way: you will be watching a movie, maybe a romance, and there will be these pop tunes in the background of scenes instead of the big lush scores that added to the film experience. And you won't know why this film seems less romantic than a movie like OUT OF AFRICA, but it just doesn't feel the same. That's because John Barry wasn't here to write the music.

Let's end with one of my favorite John Barry scores... for an awful movie. The 1976 version of KING KONG:



RIP: John Barry - won 5 Oscars, was 77 years old. I'm going to miss him.

- Bill

One of my movies invades the UK again...

I'm sorry...



- Bill

And The Nominees Are...

83rd Acamedy Award Nominees!

Writing (Adapted Screenplay)
“127 Hours” Screenplay by Danny Boyle & Simon Beaufoy
“The Social Network” Screenplay by Aaron Sorkin
“Toy Story 3” Screenplay by Michael Arndt; Story by John Lasseter, Andrew Stanton and Lee Unkrich
“True Grit” Written for the screen by Joel Coen & Ethan Coen
“Winter's Bone” Adapted for the screen by Debra Granik & Anne Rosellini

Writing (Original Screenplay)
“Another Year” Written by Mike Leigh
“The Fighter” Screenplay by Scott Silver and Paul Tamasy & Eric Johnson;
Story by Keith Dorrington & Paul Tamasy & Eric Johnson
“Inception” Written by Christopher Nolan
“The Kids Are All Right” Written by Lisa Cholodenko & Stuart Blumberg
“The King's Speech” Screenplay by David Seidler

Best Picture
“Black Swan” Mike Medavoy, Brian Oliver and Scott Franklin, Producers
“The Fighter” David Hoberman, Todd Lieberman and Mark Wahlberg, Producers
“Inception” Emma Thomas and Christopher Nolan, Producers
“The Kids Are All Right” Gary Gilbert, Jeffrey Levy-Hinte and Celine Rattray, Producers
“The King's Speech” Iain Canning, Emile Sherman and Gareth Unwin, Producers
“127 Hours” Christian Colson, Danny Boyle and John Smithson, Producers
“The Social Network” Scott Rudin, Dana Brunetti, Michael De Luca and Ceán Chaffin, Producers
“Toy Story 3” Darla K. Anderson, Producer
“True Grit” Scott Rudin, Ethan Coen and Joel Coen, Producers
“Winter's Bone" Anne Rosellini and Alix Madigan-Yorkin, Producers

Actor in a Leading Role
Javier Bardem in “Biutiful”
Jeff Bridges in “True Grit”
Jesse Eisenberg in “The Social Network”
Colin Firth in “The King's Speech”
James Franco in “127 Hours”

Actor in a Supporting Role
Christian Bale in “The Fighter”
John Hawkes in “Winter's Bone”
Jeremy Renner in “The Town”
Mark Ruffalo in “The Kids Are All Right”
Geoffrey Rush in “The King's Speech”

Actress in a Leading Role
Annette Bening in “The Kids Are All Right”
Nicole Kidman in “Rabbit Hole”
Jennifer Lawrence in “Winter's Bone”
Natalie Portman in “Black Swan”
Michelle Williams in “Blue Valentine”

Actress in a Supporting Role
Amy Adams in “The Fighter”
Helena Bonham Carter in “The King's Speech”
Melissa Leo in “The Fighter”
Hailee Steinfeld in “True Grit”
Jacki Weaver in “Animal Kingdom”

Animated Feature Film
“How to Train Your Dragon” Chris Sanders and Dean DeBlois
“The Illusionist” Sylvain Chomet
“Toy Story 3” Lee Unkrich

Art Direction
“Alice in Wonderland”
Production Design: Robert Stromberg; Set Decoration: Karen O'Hara
“Harry Potter and the Deathly Hallows Part 1”
Production Design: Stuart Craig; Set Decoration: Stephenie McMillan
“Inception”
Production Design: Guy Hendrix Dyas; Set Decoration: Larry Dias and Doug Mowat
“The King's Speech”
Production Design: Eve Stewart; Set Decoration: Judy Farr
“True Grit”
Production Design: Jess Gonchor; Set Decoration: Nancy Haigh

Cinematography
“Black Swan” Matthew Libatique
“Inception” Wally Pfister
“The King's Speech” Danny Cohen
“The Social Network” Jeff Cronenweth
“True Grit” Roger Deakins

Costume Design
“Alice in Wonderland” Colleen Atwood
“I Am Love” Antonella Cannarozzi
“The King's Speech” Jenny Beavan
“The Tempest” Sandy Powell
“True Grit” Mary Zophres

Directing
“Black Swan” Darren Aronofsky
“The Fighter” David O. Russell
“The King's Speech” Tom Hooper
“The Social Network” David Fincher
“True Grit” Joel Coen and Ethan Coen

Documentary (Feature)
“Exit through the Gift Shop” Banksy and Jaimie D'Cruz
“Gasland” Josh Fox and Trish Adlesic
“Inside Job” Charles Ferguson and Audrey Marrs
“Restrepo” Tim Hetherington and Sebastian Junger
“Waste Land” Lucy Walker and Angus Aynsley

Documentary (Short Subject)
“Killing in the Name” Nominees to be determined
“Poster Girl” Nominees to be determined
“Strangers No More” Karen Goodman and Kirk Simon
“Sun Come Up” Jennifer Redfearn and Tim Metzger
“The Warriors of Qiugang” Ruby Yang and Thomas Lennon

Film Editing
“Black Swan” Andrew Weisblum
“The Fighter” Pamela Martin
“The King's Speech” Tariq Anwar
“127 Hours” Jon Harris
“The Social Network” Angus Wall and Kirk Baxter

Foreign Language Film
“Biutiful” Mexico
“Dogtooth” Greece
“In a Better World” Denmark
“Incendies” Canada
“Outside the Law (Hors-la-loi)” Algeria

Makeup
“Barney's Version” Adrien Morot
“The Way Back” Edouard F. Henriques, Gregory Funk and Yolanda Toussieng
“The Wolfman” Rick Baker and Dave Elsey

Music (Original Score)
“How to Train Your Dragon” John Powell
“Inception” Hans Zimmer
“The King's Speech” Alexandre Desplat
“127 Hours” A.R. Rahman
“The Social Network” Trent Reznor and Atticus Ross

Music (Original Song)
“Coming Home” from “Country Strong” Music and Lyric by Tom Douglas, Troy Verges and Hillary Lindsey
“I See the Light” from “Tangled” Music by Alan Menken Lyric by Glenn Slater
“If I Rise” from “127 Hours” Music by A.R. Rahman Lyric by Dido and Rollo Armstrong
“We Belong Together” from “Toy Story 3" Music and Lyric by Randy Newman

Short Film (Animated)
“Day & Night” Teddy Newton
“The Gruffalo” Jakob Schuh and Max Lang
“Let's Pollute” Geefwee Boedoe
“The Lost Thing” Shaun Tan and Andrew Ruhemann
“Madagascar, carnet de voyage (Madagascar, a Journey Diary)” Bastien Dubois

Short Film (Live Action)
“The Confession” Tanel Toom
“The Crush” Michael Creagh
“God of Love” Luke Matheny
“Na Wewe” Ivan Goldschmidt
“Wish 143” Ian Barnes and Samantha Waite

Sound Editing
“Inception” Richard King
“Toy Story 3” Tom Myers and Michael Silvers
“Tron: Legacy” Gwendolyn Yates Whittle and Addison Teague
“True Grit” Skip Lievsay and Craig Berkey
“Unstoppable” Mark P. Stoeckinger

Sound Mixing
“Inception” Lora Hirschberg, Gary A. Rizzo and Ed Novick
“The King's Speech” Paul Hamblin, Martin Jensen and John Midgley
“Salt” Jeffrey J. Haboush, Greg P. Russell, Scott Millan and William Sarokin
“The Social Network” Ren Klyce, David Parker, Michael Semanick and Mark Weingarten
“True Grit” Skip Lievsay, Craig Berkey, Greg Orloff and Peter F. Kurland

Visual Effects
“Alice in Wonderland” Ken Ralston, David Schaub, Carey Villegas and Sean Phillips
“Harry Potter and the Deathly Hallows Part 1” Tim Burke, John Richardson, Christian Manz and Nicolas Aithadi
“Hereafter” Michael Owens, Bryan Grill, Stephan Trojanski and Joe Farrell
“Inception” Paul Franklin, Chris Corbould, Andrew Lockley and Peter Bebb
“Iron Man 2” Janek Sirrs, Ben Snow, Ged Wright and Daniel Sudick

So, what are your favorites? What films/artists do you think should have been nominated but were not? What films/artists do you think shoukld be on the Razzie List instead of here?

- Bill

Lancelot Link Thursday

Lancelot Link Thursday! For those of you who think Bonzo should have run for President after graduating college, here are some articles about screenwriting and the biz that may be of interest to you. Brought to you by that suave and sophisticated secret agent...



Here are four cool links plus this week's car chase...

1) A sentence that only uses one word many times.

2) Movie Reviews, Broken Down.

3) Got a novel? - my friend Harry posted this on his blog - Del Rey has a conest going!

4) Trailer #3 for the movie RUBBER - like PSYCHO, but with a car tire.

5) The car chase is from RONIN - a movie with kind of a nonsense story, but a bunch of great action scenes.



No CGI, no tricks - just some amazing French drivers!

- Bill

IMPORTANT UPDATE:
TODAY'S SCRIPT TIP: Writing Action Scenes - and the 5 reasons why they need to be on the page.
Dinner: Tortas in Studio City - a burrito as big as my head, salad, chips, salsa... all for less than you'd pay at some fast food joint.
Pages: Yes - slow progress on the spec.
Bicycle: Yes. Sort bike ride to NoHo for the afternoon shift at Panera.

Boys! Boys! Boys!

I’m behind on the new screenplay. I had hoped to make up for lost pages on Saturday, but completely screwed up and didn’t do squat. I can still finish by the end of the month, but it becomes less writing a comfortable number of pages every day and more *work*.

The problem is probably the script I finished last month just before Christmas (actually, I think it was December 24th!) - I haven’t written two scripts back-to-back in about 15 years! It’s like running a Marathon today... then trying to run another Marathon tomorrow. The plan was to work extra hard on Saturday and then take Sunday off - because I think having a day off might help me be more productive (sounds counter-intuitive, but also kind of makes sense). But the various events that caused me to get nothing done on Saturday kind of screwed up that plan. I had to do some work on Sunday just to keep from getting father behind.

My sleep patterns are all messed up, and add to that some stupid stuff - like leaving some materials I needed at a copy place on the other side of the valley. The problem with sleep being off is that it makes you stupid. So I’ve been doing all kinds of stupid things over the past few days in addition to not getting many pages written.

One of the other problems with this screenplay - it was originally about a 12 year old girl. The problem is that a 12 year old actress can only work 4 hours a day, and must have an on set teacher, and there are all kinds of other fun rules that will screw up making the film. But an 18 year-old actress pretending to be 16 years old? No restrictions at all! Work them ‘till they drop - they are adults. So I switched the lead from 12 years old to 16 years old... Simple!

Except there is one HUGE difference between a 12 year old girl and a 16 year old girl.

Okay, boobs... but also what comes with boobs...

Boys. A 12 year old girl may like boys and have crushes, but a 16 year old girl may be boy crazy - and boys are part of their every day life. A 12 year old asks her parents if she wants to go to a movie, a 16 year old is asked out by a boy or wishes she were asked out by a boy... or goes with a group of other girls and they talk about boys, etc.

There were no boys in my story idea. No romantic subplot.

I tried to just ignore boys when I started writing the script, but it wasn’t working. So I had to go back and add boys - rewritting a bunch of scenes. The lead girl’s best friend went through a sex change operation (behind the scenes) and Alice became Arlo. This solved part of the problem, but I’m still having boy problems on almost every page. What was outlined to be a scene where she watches a sporting event... is about *boys*! Because boys are the athletes. What was outlined as a scene where she becomes involved in a hobby that’s the main plot... is a problem because she can’t spend that time thinking about *boys*! I’m trying my damndest to keep the boy stuff to a minimum because it has nothing to do with the plot, but it isn’t easy. By the way, here’s a tip: the problem is usually the solution to the problem - so a scene where she had problems with her hobby is now going to include *boys*!

There will still be no romantic subplot for my 16 year old girl.

The other issue with this script - it is not KICK ASS 2. The 12, now 16 year old girl is not shooting guns or outrunning explosions. She also isn’t the reincarnation of a serial killer victim hell-bent on revenge. She is just a girl. This is a family film. Not my genre. Though it is *my* story, and I have a connection to it and a passion for it - um, I want something to explode on page 24. So, on top of this being a Marathon right after a Marathon, it’s a Marathon I’m not obsessed with winning. Hey, it would be nice, but there are many other races that I am more interested in. So, while I’m running this one I keep thinking of other races.

And now I’m just bitching. Venting. Using you kind folks. Sorry about that.

Sometimes, it’s work. You have that fantasy that you’re going to sell that script and tell your day job boss to take this job and shove it (though my boss was a great guy) and then live this romanticized screenwriter’s life where you sleep until noon and type either in your pjs like Marcel or in the bathtub like Waldo... and sometimes you can do those things. Other times, it’s work. You still love it, but it’s that love you feel for your spouse when she does something that screws you up bigtime and you are mad as hell but bite your tongue. You may almost hate her now, but in a couple of days or a week all of this will be dust in the wind and you’ll be back to loving her. You *know* you’re going to still love her when all of this blows over (and you still love her now, you’re just mad at her, too) - so you stick with it and put on that “Yes, Dear” smile and say it doesn’t matter when it does and work to get past it. I’m going to work to get through this script because I know somewhere down the line - maybe the day after tomorrow - I will fall back in love with it and everything will be wonderful.

Except for all of those scenes that now require *boys*.

- Bill
IMPORTANT UPDATE:
TODAY'S SCRIPT TIP: Beginning, Middle, and End - and SLUMDOG MILLIONAIRE.
Dinner: Carls Jr Chicken Strips.
Pages: Yeah, read the blog entry.
Bicycle: Yes. On Thursday I took a bike ride of epic length - all over NoHo, then to Burbank, then to Writers Store, then to an undisclosed drinking location, then home. Saturday - another long one. Sunday - short ride, but should have just rested my legs.

Lancelot Link Thursday

Lancelot Link Thursday! For those of you who wonder why Marcel the monkey didn't get a spin off series from FRIENDS, here are some articles about screenwriting and the biz that may be of interest to you. Brought to you by that suave and sophisticated secret agent...



Here are four cool links plus this week's car chase...

1) Talk like a Cowboy!

2) The Strange World Of Sherlock Holmes.

3) What If That Movie Had Been Made In Japan?

4) The Writer Behind THE KING'S SPEECH.

5) And this week's car chase...



RIP: Peter Yates.

- Bill
IMPORTANT UPDATE:
TODAY'S SCRIPT TIP: Character Driven Blockbusters?
Dinner: Roast Beef sandwich at Togos.
Pages: Some pages on the new spec - I'm a little behind, but okay.
Bicycle: First medium ride since returning from the holidays!

Do Not Drink Liquids While Reading This

My friend Ronson posted a link to this on Facebook. I've been to this page before, laughed too hard in public, and then forgot about it.

DAMN YOU AUTOCORRECT!

- Bill

Best Of The Blog

So, here's a sample of the posts that usually pop up on this blog...

1) The LEOPARD MAN post on creating dread and suspense.

2) How NOTTINGHAM became ROBIN HOOD. - my most read blog entry.

3) Chess Moves and DARK PASSAGE.

4) The Fridays With Hitchcock Index - What we can learn about screenwriting from Hitch's films.

5) What does a car chase look like on the page?

6) My First Agent! - actually, the only one I've ever had.

7) Last, but not least: The Saga Of The Brad Pitt Guy. There are 5 parts to it, next part linked at the end of each part before the comments.

What are your favorite blog entries?

- Bill

Wish I Would Have Thought Of That

I never come up with any good Get Rich Quick schemes - mine are always the ones that take a lot of hard work.

A friend of mine came up with a scheme to sell stuff that was made by other people - he'd just be the middle man. I thought this was a dumb idea, as customers could buy the products from the manufacturer for *less* than he sold them for. But his theory was that if you put a bunch of connected products from different sources on the same website, people would buy from you rather than go all over the place online - even if you would save money doing that. And he was right. I was wrong. He makes a living with a website that sells other people's stuff... and now I wish I'd have done that.



So when I was e-mailed by the writers of this proposed screenwriting book, I felt like an idiot again. Great idea! Why didn't I think of that? They had professional screenwriters and screenwriting teachers each write a chapter of their book... and they wrote the introduction! (okay, they had to plan and edit the book, too.) So you get a bunch of name writers each doing a chapter - like an all star movie.

Meanwhile, I am writing my own damned books - doing all of the writing myself! And I don't have an all star line up of writers - just me.

I wish I would have thought of this book!

- Bill

Crank It To 11!

Welcome to 2011! Though last year was so much better than 2009 for me, I’m hoping this new one will be better still. And I’m hoping that it will be a good year for all of you as well. I mean, what if those Mayans were right? If this is the last full year before all of that stuff from that John Cusack movie happens, let’s hope it’s a good one! So get those specs finished and sold and made... and I hope your film premiers happen before December 20, 2012! Just in case.

If the Mayans motivate you to get things done, that’s a good thing. If something else motivates you to get things done, that’s a good thing. The key is to get things done. We have a whole new year to get things done in. Wipe away any deadlines you may have missed and start with some new ones. Or some new projects. Whatever works for you.

I ended the year with a new spec, and am starting the year with a new spec...

Which means the 2 weeks of new Script Tips I had planned to kick off the year with? Not going to happen... but I had almost a full month of new or completely rewritten Script Tips last year, so I’m going to run those and then try for 2 weeks of new Script Tips in February. Heck, maybe even a whole (short) month of new and completely rewritten tips.

Tuesday’s New Script Tip rerun is on making some sort of plan so that you can get something done before those earthquakes and giant waves and flocks of dead birds falling from the sky that means the world is coming to an end. This is a good tip - don’t miss it!

Though I haven’t secured the venue, yet, I plan on doing my first USA screenwriting class in *years* on April 16 & 17 - probably at the Burbank Airport Marriott.

I hope to do a few small blog entries every week, and get around to those epic multi-part stories about people who claim to have urinated with Brad Pitt once this spec is finished. I may squeeze in some Hitchcock entries and maybe talk about some more of my favorite films in January - provided I don’t get too far behind. I hate/love Stephen King for having enough residual energy left after writing an 800 page novel to knock out a couple of short stories. Even if I crank my energy level up to 11, when I finish a script I want to take a nap. But I’ll try to get some new material up here in the new year.

And I want *you* to create some new material of your own. This is the year to crank your energy up to 11 and get some stuff done!

- Bill
IMPORTANT UPDATE:
TODAY'S SCRIPT TIP: That's Episodic! - and a movie starring Jack Black.
Dinner: Pizza with everything on it.
Pages: Did some work on the Action Book rewrite.
Movies: TRUE GRIT in the cinema and John Sayles' MEN WITH GUNS on DVD.

Happy New Year!

Happy New Year!



Hope 2011 is a great year for all of you!

- Bill

National Film Registry inductees 2010

These 25 films have been deemed "national treasures" by the Library Of Congress. There are several of my favorites on the list every year, this time around we get AIRPLANE! and ALL THE PRESIDENT'S MEN and EMPIRE STRIKES BACK and McCABE AND MRS. MILLER. The last film on the list is a documentary ride on a cable car down San Francisco's Market Street only days before the earthquake.



AIRPLANE! (1980)



ALL THE PRESIDENT'S MEN (1976)

THE BARGAIN (1914)

CRY OF JAZZ (1959)

ELECTRONIC LABYRINTH: THX 113B 4EB (1967)



THE EMPIRE STRIKES BACK (1980)



THE EXORCIST (1973)



THE FRONT PAGE (1931)



GREY GARDENS (1976)

I AM JOAQUIN (1969)



IT'S A GIFT (1934)

LET THERE BE LIGHT (1946)

LONESOME (1928)



MAKE WAY FOR TOMORROW (1937)



MALCOLM X (1992)



MCCABE & MRS. MILLER (1971)

NEWARK ATHLETE (1891)

OUR LADY OF THE SPHERE (1969)



THE PINK PANTHER (1964)

PRESERVATION OF SIGN LANGUAGE (1913)



SATURDAY NIGHT FEVER (1977)

STUDY OF A RIVER (1996)



TARANTELLA (1940)



A TREE GROWS IN BROOKLYN (1945)

A TRIP DOWN MARKET STREET (1906)

How many have you seen?

- Bill