I'll Read That, Thanks

This morning I read the movie section of our local newspaper and came across a blurb about Canadian filmmaker Atom Egoyan. He's discussing how he'll miss not being part of the Toronto Film Festival. Since I either don't particularly like or haven't seen his films, I could care less. That's not what caught my interest. Atom is filming 'Where the Truth Lies', a "story of two entertainers in the late 1950s who are somehow involved in a death that occurs while they have a perfect alibi: they are taking part in a telethon witnessed by millions of viewers. Fifteen years later, a journalist begins to unravel what really happened".

If you tossed me that logline, I'd say, "I'll read that, thanks". I don't know where that logline came from but I paid a visit to IMDB to read the Plot Summary for Where the Truth Lies (2005). If you're too lazy to follow the link, the logline there reads, "A female journalist tries to uncover the truth behind the breakup, years earlier, of a celebrated comedy team after the duo found a girl dead in their hotel room. Though both had airtight alibis and neither was accused, the incident put an end to their act."

See the difference? One logline makes you want to read the screenplay and the other, ehh. If you can build an open hook into your logline like the first logline in this example, I think you're halfway to getting your script taken seriously. People want to know what really happened. The second logline reveals pretty much the same premise but there is no hook. It's just flat.

I'm gonna go rework my logline. I suggest you do the same.

Feminine Mode Movies

I recently listened to Screenwriting for Hollywood by Michael Hauge. About two and a half hours into the program, Michael provides a "gift" for his listeners: His concept of Feminine Mode Movies.

To understand feminine mode movies, you must understand masculine mode movies. The good news is you already do. 95% of Hollywood movies are masculine mode movies. Masculine mode movies are defined by the hero's outer motivation. The specific, visible goal with a clearly defined end point. The goal we as the audience are rooting for the hero to accomplish. We know that once this goal has been accomplished, or the hero has died trying, the movie is over. The primary objective in a masculine mode movie is to establish an hierarchy - to come out on top, beat the bad guy, to finish first.

The primary objective of the feminine mode movie is to resolve an imbalance or conflict in a non-romantic relationship (winning romantic love is a masculine mode goal). Michael Hauge uses Postcards from the Edge as an example of feminine mode movies. Postcards is about a troubled actress trying to resolve her relationship with her show business mother. Her outer motivation is to stay with her mother so she can finish the film she is acting in but this is simply an excuse to put the characters together so they are forced to confront one another and attempt to resolve their imbalanced, conflicting relationship.

I don't know if I buy any of this either. Sounds like the difference between a plot driven movie and a character driven movie. I think the idea deserves exploration if only to further understand why some character driven movies do well with audiences and others do not so well.

QT's Diary

Quentin Tarantino's Diary. What do you think?

Up and Running

After much fucking around with iBlog and BlogWave Studio, I finally decided to throw in the towel on hosting my blog on my .Mac account and use Blogger. I just couldn't tweak the templates enough in the other apps to get things the way I like it. Plus I'm too fucking cheap to pay the shareware fees.

The point of this blog will become apparent to you as it becomes apparent to me. My intentions are to chronicle my journey to complete my first feature screenplay, market it to Hollywood, and finally make enough money to be able to pay for some of the hacked shareware on my hard disk.

Let's begin, shall we?