23 - spoiler warning!

I found this movie extremely well done and it stuck out as something different due to the playful scenes in the fictional world of the protagonist.

Note: the explaination after the climax is sort of needed - I'm sure it will be bashed for hand-holding the audience. After the wild ride through the story, twists, turns, and leads everywhere, the audience needs that slap in the face of a climax then guided walk through what just happened. It's the "click" for the audience ... what makes them realize - "ooooh. i get it".

This might occur a little before the hand holding if you're a savvy movie-goer and reader when the wife opens the box revealing her husband's name on the front - but for the rest of us - the summarization of the whole is needed and welcome.

The eerie tale centers with this dog that gives the audience a steady uncomfortable feeling - was it the devil? was it God? What ever it was - it seemed to me that it was a little more than just a dog who witnessed the murder years ago.

Overall the movie was something new for the audience, Jim, and genre. As a DIY filmmaker, I can't help but think that the marketing department didn't take enough advantage of the title and promotion opportunies it offered - I can imagine the number 23 everywhere ... they needed a street team to sticker everything!

Anyway, good movie!

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Bridge to Terabithia

Katherine Paterson's emotional childrens book was adapted very well by Jeff Stockwell and Katherine's son, David Paterson. Like the book, the story deals with two friend's adventures in the imaginary land of Terabithia where anything can happen. The life of Jesse Aarons reveals that he is a misfit character at home with the use of two bickering teen sisters and seemingly preoccupied parents as well as at school due to the school bullies that constantly pick on him and a music teacher he has a crush on.

The imaginative aspects of the story brought the audience back to when they were a kid playing make-believe in their backyard or fort they had built due to the realistic portrayal of how the imagination can work between two people. Unlike the trailer, which marketed the movie as more of a Narnia type adventure story, this really stuck close to the book and echoed the themes and lessons Paterson told years ago in the classic book.

The only problem I personally had with the movie was the ending. The reason I balked at it was because it felt alien when Jesse brings his little sister to Terabitha and makes her princess. It wasn't their story ... it was the friendship between Jesse and Leslie - but as time only tells, obviously the story is a classic because the author knew what she was doing. The imaginative creatures, most of which the audience has never seen before, reveal themselves in applause as the little sister enters and the audience wonders, "why?" The audience wasn't pulled from their seats in applause with the characters, like when watching the ending of Titanic, because the audience didn't care about the little sister as much as they cared about Jesse and Leslie. The audience wanted Jesse to see Leslie one last time in Terabithia, after all, it would be nice to know that she will live on forever in Jesse's imagination, as told in Finding Neverland. In conclusion, this movie is self-contained, well adapted, and climaxes fine when Jesse's Dad hugs him in comfort in Terabithia after Leslie's death ... but the movie keeps running in efforts of avoiding a downer ending. All I have to say about that is that it seems to have worked for the book, now known as a classic, and made the story different and well-heard because of it.

Christopher
www.ScriptDig.com

Norbit: A Review

Written By
Christopher
ScriptDig.com

The movie was a simple, fun, Friday night movie worth a few good laughs. It’s not to be taken seriously and its characters are dramatically exaggerated for comedic effect. The screenplay is an average romantic comedy with it’s up and down rollercoaster ride between the three main characters which keeps the audience holding on tight and rooting for Norbit.

This movie seemed to end a couple times which leads the audience into thinking the film is long – but it’s average. The film opens with the perfect image for the entire movie, reflecting the director’s talent, of a baby Norbit being thrown from a speeding vehicle in front of Mr. Wong’s … which reminds me, for those who don’t know, Eddie Murphy actually plays three characters in this movie!

The second act certainly puts Norbit in the tree of story and throws rocks at him. His wife, Rasputia is impossible to deal with and even breaks Norbit’s heart, which fuels the audience to laugh at the ‘fat jokes’ though out the movie as a way of saying ‘it’s okay to laugh … she’s really mean.”

Those who liked The Nutty Professor will enjoy Eddie’s new starring to the third power movie. Norbit’s a great guy and easy to root for. Check out the previous article and read about the Sea of Emotions including: sympathy, empathy, and antipathy - all of which drive Norbit's screenplay.

SEA of emotions: or Sympathy, Empathy, & Antipathy

Written By
Christopher Rice
ScriptDig.com

Norbit provides the audience with a trio-performance by Eddie Murphy as well as a great example of sympathy and antipathy. From a writer’s point of view, it’s you job to supply the audience with a character that presents empathy, sympathy, or antipathy or a combination of the three. This is how to get your readers invested with your characters and fuse together in an emotional bond. By doing this, you create a link where then readers can feel the conflict and worry about what’s at stake.

In case you’re not sure what sympathy is, lets look at an example from Norbit:
As a grown man, Norbit takes abuse and harassment like your car’s engine in Hollywood’s traffic. His wife, even goes as far as cheating on him then reprimands him for even thinking she would do such a thing. This is a great example of empathy: First it creates a situation everyone can identify with and second, it allows the reader to step into their shoes an imagine what they would do. This is empathy.

Sympathy on the other hand can be seen in Forrest Gump when Momma defends Forrest as they walk down the street for the first time with braces on his legs and are starred upon. The reader feels bad for the poor kid … but doesn’t imagine what they would do in that situation. That’s sympathy.

Antipathy should be reserved for your antagonist and for the rare occation that a character looses their grip in a situation and reveals their inner thoughts or motivations, as seen in “Meet the Fockers” when Gaylord is drugged to tell the truth and he spills his thoughts about his mother-in-law, his wife, and his past … and the audience hates him for that.
But for a broad example of antipathy, look at any major antagonist of a film. Lead Nazi in Schindler’s List, the Emperor in Star Wars, and Voldemort from the Harry Potter Series are all extreme examples of characters the audience feels antipathy while watching or reading.

Combining these emotionally pulls allows the reader to get involved, pick sides, and root for your antagonist. Remember, Captain Jack Sparrow? He’s another breed. Though the audience sees him as the coolest pirate of all time, some of his actions force the audience to feel antipathy instead of sympathy. This is a fine example of a trickster character getting the best of the characters and the audience – you never know which side he;s on, therefore, you question yourself and switch sides throughout the story until you realize what his true character is and where he stands in the big picture.

Try identifying these types of emotions next time you see a movie and define how a character makes you feel. One thing to watch out for when writing is to write a feel-sorry-for-me character whom mopes around and forces the audience into feeling bad for them … that’s cheap and ineffective because the only emotion you’ll inject into the reader with that character is frustration and anger. Take note of how family, co-workers, and friends make you feel as an audience, friend, and character in your story – it’s a great exercise.

COLLATERAL

By Christopher Rice

The super-thriller, not to be mistaken for super-natural thriller, released 2004 but viewing it last night gave me the chills, raised my blood pressure, and formed beads of sweat on my cheeks.

This film is absolutely one of the best urban movies in a long time. It places two opposites together in a tight little space for the entire movie. But unlike phonebooth, the characters do manage to escape the taxi here and there providing a great sense of the Los Angeles area as well as development between the two lead characters.

Tom's character is intense, fierce, and dangerous and the performance is reflects this description. The characters conflict spawns from their differences in philosophical perspective and ultimately creates a turning point for Foxx' character in the third act.

If you haven't seen it, see it. Especially if you're a screenwriter because there are endless examples of character driven action. Additionally, it reveals how to pin all forces, both good and evil, against your lead protagonist through the use of misunderstandings due to smart planning on the antagonists part.

Writing your First Screenplay: or Self Portrait

Written By
Christopher Rice
ScriptDig.com

As a script reader, I’ve read a lot of material from seasoned, represented, and first-time writers. Of the three, you might be able to imagine which group submitted the best written of the material. But the topic of this article is neither the seasoned nor the represented writer. I’d like to talk about most of us struggling to write solid material destined for the screen. I’m talking about the first-time writer and their material.

The more I read from different first-time writers, the more I realize that first-time writers tend to write very personal material. In other words, we write not only what we know, which is ourselves, but we write what we’d like to share with people. With my first screenplay, I wrote about two of my best friends and myself going out on a sea adventure along with the main character, Casey Jones. It was very fun to write but I realize now that by including myself in that adventure, I distracted my writing focus from the main character in order to execute the best representation of what my childhood with my two best friends was really like. And as a first screenplay, I made peace with what I did and moved on.

But it was only until tonight while my flight was descending into San Francisco that I realized most first-time writers write what’s close to them … and most of the time it’s themselves. They, like myself, write themselves into the material in order to tell people something they want audiences to know about them. For me, it was my childhood. For others, it’s their professional life, their family life, or even their darkest secrets. So as I continued to read this particular screenplay, I knew that the writer made their first mistake, as I had, when they decided to include themselves into the action. Let me just say that like everything else in the movie business, there are exceptions. Take Adaptation for example; Charlie Kauffman wrote himself as the main character in his screenplay actually adapting a book for the screen. This is an exception because it’s sort of the sequel to Being John Malcovich as an industry inside joke where real professionals are in the material.

I guess for many, including myself, it just needs to happen and then you neek to move on. Screenwriters that read books that inform that writing should be very personal and the best screenplays are always reflective of the writer shouldn’t make the mistake of writing their life verbatim. Work that reflects it’s creator usually reflects in a minor way that establishes the creator over time. Over a period of ten years, a writer might have a body of work that continues to use a similar theme. This can only be viewed from a long-lens of time.

So for those of you interested in writing personal work, remember that personal stories don’t always have to be YOUR story. Don’t be the writer who writes their life’s story with a protagonist who is constantly put in situations that make the reader feel sorry for them. If you want readers to feel sorry for you then you should carry around a sign that reads: I’m abused, I’m neglected, Etc.

Believe me, readers will know when they’re reading a screenplay mean to be sold and a screenplay meant to expose the writer. If you want to be noticed that you should choose another profession because writers go even more unnoticed than editors!