The Writing Week part 35

Where does the time go? We're (all) 35 weeks into 2008, and 2009 is quickly approaching. I've recently felt myself racing toward anonymity faster than I have been in the past. There's a certain drive people need to have to succeed in this field, and while I feel it often, it just hasn't been there recently. Months ago, I vowed to actually make something happen in 2008 - to do as much as I could toward getting my screenwriting career off the ground.

I intend to devote myself to that for the remaining 17 weeks.

This weekend, I reread my post-Apocalyptic spec. I was pretty pleased with what I read, to be honest. I was uncomfortable last time I sent it out to someone, but out of the entire draft, there were only two scenes that I considered re-working, and they're not even necessary re-writes I considered. This week, I'll be sending the latest draft to a former board member of the company I work for. He (the board member) used to do a lot of television writing, still writes occasionally, and has an agent. I'm not hoping to get in through his agent (though of course if things go that way, that'd be nice), but I am hoping to get some feedback from a working writer who is not my professor. Since getting out of school, I've had little contact with working writers, and I'm curious to see what he says about my script.

Ideally, obviously, I hope he likes it, as the next step for me is to send out query letters. However, if he doesn't like the script, hopefully he'll provide insight into what he feels isn't working, and I'll save face by not sending an incomplete script out to agents and whatnot. Bottom line is this: September, I'm taking the reigns. You will work for me. In exchange, I'll find my motivation once again. I'll work for me, too.

Trailer Trash IX: Color Me Blood Red (1965)

"This is Adam, and this is a story of Adam and EVIL."

Before you check out this delightful little Herschell Gordon Lewis trailer, pour yourself a drink. Take a gulp whenever the narrator reminds you that this is just a movie, or repeats the title of the film:



Drunk? Can you even still stand?

This is just a movie.
This is just a movie.
THIS IS JUST A MOVIE.
FOR THE LOVE OF GOD
THIS IS JUST A MOVIEEEEE
THIS ISSSSSS JUST A MOVIE
I GET IT ALREADY
Color Me Blood Red.
Color Me Blood Red.
Color Me oh good god...

The plot for this one is standard Gordon Lewis fare: a psycho killer uses blood as paint in his art. Shot on little to no budget, gory as all get-out... you know the deal.

Favorite moments, outside of the non-stop repetition:

0:01 - The first ten seconds of the trailer are a guy's twitchy eyes. Real selling point.
0:22 - And here come 12 seconds of a close-up of fire. Does anything happen in this movie?
0:45 - "A blood-spattered study in the mawcarb"... has anyone heard it pronounced that way before?
0:56 - And another 25 seconds of that same fire-closeup. I'm convinced that this movie is mostly shots of things burning gently.


Movie poster via (the AMAZING) Wrong Side of the Art.

Color. Me. Blood. Red. Color. Me. Blood. Red. Color. Me. Blood. Red. Color. Me. Blood. Red.

Remember, guys. It's just a movie.

A few fall previews...

Summer is (sadly) coming to a quick end. Autumn, at least, will bring new television and lots of great-looking movies. Here's a quick-n-dirty roundup of related links:

TV Writer Ken Levine's hilarious fall movie preview. (Part II is here - check back for the third installment, but really, you should be subscribing to this already.)



The first part of The Onion's fall TV preview.

The Writing Week part 34

Not much writing this week. At all.

I started working on a short for that Hotel Guignol thing earlier this week, but as I was relaying my idea for it to Onyx )damn that Onyx) he told me that it sounded exactly like that movie 1402, or whatever that Sam L. Jackson thing was. I've never seen 1402 beyond the trailers, and I didn't know much about it - I think I knew it took place in a hotel. Other than that, I knew bubkes about it. Apparently, I also knew everything about it, as, little did I know, I was pretty much writing the condensed version of it.

It's funny how that can happen - all of a sudden, your great, original idea is not so original, and perhaps not so great. The basic premise behind my post-Apocalyptic spec, much to my horror, my just used as a spoof trailer in a comedy. The fact that it was a spoof was discouraging on two levels: 1) people were making fun of it, undercutting the seriousness with which I treated it, and 2) it was my "original" idea, my hook, my big break. Now, not so much. To top that string of unfortunate discoveries off, Onxy (damn you again, Onyx) had to remind me of a script a mentor of his is lending him to read, which essentially rips two of my ideas from me. Two scripts now "been done" by this, as-of-yet -unmade movie.

Ok, ok, that's a bit dramatic. Ideas get done, they get repeated. Afterall, aren't we taught that there are only like 10 real stories anyway? The point, though, is that what I thought to be my hooks suddenly aren't that unique. I know it's to be expected, but, come on, this many of them? All at one time? I can still take solace in the knowledge that I came up with these ideas on my own, uninspired by any of the - what skeptics might call - "source material." It still sucks, though, and I can't help but wonder if I've just gone back to Go without being able to collect my $200.

Trailer Trash VIII: The Video Dead (1987)

"Don't you find it a little creepy, living in the murder-house?"


Watching this trailer, you have to wonder if the makers of the original "The Ring" saw this, with all of the scenes of monsters crawling out of televisions? I can't imagine this would have ever been exported to Japan, though, but who knows. I'm sure Japan appreciates stupid as much as we do.

The movie itself is just as bad as it looks in the trailer. A demonic TV is delivered to a house - it only shows a gory zombie movie when it's turned on, and if you leave it on too long the colorful cast of zombies will come out of the TV and after you. The zombie bride is probably my favorite, though there's no explanation of why she's wearing a wedding dress.

I'm going to give away a few spoilers here, because the ending is so priceless that it's worth mentioning. A few teenagers, trapped by the zombies at the very end of the movie, throw a dance party to show the zombies they're not afraid of them. The zombies, dismayed by the teenagers' lack of fear, give up their rampage and go back into the TV. Yes, that's really how the movie ends. I haven't seen this movie since I was maybe 13, but the ridiculous ending remains burned into my memory.

Favorite moments:

At 0:40- No, no - don't open the washing machine! AAAAAAAGGGGGGGGGHHHHHHHHH!
At 1:05- Zombie David Bowie?

"[It] may change the way you feel about your televison... forever!"

Korean Film Fes!

For all you living in the New York City, it’s time for the

2008 New York Korean Film Festival!
August 22-31
Cinema Village and BAMcinematek
http://www.koreanfilmfestival.org/2008

They will be playing 14 feature films that cover everything from horror-romance to sports drama to chefs facing off and good old bare-knuckled action flick. They are also showing 3 short films program. So, if you got a few hours to spare the next two weeks, come and join the fun!

Hi Ho, Hi Ho, It's Off to Work We Go....

Some time back in March or April I was suddenly inspired to write a fantasy romance action movie. My main goal was to write something that'll appeal to the pre-teen/ teen girls. I wanted to create the same feeling girls get after seeing Kate & Leopold, except instead of "sigh...I want a 19th century Duke as a boyfriend", change that to "sigh...I want a thief from a distant land as a boyfriend."

Both the rough draft and first draft got very positive response from my female readers, but they also pointed out that it's a total mess. The structure was in shambles, lots of things didn't make sense. I got some bones but didn't have the flesh. But, through the murky disorderly script, they saw something they liked. Some scenes created the reaction I wanted. That was really all that mattered, since I don't mind fixing up a script as long as it has appeals. The worst that can happen is to write a perfect script, and no one wants to read it. Or just no one wants to your script, period.

The next draft I clarified a lot more of the world. Like writing any fantasy, I pulled out my hair trying to figure out how to get the logic in my head to make sense on page. Or figure out which of the logic in my head doesn't actually make logic sense. I wanted to create a Greek pantheon universe, where the people don't view the gods and rituals as a "religion" but as a way of life. Even after setting up clearer rules and putting in the god's story, my fellow leagues still pointed out a lot of things that didn't make sense, but more than that, I had to fix up my structure. The inciting incident was happening on page 50. Disaster.

I am now on the third draft of the script, and it seems to be the only thing that's going well currently in my life. The inciting incident is happening on pg 15. The end of first act at pg 37. Much closer to the mark. I've really strengthened my antagonists, and I have a clear view of where is this going scene by scene (for the next 30 pages anyway...). On the other hand, I look back and realize that, much of the rough draft is gone. The scenes that I originally wrote for the squeal factor are almost all tossed out to make way for plot-focused scenes. That, or maybe there're still there, I just no longer see it objectively. (I have a bad habit of hating all my jokes after reading it 3 times.) Sometimes I'm afraid that while making it a clearer, better, more professional script, I'm also butchering it. And maybe, the 4th or 5th draft what I have to do is to go back to the very beginning, the original goal, and have my focus for that draft be to make it young and fun again. Not that, er, it's not young and fun now.