Soderbergh: "Maybe everything is just fine, but ..."

Steven Soderbergh's speech at the SF Film Society a few days ago made quite a splash. He initially didn't want it released but gave in to many requests - 40m video clips and transcripts are up now and have flooded the web. Watched it ... big whoop.

Stick around, Steven

Click here for the full transcript (the actual video's below). Overall he's mainly talking about the old "business vs. art" thing ... as if Hollywood hadn't always been show business. There's been much talk about his bowing out - I think he should stick around and help to revolutionize the system. Well, here are a few of the quotes from the speech that I thought were worth picking up on:

Soderbergh: "So that’s sort of the hum that I’m talking about and I mention this because I think it’s having an effect on all of us. It’s having an effect on our culture, and I think it’s having an effect on movies. How they’re made, how they’re sold and how they perform."

• Of course films are a reflection of the times we live in - look at any of the bygone decades. That's where we are, that's the reality - this reality will of course color the films we make, they will be colored by our experiences, by our upbringing, by our evolving culture. The "hum" he's talking about, is something they'll see in the films made in our times. That's neither good nor bad, it simply is.

Soderbergh: "So what I finally decided was …art is simply inevitable. It was on the wall of a cave in France 30,000 years ago, and it’s because we are a species that’s driven by narrative. Art is storytelling, and we need to tell stories to pass along ideas and information, and to try and make sense out of all this chaos."

• "Art is storytelling", yes. And storytelling will remain essential, always. Hollywood - the studio system - is just one of the many channels we can and should use to share our stories.

Soderbergh: "... a movie is something you see, and cinema is something that’s made."

• The way Soderbergh continues on this he suggests that "movies" are mainstream and less worthy, whereas "cinema" is what studios don't want, artistic expression. Baloney in my view. Call it cinema, film, movie, whatever - some of what he would call "movies" are absolute classics of filmmaking - popcorn mainstream and all. Some of what he'd call "cinema" is "auteur film" - directorial visions with no regard for an audience (and hence, no audience). This is pure semantics - it is about film as the storytelling medium, pure and simple.

Soderbergh: " ... the problem is that cinema as I define it, and as something that inspired me, is under assault by the studios and, from what I can tell, with the full support of the audience. The reasons for this, in my opinion, are more economic than philosophical, but when you add an ample amount of fear and a lack of vision, and a lack of leadership, you’ve got a trajectory that I think is pretty difficult to reverse."

• No doubt everyone in the film industry would agree. Probably even studio executives would do so (on condition of anonymity, of course). It's always easier to keep doing what you've been doing - what studios do is understandable, if unfortunate. But "difficult to reverse" means it's possible - someone like Soderbergh, instead of bowing out, should use all his clout to open new doors from without and within. He goes on to say that the pie for independents is shrinking more and more (despite the fact that they make a lot more movies and the studios almost 30% less) ... so fight for the pie, even the odds, find new ways - that's absolutely worth fighting for. He references Steve Jobs ... maybe Soderbergh could find those new ways and be the Steve Jobs of filmmaking - someone who's revolutionized the system. Now that'd be something worth sticking around for, wouldn't it, Steven?

Soderbergh: "There are fewer and fewer executives that know movies. So it can become a very strange situation. I mean, I know how to drive a car, but I wouldn’t presume to sit in a meeting with an engineer and tell him how to build one, which is what you feel like when you’re in these meetings. You’ve got people who don’t know movies, don’t watch movies for pleasure, deciding what movie you’re going to be allowed to make. That’s one reason studio movies aren’t better than they are, and that’s one reason that cinema, as I’m defining it, is shrinking."

• If that's the case, that's unacceptable. Any studio executive should have a proven love for film. Best way would probably to have them be tested by Quentin Tarantino. If an exec can successfully go film-lore-toe-to-toe with QT - he's allowed to stick around.

Soderbergh: " ... in my view, in this business, which is totally talent-driven, it’s about horses, not races. I think, if I were to run a studio, I’d just be gathering the best filmmakers I could find and sort of let them do their thing within certain economic parameters."

• Nice thought - personally I've always liked the old studio system. Sounds like he would see it going back to the 30-50s. But in this day and age? The system would have to be restructured completely. More likely would be that the Soderberghs of the industry all set up their own value chains from production to distribution to actual cinemas.

Soderbergh: "... why are you always remaking the famous movies? Why aren’t you looking back into your catalog and finding some sort of programmer that was made 50 years ago that has a really good idea in it, that if you put some fresh talent on it, it could be really great. Of course, in order to do that you need to have someone at the studio that actually knows those movies."

• If studios don't have such people on board, they should definitely go with Soderbergh's idea. Good old TV and B-movie mining would net them a wealth of ideas with huge potential.

Loitering with intent

Haven't blogged in a while, haven't written in a while - been busy living life. From a casual observer's point of view it might have seemed like a writer doing everything BUT writing ... but writing is far more than the actual sitting down and typing. Have I been goofing off? Hell no.

"Loitering with intent" - the title of Peter O'Toole's autobiography ... love the sentiment. It may appear like loitering - but you bet there is intent. In the case of the writer, there's a variety of productive non-writing - lemme see what I've been up to:

1. Think-walking: This German dude named Friedrich Nietzsche used to say something like "I never trust a thought that didn't come by walking." Well - if you're a working writer, you know all about that. If you're a newbie, learn to trust the walks. Let your mind roam while you walk and things will happen - important things - things you'll be writing down once you're back home. Mind you - there's great dictation apps by now - I occasionally use them, too. But most often I just talk to the forest, to the wind, to the dog, as I walk through nature. And these walks are currently fuelling two of my current projects.

2. Percolating: Loitering with intent is also trusting yourself - trusting that your ideas are percolating. I used to worry - about story, about time, about deadlines - not anymore. I trust. I know that the percolator is switched on at all times. I can practically hear it like the sound of that classic Italian coffee machine, bubbling, slowly, as if lazily. But it's steady, it's happening, it's coming. And when you know your percolator, you know when it's time to put it all on paper.

3. Networking: You know what I mean - the other 50% of a professional writer. Been doing my bits, connecting with producers, reading offered material, following up on emails, highlighting and curating stuff in this blog and on Twitter as @DMEckhart. Sell yourself - not your art, but show your very existence! Let the film world know that you're here and once they notice you - make sure they don't forget you. Social media may seem like goofing off to some, but for writers it's essential in my view. Strut your stuff, be there, participate, matter, help, show your worth and it'll ripple out into the world and it'll come back to you.

So, while not yet crafting the next actual script, three projects are percolating, bubbling, building in my head and in my notes ... loitering with intent, indeed!

Kubrick's Napoleon ... the greatest movie never made?

Back in 1968, after completion of "2001: A Space Odyssey", Stanley Kubrick turned to the story of Napoleon with the intent of turning it into a monumental historical costume drama... well, it never happened - but the script exists and it's definitely worth reading.

Kubrick was a perfectionist, well known to immerse himself completely. In the case of Napoleon, he researched for years, visited locations, hired historians who built up a card catalogue detailing every day of Napoleon's life - who was with him and why, who he ate with, who he slept with and and and ... the extent of Kubrick's massive mounds of research is on display in a beautiful book that was published in 2011 (actually, I just may have to get it for myself - sounds like a special treat).

Here's a fascinating Telegraph article that details how Stanley Kubrick and Anthony Burgess (writer of A Clockwork Orange) tried to bring forward a unique telling of Napoleon's life by following the symphonic structure of Beethoven's Eroica (listen in)... alas, it wasn't meant to be. 

What Burgess eventually delivered wasn't what Kubrick wanted and what writer-Kubrick wrote in the form of the screenplay didn't really seem to satisfy director-Kubrick either. According to Wikipedia et al what really doomed the project was mostly that the costs of filming on locations with tens of thousands were expected to be prohibitive and that the risks of such a massive costume drama falling flat at the box office were too big.

Now - I've read the script and, especially if you're a fresh writer, I'd urge you to read it as well. As you read it, try and forget that Stanley Kubrick wrote it. It's just pages, just words, just a story - it should work on its own. Ask yourself, does it?

>>> Straight to the script! 

My reading experience was quite interesting. Yes, it is about the life of Napoleon and Kubrick depicts it as he had planned from beginning to end, boyhood to death. It definitely isn't the greatest movie never made. The script is well executed but linear and episodic, strung together with the traditional narrator's voice. A fairly uninspired choice. The scenes are properly executed, i.e. they have clarity of purpose, they exist for a solid reason... but there's nothing that remains in my mind as extraordinary, surprising beyond what I'd expect from a Napoleon story. 

Interesting for fresh writers is also to see that Kubrick breaks quite a few rules that you, as a beginning writer, are told to remember and follow at all times. Fact is, you need to know the rules - and you need to learn that sometimes breaking them can be the perfect thing to do to suck the reader into your script. Nuff said - read the damn thing - it's movie history (even if it was never made) - you'll have fun and you'll learn a thing or two.

>>> More great stuff with Kubrick's personal notes at Cinephilia and Beyond

Island of Dr. Moreau - a few of Brando's notes

I've discovered the 2nd draft of Marlon Brando's personal script for "The Island of Dr. Moreau on an auction website. The buyer will of course get the full joys of Brando's undoubtedly psychadelic insights - but heck, we can at least partake of the few freely available jpegs.

The 1996 version of The Island of Dr. Moreau was a troubled production - and that's what it'll probably be rememered for. Well, that and Brando's interesting acting and outfit choices ... The few notes below, written by Brando in red ink, are from the 1994 draft.

On Reddit, a few voices came together around this content - interesting read since some of the commenters were connected with the production > read the comments here

On the front it says the following: "Dio -- By craft + stealth" ... "Make speech about inability to invent religeous [sic], political, military, economic, philosophical ethics. Most destructive animal that ever evolved women are different are life protectors. Animals are not the problem humans are and virises [sic] as well. We will either find a solution to male ferocity. or we will find our graves in the poisoned snow of a dead planet. I have sacrificed everything I have on this earth. I see myself as a soldier of the mind, and death holds only a sliver of fear for me -- my work is my life." 

And now - if you're ready for a bit of freakish entertainment - here's the trailer:

Serendipity strikes at the Berlinale

"Serendipity" - the faculty of making fortunate discoveries by accident. Good ole lady luck... Screenwriting Principle #7 clearly states "Network. You'll never have a career if you don't get out there." All too often I fall into the trap of ignoring #7 ... but this past weekend at the Berlinale 2013 was a reminder of just important it is.

I wasn't even planning on attending the Berlinale - happened to be in Berlin for another reason. In fact, I was so far off on my own track I wasn't even aware that the Berlinale was happening just at that very same time! Serendipity. Found out by accident and things began to roll.

This past weekend I've ended up enjoying receptions and parties, ran into director and writer friends of mine, met with producers, distributors and actors and had an all around amazing time. An old project suddenly began to bubble up. An agent friend of mine spotted me and called out loud, the moment he saw me, "Daniel! I just pitched you yesterday!"

I've said it before I'll say it again - and again - network! Don't be the schlump I've been this past while. Mind you, I have been writing, but still - there are always moments. Times when we need to stop writing, get some fresh air - network! The moment you do, things happen. Sometimes not right away, as with the aforementioned old project. But networking started it and networking brought it back to the surface. Get out there, meet people, things - will - happen.

Screenwriting Principle #7 rocks (as do the others, of course, like that particular favorite of mine, #2 :-) ... click here for more on the Screenwriting Principles.

A few Harrison Ford annotated "Raiders" script pages

Found these pages buried in Google images - some lucky (and wealthy) person aquired the complete heavily annotated "Raiders of the Lost Ark" script, by non other than Indy himself, for a 100'000 bucks. Well - here's a least a few glimpes.

Harrison Ford apparently used this script throughout filming. Notes range from single words to complete pages of writing and cover all aspects of the film making process, ranging from dialogue alterations and questions about the plot to suggestions and perspectives used to create the iconic character of “Indiana Jones”.

These are all the pages I've come across. But heck, if this has given you an appetite to dive deeper into the world behind the film - here's the Making Of - part 1 and 2:

The 5 key things every story needs

According to script guru Michael Hauge, there are five key elements any story needs.

A classic hero's journey

He argues that every story has a far greater chance of ever being turned into a film and reaching an audience if these universally applicable elements are there. I think he makes some interesting observations on why the Hollywood-style of storytelling works across the globe... Here's the transcript - below that the 4min YouTube clip:

Transcript of script chat with Michael Hauge:

"... The key things that any story has to have if it's going to be a movie, if it's going to have a chance of being produced, of reaching an audience:

1. The first is, it's gotta have a hero. It's gotta have a protagonist, somebody we're rooting for, some main character who's driving that story, who's the focus of our attention.
2. The second thing - we have to empathize with that character. We have to put ourselves inside that character psychologically. So we like them, or we feel sorry for them or we worry about them - but in some way we become that character on a psychological level.
3. The third thing - the character has to be pursuing some goal, some desire. That hero has to desperately want something. Desperately want it, not just mildly want it.
4. Fourth - it has to seem impossible to get. There has to be conflict, because the goal of any movie ultimately and the thing that makes a successful movie successful is - it creates an emotional experience for the audience. That's what you gotta do as a writer or a filmmaker. And the emotion primarily grows out of conflict. So the bigger the obstacles you throw in your hero's way, the more emotion there's gonna be.
5. And the fifth quality is courage. You want to write stories where, whatever the hero wants, in order to get it they have to put everything on the line. In a thriller their putting their lives on the line - or in an action movie. But it might not be that. But it might be their sense of who they are, their own identity, or risking embarrassment or rejection or something that they've been afraid of. But they have to risk a great deal.

I think if any one of those is missing from a story idea or a script, it has a very very slim chance of getting made, let alone reaching an audience. Because, I guarantee, cause I've done it, if you look at the top 100 movies of every year - take away the documentaries and stuff - although most good documentaries have those qualities, too, actually - but for fictional films you look at the top 100 coming worldwide at the box office - every one will have those five qualities.

What my belief is, except for maybe Indian cinema in India, Hollywood filmmaking is the most popular in the world. I recently, before coming here, I looked at the box office returns in Sweden for the last few years and, in any given week, there's always a Swedish movie or two in the top ten, it's usually not number one - but most of the movies are the same movies in about the same position they were in in the United States when they were released there.

And I don't think it's just because Hollywood has more money to spend. Because some of those popular Hollywood movies have budgets that are no bigger than Swedish movies or Australian movies or whatever. I think it's because Hollywood has developed a set of principles of storytelling that really reach the mass audience effectively.

And because we've been watching Hollywood movies for over a hundred years, it's also molded the  expectations of the audience worldwide. So given that those principles have proven the most successful at reaching the mass audience - then I'm comfortable saying that that's what I bring to the party. I have found that, certainly in seeing the Swedish films I've seen, or the Australian films, there's certainly cultural differences. There's certainly tonal differences. There's different subject matter. Humor is different in different places, somewhat. But again, I'm not really, my expertise is not in what those differences are.

And what I do with the lecture that I'm doing here - or whenever I lecture in a country other than the US, it's pretty much the same lecture, because I say - If you can take these principles and apply them to your story idea, even if the idea might be uniquely Swedish - ehm, it's about a celebration, a holiday that isn't celebrated anywhere but Sweden, that's fine. But the principles on how you create empathy, the principles of structure, the principles of what makes a love story work or not work - those are universal."

Script guru Michael Hauge on the hero's journey

After about a decade spent in the marvelously mad world of screenwriting, you'll know all the terms, you'll know about structure, you'll know what they want to hear in meetings and you'll know how to get it across. 

Prime example of the hero's journey

After the second decade (as is the case with me), all of the above is pretty much internalized - you don't think about it anymore, it's become part of who you are. You're also in a place where you'll want to go your own creative ways, challenge yourself, break a few rules - and you can do all of that because you know the essentials inside out.

But as a beginner all that stuff, the books, the seminars, the workshops, the dos and don'ts - it can seriously wear you down and/or scare you off. Here's a few thoughts that'll hopefully encourage you to NOT quit (at least not before you've given it a decade or so).

And below's a series of roughly 4min clips by script guru Michael Hauge. I have to admit he pisses me off right off the bat - his first words are "The first 10% ..." - and you'll see he structures it all very  concretely. I can't stand numbers and I most certainly don't think of scripts in percentages ... but you need to realize that the man's got a point - it's a business and if producers think in percentages, it is essential that you understand and speak their language, too.

So view the clips, they're sound - and what I particularly like - they lead you through the theory of the hero's journey with the concrete example of "The Firm". So watch, take from it what you can and then get back to writing!

Stage 1 and Turning Point 1

Stage 2 and Turning Point 2

Stage 3 and Turning Point 3

Stage 4 and Turning Point 4

Stage 5, Turning Point 5 and Stage 6

It's all about the twist and the turn

I've said it before and I'll say it again - screenwriting is easy. All you need is a few basics, discipline, stamina and a passion for film ... and then just remember to never, ever, bore the audience. What that comes down to is simply twists and turns.

Read the books, go to seminars, attend the workshops, by all means. Every guru has a bit of something useful to impart. But all they do is, in the end, give you the basics in a thousand different forms. They give you names for everything and put a larger meaning into every single step you might possibly consider taking. All of those elements wear you down and all of those names and explanations weigh you down. Your potential script becomes this artistic monster if you choose to believe them, if you choose to take all of what they say on board.

The monster will stare at you, stare you down, scare you. You'll wait, you'll put your story on hold, you're not ready. You haven't yet mastered this or understood that. When you write your script, you want it to live up to everything they preach, you'll want it to be perfect. And all of that sets you up for failure. Here's what you should do:

Stop all of the above.

Don't try to measure up with your script. Don't try to live up to other films, other voices, other writers. Don't try to describe and analyze everything. Forget about all of those fancy words - screw the climaxes (hell, lousy pun intended, sue me), tell that reversal to kiss your ass, kick the shit out of beats and the sequences, choke the inciting incident, shoot mid-point right between the eyes and take the chainsaw to the hero's journey. Okay, seriously now, all I'm saying is, don't let all of that stuff strangle your creativity.

Back to my statement: "Never bore the audience". That's it. In a nutshell. Whatever stage of your story you're in - be creative, be inventive. Whatever the fancy word, and that includes the ever portent "subtext", of course, they all come down to "twists and turns". Every subplot, every layered line - they're all surprises built into your tale. So - whatever you write, regardless of genre - surprise your audience, keep them guessing, deliver but in unexpected ways. That's what it comes down to. Period.

Whether your story will be good is a whole different matter - but at the very least you will have written something that didn't bore the audience. That's more than can be said for a great many films - so snap to it - TWIST AND TURN!

All hail to King Java!

If coffee didn't exist, yes, we writers would drink something else. But it does exist and countless cups of java have helped me through countless drafts over the course of 20+ years of screenwriting.

As the meme suggests, those treasured mounds of coffee don't exactly make us emerge from our writing caves smelling like roses. But when we do emerge, we often do so victoriously - with another bit of dialogue nailed, another scene cracked, another draft completed. So, thank you Coffee! And a mighty thanks to all our loved ones who put up with us!

Wishing everyone an amazingly successful 2013!