Cinematography/Screenwriting Readings

I definitely learned a lot from the readings listed on the blog for this week. I actually spent six and a half hours on Saturday reading most of them, and finished the rest on Sunday. Thinking about it now, I really couldn't have done that if they were not slightly interesting, but they obviously were otherwise I would have given up on them. The article I favored most would have to be the "Premise" article. It's my favorite, but also the scariest. Even now, the question, "What's your premise?" resonates in my head. Two of the notes I jotted down were:

• The premise should be the driving force behind every event in your screenplay.
• If your story does not have a clear premise, it will lack focus and drive.

I guess it's the importance of the premise that scares me. If I don't have a good one, which is foundational to the film itself, my film will be unsuccessful.

I also enjoyed the character development article. This one left me a bit anxious too. I'm no expert in developing characters by any means. I even remember story writing assignments in middle school and some high school, and this has always been a problem for me. I develop them as I write, when I should really develop them first, then write. Not just that, but I also learned that EVERY character must be carefully developed and in detail, not just the protagonist and antagonist.

The readings were great. Those were the two that I enjoyed the most. I did enjoy the basic time structure of a two-hour film. Now, I will be the girl in the theatre timing the first 30 minutes, then the next 90 minutes, and the final 30 of any two-hour film. :)