Vampires And Budgets, Your Screenplay

            Vampires And Budgets


    There is a mega budget feature film world that is dominated by Vampires. Sure they are vampires covered in glitter, but still vampires. There is room in the low budget and micro budget world for vampires to dominate as well.

    When writing your screenplay it is okay to glance at some of the films that are being made and are dominating the competition. If you did not do this you would not be doing your job as a screenwriter. Look to the big budget films and understand that they are mostly dominated by over paid stars and massive special effects.  The low budget counterparts are usually plot and character driven.

    Today we are going to look at the most successful vampire saga in modern history and the best vampire movie produced during the last twenty years and they do have many similarities.

    The most successful is of course the Twilight Saga.

    The best is the amazing low budget foreign film Let the Right One In. Please do not confuse this movie with the watered down and dumbed down Hollywood remake that came out a year after the original.

    Okay both movies are basically love stories. Twilight buries the fact that this is a somewhat creepy relationship between a old old man and a teenage girl. Appearances are all that matter in the universe of this film. Everyone looks good and that is all that counts.

    In Let The Right One In, it is more of the love between two friends than an actual romance. The boy is twelve and is on the verge of being hazed to death by other vicious boys at school. The girl appears to be twelve and since she is a vampire is a great deal older. This character is handle much better than any in the world of twilight. Though there are special effects in this film and because they are far between and amazingly well paced they are far more affective and realistic than those in the mega budget Twilight. The script of this film is so well crafted you never for a moment get that waiting for the next massive explosion that most larger budget horror films give their audiences. The final act of Let The Right One In is about the price of friendship. Both characters have to make sacrifices and take risks for the other. The characters are younger than those in Twilight but are so much more mature in how they interact with their world and the people around them.

    Let The Right One In shows us how plot and character can make up for a massive budget. Your no budget script can be one that stands out from the rest if you focus on the idea that we stick with and stand by characters that we know and can relate to. Hey not everyone has been the outcast, but all most everyone has felt like an outcast at one time or another. The children of Let The Right On In feel more familiar than the Romeo and Juliet like teens of Twilight.

    The no budget screenplay world is usually a world filled with characters who do not have it all together and never will. The character we introduce at the beginning will most likely be just as screwed up at the end of the story with the only difference being that they have someone to share their journey with.  The greatness of Let The Right One In is that the characters only seem to have it together, to have control over the world they occupy when they are together.

    Good luck with your screenplay and remember to try to write something everyday.

Your Screenplay, The Classic Film Lessons

            Your Screenplay, The Classic Film Lessons

    It seems that the majority of film critics agree that the best year ever generated by film makers was the year 1939. At least 10 four star all time classic films were released that year. The Wizard of Oz, Stagecoach, Young Mister Lincoln, Destry Rides Again, The Hunchback of Notre Dame, Wuthering Heights and The Oscar winner that year, Gone With the Wind.

    All of these movies have one thing in common. They are almost pure story from beginning to end. Every scene has value. In movies like Gone With The Wind almost every line of dialogue is there to reveal something about the character who delivers it.

    “How can these movies help me to write my micro budget screenplay?”

    I will go back to what I just told you. These films were pure story. Some had the equal of multi million dollar budgets and some did not. All of them had great story telling at their core. In the low to micro budget world story telling will have to make up for massive special effects and overpaid actors.

    We live in a world where board games become major summer releases. Pointless and plot-less releases that are quickly rejected by the movie viewing public. A great story well told is what we should all aim to produce.

    The problem is that no one knows exactly how to do this because no two people tell a story in exactly the same way. I can suggest things to you, but I cannot give you a special formula that will get it done every time. The best screen writers on earth have written great films and turned around and written something lifeless and boring. You are the writer of your no budget screenplay.

    One of my favorite modern horror movies is Jeepers Creepers. I love the script for that movie. The writer/director of the film based it largely upon the great Universal films of the 1930's and the Creature from the Black Lagoon from the 1950's. My favorite Vampire film of all time  Fright Night (1985) and the movie Disturbia is based upon the Hitchcock classic Rear Window. The writers of these films took lessons from these movies and gave them their own spin.

     Learn to watch classic films in a new way. Not just as a member of an audience, but as a writer. Watch how one sense is connected to another. Study how dialogue is selected to tell you all that you need to know about the characters and their motivations. The greatest scene ever written of this type is in the movie It’s A Wonderful Life.  You find out everything that you will ever need to know about these characters by what they say about themselves and about each other. And it is all done in one minute.  Violet, Mary and George are revealed to us through this little exchange.  Here is a except from the shooting script of It's A Wonderful Life.

 INTERIOR DRUGSTORE —– DAY

MEDIUM SHOT –– George comes in and crosses to an old-fashioned
cigar lighter on the counter. He shuts his eyes and makes a wish:

GEORGE
Wish I had a million dollars.

He clicks the lighter and the flame springs up.

GEORGE (cont'd)
Hot dog!

WIDER ANGLE –– George crosses over to the soda fountain, at which
Mary Hatch, a small girl, is seated, watching him. George goes on
to get his
apron from behind the fountain.

GEORGE (calling toward back room)
It's me, Mr. Gower. George Bailey.

CLOSE SHOT –– Mr. Gower, the druggist, peering from a window in
back room. We see him take a drink from a bottle.

GOWER
You're late.

MEDIUM SHOT –– George behind soda fountain. He is putting on his
apron.

GEORGE
Yes, sir.

WIDER ANGLE –– Violet Bick enters the drugstore and sits on one
of the stools at the fountain. She is the same height as Mary and
the same age, but she is infinitely older in her approach to people.

VIOLET (with warm friendliness)
Hello, George.
(then, flatly, as she sees Mary)

VIOLET
'Lo, Mary.

MARY (primly)
Hello, Violet.

George regards the two of them with manly disgust. They are two
kids to him, and a nuisance. He starts over for the candy
counter.

GEORGE
Two cents worth of shoelaces?

VIOLET
She was here first.

MARY
I'm still thinking.

GEORGE (to Violet)
Shoelaces?

VIOLET
Please, Georgie.

George goes over to the candy counter.

VIOLET (to Mary)
I like him.

MARY
You like every boy.

VIOLET (happily)
What's wrong with that?

GEORGE
Here you are.

George gives Violet a paper sack containing licorice shoelaces.
Violet gives him the money.

VIOLET (the vamp)
Help me down?

GEORGE (disgusted)
Help you down!

Violet jumps down off her stool and exits. Mary, watching, sticks
out her tongue as she passes.

CLOSE SHOT –– George and Mary at fountain.

GEORGE
Made up your mind yet?

MARY
I'll take chocolate.

George puts some chocolate ice cream in a dish.

GEORGE
With coconuts?

MARY
I don't like coconuts.

GEORGE
You don't like coconuts! Say, brainless, don't you know where
coconuts come from? Lookit here –– from Tahiti –– Fiji Islands,
the Coral Sea!

He pulls a magazine from his pocket and shows it to her.

MARY
A new magazine! I never saw it before.

GEORGE
Of course you never. Only us explorers can get it. I've been
nominated for membership in the National Geographic Society.

He leans down to finish scooping out the ice cream, his deaf ear
toward her. She leans over, speaking softly.

CLOSE SHOT –– Mary, whispering.

MARY
Is this the ear you can't hear on? George Bailey, I'll love you
till the day I die.

She draws back quickly and looks down, terrified at what she has
said.

CLOSE SHOT –– George and Mary.



    It has never been done better.  You will know who George is, who Violet is and who Mary is for the rest of the story. George is a dreamer. Mary loves George and Violet is well Violet. Their characters are defined in that one scene.

    Okay that is it for today. Sorry that the post are coming about a month apart, but I am working on a script and it is taking longer than I thought. It always does doesn’t it. Remember to add us to your google plus.

Allowing Your Lead To Lead

            Allow Your Lead to Lead

    I had the opportunity this week to see The Birds on a big screen in a full theater. Because I have seen this movie so often I decided to do two things, to study the film and to study the audience. Hitchcock always talked about what he was trying to do to the audience with his films. I never understood this until now.

    Average movie audience these days talk and chatter and check their phones. In other words they are rude. They believe they are at home. For the first thirty minutes of this movie that is how this audience was and then the ride began to grind into motion. That roller coaster Hitchcock would talk about started up.  The next hour and twenty minutes was dead silence except when Hitchcock wanted his audience to react.

    Hitchcock along with his screenwriter Evan Hunter achieved this in many ways. The way that I want to look at today is through the lead character of the screenplay.

    Melanie Daniels, played by Tippi Hedren, is the first character that we meet. We learn about her through her actions and by the reputation that she had built up over time in the tabloids. She is on  the screen for over 90 percent of the time. She becomes our gateway into this world that is being revealed. She becomes our gateway into the lives that she comes in contact with. Let’s face it they call this character the lead because that is what he or she does. They lead us through the story. What they fear we grow to fear. Who they love we grow to love. If you got a good one then they will make your story so much easier to tell.

    If you have a poor lead or worst you do not know who the lead is then you are probably having a problem with your script. They take you places that you do not wish to go or they talk too much or worst they have nothing to say.

    How do we solve this problem?

    Start over?

    Switch leads?

    Do a rewrite?

    Many of us have done all the above. The advice that you are going to get from me is sit down with your lead character and ask him or her what is it that they want. What is it that they need?  Keep asking questions until you run out of them and if at that time you are still interested in them then and only then should you continue with them as the lead of your story.

    “What if their answers are simple?”

    That would be great. What do you want? To stop these shark attacks, the sheriff in Jaws. What do you want? To get my daughter back, the father in Taken. What do you want? To survive these Bird attacks, Melanie in the Birds.
 

    What do most characters want? In one way or another it comes down to getting back to normal. The abnormal or strange has changed their world and they want to go back to the world that they knew.

    Allow your lead character to lead you to where they want to go. Part of the problem that many of us have with our scripts is that we try to lead rather than allowing our characters to lead. We have a plot and we must follow that plot even if our lead is not a willing traveler.

    I will end by putting it in sports terms. You have a superstar on your team. In who’s hands do you want the ball? Do you want to give the ball to the kicker? Why would you? His job is to give it back to the other team. Your lead is your point guard. Your lead is your quarterback. Your lead is your Ace pitcher. You are the coach, but they are the ones who execute  the game plan. Allow them to do it. Encourage them to do it.

    In the Birds Hitchcock keeps the character of Melanie Daniels on the field into she has to be carried off. Battered, beaten up and pecked half to death she did her job. She got the ball across the goal line again and again until the it reached historic levels. Watch the end scenes of the Birds. She left it all on the field. There is nothing more that this character can do and better still nothing left that she has to do.



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Is Your No Budget Script Limited?

                The Sky is The Limit on Your No Budget Script

    Just because this is going to be a low to no budget screenplay does not mean that it has to take place in an abandon building or a kitchen. You can include anything that is available in the free world. What I mean by free world is the places all around us that cost nothing to shoot a movie in.

    I understand that you are not shooting the movie, just writing it, but you have to think as if you are. Where can I set my scenes that will cost little to no money while at the same time adding something to my script. Hopefully adding size and or scope to your script. Many free interiors are parking garages, auditoriums, meeting halls. If you include scenes in a school, do not worry about the cost, many schools will allow a film crew to visit just as a teaching exercise. If your story offers positive views of the church, many churches will allow your story to be shot there for free. Many public places will be available for free or a small fee. What I am saying is do not be afraid to add size to your script just because you believe that a location you wish to include will cost too much so why bother. I am telling you to go ahead and included it. If the scene is solid and is necessary for the script it will get shot. If the location you have written about can not be gotten there will be a way to work around it.

    Most out door locations are good. You can always include a athletic fields. Parks, woods, open land. If you are not only the writer, but the film maker as well you will no if there are hills or mountains or water ways near and available. If there are farms or factories or scrap yards that can be used. The size of your free budget is largely up to you.

    Some of you reading this use to live in big towns and near economic centers that have now become much smaller or are past the point of no return. Left behind are factories and shipping centers. Left behind are boat yards, docks and storage areas. They are just waiting there to become a part of your story. These forgotten places can make a no or low budget script seem like a medium to big budget script.

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The Found Footage Saga, Cont.

                The Found Footage Saga Cont.

    I keep coming back to found footage for two reasons. First there is a part of me that thinks that it will fade away and die off in its present form. Mostly horror films and dark suspense. And the second reason is that they keep coming. This fall we have a slate of new found footage films, some look good and at least one is a sequel to the found footage franchise Paranormal Activity.

    My last post was about Anthologies and the movie that sparked that post was V/H/S. Found footage told in a multi story format.

    The best series of found footage movies for me at least is the foreign series know as Rec. So far a trilogy of horror films about a demonic plague. I like the concept of the third film, I have not seen it yet. I plan on seeing it on demand this weekend with friends.  The concept seems to revolve around a wedding video. Why hasn’t that territory been tapped sooner. Many film makers start off filming wedding videos to help pay the bills. There are so many stories that can be told using that kind of footage. From drama to screwball comedy.

    The movie Cloverfield showed us that you can start with footage taken at a party and branch off into a totally different direction.

    What I am suggesting is that we need to do different things with this format or it will disappear. Right now I am in the middle of a screenplay where I have decided that the entire second act will revolve around found footage.

    What, what was that? What genre?

    Okay.

    You caught me. It is a horror movie. Hey, I am writing this one to actually shoot, hopefully by the end of the year, and for all involved horror was the best economic choice. Meaning cost to shoot, cost to market and return on investment.

    Keep in mind that no movie has to be made. I cringe when I hear an actor or director say of a movie that it had to be made. No it does not. Pick the ten most important or impressive movies ever released and none of them had to be made. At least breaking even has to be considered when crafting your script. People are going to be investing money based upon your script. This act is going to be the their clearest way of saying that they believe in your talent. Found footage and horror movies are being done because they are cheap to make. They are easy to market. If well done they rarely loose money.

    Money should never be your first thought when writing a low to no budget script, but it should be a factor. Found footage is a response to economics as much as it is a genre that the public is willing to embrace.

    Okay enough about the money talk.

    Here is some advice about your main character in this type of film.

    He or she must be driven. Must be the type of person who could not turn that camera away even if their children were being eaten by wild dogs.

To quote a fantastic episode of Doctor Who, “Don’t Blink.”

    They are the one’s in the story who never blink and you need to answer why before the interesting stuff starts to happen.

    The audience will want to know why he or she won’t drop that camera and run. Why is it so important that they keep shooting. Perhaps it is as complex as the fact that they are obsessive compulsive or as simple as the can not see what is happening without the camera. Give a good reason during the first few minutes and the audience will have one less voice whispering in the back of their minds. 

    Okay, I think that is it for today.

    Remember to add us to your google plus. Stumble us on stumbleupon and tell a few friends about this blog.

    This is where I will make this offer again. If someone out there wants to write a guest post I am open to it. If you have written a low to no budget script or two and you believe that you can offer some good advice. You can contact me by leaving a comment and I will get back to you.

    That is all, now get back to writing guys.

The Anthology Script

            The Anthology Script

    I have heard that the Anthology film is making a comeback. The Anthology for those who don’t know is a film with multiple stories. Usually broken down into 3 to five separate tales. It is most popular in the horror film world. Think about movies such as the original Tales from the Crypt, Black Sabbath, The Creepshow, Cat’s Eyes. Mostly horror films then and mostly horror now.

    There is a lot of room to do an anthology that is not Horror. You could do comedy or action or even drama. There are no rules to writing your no budget screenplay. Not even how the stories are connected. All you really need is a theme and if you don’t have one a narrator will do.

    The last movie that could be consider anthology that played on over a thousand screens would have been Grindhouse, featuring the films Death Proof and Planet Terror.

  

I am bringing this up for two reasons. First there is one V.H.S that is coming to theaters soon and secondly this is a way for those of you who do not feel as if they have a feature script in them to still write a movie. If you can not travel the road of a 90 page feature how about a series of 15 to 40 page short films that combine to make a feature. The cool part of this type of feature film writing is that if you can only deliver one of the stories you could always invite a friend or two to join in. I understand that each director involved is V/H/S has written their own part of the movie that connects up to form a complete story. Did I mention that it is a found footage anthology?

    How do we do an Anthology?

    We use a central location Sin City and connect the stories through events.

    We connect the stories through a few shared characters, again Death Proof and Planet Terror are connected by the sheriff and his daughter the doctor.

    We can connect the stories through the quest for an item or the search for a person.

    You figure out what works best for you. That is part of the fun of this genre. You are the writer and as long as it at least fits a common theme you should be okay.

One of my favorite Anthologies is Trilogy of Terror. The element that connects the three great stories is the lead actress. Karen Black plays the lead in all three films and because it is always her that we meet the stories fit together. Understand to make this work you will most likely need to be the write and director of your script.

    Here is an exercise for you guys. If you have a short script laying around ask yourself is there a character or a location that you can tell a second story with. Is there something that you did not know you left behind until now? Can you add another branch to this tree? Is there a road that you can travel down with what remains of this story? Did it happen months ago or will this new story take place years in the future.

Here are trailers for a drama and a comedy to show that any and all genres can be approached using this format.





   Anything to connect the stories will do. A book, a gun, a note, a ghost, a ring, a person, a death or even a song. Anything will do and you will be well on your way to creating an anthology. If you have friends who write sit down and discuss story ideas. You never know where it might take you. And if all else fails and you need someone to join you on creating your anthology you could always contact me. If you have a great idea I might do thirty pages for the fun of it. After all the secret about writing for me is that I really like to do it. Writing is like drinking, some of us just need an excuse to get started.

    Good luck and I hope to post again soon. Remember to stumble us on stumbleupon, add us to your google plus and to tell a friend about this blog. 

One last thing, did any of you ever consider the fact that Pulp Fiction is an Anthology?

Who is Driving Your Script?

            The Story Driver

    I was reminded by Christopher Nolan’s The Dark Knight Rises about a simple concept that most of us over look and it is the same whether you are writing a script for a three thousand dollar film or a three hundred million dollar blockbuster. The question must be asked, “Who is driving your script?
”
    If it is not the antagonist or villain why not?

    We love our heroes so much we spend little to no time with our villains. This means that most of us will create stories that will soon be forgotten. The strength of Nolan’s last two films have been his Villains.
Both his Joker and now Bane are remarkably complex antagonist who in different ways offer almost overwhelming challenges for the hero.

    Take the time to ask the question, What is it that will give my protagonist the most trouble?  What is it that he or she will not be able to deal with? A character who lives in a world of logic and order will be disrupted and or undone by a force that is all emotion or chaos. A character like Batman who depends upon practiced fighting skills and the power of his technology can be undone by a force that is elementally brutal in its approach to everything. 

    There is a saying in the world of boxing, that if you can trick a boxer into a real fight with a fighter the boxer will lose 19 out of 20 times because the boxer depends upon their plans, their technique and their timing. A fighter depends only upon brute force and instinct.

    What is your lead character?

    Understand this and you will be able to create his opposite and once you have created this opposite give him or her or it a lot of screen time. I believe that the reason why we do not give our villains as much times is that we want to identify with our heroes. Stories have always been about can the hero save the world or the girl. On some level we wish to be that hero and at the same time most of us are afraid to spend too much time with our bad guys, but a bad guy well written can change everything.

    Looking back on the movie Silence of the Lambs is there anyone out there who does not wish that we had been able to spend more time with the character of Hannibal Lecter? He was not only repulsive, evil and ruthless, he was also intelligent and charming and honest in a way that few people will ever be.

    I am going to suggest an exercise for you guys. Write some scenes that are off script with or about your antagonist. By doing this you will be spending some time with them, getting to know them and over time this will help you to create stronger characters.

    Face it, that in the low to micro budget film world your characters have to make up for the lack of effects and sets and size of cast. Those characters are the one thing that you can offer to any size production. Create a great and memorable villain and you have traveled a long way toward creating a quality script.

    Okay, good luck guys. Remember to stumble us on Stumbleupon and to tell a friend about this blog. I wish that I could post more often, but right now I am in the middle of pre-production of a feature that I am aiming to produce around November of this year. So I am spending every free moment looking at equipment and talking to possible crew members and working my day job and trying to get my script just right. If I turn in a movie with a script that does not measure up to what I have been preaching here you guys will tell me about it.

    Each day the director/producer me is constantly yelling at the screen writer me. When will we have a final shooting script? The answer to those parts of me is what Hitchcock would have wanted to hear. “Once the script has been written and then the dialogue added we will be ready to make this movie.”

    I know, I know, we have not talked about writing the script with no dialogue and then adding it in a second or third draft. The next post will most likely be about that subject.

    Good bye for now.

All is in The Name

                Your Script, The Name Game


    There is an expression that many Christian ministers use, “Name it and
claim it.”

    Many of use start a script with Untitled written at the top. Looking back on the scripts that I have finished and the ones that I have not, the ones with a name reached the finish line far more often than the one’s without.

    But the title will change many times once it is done.

    Yeah and so what. That is the future and this is now. Living in the now you need to consider the name game. One of my favorite saying of all time from a really bad movie is spoken by a knight. When it is suggest that he may get lost in this new strange land he is visiting his response is that a man with a purpose can never be lost. The name is the purpose, the direction that your script is going to travel.

    During those muddy thirty to fifty middle pages of your script that name is
the true north that you will travel toward.

    The Sicilian sounds like a nice name for a film, but can that title steer your on a true course as easily as The Godfather. When in doubt, what is this movie about?

    The Godfather?

    Who is under attack?

    The Godfather.

    Who must hold the family and the business together?

    The Godfather?

    Who are they trying to kill?

    The Godfather.

    If the family is to survive who must Michael become?

    The Godfather.

    After all the bullets stop flying and the smoke and dust clears who is left standing?


    Love him or hate him. See him as a villain or hero. What is his name and the name of the film?

    The Godfather.

    Do it with most great films or even good films.

    The Exorcist, The Birds, Titanic, The Jerk, The Hangover, The Artist, Dumb and Dumber, Star Wars, The Empire Strikes Back, Return of the Jedi, The Avengers, Alien, Unforgiven, The Sixth Sense and countless other films.

    You are stuck in the middle of act 2 of your screenplay and Dorothy, the Scarecrow and Tin Man are standing around wondering what to do next. That is easy. There is a yellow brick road. Get back on it and sing that song again. We are off to see Tokyo? New York? The sales at Target? No. The Wizard. The Wonderful Wizard of Oz.

The Reality Test

                Your Script, The Reality Test

        One of the biggest problems that I have noticed in most horror and or action films is that they by pass the basic act of establishing reality. The art of the horror movie is to subvert reality. Or in other words you have to construct a real world before you can de-construct it. I have seen too many movies lately
where the screenwriter hurried passed the basics to get to what they believed to be the heart of the story.

    Let’s talk about the opening of the movie the descent. We get introduced to the lead characters in the opening scene. We are shown not told that they go on adventures together. We get a glimpse into the dominate relationship in the movie, Juno and Sarah.  We see the lead character lose her husband and child in a horrible car accident. We see all the friends gather together at the hospital to check on the one who has survived. We see them a year later. Time for another adventure that they hope will help heal their still damaged friend. We see all of this in the first fifteen minutes of the film and if not for all of this real world business what happens beneath the earth in those caves would not nearly have the same impact.

The  Descent

    Getting to know the characters and the world that they live in can only make the horror more intense when we watch that world being picked apart. The movie that did this better than any other was of course The Exorcist. We get almost a half an hour of real world before we are slowly let in on the fact that something supernatural is happening.

    I am going to agree with Neil Marshall on the fact that Deliverance is sort of a horror movie. Call it a thriller if you wish, but it does follow the rule of establishing reality. Then watch that reality get torn apart by men who see life and death in a completely different way.


    The problem with the majority of horror films being written today is that logic and reason are thrown out the window. Shock and gory replaces real suspense and what are you left with? A film that is seen once, then laughed at and soon forgotten. I want more And I believe that so do you. If you did not you would not be reading this blog.

    Here is what I am going to suggest. You can write your script anyway that you wish, but when you rewrite it I want you to keep your eye on reality.

Does my script occupy a recognizable world?

    But I am writing a walking dead film.

    Really?

    Let’s time travel back to the first one and see if George Romero established the real world first. A brother and sister visiting a grave. The brother is picking on his sister. Real world as can be until the dead guy walks up and then their world and the world of horror films is forever changed.

    Last movie to look at is The Sixth Sense. This film is as well written as any movie ever written. The opening scenes with Bruce Willis and the wife are the scenes that make the rest of the movie possible. It shows you a world that is so familiar and easy to relate to that we never question the reality that his character brings with him until the very end of the film.

    You do not have to do it that well, but well enough so that we know the world that the characters are fighting to get back to. That we can relate to the world that has fallen apart, it is easy to relate to it: after all it looks a whole lot like our own.

Beyond The Writing

                More than Writing is Involved

    We spend so much time and effort on how to write a quality screenplay and not much if any time on why we are writing this screenplay.

    At the end of the day the question that has to be asked is do you love what you are doing? If you don’t and you are doing it only because you have to that is okay. I am not going to tell you that unless you love what you are doing you will do a ass backwards job at it. The purest in the room will say that you will, but some of the best scripts ever written have been jobs rather than labors of love.

    If you are a producer or director and you are the only one that you can afford to hire to write your script then I am here to say that you can do a great job of it. If you are like me, someone whom has been writing most of their lives and love it, you can write a great script.

    The argument that I am working towards is the concept of the business person vs. the artist. If we were here about screenplays in general I would not be doing this, but this blog is about ultra low to no budget screen writing. You have a story that the artist believes demands certain things and you have this voice always whispering that is going to kill the budget. You can not put that in the script, it will cost to much and get cut out later. My response is put it in the script. Get through the first draft by any means necessary and then if that amazing part of the script that also cost far to much to be included has to be cut out, then do it. Cut it out. Find a way to save some of it or to rework it at a lower cost and put it back in later.

    The business person would never include that part of the script, but the writer/artist can not help his or herself. Maybe someday you can or will become both. The greatest filmmaker of all time was Hitchcock, one day he decided to make at the time a ultra low budget film. He founded a story and hired a writer named Joe. Together they crafted a screenplay that had limited cast, limited locations, limited setups, limited need for special effects or even makeup effects. He hired a tv crew instead of his film crew to shoot this movie. He shoot it in black and white instead of color. The name of the movie was Psycho. Some believe that it was his best movie (I think it was Shadow of a Doubt) and he did it will low budget considerations in mind. He did not have to, Hitchcock chose to and with those restrictions came greatness. Limiting location and sets and cast does not limit the possibility of creating something great.

    You can be artist and writer and business person and do something remarkable.Good luck and write everyday.

More About Found Footage

            More on Found Footage

    I have just spend a week trying to analyze what is right and what is wrong with the found footage craze.
    I believe that the craze began with Paranormal Activity. After the Blair Witch there were a few attempts at making found footage films, but that movie was basically a one and done. Even the sequel is not found footage (that was a major mistake on the producers part).

   We could go back further to the first great found footage movie. All the way back to the 70's there was a notorious movie titled Cannibal holocaust. It is so dark and bloody that most fans over look this minor master piece. It is about a band of so called journalist who travel to the Amazon to document a lost tribe only to first create the story they are there for and then later become victims of their own curiosity.

    I believe that curiosity is the key to the quality found footage films. In Cannibal Holocaust these jerks ( I am being kind) keep filming from a safe distance while someone is raped, later while the same thing is happening to one of them and then they keep film while one of their own is being killed. It is a film that shows that the person or persons with the camera does not have to be a hero or likable. You can give that camera to a murderer or a thief or a total coward.

    I say that you can do this because you are doing this. You are picking who holds the camera and reveals the action. We are trying to follow rules here and there are no rules. Anything goes in this new genre.

    I would argue that the biggest problem with this genre is the sticking to the rules of normal films. Look at most of them, they are still stuck in a 180 degree world. They are shot as if there is still a crew of fifty people behind the camera.

    To prepare for this post I looked at a few movies that I had not seen yet. The first one was Paranormal Activity, Tokyo Nights. A sort of remake of the American version. You can see the whole thing on youtube if you wish. I like the pacing of this version. There is a rule about Japanese horror film making. It is said that American’s try to startle their viewers while the Japanese try to disturb them. Their style of filmmaking is to get under your skin and scratch away.



    The other film was one that I had high hopes for, Area 407. This could have been a great film instead of just an okay film. The people who boarded the plane that crashes in this film are much smarter than the ones who crawled out of the wreckage. I would have rather watched a movie about the flight and the crash without the monster portion. All the stuff that happens on the ground reminded me of the playstation 2 games I did not like enough to finish.

    Challenge yourself and your characters to be smarter than the audience. Characters who go out of their way to get killed are characters that no one will remember.

    Okay that is it for now. If you have any suggestions leave them as a comment. If someone disagrees with me so much that they wish to respond in post form I would be happy to post it here if it is well written.
Lastly remember to stumble us on Stumbleupon and if any of you are interested in learning to turn your no budget screenplay into your own no budget movie please visit my new site where I offer advice and tutorials on different types of filmmaking. You can visit it by   clicking here.

Think like A Filmmaker

            Think Like A Filmmaker

    Do I need to learn about filmmaking to be a good writer?

  No. You can be a great writer and never learn anything more than the basic format of a script.

    Is there a but coming?

    Yes.

    But you need to learn something about no budget filmmaking to be good at writing this type of script. You need to understand that it is not like writing any other kind of script. The limitations of your no budget screenplay are fixed. There are certain things that you cannot include in a script because it cannot be done on a budget of under fifty thousand dollars.

    Here are some basics to keep in mind.

    You cannot count on CGI to save you. Computer effects can only do so much. Unless you or the director you are working with is a master at this and can reproduce scenes from the Avengers on his or her Mac you need to keep it realistic. The software required to make it look great will probably cost more than the film’s budget. Final advice on this subject if you are going to write scenes that require seeing a lot of monsters, explosions and space ships just sit back and watch what the sci-fi channel has on any Saturday. This should cure you. There is being cheap and looking cheap and sci-fi channel manages to pull of both.

    Next up is your cast. Do not include more than twenty speaking roles. I would suggest keeping it to around ten or less.

    Why?

    They need to be paid usually. Either up front or down the road.

Secondly you have to feed them. “So what,” you say. So just imagine having to feed fifteen or twenty of your friends sleeping in your living room for a week. They will need bathroom time and they will need food. Lots of food and you (the writer filmmaker)  will have to provide said food at least three times a day. Screenwriters do not usually think about this. The writer producer has too. Food cost money and did I mention coffee cost lots of money and people drink lots of coffee when it is free to them. This is one reason for a small cast of characters. The other reasons are the cost of wardrobe. The cost of transportation for each one of them. The added risk that someone gets hurt on and off the set. An injury to one actor who is in multi scenes shuts down the movie until they are able to work again. Keep your cast small. Here is a clip from a film that kept its cast small and I bet you never noticed.

    One more note on cast. Extras that show up for one day and one scene do not count. You do not usually have to feed them. They are people who just want to be in a movie and are going to be easier to deal with than your real actors.

    I will not talk about location here. I did a post on location. I will mention that one of the best things that you can do is actually see a movie being shot. Watch some behind the scenes tutorials. Visit a set if you can, even as an extra. Get your camcorder out if it shoots 24p and or if you have an iPhone download the filmmaking apps and shoot a scene or two of your script with friends to see how it flows visually. Trust me you will learn a great deal from this process.

    What was that?

    You do not know how to shoot a scene. Fine, I can help you. You can visit my new filmmaking site, (shamless plug coming) it is titled thephonefilmmaker. This site has basic tutorials on how to make a film using the iPhone and digital cameras and camcorders. Also a bunch of short films shoot with each. There will also be advice on where to go and get Apps and or basic equipment to shoot you little test films. To go there you can   click here. 

    Okay I think the next post will be about writing a short film. Good luck and remember to add this blog to your Google plus and Stumble us on Stumbleupon.  It is a way for me to know if this site is worth continuing. It is a way of knowing that there is someone out there that is getting something from these post. If you have a suggestion for a future post please leave a comment.

    Thank you and see you soon.

Busy Work

                  The Busy Work Curse

    Sounds like the title of a bad short film. If you like it then use it, but that is not the subject of this post. Busy work is. Busy work and why it is one of the great curses that afflict every writer from time to time.
    Busy work is the work that you do that keeps you from doing the work that you are afraid to do; writing your no budget screenplay.
    I am busy doing research, can’t write today.
    I am busy going over last years collection of bill receipts, can’t write today.
    I am busy writing the treatment for the new screenplay that I am planning, can’t finish the one that I am working on.
    I am waiting for the hairdresser I found online who moonlights as a demon slayer to come by and get rid of that entity who lives inside my playstation 2.
    Really?
    Seriously?
    Let it go.
    Push all of these excuses aside and make your busy work the actual act of writing. I am guilty of this myself. I have a dozen scripts that have died thanks to the curse known as busy work.
    The only busy work that is acceptable in this universe involves Jennifer Love Hewitt, a dwarf, a camcorder, silly string and Snapple. You figure it out and if your imagination has Jennifer holding the camcorder at any time you are both wrong and sick.
    Busy work is writing.
    Writing is your job.
    We avoid it because if we are good at it we open up and lose ourselves. We are not only revealing things about our characters, but about ourselves as well. That is a scary experience and on some level each of us who write realize this. Not one of us who manage to do this for a living will look back on the experience of writing and wish that we had done it less often. (Do I have to mention Jennifer Love Hewitt again? Why did she have to do that new show? I was recovering from watch the Ghost Whisperer. The medication was working and now its little maid outfits. Why does it have to be on demand too?)
    Okay I am back and that will not happen again. Well again today.
    Here is the perfect counter to busy work.

    Don’t you wish that we could all have an Annie to help us get off of our butts and write every single day?

More About Dialogue

                More On Dialogue

    I am returning to dialogue for this reason. It sort of sounded earlier
that I was anti dialogue. I am not. I am against the over use and dependence upon dialogue to progress the script. Dialogue pages fly by, while action and description takes longer to write.
    Secondly my problem with dialogue is that people are just not as good at it as they use to be.
    Hold it.
    Wait a second.
    Drop that protest sign.
    I want you to go and look up what are considered the top fifty or so films of all time. Do the same for television. Do the same for songs. After you have done this review go back and look at the years these films, tv shows and songs were written. They will have something in common. Most if not all were written before the internet age, before the way we communicated changed. Instant messaging, texting, twitter has changed the way we talk to each other. Sentences do not always have begin middles and ends anymore. And of the modern day classics how many of them were written by older writers. People who started in the 80s or 90s?  How many? Just about all of them?
    You have two golden ages in filmmaking and screenwriting. The 1930's and the 1970's. The music was mostly bad, but the films were amazing.
    Examples from the 1930's, The Thin Man, Gone with the Wind, The Wizard of Oz, Destry Rides Again, Stage Coach, Public Enemy, The Hunchback of Notre Dame, Dracula, The Lady Vanishes, Murder, The Bride of Frankenstein, Duck Soup, Grand Hotel and I could list a hundred more films. Can you list 10 films from the last 5 years.

The scene is from the 1931 movie Public Enemy. the perfect mix of dialogue and action to tell you everything that you need to know about these two characters and their relationship.

    Let’s jump to the 1970's. The Godfather and its Sequel. The French Connection, The Exorcist, One Flew Over the Cuckoo’s Nest, The Shining, Vanishing Point, Halloween, Rocky, Scarface, The Outlaw Josey Wales, Superman the Motion Picture, Jaws, Star Wars, Patton, Taxi Driver, Frenzy, Straw Dogs American Graffiti, Alien and half a dozen Woody Allen movies. I am leaving out tons of international films, Grindhouse movies, and the golden age of Italian horror films.

    Watch movies from both decades and read scripts from both. You will see that in the 1930's they had to hint and suggest what was really meant at times while in the 1970's they were allowed to hit you with a sledge hammer. The 1930's were about writing with a quill pen and the 1970's were about writing with a hammer and chisel. And the cool thing is that both ways were equally as effective.
    Recognize this and understand that you can do it both ways depending upon the story.
    Really? I don’t believe that. No one can tells stories using both styles.
    You are almost right. Most of us will find our niche and stick to it, but I would like to say that Hitchcock managed to do it. As a matter of fact he managed to produce classic films in both of the decades listed. I am not saying be Hitchcock. That is like saying go hit home runs like Babe Ruth. What I am saying is that Dialogue is a tool. Learn to use it and if you have to visit past experts that is okay.

One great scene from the Godfather. Basic one on one dialogue at its finest. The actors and writer made this look too easy.

Another Software Review

            A Software Review

    I have written about it, but I have not shown you the software in action and I have not allowed others to tell you about certain aspects of screen writing. For this I am sorry. There are a lot of great writers out there and their advice is as good as mine and sometimes better.
    I have gotten so caught up in teaching you how to write a low budget script that I forgot to focus enough on the basics. You will need a great deal of knowledge about the basics. You will have to be more fundamentally sound than those who write big budget epics.
    I would first like to mention a new free software program that I have been introduced to. It is called Adobe Story. Just google that and you will find the download page. So far it is a really nice free program that can be used online or downloaded.
    The two that I wanted to revisit today are Celtx and Scripped.
    Here is a quick tutorial from the guys at the Scripped site. If you are ever worried about losing your work via a crash or lose of your computer then this is the place for you. Store your work here where it is safe and you can revisit it any time.

    Now here is a tutorial on Celtx. Keep in mind that once you finish your script here you can import it, print it and if you wish to register it on site.

No Budget Screenplay Structure

            Building a Structure


    Let’s review the basics.

    We are telling a story.

    Your screenplay is a story and just about every single story have one thing in common. They all have a set structure. Someone tells you a story and it always boils down to this. The story will have a beginning, middle and an end. In screenwriting we call this Act I, Act II and Act III. If your script is one hundred and twenty pages then Act I will be about 30 pages, Act II will be around 60 to 70 pages and the final act should be 20 to 30 pages.

    I believe that the last act should be the shortest because of intensity if no other reason. The time for talk is all, but over and action on the page and on the screen is what we are looking for at the end on our screenplay. Look at one of my favorite movies, Taken.  Act I is over when the daughter is taken, Act II is over when our hero finds out from his former friend when his daughter will be auctioned. The final act is short and brutally sweet.

    From this point forward in the Blog I am going to try to offer as many video tutorials on the subject as possible. I do this to follow my own favorite rule about movies. Show and do not tell.

    Below is a video about structure.

    Good luck with your script.

Short on Dialogue

                    Your Screenplay, Short on Dialogue

    When writing your low or no budget script you need to consider the actors. I do not mean that you need to consider casting. You need to consider their limitations. Unless you are lucky the majority of your cast will be new to the business. They will not be use to being on screen. They will not be use to hitting their marks and the massive pressure of a low budget film shoot.
    You as the writer need to help them out as much as possible.
    How do you do this?
    Keep dialogue as short as possible.
    No, I do not mean keeping the scenes as short as possible. I mean that you you try to keep their speeches as short as possible. One to five lines at most. Your name is not Tarantino and this is not Kill Bill. If you are going to have stage trained actors who are use to memorizing massive amounts of dialogue then go for it. But most likely you are going to have people who have never done this before. Friends trying to help you out or models who are trying to branch out. It will most likely be their first time so follow the first time rule, be gentle.
    Acting is a funny thing. It is easier for a novice to react than to actually act. Some of the greatest movie stars of all time are not actors, but reactors. Go rent a Kevin Costner movie and watch one of the worlds great reactors.
    Your lead character gets the most dialogue and the biggest blocks of dialogue. Allow those who interact with the lead to have shorter bits of talk that when and where ever possible they are called upon to react to what is said to them.  Bill was killed, react. Did you hear that Mike died, react. There is a monster in the basement, react. Our son is missing, react.
    Make it easy on the actors and they will show their love by giving a quality performance.

What Do You See?

What Do You See?

What do you see?
This is an important question.
Why?
Because what you see is what the audience will see one day. Movies at the end of the day are visual. I would say go back to silent films and watch them, but the truth is a silent film is doing very well for itself right now, (The Artist). When writing a script dialog tents to take over. I understand why. It is easier to write. To eats up a lot of pages. It progresses the story in a way. On the page it looks great and there is all that clear white space around it. While description and action is usually that ugly block text that look like paragraphs in a text book.

On the screen that block text flows quickly while those lovely pages of dialog drag along. More than 90 seconds on screen of uninterrupted talk is like watching paint dry unless you are named Tarantino. What we see is more important than what we hear or in other words show do not tell. If you can show that characters do not like each other rather than telling us then do it. If they love each other love is what they do with and to each other rather than going on and one about who loves who. Save that stuff for soap operas. We are going to talk about dialog soon, but this is about the visual and what we see comes first second and third.
Does genre matter?
Same rule for all.
I do not care if it is Action, Horror, Comedy, Drama or Found Footage show me do not tell me.
But in comedy they tell jokes.
Really?
Take Dumb and Dumber, it is the stupid things that they do and not what they say that makes it a comic classic.
Action is obvious. The Road Warrior is all most a silent film for the first twenty minutes.
How many times have you heard when will they shut up and when will something happen in this movie?
I am going over some familiar ground here, but hey this point has not gotten through to some of you. Show them at all cost and then resort to telling them. With low to no budget film screenplays sometimes we have to tell rather than show. We can tell about an alien invasion or a murder spree rather than showing it because we can not afford to show it, but when or where ever possible we must show them.

Your No Budget Screenplay, Cutting Scenes

            Your No Budget Screenplay, Cutting Scenes

    You have finished your entire no budget screenplay or at least an act of it and you are at a point where you wish to do some editing.  I would like you to review every single scene and list what you believe to be the 5 worst scene.  These scene will feel forced or they just do not seem to connect well with the joining scenes or maybe they are much too long or too short.  For what ever reason they do not seem to work.
    Isolate the absolute worst of them and cut it.
    I said cut it.

    Do not edit it or try to redo it or move it around.  Just take this scene and if you have a paper copy tear it out.  If it is on the computer delete it from the script.  Yes I really know that this scene has its place in your screenplay.  It is really necessary and conveys an important bit of information or character development.
    Here is my response to that heart felt and sincere argument.
    CUT IT.
    It is better to get rid of this really bad scene rather than have it stinking up all the scenes around it.  I do not care if this scene tells who did it or where the body is buried or who stole that piece of cake or if Jessica Alba is nude in it, cut it.
    “Did I really just say that last thing?”
    Okay keep the Jessica Alba scene and cut the rest.
    I am just trying to make your screenplay stronger and after you cut and edited you will find that it is stronger. After you cut that worst scene and cut as much as possible of the second scene, edit down the third worst scene and rewrite the forth and fifth worst scenes.  Make your script better and better.  It will be painful to do this, but you know what the military say about pain.
    Pain is just weakness leaving the body and in this case pain is just the weakest elements leaving your script.
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Your No Budget Screenplay, King Conflict

Your No Budget Screenplay, King Conflict

    Perhaps you have heard the expression that content is king.  I disagree, I believe that conflict is king.  Within those first ten pages you have to establish characters who will be in natural conflict with each other.  Unnatural conflict is this is page 8 and this is where character one argues with character 5 for no reason other than there is suppose to be conflict in the script somewhere.
    Natural conflict comes from character traits.  Their world view as it conflicts with the world view of others.  Their personality is at natural odds with those around them.  I will use 2 characters from a series of films that almost all of you have seen at least one of whether you were willing or not.  We are going to pluck two characters from the Harry Potter universe (I could use the Star Trek Universe) to illustrate how to create conflict naturally.
    Now entering the ring an attractive young mud blood, Hermione.
    Stumbling in, late as usual, is the red headed terror himself, Ron.
    Yes I know that they become a couple.  Hey opposites attract. These two are made to produce conflict.  This conflict does not come from the writer as much as it does from who they are.  Ron is all emotion and feeling.  Hermione is all reason and logic. Early one she looks at him as being a silly unprepared block head.  He looks at her as a bookworm who does not feel much of anything and has no concept of how to have fun.
    When ever they have a problem she tackles it with reason and logic while Ron gets caught up in doubt, fear and a hundred other emotions.  They will forever rub each other the wrong way and not because they do not like each other, (they grow to love each other) but simply because they do not see the world the same way at all.  Without the third character of Harry, who is mostly instinct, to balance them out they would have never been able to progress much past hello.
    Conflict between your heroes will come naturally if you keep this in mind.  Conflict between heroes and villains will be intense if you have a hero who is all emotion and instinct going up against a villain who is as coldly logical and remorseless as a plague.

    Whether it is Bond going up against Doctor No or it is Van Helsing doing battle with a soulless vampire who looks at innocent people in the same way he would look upon chest pieces conflict comes from being opposites.
    Your first and I hope only exercise that I am going to suggest is that you list your top character and in a word describe their primary approach to any situation.  If these characters share a lot of scenes together make them opposites.  If they are best friends or husband and wife or brother and sister or father and son.  These opposing traits can get you through the roughest parts of your scripts.  They will find ways to push the story forward even where you are lost.

No Budget Screenplays, Found Footage

            No Budget Screenplay, Found Footage

    An ultra low budget film in number one at the box office.  Another found footage horror movie has taken the top spot at the box office.  These movies look like documentaries and act like documentaries, but they are really well thought out and written films. 
    They all come with a script of some kind.  Someone had to write it before it got filmed and the better the writing, the better the film.  I am not going to talk about The Devil Inside, I am going to allow the smoke to clear on this movie.  Like the Blair Witch Project many years ago, some people love it some people really hate it.  Let’s begin where this trend really started.  Not with the Blair Witch, but all the way back in the 1970's with a movie titled Cannibal Holocaust.  A repulsive movie at times, one that got band in a few countries during its first release.  This is a movie were the film crew travels to south America to film native tribes and instead of just recording the events they encounter they caused them and then later fall victim to them.  This simple plot device has been part of almost every found footage film since then.  Observe and become a victim.  Observe and linger too long for safety. 
    Blair Witch, Paranormal Activity, CloverField, Grave Encounters, Apollo 18, Rec and the fantastic Rec 2. All of these films could be summed up as curiosity killed the cat.  The camera feels like a shield to the one holding it and only too late are they reminded that they are part of events.  Not safe at home watching on a tv screen, but in the middle of a life and death struggle.
    What I suggest is that you keep this in mind, but you also add a twist.  Try this found footage concept with comedy or straight drama.  Remember the scene in the Sixth Sense where the boy delivers to a grieving father found footage of a step mother poisoning the daughter.  We are missing the boat, but only doing horror.  Use security camera or webcam footage or even iphone footage.  Take a chance.  Do something different with this type of story telling.

 

Your No Budget Screenplay, The 10 Page Rules

    Your No Budget Screenplay, Ten Page Rules


    If you have read my other post you probably at this point have a good idea of what you wish to write so we will by pass that for now and get to the basics.  What is it that we must accomplish within the first ten pages of our script.
    We must establish the location of the story.  The script can begin there or through a series of events we can travel there.  The central location needs to be established because this is not only where your story takes place, but also this is where your future cast and crew will be spending most of their time and efforts.  Even if you are only the screen writer and not going to be wearing the hats of producer and director you have to keep these things in mind.  The majority of movies manage to achieve this whether they are low budget or mega budget.  People, meaning the viewers, need to know where the story is going to take place.  They need to get comfortable in the world that you are creating.  Whether it is the Blair Witch Project or Gone With The Wind those first ten pages and or minutes are the most important.
    In times gone by once a ticket was purchased the film maker had his audience and they were going to be stuck in that seat until the end credits.  Now your audience is one button click away from leaving you and the movie that you have written behind. Remember that scene from Gladiator where Maximus yells to the crowd “Are you not entertained?”  I am not saying that they have to be entertained during these first ten pages, what I am saying is that you have to hold interest.

    The best and most cost effective way of doing this is with you main character. The lead Character is not necessarily the main character.  (Quick note: Think about the movie Terminator.  The lead is Sarah, the main character is the Terminator.  In this movie we meet the Terminator first and he pushes the action and drives the story.)  Your main character will be presented and shortly there after he or she will become the seeker or the searched for center of this universe.  They must always drive other characters to act or to react.
    The world is about to end.  They have the ability to save it.
    Their marriage is on the rocks, they are responsible for this and they must undertake the journey to repair or Fireproof it.
    Someone is about to be murdered and they are the only one who knows about the plot and the only one capable of stopping it, The Man Who Knew Too Much.
    To change the future they must travel back in time and terminate someone, but they are not sure exactly who.
    Find the who and the thing that will drive him or her to chase and or run and you will have a great jumping off point for your no budget screenplay.

Your No Budget Screenplay, Peter Jackson's Bad Taste

               Your No Budget Screenplay, Bad Taste

    Peter Jackson started where you are.  From a no budget little feature to the Lord of the Rings he has come a long way.  Having worked in a video store at one time I became familiar with just about every low budget release during the eighties and nineties. I had bought a copy of Bad Taste from the store I worked in for about two dollars, stuck it on a shelf and revisited it only when I heard that this guy named Peter Jackson was going to do the Lord of the Rings movies and he had started with a movie titled Bad Taste.  I dug the movie up and watched it again.  If you can not find it try to at least watch the movie trailer, it is great fun. Then go and watch clips of his later movies and perhaps the new Hobbit Trailer.

    To me Peter Jackson is not your typical no budget film maker.  He wrote a sci fi movie and if you pay close attention to it this movie what he wrote was a big budget epic that he shot for eight dollars and twenty seven cents.  Bad taste is a gross out take on the genre with a lead that actually gets part of his brain
knocked out and keeps on going.   Why does he keep going? The only answer is “Derricks don’t die.” His name is Derrick and he will not die until his task of saving the world from an alien invasion is complete.

   The lesson from this film is that no budget does not mean that you can not be ambitious. You can write a huge story as long as you remember to write down only the most necessary visual elements.  Steven Spielberg needed to blow up buildings and show gigantic alien machines in his version of War of the Worlds, while the no budget writer/film maker would have to rely on sound and light and shadows to suggest what is going on with the invasion of earth.  Look at one of my favorite film makers M. Night, his movie Signs.  The most frightening and intense part of that film takes place in a basement.  No real special effect needed. Both movies with a adjustments could have been utra low budget and done well. 

    M. Night Shyamalan  and Spielberg started out shooting super 8 or video.  They began as no budget writers and film makers.  Peter Jackson began in the no budget world and now he is one of the top film makers on earth.  With the arrival of part one of The Hobbit this year you will have one more reminder of where you can get to from here.

    Good luck guys, next time maybe we will talk about the basics of writing your first no budget script this year.  I say first because I expect that you will write at least three of them this year.