Start with a Horror Screenplay

 Every screenwriter knows it is notoriously difficult to break into Hollywood. However, there is a way that is proven worthwhile if it is done right. Low budget horror screenplays are a great way to break into the industry, and they don't have to be bad B-movie's either.

  Consider this: the wildly popular movie Unfriended brought in forty-eight million dollars in the box office, while only having a budget of one million dollars. Horror is a low risk genre with massive potential, because there is already a built in audience. If you stick to a well thought out script without the major computer graphic or special effects, it could be your way in.

  You should be of course concerned with the quality of your screenwriting. Think of originality. There are so many horror movies that viewers don't want to be bored with the same old plots and scares. Try to draw out your own fears because this can inspire you to create even greater plots. It can also make you think of scenes that haven't been done before. Try to stay as close to reality as possible. The fact that it can happen to you is more frightening. Finally, don't overdue it. That makes your screenplay seem more like a parody than something truly scary.

  Think about the movie Seven. It is based off of the seven deadly sins. They used an incredibly low budget with no special effects, but the plot made it so that you could really think it could happen to you. Also movies like It Follows and Get Out have been huge hits as compared to budget.
Offering a low budget movie as your first screenplay makes your script that much more attractive to potential producers. Not only that, it could be a huge hit. If this is your genre, you have a great window of opportunity. If you take advantage of it, you could really prosper.

 This has been a guest post. Thanks to the writer and I invite others to post on screenwriting topics of their choosing. 
 

If you would like a mini masterclass in the art of micro budget screen writing my book on the subject is now available in audio form. You can find it at audible and on Amazon.

 
 

YOU WANT TO BE A HOLLYWOOD SCREENWRITER

YOU WANT TO BE A HOLLYWOOD SCREENWRITER?

I understand the feeling that comes from the idea of being a successful Hollywood screenwriter. It is like getting a lifetime membership to the country club. Vision of wealth and fame fill the imagination. That is the reality for those who reach the tip top of the food chain. For the average screenwriter you are going to struggle. The hard work that you did to get there is going to double once you get a foot in the door. 

 

This is not the worst thing that can happen if you learn the basic rules of how to write a quality screenplay. If you are doing something that you know how to do and that you love to do then no amount of work will seem too much for you. I love to write once I sit down to do it. I am sure that most of you love the process as well. Here at this blog I hope to share a few lessons that I have learned along the way and to offer you advice that have been posted by others.

I know that some of you are wondering if I have ever sold a screenplay to a Hollywood producer. When I was younger I entered the contest and tried to network my way in, but the game was not for me. Thankfully I decided to walk away from that chase just when the indie micro budget film making revolution was getting started. I found people who could shoot movies for under twenty thousand dollars and since I enjoyed the work more than the idea of wealth I have had the time of my life for the last few years and who knows if I ever write a breakout hit I could get to continue to have fun and freedom doing what I love and make a lot of money too.

Here I an excerpt from my book On Low Budget Screenwriting. You can find it at audible and on Amazon, to do so click image of book cover below.

   


 

BOTH SCREENWRITER AND FILMMAKER

In a world where film has largely been replaced by digital the modern screenwriter needs to consider the idea of being both screenwriter and filmmaker. 

 For the first century of film making the writer hoped to be part of the film making process as a voice on set or to work their way up to directing someday. This was because movies costed so much to make. Millions of dollars meant that there was a system that allowed very little if any vertical movement. Now low budget films are shot for under a million dollars. The ultra low budget film can be done for less than one hundred thousand. The micro budget film can be done and done well for under ten thousand dollars.


 If you want to be the writer, the producer and the director you can now do this. You do not have to use your own money either. You can shoot a scene of a minute or two to prove your concept and then use it in a crowd funding campaign. You can now craft a no budget screenplay, shoot it and use it to market your skills as a writer or better yet the all in one filmmaker. Let's look at the no budget short film.


 

  Perhaps it is time to consider that the best way to become a successful screenwriter is first to become a film maker. 

If you wish to learn how to craft a micro budget screenplay I have written a great little book that you can check out. It is a paperback that soon will be for sale as an audiobook. What I have suggested here is one path to becoming a successful screenwriter. 

In the next post we will look at the Hollywood way. If you wish to learn more about micro budget film making I would suggest visiting my other blog on the subject. Click here to do so. 


Thanks and good luck with your screenplay.

Low Budget Screenplay, Characters and Dimensions

Low Budget Screenplay, Characters and Dimensions

The problem with most screenplays begin before we get to whether or not the plot is sound. The problems begin at the level of characterization.

You have heard about three dimensional characters. In an effort to produce such a character you go out and write a character with a series of traits and skills that you hope will add depth to your character. This never works. This is not how a three dimensional character is created.

Look at dimensions as layers. Try to create a character when writing your screenplay that has layers.


Ask yourself a question about the lead character.

Who do they say that they are?

If they say I am a good person who loves my family, my dog, my friends and the whole wide world. Or the reverse I am a good person, but I can not stand my family, my dog, my so called friends or this crazy world I live in.

That is fine to start of with, but if that is your character from page one to page one hundred and one you have created a boring one dimensional character.

Here is a quick glimpse at a villain who is definitely not one dimensional.



Go beyond this to the next layer.

Who is this person underneath?

I love my family, but I need to spend hours away from them one a fishing trip or at work just to get away from them. I love the world, but I do not care about everything that happens to it, on it or inside it. I love my friends, but I am tired of dealing with their problems, their drama or even their upbeat attitude.

Or I hate the world, but there is one person that would make me fight to save it. It could be a child. It could be a love. It could be someone that they know, but has never said anything to. Shyness in a character or self doubt is a great second dimension. There are any number of character traits that can add dimension to a character in your low budget script.

To review. What a character says they are or even what other characters say about the lead character and who or what they actually say or do in reality adds a second dimension.

The third dimension is more tricky.

Here is a character that is fully three dimensional.



It could be something that the character discovers about themselves. Something good or bad that they never knew was there. A hero finds out that he is a coward when the going gets really tough. A person who has never stuck his neck out for anyone finds that he is willing to risk his life for a stranger. It is what the character does not know that adds that extra. It surprises both the character and more importantly the audience.

Writing a low budget screenplay requires that you pay more attention to characterization. Big budget films can and do get away with paper thin characters. They can hide this behind massive special effect and stars. The success of your low budget screenplay will depend on how well it is written. On how strong your characters are. Get to know these characters. You will over time discover things about them as they discover things about themselves. I am not going to lie to you and tell you that it is easier to write fully realized characters. It is harder, but is is also more rewarding.

Good luck with the screenplay. Please take a moment to bookmark this post and to share it.

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.

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.

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.

Your No Budget Screenplay,No Money is Good

Your No Budget Screenplay, No Money is Good

    For the short term having no money to produce a big budget epic is a good thing.  If you had an unlimited budget to work with and access to all the actors and locations on this world and how ever many others that could be computer generated then you would not have to learn the basics and you could happily go off and produce your version of  Dune.
    If that is your goal then you do not need any help or advice, go forth and create your epic piece of what ever Dune was.  Do not get me wrong Dune is an entertaining film, but it is in that accidental kind of way.  Sort of like a Three Stooges kind of car wreck.  The sad thing is that we can not say that for 99 percent of the mega budget flops that hit theaters each year.  These movies are usually written and produced by those who never bothered to learn the basics.
    Are you familiar with the films Batman the Dark Knight and Inception? 
    Christopher Nolan did both films. Wrote, produced and directed.  This is a man who learned the basics while making low to no budget films. 
    Most people think that Nolan’s first film was Momento.  It is a film with a million dollar budget and that was not where this great writer/filmmaker began.  He started with a movie titled Following.  It was a 6,000 dollar little movie that he wrote and shot on weekends for almost a year.  It is the hard work and lessons learned while writing this screenplay is what helped to make him someone capable of creating a film as unique and massive as Inception over a decade later.

    When you have to be inventive to solve problems rather than throwing money at the problem you will actually be learning the fundamentals that will help you years down the road to create epics.
    Do not look at having to limit your locations, the scope and number of characters as a handicap.  These are the lessons that will make you a better writer.
    Keep in the back of your mind while doing the first draft the number of locations that you are using and the population of your screenplay.  Remind yourself that locations cost money and that actors cost money.  What about extras they work for free?  Hey in the ultra low budget world your stars will most likely work for little to no money, but they have to be fed.  Extras have to eat.  Even if it is pizza and pop tarts they have to be fed.  Food cost money, so extras cost money. 
    If you have a script that requires a cast of less than ten people then that cast can most likely be held together by the producer and or director for many weeks or months if the weekend way of shooting is required.

    Keep these things in mind and try to write something every day.  Even if you are just writing notes.

Your Screenplay is a Circle

        Your Screenplay is a Circle


    You are having problems with your screenplay.  You know how it begins,
but the middle and the end have you at a loss.  I can tell you this much.  The
place that you start should be the place where you finish.
    A good script is a perfect circle and allow me to explain how and why.
    You story will most like begin with your characters living in their idea
world.  A perfectly calm existence is shattered and it is a never ending scramble to return to that perfect life.
    Sounds crazy?
    Remember the Godfather?
    The opening scenes?
    The family is happy and intact.  They are celebrating a wedding.  The
Godfather and is inner circle are in total control of a world that is going to be
attacked from both outside and within.  This world is destroyed.  The Godfather
is shot. Sonny, his oldest son is killed, his enforcer is killed and his youngest
son Michael is beaten.  From this point on there is a never ending quest by those
left standing to put their universe back into its proper order.
    The last scene of the film, after all the violence and bloodshed, is Michael
in his father’s place as Godfather conducting business as his father did when the
film began.  All is right with the world.  The natural order has been restored.
    You can look at a saga like Lord of The Rings and the same holds true.  Where
does that story begin?  Home, comfortable and safe.  After an endless quest
where does it end up.  Frodo and Sam back to where they started.  Missing
a finger here and a lot of bruises there they are back to the perfect world
that they had to flee.
    Some stories begin with that perfect world already shattered and through
flashbacks it is revealed through out the story.  The character is forever trying to
find away to or back to their idea world.  Some characters do not realize that their
world was great until they venture outside of their comfort zone and after having
all of their illusions shattered to they really appreciate what they had going for them.
A great example of this is in the minor UK classic Mona Lisa starring Bob Hoskins.
    Your characters do not travel along an arc if the story is going to be
great and memorable, they travel along a circle.  That circle traveled in the Wizard
of Oz.   Dorothy has to leave home to realize that there is no place like home.
    Send your characters on grand adventures, but always keep the end zone
in sight.  The place that they are headed looks a great deal like the place that they
have just left behind.    I am not suggesting that it should be a steady walk
toward the place that they just left.  Put obstacles in their way.
See if they can jump through an endless series of hoops, but at the
end of it all if they have proven themselves worthy let them come home.
They do not need a hero’s welcome, but they need to return to
the world where they feel most welcome.  There is a line in one of the greatest
of all westerns, Ride the High Country, where the lead say that all he wants at the
end of the day is to come home Justified.  He wants to go off into the world, do
what his code of honor will allow him to do and come back home knowing
that he could not have done things any other way.
    Look at Michael in the Godfather or Sam in the Lord of the Rings Trilogy both
of these characters did things their way.  Always guided by their own personal
code and in the end they make it back to a world where they belong.
    The greatest stories ever told are not straight lines.
    They are not rocky hills and valleys, but as Scarlett traveled in
Gone With the Wind, they are a full circle and the fuller the better.

The Ultra Low Budget Script

            The Ultra Low Budget Script

            Your Screenplay, Time to Write It

    1.
    As someone who has written a few of these things my advice for
the beginner is just to get it down on paper.  Beginning, middle and end
as fast as you possibly can for this reason, gravity will take over other
wise.  What I mean by Gravity is the pull of the other (dreaded better)
idea.  The story that you are trying to write will not seem nearly
as fresh or as interesting as the one you have just come up with.
Gravity is the weight of everyday life.  The normal doubts
about whether or not you can do this thing.  After all who do you
think that you are trying to write a screenplay.
    Other people write movies, but not me.
    They are so long and so complicated.
    These are the myths that will weight down.
    Allow me to kill these two myths.
    First screenplays are not that long.  90 pages and less than
20,000 words on average.
    What?
    90 pages sounds like a lot.
    Unless you are writing a silent movie over half of these pages will
be dialogue.  That is a lot of white space.
    I don’t know the format.
    Really?
    Really, I do not know the format.
    Fine, go online.  Google your favorite movie, search for the
script and read it.  It will not take long to read.  A good script is a
quick read.  The cool thing about doing this you will read where there
were changes made that are not even amongst the deleted dvd scenes.
Also the software that you pick may help you with the formatting. Last
bit of advice on this subject and it is the best writing advice I ever
got.  Get a notebook and a pen.  Sit down and hand copy 3 pages
of the favorite screenplay that you have read.  By doing this simple
exercise you will learn so many subtle details you missed by just
reading it.
    Secondly, it is not complicated.  Bad scripts are complicated.
Good ones are so simple that you wonder why there are not more
good movies.
    My girlfriend loves the Notebook.  As a guy it makes me
cringe.  As a writer it makes me smile.  On the surface it looks complicated.
Only because it bounces back and forth along the time-line to keep
you guessing.  The truth is that it is just a boy meets girl story.  Boy loses
girl, boy gets girl back, boy loses girl to illness and each day boy gets
girl back again.  Wow, that is so complicated.
    Need more examples?
    Fine.
    Lunatic tortures people to make them appreciate their lives more, Saw.
    Young couple falls in love on doomed ocean cruise, Titanic.
    Brain dead couple make all the wrong choices when dealing with a violent
supernatural entity, Paranormal Activity.
    Get the picture?
    Not that complicated at all.
    But my idea has twists and turns and surprises and is filled with deep
symbolic elements.
    Good grief who let M. Night in here?  Who told mister Happening,
mister The Village where we would be having our little chat?
    Fine, okay, I can deal with this.
    A group of strangers discover that they are trapped in an elevator with
the devil, The Devil.  Story by our good friend M. Night.
    Cut this nonsense out and make an entertain movie or all the studios
will stop answer your calls is a great motivator huh?
     Now you need software.
    Final draft is the best.  It cost a good amount.
    There is also Movie Magic screenwriter and Script Wizard.
    You could go for a free program.  There are 3 that I like.
    Scripped is a site where you write and save your screenplay at their
online site. You can even register it there.
    Celtx is a nice little free formatting software.  It also will help you
with the full production of your movie, but that is another article.
     I really like a freeware program called Roughdraft, it is bare bones
basic, but if you already know the elements of screen writing then it is a
solid program.
    Good luck with your screenplay and remember if you write just
3 pages a day for one month you have a screenplay.