THE ART OF STORY, THE CRAFT OF SCREENWRITING AND MORE

After watching many good and bad inspirational Christian films I began pondering what story structure elements make for a successful inspirational film.  My observations are that the good ones use empathy, underdog status and flawed characters with ambitious personal and spiritual goals to hook the audience.

Inspirational films that aim at changing lives have life lessons in them. Definition of Inspire: “To affect, guide, or arouse by divine influence; to stimulate to action; motivate; to breathe life into.”

I’d really like to hear your views on this. Maybe this could help other filmmakers trying to make inspirational faith-based films, as this seems to be a surge of these films lately.

– Craig,                                                                                                                                                            Capetown, South Africa

It’s a good line of digging, Craig. But I think you could ask the same questions about all filmmaking — faith-based, secular, agnostic, red, blue, green or anything in between.  What makes for a good faith-based film are probably all the same story elements and techniques that make any film a good film.  And the opposite is also true.  Cheese is cheese — whether it’s a lo-fi apocalyptic, evangelistic thriller or M. Night’s The Happening.

In films of faith, I think it’s a good habit not to analyze the story on whether it hits a certain set of expected high notes. Yes, that underdog quotient and sympathetic plight are good ways to make the audience care about your protagonist’s quest, but I would argue that those are important story streams for any good film adventure. That’s because they are universal human themes that have been used in story-telling for thousands of years.  Check out the Epic of Gilgamesh, an ancient Sumerian poem written 2,500 years before Christ, for a reference point.

For me, the bottom line is we just need to learn how to be better story-tellers, and one of the best example we have to draw on are the parables of Jesus. He captivated crowds by using real-life, human situations, emotions and dilemmas his audience could all relate to in order to communicate eternal truths. He plucked strings in his followers’ souls, and they reverberated with themes of rescue, sacrifice, courage, nobility, grace, redemption and resurrection.

I believe people’s emotional strings reverberate in the same way even today.

So pluck away.  Help the audience care about your characters’ quest by making it their quest.

One big reason why I’m so passionate about people of faith taking a bigger role in the  arts comes from a personal epiphany (“theophany”?) I had late one night in 2001.

I was working on a script for Touched By An Angel that was due the next day, and I was totally lost.  I had written myself into a figurative tributary of the Amazon River and I couldn’t find my way back the main story channel.  And you have to understand, there is no such thing as “writer’s block” in the television writing business. Writer’s block would probably result in your pink slip from the show because shutting down a crew for a day or so while the writer figures out how to finish his script just isn’t possible.  It would essentially leave a $100,000 meter running. That production beast is hungry and has to be fed a new script every seven days.  

Then those negative self-esteem tapes began to play in my mind.  ”You suck, Bird.”  ”How did they even let you in this business?”  ”Now they’re really going to find out what a poser you are.”  Obviously that only stoked my desperation even more.

So I finally did what writers do after screaming and cursing and pulling their hair out.  I begged God for help.  Well, maybe not all writers do that, but I’ve never had a problem admitting I’m a big weenie of a man who needs a giant crutch to lean on. I prayed, “God, please help me figure this story out, and please help me NOW because I’m dead meat if you don’t.”

Did I hear a voice?  Did words begin typing themselves on my computer screen?  Well, no.  But I did feel a deep impression on my soul, and these are the words that pressed themselves on me. “I was a writer… now you be one.”

Chills went up my spine and I actually gasped.  See, I was raised in church.  My grandfather was a pastor.  My father was a pastor for a time when I was young.  I went to Sunday School.  I had identified myself as a Christian since boyhood.

Suddenly, spiritual principals from the Bible I’d learned began to flood my soul:

• God is the “author” of life… the AUTHOR of the universe.
• (John 1:1) “In the beginning was the WORD, and the WORD was with God, and the WORD was God.”
• (Heb. 12:2) ” Looking unto Jesus, the AUTHOR and finisher of our faith…”
• (2 Cor. 3:2-3) “You are our epistle written in our hearts… written not with ink but by the Spirit of the living God, not on tablets  of stone but on tablets of flesh, that is, of the heart.”

Then it hit me… how did God choose to leave his message to mankind?  In a giant novel. History is His Story… a great, big cosmic narrative he is writing through space and time in which we are all characters — whether we acknowledge it or not. And through creation he has chosen all of us to be tiny creative threads in that tapestry.

That night, I don’t remember exactly how I finished that script, but I did, and I turned it in on time. And it actually turned out to be one of my better episodes.

Now, you may read this and not be able to relate. You may think, “what a religious nut.” That’s okay.  Most writers are nuts of one kind or another. But I’m happy to report I’ve never had another bout of the dreaded “Block” since that night. I have learned how not to out-think myself. I’ve learned not to over-analyze every line. I’ve learned to stop editing myself so much and start trusting my instincts more. That’s not to say that everything that flies off my keyboard is gold, or can’t be improved on. But it usually works pretty well.

And that’s because I now keep a little yellow Post-in on my computer monitor. It reads: “God was a writer… now you be one.”

I’m often asked by new writers how I learned how to write for film and television.  I have to admit that for me it didn’t happen by going to film school — although I wouldn’t discourage anybody from doing that.

I first learned how to write in journalism school, and then as a working journalist for 10 years or so before I morphed into writing for film and TV.  So for me one of the big answers to the question is I learned how write scripts from READING OTHER PEOPLE’S SCRIPTS.  Especially produced scripts.

It is one of the best screenwriting classrooms I know.  Scripts, scripts and more scripts.  It’s actually a concept that dates back to an accepted form of learning how to “do art” for  thousands of years.

It’s called “Copy the Master.”  It doesn’t mean literally to “copy,” but to draw inspiration, style, technique from the experts in the field of art you aspire to.  If you can picture a painting class, all the students are sitting at their canvasses while the Master, or teacher, is at the front of the class doing what?  Painting on his/her canvass. What are the students doing?  They are “copying the master,” mimicking his style and technique. Since the beginning of time, the idea is for the student to copy the master, but bring himself to the canvass (or script page) in order to surpass the master. Even Michelangelo was in his Master’s class in the Medici School.  Make sense?

Before I write any new project, I prime the pump creatively for myself by reading five great screenplays by “master” screenwriters.  That is, the Greats.  The Horton Footes, Robert Bolts and Robert Townes of this world, just to name a few.  I read them to see how they nail scenes, how they escalate the action, how they introduce characters, how they weave character and plot together at act breaks.  And then I try to go and do likewise on the project I am writing.

If you’ll navigate to my READING ROOM page under RESOURCES, you’ll find I have included sub-pages with .pdf files of some of the FILMS and TELEVISION projects I have written over the years.  They are there for your benefit.  I don’t in any way put my own scripts in the category of the above greats. I include them because I hope they will be helpful in some measure, and many of them were in fact produced, so somebody saw merit in them and spend a lot of money on them.  I consider myself a fellow student in art class, so feel free to look over my shoulder and read whatever you like.

I’m also including pages for projects I’m still working on and which are in various stages of COMING to fruition.  And another page for busted projects, a page I’m calling DEVELOPMENT H*LL.  That is, projects I got paid to write, but that ended up not being produced. Every produced writer has some of those in his career quiver.

Just a quick disclaimer.  Maybe it goes without saying, but please don’t try to sell or stage any of these scripts. The networks or studios or production companies that hired me to work on them might frown on that, and their lawyers would send me and you some creepy, annoying letters.

Ever wonder why movies seem to resemble each other in so many ways?   Or why action scenes all seem to be staged by the same choreographer?  Or why certain story points keep repeating themselves in film after film?

Well, there are unwritten rules screenwriters are expected to follow. We don’t really want to follow them, but if we don’t capitulate, somebody else will step in and force our hand.

Here are the 22 most common unwritten rules of screenwriting (Some of these come from The Freeman Institute. If you have any additional rules, please feel free to add them in the comment section):

1. During all police investigations, it will be necessary to visit a strip club at least once.
2. All beds have special L-shaped sheets which reach up to armpit level on a woman, but only to waist level on the man lying beside her.
3. All grocery shopping bags must contain at least one loaf of French bread or a bunch of celery that sticks out the top of a full bag.
4. It’s easy for anyone to land a plane, provided there is someone in the control tower to talk you down.
5. The ventilation system of any building is the perfect hiding place. No one will ever think of looking for you in there, and they will allow you to travel to any other part of the building without difficulty.
6. If you need to reload your gun, you will always have more ammunition, even if you weren’t carrying any before now.
7. Should you wish to pass yourself off as a German officer, it will not be necessary to speak the language – a German accent will do.
8. The Eiffel Tower can be seen from any window in Paris.
9. A man will show no pain while taking the most ferocious beating, but will wince when a woman tries to clean his wounds.
10. If being chased through town, you can usually take cover in a passing St. Patrick’s Day parade – at any time of the year.
11. When paying for a taxi, you don’t need to look at your wallet as you take out a bill. Just grab one at random and hand it over.  It will always be the exact fare, including tip.
12. Mothers routinely cook eggs, bacon and waffles for their husbands and children every morning, even though they never have time to eat.
13. Cars which crash will always burst into flames.
14. The Chief of Police will always suspend his star detective – or give him 48 hours to finish the job.
15. Any person waking from a nightmare will sit bolt upright, perspiring and panting.
16. It is not necessary to say hello or goodbye when beginning or ending phone conversations.
17. All bombs are fitted with electronic timing devices with large red readouts so you know exactly when they’re going to go off.
18. Most laptop computers are powerful enough to override the communication systems of any alien civilization.
19. Any lock can be picked by a credit card or a paper clip in seconds – unless it’s the door to a burning building with a child trapped inside, in which case you will need a battering ram.
20. Police Departments give their officers personality tests to make sure they are deliberately assigned a partner who is their total opposite.
21. Television news bulletins usually contain a story that affects you personally at the precise moment you are watching, and it’s never necessary to listen to the complete bulletin.
22. It doesn’t matter if you are heavily outnumbered in a fight involving martial arts.  Your enemies will wait patiently to attack you one by one. They’ll dance around in a threatening manner until you have knocked out their predecessors

Now you know our dirty little secret… he-he