Tag: screenplays

Mulling Having Working On A Screenplay As A Side Project


by Shelt Garner
@sheltgarner

I’m quite content with the four novels I’m working on. And, yet, I still find myself creatively restless. It would be fun to have the side project of a Hollywood screenplay to tinker on if I ever get too frustrated with this huge series I’m working on.

But there are problems. A lot of them.

One, I would risk simply throwing myself into a whole different writing endeavor after three years of working on novels. Second, I would have to invest in book and software for this whole new thing. And, third, I would be starting at even below the current level of likelihood of actually being a success than I am now with these novels. It’s not like I live anywhere near LA, after all.

So, I think I’m going to wait until I reach some major milestone with these four novels I’m working on — maybe four first drafts?

But all this thinking about doing something interesting indicates I need to really start reading books that I haven’t read before and watchin TV shows and movies I’ve never seen. Something, anything to distract myself from the over all project I’m working on at the moment.

Notes On ‘Scriptnotes’


by Shelt Garner
@sheltgarner

I really enjoy the “Scriptnotes” podcast, but I do have some…notes. My chief beef is the very strength of the podcast is its weakness — it’s two very accomplished, successful and knowledgeable guys talking about what it’s like to be be two very accomplished, successful and knowledgeable guys.

As such, sometimes they are rather….patronizing…to the serious concerns of people who are just starting off in the business. The show seems more for people who actually have a career in Hollywood than someone who aspires to have a career in Hollywood.

But you can’t be all things to all people.

I guess I’m suggesting that there’s a market for a Scriptnotes for extras who aspire to be screenwriters. Or something. A program that takes novice screenwriter’s concerns about IP theft seriously, that kind of stuff.

Yet, in general, I find Scriptnotes interesting. I sometimes feel like a street urchin with my nose pressed against the glass of the podcast as they talk about their careers, but lulz.

How To Reboot The ‘Alien’ Franchise



by Shelt Garner
@sheltgarner

Absolutely no one listens to me. The number of people who read this blog on a daily basis is barely a rounding error for places like The New York Times. But I do know some about how to tell a good story and what audiences expect.

So, let’s talk about the Alien franchise.

The existential problem with how the franchise developed is the producers made some pretty big mistakes after Aliens. Alien and Aliens are two solid films. And, really, if they hadn’t choked about showing the xenomorphs on Earth as was teased at the end of Aliens, things would have gone really well from there.

But, alas, a number of different things happened.

One, as I understand it, Sigourney Weaver started to have such power over the franchise that it kind of warped what happened to it. Also, the little girl who played Newt simply wasn’t a kid anymore by the time the third movie was being produced. Lastly, CGI simply wasn’t where it needed to be to show what everyone wanted to see — xenomorphs consuming Earth.

Here’s how I would reboot the series with all that in mind.

First, you need to remember what the whole thing is about — Alien was a horror movie. So, you get someone like Eli Roth to direct a totally rebooted series. Give him a three picture deal to give the rebooted franchise some much-needed consistency of tone.

Then, you cast someone like Ana de Armas as the new Ripley. Give her, too, a three picture deal.

I would then map out three movies so you had a three-movie arc like in the Dark Night series of movies. I would totally reboot the entire franchise, leaving only the look and feel of the xenomorphs the same. But the point of doing this is the movies would be fucking scary and, to the extent that Alien was gory, gory.

The premise is really strong and there’s a built-in fan base that would flock to a rebooted series if you did as I suggest. Fans like me are extremely annoyed with how the Alien franchise has totally lost its way.

Come on Hollywood, you can do better.

The Quiet Before The Storm: Daydreaming About Hollywood On A Dull August Evening



by Shelt Garner
@sheltgarner

Usually, August is good for one good astonishing surprise. But, so far, things have been exceedingly meh. It’s normally just about now when breaking news event forces all the Beautiful People drinking pina coladas on the a Seychelles beach have to rush home because everything has changed.

If you’re an astute media consumer, you will notice that the Beautiful People let interns take over the office and we end up with some very earnest, very dumb articles that leave you asking, “How did THAT get published?”

Now, I’d prefer if some Big Event happens in August that no one gets hurt and it’s “fun interesting.” But, as of right now, it seems as though August is simply going to be the quiet before the storm of the fall when we’re going to have the double wamny of a the flu season smashing into the COVID19 pandemic and a pitched battle to see who POTUS is going to be.

For my part, I find myself thinking about starting work on the development of a screenplay. I’m already cruising along with a novel and this weekend I had something of an existential moment when I realized I do not have a Plan B. As such, I think I’m going to use a number of things I’ve learned from developing this novel to begin working on a screenplay. I’m going to use Star Wars as my “textbook.”

Now, I know I’m being delusional. I’m too old, for starters. I’m far my likely to sell a first novel given my specific circumstances than I am a screenplay. But something about having the adventure of developing and writing a screenplay (or two) then traveling all the way to LA to see if I can accidentally-on-purpose run into a producer or some other Hollywood type is very enticing.

In fact, my personality is probably the only thing I have going for me on that front at this point. I’ve got solid talent, but, as I mentioned, I’m kind of old to get into the screenwriting business. But, again, I know that if I have a screenplay finished that I have the wherewithal to fly to LA (on the other side of the country) and hit the pavement. The idea of “somehow” being invited to a Hollywood party while I’m in town and “somehow” catching the attention of someone of note at the party is just the long-term project that appeals to me on a very basic level.

I know myself well enough to know that if I “somehow” was to find myself in a Hollywood party that all I would have to do is get liquored up and before you know it, I’d be Quentin Tarantino in the movie “Sleep With Me” pontificating on a wide range of thought provoking ideas and ending up with a three picture deal before it was all over with. (This is an extreme romanticized dream on my part. Probably none of that would happen, but, lulz, this is a very dull August evening.)

So, as such, I’m going to try — try — to have a Plan B, C and D that I can turn to if and when disaster strikes and I simply can’t continue with the novel I’m working on. The novel itself is really, really good (at least relative to my abilities) but I’m growing nervous that I’ve put all my eggs in one basket and I need to have a few backups in case something out of my control happens.

Anyway. What else am I supposed to do as House Trump consolidates power and turns us into a fascist state?

Mulling Screenplay Concepts



by Shelt Garner
@sheltgarner

For a time, I was all excited about having two creative “tracks” that I was going to have going forward. On one would be the novel I’m working on, while the other would be a screenplay. This, however, did not work out. I’m so completely consumed by the novel that I simply am not able to pull myself away from it.

But I continue to occasionally think about different potential screenplays. Being a screenwriter is much, much different than being a novelist because, well, Hollywood. I know myself well enough that if I did ever manage to finish a script I am so good at self-promotion — and socializing — that there would be a decent chance I would find myself in Hollywood (which is on the other side of the country from me) on occasion to hunt down family people to hand my script to. I’m fairly good at meeting famous people and so that part would be a cinch.

Screenplays have a whole different internal logic than novels. With a novel, you have to explain in a lot of detail why something happens. In a screenplay, lulz, you can think up the most bonkers conceit and get away with it with not a lot of explanation because that would really, really slow the story down.

I’ve been working on one idea for about a decade because it’s something of The Impossible Scenario. I love scenarios and there’s been one I’ve been working on for years and years that I simply can not figure out. But I’ve thought it through so much, that I find myself returning to it again and again. I won’t give you details, but imagine if humanity got an astonishing offer but with a catch — we had to work together as a race to figure the specifics of something out.

I like the idea that the audience would be on the edge of its seat as I walked them through the Biggest Event In Human History that kept getting hung up on the stupidest of differences between humans.

Another idea I have is The Martian, but for time travel. I have a decent method through which you could get some regular guy stuck in the past and you’d see how he if not escaped, at least made his life a lot better. But that one is problematic because I would want to do it absolutely hyper-realistic. So that might make it a bit more difficult to place it in the far past. I had the idea of maybe The Martian meets time travel meets Mad Men.

That would be pretty cool.

Anyway, one issue is buying FinalDraft. It’s so expensive that I think buying it would be the end of the beginning of the process of writing a screenplay. I would have gotten all my development finished and would be literally about to sit down and write when I bought it.

Why I’ve Walked Out Of Some Recent Movies

Shelton Bumgarner

by Shelton Bumgarner
@bumgarls

I’m of the opinion that a great modern story has to ignore any sort of overt political agenda and simply entertain the audience. Given how existentially political the novel I’m writing is, this causes me a lot of consternation. But my primary goal is write an adult tentpole story. Things blow up. Shit burns down. A little sex happens. And so on.

But let’s go through some movies I’ve seen recently and why I hated them.

Booksmart
I walked out of this movie just between the time Beanie Feldstein’s character started screeching about lesbian sexual actives and when I learned what the “hero’s journey” was going to be. I had only gone to see the movie because I felt shamed by a combination of Entertainment Tonight, E! Network and the center-Left Twitter echo chamber. I knew going into the movie that I was NOT the audience, but I went anyway so I would not feel bad. Turns out, I wasn’t, in fact, the audience. I wanted a modern-day Heathers. I got a woke movie that I felt insulted me on a basic, existential level. There were plenty of ways to express the same political agenda on the sly without insulting me and people like me. I felt the acting lacking in general. I also felt the movie was a bit too cute by half. And it seemed produced by identity politics bean counters who felt rather smug that the had managed to make the girl who would otherwise be hot, not be hot.

The Joker
On the other end of the political spectrum, I bounced pretty quick with this movie, too. I hated this movie. Loathed it. It just seemed too anti-woke. It was a pretty loud dog whistle for incels who feel like they’re so smart that no one else “gets” their jokes. Ugh. Just tell me a good story. Don’t produce a movie that has as the core of its marketing campaign the fear that some crazy incel is going to murder people because of the movie. I see The Joker as just as a bad as Booksmart. Why can’t I just get a well produced movie that may have an agenda, but is, like, actually good? I mean, Network, Deliverance, Taxi Driver, The Dear Hunter, all are very powerful movies with political messages that don’t overshadow basic things like plot and character.

Hustlers
This was probably one of the better movies I’ve seen recently and I still walked out of it about 2/3rds of the way through. When it dawned on me that J.Lo’s ass cheeks were simply a ruse to get my butt in a dark theatre and that there would be no positive male characters, I bounced. But the movie itself was very strong did a great job of telling its story. I didn’t see the whole movie, so maybe this is a dumb question, but, how come there wasn’t more lesbian action in the movie? It’s implied in a whisper, but this is 2019. I think audiences can handle the two main female characters having a dimly lit naked romp in bed.

Charlie’s Angels
This movie needed to be darker and have more sex in it. Since only old farts like me care about the franchise, I think Elizabeth Banks should have done a Buffy The Vampire Slayer and made her version of this otherwise campy movie far more adult. Put a lot more John Wick and Hustlers in it. Make it a gritty — if a bit campy — action packed movie with sex-positive portrayals of female sexual agency. This whole business of having an out-of-nowhere montage of young women running around with big smiles on their faces made no sense to me. It was a real, “What the what?” moment. If she’d done as I suggested, a lot of middle-aged couples would have really enjoyed the movie. It might not have been the hit everyone had hoped for, but it would not have been a flop. Needed far stronger actresses, however, to pull it off. Though I really did like Kristen Stewart.

Anyway, I am extremely brutal with movies I go to see and if I walk out of it, the producers shouldn’t take it too seriously or personally. I often have a drink before I go see a movie and I bounce because I just don’t feel like the movie has any more to give. Also, I sometimes have an ah-ha experience because of the movie and I leave because I’d rather be home developing my novel.