Workshop 4

SCRIPTWRITING
Tuesday May 24th, 6:30PM to 9:30PM

Scriptwriting and Alternatives to the Narrative Story

We will critically examine ideas/premises of the feature film scripts and or treatments that we have chosen to develop in the school. The goal of this workshop is to examine why a video/filmmaker should do that and how they can do it.

We are going to break scenes down into their constituent elements in this workshop. We will look closely at establishing character and conflict and then at the demands of developing character through conflict to a point of crisis.

We will examine the kind of motivation needed to justify a significant, climatic moment and look at the necessity for change in characters through dramatic change. We'll deal with the use of overtly thematic material and conclude by considering dialogue and the pure use of action without dialogue to convey story.

We will also examine camera language and format and discuss different scriptwriting software. We will discuss the purpose of the narrative and its strengths but also its weaknesses in terms of establishing fresh new approaches to material.

Then we will look at how various innovative filmmakers from around the world have gone beyond the purely narrative structure. It is important that film/video makers understand that they can work outside of the boundaries of the narrative.

Assignment: Rewriting the scenes or scripts picked for development.