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magnifique
I finished the re-writes on the story I wrote earlier in the month and I’ve sent it out to a market. I have to keep rolling the dice. I watched the terrific low-budget French horror film, Maléfique (2002), today. I saw the film originally at the London horror film festival, FrightFest a number of years ago, where the director, Eric Valette, gave a Q&A afterwards. The film made a lasting impression on me, so I was delighted it got a DVD release. The lads behind FrightFest have shown considerable foresight and have established their own DVD label, FrightFest Presents. Maléfique is the second title in their catalogue of horror flicks.…
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for the love
Since the New Year my writing has been going well. I’m almost afraid to type these words, as if it will cause the mysterious writing Genie that is my current companion and comic sidekick to disappear in a puff of multi-coloured smoke with a final sarcastic bon mot. This is ridiculous, of course, but yet I hesitate to tell people that I’m writing, meeting deadlines, ideas are flowing, and projects are being fleshed out. I should be celebrating this fact. Yet, sometimes I live in the fear that it will vanish. So part of what’s keeping me on track is the desire to tap into this creative spurt and to…
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respect the early masters of the genre
Yesterday, much to my delight, I got delivery of The Val Lewton Horror Collection (region 1 only). For those of you unfamiliar with the man, Val Lewton was appointed head of the Horror unit in RKO in 1942. He proceeded to commission a series of films that only had to conform to three rules: 1. The budget had to be under $150,000. 2. The film could not run more than 75 minutes (each film was shown as half of a double feature). 3. The title of the film was supplied by Lewton’s supervisors. The obvious 4th rule that is not normally mentioned is that it had to be scary. Horror…
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read
A few days after I listed my three one-word summaries of my goals for this year (write; hydrate; exercise.) I realised that I’d left one off the list: read. It slipped my mind because reading has always been an integral part of my life Yet, reading for pleasure has taken a lower priority as demands on my time have increased. In two hours I can watch a movie, but a book requires a greater investment. I read all the time: articles, journals, magazines, news items, blogs, etc. On top of this I’m usually involved in some kind of research, which requires scouring through history books, reference material, and/or online resources.…
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diversity
There’s really a great post (and comments) on screenwriting, films and race on the Artful Writer in reaction to a piece on Complications Ensue. I think it’s a great debate with a lot of different viewpoints being expressed. Exactly the kind of dialogue that brings forth new perspectives. I am conscious of gender, race and sexuality in the scripts and stories I write. Tokenism usually comes across as patronising, but I try to reflect the diversity in life that I encounter. It’s that simple. Sometimes characters turn up as white or Indian, gay or straight, and I work with them. I don’t consciously say “oh, why not make character x…
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inspiration
There were a number of programmes on TV during the run-up to the death of 2005 that detailed lists of movies that people rated very highly. Around Halloween I assembled a list of horror films I admired. Today I’m delineating the non-genre (not sf/fantasy/horror/action/thriller) films that burn brightly in my imagination. When I mull over the choices there are many criteria I could use, such as excellent acting, innovative direction, and intelligent writing. In this case I have chosen films that left an undeniable emotional impact upon me after watching them. Of course it’s deeply personal. After viewing each of these films I came away with the thought “This is…
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one to keep an eye (of the devil) on
Often, there are subjects that I want to tackle on this journal, but the press of time doesn’t allow me the opportunity. Over the coming weeks I hope to tackle a few items that have been on the mental back-burner for some time. For instance, I’d want to mention a horror flick I saw at the end of October, when TV channels were dripping with slasher pics and creature features. On TCM late one night I caught the beginning of a film called Eye of the Devil (1967), and made a snap decision to watch its entirety despite the fact it was going to cost me the next day. The…
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I may explode
I found out, about an hour ago, that I have been awarded a 1st Class Honour in my MA in Screenwriting. I’m past the numbed shock and now I’m speeding into hysterical gibbering excitement. For the Americans out there, this is the highest grade you can obtain in any degree in Ireland. It is also very difficult to obtain (I’m not trying to toot my own horn here, but that’s the reality of the situation for Arts degrees in Irish Universities). The degree was part academic (film theory, history, etc.), and part creative writing, but the completed screenplay was a significant portion of the mark, so as you can imagine…
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creepy films
Lately, I’ve been thinking a lot about horror. For the next meeting of my screenwriting group I’ve agreed to discuss the horror genre, and show a classic horror film. Since this is for the purposes of writing, I picked a film that would be well-known by everyone, had a script online that everyone could read in advance, and I decided that I’d go with a movie that was not based on previous material (book, comic, short story, etc.). If we’re trying to flex our writing muscles to generate new concepts I figured we might as well look at how an original idea was developed for the screen. So, I chose…
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this I suspect…
Today I started reading Playwriting: Writing, Producing, and Selling Your Play by Louis E. Catron. So far it’s a good read. I like Catron’s direct no-bullshit approach. He’s not trying to work New Age marketing crap into his book. From what I’ve read so far it’s a solid introduction to the basics of writing for theatre. He has a number of early suggestions about how to develop as a writer long before he gets to the concrete advice about constructing a stage play. For instance he advises writing a journal. He has some nifty ideas for establishing a private journal that is designed to keep random dialogue, story lines, characters,…
