Scripts Discussion

[Gwynplaine]

Does BG have many script wonks? I can't confess to have read a great many, but I've been digging the whole process of reading hollywood scripts and comparing them to the actual movie, or older drafts to a final product.

Didn't notice any threads specifically about scripts, so I thought why not. Maybe if there's enough interest discuss anything and everything related to written scripts. Ask for tips, share your own, share current or upcoming scripts you get your hands on, or discuss older classics, whatevs.

I recently stumbled upon this site which has an impressive amount of older and slightly dated movie scripts. Some links are broke but a lot still work. I had a lot of fun reading the BeetleJuice script drafts and seeing how vastly different the final turned out to be.

[Senji]

People only started reading books half way through GoT and you expect they are reading old scripts?

[Trichocyst]

I have a BFA in writing for film and television so I spent a lot of time reading scripts in college. These days I don't do as much reading as writing. Tarantino always seems to put out a bloated script. I'd say a good 20-25 pages will get cut at least, but you never know with him. He might want a two and a half hour movie.

[Talus]

Aren't they normally 110 pages? The difference of course being in the initial script and revisions (to write is to rewrite/revise/tighten up), and the shooting script with the additions made by the director/DP?

If you read scripts, and you're interested in writing, I'd say definitely read the scripts for movies that bombed/didn't work, because it's useful to compare the script of something successful (big box office and/or critical acclaim) with absolute turds.

[Gwynplaine]

I have a BFA in writing for film and television so I spent a lot of time reading scripts in college. These days I don't do as much reading as writing. Tarantino always seems to put out a bloated script. I'd say a good 20-25 pages will get cut at least, but you never know with him. He might want a two and a half hour movie.

Yeah this sucker is 168 pages. His writing style doesn't make it seem so bad though, it kinda flows easy. Almost done and it seems like it'll make for good movie watchin' but nothing exactly spectacular or surprising. Inglorious Basterds with slaves and cowboys more or less.

People only started reading books half way through GoT and you expect they are reading old scripts?

What's GoT?

[Qalbert]

game of thrones

[Gwynplaine]

game of thrones

Gawtcha. Well I don't expect anyone to be, I just know there's at least a little slice of the populous out there that does like to read movie scripts. Either just for the insight into movie-making, or becoming a better writer, or what have you.

For example I've heard that the various drafts for Indian Jones 4 are vastly different. I'd like to check it out if I could find them somewhere. It went through multiple writers before turning into the thing that became the finished movie. I've heard say the other writers draft was much better.

[Trichocyst]

The average script is about 120 pages (two hour feature film). If you're an unknown writer trying to sell a 170 page script, odds are nobody is going to read it, ha. Of course, even if you write an amazing script, odds are a studio will buy it, shelf it, and put you to work writing for committee on something. I give a lot of credit to Tarantino for paying his dues and studios will actually finance movies he wants to make, but I wish he had any humility about the way he borrows elements from a billion different sources.

[Trichocyst]

It's worth mentioning that when I was in college Chinatown was considered the most perfect script of all time. I can't think of anything since that would have changed that. Ha.

[Gwynplaine]

I'm not like a huge script nut or anything, but that is what I've heard. Can't say, I've never seen Chinatown let alone read its script. I also hear tons of praise of Back to the Future and the first Indiana Jones.

Finally finished off Django. Was captivating enough, exactly what you'd expect form Tarantino just little else. In particular he has a knack for creating compelling dynamics between each character in the room. They all have an angle and a goal. Although I felt much of the purpose of the story was lost in the final part because

Spoiler: show

the hero's goal is to get his girl back. The villain dies, and he does, but then it keeps going and it feels pointless because now he's just killing the villains "family unit". Which is partly comprised of an old man, and a clueless woman who seemed to have done nothing wrong. So it's a little... unnecessary, bizarre, and anticlimactic. He even takes vengeance on the dogs lol.

[Trichocyst]

Chinatown is incredible. So long as the story hasn't been ruined for you (and it may very well have been without you realizing it) it's astonishing. Even if you know the twist, it's amazing. Depending on what draft of the Back to the Future script you get it could be very different, but the finished version is great. It's a very well put together movie. It was passed over four times before somebody made it. What's funny is that nobody wanted to buy the Casablanca script. In the 80's somebody took the script around to studios under the original title (Everybody Comes To Rick's) and it got passed on by everyone who didn't recognize it (not enough sex, too much talking, etc.)

I think Hot Fuzz is the best written movie of the last ten years. I'm a big Wes Anderson fan (like pretty much everyone from art school). Eternal Sunshine is genius script. I think Diablo Cody is a hack who had one good story idea and writes dialogue like the dying wails of cats. Just thinking of recent movies lauded for their writing. I usually don't agree with the academy.

My biggest issue with Tarantino's spaghetti western is the fact I know he got the idea from Takahashi Miike who just did the same thing.

[Trichocyst]

I love bad, campy, grindhouse movies and the like, but bad scripts are just too much for me. Like nails on a chalkboard. I did a lot of reading for the Greater Philadelphia Film Office for it's annual "Set-In-Philadelphia" contest and read a lot of really terrible scripts. I distinctly remember one starting out with this fantastic premise: a woman gets killed in Philadelphia and her family avenges her death, but one of the members of the family is a police officer. I was kind of excited at the tension they were presenting. "What are they going to do? How are they going to keep the aunt from finding out? What happens when she gets too close to the investigation?" Immediately after feeling these emotions they told the aunt and it became a sloppy "family versus mafia" mess. I was so angry at them for wasting a decent premise.

Patton Oswalt has a really funny bit about working on a script and how hard it is. He talks about the release of Death Bed: The Bed That Eats making it even harder because somebody got up every day to work on that script, got financing, and got it made.