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Post by Richard Kimble on Oct 7, 2022 16:53:52 GMT
A thread about screenwriters and screenwriting. Oft-ignored in this "The Director is The AUTEUR" world we live in. If you don't know anything about the subject, here are two very readable books on it:
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Post by Richard Kimble on Oct 7, 2022 16:58:10 GMT
A page from the souvenir book for Hatari, spotlighting Leigh Brackett and the legendary wit Harry Kurnitz. A rare acknowledgement of screenwriters from the studios of the era.
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Post by Richard Kimble on Oct 7, 2022 17:01:08 GMT
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Post by Isapop on Oct 7, 2022 17:23:14 GMT
William Goldman was always a great favorite of mine. I've ready nearly all his books, fiction and non-fiction.
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Post by Richard Kimble on Oct 7, 2022 20:35:45 GMT
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Post by Penn Guinn on Oct 8, 2022 2:44:28 GMT
JOHN HUSTON : Writer: Movie (33 credits) - several of which were nominated for academy awards with one win 1988 Mr. North (screenplay) 1975 The Man Who Would Be King (screenplay) 1970 The Kremlin Letter (screenplay) 1964 The Night of the Iguana (screenplay) 1957 Heaven Knows, Mr. Allison (screenplay) 1956 Moby Dick (screenplay) 1953 Beat the Devil (screenplay) 1952 Moulin Rouge (screenplay) 1951 The African Queen (adapted for the screen by) 1951 The Red Badge of Courage (screenplay) 1950 The Asphalt Jungle (screen play) 1949 We Were Strangers (screenplay) 1948 Key Largo (screenplay) 1948 The Treasure of the Sierra Madre (screenplay) 1946 The Killers (uncredited) 1946 The Stranger (uncredited) 1946 Three Strangers (original screenplay) 1944 Dark Waters (uncredited) 1941 The Maltese Falcon (screen play by) 1941 Sergeant York (original screen play) 1941 High Sierra (screen play) 1940 Dr. Ehrlich's Magic Bullet (original screen play) 1939 Juarez (screen play) 1939 Wuthering Heights (contributing writer - uncredited) 1938 The Amazing Dr. Clitterhouse (screen play) 1938 Jezebel (screen play) 1935 It Happened in Paris (screen adaptation) 1935 Death Drives Through (story) 1934 The Mighty Barnum (contract writer - uncredited) 1932 Law and Order (adaptation) 1932 Murders in the Rue Morgue (added dialogue) 1931 A House Divided (dialogue) 1930 The Storm (dialogue)
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Post by Penn Guinn on Oct 9, 2022 5:45:48 GMT
RUTH GORDON married Garson Kanin in 1942. She began writing plays, and, later, her husband and she collaborated on screenplays for Katharine Hepburn and Spencer Tracy, whose screen relationship was modeled on their own marriage. Writer: Movie (7 credits) 1967 Rosie! (play "A Very Rich Woman") 1953 The Actress (from: her stage play "Years Ago") / (screen play) 1952 Pat and Mike (written by) 1952 The Marrying Kind (written by) 1949 Adam's Rib (screen play) 1947 A Double Life (written by) 1945 Over 21 (play) Writer: TV (6 credits) 1980 Hardhat and Legs (TV Movie) 1973 Adam's Rib (TV Series) (story - 2 episodes) The Unwritten Law: Part 2 (1973) ... (story) The Unwritten Law: Part 1 (1973) ... (story) 1960 The DuPont Show of the Month (TV Series) (play - 1 episode) - Years Ago (1960) ... (play) 1957 The Alcoa Hour (TV Series) (previous screenplay - 1 episode) - A Double Life (1957) ... (previous screenplay) 1950 The Prudential Family Playhouse (TV Series) (play - 1 episode) - Over 21 (1950) ... (play) The Ford Theatre Hour (TV Series) (play - 1 episode, 1948) (writer - 1 episode, 1948) - Years Ago (1948) ... (play) / (writer)
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Post by Captain Spencer on Oct 9, 2022 13:08:49 GMT
Say what you want about Joe Eszterhas, but he had a very interesting career as a screenwriter as detailed in his memoir Hollywood Animal.
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Post by Penn Guinn on Oct 9, 2022 13:37:43 GMT
Fictional
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Post by Richard Kimble on Nov 3, 2022 10:22:34 GMT
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Post by Richard Kimble on Nov 19, 2022 21:03:24 GMT
John Michael Hayes is especially remembered for the four screenplays he worked on for Alfred Hitchcock. In this video Hayes discusses working on Rear Window: How They Write A Script: John Michael HayesOn working with Hitchcock: On working with directors: Hayes had a great gift for repartee. Even on a project as unremarkable as the long forgotten TV movie/pilot for Nevada Smith (1975) there are a number of memorable dialogue exchanges.
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Post by Richard Kimble on Mar 14, 2023 19:39:33 GMT
TSH,DT? was originally set to be filmed in the late '30s, with Bette Davis (and Henry Fonda), as was The African Queen (with David Niven! The Bogie character is much younger in the novel)
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lune7000
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Post by lune7000 on Mar 14, 2023 20:26:39 GMT
This is a great thread, I am glad that you bumped this so that I know it exists. I have ordered a bunch of screenwriting books from the library and will come back here to relate what I found interesting. I have always felt that the focus on the director is excessive- I don't think the director has much more than 20% of an impact on any film.
One of the major limits of film, as an art form, is that movies are so expensive that they have to be compromised in such a way that enough members of the public will watch them. This really limits the possibilities of story and script to "what sells". The best screenwriters are able still to inject good material within a formula plot to make it stand out.
I especially admire screenwriters that have a sense of personality among their different characters. In so many movies today, it seems like every word that somebody says could have been said by somebody else in the movie. There is no sense of individuality in any of the characters in the way they speak, they all sound the one person- the writer. Grammar, word choice, sentence structure, flow- its all the same for everyone.
Also, most writers wouldn't know an authentic regional style of speech if it hit them on the head. They spend al their time in L.A. and think everyone talks like they do. But different regions have unique words, phrases and ways of structuring sentences. If you want to watch a great movie in this regard, take a look at Junior Bonner (1972) written by Jeb Rosebrook- a total devotion to regional speech patterns and phrases.
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Post by Prime etc. on Mar 14, 2023 20:54:56 GMT
Richard Matheson was very fussy as a writer of scripts--he included camera directions. That surprised me--I didn't think he would be so concerned about the visual side of things. He did not like dialogue changed (Peter Lorre being an exception since he improvised a lot)--and it is hard to find examples of his scripts being altered. Literally word for word--his screenplay dialogue is followed from what I have studied of his writing.
On Burn, Witch, Burn, he wrote half the screenplay and Charles Beaumont did the other half.
He also said he was strict about adapting other people's work. He did not like to add his own ideas to someone else's writing. He felt his job as an adapter was to get the essence of the author's vision and not include any of his own. Dennis Wheatley was so pleased with his screenplay for The Devil Rides Out, he sent him a thank you note.
Stirling Silliphant opined in a documentary on screenwriting that he found most novel dialogue to be dreadful and advised a writer to start with dialogue like they were doing a play, and add in the exposition after the dialogue was finalized.
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Post by manfromplanetx on Mar 15, 2023 0:20:56 GMT
Kaneto Shindō (新藤 兼人, 1912-2012) Shindō’s distinguished career spans practically the entire history of Japanese sound film, he remained actively working as a screenwriter, director, and author until close to his death at the age of 100. Kaneto Shindo is credited with over 230 screenplays, and he wrote and directed 49 films himself, attributing the development of his screenwriting skills to the time he was an art assistant for the famous film director Kenji Mizoguchi. His films of the 1950s were mostly social realist films, depicting the fate of women, and the underprivileged, being born in Hiroshima Prefecture atomic weapons and the associated fallout issues from nuclear testing feature in a number of his early works. Shindo was also one of the pioneers of independent film production in Japan, co-founding his own film company Kindai Eiga Kyōkai with director Kōzaburō Yoshimura in 1950. Many of Shindō's film scripts were autobiographical, notably his 1951 directorial debut is titled Story of a Beloved Wife. He wrote a diverse range of screenplays for many of the best Japanese directors of the era, his pensive screenwriting was in high demand for the new-wave of Japanese cinema throughout the 1960s. Classic films from the directors, Yūzō Kawashima, Kon Ichikawa, Keisuke Kinoshita, Yasuzo Masumura, Fumio Kamei, Kōzaburō Yoshimura, and Tadashi Imai, to name just a few, are highlighted and enhanced by the collaborative work of screenwriter Kaneto Shindo. As an author, Shindō made a name for himself as the author of books on the theory of filmmaking and screenwriting, unfortunately no English translation as yet of his personal story, A Life in Screenwriting (2004), however this fascinating book was released in 2020 in English. Life Is Work: Kaneto Shindo and the Art of Directing, Screenwriting, and Living 100 Years Without Regrets...
At his desk, circa 1962...... .
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spiderwort
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Post by spiderwort on Mar 15, 2023 1:26:16 GMT
Lois Weber (1879-1939) was the first American woman movie director of note with over 140 credits from 1911 to 1934, of which she wrote 120. Most of her scripts were in the socially conscious realm, dealing with subjects like poverty, abortion, political crimes, suicide, birth control, infidelity, etc. Her works were significant and profoundly influential.
Frances Marion (1888-1973) was the most renowned female screenwriter of the early 20th century; maybe of the whole century. She won two Oscars (for The Big House and The Champ), and was nominated for a third, for The Prizefighter and the Lady. She wrote a total of 186 films from 1912 to 1953. Other notable titles include Anna Christie, The Big House, The Wind, Stella Dallas, Dinner at Eight, Camille, Min and Bill, and The Good Earth.
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lune7000
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Post by lune7000 on Mar 15, 2023 3:22:21 GMT
It should be noted that story and dialogue are two vastly different realms. Most dialogue I have heard in film is uninspired and serves as a simple exposition of story. Playwriters tend to focus more on how speech impacts the phycological dimension of a story. The best movies I have seen in this regard are usually adaptations of plays.
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Post by Prime etc. on Mar 15, 2023 23:34:47 GMT
Don't forget Ruth Rose! King Kong/Son of Kong screenwriter.
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Post by Penn Guinn on Mar 15, 2023 23:47:03 GMT
It should be noted that story and dialogue are two vastly different realms. Most dialogue I have heard in film is uninspired and serves as a simple exposition of story. Playwriters tend to focus more on how speech impacts the phycological dimension of a story. The best movies I have seen in this regard are usually adaptations of plays. and yet there are all those "quotes" which are included in the IMDb pages about films ... especially the "Classic Era Films"... reading (or even hearing someone else say them) many of which immediately inspires seeing in one's mind's eye the image of the character, the setting, the mood of the scene etc. We don't NEED no stinkin' bad-ches ! Play it Sam, you played it for her, you can play it for me ! Frankly my dear ... etc
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Post by manfromplanetx on Mar 16, 2023 2:03:28 GMT
Samuel Fuller began his career as a crime reporter for the sensationalist tabloid The New York Evening Graphic when he was only a teenager. He enthusiastically roamed the US in pursuit of the “big” stories that captured the drama and turmoil of Depression-era poverty, race riots, labor unrest and strikes. Inevitably Fuller’s talents and interests as a writer brought him to Hollywood in the mid 1930s, where he found success as a screenwriter for hire. At this time Fuller also started to write the first of his pulp fiction novels, his first screenwriting credits were for Hats Off (1936) and It Happened in Hollywood (1937). Refusing the safe option of war correspondent, Fuller instead enlisted in the army immediately after the Pearl Harbor attack, he wanted his boots on the ground, for “the greatest crime story of the century”. Fuller’s decorated war service was an experience that profoundly influenced his later career in writing, screenwriting and filmmaking. Bravely outspoken and politically progressive Samuel Fuller’s screenplays addressed urgent and deeply sensitive historical and contemporary social issues. With a mixture of genuine patriotism and scepticism Fuller through his writing incorporated controversial themes and taboo subjects rarely touched by others or the studios. He aimed to expose the stubborn prejudice, ignorance and bigotry, difficult issues that he saw as a terrible blight on the American nation. A consummate cinematic stylist and crusader for social justice, bold, and vibrant, Fuller had a passion for research and was broadly learned, his screenwriting was uniquely original and coloured with an eccentric language, one that he developed from his journalistic exposure among the characters encountered in the back alleys of the depression-era city streets. Samuel Fuller was a master storyteller, unprecedented and entertaining, his extraordinary screenwriting and films pulsate with unexpected drama and tremendous emotional depth... In the writer's room... "Cinema is like a battleground: Love. . .hate. . . action. . .violence. . .death. In a word, emotion.”
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