Failure 3

The failure to act. To endure procrastination in the works or other people. To not progress, to grow stagnant.

That is my chief failure. That is everyone's chief failure.

I always know what I am going to do, but I never act upon it. A shame for the sperm and the egg that "won".

I

I, I, I, I, I, I, I, I, I, I, I, I, I, I, I, I, I, I, I.

That is the entirety of the blog, no need to read anymore.

The Larry David Method

Pretty sick of writing scripts for today. Slowly getting to another point in my life where it is time to change... Again. Because changing is fun, and I'm a little bitch with change, so it proves interesting and provides material where I can write characters in funny situations and pretend I came up with it. This is known as The Larry David Method.

The Larry David Method is the writer's version of the Stanislavsky acting method. You go out, fuck up in abundance, feel stupid. Go home, laugh at yourself, and then try to sell someone fucking up in the same way as you did.

I think more people would read this (not that I care) if I put more pictures in it.

First Draft

Lars

(Breathlessly)

Thanks.

Lars looks around and notices a RECEPTIONIST in her forties and another fifty something man JULIAN. 

Receptionist  

Does it smell?

Lars

Yes.

Receptionist

God's green earth! Do you see what I mean? Some people need to sort out their diet.

Receptionist pulls a can of air freshener from beneath her desk and walks around it and out of the reception and closes the door.

We can see through a tiny pane of the door and hear the "SHUHHHH!" of the air freshner and it sprays out white gas.

Receptionist (CONT’D)

(Muffled)

It bloody stinks out here!

Receptionist opens the door and walks back to her desk.

Receptionist (CONT’D)

How are we supposed to make a good impression to clients if they walk into a cloud of that?! I swear Julian, this is going to cost so much in aerosols. You need to talk to security.

Julian

I did. The building is responsible for the toilets, not the companies. As such anyone on any floor can use any toilet on every floor. We can't stop them. Some people are so boring they play toilet bingo, trying to use the facilities on every floor.

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Just working through my first draft as of Monday. I was so happy to be done with the treatment that came to 26 pages. The funny thing is I didn't include the end sequence, because that would've took 26 pages. 

As I continue, I don't need to look at my treatment as I know the piece intimately now, and just look back at it now and then. Spending all this time on it, writing on index cards and all other things, I must've written 90 pages on it, before I even started.

However, now I have started and it is good to be back. Writing screenplays feels good. It's not perfect, but it's the first draft. 

The beginning of the piece was the hardest, I just hit a wall straight away. Now I am almost knee deep in it and have hits my stride as the screenplay is going in the direction it is supposed to. A lot of foreshadowing at the moment. 

I 'm at page 34 at the moment. I have about another hour of writing left in me today. The thing I am struggling with is finding the main character's voice and the fact that he seems to be a victim or witness to things, rather than an instigator. I know events change this in the screenplay, but I get the feeling if someone read this, they would chuck it away quickly.

I should finish the draft somewhat soon. Then in two weeks, off to film school to learn the basics of filmmaking.

Mission: Success

Huzzah! The treatment has been completed. Onto the screenplay. Huzzah!

Trying to write: A hamster wheel

Back when I was writing the second draft of my dissertation at University, I had one big problem. My laptop would always overheat after a while and if I didn't keep saving, then I would lose a stack of lines, if not pages of information. Then I would usually walk off and let it cool down for a while.

I was in an abusive relationship with my laptop. The amount of porn that it succumbed to allowed a virus to get through my Kaspersky antivirus and after a while, despite plenty of ventilation: it would shut down on me. 

The only source doing something is writing, to be shut down literally is hard. When you have no choice, you get back to it and keep on writing. It was like rewriting a sentence five times in a row, but you're never disappointed with it, you have a really shit editor who just goes that's shit, but it works. I had no choice, it was either keep doing it, give up or write it down on paper. The thought never crossed my mind to write it down on paper.

Probably because I can type things out faster than write it and it messes with my flow. I am starting to notice that because I did this, it makes me write things out many, many times. Such as I am now. I will say I am close to finishing my treatment for the screenplay. 

What this does allow me, despite the cons, is I have a more intimate knowledge of the characters and the source material. A way of layering the piece, not matter how good. It allows me to see who were originally just extras, to extras with lines, to side characters.

Despite all this, I feel like a glutton in not achieving anything. I hold myself back by too much preparation as I have nothing to show for my actions.

Perhaps a bit more writing the treatment and tomorrow and I can officially start writing the script (for the third time). 

Well, at least I know how the story goes now.

Breaking the story

Argh! Forcing my Saturday into a day of prepping the final draft of my treatment for my screenplay. I know, I know, "Bitch, why are you procrastinating?"

Aha.

I am not procrastinating. I am breaking the story. Getting things down in order, prior to making an extremely detailed treatment in preparation for the screenplay itself. This may lo overdrawn, but I prefer to do it rather than doing nothing, and I feel I am making progress and adding in little details into the story even now.

The trouble is with all this planning is you forget that it has to be cinematic. It needs to be worthy of being projected onto a giant screen in a big room, with many seats that only a few people are sat in. 

I watched the hobbit film for the first time last night. Two things struck me: why is this not more fun and I truly am missing out on the effect a cinema would allow me.

Anyway, I feel like I'm nearing the mid to end point of the project. Thank fuck, I think the biggest difficulty will be making the dialogue sing. It's not something that plenty of rewrites cannot achieve. I am starting to feel I need a break from this project anyway. 

I have decided to make my first real cut. Something that feels tacked on. By the time the script is done, it'll probably be around 120 pages anyway.

Another day of writing tomorrow and By the end of it starting the treatment. If I could finish this by the end of the month, I would be so happy.