Script and Pitch Insights #2 (Torino Film Lab)

150 mm 11 mm 150 mm
Script & pitch
Insights // 2
Script & pitch

Script&Pitch Workshops is an advanced script
development course for scriptwriters and story
editors from all over the world.
One of our aims is to share our passion for stories
Insights // 2
and the craft of writing, developing and produ
cing them. One way to share this is through this
book: a collection of lessons, essays, conversati
ons and insights from both tutors, alumni and
guests.
210 mm
Enjoy!
www.scriptpitchworkshops.com
SCRIPT & PITCH
INSIGHTS //2
Script&Pitch Insights //2
2009/2010
Edited by Valeria Richter, Denmark

Published by Script&Pitch Workshops, Italy, Savina Neirotti
Cover design by Lene Nørgaard, Propel Design, Denmark

Book set in Klavika by Fabrizio Demichelis, Italy
All rights reserved.

No part of this book may be used or reproduced in any manner whatsoever
without written permission from the authors and/or Script&Pitch Workshops;
except in the case of brief quotations embodied in critical articles or as a reference.
© The lectures remain copyright of their individual authors.

© The e-mail conversation remains copyright of its authors and Script&Pitch
Workshops.
Printed and bound in Italy by

Moglia s.r.l. - Via Sansovino 243/65/E - Torino
Index
Foreword 7
About Script&Pitch Workshops 9
Biographies 11
Inspirational Lectures / by Tutors 15
A Question of the Audience / by Franz Rodenkirchen 17
Idea, Concept, Soggetto / by Gino Ventriglia 27
On the Imperative for Action in Screenwriting: 37
An Attempt at Moving from Aristotle to Sartre / by Antoine Le Bos
Now You See It, Now You Don’t / by Franz Rodenkirchen 45
Paris-Texas - an Ideal Development Scheme? 59
The Importance of Finding a Driving Force… / by Antoine Le Bos
An Email Conversation on Adaptation 67
About Script Editing / by Tutors and Alumni 87
Life-Like: The Schizophrenia of the Limitless Possibilities / 89
by Marietta von Hausswolff von Baumgarten
Working with a Script Editor - from Killers to Fairy Godmothers / 97
by Jenni Toivoniemi
Impostors? / by Antoine Bataille 109
How Do You Know if the Customer is Happy? / by Atso Pärnänen 117
Answering Questions on Script Editing - from 3 Script&Pitch Alumni / 123
Contributions / by Guests 133
What do Scripts Sound Like? / by Michel Schöpping 135
The Dawn of the Independent Producer? / by Thomas Mai 143
Contact Information 149
A Question of the Audience
Foreword
Script&Pitch is moving into its fifth cycle and for every year something or
someone new is added to our programme. We simply can’t resist the joy of
being in constant development and flow. Since the story editor trainees have
gotten their own curriculum, we’d like to reflect on this in the section focusing
on story editing, and are happy to introduce three essays by our Alumni here.
Thanks to our new and close collaboration with the TorinoFilmLab we

have invited two Guests to contribute to the book, one with a special pas-
sion for integrating sound in the script and one with many years of experi-
ence in connecting films with audiences through sales and distribution. It
has always been a goal for Script&Pitch to link the different stages and
people involved in a script’s journey towards its audience. We aim to be
more than a course for professional scriptwriters and story editors by cre-
ating a space where everyone who makes this possible also enjoys to be,
a place where stories - the ones we write and the ones we live - are shared
by keeping a mutually giving and open spirit, all the way from the intimate
group work and workshops, to our direct encounters with the producing and
financing worlds at our yearly pitch event and the Alumni-meetings.
We wish to extend a thank you to all our Tutors and Authors for the gen-
erous sharing of their experience, insights and views on film and the craft
of writing and developing them; also a thank you to Olga and Fabrizio for
their work on the book.
A final big thank you to all who believe in our unique spirit of develop-
ment, first of all our partners, and MEDIA.
This book is especially for the participants; we hope it captures some of

the Script&Pitch-atmosphere by bringing us all together, also in writing.
We look forward to more of your contributions in the future. Enjoy!
Savina Neirotti
Director & Founder of Script&Pitch
Valeria Richter
Editor
7
About Script&Pitch Workshops
Focus
Script&Pitch Workshops is an advanced scriptwriting and development
course for European writers and story editors that unfolds over the course
of 11 months. Starting from 2010 it will also be possible for non-European
citizens to apply to Script&Pitch Workshops International.
20 participants are selected from all over the world (15 scriptwriters and
5 story editors) to take part in an integrated scriptwriting process, offering
training through the development and pitching of projects: from exploring
the ideas to structuring the material through a first and second draft, up
to a final pitch-event at the Torino Film Festival with 100 invited produc-
ers, sales agents and partners from around the world. The training and
script development process therefore culminates with a focus on network-
ing, which enables participants to find potential international production
and co-production opportunities.
In 2009 Script&Pitch entered a close collaboration with TorinoFilmLab,

an international training, development and production fund that offers
projects by 1st or 2nd time directors a chance to win a Development Award
and thereby gain access to the possibility of winning a Production Award.
By participating in Script&Pitch participants not only gain this extra

possibility if their project is eligible, but are also encouraged to network
with TorinoFilmLab participants at the workshops in March and Novem-
ber, broadening the scope of our active network. In order to be eligible for
the TorinoFilmLab Development Award writer-directors/directors must
work on their 1st or 2nd feature film; this limitation is not applicable for
writers.
Aim
Our primary aim is to advance and sharpen writers’ and story editors’
professional skills. The passion and knowledge of our tutors is therefore
an important energy. Another aim is to create a vibrant network and we
therefore connect Script&Pitch with festivals and industry-events, seek-
9
SCRIPT & PITCH - INSIGHTS //2
ing producers and partners who wish to invest their time in writers and
the development process, not only seeking single projects. Our vision is to
develop people with projects, rather than projects with people attached,
always supporting the independent talent.
Insights
Our tutors, Antoine Le Bos, Franz Rodenkirchen, Gino Ventriglia, Mari-
etta von Hausswolff von Baumgarten and Anita Voorham are experienced
and well connected professionals, both in their countries and on an inter-
national level. We work from the assumption that every story needs its
own individual approach, and that form is determined by content. Inspira-
tional lessons from the course are shared through a periodic publication:
Script&Pitch Insights, supporting our passion and goal to shed light and
dignity on the scriptwriting and story editing professions.
Workshops & Alumni meeting

Participants work in groups of three writers and a story editor trainee,
with a tutor heading the process. This intensive work is combined with
lectures on for example dramaturgy and script - and film analysis. Master
classes and one-to-one meetings with industry professionals are also an
integral part of the course. Three weeklong workshops and two on-line
sessions give the project development a constructive flow. Story editors
have their own coach and group-sessions that focus on their role in the
development.
Who can apply?

This is a post-graduate course open to professional scriptwriters and
story editors, film school graduates, writer-directors and writer-producers
from all over the world. For the story editor training we encourage devel-
opment executives and other professionals working in development or in
script decision-making positions to apply. Fiction writers and playwrights
can also participate, for example with an adaptation project. Many of our
participants already have a production company attached to their project
and look for script - and development training to strengthen the univer-
sality and personal voice of the project, yet it is no requirement to have a
producer attached.
Read more on our website: www.scriptpitchworkshops.com
10
Biographies
Tutors //
Antoine Le Bos
Antoine Le Bos is a French Screenwriter and Script Consultant, with more

than 25 feature scripts delivered under contract as a writer and more than
100 feature projects as a consultant. He won the Gan Foundation Prize in
2005, and works with among others the Afghani director and Prix Goncourt
winner Atiq Rahimi. He is also Artistic Director of Le Groupe Ouest, a Euro-
pean Centre for film creation in Britanny, France.
Marietta von Hausswolff von Baumgarten
Marietta von Hausswolff von Baumgarten is a Swedish Screenwriter

and Script Consultant. She works mainly as a consultant for feature film
projects from around the world and Scandinavia. She is also head of a
small art film production company (Automat/MotherofSons M.O.S.) Her
background is in production, publishing, art and music video projects, as
well as TV-drama, where she did script editing, commissioning, develop-
ment and writing.
Franz Rodenkirchen
Franz Rodenkirchen (*1963) is an international Story Editor and Tu-

tor. Franz has been working as a story editor on mostly international film
projects for over 10 years, predominantly with writer-directors. He also
gives workshops on alternative approaches to script editing and is a tutor
in various development programs.
11
Gino Ventriglia
Gino Ventriglia is a Script Consultant at the Development Office of Isti-

tuto Luce. He has worked for both the major Italian networks (Rai, Media-
set) and cinema/TV production companies. He co-wrote 3 feature films and
worked on the development of a large number of TV series and co-created a
daily serial drama. He teaches drama theories at Rai-Script, Mediaset-RTI
Courses, Scuola Holden and the National Film School in Rome (CSC).
Alumni //
Antoine Bataille
Antoine Bataille is a freelance Story Editor since 2007. He’s also writ-
ing a Master’s thesis on the affective charge of moving pictures at the
Paris Denis Diderot University, where he works as a tutor. His main aim
is to explore the limits and new possibilities of narrative forms in current
storytelling.
Atso Pärnänen
Atso Pärnänen likes to define himself “a beginner, in more ways than

one”. He is a Writer, Director, Producer who took part in Script&Pitch in
2008 as a story editor trainee. Atso is currently story editing and develop-
ing various projects in/from different countries.
Jenni Toivoniemi
Jenni Toivoniemi is a Finnish Scriptwriter and Journalist. She and her co-
writer Kirsikka Saari are just finishing their first feature script Korso (devel-
oped at Script&Pitch) - a film produced by Blind Spot Pictures and directed
by Aleksi Salmenperä.
12
Guests //
Thomas Mai
Thomas Mai is an international, very experienced Film Sales Agent, who

specializes in the new digital distribution possibilities. His new company,
Festival Darlings, functions as a so-called traditional sales agent, yet with
a strong focus on digital rights and sales/distribution strategies (like for
example VoD, DoD & CoD).
Jeff Rush
After serving as the Founding Chair of Temple University’s Department

of Film and Media Arts and then the Senior Associate Dean for the School
of Communications and Theatre, Jeff Rush has returned to the faculty as
Associate Professor to teach and work on his own projects. He is currently
writing on contemporary screenwriting, and developing projects in interac-
tive media. He is the co-author of Alternative Scriptwriting.
Michel Schöpping
Michel started his career as a Film Music Composer. He studied musi-

cology and soon got involved in sound design and film mixing. During the
last 20 years he designed, edited and mixed dozens of documentaries, art
films and features; he has also produced several CD recordings and directed
two music-documentaries. Currently he is still working as a sound designer,
dubbing mixer, composer, music-supervisor, film-, music- and post-pro-
duction consultant; and he is a teacher at the Dutch Film Academy.
13
INSPIRATIONAL
LECTURES
by Tutors

by Franz Rodenkirchen
“I never think of the spectator”
Robert Bresson
Telling a story means to tell it to someone. Be it a single person or a

great mass of people - one might safely surmise that, whoever attempts to
tell a story, also wants this story to be heard. Without a listener, without an
audience, without an addressee, the act of narration appears to be a form
of masturbation. But even when telling a story only to oneself, we create a
narrating and a listening self.
So it can be asked whether a story without an audience exists at all.
Film being a (mass-)medium, we find it self-evident that there shall be

not a single addressee, but that we intend to address a potentially great
mass of people: the often quoted audience or spectator. It is useful to not
just accept this term as a given and then speculate upon it, but rather to
take a closer look as to how it is being used. Eventually quite a few misun-
derstandings in developing scripts can be traced back to an unclear usage
of the term audience, while all parties concerned would vouch that they’ve
been speaking of exactly the same thing.
Many film authors reject the notion of audience, and this rejection of-
ten stems from the idea, that any mention of audience is referring to an
implicit judgement of taste, as in “the audience doesn’t like this” or “this
kind of character is not sympathetic for an audience” etc. Here, audience
is used as a label to refer to an amorphous mass, whose assumed likes
and dislikes the film author should (or maybe even wishes to) follow, in
a kind of anticipatory obedience. More often than not, this is fuelled by
a fear of rejection, but maybe also by a subtle uneasiness, if one isn’t yet
completely sure what it is that is (being) written. Naturally, serving the as-
sumed taste of an imaginary audience won’t help in the least to relinquish
that uneasiness.
17
Fearing the audience’s taste judgement is but only one aspect of a faulty
reasoning with the audience. Unfortunately one often finds with commis-
sioning editors and producers the conviction that one needs to tell the story
to the audience in such a way that even the dimmest of spectators will be
able to understand. Usually this is the kiss of death to any subject, as we
should rather work from the assumption that the audience of a film is as
clever as the people behind its making. If we think ourselves to be cleverer
than our audience, we are already seriously disadvantaged. Overestimat-
ing one’s own cleverness, while underestimating an audience’s intelligence
can never lead to a successful act of communication. For this reason, one
should not make changes in a script that are motivated by assuming that
the audience lacks intelligence, subtlety or whatever. Some writers are for
example, masters of subtext, but that is by no means their privilege. We
rather find subtext in a lot of everyday situations and it is usually well un-
derstood. If not, irony would become impossible.
So if any demand for changes in a script uses the audience as its argu-
ment, it is important that all parties concerned take the audience as seri-
ously as they take themselves. It is therefore useful to first check if the
creative team can agree on what story they are working on, how a script
tells this story and what that is supposed to mean. If we find that we un-
derstand it, that is, if it is really the script that supplies all necessary means
for understanding (and not our contextual knowledge acquired through the
development process), there is really no reason to assume the audience
won’t be able to understand it, too.
Besides this rather unknowable audience, which usually brings more

harm than good when drawn into the writing process, there is also the idea
of audience as the addressee of an act of communication.
If we can agree that film authors are really interested to convey a mes-
sage, to tell something, to successfully communicate, or to at least make
such an offer to their audience, then this addressee already exists during
the script development. In this understanding, every reader of the script,
including the script editor, is part of the audience.
There are some film authors who even reject this idea of communica-
tion with an audience. But the sometimes strong resistance, the excited
discussions about the role of the audience in the creative act often have
more to do with the context in which they occur, than with the thing itself.
When Robert Bresson states (see the quote I used in my opening) that he
never cares about the audience, he is referring to audience as a means to
18
have leverage when pressuring film authors to comply with an assumed

taste and need. But in one of his Notes (on the Cinematographer) he writes:
“Creating expectations, to fulfil them” [my translation]. This is clearly not
possible without taking the audience into consideration.
So if we do take audience as the addressee of an act of narration, one

can very well argue with the audience. Stories are consciously shaped to-
wards what is to be told and understood when and how. Narrative tools aim
to elicit an effect and this effect in turn is created within the audience.
We can therefore conclude that the audience is to be considered taboo

whenever we talk about matters of taste or matters of moral judgement.
Whereas audience is always to be reckoned with where we consider the re-
ception of a work of art, a successful act of communication and the more or
less active participation in activating the story while reading or watching it.
Here, audience is by no means the passive recipient of a message, but
rather shapes the narration through its ways of reception.
The study and analysis of narratives has long been focused on tracing the
intentions of the author and interpreting the work. Around the 1960s, the
role of the reader became a topic of scholarly interest and only in the wake
of this development it turned out that readers do not just extricate meaning
from texts in a kind of neutral way, but instead contribute to the shaping of
the text through the act of reading. And it transpired that this contribution
of the reader, her/his actualisation of meaning through the act of reading,
is implicitly considered by authors already in the act of writing. So the active
participation of the reader has been a key subject of academic research - in
narratology, and especially in reader-response criticism - for decades.
One can safely state that this academic research has been largely ig-
nored by the film industry and its respective findings have had almost no
impact on the development of film scripts. One reason here is surely the
considerable scepticism of most members of the film industry towards
academic theory. But maybe it is also not immediately obvious if and how
such theories can be put to practical use when working on scripts and yield
concrete results. After all, a script is no literature, written to be read by an
audience, but simply a very exact plan of something that eventually is to be
watched - the “dream of a film”, Jean-Claude Carrière calls it, thereby also
pointing out that film authors need to see the film in their mind’s eye, to
be able to write it down. And write it such that also others can see it with
sufficient clarity.
19
Yet there are possibilities to make use of the theories on the role and
function of the reader / spectator when working on scripts and there are
definitely very practical benefits, for example when considering the differ-
ent types of an audience’s emotional engagement with a narrative.
Another obstacle in really looking at the potential usefulness of academ-
ic research can be the impression that some things are almost too obvious
to bother, too simple to make a point of. Eventually it might turn out that it
can be a highly complex task to analyse a simple action into its various ele-
ments and then analyse their interrelations to again end up with something
seemingly simple, which we do rather intuitively than consciously.
I for myself always find it worthwhile and useful to look at the mecha-
nisms that are at work when we create a story, a narrative (one that is al-
ways meant to be transferred into a multi-layered sequence of images and
sounds) that is then to be received by an audience.
In this largely subconscious effects-mechanism of exchange between
sender, message and recipient we create the stories we tell ourselves.
So what exactly is it that is understood in this act of “understanding”?
Every time we tell a story, we find it natural to rely on our silent agree-
ment with the audience regarding their co-operation. Therefore we do not
have to tell it all, but can confine ourselves to that, which is necessary for
understanding this particular story we are just telling.
I might start by telling that when I left the house this morning I met the
woman who lives next door. If I start like that, there is no need to mention
that before that I woke up, had a shower, got dressed, etc. If waking up and
getting dressed has no specific meaning for the story I am about to tell, I
will skip it, for I trust that my audience knows, thanks to its general knowl-
edge of the world at large, that for example one has to wake up before one
can leave the house in the morning.
I could be secretly in love with my neighbour, though and always set
my alarm clock so that I manage to “accidentally” leave the house at the
same time as her. Then it might make sense to start with my waking up –
maybe I almost overslept, dressed in great hurry and eventually found my-
self downstairs at the door in my slippers, facing my beautiful neighbour’s
derisive smile.
This extremely simple story contains a series of automatic assump-
tions that I have to trust my audience will make, in order for the story to be
understood. Besides certain behavioural characteristics of secret infatua-
tion, some simple things have to be automatically agreed on: if I use the
same main door as my neighbour, I seem to live in an apartment block. I
also rely on my audience to know that alarm clocks are used to wake up at
20
a certain set time, and that a malfunction of this device can result in me
oversleeping, etc.
Umberto Eco has published several influential works on the co-oper-

ation of the audience. As he says in his Norton Lectures: “Every narra-
tive fiction (is) inevitably and unavoidably ‘fast’… just because, while it
builds a world with its events and people, it cannot possibly say every-
thing about its world. It makes suggestions and expects the reader to
cooperate and fill a series of gaps. Every text is …a lazy machine, which
asks the reader to do part of its work”. [my own translation from the Ger-
man edition].
Accordingly I wouldn’t have to mention in my above example, that I

was embarrassed to find myself standing before my beautiful neighbour
in my slippers. Here we rely on a series of complex assumptions, for ex-
ample that we want to make the best possible impression on somebody
we are in love with, and would not like to feel ridiculed in their eyes. That
my neighbour is beautiful can also be considered almost a given, for if we,
the audience, can identify with the general situation, we can assume that
we all would bestow the object of our infatuation with positive character-
istics such as physical beauty. On top of that, through the context of the
situation I describe it seems likely that as of yet I know my neighbour only
by sight, so it is even more likely that I was predominantly taken by her
appearance.
Of course I could also be a sleepwalker, then we’d have to take a dif-
ferent set of conditions into account - but again, I could assume that my
audience will know several of them without me having to mention them
explicitly.
As an author, one cannot only rely on the active co-operation of the

reader (of a text) and the audience (of a film); rather I am quite convinced
that this co-operation is key to an audience’s sustained interest (while we
have to keep in mind that films inevitably have much more definiteness
than a written text, because of their images). Indeed, one might say that
too much information weakens the audience’s interest, because it only has
limited or no opportunity to co-operate and actively engage with the story.
Where everything is spelled out, the audience has no choice but to pas-
sively accept.
The tortuous explanatory dramaturgy that is so often demanded in TV-
fiction creates a high redundancy of the narrative and has a paralysing ef-
fect on any audience that is willing to actively engage.
21
If a text, as Umberto Eco writes, is that “lazy machine”, which relies on

the co-operation of the audience, the selection of which elements to in-
clude (and exclude) gains vital importance.
For then all events, persons and objects actively mentioned in a text
(script/film) are, by silent agreement, been put there deliberately. This is
especially true in something as clearly defined as a screenplay, which, as we
already mentioned, is not an end in itself, but a tool to achieve something
else. So the film author must be aware that everything she/he writes in a
screenplay or shows in a film will be seen by the audience (whether con-
sciously or unconsciously) as the result of a choice by the author, whereby
they can assume that every selected element is meant to be meaningful
within the context of the work presented.
It can be meaningful with regards to a clearly defined goal of the char-
acter or a resolution of an action that is joined through chronological cau-
sality. Sometimes an element of the narrative describes an observation,
a state of being or a situation, where the selected elements presented in
this description combine to suggest a specific interpretation. It can also
be part of an author’s strategy to create a specific atmosphere. Whatever
the intention, we cannot but connect the elements, just because they are
presented within the same framework (a screenplay, a film).
Aristotle already pointed out in his Poetics that the elements of an ac-
tion/an event should be meaningful through the context of the selected
elements. Seymour Chatman puts it like this: “...events in narratives are
radically correlative, enchaining, entailing. Their sequence... is not simply
linear but causative. The causation may be overt, that is, explicit, or cov-
ert, implicit.“ Chatman refers to the much-cited example by novelist E.M.
Forster, who says: the sentence “the king died and then the queen died” is
only a story, a mere chronicle. Whereas “the king died and then the queen
died of grief” is a causally structured narrative, a plot. But, Chapman con-
tinues, even in the first example, we intuitively create a connection be-
tween the elements. The linear sequence of elements and the relation of
the elements to each other (the death of the king/husband is followed by
the death of the queen/wife) is already enough to suggest a causality, and
intuitively we create that causal connection.
As we can clearly see in this example, every element acquires meaning

(becomes meaningful) by its sheer presence in a particular context, where
it must appear as having been chosen with a purpose. Even where this con-
nection of elements seems difficult to forge, we, the audience, will attempt
to create such a connection, because we have come to consider elements
22
of the same narrative as being related to one another. If we changed For-

sters sentence as follows: “The king died, and then a tree was felled”, we
would most likely try to find a connection between the death of a king and
the felling of a tree (as a ritualistic or symbolic action after the death of a
leader; to use the wood for his tomb; even as a punishment of a magical
sort, for maybe the king died falling from that very tree?).
Forster’s two sentences about the king and the queen differ primarily in
their clarity when postulating a causal connection. They differ not in kind,
but merely gradually, and the second sentence (“the king died and then the
queen died of grief”) simply makes its intention explicit to create a causal
connection, while in case of the first sentence, this intention remains rath-
er implicit. But still it remains.
We can therefore assume that on a deeper level the audience will add
the causal element, which is missing from the first of the two sentences.
When making such “additions” we draw upon our general knowledge of
the world (our experience, our “empirical reality”, which allows us to accept
that a person can really die of grief) - but most of all we are motivated to
make this addition because we can be sure of the goal-oriented or inten-
tional character of deliberately shaped narratives.
How much this practically automatic co-operation of the audience in

the creation of meaning influences the writing process can be illustrated
by an anecdote Michael Haneke related in an interview with German film
magazine Revolver, about his work on the script of his first feature film
The Seventh Continent. The film tells of a family that first destroys all their
earthly belongings and then collectively commits suicide: “I wanted to tell
the story in flashbacks and have constantly invented the most incredible
things for the whole family, a biography for everybody, etc. And then there
was always the question: where do I now position this particular flashback?
So, one character does this and that, takes, for example, a glass and pouf!
Association! Then another thing. The funny thing was that every flash-
back automatically became an explanation. I then carefully worked out the
flashbacks, always using diversions and being indirect, so that in no way
they could be seen as explanatory, always going against expectations; all
that was terribly tedious because I was not getting anywhere”. [my own
translation from German].
In the end Haneke scrapped all the flashbacks, because he could not es-
cape the mechanism of implicit causality. Because the audience knows that
the flashback is chosen and positioned by the author, it is already asked to
connect them with the current actions or situations of the characters in a
23
causal construction. What’s more, flashbacks break up the chronological

sequence of the action and thereby attract additional attention, so it is
virtually impossible to regard the positioning and content of a flashback as
being not meaningful or a-causal.
Most interesting maybe is the fact that by choosing to stick to a strict
chronological sequence, Haneke managed to be least explanatory.
It is quite telling that the script was rejected by the TV-station that was
meant to produce it, because it refused to give a clear causal motivation.
Consequently Haneke was forced to make The Seventh Continent his first
feature film for the cinema.
We need to assume the aforementioned, unavoidable forms of audience

co-operation if we want to become able to tell a story. But the role of the
audience in the writing process goes further than that.
Imagining an audience is also necessary when deciding which elements
of a story are needed to adequately tell exactly that story, which we have
in mind at a given moment. Each effect, be it emotional, intellectual, infor-
mational or mood-related can only be achieved if we assume an audience
that can react adequately to the narrative signals we plan to give – ade-
quate in relation to the narrator’s intention. The reactions of this assumed
audience we anticipate according to general experience, which, apart from
our own life-experience, also includes experience with other (film-)stories.
Peter Brooks observes, in the preface to his book Reading for the plot: “...
most viable works of literature tell us something about how they are to be
read, guide us toward the condition of their interpretation”.
What he is referring to here is the interrelation between a work of art
and its addressee as a complex process of what we might call “planting”
and “payoff”. Umberto Eco speaks of the “model reader”, and how every
text creates its own ideal reader. There is, beyond a series of general unspo-
ken agreements, usually called narrative conventions, a number of things a
reader needs to know to fully actualise a specific work.
In that sense, Pier-Paolo Pasolini’s film The gospel according to St. Mat-
thew may need a different spectator than Mel Gibson’s The Passion of the
Christ, although in both cases, the spectator will benefit from knowing cer-
tain things about the man called Jesus Christ and Christian faith.
Films acknowledge the mechanism of what I deliberately call “planting
and payoff” (we normally use this term specifically when speaking about
information we need to “plant” with an audience, to enable them to an-
ticipate or understand some element of the narrative they will encounter
later in the work) and very often it is in the opening, the exposition, that
24
the idea of the ideal reader is most clearly indicated. For every script, every
film - whether consciously or intuitively - creates a kind of tutorial for its
audience, simply by the chosen sequence of images, characters and events.
When watching a film, we are first collecting information, taking in visual
sensations and postponing judgment until we have a fairly good idea how
the film author wants us to read his work. From then on, the successful
tutorial focuses our gaze and attention, so that the narrative can move on
more economically (and sometimes also more elliptically).
Here we already move into another interesting aspect of the writing

and reception process, to be dealt with on another occasion. For now, the
conclusion shall reflect that the role of the audience in the writing process
(as its collaborator and addressee) cannot be denied and we might benefit
from not seeing this as a threat, but rather be respectful of the audience as
our most powerful ally.
25
Idea, Concept, Soggetto
Idea, Concept, Soggetto*

by Gino Ventriglia
In film or TV production the initial stages are often beset by the ter-
minological and conceptual vagueness of the authors: the idea, concept,
’soggetto’, step outline treatment, and scene breakdown are all stages in
drafting prior to the screenplay itself. They form as it were a series of “ad-
vances”, the first stages of an exploration whose final goal is the accom-
plished work.
In the course of his or her experience, every author will arrive at their
own personal methods to achieve the best possible conditions when writ-
ing the first draft, and it may happen that through personal interpretations
the various stages and dividing lines blur or overlap. After all, in the proc-
ess of extracting from reality and imaginings a certain something to mould
into precise narrative and dramatic form, endowing that ‘something’ with
significance, an object imbued with sense - aesthetic, poetic, ethical - it is
not always possible to take a logical, linear approach. Often, indeed, room
must be made for insights and perceptions that emerge somewhat murkily,
but which, investigated and developed in depth, may prove decisive for the
final outcome.
Thus it is, I believe, of great importance to understand which particular

needs - not only practical, but also logical - the various stages answer to, to
identify them and define their requisites and nature.
*In Italian, the term ‘soggetto’, plural ‘soggetti’, is used to indicate the written
document used to present a project to a producer in a rather defined shape, usually
between five and fifteen pages: in English, it may correspond to the ‘short treat-
ment’, as different from the (long) treatment - in Italian ‘trattamento’ - used to
explore extensively the narrative universe told by story, usually from thirty pages
up, and supply a more detailed layout of the story in its progressive articulation.
In this writing, we’ll keep the Italian word ‘soggetto’ for reasons that will become
clear further on.
27
THE IDEA

On what constitutes the initial impetus, the first moment of creation,
there is ample consensus.
‘(…) a film can be born of an insignificant detail, like the impression

of a colour, the memory of a look or a tune that comes back to your aural
memory, obsessively, achingly, for days on end, or, as you remind me, La
Dolce Vita dawned on me as the apparition of a woman walking down via
Veneto one bright morning wrapped in a dress that made her look like a
vegetable (…)’
Thus Federico Fellini, in his Fare un film, answered the interviewer’s

question: ‘when and from where does the idea of a film emerge?’ It is
also true that he immediately added that he was not sure whether he
had been quite sincere when he gave the answer years before, but that
hardly matters. The fact is that not so much as a trace of the ‘vegetable
woman’ remained in the screenplay or subsequently in the finished film
as shown.
The cues and prompts, the original sources of inspiration may be of

the oddest and least expected, or of the most commonplace and eve-
ryday. But when the time comes to choose, to decide to follow up some
particular initial prompt, the process to arrive at the screenplay involves a
series of transitions, of stages, each aiming at picking out in ever sharper
definition the story to be told, the drama to be enacted. Of course, as
development proceeds what seemed settled for once and all may be reap-
praised, pitched on ever different planes; new themes, tones and view-
points may emerge, departing from the original choices. And so, even the
original ‘idea’ itself may be scrapped, for the only function it serves is to
set in motion the process, the creative movement of that particular dra-
matic invention - a manifestly strategic function, closely bound up with
the subjectivity, sensibility and culture of the individual author.
THE CONCEPT
Between the initial idea and the first written draft of the story, the sog-
getto, there is an intermediate stage - the concept - the peculiar nature
of which is not always clearly recognised: often it is seen as expansion of
the original idea, or as a miniaturised form of the soggetto. It is not hard
28
to see why, for both approximations contain an element of truth, and the
process is the same, but they remain compromise definitions that end up
by confounding the precise nature of that particular stage.
The concept is in fact a combination of various ideas (which may or

may not include the original idea) bound together in a particular pattern;
if the idea is an atom, then the concept is a molecule. It is already an ob-
ject of some complexity, made up of the essential, distinctive features of
a narrative structure: its function is to circumscribe a dramatic territory
and denote a dramatic potential.
A man shipwrecked on a desert island: the image evoked with the bare
words might be something like a cartoon in the popular press. But, again,
it might form the initial idea of a concept. If I decide to take it up and
follow it through, I might eventually arrive at something like Robinson
Crusoe, Cast Away, or Umberto Eco’s Island of the Day Before. All three
stories were generated by the same idea, born of the very same sugges-
tion, but become three very different stories that clearly share certain
‘narrative topoi’, but are engineered into different mechanisms respond-
ing to diverse aesthetic and poetic strategies.
In the case of Eco’s novel the concept identification process is interest-

ing; in a television interview the author explained that what “thickened”
the initial idea into concept was the association (arbitrary and creative,
a flash of inspiration) with a clock that could show the different times
in various parts of the world. Behind the idea of the clock lay a place -
an island, for example - traversed by that particular meridian, the anti-
meridian opposite the prime meridian of Greenwich - marking the inter-
national dateline. Crossing this imaginary line running between the two
poles of the planet, today becomes tomorrow or, depending on which way
you go, today is still yesterday. Another relevant point was that in the 17th
century, with colonisation at its height, States were preoccupied with the
serious puzzle of finding a way to calculate longitude, ready to pay out
lavishly to get their hands on such a scientific discovery.
These three elements - the idea-image of the man on the island, the
meridian where yesterday, today and tomorrow mingle, and the feverish
search for a method to calculate terrestrial longitude - are three ideas or
atoms that, structured together in a particular pattern, constitute a mol-
ecule quite different from the Robinson Crusoe or Cast Away molecules.
It is no longer the original cue, but the Island of the Day Before concept
29
- not yet the story (albeit in its essential movements - the soggetto) re-
counted in the book, but its constitutive ingredients (or an essential part
of them).
As yet nothing is known of the tone, theme, viewpoint, character of

the protagonist, or ending - all of which are to be invented and given
expression. But the territory has been established, its narrative poten-
tial delineated: in the 17th century a man searching obsessively for the
secret of longitude is shipwrecked on an island where conventional time
becomes uncertain …
The concept is that fundamental stage in the ideation of the film when
it is no longer the mere idea - I want to make a film about a castaway, a
vegetable-woman, freedom - or in other words something that cannot
yet be seen as an ‘offspring of the mind’, and has yet to find its own
dramatic/narrative formulation, as with the soggetto, or in other words
manipulation (‘treatment’) of a combination of ideas to construct a story
for the cinema or television.
The increasingly widespread practice, also in Europe, of pitching, i.e.

summary, oral presentation of projects to producers and networks, leads
some people to confuse concept and pitch or take them as the same
thing, using the terms as synonyms or considering the concept as a more
or less written sort of pitch. Once again, the two things are correlated, but
they do not work on the same plane.
Formulating a pitch is simply a technique to present a film or TV project

as attractively and efficaciously as can reasonably be done: thus, I can
construct the pitch of a concept (i.e. a project still in the earliest stages),
although of course we know very well that the more advanced the state
of project formulation, the better the pitch will prove. In fact, the pitch
generated from the concept can be enhanced with further elements that
have already been developed in the soggetto, or the step outline, or even
the first draft: it now becomes possible to indicate the level of comedy
or drama at which the concept has been pitched, the theme that can be
explored with that concept, and so forth. In this respect, the concept pre-
sented in the pitch may not be limited to exposition of the main ingredi-
ents in the ‘promise of a story’, but may also contain precise indications
about the story itself.
30
SERIES
When applied to projects for TV-series - excluding the para-cinemato-

graphic formats such as TV-movies and miniseries in two instalments - the
concept category shows properties that endow it with further enhance-
ment and development.
In general, inventing the concept of a TV-series includes in the organisa-

tion of distinctive ideas the matrix to generate narrative that can be treated
from the particular point of view that is the underlying ‘deep philosophy’ of
the series, the ‘vision’ it implies. While the standard investigation mecha-
nism - for all such narrative - consists in identification of the culprit by the
investigator, there are decidedly a great if not infinite number of possible
concepts for a TV crime series. For example, in CSI the concept involves the
final proof of guilt being obtained thanks to a technology able to produce
indisputable facts. On the other hand, Columbo worked on an eminently
logical plane, basing his proof of guilt on the contradictions between vari-
ous versions of the events, including the events as they effectively were.
And again, looking back further into the past, Maigret proceeds with his
investigations with increasingly sharp focus on the relations between the
various characters - and thus the possible motives - and the victim, and the
circle of suspects. These are all series that rest on a philosophy (reliance on
technology, logic or psychology) implied by the concept, which is constantly
put to the test and modulated in the stories of the series.
It is precisely to delimit and specify the areas through which the sog-
getti of the episodes can move that the ‘concept’ is defined in presenting
projects for TV-series, associating it with the term ‘arena’. The term ‘arena’
is clearly understood in the sense of setting (a ‘where’ and ‘when’) but also,
and above all, as indicating the theatre for the peculiar conflicts, able to
sustain at length the varied repetition of the stories belonging to the con-
cept, the ‘seam’ to mine for subjects befitting the series. In this respect the
X-files arena is of a conceptual nature, lying in the unaccountable - from
the presence of aliens on earth to the enigmas of antiquity, supernatural
phenomena and esoteric cults.
Such is obviously the case with series of closed-end episodes (and also,
in many respects, with films that give rise to sequels thanks to the popular-
ity of their fantastic heroes, from 007 to Indiana Jones), but it also applies
- on other planes - to continuing series, or serials, although here things are
rather more complicated, meriting separate treatment.
31
In the ‘bibles’ of series it is precisely the requisite of repetition/variation

of stories belonging to a particular arena-concept that is played out to the
full: the soggetto or screenplay of the pilot (which to a large extent lays the
foundations for the universe of the series), the soggetti of the instalments
to follow (the ‘legs’ of the concept, or its serial dimension), the recurrent,
characteristic places of the series, the value themes and material favoured
and suited to the series, the tones that create the colouring, the ‘spines’ of
the leading roles, and their spans in the case of serials.
A FLASHBACK
At this point let me slip in a brief flashback, re-evoking a particular mi-

lieu to which we are still indebted today. Of course, I do not imagine that
my reconstruction will find everyone in total agreement, irrespective of the
inevitable simplifications and schematizations made here.
Around the mid-1970s Hollywood - the Studio System - was on its knees.
The 90 million cinemagoers of 1946 had steadily dwindled over the follow-
ing decades to a historical low of 17 million in the early seventies. It seemed
as if audiences could not be torn away from their TV screens. Something
of the sort was also happening in Italy, for different reasons, and with dire
consequences for the movie industry as a whole.
And yet the majors managed to find a way out: on the one hand, the cin-
ema was moving towards a more European style of films d’auteur with di-
rectors like Penn, Altman, Scorsese and Coppola, to name but a few, while
on the other hand the renewed industrial vitality of the cinema as popular
mass trend was the result of certain choices - possibly unwitting of their
future potential but evident fruit of calculation - that gave rise to that phe-
nomenon, still to be examined in sufficient depth, that became known as
the New Hollywood.
The Majors - Universal taking the lead - decided to target a young audi-
ence, less reluctant to drag themselves away from family TV viewing and
go out. Of course, to succeed in this the movies had to find a way to ad-
dress the kids’ culture, consisting largely of comic strips (Marvel, above all),
pulp-fiction, science fiction, horror, fantasy and westerns. And there had to
be scriptwriters and directors acquainted through their personal experience
with the imaginings generated in and by that culture. Thus came a season
of hunting down young talents, often plucked by the industry from the uni-
versity campuses even before they had completed their cinema studies.
32
This was the generation of the movie ‘brat pack’, from Lucas to Spielberg
and Milius - a generation that brought stories that, crucially, called for a
radical change in movie language (at the visual level, in the first place).
Thus lavish funding was soon being poured into special effects, in the
broad sense, from the traditional variety to ad hoc inventions, and movie
budgets rose significantly as a result of these investments.
It was in this state of affairs that the distinction came about - a verita-
ble line of demarcation, a ‘continental divide’ - between the High Budget
Concept (i.e. movies rich in special effects) and the Low Budget Concept
(films with no particular need of SFX).
In the space of a few years, however, the general increase in the average
cost of a film evened out the budget aspect: a box-office star could cost as
much as if not more than special effects. What remained unchanged was
the distinction between the High Concept and Low Concept.
Legend attributes to Spielberg the dictum: “If a person can tell me the
idea in twenty-five words or less, it’s going to make a pretty good movie”.
In a way, this encapsulates the essence of the high concept; a litmus test
based on the effectiveness of a “pitchable” concept in one or two phrases
that, in all its simplicity and immediacy, can be universally accessible - in
its promise of a story, in its possible imaginings.
What the high concept is still taken to imply is a plot-oriented film, or

in other words a movie that features a succession of surprising, spectacu-
lar events; some have even gone as far as theorising a particular ‘block-
buster’ dramaturgy as rollercoaster movie, following a progression marked
by a startling twist of the plot every ten minutes (Geoff King). On the other
hand, the low concept runs in the direction of a character-oriented film,
with the stress on development in terms of the character’s psychology. It
goes without saying that both elements (interesting characters in a grip-
ping plot) are indispensable for any film, and that the ideal solution is the
right balance between the essential features, but this is, of course, a mat-
ter of dosage and audience targeted.
THE SOGGETTO
If the concept traces out an area rich in dramatic potential, the next
step is drafting the soggetto (short treatment), which entails far more
complex, interrelated choices. To begin with, in the process of becoming
33
a treatment the concept will show just how far it can go - the length of
narrative it can sustain, and the format that would best suit it. It will also
be seen which are the major dramatic advances setting the pacing, what
succession of events develops the psychological aspects of the characters
or leads them towards achieving their goals, or both, and what tones will
best bring out the potential of the concept - comic, tragic, dramatic, or a
particular blend of them. When it comes to the soggetto, it is time to de-
cide on the ending, and thus on the theme of the story. What is the point
of telling this story? And, last but not least, how should the story best be
written to capture the attention of the readers, and make them want to
see the film of that particular story? At the soggetto stage it is perfectly
legitimate to use any type of literary device to enthral the reader - it is the
written page that has to arouse the reader’s interest, and keep it alive. Of
course, the essential criterion behind all this is the power of the written
word to conjure up mental images.
While theme and ending are still open to all sorts of possibilities in the
concept, in the soggetto the choices will define an initial level of complete-
ness, albeit by no means definitive. Obviously, however, if the draft of the
screenplay has a different ending from the one decided on at an earlier
stage, thorough scene rewriting is called for in order to bring the dramatic
structure into line with the new ending and the new theme - and, in all
probability, with the consequent re-nuancing of tone. Otherwise, the dra-
ma may sag; the desired effect may not prove so clear and powerful. If we
decided that Thelma and Louise should have a happy end, then we would
have to get to work not only on the screenplay, but even on the soggetto
(not necessarily the concept!), or at least the step outline of the whole film.
It would be absurd to suppose that such a radical negative-positive change
in parameters as decisive as the ending, and thus also the theme, could
leave the structure, or, rather, the sense contents of the structure, quite
unaffected. If Juliet had woken up in time, Romeo would not have killed
himself, the two would have eloped and lived happily ever after, and the
whole tragedy may well have been written in a significantly different way.
And this applies regardless of the examples of success that inconsistent
films can enjoy with audiences, or post-production marketing choices, such
as we have encountered in practical experience.
As already pointed out at the beginning of these pages, in the Anglo-

American market the soggetto, as a physical object of about 5 to 15 pages
to be submitted to potential purchasers, is called ‘treatment’, or to be
precise ‘short treatment’, in contrast with the ‘long treatment’, which
34
contains all the scenes in narrative form, comparable to the scene break-
down, but with a less technical - graphic - framework. Until a few years
ago, on the other hand, in Italy the soggetto was an expanded narration
in which it was still possible to explore the universe of the film story to
be enacted with literary means and devices, looking into the psychologi-
cal makeup of the characters, their hidden thoughts, the descriptions of
places and atmospheres, the possible repartee and even elements that
had found no place in the screenplay. In the Avventurosa Storia del Cinema
Italiano, scriptwriter Age defined it as the ‘romanzo del film’ - the novel of
the film: the interesting point about this is that the screenplay became an
adaptation of this novel, not to be published as such but written expressly
to draw a screenplay from it. Nowadays this approach to treatment has
become obsolete; the preference is for the more concise and functional
form of the scene breakdown (in Italian, ‘scalettone’) or in other words the
entire sequence of scenes in the film, each indicated with their specific
dramatic functions in carrying the story forward. There is a certain resem-
blance here to the ‘shooting scripts’ of the old days, when dialogue scripts
were not used and the list in sequence of the shots to be filmed “was” the
dramatic text of the film, its ‘screenplay’.
There is one more point I would like to add about the ‘soggettisti’, of
Italian cinema in the past. The role of the writer of soggetti has lost the
specific nature it used to have, except perhaps a mention in the credits
of ‘Soggetto by… ’. Probably it is no longer enough in today’s cinema and
television to be a ‘mere’ soggetto writer, and to tell the truth I don’t know
if it has ever been a real profession in itself, to be practised independ-
ently of the other roles involved in writing for the cinema or TV. Neverthe-
less, it is an image we are fond of - saying ‘I’m a soggetti writer’ suggests
something like a truffle hound with a flair for sniffing out where the tasty
tubers lie hidden. Or, better still, a gold prospector - someone who sifts
through the real or imaginary world in search of precious nuggets - ideas,
concepts, soggetti.
35
On the Imperative for Action in Screenwriting: An Attempt at Moving from Aristotle to Sartre
On the Imperative for Action in Screenwriting:

An Attempt at Moving from Aristotle to Sartre
by Antoine Le Bos
Action
The moment we approach the fundamentals of dramaturgy in screen-

writing, one of the central questions that inevitably pops up is the notion
that a character (and a protagonist, even more so), can only “be revealed”
and truly exist eyeball-to-eyeball with the viewer, can only really “come
to life” and grab her attention by expressing himself through action. That
is, by way of concrete interactions with the world around him, by his way
of interacting with others, or, more generally, with “what appears in front
of him”. That imperative is so strong that those celebrated “screenwriting
seminar hawkers” enthusiastically proclaim that a protagonist must “col-
lide with the world”. According to them, that is the only possible technique
for “advancing the story” in movies.
If we had to make a list of the various levels a screenwriter must at-

tack as he launches into a rewrite of a script - by a writer with little experi-
ence - or a consultant or “script doctor” attempting to present a detailed
diagnosis and handy suggestions for a feature-length screenplay, “not
enough action” would certainly be among the first three items on their list
of problems to solve. Whereas in a novel (or even in the theatre), the use
of an interior voice can allow characters to “be revealed” without necessar-
ily “setting them into motion”, the experienced screenwriter, for his own
professional survival, is trained (or trains himself) to set those beings into
motion, to shake them up, to create impact, to push them to react.
No sooner is that word “action” uttered and potential suspicion and jus-
tifiable anxiety inevitably jump out of the bushes. Isn’t the experienced
screenwriter (as opposed to the emerging, “pure” writer-director…) some
scary guardian and ruthless watchdog of the schematic, Hollywood-influ-
enced vision of the world that valiant young filmmakers try to escape in
every way possible?
37
Having a little experience under your belt can easily sweep aside some
objections. Doesn’t the screenwriter’s craft completely rest in his ability
to reveal what could remain concealed deep down, inside a character? And
isn’t character interaction with the outside world the only way to pull the
character “out of him- or herself”, thus taking the viewer “inside”, or putting
what is inside “out”?
Yet, does that unveiling have to come about through action?

In other words, is it so unimaginable to film a static protagonist, reject-
ing any possibility of thrusting him into action? Is it so unimaginable to use
a character’s immobility as a potential - and potentially strong - means of
cinematic exploration and deepening vision? To rephrase this: is launching
a character into action a kind of dogmatic pollution that comes from the
classics? Or does it originate from an even more inescapable reality, intrin-
sic to the film narrative?
Poetics revisited
So, once again, let’s look into the fundamental theories that Western
drama has revolved around ever since we first became involved in develop-
ing those great principles on how a staged narrative can best “capture” and
“hold” an audience.
For advocates of the three-act narrative orthodoxy (“one hero, one

goal, rising action! ...”), Aristotle is the number one authority, an ines-
capable reference, and the icon who gives a touch of theoretical bless-
ing to often simplified equations. That’s reason enough for us to take
a look at his Poetics — the pivotal “bible”, or it’s antithesis, for almost
all occidental theories on dramaturgy; particularly from the Italian Ren-
aissance on, by way of 17th century French theatre. During that period,
which saw the creation of the first established theatres in Paris, the
principle preoccupation of the dramaturge was analyzing the effect
his work had on an audience. And Aristotle’s writings are the absolute
touchstone (even for those who’ve never read them) on the rules that
must be respected to reach the audience - rules that are supposedly
categorical.
Jean Racine, to cite just one, is among the legions of devotees of the
Poetics and the famous rule of three unities (unity of time, unity of place,
and unity of action) - which, although never expressed by Aristotle, as
such, is considered to be a direct extension of the master’s thinking.
38
So let’s open Aristotle. The Poetics is a somewhat confused, incomplete

work. (It’s probably missing some essential portions or chapters for its com-
plete comprehension). At times, it even contradicts itself on certain points.
Incomplete transcriptions and successive translations over the course of
2,400 years do not make it any easier to understand. Nevertheless, some
key elements emerge fairly clearly.
Aristotle was probably the first person to be intrigued by what “grabs” or

“doesn’t grab” the viewer in the public experience of tragedy. Although his
analysis remains surprisingly detached from any objectivity, he announces
that certain plays are successful and attempts to analyze why. In doing so, as
opposed to Plato before him, he attempts to introduce the “concrete world”
into his analysis, thus leaving behind a strictly philosophical approach.
It’s more a kind of manual for poets - in other words, writers - and that’s
where he piques our curiosity. He’s probably the first person in the history
of thought to bring “criticism” out of its stylistic, or strictly poetic, param-
eters, in favour of a frontal attack on the dramatic structure of a work.
The writer must, above all, “construct an argument” (we find this concern
among most dramaturgy and screenwriting gurus today) - meaning a nar-
rative structure that escapes the trivial, the particular, in order to arrive at
a kind of dramatic stimulation that’s universal in scope.
The next point in his “method” brings us back to the subject at hand.
For Aristotle, “tragedy is an imitation, not of men, but of actions”. The es-
sentials are found in “the combination of acts accomplished, since tragedy
imitates, not men, but action, life”. (Note the equation “life = action”, in
a world still light-years away from Hollywood.) And, a few lines later, our
subject resurfaces: “Dramatic action, therefore, is not aimed at the rep-
resentation of character: character comes in as subsidiary to the actions.
Hence, the incidents and the plot are the end of tragedy; and the end is the
chief thing of all”.
(-Poetics, chapter VI.) So, “those who start in poetry are capable of accu-
racy of expression and of creating characters, before they are able to com-
bine the actions…”.
His statement is very much in agreement with many experienced screen-
writers. You’ve got to put in years of practice and experience before you
can grasp how much prompting your characters into action generates an
instinctive bond with the viewer.
But we must admit that Aristotle in no way answers our question…
Why? Why does it work like that? You might say, “Why look for the answer
in ancient times, when it’s staring us right in the face?” As soon as the
character makes a move, s/he expresses her intention. S/he makes us an
39
accomplice in that action. To the viewer, sitting in a dark theatre watching

her, s/he “betrays” where’s/he’s going, what s/he wants, what her inten-
tion is. And suddenly we understand (and anticipate) what may (or may
not) become an obstacle to that intention; which in turn creates an expec-
tation, anticipation, and incites the viewer’s participation in the film (or
the performance) presented to her.
The body-brain system
As another possible explanation of the viewer-character bond triggered

by action, neurology offers up some interesting perspectives. Over the last
few years, research on the brain has revealed the existence of a unified
body-brain biological system. We’ve discovered that the human brain is
divided into two distinct cerebral hemispheres. Cognitive, conscious and
rational brain functions (linked to the neocortex), turned toward the outer
world, are located on the left side of the brain. The right side holds the
emotional, unconscious brain (linked to the limbic brain), which is particu-
larly connected to bodily functions and primarily preoccupied with survival.
We share these right-brain functions with animals, including reptiles. Lim-
bic organization is much simpler than that of the neocortex: it’s made up
of neurons that are combined but not structured into a network, but it also
responds instantaneously and is, therefore, capable of short-circuiting rea-
son. This limbic brain is the one we call upon to seduce. It’s the entity that
controls respiration, heartbeat, blood pressure, libido and appetite in the
human body. It’s directly plugged into everything about us that’s purely
animal, instinctive, and which escapes us altogether…
In the cinema, more than in the theatre (given the eyeball-to-eyeball

sensation we experience when the character is shot in close-up), the viewer
has an almost identical kind of access to a protagonist as in real-life, hu-
man interactions. If a large part of this “access” happens outside rational
categories, via the limbic brain, the viewer is “grabbed”. Facing the screen,
he stares the character right in the eye and, by reflex, tries to access his
being in an attempt to discover what makes him similar - someone to love,
someone to protect - or someone to run away from, to fear. Yet, when the
protagonist comes into conflict with the world around him (when his desire
is thwarted by an obstacle, or he’s humiliated by his beloved, or panicked
about being discovered…), the viewer responds to that impulse through a
kind of animal bonding - through fear, the immediate desire to protect,
physical desire, irrational panic, etc…
40
Those reflexes can only be generated by this play of situation-action

that could lead the protagonist(s) into dead-end, humiliating or appalling
situations. Which explains Aristotle’s obsession - the “arrangement of acts
accomplished”, as a priority. And the obsession of assembly-line screen-
writers - to push their protagonists in deeper and deeper, to grab them by
their throats and force them to cough their guts up…
Yet, a premise on the order of “the writer has to try to trap the viewer”,
even by way of his most animal instincts, is undoubtedly a little too short,
a little too simple. Especially if we want our study to include a kind of cin-
ema that’s equally capable of poetic - indeed, at times, metaphysical - ex-
ploration.
Existence of consciousness: Sartre
In his A Short Organum for the Theatre, Bertolt Brecht, who rarely slips
into the desire to grab us “by the gut”, makes use of Aristotle’s Poetics as
a foil. He finds the work emblematic of a tradition we must fight against
and reject - the bible of those who still dare to speak of the “eternal laws”
of theatrical creation. Brecht insists that “dramatic theatre”, the theatre of
catharsis, based on the audience’s identification with the protagonist(s),
must give way to a non-Aristotelian dramaturgy, an “epic theatre” based
on distance, which functions through the opposite principle. It’s no longer
really a question of body and emotions. It’s a return to the brain, the cogni-
tive brain.
He almost wants to sever the dramatic narrative from its organic com-
ponent - that primitive element that Friedrich Nietzsche emphatically de-
mands, in his The Birth of Tragedy, when he rails against the loss of vital
density that ensued when the Greeks moved from the Dionysian power of
pre-Socratic tragedy to the methodical world of Euripides, the father of “aes-
thetic Socratism”. The “primitive dramatic phenomenon”, Nietzsche tells us,
“consists of (the spectator) seeing himself transformed and henceforth act-
ing through another body, another character…”. The art of identification and
cathartic functions… The Enlightenment led us to a glorification of omnivo-
rous Reason. Where does this fear of narrative-via-the-gut, among so many
“refined intellectuals” over the past three centuries, come from?
These considerations are not neutral. They fundamentally determine a

relationship with the world that’s generated by the theatrical or cinematic
41
narrative. Here, is it the dominant narrative form that helps generate our
relationship with the world (A), or our dominant relationship with the world
that produces a narrative typology (B)? Both obviously. But the political
relevance of proposition (A) arouses our interest and whets our appetite to
reread a bit of Jean-Paul Sartre’s Being and Nothingness.
Because, here’s my question:
Can the story of a character who is so confident in himself that he refus-
es to relinquish his comfortable situation, be the subject of a film today?
(Other than a documentary, of course.) In other words, can the notion of
action, or setting the protagonist into motion, happen outside our concep-
tion of cinematic narrative? Can we spare the protagonist that clash with
the world around him?
In Being and Nothingness, Sartre’s analysis is a departure from the fun-

damental opposition between consciousness and the thing (the “being-
for-itself” and the “being-in-itself”). Consciousness, as such, is “no-thing”,
a non-being. A thing is what it is. (An ashtray is an ashtray.) A thing in itself
is complete. On the contrary, human consciousness is characterized by the
paradoxical fact that it isn’t identical to itself. Consciousness is always fac-
ing outward.
“All consciousness is the consciousness of something”. (Husserl). Con-

sciousness is a movement; it’s a perception of that tree in front of us, or
a building we can conjure up in our minds. It only exists in its relation-
ship to something other than itself. So it’s condemned to be in motion, to
endlessly move outside itself. Contrary to René Descartes’ anthropocentric
intuition, a consciousness, in itself, doesn’t exist. It is nothing within itself
(in the sense that things are). It only exists once it moves outside itself.
That’s why I can’t say, “I am me”.
In Intentionality: A Fundamental Idea of Husserl’s Phenomenology, Sar-

tre says, “If, impossible as it may be, you could enter ‘into’ a conscious-
ness, you’d be sucked into a vortex and thrown back outside, next to that
tree, in a heap of dust. For consciousness has no ‘inside.’ It’s precisely that
being-beyond-itself, that absolute flight, that refusal to be a substance
that makes it a consciousness”.
To summarize, consciousness is a void, a hole within the being, and a

decompression of being, nothingness. And as Sartre-scholar Jean Beauf-
fret proclaims, “It is the essence of what is most interior in us to refuse
interiority”.
42
Consciousness alone produces nothingness, not being. In other words, if

the screenwriter is after density, he should avoid focusing on the immobil-
ity of an ego.
So, in Sartre, the existence (“ex-istence”, going outside oneself) of con-

sciousness precedes its essence. Or we could say, man only exists once he
acts. He is nothing within himself; he fundamentally exists in a void.
As a result, it is man’s duty to determine himself by his actions. And,

in that sense, he is “forced to be free” - which is not without producing a
certain anxiety that is close to fear of the void.
The need to act
Getting back to the subject at hand, the filmmaker who says he wants to
avoid “setting his world into action” strongly risks moving us towards the
experience of its void.
That experience will only rarely merit conscious undertaking and wilful
exploration.
Even among reputedly contemplative filmmakers, the concern over
putting things in motion is noteworthy. In the sublimely slow Mother and
Son, Alexander Sokurov plunges us into an existential, sensory, poetic ex-
perience, thanks to the final walk the son takes his dying mother on. That
hypnotic stroll is a second-by-second battle against death. It is motion it-
self confronting immobility. When a protagonist is locked inside the con-
crete impossibility of rubbing against the world (like in Birdy or Johnny Got
His Gun), the screenplay comes up with ways to create movement. In Birdy,
it’s via flashbacks, or Nicolas Cage’s struggle to bring the hero back to life.
Johnny Got His Gun uses flashbacks, the protagonist’s voiceover narration;
an initially tragic, terrifying situation capable of holding the viewer speech-
less; and by imposing immobility as the absolute obstacle that becomes
the engine of an endless rage within the hero.
As such, it’s interesting to note how imposing non-action can be used

with protagonists who are conditioned to take action. For example, War-
riors, a miniseries produced by the BBC, which recounts the story of British
peacekeeping forces who were sent to Bosnia, pulled into combat and for-
bidden to act in the face of that atrocity. That situation generates a power
to engage the viewer that’s literally colossal. The struggle for the protago-
nists lies in trying to resist the overwhelming urge to scream, the urge to
43
jump in to save the woman who’s being raped or the child who’s burning.
It operates on the notion of an obstacle to action obstructing the heroes’
desire to play a role that’s ultimately very classical – they are muzzled,
neutralized. It’s as if their desires were hermetically sealed, provoking a
rise in pressure that’s almost unbearable and creating an uncommon level
of viewer identification.
Sartre cruelly said that man is nothing but the sum of his acts, not some-
thing ineffable, hidden in the depths of his heart and soul, something that
exonerates him. In other words, man’s duty is to define himself through
his actions; otherwise he is nothing. In the case of Warriors, the soldiers’
inability to act drove some of them mad, drove others to suicide. In Sar-
tre’s words, they felt responsible for not being defined enough, in their own
eyes.
In this season of ponderous political emptiness and global marketisa-

tion, forcing a protagonist to act may not be the formal ease of following in
Aristotle’s footsteps. To my mind, it’s an organic necessity, as well as a bias
that ultimately has far more political meaning than it seems.
44
Now You See It, Now You Don’t

Some introductory thoughts on point of view/perspective in film
narratives; including some examples
by Franz Rodenkirchen
“When I was a kid, I used to spend a lot of time trying to figure out whether
everybody saw the same colours. Could a leaf be orange when some people
look at it, but no one ever knows because they were taught to call orange
“green”? To this day I haven’t figured out a way to find out if it’s true, so for
all I know some people may see orange leaves”.
Taken from an Internet-Blog
Whenever the question of narrative perspective in films comes up,

questions abound, making it immediately obvious that we have neither a
clear vocabulary to talk about this, nor is there an established tradition in
discussing it. A clarification of terms would be a first undertaking before
one can really think of starting a discussion of content.
What’s more, the art of storytelling can operate deliberately with oscillat-
ing points-of-view and can obscure any clear delineation between fiction and
reality. Therefore all attempts to categorize narrative perspectives and cre-
ate models or typologies to discuss them are always only partial and not fully
successful. Then again, they can still be useful when working with fictional
narrative texts (for our purpose, films can also be considered texts).
The question which point of view the audience takes (or is posited in)
towards the film-narrative seems to be one of the most important to ask
when discussing scripts as well as films. How we follow a film-narrative
depends to a large degree on how we posit ourselves or find ourselves pos-
ited. Inside or outside? In the middle of the action or rather like a fly on the
wall? Next to the character or as a distant observer?
Every writer or writer/director has an opposite, an other, with whom she
wants to communicate by means of the film, and consequently positions
herself within the narrative, be it involuntarily or consciously planned.
45
This position of author is defined not only in relation to the narrative, but
at least to an equal measure in relation to the audience.
Within the space of this introduction I cannot possibly cover all possible
approaches, so I want to settle for a predominantly practically oriented text
that should help writers/directors and script editors who are actively work-
ing on projects, to continue exploring this matter.
It appears that some of the most frequently mentioned “problems” or

“mistakes” in connection with film-narratives seem to be closely connected
to questions of perspective. If the main character in a story is not present
in one or two scenes of a script, it is quickly stated that those scenes are
unfitting or disrupt the perspective. Most likely what is threatened here is
the illusion of invisible narrative, a way to tell the story that draws as little
attention as possible to its narrative means and techniques, comparable to
jump cuts. Like ruptures in the visual flow of a film, changes of perspec-
tive tend to bring to mind the existence of the narrator and insist on the
artificiality of the filmic universe. Therefore they are often considered a
disturbance of audience identification (which is of course less serious for
films that require a more reflecting audience).
The use of a voice-over narration (especially when using the voice-over
of an on-screen character) to convey elements of the story, but even more
so emotions and mental processes, for which no visual equivalent could be
found, is also closely connected to questions of point-of-view/perspective.
Our first inquiry shall therefore be: in which contexts is the question of
point-of-view and perspective actually relevant?
A first obvious answer: it is one important possibility of identification for

an audience. It is also important in relation to the attitude we are to take
towards the narrative and the actions shown. It is also important when dis-
tinguishing between reliable and unreliable narrators (for example in The
Usual Suspects or Fight Club).
But the question of POV/perspective is maybe most important with re-
gards to the complex inter-relation of POV/perspective of the camera and
the POV/perspective of the person acting within the frame.
What kind of distinctions do we have to make regarding POV/perspective?
The easiest to confuse is the use of the term perspective as visual code
and perspective as narrative strategy/agent.
46
Visual code is meant as that which the camera “sees” or shows to the
audience. Perspectives can be “objective” or “subjective”, the latter also
being referred to as point-of-view shot. Even though the terms objective
and subjective should be handled with care, I want to use them for a quick
and simple distinction.
In film, what we understand as the subjective view usually refers to the

gaze of the active character, whereby the camera takes the point-of-view of
that character, who we consequently cannot see. The objective view would
then be every other perspective the camera could take that is not explicitly
the subjective of one character. As is immediately obvious, this distinction
is not sufficient to grasp the divergent visual strategies of perspective.
Perspective as narrative strategies we know particularly from narrative

fiction such as novels, short stories, etc. where besides the distinction be-
tween first person narrator and third person narrator (“I” or “he”) we find
another distinction between personal and authorial narratives. The latter are
categories that indicate which “view” the narrator persona (not to confuse
with the physical author) takes with regards to the world of the narrative and
the knowledge of its characters. Sometimes we use the term “Olympic” to
indicate a particular authorial view that appears to give the narrator a god-
like control over his material. Here we watch from above, we know it all, not
only what happens, but also what each character feels, thinks, plans, etc.
In films, this is much more difficult to convey and if we do not want to
make use of literary tools such as voice-over, we are forced to look for ways
of how to visualise the interior world of the character through action (not in
the Hollywood sense of Action with a capital “A”, but as doing rather than
talking).
It would therefore be very interesting to consider which cinematic tools
we have available to compensate for this lack of an inner voice and how
point-of-view can maybe help here.
But it should also be clear that for this reason the distinction between a
narrative and a visual point-of-view is much more difficult and the bounda-
ries more blurred in film.
We need to make clear whether by perspective we mean the narrator’s

or the character’s POV within the story/film. It is exactly the inclusion of
the character’s POV that creates these blurred boundaries, because in film
we need to distinguish the POV of character from the POV of the camera
(which does not at all have to coincide with the perspective of the narrator,
not even of the narrator-persona).
47
And one more thing: subjective shots can lead us to assume that we
are seeing things with the eyes of one particular character. When this sub-
jective view is missing we are obviously expected to assume that we see
things independently of any single character’s perspective. And while we
are asked to assume that a character within the frame sees what we see,
the objectified gaze is always the result of a narrator we are asked to imag-
ine (despite the “willing suspension of disbelief”).
Then there is the impression of an almost documentary, objectified, fac-
tual gaze, where things are exactly what they seem and the camera has just
been used to neutrally record events.
In this kind of opposition, subjective and objective perspectives also are
strongly connected to the credibility of the material on show. A special view
on this neutral gaze of the camera is of course to be seen in the work (and
the writings) of Robert Bresson.
A good example of the complex questions regarding visual and narrative

perspective would be Andrea Arnold’s complex thriller Red Road. The first
half of the film works like a taut thriller that takes its suspense from the
audience’s limited perspective (knowledge) of both the main character’s
back-story and the motives for her present actions. This character (Jackie)
is working in a CCTV-surveillance centre, and while we see what she sees,
we can’t make as much sense of it as she can. But although she sees “all”,
she can’t look behind the surface of the image, so the “meaning” can be
concealed and misreadings can (and do) happen.
At the same time, the narrator doesn’t allow us to see enough to un-
derstand everything about Jackie’s past and her motives, limiting our per-
spective in a similar way. As an audience, we are just aware of a diffuse
threat and observe the agitated behaviour of Jackie. The tension is actually
created through the techniques of storytelling; we could say the story hap-
pens between the narrator and the audience.
After about 50% of the film, when we have finally caught up with Jack-
ie’s back-story, and have consequently also been made aware of the cause
of her emotional state, the narration shifts gear and we are allowed to see
all that happens with the character. The story now happens between the
character and the audience and vicarious identification is encouraged more
strongly, while the narrator moves into the background, her tools a lot less
visible from then on.
Still, the narrator has one trump card up her sleeve and she plays it at
the very end to elicit the strongest emotional response from the audience
(through the final reveal about Jackie’s own guilt).
48
In the Chandler adaptation The Lady in the Lake (1947) by Robert

Montgomery, after a screenplay by Steve Fisher, the action is completely
presented through the eyes of our main character, private detective Philip
Marlowe. Detective Marlowe, played by director Montgomery, is behind
the camera during the whole length of the film. We hear him talk, see
the other actors react to his words and actions, but him we only see as
a shadow or sometimes as a reflection in a mirror. The film therefore
appears to be completely subjective from Marlowe’s perspective. When
Marlowe is addressed, the other actors directly face the camera (an in-
teresting borderline case of almost breaking the invisible “fourth wall”).
Sometimes we see a part of Marlowe’s arms or legs. To be as realistic
as possible, we also get extreme close-ups of objects (a phone receiver
when Marlowe makes a phone call) or body parts (a fist hitting Marlowe in
the face, Marlowe kissing a girl). When Marlowe walks, the camera sways
slightly, when he is hit in the face it wobbles, and when he’s knocked out,
the screen goes black.
Why this huge effort in 1947 for what was essentially a B-movie, and
long before small 35mm-cameras or steady-cams were around? A first
answer might be that the strategy is meant to heighten identification
with the character. We share everything with our protagonist, we’re al-
ways right there when it happens.
While a detective story seems to be especially suited to such an experi-
ment, because the audience can always get the clues fresh and join the
guessing game, the interesting contradiction comes from the character
of the detective, as he is usually portrayed. As protector of order he is
called in when order gets disturbed, to restore it. By definition, he has no
own stake in the matter - he is “objective”. So the subjective view of the
detective is at odds with his traditional role.
What’s more, the constant subjective shots rather confuse and under-
mine the confidence of the spectator; because our vision is limited there
is a lot less control of the environment as such.
Another thing to consider for a contemporary audience is the fact that
these POV shots were later used as a trademark of stalker movies (espe-
cially from the 70s onwards). Consequently the best combination of genre
and subjective camera style is to be found in the modern horror movie,
and of course The Blair Witch Project has used that to the max.
In addition, one might say that filming exclusively with subjective shots
has not heightened identification in Lady in the Lake, because it puts us into
the same line of vision as the character, but doesn’t say much about how
that character is and feels. So maybe Marlowe is not the main character?
49
Indeed, he is the detective and by definition, he should not get personally

involved, although eventually he does “get the girl”.
But most interesting are maybe the four shots, which apart form the
credits, break the total subjective strategy. In these shots Marlowe is seat-
ed in his chair and addresses the audience directly:
“Right now, you’re reading in the newspapers and hearing over the radi-
os about a murder. They call it ‚The Case of the Lady in the Lake.’ It’s a good
title. It fits. What you’ve read and what you’ve heard is one thing. The real
thing is something else. There’s only one guy who knows that. I know it”.
This seems to justify the choice of perspective through the narrator’s spe-
cial relation to the case. He alone knows it all, he is the master of this story,
and what’s more, if only he knows it, he is also the one who creates it for us,
right here and now. And he has a promise for us, if we buy into the deal:
“You’ll see it just as I saw it. You’ll meet the people. You’ll find the clues.
And maybe you’ll solve it quick. And maybe you won’t. You think you will,
eh? OK (points his finger at the camera), you’re smart. But let me give you
a tip. You’ve got to watch them. You’ve got to watch them all the time.
Because things happen when you least expect them”.
The privileged perspective is therefore used to suggest a closeness to

the events, but also to pose a challenge to the audience to measure their
wits with him. Of course they can only lose. But it clarifies the main pur-
pose of the subjective POV as a tool of heightened suspense – and while
Marlowe promises us immediacy (“right now” suggests we are still actively
involved), he also indicates that he already knows the ending.
The playfulness of Lady in the Lake and its contradictory intentions, com-
bined with some rather heavy-handed narration lead to mixed responses
and it is generally agreed that the film represents “an interesting failure”.
A more recent example of a similar strategy that takes more than a leaf
out of the Film Noir-repository is Lou Ye’s Suzhou River (2000). Here the
subjective narration is used to reflect upon the different narrative planes
(that seem to have different reality status) and lay open their artificiality.
Also here the narrator addresses his audience directly, albeit only in a voice
over, not via the camera, so that the fourth wall is actually never breached.
The narrator presents a story that he himself calls “probably made up”, in-
spired by his long observations of the street outside his window. Still, at
one point he inserts himself as a real person into the action of his story and
we start accompanying him. The play with different roles, identities and
50
questionable realities is key to the functioning of the story as a whole, so

in this case the visual strategy mirrors and doubles the complex narrative
relations. Therefore Lou Ye’s film uses the subjective narrative as an ade-
quate tool that befits the central character of his film, while Montgomery’s
subjective detective Marlowe could have solved his case also in a more ob-
jective way. But it is to be noted that also Lou Ye’s nameless narrator has
only a supporting role in the central story.
For sure one could have long debates whether such experiments have
any merit and actually support the intentions and themes of the respective
story, or if they aren’t mostly seeking attention for their cleverness or sim-
ply for “being different”, a bit like the fractured chronologies of recent years
have sometimes proven to be rather self-serving than truly necessary for
their stories. Still, despite their seemingly mostly visual strategies, many
of these elements can already be worked with in script stage.
This can also be seen in Lady in the Lake, where the seemingly objective
narrator Marlowe is interrupted in his last monologue to the audience by
the arrival of one of the film’s characters (one of the previous main sus-
pects and antagonists). She kisses him and we learn that they plan to go
away together and start a new life. This turn of events changes the status
of the narrative and re-integrates it into the realm of conventional fiction.
The seeming outside perspective of Marlowe terminates, the fourth wall is
firmly closed and so is the story.
Another form of filmic narration in the first person - without the cam-
era taking the subjective view of the character - is the use of a voice-over,
which, as I already mentioned, is more of a literary device than a tool of
visual storytelling.
Hence we find this tool quite often in literary adaptations (and we tend
to find them less than satisfactory at times, because we might feel the
screenwriter failed to find a visual solution), but more generally in films
that deal with the inner world of its protagonists - another form of subjec-
tivity - and in certain genres such as Film Noir.
A great example of a well-integrated voice-over is Martin Scorsese’s Taxi

Driver, based on the script by Paul Schrader. Starting with the first image
we accompany the main character, taxi driver Travis Bickle, watch his rou-
tine, and hear his thoughts in a kind of stream-of-consciousness commen-
tary, that was later taken to its breathless culmination by Gaspar Noe in
Seul contre tous (I stand alone, 1999).
The first thing we register is the contrast between inner and outer world,
51
subjective experience and action of the protagonist. While we see Travis

act and hear what he thinks about it, we follow the gaze of the camera,
which is not at all identical with Travis’ gaze, nor necessarily with his ob-
servations. In Seul contre Tous this even becomes the key element of the
narrative, because we are invited to register the difference between the
grandiose, aggressive and violent thoughts of the character and his pos-
sibilities (and choices) for action. In this juxtaposition the drama of the
character is eventually played out.
Scorsese remains more homogenous in his depiction of Travis, but he

too is a character we are developing rather ambivalent feelings for, and
Scorsese knows how to use this for dramatic effects (for example in the fa-
mous scene of aftermath when Travis has ended his shooting spree and is
sitting on the couch, with the camera adopting a distant perspective from
high up).
In terms of the rules of narrative perspective in film, Taxi Driver is often
cited as a tight and very successfully working example, maybe just because
the immediately established rule to stay very close to the character and
have him in every scene of the film is broken only once.
The one scene without Travis takes place in the lair of Iris’ pimp Sport
(played by Harvey Keitel), where Sport uses all his conviction to erase any
doubts Travis might have raised in Iris’ mind about her working as a prosti-
tute. Reportedly the scene was shot quite late during production and gave
Scorsese some headaches because Travis wasn’t in it and for him this meant
a break in the narration’s perspective. For this reason he had Travis wait
outside the house while Iris was inside, so his presence would justify our
watching of Iris and Sport, although Travis could actually not see them.
Implicitly we learn how important this homogenous view must have
been for Scorsese, how much he must’ve considered this one cut to a scene
without the main character a break of conventions. Some writers go so far
as to interpret this scene as stemming from Travis’ imagination, to keep
the unbroken one-character perspective.
An interesting side-aspect here is the thought that Scorsese must have
feared the audience would not understand why Iris doesn’t just shift her
loyalties to Travis. He obviously deemed the scene indispensable to moti-
vate Iris’ continuous resistance to Travis’ attempts of “saving” her, so he
rather risked a break in perspective than a break in causality of action and
motivation.
When we don’t see everything with the eyes of one character then we
often know things the character doesn’t know, for example what happened
52
in a character’s absence, or at the same time in another place, but in any

way relevant for the character’s own story.
This gain in knowledge also removes us a bit from the character and we
are asked to register more, to not only accompany a character and experi-
ence things vicariously, but have more of an outside, maybe even reflecting
perspective - or shift our attention to something beyond the character. In
genre films this is often the plot, or rather, the story, which sometimes re-
quires us to take different perspectives one after the other, so that we don’t
miss anything crucial. At the same time we can sometimes gain a certain
independence of the tight psychology of experience, we remove ourselves
from the one time of a character and can “inhabit” several times.
An example of changing perspective to support the effects of the narra-

tion can be seen in Halloween by John Carpenter (written by Carpenter and
Debra Hill, 1979).
The film opens with a seemingly free-floating camera, we are looking
from the subjective view of an unseen person while we approach a house.
The invisible observer seems to be a stealthy voyeur, who later dons a
mask, so that we are forced to look through the eyeholes of that mask and
so underline the forced inhabitancy of that person’s private gaze. Our invis-
ible ego first explores the inside of the house then arrives in the room of a
teenage girl. It/we attack the girl with a large knife and kill her. We leave
the house, still in the subjective view, when a couple arrives in a car.
Now the man rips the mask off “our” face and with this we jump into an
objective POV. We now see the killer is a small boy. Parents and child stand
still as if in a tableau while the camera moves away, higher and higher, until
it assumes an Olympic vision.
Cut to the present. 15 years later. We meet Dr. Loomis and a nurse, driv-
ing in a car, observed by the camera. And from now on we remain in this
observational POV, with the camera assuming the position of a knowing
narrator (sometimes knowing in advance), who can already go to the next
position before the action follows. This knowledge is necessary to cre-
ate suspense and have the crucial parallel montage: what happens in the
house of the babysitter, while the young couple is slaughtered in the house
just opposite, etc.?
After its eerie subjective opening, Halloween consistently uses an
outer perspective that is not connected to one character, and is used for
the creation of maximum suspense. We get to see just what excites us
most, what we need to know to create and uphold the tension of the mo-
ment. Never do we return to the subjective gaze of the opening shot, al-
though the young killer returns as an adult in the main part of the film and
53
commits more murders. All murders in the present are always shown from
a perspective close to the victim, seeing just what they see, but knowing
(unlike them), that the killer is lurking close by. One of the most effec-
tive shots is on a street in broad daylight, with the teenagers just walk-
ing along chatting, and after they have passed the well-pruned hedge be-
tween two houses, the killer steps out from behind it into the street and
looks after them, something only we see and that creates a strong feeling
of dread. It is this difference between the knowledge of the audience ver-
sus the knowledge of the characters, sometimes combined in the same
shot, where the film draws most of its suspense from (and actually the
whole Slasher-genre).
It is interesting to remark that suspense can also work the other way
round, as I have mentioned above when citing Red Road, where the charac-
ter knows more than we do and the narrator uses this to create suspense.
We touch here the question of the distribution of information, which is

key for most suspense plots. Meaning that also Hitchcock’s famous dis-
tinction between suspense and surprise (the bomb under the table) is also
a question of narrative perspective.
We all remember the surprise version of the story, with the people sitting
around a table talking and suddenly a bomb goes off. In the suspense ver-
sion we know there’s the bomb under the table, while the characters don’t.
We also know when it is supposed to explode and we know how much time
is left until that moment (the proverbial “ticking clock”). It is quite possible
to ask if this is merely a case of distribution of information or the build-up
of an emotional arc of suspense. Let’s imagine different points of view. In
one example we could see the bomb being placed under the table and then
see the people seated at the table from the POV of the hidden bomber.
What if this guy has “honourable” goals, so we may hope the bomb will
go off at the right moment (we could think of the assassination attempts
against Hitler). But what if it is not someone as evil as Hitler, but just a
regular “bad guy”? And what if the bomber isn’t acting for the best of hu-
mankind but from a more personal motivation? It might be an interesting
experiment to present such a scene from different points of view and see
how this could change our attitude towards the doer and the deed.
We could invent more variations of this, but their effect would always
depend on our position within the story, meaning how close we are to a
character versus its context, the specific causality of the action. Depending
on our knowledge and perspective our attitude will shift. For the choice
of POV (not only the camera’s) is one of the most effective tools to steer
54
the emotional responses of the audience, their attitude towards the

character(s) and the conflicts/questions connected to it.
A nice example that again goes back to Hitchcock can be seen in Psy-
cho. After Norman Bates has found our dead main character Marion
Crane murdered in the shower, he quickly cleans up all traces of the deed.
Then he puts Marion’s corpse into the trunk of her car and drives it into
the swamp. We see the vehicle sink, when suddenly it stops, with the
trunk still sticking out. And although just a few minutes have passed
since the murder of Marion, almost everyone holds their breath, hoping
the car might continue to sink and vanish completely. This identifica-
tion with the perpetrator is clearly influenced by the choice of narrative
perspective.
What we have discussed up until now seems to indicate that we need

to differentiate the material further.
Obviously there is a form of subjective perspective that is not identical
with a subjective gaze of the camera and likewise there is an objective
perspective where a character can be continuously present. Both can ex-
ist with a character. It is just that we see different things. The presence
of a character within the scene appears to be a condition for our gaze
(without her presence we couldn’t see anything), but the direction might
allow us to explore the space differently from the character in the scene.
We can register things the character doesn’t, we can draw different con-
clusions, we can even understand things differently and this difference
is instrumental, not accidental.
In most films we jump between different options. We might enter
the room with a character, we look around on our own, register some
detail the character registers too (maybe sooner, maybe later?), all this
we do visually. But it is our connection to that character, the perspective
we have onto him, that determines if we align our own perception with
the character’s or maybe deliberately look for differences. And this can
largely be done already in script stage.
As in most central aspects of filmmaking, also here the rules are es-
tablished in the beginning. If we break a constant one-character per-
spective after 50 minutes without an absolute narrative necessity, the
audience will experience it as a break in the non-verbal agreement of
the previous 50 minutes of viewing. So if we do have one homogenous
perspective, any digression is usually an indication of an unsolved script
problem. Quite often it is because the author finds that some piece of
information must be given under all circumstances and he couldn’t come
55
up with a better way to do it. But this is mostly true for films that rely
heavily on coherence and cause-effect logic on their stories.
We could try to think about the different aspects of perspective in

combination with the distinction between plot-driven and character-
driven storytelling. If we have to be with the character, and the character
wants to know what happens in the house across the street, she has to
go there and we have to be with her. We might then see things with the
eyes of the character, or not. But we start on a common ground with the
character. Events will be shown in their relevance for the character and
we can observe them as such in a character-driven film. The character is
much more an agent of our gaze in the plot-driven film, where we use
characters as justification to observe and continue down the path the
story leads us.
It could be interesting to shift perspective willingly, to switch between
different character perspectives and see how this influences our experi-
ence of the story. There are films that do similar things to create a kind
of productive insecurity that increases the tension (The Usual Suspects
would be an example, also David Fincher’s Fight Club makes use of a
change of perspective as a key element of its story).
In a film like Gus van Sant’s Elephant the different perspectives are
rather used to avoid mono-causality and subjectivity. Still, while we shift
perspective and relive moments with different characters, it is not pre-
dominantly their difference we are asked to observe, but their individual
singularity that some might also call isolation.
Episodic or multi-strand narratives can have a one character perspec-

tive for each storyline, but whenever the stories touch each other and
characters start to interact, the focus can shift, which can be difficult,
because in multi-strand storylines we tend to favour some characters
over others anyway. This could be one reason why we usually do not find
strong subjectivity in such films and why they are quite often held to-
gether by a unifying theme, rather than a strong identification with one
character. So while our favourite character is maybe not to be seen at
the moment, we still have an event, an action that relates to the overall
“meaningfulness” of the narrative.
This leads us back to the simple observation from the beginning

that a lot of people seem to find it disturbing if a film with one clear
main character contains scenes in which this character doesn’t appear.
But sometimes it is enough if the actions of the other characters re-
56
late to our absent main character. A good example here is Jean-Pierre

Melville’s Le Samourai (1967). In the long sequence where the police tail
our “samourai” Jeff Costello through the metro system of Paris, Costello
is often just represented by a red bulb on a board. Still, the view of the
concerted action and the determined behaviour of the police strength-
en our empathy for the physically absent hero. He is the lonesome wolf
(says the barkeeper at one point) and the scenes in which others act
without him, but because of him, only increase this loneliness.
As a further indication of how much ideas of perspective can be used

to great effect, I would like to present a longer quote from Luc Dardenne’s
notes from the preparation of their film Le Fils (The Son, 2002):
“A common element between Olivier (main character in Le Fils) and
Rosetta (main character in Rosetta) is the mystery. As we filmed Ro-
setta and peered through the door of the waffle stand, we tried to po-
sition the eye of the camera such that it could not observe everything
that Rosetta saw, but still be very close to her point of view. The ten-
sion between what Rosetta sees and almost seeing what Rosetta sees,
this is what creates the suspense of the mystery (the secret). The more
the borders of this margin come closer to one another without reaching
each other, the stronger the current of the mystery that connects them.
When Olivier, standing on his toes peeks through the office window of
the director he sees Francis, his hand, just signing a document, his arm,
his chest, his face. The eye of the camera, unable to take the same place
as Olivier’s eyes, because part of the window frame and Olivier’s head
prevent it, can see a part of Francis’ body, but not his face. When the
eye of the camera manages to focus on Francis’ hand, who is about to
sign the document, the suspense of the mystery increases for the audi-
ence, for seeing clearly what Olivier sees, without being able to see the
face, increases the desire to see this face. To find the “bad place” for
the camera, to arrange things such that it might as well try to get to the
right place, the place from which the character watches, but can’t stay
there because of the character’s being there, because of an obstacle, a
delay - this is our way to create suspense for the spectator, while at the
same time we give our characters a secret, hence, an existence”. (My own
translation from a German translation)
From here, the real investigation might just be about to start.
What we can note as a preliminary insight of this first exploration is

the confidence that questions of narrative/visual perspective are both
57
complex and crucial at the same time. Just because we find many well-
known concepts from older arts (like literature, maybe even painting)
or our own daily processes of perception, these questions can yield very
useful strategies and tools, without being too obvious about it. As we
have seen, it was exactly the fear to draw too much attention on ques-
tions of perspective that helped create some of the unwritten laws of
dealing with it.
Understanding perspective is a stepping-stone to understanding the

complex interrelation between the storyteller and his audience, which
lies at the heart of our engagement with the seventh art.
58
Paris-Texas - an Ideal Development Scheme? The Importance of Finding a Driving Force…
Paris-Texas - an Ideal Development Scheme?

The Importance of Finding a Driving Force…
by Antoine Le Bos
At the Angers Film Festival, we had a pretty interesting discussion

around the film Paris-Texas. But that debate launched another discussion,
between me and myself, which I would like to share with you.
With Paris-Texas, Wim Wenders managed to reach a kind of audience he

wasn’t used to reaching until that film, he connected with people coming
from very different backgrounds, ages, countries, and in amazing numbers
for the first time in his career (I was18, knowing very little about cinema,
and the film impressed me to a degree I wasn’t used to at that time, as
much as Apocalypse Now or Kubrick’s 2001). Years after this success, which
some critics may have considered as the mere result of a short lasting
“trend”-effect after winning the Cannes’ Golden Palm, it could be interest-
ing to take a look at the screenplay he wrote with Sam Shepard.
Why did that film reach so many people? How did these pictures get to
have such a long-lasting effect and imprint on the viewers?
First and foremost, let’s take a ‘cold’ look at the film.

On a purely formal level, it is a pretty overstated picture; the photogra-
phy can even seem kind of heavy looking at it frame by frame! As if both the
director and the DOP had been working too long in advertising. Apart from
the landscapes, the frame always includes very obvious colour themes, and
plays surprisingly with red and blue all the way through, until the peep-
show moment in the very last part of the movie.
In a quite heavy symbolic use, the red seems to underline every pos-
sible link to love: bed covers, a woman’s shoes, Nastassja Kinsky’s car
and clothes, the father’s and son’s shirts when they re-unite to find the
mother, and even Travis’ hat in the desert is red: love drove him mad, love
still weighs on his mind, the pain in his mind pushes him to walk, heading
nowhere… Like an advert, everything is clearly pointed out for the viewer,
and thank you, we get it. Red = love = blood is a kind of equation that we
59
might find tiring after a while. Not to mention all the sky-blue cars in the
renting company (+ the rental sign, Avis, is… red, of course…), and then
the car is drowned in a huge perfect blue sky: Travis was “out of the blue”,
and he is still lost to the world; he is “out there”! Out there being the
desert, where motels and windmills of course have been painted with the
very same two colours, for the sake of the viewer. Looking at the composi-
tion of the frames themselves, it’s nearly “too perfect”. In the car, Travis
is - little by little – trapped by his brother, who brings him back to society.
Compared to the amazing free spaces of Mother Nature, the new “world”
is like a prison that gradually takes him back again, puts him into boxes…
The picture speaks too much in a way. It’s overplaying, overstating.
If we continue to look at it carefully, taking the angle of psychologi-

cal coherence, the film can appear to be pretty weak in a way. Why did
Travis really leave them? We never really understand it. Any father in
the same position, if his wife had tried to kill him, would have tried to
save his son. Travis says Jane has never been a real mother, then why
couldn’t he take care of the kid? Why is Travis leaving them again at the
end, if not in order to create the lonesome-cowboy-effect ending? Guilt
cannot be the only explanation: after all that time, he could be forgiven,
and in a way, we feel that Jane is about to forgive him in the last peep-
show moment. Why is Jane suddenly accepting to see her son, and it
seems that she’s accepting to take her son back, even if she had done
everything to stay away from him all those years? Why is it so simple
for the son (Hunter) to leave his adopted parents that easily: he’s been
sharing everything with them for the last four years, to a point where he
considered them as his true parents, having only seen his real parents
on an old super-8 film?
If we continue our dirty job of looking at flaws, we could also spend

some time analysing the second half of the script: the way they find Jane,
and how Travis finds a way to talk to her; it all sounds too easy. The script
is rushing to make things happen; the scriptwriter is in a hurry - they have
to close the package.
The more closely we look at the film, the more we look at the script it-
self - the more we discover its obvious imperfections. But what cannot be
denied is the fact that the film has been totally successful in “reaching”
audiences. And the Golden Palm was a unanimous choice of the Cannes-
jury, whose members seem to have been overwhelmed by a wave of faith
and enthusiasm for what the film was giving an audience.
60
Clearly the film must have reached something.
According to us, whatever the imperfections of the film are, whatever

the “holes” are, Paris-Texas has a driving force that grabs the viewer. What
we call driving force is what we could name the emotional engine, which is
what pushes the character(s) forward, what drives the quest, the search,
and the desire (both for these characters and for the viewer). And as soon
as you have that driving force (not to be mixed up with the theme), every-
thing is possible.
And that should be the very first angle for us to look at in a material in
any scriptwriting process, be it a dive into a first draft, a rewrite, or even an
adaptation.
I recently found myself working on a script adapted from a novel.

I deliberately asked the director who had been writing the first draft
alone if I could avoid looking at the novel. I wanted to try to restructure
the material of the script itself without any regard for the novel. The
director had selected all the material he found tasty in the novel, and
I wanted to stay in this tasty world he had created. It was wonderfully
rich, full of poetry, but there was no driving force at all. And to my sur-
prise, in reinventing a struggle, a desire within that world, in reinvest-
ing the material with what I thought was a strong “emotional engine”, I
reinvented the driving force that the novel initially had, without know-
ing it! This is to say that the director (a quite talented one I think), ob-
sessed with his search for visuals, for scenes and characters, had been
diving into the novel without looking for any “deep engine” to build his
story; and that engine, to the director’s utter surprise, was right there
in front of him, in the novel. And very often that is what happens: the
writer-director, both drowned in and fascinated by his own material,
doesn’t look for the driving force he needs, doesn’t realize that the
script he is trying to write doesn’t give him an “emotional engine” he
can rely on. Often, young writer-directors either are genuinely looking
for that driving force but don’t know how to build it properly into their
story, or they tend to think that such a driving force could damage their
material.
My personal belief is that the “engine” in a script not only cannot
damage a poetic material, but the very duty of that scriptwriting device
is to help “deliver” this poetry to the public, thus helping it to vibrate
properly with the audience, helping it to flow through their veins, bodies,
and minds, instead of remaining in a closed system that only the writer-
director is connected to.
61
When that drive is in place in a script, another huge advantage for the
writer is that the imperfections can often be taken as strengths in the film.
The “holes” become genius ideas, become parameters that the spectator
will want to dig into and think about… By using the engine of a story prop-
erly a writer and/or director can free himself or herself from the painful job
of engineering an End to give an “answer”, of taking care of every detail,
because when the audience isn’t “taken” by the story, they look at every-
thing with a very sharp eye: the images, the quality of the dialogues, the
logic of the actions, set-design etc. - whatever they are drawn to notice.
So, in a way, working properly on structure early enough is the best way to
free yourself and allow a real creative process to happen during both the
shooting and the editing of the film.
What I’ve discovered, looking through all the interviews given by both
Wenders and Sam Shepard (co-writer of Paris-Texas; L.M. Kit Carson is cred-
ited for the adaptation), is that in a way, and not voluntarily at all, the writ-
ing process of the script had experienced a kind of “ideal” creative path…
First of all, before the shooting even started, they discovered that the
initial second half of the script wasn’t what they were looking for. Wend-
ers started to shoot having only the first half of the script. Thanks to the
production plan, he was able to shoot the film chronologically, leaving him
(and Sam Shepard, who was working on another project far away from the
set) some more time to think about the second half.
What allowed them to start was the strong feeling of having in their
hands what they needed to dive into the story:
1. The poetic and thematic parameters they wanted to build the film with:
space, the loss of any connection, innocence, parentage, brotherhood,
paternity (can one learn to be a father from scratch, from a blank page?),
and the quest of one man: can you survive the loss of everything?
Can you destroy yourself with love? These poetic parameters were not
put on the page as precise questions that begged precise answers, but
as a quest in itself for Wenders, a way to consider the making of the film
as a way to dig into a path in mind and space.
2. A strong “driving force”, an emotional engine able to powerfully take the

viewer and make him a part of that poetic journey. In fact, in the first
half of the movie, this driving force works with two engines, which are
two quests:
62
A) The quest of the brother (Walt) (first part of the first half): finding
Travis, finding out what happened to him, why he disappeared all
these years, and helping Travis to reconnect with his son. This could
be summed up with the idea: “to help Travis come back to life”. What
makes the quest very powerful for both Walt and the viewer is that
Travis is his brother, who is totally lost (doesn’t even know his own
name), and Walt, having no kid of his own, has become the adoptive
father of Travis’ son (Hunter) during all these years.
B) Travis’ quest (starting slowly, gaining strength in Los Angeles, and

in the second part of the first half of the story): finding out who he
is, and who he was. Reconnecting with life again. Recreating a link
with his own son, which leads him to what the second half of the
story will be about: finding Jane, Hunter’s mother and the love of his
life. This quest will be taken together with his son. Travis’ quest is
reinforced by the fact that Hunter initially doesn’t recognize Travis as
his father. Walt’s wife was so dedicated in bringing up Hunter (they
thought Travis was dead!) that Travis’ reconnection with his son is a
nightmare for her (and for Walt). Travis’ quest is further reinforced
(quite artificially, we must admit) by the fact that what happened
four years earlier seems to have been so terrible it is nearly impos-
sible to tell. And in fact, when they shot the middle of the film, both
Wenders and Shepard were unable to tell us what happened, simply
because they didn’t know it themselves…
But who cares, what we ask of the filmmaker is to take us with them
and they take us! In this film the driving force is powerful enough to al-
low Wenders to build his film with a pretty slow pace, surrounding us with
deeply poetic parameters, or parameters that we can perceive as being po-
etic because we are taken by them.
And not having enough time to construct the second half of the story
properly, they could only count on the strength of what they had already
put in place for us. In other words, the strong drive and quest of the sto-
ry/characters creates enough dynamic to allow Wenders to climb into the
“boat” of what he’s already created in the first half, and allow the river of
the story (to use his own words) to continue it’s path as naturally as pos-
sible. In other words, the story guides him more than he guides the film. In
an interview with Laurent Tirard, more than 20 years later, Wenders says:
“- in doing Paris, Texas, I had a kind of revelation. I understood that a story
was like a river, and if we took the risk of putting our little boat on it, and if
63
we trusted that river and its flow strongly enough, then the boat could be
taken to some amazing place”.
To return to the delivery of the second part of the script:
While they were already shooting, Wenders sent Shepard the part with
Travis and his son leaving Los Angeles to try to find Jane in Houston, know-
ing that the fifth of each month, she would go to a bank to send some
money for her kid. This sounds like a poor idea: why on the fifth? Apart
from the fact that the scriptwriter needs it, it doesn’t sound realistic at all
that she sends money on the very same day each month, but who cares, we
are with our characters, able to swallow anything, because the first part of
the story made us want to follow them wherever they went…
And just a few days before they reached that point in the story on set,
Shepard delivered the very last part, when Travis eventually finds Jane, the
famous peep show scenes that - in the final parts - reveal what happened
four years ago. Shepard delivered them by phone, at night, with the first
assistant director (Claire Denis) taking notes all night so they could prepare
the shooting plans for the next days. They were in a hurry, they had no time
to think clearly and discuss the ending. They rushed towards that ending.
And even if you can feel Shepard’s huge talent in putting words in the actors’
mouths in the dialogues, and even if the peep show idea gives a strength
to these two major scenes of the third act, you can clearly feel how rushed
the end of the script has been. They had to end it, and didn’t know how.
They had to find a way to close the story, after spending an hour and a half
telling the viewer that something terrible had happened four years before
that very moment; they had to finally deliver this “terrible truth”. It feels
like a big unwrapping, and there is a lot of awkwardness in it, a lot of holes,
a lot of non-resolution, rescued by style and by the actors. But do we care?
I don’t think so: in a way, if they had taken all the time needed to close the
script properly before the shoot, they might have lost the flow, the current,
the tide that the film was creating by itself. Holes and awkwardness are
part of the beauty of this film, of its mystery.
If they had had the time to write 2 or 3 more drafts to deliver a proper
ending for such a script, they would have probably tried to deliver some
understandable conclusion, some clear answers to the questions the sto-
ry had raised. These answers would have tried to resolve some thematic
issues, which could have damaged the film’s natural path. Sometimes,
scripts cannot be conclusive. Sometimes, stories lead towards opening up
64
more questions than they can solve; certain films are not aiming at telling
any “truth” in particular, but are opening gaps instead, abysses. Certain
films can be designed as a means to prove something, but others are de-
signed to question, to leave their doubts wide open, and often these films
cannot know precisely what they will find before they end the process of
coming into being.
That is precisely why, for some projects, finding the driving force, this
“emotional engine” that pushes the script forward, has to be the central ob-
session before any attempt at finding a theme, finding “what the author
wants to say”. For some of them, the making of the film is part of the process
to find the core of the deep metaphors that will shape the soul of the film.
For Paris-Texas, trying to find one or two “core themes” for the film is
nearly impossible.
Let’s try with a list of thematic questions:
1. Do we come from somewhere?

2. Do we (as humans) go anywhere?
3. Do our children owe their love to us?
4. Can we get used to life?
5. Is love an obstacle to living?
6. Can you still love when everything has been destroyed in you?
7. Is it possible to recover from the worst pain?
8. Can we survive the fact that our world is “canning” us?
(Putting us in small boxes)?
9. Can we (truly) communicate with others?
10. Is society and progress a machine that destroys our soul
(any origin in us)?
11. Is progress making us come from nowhere?
12. Is love helping us to come from somewhere?
13. Does parenthood mean something?
And we could go on like that for another page.
If we asked a panel of viewers which number they would choose from the
above list as a possible thematic core of the film, we can be sure we would
end up with at least ten different possibilities.
65
In other words, Paris-Texas can be considered as thematically open. And

that is a result of the fact that Wenders and Shepard didn’t (couldn’t) im-
pose a strategy for the ending of the film, they had to let it be.
This is where I wish to come back to methodology.

For this type of film, which is strongly driven by a poetic vision, Paris-
Texas has been involuntarily following an ideal script development path.
The writers had all the time they needed to write the first half of the
story, giving them, firstly, time to discover the poetic and human material
they wanted to build their film on, and secondly to find a strong, powerful
quest/engine/driving force with which they could create the true strength
of the story.
And once they had that potential, they were lucky enough to be allowed
to start shooting the material and transform this river/flow/current core of
the story into a real living being; and having started this flow, they could
only deliver the “result” of that driving force, the second part of the story
then becoming some animalistic, somewhat spontaneous offspring of the
initial input, allowing the shoot to be a kind of quest in itself, following the
quest driven by the characters… footstep after footstep.
66
Email Conversation 2008 - 2009

Adaptation
with Gino Ventriglia, Jeff Rush, Franz Rodenkirchen,

Marietta von Hausswolff von Baumgarten,
Antoine Le Bos.
Gino Ventriglia:
Hello, everybody.
The following notes are meant to start out a conversation about some of
the problems raised by the adaptation process.
In the fifties and sixties, Italian screenwriters were used to work on
original screenplays by writing down a short treatment (the ‘subject’) and
a rough step-outline. Then, in order to prepare the first draft, they wrote a
longer treatment: sometimes, it could run up to two hundred pages, well
beyond the strictly necessary material needed for the script. The world of
their story was explored in depth with the tools usually available to novel-
ists - thoughts of the characters, detailed back-stories and psychologies
to build up motivations, dialogues, accurate descriptions of places and ac-
tions, and so on. In their words, they considered the long treatment as ‘the
novel of the film’, a novel from which to draw - to adapt - the screenplay.
I find this approach interesting. I guess it was not so much a problem of
proving themselves as full ‘writers’: the problem was that the screenwriters
often were considered a minor species of literary storyteller by critics and
scholars. But the long treatment was neither meant to be published, nor
to experiment linguistic or narrative styles. It was rather a process aimed
to create and know an entire fictional world, developing its imagery to a
full extent through the written word: and the form of the novel was per-
ceived as a more flexible tool compared to the necessarily rigid form of the
screenplay (deriving its actual shape from a mix of theatre drama writing
and the early ‘shooting script’ - the list of shots to be taken to cover a scene
and tell the story visually). In order to research the different potentials of
the story, in terms of theme and plot and characters, the ‘novel’ offered an
‘objectivised’ world - from which to pick only those elements useful to tell
the story they wanted to tell.
67
That approach goes into a line of thought claiming that every screenplay,
original or not, is in some way the adaptation from some kind of pre-exist-
ing ‘text’ (either in literature, or in the oral tradition, or in real life, or other
sources). It also goes in the direction of those who support the idea that
there is only a limited amount of possible story patterns (Howard Hawks,
to name one). The consequence of such conceptions is to push the idea of
adaptation very far, till it entirely overlaps the same drama writing; I think
that our terminology is too broad: under the word ‘adaptation’, different
kinds of operations and processes are crowded together.
Let’s consider the case, not unusual, of a script adapted from (in this
case, it would be more correct to say ‘based on’) a short story - or news-
paper story - to make a 100-minute motion picture. Here, the writer has
to invent and fill in all that is missing in the few pages of the story (new
or different characters and events and twists, in order to make those few
elements that have interested him work dramaturgically) - and somehow
he must refer to some dramatic writing pattern to structure the hundred
minutes or more of screen narrative. That may mean to have a hypothesis
of a theme, which works as a compass to create the single steps (scenes or
sequences) needed to develop the story.
In The Spider’s Stratagem, for example, Bertolucci (along with co-writers

E. De Gregorio and M. Parolini) retains just the main plot mechanism of
the four pages of J. L. Borges’ Theme of the Hero and the Traitor: the whole
fictional universe is totally re-invented, in time and space, characters and
events.
In this case it was possible to avoid the main issue of the relation be-
tween Story (the bare main plot events and characters of the story) and
Style (the original writer’s peculiar way to tell the story) as posed by Rush-
Dancyger; or, in McFarlane’s terminology, between Narration and Nar-
rative. Because what was retained in the adaptation process was only a
dramaturgical knot and some movements of the plot, and no Style (or Nar-
rative) was strongly implied in the original text. So, it was relatively easy
and ‘harmless’ to retain one element of Borges poetics, and re-elaborate
it through Bertolucci’s poetics and aesthetics. Probably, most adaptations
from newspaper stories can be treated in the same way.
Very different is the case of Fellini and B. Zapponi in adapting and shoot-
ing Toby Dammit - although it’s not a full-length script: here, very little is
left of both poetics and aesthetics of E. A. Poe’s Never Bet the Devil your
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Head. In that case, it’s much more evident that the intention of the author
was to cannibalize the original and rewrite it within the categories of his
own poetics and aesthetics. The remains of the original text are just the
name of one character and the way he loses his life - his head cut off. No
trace of Poe’s theme, nor characters or plot, nor story or style.
On another level, how to consider a particular kind of adaptation like

Twelve Monkeys, directed by Terry Gilliam and adapted by J. and D. Peoples,
from another very singular short movie, La Jetee, written and directed by
Chris Marker? I don’t think that we can talk of a ‘remake’, as much as an
adaptation, although the source material is already a movie. In a way, it’s
like an author writing a novel out of another author’s short story.
In all these three cases, I’d consider the adaptation process much closer
to the screenwriting process of an original script, seeing the source mate-
rial as more ‘inspirational’ rather than the actual object of an ‘adaptation’
for the movie theatre. And probably, in the spectator’s mind, there’s al-
ready the awareness that the book (or the short) and the film are two dif-
ferent aesthetical objects, to consider and enjoy through different systems
of categories.
That may not be true for very well known books: I’m thinking, for in-
stance, of the two versions of Les Liaisons Dangereuses by Choderlos De
Laclos. In Dangerous Liaisons, by S. Frears’ and C. Hampton (who had also
written the play), the epistolary novel is strongly treated as ‘the novel of
cruelty’ meant to be by the original French writer, whereas in Valmont, by
J. C. Carriére and M. Forman, a large part of its power is lost because of dif-
ferent choices, both in the adaptation and directing.
Can the well-known ‘text’ to adapt then be considered a sort of ‘partit-

ura’ (score/composition), where each player can ‘perform’ according to his/
her own interpretation? And therefore, will the text be exposed to more or
less successful or effective interpretations?
A connected issue is about the endings, which, I guess we all agree,

‘contain’ and reveal the theme of the story. In the end of Stephen King’s
Apt Pupil, the teenager Todd kills his school psychological consultant Ed
French, then goes up to the highway with his rifle and ammunition to
shoot randomly, and is taken by police only five hours later. His initiation
to evil is completed, but it ends up in a tragedy. In the adaptation, directed
by Brian Singer and written by B. Boyce, most of the movements of the
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novel are kept, but in the end Todd doesn’t kill French, he just blackmails
him through the threat of a lie. He gets away with his misfits, and wins.
Changing sense of the theme and part of the tone (it’s not a tragedy),
makes it a proper adaptation, or just a ‘based on’ new story?
In other words, if we adapt Romeo and Juliet, and everything is just the
same, except for the ending (Juliet wakes up in time and they live happily
forever), is it still Shakespeare’s work of art, although not a tragedy anymore,
or is it something completely different? Of course, the theme would be the
same, but the sense of it would change: instead of ‘the conflicts and the con-
ventions of the adults killing (the love of) the innocents’, it would be ‘the love
of the innocents wins over the conflicts and the conventions of the adults’.
One last question arising: is there some kind of narrative text that is im-
possible to adapt for the screen, regardless of its success? As far as I may
think, probably only Finnegan’s Wake might resist an adaptation, but I’m
not even so sure about that…
Jeff Rush:
Hi All,
Gino raised so many issues I don’t know where to start. Just what is an ad-
aptation and is everything really an adaptation in some way or another? The
critical people talk about inter-textuality, the fact that every creative act is a
borrowing or reworking of the sea of mediated stories in which we live. The
new media people talk about the docu-verse, a universe of existing docu-
ments that makes writing an organization of links, explicit or otherwise.
But to be specific for a moment, I wonder what everyone thought of the

end of No Country for Old Men, particularly the stuff with the sheriff played
by Tommy Lee Jones. I had read the book and found much of the first half
very well done but a somewhat literal take on the book, which is okay, but I
wasn’t exactly getting much in the way of resonance out of it. The increased
role of the sheriff in the second half really captured me. Yet the essential
irony of the book escaped me. It seemed literal, No Country for Old Men, the
sheriff was old, and it made sense that he wasn’t up for it anymore.
I went back to the book and realized what had been cut and wonder
now about the choices. In the book, much is made of him being a war hero.
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There are recurrent first person mediations by Ed Tom (that was the sher-
iff’s name) that conveyed an underlying anxiety even before the action
built. But we never knew what the anxiety was. Then right prior to his giv-
ing up on catching Bardem’s character, there is a long scene, not in the
movie, where he confesses to the old man (his uncle), how the medal he
received during the war was a fraud. He really ran and left his men exposed
(or at least he thought he did, it is presented with enough ambiguity to
think about it). The essential irony of the book becomes much richer at that
point as the fragility and fundamental clutch on life at any age replaces
that sense of growing old and tired that the title hints at.
Now you can see why they cut this:
1) In the novel, it is a long, expositional dialogue scene, 2) the character

of the sheriff is much more compromised (yet richer) if we know about his
earlier failures, and 3) this removed the first person that is so hard in film
(but that also provides a moral perspective on the book but maybe, lacking
that apparent moral perspective, they did not need to undercut). And they
left that lovely ending and allowed Ed Tom’s dreams.
Still I wonder. Could that anxiety be added to the sheriff right from the
beginning? Could there have been more sense of his moral perspective set
up and then knocked down and would it have given it more depth (espe-
cially in the middle)? What equivalents to his first-person monologues are
there in film (short of voice over)? Or am I asking for something that actu-
ally is there and I’m not seeing it?
Franz Rodenkirchen:
Dear friends, colleagues and partners in crime,
It’s been a while. Haven’t I written this reply many times in my head? Of
course I have. Every time I thought of it, a different aspect came back to me
that I wished to respond to.
But maybe I have to start with a kind of confession: if given the choice,
I’d always say I prefer an original screenplay to an adaptation. It is an im-
pulse I had never questioned up until now, really. Needless to say, quite a
few of my favourite films are adaptations of pre-existing works, mostly
other narratives. Indeed it seems that the question of adaptation versus
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original work, if it isn’t only some very personal thing I have, seems to re-
late to a claim we make on new works, new scripts, new film ideas for them
to offer something that “adds” to the corpus of already existing works.
Or maybe I should rather say I tend to make that claim? And would that
mean that an adaptation is less “new”?
I fully realise that my own impulse is rather unsupportable once I scru-
tinize it a bit more. Still, the little voice in the back of my head pops up
sometimes.
It seems to me there is a very basic quality inherent in the idea of ad-

aptation: that, in order for it to be adaptable, there has to be something
which foregoes the specific form in which it is presented, meaning that, if
something can be a comic book, a novel, an opera, a ballet or a film, and
maybe even a painting, there must be some core element which is inde-
pendent of the different ways of expressing it. Rather like a liquid that can
assume the form of different containers, while it can also become frozen or
turn into gas. I guess in that respect Gino’s propositions were just trying to
sketch the vast landscape of the “adaptable” (the “liquid”), which of course
goes way beyond the written narrative (as just one potential “container”).
One of the first things that strikes me is that in the fifties and sixties,
a lot of films were made that naturally assumed a relation between the
novel and the fiction film, as well as between the novelist or writer of lit-
erature and the scriptwriter/filmmaker. If we look for example at films like
Hiroshima Mon Amour by Alain Resnais (based on the book by Marguerite
Duras), or Belle de Jour by Luis Bunuel (based on the novel by Joseph Kes-
sel), or indeed Resnais’ Last Year at Marienbad (adapted from Alain Robbe-
Grillet’s work), the films themselves seem to retain a more writerly, nov-
elistic, or narrative (as opposed to dramatic) way to tell their story. While
they clearly also needed to adapt the written work they based their film
on, it was not so much an adaptation that was focused on storytelling,
on primarily causality-driven “plots”, but an exploration which often used
comparable techniques - “inferential walks in the fictional woods”, as Um-
berto Eco would call it.
Working with Eastern-European storytellers and seeing their particular

storytelling and filmmaking traditions, I often found that the scripts were
still closer to novels, not plot-driven, highly dramatic affairs that used sto-
rytelling tools to carefully prepare emotional effects on their audience. If
this is nowadays at least partly considered dubious, it is mostly due to the
perception of adaptation as a strategy to expand/repeat the commercial
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success of a written work in different media (novel, film, musical), instead

of having a “new idea”.
Nowadays we often find the suggestion of novelists adapting their own
work for the screen should be rejected, because it will most likely result in
failure. The writers try to protect the integrity of their work, which of course
stems from the medium they based it in, let’s say the novel. So the assump-
tion (and quite often also the fact) is, that writers aren’t tough enough to
make the necessary cuts and changes when adapting their own work.
But what is it actually that is adapted? What makes an adaptation “suc-

cessful” or “failed”? And who’s to tell?
First, the idea to adapt a certain work indicates that there’s a perceived
potential that the work could retain some essence in another medium. This
already depends on what one finds most interesting in the source material.
For some, it is mostly the mere facts and circumstances of the story: follow
the plot, throw out all superfluous material. For others, it is the attempt at
a faithful rendering of that which made the original work effective for them
as audience. This can be mood, atmosphere, the emotional journey of the
audience independent of any specific character, etc.
We all know of the people who go to the cinema to watch the adapta-
tion of a favourite novel and come out disappointed: “I liked the novel bet-
ter”, is the most common remark. Usually this is because the film had to
select its material from the vast possibilities a novel usually offers (which
is why many consider short stories so much more adaptable, as Gino also
remarks). I myself, as a huge fan of the novels, went to see the Harry Pot-
ter-series, not hoping for much, actually dreading it. And despite knowing
that they just had to be severely cut down in content, it was exactly the
filmmakers’ attempt to retain as many story elements as possible, the fo-
cus on the mere causal sequence of events, which made it so unsuccessful
as an adaptation for me. There was no room whatsoever to get to know
the characters, not a moment to stay with them, feel them, get under their
skin a bit, or indeed, sniff the atmosphere of Hogwarts school of witchcraft
and wizardry. Had I really expected anything else? No, but still I went, hop-
ing to be able to experience again the unique atmosphere I so love in the
books and especially the strong emotional theme(s). Interestingly it was
the third instalment of the series Harry Potter and the Prisoner of Azkaban
that I felt succeeded best. It was also the one that took the biggest creative
license with the original material and in terms of fidelity was the most un-
faithful! It was necessary to create the feeling for the characters on screen.
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But actually, and maybe this expands on the idea of what “makes” a good
adaptation, I also felt that most of the people who artistically worked on
the film, had either never read the novels, or if they had, hadn’t found an
emotional entrance into their world.
A necessity for creative license in the adaptation process seems to be

quite frequent. Apart from a more formulaic suspense story (or detective
mystery), I have often found when working with adaptations that one
needed to almost exorcise the novel from the script. With every new draft
of the script, it needed to grow more and more independent of the source
material and find its own successful strategy. The same seems to work for
adaptations of personal experiences. What seems to be the biggest asset,
the writer’s intimate knowledge of every angle and detail, often proves to
be the greatest obstacle in making the necessary dramatic decisions or in-
deed, find the dramatic focus (if it is dramatic storytelling we’re after) that
actually gets to the core of the personal experience. We need to find the
suitable/adaptable elements for the respective medium, before we can go
about discussing techniques and “plot”.
What indeed makes a successful adaptation? Is Antonioni’s Blow Up

such a case? Whoever has read the short story by Julio Cortazar on which
Blow Up is based, will find little resemblance at first glance. Maybe even
at second glance. Who would want to judge whether Coppola’s Apocalypse
Now is a successful adaptation of Joseph Conrad’s Heart of Darkness, a book
written more than half a century before the American war in Vietnam?
I happen to have revisited an old favourite film of mine, Peter Weir’s

Picnic at Hanging Rock, of course another adaptation. Reportedly “based
on a true story” (and played accordingly in the film), the film is a rather
faithful rendering of the novel by Joan Lindsay. The most obvious but
maybe crucial change is that Peter Weir and his scriptwriter Cliff Green
decided to focus even stronger on the mystery, the “what happened” and
consequently the desire of the audience to get to the bottom of this mys-
tery. All material (it wasn’t much) that would distract from focussing on
this desire to “know” fell along the wayside, either in the adaptation or
later in the editing. By making the whole thing “based on a true story”
the writers (both Joan Lindsay and Cliff Green) could get away with hav-
ing an open ending and even derive strength from it for their narrative: it
is exactly the openness that goes so much against the usual conventions
of the mystery and our sense of closure, which gave the film its intense
atmospheric effect - and after-effect. I still remember how, as roman-
74
tic 13-year-olds, we’d quote from the dialogue to allude to the sense of
mystery the film so consequently conveys. And as we all have painfully
understood at one point in our lives, the mystery is only exciting as long
as it is alive - once we learn what is behind, we’re disappointed because
the mystery is essentially empty.
As I start digressing (reminiscing, dreaming), I’d rather stop here and

throw the hook out. Catch, anyone?
Marietta von Hausswolff von Baumgarten:
Dear everyone.
Gino talked about how the Italian screenwriters of the fifties and sixties
wrote long documents exploring the world of the story in depth, with a
more literary focus. I find this approach most relevant to today’s screen-
writing/adaptation process. In working with a variety of writers and writer/
directors from a wide background and range, with a diversity of themes and
approaches, one must constantly re-invent new methods to explore. I try
to pick up the impulse from the writer as to what would be the most useful
approach for them; recently having found that several writers have been
”liberated” through this free-styling.
The series of documents then become in fact ”adaptable” to the screen

format.
In one case as a bonus we discovered that the film-writer also was a
fantastic prose-writer, and that the work-in-progress-discovery-material
actually materialized itself as a publishable - and thus - literary work.
In another case the content to be explored in the film seemed not suita-
ble for a “normal” script format at all, but rather suggested that the writer/
director should devise a new format; one that most suitably would convey
the story to decision-makers, collaborators and others in the next step of
the process.
After all, there are script formats that we call standard, but when did
Standard ever measure up to Visionary?
Of course the script shall be an easy blueprint for all to work with, and we
are creatures of habit. But I’d like to remind myself that there is no death
penalty (yet) for re-invention. So, in conclusion: sometimes the script has
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to adapt to the material, and the material should lead the way for what
documents to be produced.
On a completely different note, talking of “pure” adaptation, i.e. literary
works being transformed into films, I was interestingly re-reminded (via
the initiation of this conversation) that a surprisingly high number of (per-
sonally so considered) key oeuvres were in fact adaptations.
I re-discovered for instance that Kubrick based eleven out of his thirteen
films on literary texts, some very obviously so:
Eyes Wide Shut (Arthur Schnitzler), The Shining (Stephen King), Full
Metal Jacket (Gustaf Hasford), Lolita (Vladimir Nabokov), Barry Lyndon (Wil-
liam Makepeace Thackeray), A Clockwork Orange (Anthony Burgess), 2001
(Arthur C Clarke), Dr. Strangelove (Peter George), Spartacus (Howard Fast)
- and those I have not seen too; Paths of Glory (1957, novel by Humphrey
Cobb) and The Killing (1956, novel by Lionel White). Only the first two: Kill-
ers Kiss (1955) and Fear and Desire (1953) seem to be original screenplays.
What does it all mean? Perhaps Kubrick uncovered that there was
more depth to be explored through adaptation, rather than starting “from
scratch”?
I mean no one can accuse Kubrick of being lazy, considering all the re-
search he put into each film, so it would not read as easier, but conceivably
more suitable to his style.
A lot of adapted works I had read feverishly, long before they became
films, like The Piano Teacher (Elfride Jelinek, 1983), Cronenburg ´s Crash
(J.G. Ballard, 1973), Requiem for a Dream (Hubert Selby, 1973), Wise Blood
(Flannery O’ Connor, 1952) - but quite a few were discoveries first made
through the films.
One of them was Fassbinder’s version of Berlin Alexanderplatz (named by

imdb.com as the “longest narrative ever made”) based on the novel by Alfred
Döblin from 1929. The experience of seeing this entire film work in a mara-
thon silver screen viewing is one of my strongest cinematic experiences ever.
From an adaptation point of view, I suppose Fassbinder decided he need-
ed the 931 minutes to fully adapt such a complex and innovative - visionary
- novel, and so that’s why it has that TV-ish format. But to me, it will always
be One Film (a masterpiece, actually); not in any way a serial product.
Also: I never knew Nostalghia (Tarkovskij, 1983) was co-written with Ton-
ino Guerra (what did he NOT write?) Suddenly that peculiarly kindred spirit
76
of L’Eclisse, La Notte, and L’Avventura surfaces, and it all makes sense: the
influence of this magnificent signature writer interflows into a film, which
I always felt was so “Tarkovskij”. But then of course, it is both Russian, and
Italian, as well.
Medea. This is another alluring case. The half-swede, half-dane Carl Th.
Dreyer (who, by the way, mainly adapted plays, novellas and novels for his
films) wrote and planned to make the film, but never did. Lars von Trier
filmed his script years later (1988), casting Udo Kier as Jason in the script
written by his genius predecessor/colleague, then dead since 20 years. This
Medea was - as they are - based on the play by Euripides (who for a guy
who’s been dead since 406 BC, gets a lot of film credits… some ten official
versions of Medea exist).
A note on the collaborative force, for me another form of Adaptation

- adapting to each other, to the material, to the ultimate goal of the di-
rector, to the group, to the situation etcetera. In one interview the “all
time adaptor” and woman, Suso Cecchi D´Amico uses an interesting word
for her working role. She is - so far, at the humble age of 94 - credited
with 117 films, like Rome Open City (with 4 others), The Bicycle Thief (with
5 others, based on the novel by Luigi Bartolini), Miracle in Milano (with 5
others, based on Zavattini’s novel), The Leopard (with 4 others, based on
Lampedusa’s novel), The Stranger (with 3 others, one being Visconti, based
on Camus’ novel), Rocco and his brothers (with 9 others, all men). She has
also worked with Derek Jarman, Antonioni, Moravia… and so on.
Anyway, she said in this interview that:

“My work has something of the Artisan in it. And that is something I like
very much. /--/ To understand what the director is interested in and what
he does best, and then to give him something that suits him. In the end
Visconti and I hardly talked at all about the project itself, because I knew
exactly what he wanted. For example when I wrote the Proust screenplay
for him, it was the easiest work I ever did, because we had talked about
Proust for so many years that I knew which were the scenes he wanted and
just what kind of picture he would like”.
So, again, the word Adaptation is open: in this case meaning almost
adapting to the mind of another.
My last ‘implant’ to the discussion is 24 Hour Psycho (1993) by Doug-

las Gordon, which is a drastic re-invention of an existing film into - if one
77
chooses to see it that way - an evolved form, into the art world (that has al-
ways loved and related to film). A slowed-down version of Hitchcock’s film
Psycho (1960), shown in the art space, screened indirectly through a mirror
reflection. (As a detail one can note that Psycho was based on the novel by
Robert Bloch and turned into a screenplay by Joseph Stefano, and then - as
is the custom - adapted by Hitchcock into this film).
So - looking at this simple example, there seems to be a limitless number

of adaptation levels and depths. The way Jeff suggest the critical and the
new media people discuss things is indeed highly relevant and inspiring, I
want to learn about it, Jeff!
And, dispatching this last as a submarine to perchance float up: moral

judgements/invisible censoring in adaptation:
In the Swedish film Let the Right One In (written by John Ajvide Lindqvist,
directed by Tomas Alfredsson, 2008), the paedophiliac element is elegantly
removed from the adapted film. It might make it better but: what - if any-
thing - can happen to the moral, social intent of a literary work, as it turns
into film?
Is this one reason why adaption is so exciting; that entirely new, deep
meanings can Appear, but also Disappear?
Antoine Le Bos:
Adapting Proust and a few other things.
When that subject (adaptation) was picked up to start this e-mail con-
versation, I thought that I couldn’t wake myself up on such a topic that I
felt was too theoretical. But the way Gino has started it is so opening and
refreshing that I’d like to add a few things (as somebody famous said, “we
like to add…”).
To take up on Gino’s comments from the last paragraph: on top of the

list of written materials or novels supposedly impossible to adapt for the
screen there is Marcel Proust’s Á la Recherche du Temps Perdu; because of
it’s obsession for details, because of it’s lack of clear dramaturgy, lack of
action, lack of clear human quests, fights and interactions, because of it’s
amazing dedication to the inside voice of the narrator, to his flow of very
intimate sensations. And there we have this amazing example of Raoul
Ruiz’ adaptation of Le Temps Retrouvé for the screen, with Deneuve, Mal-
78
kovich and others. When Ruiz asked Gilles Taurand to write the adaptation,
he only gave him a few months to deliver a shootable draft. Knowing how
huge the challenge was, how completely lost in Proust’s material a screen-
writer could be (Taurand explained how mad and deep his dive into Proust
has been), the short amount of time given to the writer is a clear sign of
Raoul Ruiz’s desire. He didn’t want to find a narrative “way” into Proust’s
novel. He didn’t want to find a trick to create a narrative engine in the too
rich material given by the novelist that would easily take the spectator to
the end of the movie.
The script he asked Taurand to write was just a way to get the charac-
ters moving properly on stage, to get some logic and dynamic connections
between elements like places, objects, facts and people, in order to avoid a
complete surrealistic experience like Bunuel’s Andalusian Dog (even if Ruiz
would probably have loved this kind of attempt, but his producer wouldn’t
have financed it!).
And here is another case for Gino’s list: adaptation that just asks to
organize a bit (and simplify) an initial material that is considered as be-
ing “too rich”. Ruiz probably only wanted a script in order to “play” with
Proust’s parameters once he was on the set. The script is there to make an
understandable list of Marcel’s very rich material, but the real purpose of
the director is to make things fly, to turn the spectators head and sensa-
tions, to invent new correspondences, resonances between people, facts,
places and objects. He invented the most amazing travelling of objects
we’ve ever seen on a screen. Not the camera turning around reality, but
the world of things turning around the camera, as if things and facts were
dancing around us with a life of their own. Here the adaptation clearly is
the occasion for the director to project his sensations and feelings about
the original novel (you cannot adapt Proust without trying to say some-
thing about him…), without caring that much about narration. In fact, in
this film, narration is very difficult to follow for the viewer who is not al-
ready close to Proust’s world. But the same viewer dives into a dizzying
world and has to forget logic and let the senses take over on brain, which
in a way can be considered as Proust’s signature, thus proving that Ruiz’
adaptation made it!
The question that arises here is: in such an extreme case, would we rec-
ommend (as story editors or script-consultants) to a young writer-director
to let narration down to such an extent? At first sight, I can say why not:
when you deal with a work as well-established, strong and acclaimed in the
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best society as Proust-novels, you can well decide to restructure the offi-
cial categories and leave the beast demolished. The recent (and sometimes
painful) history of art has been widely built on wiping out all pre-existing
constructions, so why not continue that pretty enjoyable game.
But when I look at it more carefully, I’m not that sure. First of all, why
continue to destroy, when so much has been wiped out already? Second of
all, Ruiz chooses as a writer one of the more gifted European screenwrit-
ers of that period. He clearly knows that when Taurand builds a story, he is
very conscious about how to use all the tricks that make a story go forward.
And even when Ruiz will destroy elements of that initial structure when
shooting or editing, there will still be some of that building energy in place.
Thirdly, the moment in time at which this film has been produced, the huge
power of the producer (Paulo Branco) in the French and European financing
system at that time, made it possible for such an extreme experience (high
budget and lack of understandable narration) to be produced. We all know
that this has become very different these days, apart maybe for acclaimed
directors that can attract the public in movie theatres to share very odd
experiences (but even David Lynch is in trouble when his narration becomes
weaker, look at Inland Empire…). I thus consider that working as much as
possible to assist (and insist) a young writer on building a dramaturgical
coherence and strength with his own material is the only way to help im-
aginary worlds of tomorrow and unusual ways to look at today’s societies
to be delivered to the public.
PS: Maybe for further conversations…
This gives me a good launching pad to jump to a subject that I’d love to
debate with you (huge jump, sorry!): as screenwriting coaches, we often see
young screenwriters try to avoid by any means to use dramaturgic devices
to develop their script. Can we let them drive into the wall full speed, in or-
der for instance that after five to ten years of crashing into the walls; they
realize that drama structure is just a way to link the spectator to their work,
emotions and feelings? For the talented, our job would then be to make
them crash as quickly as possible so that they accept to work properly on
their writing craft (or find co-writers…). Or is it possible to help them find
the right track as quickly as possible, as if they had no time? The answer
is probably somewhere in between, and clearly depends on the personality,
mind and abilities of the writer.
But what strikes me is how we mostly try to work on this with our minds
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and voices, whereas the core lies in our stomachs and emotions. A few
years ago, I dealt with a workshop that was involving both young actors
and young writers. I chose to create exercises that were linking the type
of processes you use with actors to better the potential power of a scene
and writing exercises (writing scenes from situations found in the nearby
street). The immediate lesson that the writers took from the acting work
was obvious: if there is no conflict or strong desire for something (no ob-
jective or “motivation” for the main characters), the actors weren’t able
to find anything convincing. The actors had in a way to transform them-
selves into “animals” looking for conflict, trouble or desire, thus inventing
the “engine” that would provide them enough electricity in the blood to do
their job properly. And the writers discovered that if they wanted to give
the actors the right material, they had to be (like actors!) hunting for con-
flict, hunting for words that hurt, for not confessed desires, or for the worst
fears. If they didn’t want to completely loose the control over their script
when it was in the hands of actors, they just had no choice!
Jeff Rush:
Hi All,
We’re all still in a post-Obama glow over here, although given how bad
the world looks since, he will need to work magic. Speaking of which leads
me to think about another form of adaption - adaptation of history (and
wizards); particularly in light of Franz’s discussion about Harry Potter. He
talked about his love of the books (I love them too) and how he dreaded
seeing the adaptations. I’m wondering how adaptations have different
effects on us when we love/hate the original. And also, how our feelings
about adaptations may change when our feelings about the original chang-
es, a kind of extension of the film into day-to-day life that doesn’t happen
in the same way with original scripts.
What started me on this was the question of seeing Oliver Stone’s W.

In the run-up to the election, no one would see it because of the fear that
if Obama lost, the film would continue to represent our future (or close
enough). It wasn’t that we thought the film represented the “truth”, but
rather that we were afraid we would be haunted by its images, which corre-
sponded with our fears. We would not be able to get them out of our minds.
Now that it is over, the movie seems a goof and I put it on my Netflix list.
It can’t hurt me anymore.
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Or take Hotel Rwanda. I thought I knew enough to recognize all the story
tricks that were used to make the film watchable, especially the focus on
the internal life of the main character played by Don Cheadle (who I’d watch
in anything). I thought I could imagine beyond the film the reality that
was Rwanda. But I didn’t realize the extent to which I had been taken in.
A few weeks ago, I saw the Austrian documentary-maker Hubert Sauper’s
Kisangani Diary, a brutal railway trip into Zaire, where UN troops discover
thousands of Rwandan refugees. What struck me most was the imperson-
ality of the documentary footage. How casually the bodies are handled,
how indifferent the camera feels when it records a row of dead babies,
how the emptiness of the human husk overcomes any other point of view.
The notion of a story defeats the possibility of seeing that. But I also re-
alize that while I accepted the impersonality in a doc, I would not accept
it in fiction.
One of the better pieces to come out of 9/11 was Paul Greengrass’ United
93. What’s good about it is that it does not only focus on one or two char-
acters, and it does not give you anything about them beyond how they act
on that morning. This gives the film a sense of historical weight because
our focus is directed to the event and not to the individuals. On the other
hand, what is missing from the film is a perspective, a sense of the mean-
ing of the event, as interpreted through the characters. It is a conundrum
particular to this form of adaptation. The weight of the historic adaptation
seems to require a distance that destroys narrative involvement. I wish I
knew how to solve it.
I’m done with adaptation. I wonder if it is not time to move our discus-
sion to the next topic. One new topic might be the issue that Antoine raised
- the question of do we teach/think of scripts in terms of the organization
we know ahead of time or do we let our students/writers discover as they
go. I just read a piece by the English novelist Zadie Smith called Two Paths
for the Novel (available at http://www.nybooks.com/articles/22083) which
I associate with this question. She considers what she calls “lyric realism”
which she compares to more ambitious narrative, and asks whether the
ambitious narrative doesn’t speak more cogently to our time (even though
the lyric realism sells better). I wonder whether leading our students/writ-
ers to certain organizations that we know ahead of time doesn’t reproduce
the limitations of this lyric realism.
PS: I almost forgot Proust. I really appreciated Antoine’s discussion of Temps

Retrouve, a film I had never heard of. Watching the film, which I liked a great
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deal, I wondered if we should not also add a category of adaptation that

only works narratively when considered as mediation on an existing work
that the viewer already knows. As Antoine says, I can’t imagine what sense
the film would make if you did not know the world of the books. However,
as almost a series of variations on Proust’s work, it is wonderful (particularly
John Malkovich as the Baron de Charlus).
Ruiz’s film leads me to Chantal Akerman and Eric De Kuyer’s La Captive,

another Proust-inspired screenplay. The film is narratively coherent even
without knowing Proust, but American critics found it cold and inhuman.
However, I found it quite powerful, particularly in its sexual representation.
The writers find a masturbatory sexuality in the fictional Marcel that I had
never quite imagined in the book, but that adds a layer of isolation to him
that I hadn’t before thought about. However, the film ultimately requires
the same knowledge of the character from the book. Without the ability to
imagine the character’s vacillating thoughts about Albertine, the American
critics are probably right - the film remains cold and flat
Gino Ventriglia:
I find that every conversation on adaptation has a sort of ‘natural’ ten-

dency to quickly become much wider than the starting point meant to be.
It’s a fact. Not only because any process of re-mediation (as defined by
Bolter and Grusin: that is, of transforming a text conceived for a medium
into the text usable for another medium) has to do with the ‘correct’ and
‘appropriate’ translation of the original text into the new language, which
might seem ‘only’ a problem of technical mastering of two languages (the
source’s language, for example the written pages of a novel, and the lan-
guage of destination, say the written pages of a script, or the audiovisual
sequences of a film). In fact, the technical mastering of the different lan-
guages is just the final skill that is necessary to give shape and style to a
series of choices that have been made before.

In Mario Lavagetto’s famous essay, Stanza 43, he mentions one episode
that happened in real life to Marcel Proust and a friend of his, Reynaldo
Hahn: during a walk in a country garden, the writer stopped in front of a
bush of Bengala roses. He asked his friend to leave him alone for a while.
His friend went on walking on his own, and, after a certain time, he re-
turned to the same spot to find Marcel still standing in front of the roses,
staring at them. The episode - and variations of it - has been told a number
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of times, even by Proust himself: it has been taken into consideration by

different commentators because it is found to be particularly meaningful
to define the peculiar perception and glance that Proust has on the sur-
roundings, especially on the objects, which is crucial to understanding his
works of art, as Antoine’s observations point out. Surprisingly, the simple
episode has raised different interpretations: on one side Ernst Robert Cur-
tius reads it as a classical contemplation, as the process by which Proust
‘absorbs’ the appearances (Aufsagen der Erscheinungen), he appropriates
the world. On another side, Jean Paul Sartre denies the possibility of know-
ing by ‘eating’ the object, the roses stay there, in their ‘otherness’ that
cannot be ‘digested’ and become contents of conscience; knowing is more
like ‘exploding oneself’ towards what is out there. Giacomo Debenedetti
reads the same episode in another way: not so much as Proust looking for
the essence of the roses, on the contrary, Proust ‘exposing himself ‘ to be
looked for ‘by the roses’, abandoning himself to be tempted and seduced by
the essence of those roses.
We are here in front of different, in a way diverging, interpretations

of the same ‘scene’ (and conceptions of the processes of perception and
knowledge): in one it is the ‘movement’ of a person toward the object in
order to grab its inner secret, in the other the co-presence of entities irre-
ducible of one to the other, in the third the ‘opening’ of that same person
to the object in order to be affected - and modified - by it.
If this were a scene of a script to translate into images with all its im-
plied meanings, the author should make the choice to go with either one
interpretation - or propose a fourth one - since ‘a man standing in front of
a bush of roses’ doesn’t really say more than that. So, the author would
be called to find, in terms of cinematic language, the proper techniques -
the ‘comparable techniques’ mentioned by Franz in his intervention - to
express one of the possible meanings of that scene, given that we want to
focus on the way Proust’s perception worked, and not just on the fact that
a man walks in a garden and stops in front of a bush of roses. It is clear
that each interpretation has a radically different set of image sequences to
properly correspond to the selected sense.
Whatever the final rendering of the ‘scene’ is, a huge amount of inter-
pretation of the text has been done to get the right meanings of the origi-
nal material, on many different levels, and that effort is just the first step
to determine the following adaptation choices. The process doesn’t stop
there, because if the interpretation of the original text is indispensable in
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order to understand materials and intentions of the original author, a new

set of choices is now necessary to define the criteria of the adaptation it-
self. And that implies the intentions of the adaptation writer: given that
he/she has studied the original text and interpreted it, what are his/her
intentions to be expressed in the new text? In other words, what is the
‘use’ that the author of the adaptation wants to make of both - the original
materials and the chosen interpretation?
The many issues connected to the fidelity to the original source and its
author’s intentions find their limits in the interpretation that the adapta-
tion author prefers and the use that he/she wants to make of it. In his
Saying almost the same thing, a composite essay on translation, Umberto
Eco points out the differences between Thomas Mann’s Death in Venice
and its filmic adaptation, Luchino Visconti’s Death in Venice. In the latter,
the choice is made to change Gustav Aschenbach’s profession, a 50 year
old scholar of art and history in the novel, characterized by his neoclassic
love for the perfection of the form (in a way, a critical - or ironic - treat-
ment of the ‘winkelmannian aesthete’), to a musician - fond of Mahler - in
the film. That change is read as the symptom of a strong divergence in the
themes - the intentions - that the two authors, Mann and Visconti, aim to
express. The literary pages tell the story of Aschenbach’s shocking discov-
ery that his admiration for Tadzio, a 14 year old boy, at first observed as a
classical piece of art - a statue - for the perfection of his shape, is stirring
in his mind and body an erotic passion; he finds death because it is his pla-
tonic sense of algid beauty that falls apart in the face of a very earthly lust
(it is Apollo who is defeated by Dionysus). In Visconti’s version, Aschen-
bach is already a decadent musician who fits well in Venice, where the
plague has spread. And the process of falling into a carnal passion is not
all in Aschenbach’s mind: in the novel, the innocent Tadzio looks at him
a few times and smiles at him once, whereas in the movie Aschenbach
falls at first sight and the boy, the actor is a little older than 14, is at least
ambiguous in his interaction with the musician. So, what is missed are
the original intentions of Mann’s work, the hard fall of an idealistic belief
crashed by the power and liveliness of carnal passion: in Visconti’s work, it
becomes a sort of agony, because he suffers since the beginning - he feels
guilty toward his family and, above all, he has never been touched before
by the myth of male beauty.
In this case, it’s hard to believe that Visconti was not aware of the new
and different implications of his adaptation: his culture was too refined
and deep to question his ability to properly interpret Mann’s intentions in
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his novel. Visconti just used the original text, and bent it to his own inten-
tions: on a superficial level, most of the original materials are kept - with
the exception of Aschenbach’s profession, and, partly, the age of the pro-
tagonists - but reorganized on a deeper level to tell his own story, to express
the intentions and the theme that he wanted to show. That means that the
two Death in Venice, are two artistic pieces of art, very strictly connected,
and yet to be considered, in a way, entirely independent of each other.
The considerations developed here maybe explain the fact that when we
talk about adaptation, we are playing with an ‘equation’ with multiple and
difficult solutions: the variables are many - the interpretation of the origi-
nal material, the intentions the authors want to express in their adapta-
tion, the final transmutation (a term that recalls alchemic processes) from
one language system to another, and the realization of it. And moreover,
these paradigms are to be crossed with the personal tastes and ‘encyclope-
dia’ that the authors of the adaptation possess.
On paper, the work on an adaptation may seem easier: the fictional world
is already there, built and furnished, it’s just a matter of choosing the right
pieces we want to bring with us into the new universe. But one soon real-
izes that the operation of removal raises major questions that are at the
core of any narrative form. And working with scriptwriters, as coaches on
adaptations requires us to lead the journey through a more complex and
intricate path. Which may well be the topic of our next conversation.
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ABOUT SCRIPT
EDITING
by Tutors and Alumni
Life-Like: The Schizophrenia of the Limitless Possibilities
Life-Like:
The Schizophrenia of the Limitless Possibilities
- A four year old could do this.

- So bring me a four year old
Groucho Marx
- I know everything.
Julius, 4
Script Editor? Script doctor, coach, advisor, consultant?

Really? So what do you do?
When trying to answer this at dinner party level, there are follow-up ques-
tions; sometimes out of pure curiosity, sometimes out of slight suspicion.
The friendly alternative would be:
“How does what you do relate to lets say:

- A curator in art?
- An editor in publishing?
- A dramaturge in the theatre?
- A lawyer with their client?”
Does it relate at all?”
It does and it does not, I would say.
But perhaps it actually (if anything) relates to the work that goes on
in psychology-related therapy-sessions, and the long-term process this
would imply.
Or, rather than “fixing things and healing”, it might even be a form of
“evil doctoring”, that disturbs, unleashes, discovers and unearths, one that
brings pleasure through pain (or even pain through pleasure).
In television drama, script editing usually means (in my experience) re-
writing someone else’s (dysfunctional, sloppy) work so it fits into the agenda
89
of the broadcaster and that specific feel needed for that specific product.
But a script editor - or script consultant - for feature films is quite a dif-
ferent story. There is no executive rewriting whatsoever is going on.
Let’s continue to define by the negatives, about what we are not:
We are not teachers. We are not co-writers (unless we are co-writers).
But we are creatures that writers (I know from my own experience as a
writer), often feel a desperate need for.
This creature is not the director, with whom you can have a most amaz-
ing and extremely fruitful dialogue and discovery process. (Actually you can
have this with the director, even if the director happens to be you).
This creature is not the producer, who can also - if the writer is lucky (or
rather: if the producer her- or himself is lucky) - be full of brainpower and
sensitivity.
No, this creature, the script consultant, is a weird hybrid. It is an artistic
flying partner to the writer’s soul. This creature has voluntarily spent most
of its time gathering knowledge and input that will be of use to the writer
(/director) and her/his art.
The script consultant is the secret collaborator, infiltrator - crucial at

pushing issues that need to be addressed (again and again with tireless
perseverance) and who wants, just like the pre-audience it truly is, to be
seduced, overturned, shocked and mesmerized beyond hitherto unknown
grounds. Or at least not bored, which is already a lot to ask for.
It is someone who can search out the identifiable character moments
and the functioning/dysfunctional emotional elements, the plot points,
the gripping events. In my work as a consultant I turn into a homing pigeon:
where is the identification? Emotion? Anger? Distortion? Logic?
And all this, while there is still a chance to make it all stronger, more in-
fluential, coherent, more funny and daring: before big unnecessary money
starts to roll. (By the way, when I say the script, I sometimes mean the
idea, sometimes the fully written story or sometimes the actual film as it
becomes, which of course is when we are past the development phase.)
To quote a commissioning executive: “Development is cheap”. But the
work we do is not cheap - it is very valuable and precious.
Screenwriting - of course - is an expression all of its own, having to

its advantage that it is not poetry, not literature and not journalism; it is
something entirely of its own, and can therefore be approached as such.
It is a to-be-film, a blueprint of drawings that will become the actual
“be-ing”. The writing does not have to be pleasing, skilful, first-rate or
90
beautiful (but it most certainly can be! And sometimes is!) What it has to
do though, is to communicate its intentions to those who will commit to
make the film, in all steps of the process
The script consultant - to my mind - will try to help in this process. By lis-
tening, channelling and exploring. Friedrich Jürgenson, one of the pioneers
in contacting and electronically recording “the other side” (the so called
dead people), used his polyglot experience to hear what he realised was
there. He was a “hyper cultured madman” who used his knowledge of ten
languages to intently listen for messages from the dead, and to interpret
them to those of us less so gifted.
In the same way, the script in all its forms is speaking to its “side-soul”,
wanting to show itself, and at that same moment it begins to make de-
mands on me, the living, the receiver. I, as a script advisor must approach it
with all languages at hand.
The story demands things from me - through the inbuilt dramatic “indi-
cations” (avoiding the crippling word “rules”…), explored through centuries
of human emotion. It demands:
- Structure - when, what, why
- Theme - the all around God; why are we here, what is the meaning, what for?
- Discipline - how, to what extent, with what, why?
- Order and chronology - to whom, why, with who, when, place in time
- Rhythm - flow, energy, variation, impact
- Timing - when does it occur?
- Urgency - there is no other way, it must happen, it must be
- Details - meaning, surface, depth, hidden, open, difference
- Gravity - where is it attached, how does it stand, where are the bearings,
where does air come in, will it hold?
- Realness - deep human research (mental, physical, archive, psychologi-
cal, historical, poetical)
- Expression - irony, humour, reference, memory, details
- Innovation - building on context, entering new territories, rules versus
freedom
Why am I, the script consultant there? To improve something? To break

through to the innermost of the hearts of the stories? To make them richer,
fuller, harder, more charged? Hopefully. I try - aided by the mother of wis-
dom: necessity - to help crack through the crust of pain and fear, in a trust-
ful way, so that flaws in the human condition can be shifted into pleasure
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and raw beauty; into a film worth seeing, and a film that can express the
filmmakers intention and emotional “brain”.
How to “help” writers, without loading onto her/him stale and inhibiting
tools? Honestly, I’ve been not-helped by a large number of people in my
writing situation: misunderstood - mislead - misguided.
How to avoid being one of those mis-consultants?
I strive for “non formula”: the living story, the life force, the relation-
ships, flow, events, webs, circles, control, spirituality, movement, dream,
emotion, structure and impact. As grateful as I should be to all those that
I’ve learned from, I feel that my investment toward instinct and logic,
meaning and invention is best rewarded.
Working with stories must never be routine.

Must never be convenient.
Must always be new, challenging.
Must be born out of immense curiosity; curiosity bordering on perver-
sion: patiently (having many children trains your patience…) extracting
from the writer: “How do you see it? Where does it come from? How did it
make you feel? How could it happen? What do you want to do with it?”
The details, the specifics, the personal imprints: “Listen to what I have
to say. I’m not saying it yet, but if you wait I might. Be prepared, wait, be
open. Listen. Don’t judge what I am about to say, because you really have
no idea about it yet, so you can’t know anything”.
Entering into new zones, exploring them, accepting the conditions, as

alien or foreign, as it all may seem at first. Allowing and welcoming that
there are hugely varied circumstances and personalities among us, and
that maybe it can somehow be brought to communicate meaningful artis-
tic and human experiences on film.
I have it all. All the things I have experienced -

I have everything still in my head; it gets just more and more. Memories
are the map.
I know everything.
Julius, 4 years old
I remember thinking as a kid: how stupid, when they explained to me
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about Buster Keaton falling over: “Do you know how good you have to be,
to look so bad?” How the simple - allegedly - is very hard to achieve.
As a child of course one finds this ridiculous. At 4 or 5 you know every-

thing. You master the universe and why would you have to pretend you are
bad? If you want to do it badly, you just do it badly - it’s easy. If you want
to do it well, you decide that’s what you do.
As a grown up, or “adult”, one must increasingly fight for, strive for, this
natural superiority of pretending not to know anything, not having any pre-
conceived notions, of being able to fall over well. (The artist Pipilotti Rist
made a filmed multi-piece in which she collapses and “dies” in parking lots,
parks and streets all around the world. I was impressed with her capacity
to do what (mostly) only children can do: just go for it. Try collapsing in the
street just because you tell your brain to do it. Anyway.)
So then: if I am lucky, I have become a Keaton type of character who

spent 25 years training to fall over (“badly”) in a believable way; someone
who painstakingly can overthrow the learned to make it seem unlearned.
To make professional script consulting seem simple, flow-like, stoned, im-
pulsive, and natural: child-like.
So is what am I really saying: “Be a child in the writing room”?

Well, this is such a hypothetical question - so let’s just avoid that
thought. The world would be an entirely different place if we were able to
transform. And we are for the most part unable.
As adults, we are (as a rule) far away from that childish original creator’s
channel. We must make do with what we have learned, and try very hard to
protect that thin dying streak of creativity within ourselves, that allows us
to have insightful ideas that inspire us in the moment; that creativity which
can suggest, propose, inspire. We must make do with trying to combine all
that we’ve learned and experienced, into a concoction of “stringent” and
slimmed down version of Creativity.
Children already have the thing we must make up for, when we’re try-
ing to dissolve our learned experience and to free our spirits: they have
deep imagination. They know everything. They can tell you anything, make
anything happen, they have no limits, no structural problems. The 3-6
year old runs the innumerable possibilities and options through the brain.
Anything is possible, explorable. But. Maybe the seeds of our imaginations
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are still in there, and we just need to tap into it, and re-learn from it...
With deep imagination I here mean the ability to enter (fully) into some-
one else’s world, into their dreams, thoughts and their logic. Children know
- instinctively - how to identify, and they know how to create distance to
what happens, to see it from all angles, to change point of view. If I can do
anything even near this as a script consultant, then I think I’m worthy of
that professional title.
The difference, of course, in being adults, is that we feel superior to chil-

dren in having our pasts, our growing-up perspective - that we know stuff,
like the pains of being heartbroken, of loosing someone tragically, of being
abused, maltreated or abandoned; and (possibly, hopefully) we have expe-
rienced great relief, joy and true passion. This is all useful material in the
script development room.
(Although I would argue that children’s intuitive senses are so strong
that they can sense this without having experienced it yet themselves.
That they play out and think out all this beforehand, preparing themselves
for the real McCoy. (Mimesis, anybody?) When you hear children play they
are - as a matter of fact - often more uncompromising and hardcore, real -
than us adults.)
But. It is still in this human experience (and the “refinement” of it) where
we adults can research around and be guided to grasp and understand -
where we can turn into Drama, all that pain (and yes, all that laughter…)
that we have been put through so far.
I find myself more and more drawn to the land of “classical” themes:
redemption, destiny, guilt, greed, jealousy, fate… as we strive once again
for the stories we work with to become more realistic and true to our “mod-
ern” times. Alienation, loneliness, solitude is as eternal a thing as heritage
or revenge.
Finding the structural ways to differentiate the effects, to take control

of how the story is told for supreme achievement and reaction is some-
times very hard work - and I don’t believe set formulas ever really work.
(I do agree with Paul Schrader when he talks about testing your stories
verbally by watching the way people leave you alone or follow you wherever
you go, to hear more); and: the pieces of story, the way the events unfold,
the emotional impact it has - these are areas, which are all approachable
in a session.
Understanding what the story/the film can be, finding out how to get
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there, building the trust and the confidence to actually do it. Making it be-
come that which no one knows it can be!
It is not hocus-pocus, though it’s certainly dealing with secret inspira-

tion, opening up the senses to the unknown and to the underlying chemistry
that must be allowed to bubble up. The second you enter the development
room there must be focus, a concentration - I hesitate to say “performance”,
but if the session has worked well, a post-adrenaline fatigue is felt. Thus I
understand that somehow there’s an element of performance involved. It
is like having been to a special place.
(What to name that sudden unreal moment in a session when the prob-
lem “solves” itself - how to describe the poetry and surprise when this feel-
ing takes over the room - oh man, there it is, the solution, the light, the
way to go! We know it, we recognize it, it makes sense, and it is storytelling
logic, as we have defined it there and then in that room. Group-dynamic
magic? Divine intervention? Or just plain ol’ hard work…? It is, for sure, a
form of spiritual wavelength insight).
As a script consultant, to be confused or weak between the two principal

players - the script and the creator of the script - is not a useful idea. Your
loyalty as a script consultant is only, must only be, with the script. I must
be able to take position. Sometimes the script, the story, demands for me
to be “opposite” the writer. My job is to make the script do what the writer
deep down wants it to do. “It isn’t good because you like it, and it isn’t bad
because you don’t”. Liking has nothing to do with it, really, in the process.
As a script consultant I act out of a combination of many years of using and
studying traditional structures, and out of the implanted DNA of storytell-
ing principles. I have disciplined and trained myself in order to create a path
towards the use of deep intuition.
Even if sometimes the writer “disagrees” with her/his own script, I have
to ensure that the script stands on its own merits, and then focus on creat-
ing a story that moves from paper onto film, and into the hearts of humans.
Helping the writer to bring out the things that she/he doesn’t even know are
dying to come out - and even some that they may not want to come out.
Orhan Pamuk says about Albert Camus that the writer’s “metaphysi-
cal prose ushers the reader into a mysterious landscape that we long to
understand: to see it take on meaning is to know that literature has - like
life - limitless possibilities”. And further:
“We are attached to a writer not just because he ushered us into a world
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that continues to haunt us, but because he has made us who we are”.
Maybe to a certain extent developing scripts (films) lives in this beauti-

ful and simple idea: Films make us/made us who we are.
What I know and feel (about scripts and films) has grown out of reading
scripts and watching films. So what I feed back into filmmaking, is what
scripts and films have given to me; and, of course, having said this, what
has not contributed to film making? Art, theatre, performance, literature,
architecture, technology, music, and science: Everything!
So. A crucial part of the system of Screenwriting is the films themselves:

Not only those films just made (or being made), but also, naturally, those
made by timeless and brave pioneers, and those films that we haven’t
even seen yet, the films that are being written now! Constant gathering of
knowledge via the films, the scripts and the ideas behind is what shows us
the way. I’d like to stay “confused” and open, in this focused search for the
limitless possibilities.
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Working with a Script Editor - from Killers to Fairy Godmothers
Working with a Script Editor

- from Killers to Fairy Godmothers
by Jenni Toivoniemi (S&P Alumni)
I recently discussed script editing with a producer at a cocktail party. The

young and confident producer told me that he just didn’t get it, why do I
want to work with a script editor? “Don’t you trust yourself?” he asked. I
have also been asked if the script editor is the second (or the third in that
case) screenwriter of the script. One producer described the script editor as
“a person who is called upon just before the shooting because financiers
are not happy with the script”.
In spite of some discouraging experiences in my short career as a script-

writer, I have a profound belief that in the process of writing a film, a quali-
fied script editor helps me to write a better script. I also think it is a good
idea financially for the producer. Still, a bad script editor with too much
power in the process is likely to help destroy the whole project.
Script editing is a fairly new position in the (Finnish) film industry and
there are a lot of misunderstandings and different ideas about what it
is the script editor does and how that benefits the film. I have heard of
some script editors (with different titles, but let’s use the term ‘editor’
for all those people who, sometimes, are paid to help the writer write the
script) being called “the killers”. They are the persons who often come to
a project quite late, probably when time is running out and the writer has
been struggling on her own for a long time and nobody is satisfied with the
result. Enter the magical script editor (often called “doctor”) to the rescue
and in just a few weeks s/he “polishes” the script, weeds out all irregulari-
ties and - let’s shoot.
The end result is often “right” looking from the outside, but lacks an in-
ner cohesion or worse - a meaning. The poor script editors are not the only
ones to blame in these situations - usually there have been problems in
the whole process. It might be that the director, writer and producer are not
97
making the same film, although they think they are, and it is sold to finan-
ciers as such. In those cases the position of the script editor can indeed be
very unpleasant. But that is a whole other story of it’s own.
Now I am trying to see, if there are some basic rules or codes of ethics
that could be used in the process of developing a script with a script edi-
tor. My point of view is simply based on my own practical experiences as a
young writer in the beginning of my career. I think that by researching the
process of professional script writing and editing we can also learn a lot
about how to teach (or at least how not to teach) this difficult craft. For
most of us, the first experiences of script editing come during student film
making from different teachers in film schools and courses. I am not trying
to make declarations here, but to take a part in an ongoing discussion I find
very important to keep flowing.
I First experiences on editing - film schools and courses
Scriptwriters usually either attend film school or take some courses in

scriptwriting. The quality of education varies greatly. My education con-
sists of theoretical university studies of film, theatre and literature on BA
level and several scriptwriting courses for professionals. The first experi-
ences on script editing came from the teachers at those courses, profes-
sional scriptwriters or - as called in Finland - dramatists.
I was lucky because my first teacher, in an intensive six-month screen-

writing course I took in the nineties, was a good, gentle teacher. When I
had no idea what I was doing and had a desperate need to be good at it,
she was just what I needed - she helped me to write with just my intuition.
Sure, she taught me the basics and the theory too, but I remember her
mostly from being very encouraging and supportive - just what a 20-year
old insecure girl needed.
Later, after university, when I went back to screenwriting, I learned to

really appreciate my first teacher. After a year in a screenwriting course my
writing was completely blocked. The treatment I had worked on for months
was a mess - an interesting mess, but a mess - and I had no idea what I was
supposed to do with it. If I compared the “story” I had, it was much weaker
than any of the writing I had done years before. Intuitively I knew how to
write a story, but when all the theory and analyzing came in, it all disap-
peared. I felt very insecure and anxious.
98
How did I get there? The course consisted of a few weekend workshops
with high profile Finnish scriptwriters who came in to share their ideas of
what scriptwriting is. Along with that we were developing our own scripts
with the help of an experienced dramatist - or script editor, if we want
to call him that. Taking this course you could have easily misunderstood
that in order to write a script you first invent the basic plot points and
structure and then fill out the rest. I just knew that you couldn’t have
the structure before you had the material, but that was not explained
and I started to feel trapped. At the intensive group development ses-
sions things got worse. Even though the script editor was intelligent and
had a lot of knowledge, I didn’t see the connection between theory and
practice. His method was to talk philosophically about the themes of the
scripts, recommending some reading on philosophy and when it got to
the actual script he would start to suggest wild turning points and events
that had nothing to do with the story. Or at least I didn’t see the con-
nection. I got more and more confused. I could see that my story lacked
structure and the script editor had a point in what he said. The events he
suggested to add to my script were more dynamic than mine, but seemed
completely artificial from the point of view of the story. I started to lose
contact with what I wanted to tell and if I really wanted to tell anything
at all. After months of frustration I was left with this strange mixture
that combined everything - I had gotten so confused that I tried to keep
anything anyone had said they liked. Somewhere, I had secretly tried to
keep the story I wanted to tell alive. This is not the end of the story, be-
cause later I entered the professional world with my idea, but more about
that later.
II Experiences in other media - are there similarities?
I have aimed at film from the very beginning, but I am a writer and I write
for several media. This is why I see the relationship of a screenwriter and
a script editor in a wider context. It resembles the relationship between a
journalist and her editor at the magazine or an author and her publishing
editor at the book publishing company. Those are occupations often mis-
understood too, but at least in Finland they are by now well recognized:
good editors are well paid and wanted staff.
When I write an article for a magazine I always work with an editor.

A good editor helps me to write a better article with my own personal writ-
ing style. They simply help to find the structure to best serve the content.
99
It is always a pleasure to work with a good editor, because they always

make your writing better.
This fall I attended a workshop with the Pulitzer Prize-winning journal-

ist Jacqui Banaszynski who said: “The better you get, the more you need a
good editor”.
She said she never works without an editor. If a quality editor is not avail-
able through the magazine, she uses her own network of contacts. Her in-
spiring workshop gave me some new tools for understanding and improving
my writing process. I found the six step list she used to describe the process
useful and I am going to share it here, because it helps me to explain the
places where editing takes place. I also think that the writing process is not
that different when you write fiction scripts. Different lecturers on writing
have used a concept of six (or more or less) steps and I have come across it
earlier as well, so here is what I got out of Jacqui Banaszynski’s lecture - with
some notions of my own:
1. Conceive - the idea and testing of the idea.

Writing an article starts with the editor ordering an article on a certain
topic or the journalist suggesting an article on a topic of her own. Then
the writer and the editor discuss the idea. It depends on the editor and the
case how many limitations are given for the author. Always - as a mini-
mum - the amount of characters and the fee are limited. A good editor
gives enough to work with, but doesn’t limit the journalist too much - a
writer needs enough freedom to be able to write a personal article. This is
the first time you ask the fundamental questions - what do I really want
to find out and which point of view will I use? The time spent on the first
step helps enormously in the second step.
2. Collect - reporting the research, interviews etc.

The second step, the so-called field work, reveals if the original idea really
works or not. The writer needs to know what she is looking for, but she has
to be able to change the concept if the reality does not back it up.
3. Focus - finding the primary mission

When all the research is done, the writer needs to go back to the funda-
mental questions. The writer needs time to digest the material and it is
often fruitful to discuss with the editor at this point and check if some-
thing has to be changed in the original topic. Again, there are no short cuts
from this step. Writers need to spend time with this step; otherwise the
next steps will become painful.
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4. Organizing the material

After defining the focus the organization of the material starts - what is
needed for the article and what can be left out. When the writer knows
the material and what will be used, writing of the first draft can begin.
5. Draft - writing the first draft

While writing the first draft, the writer should be able to forget the
inner editor and let the text flow. That’s why notebooks and material
may better stay closed at this point.
6. Revise - rewriting
When the first draft is finished the editor comes in again and comments
the draft - writes in questions and suggestions. After which, the writer
goes back and writes the second draft, sometimes a third.
This all sounds very simple, but in reality it is not. I think many writers try
to jump ahead of one or more of these steps, at least that is what I have done.
It is easy to get lost in collecting the material if you haven’t spent enough
time with the first step. And you get really stuck when you try to write the
first draft before you have spent time focusing and organising your material.
And sometimes it just doesn’t work.
Sometimes the editing process ends up with you getting your article
back as something you don’t want to put your name on anymore. Then
you re-write it and work with the editor, both of you are trying to make
compromises and the result is usually something that neither of you is
very pleased with. There are several things causing this unfortunate re-
sult: the lack of respect, time, experience, talent or all of these. Some-
times the problem seems to be, that the editor, usually originally a writer
herself, maybe wants to be the author of the article. Maybe she is frus-
trated with her busy schedule and not having time to write herself. Not
recognising her need, she starts writing your article. Never a good idea.
I don’t have any personal experience working with a book editor, but I
have interviewed some in research I was working on1 and I also have sev-
eral friends in the book publishing industry. My understanding is that the
role of the publishing editor is similar, but due to the nature of the work,
often more delicate.
1
Culture-Biz http://www.finnekvit.org/projects.html
101
III Back to films – protecting the creative process
Now, when we go to the world of film, we end up in a much more com-

plex situation. When you write articles pretty much everybody’s com-
ments are relevant - at least every possible reader’s comments. You find
out what is written in too complicated a way and when they lose interest.
But when it comes to scriptwriting, the synopsis, treatments and drafts
are not something that everybody knows how to read. In my experience
very few people do, actually. It does not mean that all kinds of comments
could not be useful, but it means that you need to learn to interpret the
comments and not take them literally. Also, it is very difficult to get fi-
nanced during the firsts phases (or steps) of the writing process - so you
are usually pushed to write a draft too soon.
Because filmmaking is teamwork there are always several people com-

menting the script. The people who have power over the script and who
you have to listen to are at least the producer, the director and several
financiers. Sometimes one, or several of these people work - or think that
they work - as a script editor. The co-operation between the scriptwriter
and director is of course crucial. There is no point in writing anything that
the director doesn’t believe in. It still doesn’t mean that a good director is
necessarily a skilful script editor.
The role of the creative producer is a topic of it’s own - but as I see it -
the producer has to choose to work with people s/he believes are talented,
choose a project s/he believes in, and then create the conditions under which
the project can get realised to it’s full potential. This includes protecting the
scriptwriter and the project during the long and exhausting financing proc-
ess, which usually happens at the same time as the writing takes place.
One of the things that the producer can do is to hire a good script editor.
A skilful script editor can sometimes also be a good mediator for the film
on negotiations with financiers - when the writer, director and producer
are often already too involved to see clearly.
And so we are back to the question: what is it actually, that makes the
script editor good or less good? Are there any rules?
Let’s go back to the script I was writing on the film course, the one that
got completely tangled up. Some time later I was happy to get to know
a talented script editor through a friend and this editor did me a favour
102
and commented on my script. It was an hour in a coffee shop and it was a

liberating and wonderful experience. He saw all the material and potential
there and tried to follow the different stories that it might contain and
gently tried to find out what it was that I originally wanted to tell.
The first twenty minutes we discussed one story and then I, almost
accidentally, mentioned a minor sentence in the script, how “that was ac-
tually what I was trying to do in the first place”. Immediately the editor
turned his point of view and said I should forget everything we had talked
about before. And then we discussed the material from another angle. Af-
ter that I was able to write a treatment that made some sense. A producer
and a director got interested and with the help of the script editor (that I
convinced the producer to hire) I was able to write a quality first draft of
the one-hour script in just four weeks.
What did he do differently?
First of all, he wanted to find out what I was trying to do, not to tell
me what he thought I should do. He didn’t force his opinions on what was
interesting in the themes, which of the possible themes the material pro-
vided that I should pick. He just pushed me to understand what it was that
spoke to me in the characters and the story. When he felt he knew what I
was trying to do, he was able to show me what belonged to the theme and
the story and what I wanted to tell; this process made it easy for me to
strip out things I didn’t need. When you are blocked it is often a situation
where you are afraid to let anything go because you don’t know what is
important and what is not.
Often the script editor is only attached to the project when time is run-
ning out and several versions of the script have been written. I am sure
that this is not a very rewarding time to jump in. I find it most fruitful to
get the script editor on board in the early stages of the work. At the point
when you already have some material, a hunch of what you are doing,
but are still working with the synopsis/treatment. People have different
ways of working, but I find it better to spend lots of time in the treatment
and synopsis phase. When you have a solid treatment the draft usually
doesn’t take long to write. No matter what you prefer, it is probably not
a very good idea to show very early drafts to many people; readers tend
to fall in love with different things and when you have as much material
as a draft needs, it becomes more and more difficult to manage all the
feedback you get.
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I personally find it very challenging sometimes to recognize when I am

reluctant and protective just because it is not easy to learn of your mis-
takes and when it is your intuition telling you to protect your script from
harmful feedback. I hope and believe that this is something experience
will teach me.
IV Script&Pitch - experience and the international dimension
Another experience - or a series of experiences - on script editors that I

find fruitful to share is the script that took me to Script&Pitch Workshops.
My co-writer Kirsikka Saari and I had previously attended a national work-
shop with our idea and had gotten feedback from interested producers. Our
treatment was also commented on by a well-known international “script
guru”, who was very positive and mainly gave suggestions to changes on
a rather superficial level. All the time we wondered a little, “How can this
be so easy?” and we had our doubts. We wanted to get help and luckily we
got selected for Script&Pitch.
In reality we would of course secretly have wanted to have been just

admired and cheered. It wasn’t all that nice and easy when already during
the first workshop the whole story was ripped into pieces. But we had to
agree - it was deconstruction in a constructive way. Our mentor Gino Ven-
triglia - our fairy godfather - pushed us towards the wall and asked all the
hard questions. I am so grateful that those questions got asked at that
point, and not later. We got lost during the Script&Pitch experience too,
but we also got help and tools to find the path again.
An international workshop was also a very useful lesson on commu-

nicating your ideas and script to people outside of your own immediate
culture. Even though Europeans have so much in common, there are a
lot of things that you cannot take for granted. It doesn’t mean all those
things should be eliminated from the script - quite the contrary - but they
are things we just have to be aware of. Sometimes it was very frustrat-
ing when we got feedback on something completely irrelevant because
of cultural differences, but I think we learned a lot about which words to
avoid, and which kind of things you need to clarify or leave out from short
versions of the story.
The other part of the Script&Pitch-ideology, learning to pitch, helped

with that too. We, like many writers, were reluctant to pitch and consid-
104
ered it as the “selling tool for the producers”. After Script&Pitch we were
converted. As a writer you do need many other people to work with you
and to find them, you need to learn to communicate your thoughts even
when they are not clear and ready. Pitching is terribly painful, because you
get caught by yourself as to where there are holes and problems in your
story. I am not saying I know how to pitch yet, or that it is something I
love, but at least I know it is something I need to take seriously. And if it
wasn’t so painful, I’d pitch all the time.
Looking back we could have written the original version of the script
too, it might have worked on the outside. But it would not have been the
film we wanted to write. Instead, Script&Pitch helped us to choose the
hard but rewarding way and we learned a lot about the craft and what we
want to learn more about and who we want to become as scriptwriters.
V A wish list for the fairy godmothers - and all the other commentators
I see the work of the script editor (and other editors, as mentioned ear-
lier) as similar to the work of a midwife. It is not the job of the midwife
to criticize the baby, but to help the mother to get it out, leaving both the
baby and the mother well and alive. Just like the work of the editor is not
about what he likes or doesn’t like in the script; it is in the heart of the
script editor’s job to help the writer to find the emotional theme of the
story and help the writer to keep it clear as the work goes on and the ways
of working may alter. It might be that what is important in the script is
something the editor doesn’t like at all. It is his or her job to clear this up
in the beginning. It might be that in this case she is not the right person to
work with this writer. Or she needs to take into consideration that doing
the job means helping a writer to write a script she doesn’t like.
The questions that should be asked in the beginning are: can you work
on those premises and can the writer work with you? It goes back to the
respect. Do you respect the script and the writer even if you don’t like the
script? Does s/he respect you? There are always writers who are not will-
ing to question themselves or to work hard. If the writer doesn’t respect
the editor, it doesn’t matter how good the editor is. The writer has to do
the hard work, no editor can do it for him/her.
When it comes to the hard work itself, it doesn’t stop when the emo-
tional theme is finally clear - quite the contrary. It does help a lot and it
105
saves time and versions (and money!), but after the theme is clear, work-
ing with the script editor is very practical work with the structure and the
scenes. The script editor helps to keep the core of the story clear and mov-
ing when the story and characters are leading the writer. It is always the
writer who makes the choices, but a good editor has many suggestions to
lead the writer to find his/her way to tell the story on screen.
I am looking at my personal experience so far, working with editors in

different fields, and will try to sum up some good and bad policies on edit-
ing from the writer’s point of view. I don’t think there are any tricks or “to
do”-methods in becoming a really good script editor. Or if there is, I am
sure one should have worked in film much longer to know them. I believe
there are no short cuts - there has to be a lot of talent and then enormous
amounts of work and studies of dramaturgy and how to work with people.
I have enormous respect for these people, since I already know they are a
rare species. I believe that discussing the policies on how to give construc-
tive feedback is still fruitful for everybody working with scripts and every
writer can have a say in that. So, in the end what I can do is to collect a kind
of wish list for people who read and comment (my) scripts:
1. Respect the script and the writer, it sounds simple but it is not. It is
frustrating to read bad scripts. Many scripts are bad, and most are bad
at some point. Respect means that the commentator needs to believe
this could become a good script and that this writer could do it. If she
doesn’t believe that, there is no point in working with this project.
2. Ask, don’t assume to know what the script/treatment/synopsis is all

about. Try to find different options on what it could be about and what
supports it. Listen to the writer and try to let her tell what she is trying
to do.
3. Recognize your own need to write and express yourself. If you want to
write yourself and your writing is stuck for one reason or another, you
are not necessarily in the right place to give feedback. A writer with a
block is often passive-aggressive and it might be difficult to recognize
your own feelings of bitterness, resentment or envy for a person who
actually is writing. And when you have those feelings and you are not
recognising them, you are not likely to see things clearly. You are not
the author of the script you are commenting. This doesn’t mean you
can’t contribute enormously to the script and that your ideas and sug-
gestions would not count. If there is respect, a writer with a head on
106
her shoulders will take all the good ideas and suck them into the script.
But you need to be willing to give them.
I am sure my wish list may change over time when I get more expe-
rience. So far I am very grateful to all the people who have spent their
time and energy with my scripts - without the less rewarding experiences
I might not have learned to value the rewarding ones.
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Impostors?
Impostors?
by Antoine Bataille (S&P Alumni)
In feature films, script development and the task of script editors is usu-
ally envisaged in a context of crisis, when an author is blocked or when the
script doesn’t satisfy the financiers. Nevertheless, authors often call on
script editors to get an assessment on their latest draft rather than to save
their script heading towards a near deadline. The aim is often to open new
perspectives for the project, or to choose some, rather than desperately
finding a solution to a problem that has been subsisting in the story since
the beginning of the development process.
But what does a script editor bring to the process when the writing is
in progress and the author is quite optimistic about it? Script editors are
often asked for a fresh view. They are often confronted with projects that
have been in development for some time and have to quickly merge into
them. They only have a few hours to digest a script and must be aware of all
its aspects (themes, plots, subplots, characters, rhythm, beats). When an
author looking towards financing has to confront his artistic intentions and
the singularity of his project, facing the many demands and expectations
from his different collaborators, the main challenge of a script editor (hired
by that author) lies certainly in the necessity to obey to that singularity,
without taking the place of a co-author.
An author writing a story proposes a game whose rules are decided by him,
and script editors must quickly enter the game respecting these rules. Script
editors have to submit to the singularity and the style of the author. Also, fic-
tions try to incite us into adopting a new vision of such or such an aspect of
the world and script editors have to perceive that new vision of the real world
while it hasn’t yet emerged in the frame of the script. Thus, the main obstacle
to the script editor’s task lies in the subjectivity of the author’s intentions and
the obvious impossibility to communicate these fully and logically.
For some partisans of “auteurism”, the writer’s obligatory solitude is
enough to invalidate the work of any script consultant. The French director
Christophe Honoré declared this in a recent interview: “Nobody is able to
109
read a screenplay. And we can go further: there are no good script readers
as there are no good novel readers. The principle of reading is an experience
of solitude, of absolute intimacy. Reading creates a relation between an
experience of life and some words. How could an experienced reading be
an objective work that can be shared?” He points to the unfinished nature
of a screenplay and the impossibility to objectively foresee a film from a
screenplay, and claims that, “the new jobs, which have been created at the
television channels and some production companies, script readers, are the
jobs of the greatest impostors in the world”1.
From the point of view of a script editor, that position is of course un-
bearable, but really interesting because it reflects the kind of preconcep-
tions and mistrusts that some scriptwriters can have towards script edi-
tors. In spite of its radicalism, Honoré’s provocative declaration holds some
truth. We could say that it permits us to focus on an important paradox
existing in the script editing process: the involvement of a script editor in
a script cannot be objective since it has to be emotional, and not only logi-
cal. I here understand an emotion as an event, a transitory and ephemeral
moment between the perception of the script elements (description sen-
tences, dialogues, rhythm) and the construction of a representation or an
interpretation of these script elements in the frame of a story. This phe-
nomenon, consisting of setting the mind in motion, is the essence of the
narrative process. Honoré points out that the limits set by this emotional
involvement renders useless any assessment of a script. It is true that the
phenomenon of narration always ends on a subjective interpretation; all
stories sound a bit different in everyone’s mind. But, the important thing
is the dynamic moment of the emotion, not the story as a result. From
my short experience, I could say that above all, the task of a script editor
differs from that of a common reading by the necessity to put into words
what is emotionally disturbing during the first reading of the script, not in
the story that the script editor understood. Usually, authors are conscious
of the weak parts of their scripts, they can feel where the script doesn’t
work. The task of a script editor doesn’t only consist of finding these weak
moments of the story, but also in discovering what mechanisms that are
producing this feeling of dysfunction. In other words, the main goal of the
analysis of a script lies in the necessity to find the words and the logical de-
velopment that permits one to understand what disturbs at such or such a
moment of the reading. Being attentive to one’s own affects and emotions,
1 “Le scénario n’est pas une histoire” (The script is not a story), interview with Christophe Honoré
by Frédéric Davoust in La Gazette des scénaristes, Paris, December 2007, nb.32, pp.46-48
110
Impostors?
acting as a human seismograph, are necessary conditions, an unavoidable

first step to begin the true analytic work.
Then, the script is explored in many ways, according to such or such a char-
acter’s trajectory, some scenes are read and read again, till the discovery of
the thing, the detail, a line, a sentence in the descriptions, a turning point, a
jump..., whatever it is that is preventing the whole plot from working. Thus,
script editing can be considered a precision work, which allows one to give
importance to the general structure as much as to the details. During this
second step of the analysis, the affective and emotional involvement of the
script editor, his role as a human seismograph, must be kept in the back-
ground. To take a concrete example, the final scene of a feature film script I
worked on appeared to be an easy turn over. A main character [A] was meet-
ing a secondary character [B] and was seeing this secondary character [B]
acting in a way, which created doubts on everything [A] had learned about
[B] during the story. The denouement had already occurred and there was
an obvious intention to create an overture at the very end of the story. That
final scene was written brilliantly, the atmosphere, the rhythm, and the dra-
matic tension were there. Moreover, it was pushing the whole story into a
wide reflection on beliefs, by the sudden reemergence of an inherent doubt
motivating the main character’s quest. But in the story, the event appeared
as something artificial. In spite of the evident cinematographic beauty of the
scene and its undeniably strong moral questioning, the easiest reaction of a
script consultant would have been to argue that if the scene didn’t work in
the screenplay, it wouldn’t work on the screen, and that the only thing to do
would be to take it out and let the story finish in a more classical way with
the denouement. After a long discussion about this scene, no solution was
really foreseen and as a script editor, I had a feeling of failure. As [A] was the
main character, the one in which the audience is supposed to project itself,
the main question remaining was: “What can [A] do to make this scene be-
lievable?” But one of the foreseen solutions, then adopted by the author,
came from the secondary character [B], from a detail. In the situation of a
meeting, [A] and [B] were equally conscious of the presence of the other,
which meant that [B] could control what he was letting the main character
[A] discover. The important detail, in fact, wasn’t the main character’s point
of view, but the secondary character’s. In the new draft, [B] is not able to
notice the presence of [A] when he acts in a way that creates doubt about
everything [A] has learned about [B] during the story. [A] is kept at a distance
while he observes [B]. Concretely, it just meant changing a few sentences in a
description paragraph, but the audience, identifying with the main character
[A], may now be moved by this scene because the accidental nature of the
111
event became believable. The problem was emotional because the dramatic
event didn’t move us, but the way to find a solution was logical. In such a
task, some books of script theory can be very useful. Working with books
doesn’t consist in finding the right way to shape a story, but it can help to
conceptualize what is creating a feeling of malaise during the first reading. In
the present case, it was a problem of dramatic irony.
To attempt an answer to the apparent paradox of the subjectivity of the

script editor, one could argue that the right position is a position in move-
ment. Script editing requires a necessity to be able to switch between an
affective or emotional position, and a distant and analytical one. In such
a methodological attitude, the influence of some trends in the literary cri-
tique may be recognizable2. The idea here is not to blindly use the theories
developed to study literary works, but to consider the history of literary
critique as a long adventure of thought that can provide patterns in order
to shape the paradox created by the respective subjectivities of authors
and script editors.
In spite of trying to elaborate an a priori method, a script editor can re-

main being an impostor to the film project. Any of the most elaborated
techniques or methods include the risk of losing sight of the author’s in-
tentions. Here are the limits of a written assessment and the necessity of
dialogue between the author and the script editor. Any method remains
incomplete and unfinished because the deep soul of any story keeps being
elusive. When I start a new collaboration, I usually take the necessary time,
in a first meeting, or – if we haven’t had the possibility to meet yet – in the
beginning of the first written assessment, to explain how I have under-
stood the emotional theme of the story3. This step of the work may seem
unnecessary or superfluous. On the contrary, I consider it the only way to
be sure that everyone involved in the project’s development are moving in
the same direction. And during the collaboration process, adjustments still
have to be made. At work, I expect the authors to be able to tell me “I don’t
like that idea”, or “I don’t agree with you when you say (or write) that”. Ne-
gations, opposition, are definitely indispensable to working in a common
field, and writers must know that they are the only ones who can give their
script editors the necessary boundaries for an efficient performance.
2
One can distinguish here the attitude of German hermeneutic and its influence on the so-called
“Geneva School”. See for example Leo Spitzer, Linguistic and Literary History, 1948 or Jean Star-
obinski, “La relation critique” in L’œil Vivant, 1970
On the notion of ‘emotional theme’, I refer to Franz Rodenkirchen’s essay, “… but words would
3
only make it smaller: emotional theme and storytelling”, in Script&Pitch Insights //1 - 2007
112
Impostors?
Developing a project requires understanding. Till the end of collabora-

tion, a script editor keeps exploring and discovering an unknown terri-
tory, a bit like the audience during a screening, and the objections, the
barriers set by the writer are in my view precious clues for a script editor
to gradually establish a map of this unknown territory and complete his
knowledge of the unending sense of the story. The task of a script editor
doesn’t consist in remodeling this territory, but in imagining some pos-
sibilities for the audience to discover this territory in a subtle and un-
expected manner. It consists in finding or drafting new paths. In some
scripts, many interesting situations appear from a cinematographic point
of view, and a general emotional theme can be roughly felt, but the read-
ing, from the beginning to the end, remains difficult and somewhat bor-
ing. In those cases, a narrative red line doesn’t seem to be clearly enough
constructed, and after the reading, the script editor might say things like:
“It’s both an interesting and a ‘confusing’ script”, or “This script is emo-
tionally involving, yet it remains difficult to see where it wants to take
us”. During meetings with writers, that situation is usually embarrassing,
both for the author and the script editor. Some of the questions asked by
the script editor may seem idiotic to the author to whom the answer is
clear and evident. The challenge is therefore often to find out what en-
ergy, what main movement could put the whole script into motion, within
the frame of a story. That story can sometimes be extremely simple, and
the risk to force the plot must be taken into consideration. This depends
of course on the author’s intentions and the necessity to respect these
intentions through a dialectical approach to script editing. Here lies the
difference between a script editor and a co-author: a script editor doesn’t
create and keeps criticizing, so to speak. And when a script editor gives
ideas for rewriting, it comes more from a desire to challenge the fertil-
ity of the intentions or the way they are reached, rather than a will to
offer the right direction to follow in the writing. Testing the limits of an
author’s imagination and being conscious of these limits is releasing for
a script editor.
Another main limit of the script editing process comes from the strange
and ambiguous literary nature of a screenplay. Writing a script is like tak-
ing up an impossible challenge because the written language is limited to
describe what’s going to happen on the screen. As every script develop-
ment professional knows, a screenplay must obey to some precise presen-
tational and writing rules. The descriptions must be written in the narra-
tive present, and never go beyond the description of sounds, images and
movements that could potentially be perceived by the audience during the
113
screening4. Thus, from a literary point of view, a screenplay is a relatively

poor thing, which excludes any of the poetic resources of the written lan-
guage used in novels and poetry. No metaphors, no comparisons or any
other stylistic devices are allowed5. But on the other hand, the aim of a
screenplay is to indicate the idea of a possible movie, which will probably
be shot. The quality of a good script comes from its capacity to suggest
emotions and stories through a maximal use of the resources of the words
printed on the paper, as poetry does. The paradox of a screenplay is that it
both is and isn’t a poetic object. For that reason, and in spite of its literary
poverty, a screenplay can suggest many different things, including a story,
of course, but not only a story. From such a point of view, we could say
that the term of script editor is more relevant than the term of story editor
because the script elements are not only narrative.
So what are the limits, set by the non-narrative elements of a screenplay

in the script editing process? How to deal with it as a script editor who tries
not to act too much like an impostor? A script editor who tries to act with tact
and sensibility will notice that the necessity for action doesn’t always or only
include dramatic action. The movement of bodies and things, which are de-
scribed in a screenplay, are in fact the very essence of action in a film before
the understanding of all these actions in the causal chain of a plot. Concretely,
when you read a screenplay, at such or such a moment, something happens
in you, affects you. You’re touched, but sometimes, you cannot link it to a
narrative emotion depending on the story. It’s like discovering a hidden treas-
ure that mustn’t be let buried. You just think about what’s going to happen
on the screen; you’re already into moving pictures and your mind has escaped
the textual nature of the screenplay. Screenplays providing beautiful images
escaping the narration are often delicious readings. The true problem, which
appears here, from the point of view of a script editor rather than the point
of view of a film analyst, is the determination of which degree of tolerance to
adopt during the approach to such or such a script. That indispensable tact
lies, I think, in the necessity for a script editor to know film history and theory
as much as narrative techniques. Sometimes, these particular and cinemato-
graphic moments must prevail over the story. And then, the decision to adapt
the situations to the story, or on the contrary, to adapt the story to the situa-
tions, must be for such or such a case, the object of a clear decision taken by
the author to make the script editor’s work possible.
4
Objections could be made for some exceptional cases when some more ‘interior’ or subjective
descriptions make the reading easier and quicker.
As for the case of ‘interior’ descriptions, some exceptions to that rule can be relevant.
5
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Impostors?
So, who are the real impostors? It’s well known that many script doc-
tors are actually script charlatans and a script editor who claims to be an
expert of storytelling can be considered an impostor. Honoré is absolutely
right when he determines the limits of a screenplay, but his way to use
these limits to radically refuse any form of script consulting has certainly
something ideological to it. Script writing is obviously something that is
irreducible to logic developments, but not sacred enough to be untouch-
able. Judges, psychoanalysts and journalists perform a job, which keeps a
part of subjectivity; but are they impostors for that? Not if they are able
to reconsider permanently their own method, position and thought proc-
esses. Thus, the main challenge for script editors today is certainly to be
able to work outside of the classical narrative forms. In such an uncertain
framework, when no certitudes or laws can be established about what will
work and what won’t work on the screen, it’s among the author’s respon-
sibilities to set the rules of the game. Script editors are ideally not there to
save a bad script – even if they are sometimes unfortunately hired to take
up this difficult challenge – but to play the author’s game.
Such a challenge means a lot in contemporary storytelling. We all have a

natural tendency to represent our lives and history through plots including
quests, beats and denouements. Our illusions are often made of narrative
forms, and since Cervantes’ Don Quichotte, many great novels and films
deal with the way of fiction and storytelling to build these illusions. Nev-
ertheless, for a few decades, this phenomenon has taken a more imposing
dimension. Storytelling is now everywhere in the media. It has become a
very efficient persuasion technique in all kinds of advertising campaigns.
But contrary to traditional stories, myths and legends, whose richness is
the plurality of representation they can offer, these new kinds of stories are
shaped in very standardized ways and always end up in an obvious mes-
sage. They don’t carry any doubt and their suggestive strength is closed on
one precise and targeted interpretation 6. Thus, as the 20th century’s visual
arts used to deal with the predominance of images in our civilization (see
Pop Art, as an evident example of the reaction of visual arts towards ad-
vertising and mass culture), a question to keep in mind for script develop-
See for example Christian Salmon, Storytelling. La Machine à fabriquer des histoires et à forma-
6
ter les esprits (Storytelling. Bewitching the Modern Mind), 2007, ed. La Découverte. The English
translation will be published in February 2010. Christian Salmon defends the thesis of the exis-
tence of a “new narrative order” made of the accumulation of formatted stories told through the
media. According to the author, this “new narrative order” enables a restraint understanding of
reality and the control of peoples’ emotional responses. This book was subject to some contro-
versial issues because of its Orwellian perspective.
115
ment professionals is therefore: how to write film scripts in a world flooded

by narrative forms, which often obey to the same rules? Storytelling and
fiction, which has escaped the fields of films and novels, becomes a bat-
tlefield and independent filmmakers have a duty to tell original and new
stories, also within a context that tends to refine and weaken these stories.
The struggle met by any good author is to propose new views on the real
world by telling stories that strive towards singular forms and rules. Script
editors, who often jump from one project to another, from one story to
another, are among the best observers of our narrative landscape, its lim-
its and its margins. The fervor expressed in their work, as for independent
producers, is precisely to contribute to making these original stories pos-
sible. Any person calling themselves a script editor, and who doesn’t intend
above all to be an ally in such a struggle can be denounced as an impostor.
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How Do You Know When The Customer Is Happy?

A beginner’s tour across story editing, developing and doctoring
by Atso Pärnänen (S&P Alumni)
A Pacific setting in which a Mallickian voice over starts: “What is this typ-
ing in the midst of nature...”. The camera glides over the ocean and settles on
an island, finally descending and finding a group of people sitting in a circle
beneath the palm trees.
In the middle, a medicine man, the guru of this group, is tossing out pages
and pages of paper into a fire while the group looks in awe.
They all come from different backgrounds, not just race and color, culture
and tax rate, but from genres. On the left, little Miss Romantic Comedy is ready
with her hankies, on the right the Science Fiction nut protects himself from
too much sunlight, or so he says, with a tin foil wrapped around his head. The
War Movie buff is all dressed in camo and holds a stick imagining it’s a rifle.
I leave the Island of Script Pimping and switch off the Webcam. Outside a
rainy, gray fall day is dawning. On my desk a pile of scripts supposedly con-
tributes towards the right to claim oneself to be a professional of some sort.
The scripts, treatments and the emailing in relation to them tells almost of
a new form of networking. Fine. I’ll read. As long as it does not divert from
my other goals. Plenty of storylines of my own to sort out, blank pages to fill,
meetings to go to.
While the scripts waiting to be read may not bare any resemblance to each
other and the writers are as mixed a bunch as the stories they are telling, it
does not change the fact that from myths to movies, whether art house or
mainstream, there are certain steps in the creative process of achieving a
good story. At best, developing a screenplay is like a good scene with great
dialog. It is done with passion, yet always with respect. Not to ridicule but to
improve. To find ways, to seek, to explore and understand stories and struc-
tures, forms that can be different depending on each screenplay. Like a coach
for quality the story editor tries to make sense from it all, but...
117
How do you know if the customer is happy? And for whom are you really
working? Heated debates can take place, new pages appear, but to know for
sure if you are truly helping a script or are just turning into an opinion ma-
chine is something worth considering.
To make room on my desk I lift a recent book purchase dealing with cur-
rent affairs and it reminds me of a quote from the now former Secretary of
Defense Donald Rumsfeld who said: “There are known knowns. These are
things we know that we know. There are known unknowns. That is to say,
there are things that we know we don’t know. But there are also unknown
unknowns. There are things we don’t know we don’t know”. Those lines, as
funny as they might first sound, start a thinking process. Not a look back,
not a sentimental round up of a one year adventure at Script&Pitch, best de-
scribed as a decameronian feast for writers gathered to pitch their stories, a
rare pearl among the many empty shells of film education. No, none of that,
but more an effort to try to understand which way, what kind of an assault to
make, while preparing to head to the jungle of these unknowns of storytell-
ing. Many maps have been provided; some have offered even a compass. The
flora and fauna remains varied. There are many ways, methods and styles to
come ashore to the island of writers.
A sound bite could easily give the impression that story editing must be
one of the easiest jobs ever. You browse a few scripts, take out a red pen and
mark down: “Write it again. Make it better”. Sure, repetition can introduce
something new and make things better, but “write it again” and thinking
that that is all there is to this job is like saying that every director will reach
the quality of William Wyler by asking the actors to “Do it again”.
During the golden era of Hollywood some screenwriters used to write

treatments that went up to 200 pages. Characters and all story possibili-
ties were explored. Which film fund member would have time, interest
and capability to go through a memo like that today? Besides what was
once good during the studio system is not necessarily adaptable as such
today and could contribute towards the already strong resistance to actu-
ally read the script instead of just listening to a pitch. Good news is that
more and more industry people seem to be showing an interest for skills in
story editing. Bad news? Undoubtedly this does not tone down the “Holly-
wood Suit-effect” in which the advice from them will still be to add an ex-
plosion on page 25 (always worth considering!). This time the arguments
and the confidence may reach a higher level though, while everything else
stays the same. Development and fine tuning things are a must, but an
118
endless tour of workshops and seminars can lead to indecision, formulat-

ed approaches and kill the risk taking spirit of the participants which will
still be needed in the process. I assume that the amount of flops and suc-
cesses will remain to be affected by many variables, whatever the amount
of story editors in the industry.
Sometimes one wonders if the many fine schemes and workshops are just
a way to make the knitters of the quilt feel better and help them to make a
living; an effort to create a consensus of sorts in which many would at least
appear to be happy. It is easy to point towards a workshop, market or a talent
scheme and then close the door on a young wannabe’s face. No unsolicited
scripts please.
If we do find ourselves back on the school bench then we face a new set of
questions by looking at our fellow students. How many of them will actually
during their studies read scripts, how many will learn to write something for
micro-budget movies (meaning your explosion on page 25 is smaller than you
would like it to be), how many will be taught how to get some doors open,
how to get an agent or more precisely: who will introduce you to one... Many
get into the hallways, but fewer inside the rooms.
Out of the many ways to go forward one of the best approaches is of course
the John Sayles one. He is a respected script doctor and writer for films like
Apollo 13, The Fugitive, Jurassic Park IV (Yes, your beloved Mr. Independent of
Lone Star fame) and uses this as a way to fund his own films. See this hap-
pening in your neck of the woods?
But, enough about money, since in Europe it is never about money (probably
because there never is enough of it) but about higher qualities such as finding
a voice: A European voice for screenwriting. I assume that this voice, like the
rest of the continent, must be something constantly out of tune then.
In Europe everyone is an island, but all of them form an archipelago in

which a lot of shouting from one island to another takes place. This chain of
islands is best entered by being born as a son or daughter to the king of the
island or to someone in the court.
Like dogs sniffing the behind of another canine it does not really matter
what kind of excrement you produce if the sniffing process has resulted in
an acceptance to spend time and play with the limited resources that the
islands, always in fear of a tide that will sweep over them, provide.
119
Sure, there are also walls and groins protecting the sometimes very vac-
uum packed industry products being made in California. Products that at
times have captured only a bit of the refreshing Santa Ana winds. But in
any case, the shores of the mainland of motion are always open for business
and perhaps thus, at least for this hack, getting in touch and hearing back
has so far proven to be a lot faster process when dealing with Americans or
the British. Europe, it seems, can afford to be slow and quiet with so many
masterpieces already produced.
During the writing of these ramblings I receive an email from a story de-
velopment workshop titled “The three act structure will kill you”. Whoa! And I
thought the job of a story editor was fairly safe! If the film does not succeed it
is hardly the story editor who gets blamed. If it’ s a success... I guess then you
can be assured that the customer, the producer, the writer, the audience indeed
is happy, just don’t expect a credit or a bonus. Perhaps another assignment.
Irving Thalberg produced circa 100 movies during his career and took an on
screen credit for none. By the age in which many are nowadays considered
only mature enough to be accepted to study film, Thalberg had already pro-
duced an impressive list of motion pictures. Today the credit battles start at
schools, since often it is all about making the CV look impressive, whatever
that means in the film industry, so no wonder the average length of a con-
tract keeps getting longer. Somewhere on the dotted line a preferred story
editor might be mentioned. Creating a good story is nice. Coming up with a
franchise even better.
I look again at the pile of scripts on my desk. These are my customers. The
characters in them friends that I must nurture. The world they bring alive and
make me believe in something worth disappearing into.
The end product, the script, should be ready to go into production. Thus
it is still only something that is part of a process trying to reach the screen.
Who buys scripts collected into one Best Screenplays Of The Year–book? Ever
seen it among the National Book- and Faulkner- award winners as best sell-
ers during Christmas time?
The words, carefully crafted, constantly rewritten and structured become

something to be thrown away, archived, at best argued between the pro-
ducer and the director obviously without the presence of the writer.
Yet Greek plays are still being staged even if the original cast is long gone.
120
Nitrate films have exploded in the archives, digital ones need back ups every
now and then. The scripts of the lost films offer a chance for a remake. Some
faith in the word staying around can be kept.
As this essay is not so much an article or reflections for the beginner as

they are by a beginner, it might be better to just go and take a look at series
produced by the BBC in the 70s: Colditz, a series about prisoners of war in
Germany has cheap sets, but the characters work and you are bound to fol-
low it. The Onedin Line, which works also as a great “market economy for
dummies” does the same. As does pretty much any British series about a
murder in a small village from Morse to Wexford, from Dalgliesh & Pascoe to
Midsummer Murders, from Frost to Lewis etc. etc. The Brits seem to get the
characters right. Walking the long hallways of the museums of an empire
and studying the by gone figures must contribute to the quality of writing
and acting that the John Bull studios constantly offer us. Even if on the other
hand countries with strong national broadcasting traditions often find their
film industry in everlasting turmoil.
These examples do of course not offer the more alternative and wacky,
“Let’s try to reinvent the wheel by making it a square”-approaches. I mean
this with no disrespect towards the more experimental ways of telling stories
and trying to come up with ideas for that. It is just that if you look at some
of the festival entries in recent years it would appear, that while the the-
sis on this matter might be good and worth studying, the filmmakers might
not have the intelligence to live up to Jean Cocteau’s famous “Astonish me”-
comment, which most seem to interpret as “Shock me with something sick
and disguise it as social commentary”. The original “Astonish me” was ap-
parently also a favorite of the young Kubrick. Later, it has been said, he told
“I’m still fooling them”. Perhaps astonishing and fooling are not that far from
each other in the film business, but it seems the con men capable of pulling
off the heist are fewer and fewer.
To believe that a commando group of story editors can improve the situ-
ation is almost something to use to calm the nerves of ministers of culture
and committees of filmmaking. Surely talent has a way of braking through,
help or no help, and what makes the film industry so great is that people
with no talent can do extremely well too.
So what do I know about scriptwriting, story editing? Not much. I know

that a long walk is often better than making your back hurt from too much
sitting. I know that story editing is coaching, nurturing. I know that story
121
consulting is like an affair and can turn out to be costly. I know that script
doctoring is like going to the doctor who cures by fixing or cutting, perhaps
even implanting something new.
The questions start to outnumber the answers. The diagnosis is perhaps

not coming to a conclusion, but hopefully I’m at least left with better ques-
tions after this reconnaissance mission to the many unknowns and knowns,
that contribute into developing a script. I have not ended up with a list of
rules, but still some sort of “checks and balances” has started to form. Al-
though one could as well argue that it is only the opinion machine that has
gone through lubrication and this time with better oil.
So... If you want to train yourself as a story editor or writer you train your-
self in the streets, in the hallways of libraries, in the darkness of the cinema,
by listening to older people and thinking that, now, at the age of 28, your
grandfather would have just been returning from the war.
And the future? In a few years one should have “stolen” enough unused
ideas to create a really good script or see the publication of a motivational
self-help book.
By that time story editing will have started to affect your daily life. Every
look and comment from the opposite sex could be fine-tuned or analyzed to
come with a subtext. You are desperately waiting for the tipping point, for
the beat of the conversation, so that it will again be your point of view that
dominates. There are plenty of moments in the day that you consider rewrit-
ing, but surely being a story editor will someday turn a man into a perfect
husband, since sentences like “Aha, OK, Yes...How do you feel about it?” can
never be exploited enough when listening to a writer all set out to film an
Asian version of Zabriskie Point, just because the funding is there.
But if you did not take my quote from Mr. Rumsfeld seriously enough then
let’s go back to the Pentagon once more and start learning from the OODA-
Loop, which stands for Observe, Orient, Decide and Act. A concept created
by USAF Colonel John Boyd and perhaps something that every story editor
should consider, since, as we learned from Samuel Fuller: “Film is a battle-
ground”. If you want to survive on it, make it a Western. Now go and charge
up the hill!
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Answering Questions on Script Editing - from 3 Script&Pitch Alumni
Answering Questions on Script Editing

- from 3 Script&Pitch Alumni
Questions from Story Editor Malva Guicheney:
Malva:
Would you agree that part of the work of a story editor has a lot in common
with the work of a psychoanalyst?
And - how do you understand when the time has come to stop pushing the
writer in his/her search into the inner and most hidden motivations that gave
him/her the need to write the story?
Marietta:
First of all I can’t really say my work relates directly to that of a psychoana-
lyst, since I have no experience as one at all… But, that said, there is certainly a
lot of psychology and analysis involved in this work. Secondly. It’s all a process
between more people. So I don’t feel it’s really me pushing, at best it should
feel like a collaboration of some sort. The writer should need me for his or her
purposes, in order for the story to develop along the best potential lines.
Malva:
As a script editor you often get to read material that is badly presented.
Sometimes, nonetheless, you see that the project has potential: which ele-
ments help you evaluate projects?
Marietta:
Sending sloppy material is not to be recommended, as it diminishes the
authority of the writer, and creates irritation. However, still, in the situation, I
automatically seek out the goodies, it happens without a plan: I search for the
soul and the heart. Where is the fire, the passion, and the urgency? I then - of
course - use my knowledge to instinctively discern where the project is at; is
it the right time to get involved? Is the project at a state relevant to what is
demanded of it - in relation to the work and time plan ahead? Are the major
elements missing? What is there, and what is not there?
123
Malva:
Could you briefly explain the difference between a script editor and a co-
writer?
Marietta:
As a co-writer you are an equal part in a duo (or trio etc.) with the other
writer(s). You can be the director as well, or the other writer can be, or both of
you together. A script consultant is not responsible for the script and should
not have any such ambition, and for sure no hidden co-writing ambitions.
Malva:
Would you agree that the most difficult aspect of working as a script editor is
gaining the writer’s trust? How do you manage to build a trustful relationship,
when writers “as a rule” have a tendency not to trust anybody about their work?
Marietta:
The most difficult aspect for me is not trust, and I’m not sure that writers
as a rule don’t trust. Actually, as a new writer, trusting the advice of others too
easily can be even more dangerous. So, for me, being qualified, that is, for the
consultant to be knowledgeable and educated enough creates trust firstly.
One should NOT - as a writer - trust anybody who claims to be a script consult-
ant. One would not even consider letting a person who said they like and know
about teeth drill inside your mouth. Many people “know about film”, and ap-
proaching the “knower” professionally must be done with great caution. My
pool of training, capacity and experience is the source from which the writer
can decide to trust me or not. The writer should feel safe about my skills and
then for sure we can disagree about attitudes, taste etcetera, in a fruitful and
dynamic way. I am disciplined, passionate and serious, and I expect the writer
to be as well. If we are on different levels with this, there might be friction.
Secondly. I am loyal to the script, not the writer. So if pushed, I will stand up
for the script. Sometimes the writer will inevitably confuse - or resent - that,
because they trust their story as it already is, and not me and what I claim
needs to be done. Or they are actually lazy (we writers are lazy and scared and
manipulative in avoiding pain) so they can use you as an excuse to avoid doing
the work. But, honestly I don’t often find trust to emerge as a problem. Also,
every development phase is an individual process, and what happens is not
to be confused with liking or disliking. If a writer is angry with you, it can be
because they are angry about things not working in their story. Or they need
another kind of story advisor. It’s important to not be afraid to admit and face
these things, or to feel fear in general.
124
Malva:
Once you gain the writer’s trust it could happen that the initial obstacles a
project often encounters during development discourage him/her (i.e. not get-
ting the professionals s/he wants; not finding funds and so on). At that stage
a writer could loose the trust in you: how do you deal with this in the interest
of the project?
Marietta:
The process of writing a feature script involves a LOT of ups and downs.
There WILL be discouragement for sure, sooner or later. This is part of the
work. Your function is not to give funds (unless you have a job giving funds,
or are independently wealthy by birth and habit) so this is not something the
writer can “blame” you for. If they do, chances are they need to gain knowl-
edge about the film world, and themselves. On another note, if the writer
looses trust in you for some reason, I think truly the trust needs to be re-built,
or the collaboration disrupted. Trust is so crucial in the working process. This
is for instance why, when confronted, you must not lie to the writer regarding
your position, just because it seemed an easy solution at a certain moment.
Questions from Writer/Director Petr Vaclav:
Petr:
The first quality of any script doctor (or consultant) is the right diagnosis of
the text, and the right opinion about how to continue the work on it. Directions
to change, things to keep, stuff to throw away. But,
a) this is a very subjective matter. Isn’t it? - and

b) how do you deal with that?
Marietta:
a) The answer to this is yes and no. Of course the experience and person-
ality of the one who makes the ‘diagnose’ changes how the material
is perceived. And, as with everything else, there is no right or wrong.
So from the writer’s (the “diagnosed”) point of view, it is naturally
important to know who makes the diagnosis. What capability does
the ”doctor” consultant possess?
b) Professionally speaking, one can’t just go in and “feel” things based

on nothing. One has to analyze what is there on the page (and look at
previous work from the creator) - and from there the process starts.
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The work in sessions is mainly about discovery: what is the project re-
ally about? Very often the true nature of the project needs to be un-
covered. There is sometimes a discrepancy between when the writer
understands her/his own intentions, and is able to face the emotional
issues and the work process implied, and between when I, as the con-
sultant, understand them.
Petr:
Are there some objective criteria?
Marietta:
There are storytelling mechanisms, but again: I prefer not to be locked in
any predetermined views; I prefer to be overwhelmed, surprised. And each
and every human and project must be approached in this way: anew.
Petr:
Do you agree that bad “doctoring” can happen? Bad medicine can be cho-
sen? How to avoid it?
Marietta:
I do agree. With my own material I am very choosy as to whom I show it
to, and whom I listen to in what way. And I always take into consideration
their taste, personality, professional background, experience, attitude, pas-
sion etcetera. How to avoid it? Writer/directors (and producers, commission-
ers and so on) should be very attentive and critical about the true authority
and craftsmanship of script consultants.
Petr:
Is there any sure method of how to understand how to help the text?
Marietta:
There is no sure method. The most efficient way for me to move into the
process is curiosity.
Petr:
Is there any system for how to go through the text and understand what is
strong, what is weak, where the real theme is, the real heart of the project?
Marietta:
There are of course methods that one uses. Out of the dramatically ori-
ented, trained and structured section of my brain-bank, I design instinctively:
126
for each project there emerges a form of special strategy, based on the type of
problems that are inherent in it, and based on the experience and attitude of
the writer. You can’t just apply a set of rules and throw them out, or imply that
there are preconceived “solutions” or methods that work on anything.
Based on the analysis of the project, I use dramatically relevant questions

in regards to theme, character, urgency, personal connections etc. I never sit
with a “form” in my hand. But of course, before reaching that state one must
actively learn something… And then - passionately and continuously - culti-
vate an approach to working with stories and film.
Petr:
Don’t you think that the Script&Pitch sessions are short, that the work is
not as serious as it could be?
Marietta:
In Script&Pitch the strength is, among many other things, the long period
over which it stretches, nine months (plus Alumni). The sessions are intended
to spark hours of work from the writers, work that they must do on their own,
in their gloomy solitude. A session should not, in my opinion, exhaust the
writer; it should energize the writer, and create a desire for them to run back
to the drawing board.
Check up on the progress is done through Skype-sessions. Before the next

sessions, the writers are supposed to work very hard on producing new mate-
rial. They are also encouraged to use the story editor trainee, and their fellow
writers if needed. If new work is then in fact delivered, the sessions are ex-
tremely useful.
From my perspective I really see the progress during this nine-month pe-
riod. Having said that - if the writer has not understood that most of the work
needs to be done by them, there can be a problem. The sessions don’t make
the writers’ work. The writers can use the others in the group and the tutor for
their own purposes and needs.
Then, the pitching sessions are inherently hard for most writers, so just
that we do so many in so many different forms, to a number of different fo-
rums is amazing! I’ve seen terrified writers develop into well-versed and re-
laxed front-line figures for their well deserving projects.
Petr:
Usually, when you work with young people and students, the theme is very
127
badly communicated. Sometimes, everything is pretty unconscious; badly

translated into scenes, into situations.
Do you need to meet the author in order to understand what he wants to
really speak about?
Marietta:
First of all, this happens not only to beginner writers, it is part of the na-
ture of scriptwriting. Secondly, I can probably read between the lines what it
is “about”. But it is the writer that needs to become aware of what she/he
is doing, in order to be able to do the work. So the answer would be yes. It is
crucial.
Petr:
Do you need to know the person in order to have the key for his work?
Marietta:
Not at all, you get to know them as writers in the process and sometimes
you get to know other sides too. But the main aim is: this script, this story,
this film, through this writer/director at this moment in time. But then again,
since it takes time to create trust and discovering artistic bonds, working
again with the same people can of course be extremely rewarding and fruitful,
as it deepens the exploration and the artistic process.
Questions from Writer/Director Marta Parlatore:
Marta:
On which basis do you pick the projects to work on? What does an idea have
to have to interest you?

Marietta:
Well. Often I don’t pick the projects myself, they are offered to me. But of
course there are ideas that interest you more, on a personal level, and on a
professional level. Originality is key; that I feel the material has a freshness
and uniqueness to it; that I haven’t read (or seen) something similar last week
or last year.
I want to feel that there is emotion, connection, urgency. But also that the
creator of the material has worked on it, that it’s not sloppy or haphazard,
that there is obvious thought and hours involved. It’s also great if surprise or
discovery is part of the emotion I experience.
128
Marta:
Do you think a good editor should be able to work on any kind of script or
does personal taste matter for the process?
Marietta:
First of all, lets not call me an editor. I’d prefer it to be counselling, consult-
ing or creativity person or whatever… editor is another kind of work.
A word on personal taste: I wrote my cinema studies thesis about art-and

orgy-films like Flaming Creatures, but at the same time I love Gone With the
Wind. So taste for me is obviously not in genre, but in something else. But
again, personality issues cannot be overlooked.
Marta:
Are there scripts, ideas, which you could not work on? Which ones and
why?
Marietta:
You mean like projects that are immoral or likewise appalling? Honestly, I’d
probably be intrigued by anything… But, its more like this: nowadays I try not
to say yes to projects that bore me, in which I already from the beginning see
no potential. In the past, for survival purposes, I have worked on projects that
I did not appreciate at all, and this is bad for everyone. Some projects match
better with you, just like lovers or friends.
Marta:
What kind of connection needs to be there between editor and writer to
make the process work at best?
Marietta:
I’d say building trust is definitely a key issue (see other section of text). It’s
crucial to take clear stands. The personal connection is sometimes natural,
fast and easy, even deep; sometimes it takes months and continues to be dif-
ficult. One has to find a professional attitude towards this. Patience is sister
to trust. And humour, of course, the ultimate survival kit… Respecting the
differences and borders, and recognizing each other’s unique areas of knowl-
edge is also very important.
By the way: I like this quote from one of my sessions:

Marietta: “We have two hours: what would you most want from me?”
The writer: - “Praise…?”
129
Marta:
How much of a psychologist (or even psychiatrist, sometimes) should an
editor be in the relationship with the writer?
Marietta:
It is interesting that this question comes up again... which also points to
the fact that writers are sensitive, manipulative, sincere and complicated
creatures. I try to focus on the project, on finding processes that don’t stop
the flow, that don’t create panic and writing blocks. Inventing new types of
documents, freeing the mind to any type of writing that keeps the process
going. I am strict with deadlines (necessary pressure) but open to new styles,
forms and initiatives. Anything that can create flow and creativity like music,
photography, art, research in all it forms is crucial for me; also creating and
maintaining energy and “desire” for the project, as time goes by.
Marta:
How do you deal with the writer’s emotions during the development
process?
Marietta:
Ah. This is where group dynamics are truly invaluable. The writer can find
her/his opposition where they need it, but they can also find comfort with
a fellow colleague who really supports the project. As writers we need both;
pain and love. And finding the way into a good story is very often about con-
fronting emotions you had no idea about; for the writer this can create confu-
sion and panic. Again: if the writer blocks, out of fear or immaturity towards
the project, a lot of negative things can happen. So moving forward forcefully
but respectfully is part of my strategy. The writer/director carries this golden
egg around, and at the right time s/he is ready to release it into the world.
Then all of us can see it, and together, interactively, we can discern what it
was, is and can be.
Marta:
Is the writer’s personality a tool with which you work? If so, how?
Marietta:
Of course - it’s a very exciting process, getting to know a person: their
values, their past, their secrets and all of it! Writers carry an amazing source
within them, as humans and as creators. The stories are naturally enriched
through moving closer to the personal, the private, the secret and the pain-
ful. It is a truly educational and entertaining process sometimes... Within
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any group personal bonds evolve, and also these personality combinations
can sometimes be crucial.
Marta:
Is script editing only about technique or is there an X-factor to the process?
If so, what do you think it could be?
Marietta:
I rely on all the techniques I have learned in the last 20 plus years (through
film school, cinema studies, “classical” dramaturgy methods, workshops,
mentors, formulas etc.) but: I do all I can to forget “method” in the moment.
It may seem haphazard and awkward, but there is an idea and thought be-
hind it, believe me…
The key thing here is preparation: I am always well prepared with intricate
notes etc. But actually, I rarely look at my notes in the sessions. I do of course
when there is a scene-to-scene session, when it’s more into details. (I have,
by the way, been in script meetings with Fund Commissioners where they
did not even have the script in the room. I find that extremely offensive!)
To prepare well in advance, and spend time thinking about the material is a
must for me. My only other X-factor is that I need to walk, to free my mind,
and I usually walk to wherever the session is, no matter what the weather
and/or circumstances.
Marta:
Is screenwriting only about writing or do you use tools that don’t involve
only pen and paper?
Marietta:
Screenwriting is pre-film. We must find ways to verbalize it, visualize
it (and sell it…). Sometimes when people tell me their stories I see it very
clearly, so then I try to approach it from that point of view, to come close to
how they presented it.
I believe a script CAN convey the film, I really do. I believe in the idea of
this. And I also believe that the written material can look VERY different,
depending on the location, who is going to direct, shoot, do music, play the
parts, etc.
I enjoy working with actors (in the writing process), since it is a speedy
way to get to the core of a lot of crucial elements. Character work done or not
done is immediately revealed here, and actors are trained to convey feelings,
so they search out both the holes and the useful stuff.
131
A few personal things I do are to advice writers to go walking in a forest

or other “nature” activities for half a day. Or if they are lonely already, to
find another person to tell it all to. When we do the workshops on locations
it is perfect. Taking another writer along on the beach for a 4-hour walk,
discussing each other’s projects. This physical, verbal activity is also really
good to release stress about pitching, and in finding ways to identify what
the story really is about.
I think film writers can learn a lot from artists: making “books” with
ideas, images, sound, clips etc. can help free up the path to seeing and
feeling the film.
Also, something I learned from TV is to work graphically, filling walls
with post-it notes, and writing on boards, using different colours for dif-
ferent lines, themes or characters, making it flexible and movable, testing
impact as you move stuff from one place to another. Seeing the whole film
on a wall is a gratifying feeling too. And this way you can choose which part
you want to work on which day, picking an area from the wall to focus on,
depending on the mood you are in.
Marta:
When do you consider your work as an editor to be done? What criteria
does a script need to fulfil to be “ready”?
Marietta:
Damn, that’s interesting. A script is, technically I guess, ready when (or
during) it is being shot. There are so many methods with regard to how you
work with rehearsals, changes etc., so this is a sliding definition. And then
again, the script is being put together again in the editing room. There is
in actuality a strong connection between editor, director, writer and script
consultant.
The hard part for the writer can be to know when the script is ready to be
read by whom. Testing your script on friends and allies in the business can
be a good idea, to get reactions before sending it to producers, funds and
other next step platforms.
But to conclude: the development work on a project would be done for

me when I see the film.
132
CONTRIBUTIONS
BY GUESTS
What do Scripts Sound Like?

An Introduction.
by Michel Schöpping
“The danger of present day cinema is that it can suffocate its subjects
by its very ability to represent them: it doesn’t possess the built-in escape
valves of ambiguity that painting, music, literature, radio drama and black-
and-white silent film automatically have, simply by virtue of their sensory
incompleteness - an incompleteness that engages the imagination of the
viewer as compensation for what is only evoked by the artist.
By comparison, film seems to be “all there” (it isn’t, but it seems to
be), and thus the responsibility of filmmakers is to find ways within that
completeness to refrain from achieving it. To that end, the metaphoric use
of sound is one of the most fruitful, flexible and inexpensive means: by
choosing carefully what to eliminate, and by adding sounds that, upon first
hearing them, seem to be somewhat at odds with the accompanying im-
age, the filmmaker can open up a perceptual vacuum into which the mind
of the audience must inevitably rush”.
Excerpt from Sound Design: The Dancing Shadow, Projections 4: Filmmakers on

Filmmaking. (London, Faber & Faber, 1995; p. 247)
Do we hear sounds as we are writing or reading a scenario or a script?

And how do they sound? Is it possible to start ‘designing’ the contours of
the sound - including music - during the development and writing process?
And, most importantly, how will thinking about sound at an early stage of
scriptwriting help in the development of the script, the characters and the
arrangement of its many elements?
To get an idea of an answer, we must clearly define the different ele-

ments of sound, especially those used in film. It is pretty well agreed upon
to divide sound in film into ‘The Four Elements’ (ref. Michel Chion):
- Dialogue, Speech
- (Synchronous) Sounds
135
- Music
- Silence
To get an understanding of the use of these sounds, we must first under-

stand how we ‘Listen’. I deliberately use the word ‘listen’ instead of ‘hear-
ing’. Hearing refers to the physical mechanism of not being deaf. It concerns
the ear, the hearing nerve and the way the brain receives and handles the
neural impulses.
‘Listening’ is about the way we perceive sounds.
It is about attention and psychology.
We can describe the Four Ways of Listening as:

- Causal Listening
- Semantic Listening
- Reduced Listening
- Iconographical Listening
Causal Listening:
An invitation to causal listening is often to be found in scripts. By de-
scribing sound in a causal way, we know the source. ‘A door creaks’, ‘a car
is passing by’, ‘a dog is barking’, etc.. We also often get information about
size, distance and gender: ‘a little girl is crying’, ‘the man has a dark voice’,
‘a huge truck is passing’.
Semantic Listening:
Semantic listening refers to language or ‘code’ that is carried by the sound.
The most obvious example of semantics in scripts is the dialogue. When we
hear dialogue, we automatically give our attention to the meaning of the
words and sentences. Semantic and causal listening are most of the time
closely connected. We do not only listen to what is being said, but also to
how it is said. These causal aspects of dialogue are less to be found in scripts,
but will help character development and in the end the actors and DOP a lot.
Reduced Listening:
In reduced listening it is not about the meaning or the cause of a sound,
but especially about the internal, esthetical and emotional value of a spe-
cific sound. It is hard to talk about sound itself; we tend to speak about
source and semantic meaning. Strange, because we are listening in a re-
duced way all day to understand, feel and interpret our world. We imme-
diately feel the difference between ‘a crying baby’ and ‘a weeping baby’.
136
We do not speak about ‘these beautiful violins’ but about the ‘touching
music’. This kind of listening is too seldom found in scripts.
Iconographical Listening:
The iconographical way of listening is always present in film, but not
too often in scripts. Sound does not only gets it’s meaning by its cause,
semantics or reduced values, but very often by the image, the sign they
provoke. Clear examples are ‘a car horn’, ‘an alarm bell’, ‘a car crash’, ‘a fight-
ing couple’ etc.
The Four Elements:
Speech, Dialogue:
We divide speech into five categories:

- Dialogue
- Voice-Over
- Talking People
- Voice of the Mind
- Emanation Speech
Dialogue:
Almost every script is loaded with the human voice. The primary use
of dialogue seems to be a semantic one. The meaning of the dialogue is
‘coded’ in words, language.
Another use of speech could be indicated as a ‘causal’ use. The mean-
ing of the message is not primarily in the semantic coded meaning, but in
the ‘way’ the words are spoken. Most writers use ‘causal’ speech as well.
Indications like ‘shouting’, ‘whispering’, etc.
Voice-Over:
Too often reduced to only being good for TV, news items and the like.
That is a pity, because we have so many strong examples of an exciting
use of this non-diegetic element in films by for example Coppola, the Coen
brothers, Kubrick, Tarantino, Scorsese, and others. It can be a driving force
or element from the ‘outside’.
Talking People:
Doesn’t need a lot of explanation. It can have semantic aspects, but the
real interesting use can be found in its creative power to provoke an atmos-
137
phere: a crowded bar, a playground, an office at a newspaper and so on.
Voice of the Mind:

Subjective internal sounds; in this way we are able to give information
and ‘play’ with time.
Emanation Speech:
Is causal speech - there is no (understandable) language. Emanation
speech is often used in animation (e.g. La Linea).
(Synchronous) Sounds:
These are divided into six groups:
- Sound Environment
- Atmosphere
- Habitat
- Species
- Internal Sound
- ‘On the air’ Sound
Sound Environment:
Examples are: city hum, birds, a sea far away. These sounds try to create
a certain feeling in an environment.
Atmosphere:
General sounds with small dynamics. Are there without being noticed,
but are always felt.
Habitat:
The typical sound of a certain place. Very often more specific and strong
in order to give an indication about that place. ‘Industrial sounds’ and ‘har-
bour’ are good examples.
Species:
Sounds of people and animals as an indication of ‘being there’; never (or
seldom) with a semantic meaning.
Internal Sound:
Sounds that are connected to an internal state of a character (physical
138
and mental), can be divided into:

Objective internal, when it is mostly physical sounds without a semantic
meaning, like ‘heavy breathing’, ‘heart beat’ etc.
Subjective internal, when it is, for example, ‘internal voices’, ‘internal
memories’, telling us something about a state of mind.
‘On the air’ Sound:

Every sound that is being ‘broadcasted’, such as telephones, radio, TV
and intercom etc.. It is generally used in film in two forms, which tell us
something about the source:
First source (CD quality) – zoomed in on the source. We don’t hear room
acoustics and are confronted directly and closely to the source (e.g. source
or pit music developing into score).
Last source (Bad radio) - the acoustical environment is part of the qual-
ity. It will give us a feeling of the acoustical and/or emotional space.
Music:
Sound is emotion, and music is a sublimation of this emotion. Walther

Murch referred to music as the anabolic steroid of film. It is not a very com-
mon practise to write, or describe music in the script, especially not the pit
or non-diegetic film music. Screen music should be part of the script to let
it be part of the scene. Music can be composed for film, to fit the needs
of the film. Using existing music can be interesting as well, because of its
iconographical aspects. Here are three categories of music:
- Pit Music (film music/non-diegetic)
- Screen Music (source music, set music/diegetic)
- Over Borders (diegetic/non-diegetic):
- Pit Music (film music/non-diegetic):

All pit music is non-diegetic, never recognisable by the characters. It is a
manipulation of the viewer by the director. It can help a lot in plot - and
character development to have at least indications of pit music in the
script.
- Screen Music (source music, set music/diegetic):

Screen music could be everything that is being played in the space of the
action: musicians or actors playing music on or off-screen, radio, TV or a
cd playing. To make it part of the scene (dramaturgy, decoupage, tempo,
139
rhythm, acting etc.), it is very advisable to include clear indications of

screen music in the script.
- Over Borders (diegetic/non-diegetic):

Music can easily cross the diegetic-non-diegetic borders. An actor sings
in sync with the film music (Punch Drunk Love); screen-music transforms
into film music (Apocalypse Now). Music can freely move between the
diegetic and non-diegetic space and thus invoke great emotional and
dramatic effects. To make use of this effect, the music should be in the
script in a very distinctive manner.
Silence:
Since the existence of ‘film sound’, silence must be considered as a

sound element, which can have a huge dramatic impact. We experience
silence as something that ‘should be there’, since it is in our world all the
time. The silent film was in fact ‘deaf’ (ref. Michel Chion). It had no ears for
the emotions of the character. The image of someone crying loud had no
meaning at all. With the introduction of sound, we can listen to the emo-
tions of the characters.
Leaving obvious sound out of the sound track, will give meaning to the
image. There are three different types of silences:
- Natural Silence
- Unnatural Silence
- Technical Silence
Natural Silence:
A quiet environment will give a natural silent background for an intimate
conversation.
Unnatural Silence:
Taking away the sound of a busy environment will give an extra dramatic
impact to the silence. It can give us the opportunity to ‘enter into the head
and thoughts’ of our film character.
Technical Silence:
Taking all sound out will create a technical silence. Sound equipment
nowadays is so good that we can really experience the complete silence.
It will invoke a direct confrontation of the viewer with herself.
140
The Use of These Elements in Film:
All these elements can be used in different ways. In film, visible space
is ‘bordered’ by the well-chosen frame-borders. These borders do not give
any limitation to the sound. In contrary, they will give extra dramatic and
emotional opportunities to the filmmaker in creating and manipulating an
emotional and dramatic sound environment. It is wise to include this ‘there
and now’ space in the script, because it will enhance the dramatic value of
the scene and will be of help to crew and cast. Three ‘appearances’ of sound
can be distinguished, more or less directly connected to the image:
- In the Frame/Onscreen (here and now)

- Outside the Frame/Off-screen (there and now)
- Non-diegetic (somewhere and ‘ever’)
In the Frame/Onscreen (here and now):

Elements onscreen can be heard. They move and make sound and will
give us a feeling of synchronicity. It will help to make us feel the scene as
being ‘real’ or ‘true’.
Outside the Frame/Off-screen (there and now):

The only difference between onscreen and off-screen sound is the vis-
ibility. When we close our eyes everything seems to be in one space and
strongly connected. Together with the image off-screen sounds can help
the dramaturgy, attract attention, make us curious (to the source of the
sound) or just create an atmosphere.
Non-diegetic (somewhere and ‘ever’):

Film is, as we know, a play with space and time. In general, the image
will define the space, simply by framing it. Sound is time. It can only exist
through motion in time, in the fictive world of cinema. It can easily cross
the borders of the film-reality to another universe, that of cinema. Both
worlds can easily become synchronous in an emotional and dramatic way.
Film music is an easy to understand example of this use of sound. The
non-diegetic use of sound can help a lot in creating the fictional world with
the illusion of (an at least emotional) reality. Lynch, Haneke, van Sant and
others are known for their creative use of all forms of sound.
Sound in the Script and the Sound Concept:
(Almost) every film will make use of realistic sounds. The way they ap-
pear in the final mix and the emotional and dramatic impact they have will
141
differ a lot. The only way the sound-mixer and boom-operator can collect
these sounds in an effective way is to understand the script really well. The
only way to get to really understanding the script is to include sound. When
sound is very well implemented in the script it will be extremely helpful for
the DOP, the sound dept., actors, the set designer, the editor and everyone
involved in transforming the script into images and sound: because sound
defines ‘time’ in a script better, and adds ‘space’, deepening and widening
the visual and framed world of the universe about to be created.
At times it seems hard to ‘write sound’. There are some handles to it,
however:
- Give your characters ears

- Give your characters minds, emotions and memories
- Give your characters sound (shoes, clothes, wooden leg etc.)
- Try to think of a (sound) environment where ‘something can happen’
- Try to think of off-screen sounds that your characters can react on
- Try to create ‘Space for Sound’, since sound needs time to tell its story,
provoke the emotion
- Try to create ‘Space for Sound’ in the minds of your characters. Continu-
ous dialogue, conversation or other semantic or causal sounds will make
it difficult to get into the characters’ head or mind
Try to remember that you

“- can open up a perceptual vacuum into which the mind of the audience
must inevitably rush.”
Listen carefully. Together with the image and the editing, you will be
creating cinema.
Used and interesting literature to explore the world of sound further:
Reader, Dutch Film Academy, first year, Ben Zijlstra, 2008

Audio Vision, Michel Chion, 1994
The Voice of Cinema, Michel Chion, 1999
Music & the Mind, Paul Robertson, 1996
The Conversations, Ondaatje / Walter Murch, 2004
In the Blink of an Eye, Walter Murch, 2003
Sound Design, David Sonnenschein, 2002
Silent Film Sound, Rick Altman, 2004
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The Dawn of the Independent Producer?

by Thomas Mai
Introduction by the editor:
For the past couple of years the notion of writers thinking and becoming
more entrepreneurial in way of behaving as or even being their own produc-
ers, thus keeping a bigger or a full share of the rights to their material, has
gained strength.
For example at the 4-year old Screenwriter’s Festival (SWF) in Chelten-

ham, UK, where this ‘idea’ is promoted strongly by its director, David Pear-
son, who in an article during this year’s Cannes-festival said:
“As the digital revolution impacts on distribution and traditional produc-
tion funding models break down, writers’ true value could be recognised -
both for a new-found spirit of enterprise and for their ability to be lightning
rods for the audience’s psyche”. And William Nicholson, screenwriter and
SWF regular, is (even more) optimistic: “It could be a period of creative de-
velopment, maybe a new golden age for scripts”.1
This is indeed worth bringing some attention to and as much as insights

on script writing and editing are important and inspiring, the real world sur-
rounding our stories, the world in which they are to be realized, is equally
so. One especially exciting area is the concrete link to the audience: the dis-
tribution, which represents the windows through which the audience will
be able to experience our films.
These windows are crumbling, expanding, changing and the limitations
of when you are allowed to present your film in which window (theatrical,
DVD, pay-tv, online/VoD etc.) are being challenged, not only by the growing
number of VoD-platforms, but also by filmmakers, distributors and sales
agents who try new ways to reach the audience.
We see more and more examples of films premiering on more than one
platform, paving the way towards a broader choice of sales - and distribu-
1
published in Screen, May 14th 2009, David Pearson: Screenwriters who are helping themselves.
143
tion strategies for individual projects and their specific needs. As the first
essay in this edition states: “Telling a story means to tell it to someone”
and therefore we have asked experienced sales agent Thomas Mai to write
about this new audience landscape - albeit from a producer’s perspective,
his insights are aimed equally at writers and directors:
With online digital distribution, cinema on demand and disc on demand,

the whole way of doing film business has changed dramatically and the
winner is the independent producer.
The Internet has removed the need for expensive middlemen in all other
businesses on the planet. For the film business that means that film pro-
ducers can get one step closer to the consumers in terms of financing, mar-
keting, sales and feedback, removing an expensive link in the food chain.
Gone are exclusivity, territories and bad accounting, say hello to non-
exclusivity, global market and transparent accounting.
In my 14 years of selling hundreds of feature films around the world I

have seen the film business change dramatically. About 10 years ago dur-
ing the Neue Market in Germany you would have more buyers than films,
resulting in higher prices, bidding wars and lots of pre-sales. Today the fes-
tivals are filled with loads of films (58 world premieres in Toronto alone),
5000 films submitted to Berlin, but very few buyers. 10 years ago it was
easy to sell an average film, today it is hard to sell a good film. 10 years ago
you would have 8 Korean companies visit your booth in MIFED competing
to buy your film, today you should be thrilled if any buyers show up to your
screening. So what happened?
DVD-sales, which has always been the backbone for distributors, is dis-
appearing.
TV-sales, which used to be a major financial factor for distributors, is
also declining. Why? There are more and more TV channels, which normally
should result in more competition, but because each TV channel is cater-
ing to a smaller and smaller segment in the marketplace their budgets are
getting smaller and smaller as well. Pay TV is in steady decline as con-
sumers are looking to the net for their entertainment needs, leaving fewer
subscribers to pay for the bill and therefore fewer money to buy films for.
144
The local distributor is in other words in trouble and therefore they are pay-
ing less. The bad news is that the distributor still wants the same 10 - 15
year exclusivity for all rights but for a next to nothing MG. Today you are
getting offered 10% of the MG that you were offered 10 years ago for a
similar film. I completely understand the distributor, but from a sales point
of view it doesn’t make any financial sense to give away exclusivity and all
rights in today’s world.
The alternative is to do it yourself as a producer or go to someone who

can help you take the film out in the world digitally. The net is filled with
hundreds of online platforms that can sell your film directly to the con-
sumer bypassing a traditional distributor (to name but a few iTunes, Ama-
zon, Jaman etc.; by the end of 2007, 258 VOD-platforms existed in over 40
countries and the market evolves rapidly).
The good news is that once your film is up, it stays up 24/7/365 and
unlike the theater and your local DVD store the film will not be removed
because it doesn’t perform. You are removed after the first weekend at
the box office if the numbers are not ok and the average local DVD store
only has 1000 films on their shelves leaving no shelf space for the smaller
films.
Online there is no age for a film. When I was at TrustNordisk we upload-
ed Danish films that were 15 years old and they did really well and there was
no way you were able to find the film in any video store.
Today, due to social media tools like Facebook, MySpace, Twitter etc. it
is possible to advertise your films to millions of consumers directly, not to
mention the more than thousands of trailer/video places online. YouTube
streams 1 billion videos a day, yes a day. These numbers are staggering.
iTunes has - by their own estimates - 100 million costumers with credit
cards in their iTunes store. In 5 years they have sold 8 billion songs and are
now the biggest music seller in the world. An iTunes store for film is avail-
able in a few countries like the US and UK, but will soon open in the rest of
the world.
Amazon has developed a complete cost effective way of selling DVDs

through their CreateSpace/disc on demand concept. Amazon takes a dig-
ital file of your film and when a consumer buys the film they burn the DVD
from the film, label it and ship it the same day eliminating traditional in-
ventory/storage. The good news is that it doesn’t matter if you are selling 2
films a month or 10.000 a month, the model still works. These options were
not available just 5 years ago for the independent producer.
145
So how much money can you make online? That of course depends on
the film, language, cast, theme, story and territorial availability, but on
average, if done right, you should make about $125 a month on each dig-
ital platform online. While this number is very small if you only go to 2
platforms, it can become serious money if you go to 100 platforms. That
is a cool $12.500 a month every month. Over time this can become serious
money.
Yes, it does take a lot of time and effort to get the film out on 100 plat-
forms and yes, there are also middlemen that take a cut. There are even
middlemen who sell it to other middlemen leaving less for producers. There
are aggregators, sales agents, platforms, set-up boxes, advertised VoD,
transaction VoD and so much more.
Yes, it is a whole new world, but none the less a very exciting world, a
world where a producer can retain all ownership rights to their own films
and still make money selling them online. Are there problems, concerns
and things to look out for? Yes, but look at the possibilities as opposed to
the limitations!
In the old world of selling we would rarely get a report from a distributor.
In 90% of the cases we would get no report at all, leaving us to second guess
how a film was doing in a certain territory, but that was ok, because we
would get a nice MG up front. In the online world accounting is much more
transparent because the producer is paid a share (between 50% - 70%) of
the first dollar. All costs are taken from the platform’s share. These are
the best splits a producer has ever seen and there is nothing to deduct. In
the old world we could never check if the distributor had really printed 300
posters or if the marketing campaign truly cost what they told it cost and
what about that discount they got from the ad company? It was a matter
of faith and then the nice MG of course helped us believe in the project.
This article is not meant to bash distributors, some of my best friends

are distributors, but it is important to highlight the major shift in the busi-
ness to understand the options available.
Being an old producer myself with 4 titles under my belt I truly believe
this is the best time to be a producer. The Internet has democratized the
options for everyone. There are no more gatekeepers. In the old day if the 8
buyers in one territory said no, there was nothing that you could do. Today
you don’t need a No for an answer, you can just go straight to the consum-
ers through the Internet.
146
Cost efficiency is the key for online distribution. In the old world it was
too expensive to take a film to Germany if there were only 5.000 potential
consumers, but online it all adds up. In the old world you made most of
your money from a few sources, today you will make a little money, but
from a lot of different sources.
Below a few random links to some of the available VoD-platforms:

- http://www.theauteurs.com/
- http://indieflix.com/
- http://www.jaman.com/
- http://www.amazon.com/gp/video/ontv/start
- http://www.netflix.com/Default
- http://www.artevod.com/Accueil.html
147
Contact information:
Script&Pitch Workshops
c/o TorinoFilmLab – Cineporto
via Cagliari 42 - 10153 Torino - Italy
Tel. +39 011 237 9220
[email protected]
Script&Pitch Workshops is kindly supported by:

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150 mm 11 mm 150 mm

Script & pitch

Script & pitch

One of our aims is to share our passion for stories

Edited by Valeria Richter, Denmark

Cover design by Lene Nørgaard, Propel Design, Denmark

All rights reserved.

© The lectures remain copyright of their individual authors.

Printed and bound in Italy by

Thanks to our new and close collaboration with the TorinoFilmLab we

This book is especially for the participants; we hope it captures some of

About Script&Pitch Workshops

In 2009 Script&Pitch entered a close collaboration with TorinoFilmLab,

By participating in Script&Pitch participants not only gain this extra

Workshops & Alumni meeting

Who can apply?

Read more on our website: www.scriptpitchworkshops.com

Antoine Le Bos is a French Screenwriter and Script Consultant, with more

Marietta von Hausswolff von Baumgarten

Marietta von Hausswolff von Baumgarten is a Swedish Screenwriter

Franz Rodenkirchen (*1963) is an international Story Editor and Tu-

Gino Ventriglia is a Script Consultant at the Development Office of Isti-

Atso Pärnänen likes to define himself “a beginner, in more ways than

Thomas Mai is an international, very experienced Film Sales Agent, who

After serving as the Founding Chair of Temple University’s Department

Michel started his career as a Film Music Composer. He studied musi-

A Question of the Audience

Telling a story means to tell it to someone. Be it a single person or a

Film being a (mass-)medium, we find it self-evident that there shall be

Besides this rather unknowable audience, which usually brings more

have leverage when pressuring film authors to comply with an assumed

So if we do take audience as the addressee of an act of narration, one

We can therefore conclude that the audience is to be considered taboo

Umberto Eco has published several influential works on the co-oper-

Accordingly I wouldn’t have to mention in my above example, that I

As an author, one cannot only rely on the active co-operation of the

If a text, as Umberto Eco writes, is that “lazy machine”, which relies on

As we can clearly see in this example, every element acquires meaning

of the same narrative as being related to one another. If we changed For-

How much this practically automatic co-operation of the audience in

causal construction. What’s more, flashbacks break up the chronological

We need to assume the aforementioned, unavoidable forms of audience

Here we already move into another interesting aspect of the writing

Idea, Concept, Soggetto*

Thus it is, I believe, of great importance to understand which particular

‘(…) a film can be born of an insignificant detail, like the impression

Thus Federico Fellini, in his Fare un film, answered the interviewer’s

The cues and prompts, the original sources of inspiration may be of

The concept is in fact a combination of various ideas (which may or

In the case of Eco’s novel the concept identification process is interest-

As yet nothing is known of the tone, theme, viewpoint, character of

The increasingly widespread practice, also in Europe, of pitching, i.e.

Formulating a pitch is simply a technique to present a film or TV project

When applied to projects for TV-series - excluding the para-cinemato-

In general, inventing the concept of a TV-series includes in the organisa-

In the ‘bibles’ of series it is precisely the requisite of repetition/variation

At this point let me slip in a brief flashback, re-evoking a particular mi-

What the high concept is still taken to imply is a plot-oriented film, or

As already pointed out at the beginning of these pages, in the Anglo-