Script Culture and the American Screenplay

Script Culture and the American Screenplay PDF Author: Kevin Alexander Boon
Publisher: Wayne State University Press
ISBN: 0814335713
Category : Performing Arts
Languages : en
Pages : 242

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Book Description
By considering the screenplay as a literary object worthy of critical inquiry, this volume breaks new ground in film studies. Though the history of the screenplay is as long and rich as the history of film itself, critics and scholars have neglected it as a topic of serious research. Script Culture and the American Screenplay treats the screenplay as a literary work in its own right, presenting analyses of screenplays from a variety of frameworks, including feminism, Marxism, structuralism, philosophy, and psychology. In distancing the text of screenplays from the on-screen performance typically associated with them, Kevin Alexander Boon expands the scope of film studies into exciting new territory with this volume. Script Culture and the American Screenplay is divided into two parts. Part 1 provides a general background for screenplay studies, tracing the evolution of the screenplay from the early shot lists and continuities of George Méliès and Thomas Harper Ince to the more detailed narratives of contemporary works. Part 2 offers specific, primarily thematic, critical examinations of screenplays, along with discussions of the original screenplay and the screenplay adaptation. In all, Boon explains that screenplay criticism distinguishes itself from traditional film studies in three major ways. The primary focus of screenplay criticism is on the screenplay rather than the film, the focus of screenplay studies is on the screenwriter rather than the director, and screenplay criticism, like literary criticism, is written to illuminate a reader’s understanding of the text. Boon demonstrates that whether we are concerned with aesthetics and identifying rules for distinguishing the literary from the non-literary, or whether we align ourselves with more contemporary theories, which recognize texts as distinguishable in their inter-relationships and marked difference, screenplays constitute a rich cache of works worthy of critical examination. Film scholars as well as students of film, creative writing, and literary studies will appreciate this singular volume.

Four Screenplays

Four Screenplays PDF Author: Syd Field
Publisher: Delta
ISBN: 0307569527
Category : Performing Arts
Languages : en
Pages : 338

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Book Description
Yes, you can write a great screenplay. Let Syd Field show you how. “I based Like Water for Chocolate on what I learned in Syd's books. Before, I always felt structure imprisoned me, but what I learned was structure really freed me to focus on the story.”—Laura Esquivel Technology is transforming the art and craft of screenwriting. How does the writer find new ways to tell a story with pictures, to create a truly outstanding film? Syd Field shows what works, why, and how in four extraordinary films: Thelma & Louise, Terminator 2: Judgement Day, The Silence of the Lambs, and Dances with Wolves. Learn how: Callie Khouri, in her first movie script, Thelma & Louise, rewrote the rules for good road movies and played against type to create a new American classic. James Cameron, writer/director of Terminator 2: Judgement Day, created a sequel integrating spectacular special effects and a story line that transformed the Terminator, the quintessential killing machine, into a sympathetic character. This is how an action film is written. Ted Tally adapted Thomas Harris's chilling 350-page novel, The Silence of the Lambs, into a riveting 120-page script—a lesson in the art and craft of adapting novels into film. Michael Blake, author of Dances with Wolves, achieved every writer's dream as he translated his novel into an uncompromising film. Learn how he used transformation as a spiritual dynamic in this work of mythic sweep. Informative and utterly engrossing, Four Screenplays belongs in every writer's library, next to Syn Field's highly acclaimed companion volumes, Screenplay, The Screenwriter's Workbook, and Selling a Screenplay. “If I were writing screenplays . . . I would carry Syd Field around in my back pocket wherever I went.”—Steven Bochco, writer/producer/director, L.A. Law, Hill Street Blues

Short Film Screenwriting

Short Film Screenwriting PDF Author: Austin Bunn
Publisher: Bloomsbury Publishing USA
ISBN:
Category : Performing Arts
Languages : en
Pages : 425

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Book Description
Written by a Sundance alum and short filmmaker, this book combines the practical advice of a craft guide with a curated, diverse anthology, including revealing interviews with the writers and directors. Short Film Screenwriting demystifies the process of writing effective, emotionally involving short films and, for the first time, publishes the screenplays of some award-winning shorts, providing unfiltered access to the voice, vision, and approach of the filmmakers. A ground-breaking new addition to both film and creative writing instruction, this book treats short film screenwriting as a literary mode worthy of close examination and exploration to inspire screenwriters. The book is built around accessible craft concepts and story forms: narrative design, visualizing character, uncommon relationship, the 10-minute journey, perception shift, formal experiments and hybrid forms, and revision. Contemporary, award-winning film scripts from the Oscars, Sundance, SXSW, and beyond accompany chapters as case studies, along with interviews with the writers/filmmakers about the drafting and revision process, production, and release. Each of the films is accessible for screening online, with additional screenplays included in an online resource.

Screenwriting in a Digital Era

Screenwriting in a Digital Era PDF Author: Kathryn Millard
Publisher: Springer
ISBN: 1137319100
Category : Performing Arts
Languages : en
Pages : 338

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Book Description
Screenwriting in a Digital Era examines the practices of writing for the screen from early Hollywood to the new realism. Looking back to prehistories of the form, Kathryn Millard links screenwriting to visual and oral storytelling around the globe, and explores new methods of collaboration and authorship in the digital environment.

Rewrite Man

Rewrite Man PDF Author: Alison Macor
Publisher: University of Texas Press
ISBN: 0292759452
Category : Biography & Autobiography
Languages : en
Pages : 269

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Book Description
From Hallingdal to Houston -- Hollywood on the Colorado -- Breaking away -- Highway to the danger zone -- Hollywood gothic -- One hit after another -- Batmania -- The man Hollywood trusts -- Conclusion

Women Screenwriters

Women Screenwriters PDF Author: Jill Nelmes
Publisher: Springer
ISBN: 1137312378
Category : Performing Arts
Languages : en
Pages : 931

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Book Description
Women Screenwriters is a study of more than 300 female writers from 60 nations, from the first film scenarios produced in 1986 to the present day. Divided into six sections by continent, the entries give an overview of the history of women screenwriters in each country, as well as individual biographies of its most influential.

Faulkner's Hollywood Novels

Faulkner's Hollywood Novels PDF Author: Ben Robbins
Publisher: University of Virginia Press
ISBN: 0813951526
Category : Literary Criticism
Languages : en
Pages : 274

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Book Description
Tracing the influence of Faulkner’s screenwriting on his literary craft and depictions of women William Faulkner’s time as a Hollywood screenwriter has often been dismissed as little more than an intriguing interlude in the career of one of America’s greatest novelists. Consequently, it has not received the wide-ranging critical examination it deserves. In Faulkner’s Hollywood Novels, Ben Robbins provides an overdue thematic analysis by systematically tracing a dialogue of influence between Faulkner’s literary fiction and screenwriting over a period of two decades. Among numerous insights, Robbins’s work sheds valuable new light on Faulkner’s treatment of female characters, both in his novels and in the films to which he contributed. Drawing on extensive archival research, Robbins finds that Hollywood genre conventions and archetypes significantly influenced and reshaped Faulkner’s craft after his involvement in the studio system. His work in the film industry also produced a deep exploration of the gendered dynamics of collaborative labor, genre formulae, and cultural hierarchies that materialized in both his Hollywood screenplays and his experimental fiction.

Off the Page

Off the Page PDF Author: Daniel Bernardi
Publisher: Univ of California Press
ISBN: 0520961048
Category : Performing Arts
Languages : en
Pages : 320

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Book Description
Off the Page examines the business and craft of screenwriting in the era of media convergence. Daniel Bernardi and Julian Hoxter use the recent history of screenwriting labor coupled with close analysis of scripts in the context of the screenwriting paraindustry—from “how to write a winning script” books to screenwriting software—to explore the state of screenwriting today. They address the conglomerate studios making tentpole movies, expanded television, Indiewood, independent animation, microbudget scripting, the video games industry, and online content creation. Designed for students, producers, and writers who want to understand what studios want and why they want it, this book also examines how scripting is developing in the convergent media, beneath and beyond the Hollywood tentpole. By addressing specific genres across a wide range of media, this essential volume sets the standard for anyone in the expanded screenwriting industry and the scholars that study it.

Narrative Theory and Adaptation.

Narrative Theory and Adaptation. PDF Author: Jason Mittell
Publisher: Bloomsbury Publishing USA
ISBN: 1501308408
Category : Performing Arts
Languages : en
Pages : 151

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Book Description
Narrative Theory and Adaptation offers a concise introduction to narrative theory in jargon-free language and shows how this theory can be deployed to interpret Spike Jonze's critically acclaimed 2002 film Adaptation. Understanding narrative theory is crucial to make sense of the award-winning film Adaptation. The book explicates, in clear prose for beginners, four key facets important to the narrative theory of film: the distinction between practical vs. critical theory, the role of adaptation, the process of narrative comprehension, and notions of authorship. It then works to unlock Adaptation using these four keys in succession, considering how the film demands a theoretical understanding of the storytelling process. In using this unusual case study of a film, the author makes the case for the importance of narrative theory as a general perspective for filmmakers, critics, and viewers alike.

William Faulkner at Twentieth Century-Fox

William Faulkner at Twentieth Century-Fox PDF Author: William Faulkner
Publisher: Oxford University Press
ISBN: 0190274182
Category : Art
Languages : en
Pages : 969

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Book Description
The edition makes available for the first time and in one volume Faulkner's Fox screen writings. With its essays and annotations, it also makes a valuable contribution to recent scholarship across a number of fields, including screenplay studies and film and literature, as well as to the history of Twentieth Century-Fox during Hollywood's golden age.