How to format your screenplay

`1. Introduction` `2. Before you begin - Setting up the page` `3. Putting your screenplay on the page` `4. How to direct your screenplay` `5. Eight hints` A general criticism which arose at the Brazilian Sundance Laboratory in 1996 was the lack of uniformity in formatting. Only two of the eight screenplays presented could be considered acceptable by American standards. If in the United States the amount of attention given to formatting is almost certainly exaggerated, here in Brazil an "every man for himself" attitude reigns. To a certain extent standardizing screenplays restricts the writer, firstly because he has to learn specific new rules, but also because the standard format for speculation screenplays - so-called Master Scenes - deprives the writer of certain resources (like, for example, camera angles, scene cuts, etc.). However the advantages doubly reward these small disadvantages: there are very few rules the reader starts reading a visually familiar script, and doesn’t have to spend 5 to 10 pages getting used to some unique individual style. it is the only way of readily having an idea of the film’s length (one page in Master Scenes is, on average, 1 minute of film time), which is fundamental so that not only the reader but the writer gets a good idea of rhythm. obeying these rules forces the screenwriter to dedicate himself to the movie’s plot and drama. Concerns about camera angles, when they aren’t absolutely necessary for the narrative, only distract the screenwriter from his main purpose: that of telling a story. they help to avoid another common mistake amongst the screenplays presented to the Sundance Lab: that of including invisible facts in the action. For example: "A car goes down a road towards Rio de Janeiro. Inside, a group of musicians, whose singer is a dark short-haired man, like a Third World punk. It is Jorge Salgado, who is going to Rio to do two free concerts on Ipanema beach." The spectator, merely seeing a car driving along a road, will scarcely be able to grasp the description and simile in the second sentence, much less all the information in the third. Writing in Master Scenes forces the writer to seek way of showing these facts, if they are absolutely necessary for the plot - and if not, to discard them. The worst howler of this sort that I have come across (so far) was the following sentence, which comes from a screenplay I recently translated (character name changed): "Gerald puts on his hat, makes an imperceptible movement of the head and leaves..." If, one day, any reader recognizes which film this is from by the actor’s imperceptible movement, please get in touch with me and I’ll be more than pleased to buy lunch. Rising, then, to a suggestion by one of the Sundance supervisor/guests, I proudly present a short guide to Master Scenes.



Copyright © 1996-2000 by Hugo Moss All rights reserved