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This week's Answer:
The Perfect Moment
Sometimes my money, Charles. That is, when I use a dollar bill as a bookmarker (or scriptmarker,
as it were). I
guess you could say that, at that time, I actually have
money in my own script. Truthfully, I have discovered that, after reading and
evaluating so many screenplays, one has a tendency to
develop a personal technique, an approach, if you will.
(And I hope you will.)
I’ll tell you what usually happens when I’m
handed a screenplay.
(If it’s a messenger, I talk about the weather
very rapidly so that he’ll forget about the tip.)
The first thing I find myself doing (after
searching for any possible dollar bills) is flipping
through it and scanning the dialogue.
It’s the first telltale signifier whether the
script will be well written.
I’ll go to various pages and just take in a few
lines here and there.
If the dialogue seems to be flowing and
intriguing even out of context, then there is a
very good chance that the script will appeal to me and, in
my opinion (which is the only opinion I’ve got), has
merit. For
me, a script (and a film) works when the author has
“craftily crafted” a story that absorbs me emotionally
(whether it be a romantic comedy, thriller, biopic,
whatever genre) and gives me a perfectly-timed catharsis.
(Yes, I actually like to cry in movies and while I
read. It can be a problem, though. Many a screenwriter has called, complaining of how wrinkled
and watermarked their script is after I get through with
it. Between
you and me, I never let on that I’m that sensitive and
merely mention that there must have been a local shower
and a wannabe screenwriter-postman got a little curious.)
It takes skill to choreograph
everything to that Perfect Moment.
We all know it.
My first Perfect Moment happened, I believe, when
Old Yeller had to be shot.
The floodgates opened; it was tragically euphoric;
and I’ve been searching for that moment again all my
life. (Sounds
a lot like pubescent sexual exploration to me.
Ergo, I became a script consultant.
It was either that or a raving sex addict.) That Perfect Moment usually comes in the third act (It
normally depends upon enough story building and character
development.) I
have found that that moment is enhanced when there is an
emotional release and resolution (external and/or
internal) for the protagonist (and, very importantly, us)
while, at the same time, there is comparable thematic
resolution. At
that moment, everything comes together. It’s the end of the main character’s rainbow. (Everybody
in Hollywood calls it his or her arc, but I think it
should have lots of colors.
Which works quite well when you recall that a
character’s persona needs a lot of colors.
Maybe I’ll coin a new phrase, “character
rainbow,” for Variety and Hollywood Reporter!
But they’ll have to pay me excessively for my
cleverness. I
know. I’ll
demand that they send me scripts with dollar bills in
them.)
DcH
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