{"id":1237,"date":"2021-05-22T11:21:18","date_gmt":"2021-05-22T18:21:18","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/development.moviemaker.com\/?p=2769"},"modified":"2023-01-31T05:22:54","modified_gmt":"2023-01-31T13:22:54","slug":"things-ive-learned-as-a-moviemaker-27","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.moviemaker.com\/things-ive-learned-as-a-moviemaker-27\/","title":{"rendered":"Things I&#8217;ve Learned as a Moviemaker"},"content":{"rendered":"<table width=\"100\" border=\"0\" align=\"right\" cellpadding=\"5\" cellspacing=\"0\">\n<tr>\n<td><img loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" src=\"\/hop\/issues\/40\/images\/screenwriting2.jpg\" width=\"300\" height=\"228\" border=\"1\" alt=\"Clive Owen\" \/><\/td>\n<\/tr>\n<tr>\n<td class=\"caption\">Clive Owen stars in Spike Lee&#8217;s <em>Inside Man<\/em>.<\/td>\n<\/tr>\n<\/table>\n<p>            <span class=\"text\">1. People make it to the top of this business because they refuse to compromise or settle for less than the best finished product.<\/span><\/p>\n<p class=\"text\"> 2. Even more people fail in this business for the same reason.<\/p>\n<p class=\"text\"> 3. If you come up with a great commercial hook for a film, it still helps to write a great story.<\/p>\n<p class=\"text\"> 4. If you come up with a great story, it still helps to have a great commercial hook.<\/p>\n<p class=\"text\"> 5. Don&#8217;t start out thinking you have to fill 120 pages. (I constantly ignore this rule.) Write the story. If you do it properly, you&#8217;ll go over 120 pages and will need to make choices about what to trim or cut.<\/p>\n<p class=\"text\"> 6. If the main purpose of a scene is to establish that Joe is the biggest drug dealer in the city, don&#8217;t use the words &ldquo;biggest,&rdquo; &ldquo;drug,&rdquo; &ldquo;dealer&rdquo; or &ldquo;city.&rdquo; Joe and the other guy already know this fact, so they wouldn&#8217;t have to say it. Just try to imagine what they actually would talk about. (It&#8217;s okay to use the word Joe.)<\/p>\n<p class=\"text\"> 7. Don&#8217;t worry about fancy transitions, camera angles, etc. unless it&#8217;s crucial to the purpose of the scene. You&#8217;re trying to sell a script, not film a movie. The director will do that.<\/p>\n<p class=\"text\"> 8. Even if you somehow manage to write the world&#8217;s greatest screenplay, remember that you can&#8217;t make a movie all alone. You still need actors, producers and a director. And they get to have their input. When you sell your house, you don&#8217;t tell the new owners where to put the couch.<\/p>","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Clive Owen stars in Spike Lee&#8217;s Inside Man. 1. People make it to the top of this business because they [&hellip;]","protected":false},"author":1641,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"rank_math_lock_modified_date":false,"disable_comments":false,"tpd_featured_posts_arr":"","hide_featured_img_single_post":false,"msn_featured_video":[],"_msn_custom_title":"","footnotes":""},"categories":[89],"tags":[],"feeds":[],"class_list":["post-1237","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-articles-editing"],"primary_category":{"term_id":89,"name":"Articles - Editing","slug":"articles-editing","taxonomy":"category","url":"https:\/\/www.moviemaker.com\/category\/archives\/moviemaking\/editing\/articles-editing\/"},"thumbnail":false,"fimg_url_thumb":false,"featured_img_medium":false,"author_name":"Tim Molloy","author_avatar":"https:\/\/www.moviemaker.com\/cdn-cgi\/image\/width=100,height=100,fit=crop,quality=80,format=auto,onerror=redirect,metadata=none\/wp-content\/uploads\/2020\/08\/IMG_1078.jpg","author_link":"https:\/\/www.moviemaker.com\/author\/tim-molloy\/","post_categories":["Articles - Editing"],"parsely":{"version":"1.1.0","meta":{"@context":"https:\/\/schema.org","@type":"NewsArticle","headline":"Things I&#8217;ve Learned as a Moviemaker","url":"http:\/\/www.moviemaker.com\/things-ive-learned-as-a-moviemaker-27\/","mainEntityOfPage":{"@type":"WebPage","@id":"http:\/\/www.moviemaker.com\/things-ive-learned-as-a-moviemaker-27\/"},"thumbnailUrl":"","image":{"@type":"ImageObject","url":""},"articleSection":"Articles - Editing","author":[{"@type":"Person","name":"Tim Molloy"}],"creator":["Tim Molloy"],"publisher":{"@type":"Organization","name":"MovieMaker Magazine","logo":"https:\/\/www.moviemaker.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2023\/01\/mm_site_logo-2.svg"},"keywords":[],"dateCreated":"2021-05-22T18:21:18Z","datePublished":"2021-05-22T18:21:18Z","dateModified":"2023-01-31T13:22:54Z"},"rendered":"<script type=\"application\/ld+json\">{\"@context\":\"https:\\\/\\\/schema.org\",\"@type\":\"NewsArticle\",\"headline\":\"Things I&#8217;ve Learned as a Moviemaker\",\"url\":\"http:\\\/\\\/www.moviemaker.com\\\/things-ive-learned-as-a-moviemaker-27\\\/\",\"mainEntityOfPage\":{\"@type\":\"WebPage\",\"@id\":\"http:\\\/\\\/www.moviemaker.com\\\/things-ive-learned-as-a-moviemaker-27\\\/\"},\"thumbnailUrl\":\"\",\"image\":{\"@type\":\"ImageObject\",\"url\":\"\"},\"articleSection\":\"Articles - Editing\",\"author\":[{\"@type\":\"Person\",\"name\":\"Tim Molloy\"}],\"creator\":[\"Tim Molloy\"],\"publisher\":{\"@type\":\"Organization\",\"name\":\"MovieMaker Magazine\",\"logo\":\"https:\\\/\\\/www.moviemaker.com\\\/wp-content\\\/uploads\\\/2023\\\/01\\\/mm_site_logo-2.svg\"},\"keywords\":[],\"dateCreated\":\"2021-05-22T18:21:18Z\",\"datePublished\":\"2021-05-22T18:21:18Z\",\"dateModified\":\"2023-01-31T13:22:54Z\"}<\/script>","tracker_url":"https:\/\/cdn.parsely.com\/keys\/moviemaker.com\/p.js"},"amp_enabled":true,"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.moviemaker.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1237"}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.moviemaker.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.moviemaker.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.moviemaker.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1641"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.moviemaker.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=1237"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.moviemaker.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1237\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.moviemaker.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=1237"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.moviemaker.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=1237"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.moviemaker.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=1237"},{"taxonomy":"feeds","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.moviemaker.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/feeds?post=1237"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}