So Far, So Good

I'm going to try again to log on here daily and give updates to my progress. I still can't manage to find the energy I used to have to get up, but since I started reading Save The Cat by Blake Snyder, I at least feel that my work is a little more streamlined.

I got all my scene headings in place today. I think there is a little more leg work that needs to be done before I write the scenes, but, I started this morning and am on my way. A lot less overhead, for now, than Jeff Kitchen's method, but I'm hoping to synthesize Snyder, Kitchen, Hauge, and Iglesias into a method for me to use to accomplish this screenplay.

Blake Snyder's Beat Sheet worked, though. It helped me trim down a lot of the stuff that would have made my screenplay, now titled, SHATTERED SILENCE (again retitling thanks to Snyder), a better novel than a screenplay. I also have a good logline (perks to Snyder and Iglesias for direction on this one): In a world ruled by the deaf majority, a framed detective hopes to clear his name of a murder he didn't commit.

Let's see how it does...

The Changing Face of War: Into the Fourth Generation - LIND

I found a really interesting article while researching the OODA loop and its associated realizations and usages.

The Changing Face of War: Into the Fourth Generation - LIND

Science Fiction Movies I Love

So, I’ve been asked by a few friends what my top ten science fiction movies would be. Here they are:

1. Inception

2. Dark City

3. Primer

4. The Matrix

5. Cypher

6. Blade Runner

7. Push

8. Moon

9. Tron

10. Star Wars (Original Trilogy) I only acknowledge three movies as Star Wars

Moving out of the top ten.

11. Paycheck

12. Dune (1984 David Lynch/Alan Smithee Extended Version)

13. Serenity

14. Tron: Legacy

15. Soldier

16. Terminator

17. Philidelphia Experiment

18. Iron Man

19. Pitch Black

20. Star Trek (2009)

Okay, that’s a good start for a top twenty, when I promised ten. I’ll start reviewing them over the next while and tell you why I love the film so much.

Screenwriting helps.

Watch screenwriting lectures. Read screenwriting and playwriting books. Don’t ignore them if you seriously risk not creating a compelling story. As my uncle, the novellist, once said to me, “...Hollywood has it right.” We went on to discuss how the execution is not always right, but the story and creation is good. And I have to say, what I’ve found so far that holds true. I am currently writing a screenplay anyway so my research helps me in all directions.

I’m currently reading Lajos Egri’s The Art of Dramatic Writing, from the theater camp. I recently read Robert McKee’s Story: Substance, Style, and Structure which also supplied some beautiful suggestions for setting, character, and conflict creation. Recently I just watched Jeff Kitchen’s Sequence, Proposition, Plot from the Screenwriting Expo series. This tool he shows in his book, apparently, and it rocks. I plan to purchase his book in the future, but I have to get some money first and let circumstances stop sucking it out of my pocket.

The sequence, proposition, plot tool is helping me develop LISTENING. I’ll report how it goes.

Rediscovering a Classic Album

Sorry, I dropped out of sight for a while, been working a lot on Wild Hunt version 6. Today I listened to my recently-ripped CD of Weezer (Blue Album). I know I heard it in high school, it came out in 1994, and I still, occasionally hear the “Unraveled (The Sweater Song),” “Buddy Holly,” and, even less frequently, “Say it Ain’t So” on the radio. But, I think this is the first time I ever listened to the whole album from beginning to end. Wow! The album has deep tracks that the radio missed that make me remember high school, my mission, and college. I am grateful to own the album.

Speaking of radio, I must, here give a eulogy to a long string of wonderful, connected radio stations. It started in the 1980s with a core group of DJs at KJQ, then they moved to X96, then they moved to 107.5 The End and finally to 101.9 The End. Recently 101.9 The End, arguably my most favorite radio station on the FM dial died a painful death when Clearchannel, its parent company went bankrupt. Fortunately 104.7 picked up the slack, but I will sorely miss the End with Chunga, Cort, and the rest, especially my good friend, who should have been a DJ, Gregg. They never should have fired Parker, he could have taken the station places they never knew they wanted to go. After all, Parker, basically, started Kerli, Colbie Caillat, and Thriving Ivory on their American concert tours. He had contacts in the industry and saw that Salt Lake City could become one of the best test audiences in the nation. Mike, you are sorely missed by at least one fan, and the End and everything to do with it is missed as well.

I just emailed my friend and former End-er, Gregg, I hope that maybe we can write a book about the rise and fall of those who were the DJs that path. Let’s see how it goes. It might need to wait a little, like until after I’ve published a few things before I can afford to write it. It will probably need a lot of research, but it will be very fun.

Speaking of which, I just finished a short treatment of my story now I can, finally, outline it and script it into the screenplay. Also, I’ll get my Celtx account back this month too, yay for third paychecks.

Havrett Started

Well here it is: a new year. I’m hoping to blog a little better this year that way I can be ready for my press of fans as they begin swarming my blog and reading all about me. Yeah, right. But, I do want to have something that can be referred to so people who are curious as to how I got here, wherever that here is by the time this is read, can refer to this, albeit brief, history.

I started writing the background and history of “Havrett” on New Year’s Day January 2010. After ten days, I have written sixteen pages, scrapped them and have written three. Not bad considering I restarted the story, or more started the story in the second and better place to start it, further in. It does not negate what I’ve already written, but, it does pick up the action a lot sooner. But I doubt I’ll need to flash back to it, with the exception of perhaps the video courtroom scene I wrote in the first start.

I plan to finish this draft then let it sit for a month or so before editing it into a second draft. I haven’t really more than mentioned the story to my wife (my wise reader, set up as suggested by Orson Scott Card, thanks, Scott) anything about the story although I have told a couple of my buddies who liked the story. And I am also noticing in the retellings, and the writings that I am finding another character coming to prominence: the Ship Grid himself. He is actually proving to be pesky, but helpful.

Well, maybe I should also explain the word a little, havrett was discovered when I switched the posting I was reading on Admiralty Law to Norwegian. The name fit. So, there you go...

I plan to publish this by the end of March, or at least have it submitted for that.

Well, plan on more to come in the coming year. I also plan on posting some of my own thoughts on writing this year too.

Ideas and Thoughts on Antagonists

The following I posted in response to a question on a LinkedIn forum I belong to in reference to the means of “chosing an antagonist.”

I like the idea that an antagonist personifies the hubris or fatal flaw of the hero. He shows the audience what the hero would become if he succumbed to his flaw and even embraced it.

Since Luke and Vader have already been mentioned, let's run with it. Darth Vader (and later the Emperor) has embraced the Dark Side and has become very powerful for it. Luke is being tempted by the Dark Side and is even succumbing to it to a degree. But, it is at that moment where he demonstrates that he would rather die by falling down the gas mining shaft than join Vader that he triumphs over himself and becomes the final hero whose actions lead him to his final confrontations.

What Bill said is correct, you need to see that the antagonist might have a shot at winning. He might even have a very good reason for winning.

Remember, though, that Darth Vader offered to finally end the entire war with Luke by his side, and they probably could have too. But, which was better, to give in and save hundreds to thousands of lives to establish a tyranny, or to continue to resist, lose hundreds to thousands of lives but let those lost along the way die in pursuit of the freedom of those who came after?

Provide both your antagonist and hero chances to grow and change becoming more of their defining character value. Remember that Han Solo is a lot more interesting (at least to me and many others to whom I have spoken) than Luke. Han starts at "Scoundrel" and becomes "General" and a hero of the Rebellion. But, ultimately it is when Luke faces the darkness within himself that he is able to become the true hero by triumphing over it.