All the way from LA!

I had been looking forward to this week for a while now, this was the week Richard are script writing tutor was coming all the way from LA to teach us. The day started off with an exercise where two members of the group had to stand up and be directed into a freeze frame position. The rest of the group then had to write an idea for a short film based on the image in front of us. I am always really surprised how successful this task is. I think it is a great way to come up with a variety of ideas and seeing an image in front of me and working my way back from that in terms of a story is a method that really works for me. What I like about this task is that the inspiration for the idea is right in front of you. I think having this inspiration instead of going looking for it helps me to think of ideas quickly, instead of spending hours musing over one short film, I am able to think of ideas at a much faster pace.

Later on we went over some of the topics that we had learnt before Christmas. We refreshed our memories of the three act structure, a concept that seems simple enough. We also discussed 'theme' something I think most members of the class were having trouble with. At first the idea of a theme seems simple enough, but when you really think about it, it is actually really hard to identify what one message the director is trying to convey to the audience, or to pick out only one thing that the character learns. At the start of the class we were all suggesting that the themes for our films were Love or Friendship. However after being questioned by Richard and his infamous phrase "Is it?" I think we all began to think a little deeper about the themes within films.

After lunch we had what can only be described as the most funny lesson we have had all year. We did an exercise where we had to complete 13 different stories we each filled out one line of information so we had all contributed to each story. We had to write about the character, the inciting incident and the characters fatal flaw along with many other things. We sat in silence working hard for about 30 minutes. When we were all finished Richard told us to go round the circle and each read out the story in our hand. Chris was the first to read a story out and i couldn't believe how funny it was, by the time three or four people had read out the stories most of the class were literally crying with laughter. I just could not believe how we had all taken the task seriously and it had amounted to a story that was far fetched, unrealistic and so badly structured. I think that the main problem was that we had not read each others ideas closely enough, we all wanted to make our mark on each story so maybe we weren't thinking how it ties in with the idea written previously. I think people were also were trying to obstruct or resolve the characters goals too quickly. Things were happening that were unrealistic (but also very funny). I think the best had to be the submarine driver that didn't know he was claustrophobic until he was in the middle of the ocean in a submarine. When he discovered his fear he went and had a panic attack in a toilet cubicle (which is one of the last places you would actually want to spend a lot of time in if you were actually claustrophobic!) However all was resolved when he realized he was the most capable man on the ship and he could simply direct the submarine back to dry land and everything would be okay. I feel by this point Richard was seriously worried by our lack of talent and was most likely considering getting straight back on the plane and jetting across to LA, where I am guessing there are no submarine drivers with undetected fears of enclosed spaces.

However I think that we redeemed ourselves slightly on the second day of Richard's stay. We started Tuesday morning by working on visual storytelling. We were split up into small groups and asked to plan out a visual sequence about a man who sees his father again for the first time in 13 years. We were instructed to use as little dialogue as possible and to really focus on the action. I found this to be quite an enjoyable task which seemed to come quite naturally. I really liked the idea that we came up with and i could really see it becoming a short film. And after all we have learnt on the course so far I can now understand that sometimes using no dialogue can actually be more powerful than when the characters talk. Emotion can sometimes be portrayed better visually, and this can often produce a more natural and organic scene. After all, in the silent films we have watched with Andy, I never found my self thinking "My god i wish they would just say something." I think in some of the films we have watched, using dialogue may spoil the effect. For example the Chaplin film 'City Lights' that we watched on Friday did not need dialogue to make it funny. I also felt that the final scene in 'City Lights' would have been totally spoilt if the characters had spoke to each other. Sometimes a gesture or subtle facial expression is enough to satisfy the audience and tell them everything you need to know.

Anyway, back to tuesdays lesson. We were asked to pitch the two premises we had written the night before. I really like it when we do this activity as I love to here other class members ideas. I was also happy with the fact that people in the group seemed to like my ideas. Talking about them as a class really made me want to go away and transfer my ideas into a script. After a really detailed discussion about several of our ideas, i really began to understand just how difficult it is to make a story that is interesting, fits inside the time frame and works structurally. As we discussed our ideas many seemed to fall apart slightly, however we have all been instructed to go away and write an outline and in turn a short film based on Sam's premise. This should be quite a challenge but I am looking forward to it.

In Wednesdays lesson we had to talk about three things that we do not like about ourselves. It was quite a strange experience to write down these things on paper and i was surprised by how many things I could think of. It was interesting to here the things that other people do not like about them selves, many of which i could identify within myself as well. I can see how this task was useful, being aware of our flaws and in turn, flaws within the characters we write about will help us to be better writers and portray truthful and universal flaws that an audience can identify with. We also discussed conflict and tension within this lesson, which was followed by a tutorial discussing our scripts. After everything I had learnt within these past three days I have to say I had no trouble identifying what was wrong with the script I had written and I can think of many things which I had learnt in the past three days that could improve it.

On Thursday we said goodbye to Richard and hello to John York. This lesson was very fast paced and within it, John introduced us to the 5 act structure. Something that to me made a little bit more sense than the three act structure. It just seemed as though the five act structure went into more detail and would make it easier to construct the middle of the story. In the afternoon we had a lesson with Andy on the History of cinema and I think he hooked our attention perfectly by saying that this class would contain the one thing it would be vital to remember within the three years of this course. Pretty important stuff. Friday finished with the our final Chaplin screening of the term, City Lights. This is an great film, possibly the best Chaplin film we have seen so far, and the ending was just lovely.