Category: Other Musings

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First, Write the Ending

The ancient Chinese military leader, Sun Tzu: “Begin with the end in mind.

Screenplays That Get Produced
“If you want to write screenplays that you can sell and get produced, you might want to consider writing your ending first. What? Yeah, well, check movies out that get produced. You know, those you pay $8 to $10 to see in the theater depending upon where you live and what time of the day and week you go to see them, and then read about the millions of dollars they made at the box office each weekend.

The Main Character
In almost every one of these movies, inevitably, the end is the defining moment in top box office movies. It is where the main character experiences an epiphany. The main character is challenged to confront and conquer his fatal flaw or go down to defeat. If you want to write screenplays that you can sell and get produced, you must build your screenplay to this moment in the movie. The tension must be wound so tightly that it feels as though everything is going to pop, like the drawn string releasing from a bow. SNAP!

The Villain/Antagonist
How can you create this kind of tension that is so necessary in great drama unless you know where you are going in your screenplay? The villain (in fiction, the villain represents evil) or the antagonist (in fiction, the antagonist can represent someone or something that is not evil, but who or what is competing with your main character or protagonist for the golden ring) must represent your main character’s fatal flaw. In other words, what your villain or antagonist seeks or has is what your main character has been seeking to overcome (your main character’s goal)throughout your screenplay. So, you must have your main character defeat the villain or antagonist in order to overcome his fatal flaw and win.

Movie Example
The movie, “Ransom”, starring Mel Gibson is one of many examples. Mel Gibson plays a good person. His son is kidnapped by an evil man. Through a series of events, Mel’s character has to become less and less nice with others if he is to save his son until he is confronted with defeating the kidnapper or losing his son forever. He is forced to kill the kidnapper, and in true Hollywood fashion, not only kill him, but obliterate him. Not that I condone this kind of violence in movies, because I don’t, but the example is there. When Mel’s character finally overcomes his “niceness”, it is only then that he saves his son.

Another Movie Example and Character
Another example, in “Warriors of Virtue”, a $56 million MGM movie for which I was a writer/consultant, Ryan, the main character seeks to conquer his disability, he wears a brace on one leg. In order to accomplish this, he has to overcome his fear of being too weak to succeed in physically achieving in entity. It all happens in the climax when he is confronted by evil itself, Komodo. Will Ryan win, or will Komodo win? It all circulates around Ryan’s disability which is really in his mind even though he has a disabled leg. Komodo wants to destroy to Ryan. How will Ryan escape? Or can Ryan stand his ground and defeat Komodo?

9 Writers and 4 Producers
How did nine writers and four producers arrive at this ending/climax? By determining beforehand how we wanted the movie to end. We spent days and weeks obsessing over this. The question was, what was Ryan’s goal and how does he achieve it? How could we attract an audience and incorporate this story idea? A teen boy. Did he smoke? Shoplift? Beat up other kids? Or run away from fights? Was he physically strong or physically weak? What kind of boy was Ryan? With his disability, we knew we had to come up with something that gave him no possible way to achieve his goal because that’s what high concept movies are all about, to have the main character overcome all odds and win. One of the producers came up with the suggestion that Ryan is afraid of life because of his physical disability.

Character Transformation
How could we write a story where he could learn how to overcome his fear of life because he is physically disabled, and thus, inept with respect to physical activities of most all teen boys? Well, I suggested, let’s first look at how he will be after he wins at the end of the movie. I suggested we create a character transformation arc. In order to this, I suggested that we take Ryan from a fearful boy to a confident young man. Between that kind of beginning and that kind of ending, I suggested we build the arc. So, I asked, how will Ryan defeat his fatal flaw and Komodo?

The Ending/Climax
The producers told us to each write the ending/climax. A combination of endings appeared. It wasn’t easy. Actually, writing the ending first felt like trying to empty the Pacific Ocean with a coffee cup. After several hours of musing over the endings which the writers wrote, the producers sent off two writers to write the screenplay with a couple of endings they selected. Eight months later, they called me to rewrite their draft. The first thing I looked at was the ending. The first thing I did was rewrite was the ending.

“Warriors of Virtue”
Three years later, “Warriors of Virtue”, was released in over 2,000 theaters in the United States. The Sunday afternoon I slipped into the theater with my wife to see the movie, the theater was packed with kids and parents. I watched the audience more than I watched the movie that Sunday afternoon, particularly when the ending/climax appeared. Guess what, I felt a special thrill when I noticed the audience sliding closer and closer to the edge of their seats as Ryan’s transformation evolved. At the end/climax, many of them crouched from their seats to cheer Ryan on as he defeated his fear and Komodo in a most unusual way. It was at that point I was convinced that writing endings first in my screenplays is one way to write screenplays that sell and get produced.

Donald L. Vasicek

Award-winning, writer/filmmaker, Donald L. Vasicek, dimensionalizes Olympus Films+, LLC’s services. He will bring you 35 years of writing and film making experience. Need to put your project together in a coherent fashion, but are stuck! Your storyline is rocky! What shots are you missing? Does your theme escape you, runs like an Olympic sprinter, away from you? Whatever else needs repair so that you can move to the next level in your film, you will benefit by contacting Mr. Vasicek at dvasicek@earthlink.net or 303-903-2103. Rates, fees negotiable.

PAMELA'S FALCON
PAMELA’S FALCON

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Life and Death, No One Ever Said Either is Easy

I wrote this article below and posted it here on my blog on January 4, 2011. 11 days later, Mom passed on. So, the profundity of losing my parents and twin brother in a matter of less than two months evokes powerful emotions, that left unattended, could cause more pain and suffering than I’ve already experienced.

My father died quietly in his sleep on November 20, 2010. He was a quiet man and lived nearly a full century. A hard worker. Devoted to Mom. A simple man. My twin brother, Dennis, died quietly sitting in his chair on December 23, 2010, a nearly larger-than-life guy, who always cheered others up.

Dennis called me a couple of days before he died. He asked me if I could get the family together one more time. I asked him what he meant by one more time. He said, “I just want to see everyone.” Then, I remembered what he had told me a few days prior to this call. He said that he was giving me a heads up. He described how he felt and said that he was going to crash just like he did in 2007 and 2009, both times having been put on a respirator to keep him alive. I contacted his doctor and tried to get him an appointment. Dennis died on Thursday. His scheduled appointment was on Monday. I told Dennis that as soon as I returned from Chicago after Christmas, I would go to work on getting everybody together. I never got the chance.

I am sharing this with you because I believe I can give an insight into life and death that might be helpful to some of you. It helps my grieving. I hope that you understand. If it’s a big turnoff, as they used to say eons ago, move on to something else.
There will be no problem here.

These losses, so close together, have bonded me to the present. What is, is. And it is January 4, 2011. They are gone. There is nothing I can do to bring them back. I cannot call them to chit chat about Tim Tebow and the Denver Broncos, their needs, what we are going to do to celebrate Dad’s birthday on January 21, how Mom’s feeling, etc. I cannot look at photos or talk with others about them without feeling the deep loss. So, the only choice I have is to move forward in my life, to grieve, to weep, to feel the massive feeling of loss without tumbling over.

This feeling of loss is so deep that I push myself to move forward, or else, something will die inside of me that I will never be able to recover. This something is love. I want to be bitter and angry to have been hammered with their passing, and so close together. If I allow these emotions to overtake me, I will become a hard person. Being a hard person works to accomplish a degree, to survive, but without love, I would become a robot without feelings.

So, I focus on my work. The family I have left. My cats. My health, trips to 24-Hour Fitness every morning to do cardio, weights and stretching. I focus on what is of interest to me. Sports. Movies. Reading “The Real Lincoln”, by Thomas Dilorenzo, a book I found in Dennis’ home when I was moving everything of his out, jazz, the symphony, the theater, watching Jerry Seinfeld reruns and movies, laying on the floor, on my back, and petting Zo, my cat, who is laying on my chest staring at me with her beautiful eyes. Venturing out with friends to a restaurant, or over to their house to discuss the ridiculousness of living and dying, two very different aspects of life each of us experience as human beings. Talking with Felix the Cat about my woes. He watches me. He might tip his head, one way, or the other, like he is trying to understand what I am saying, or, perhaps, how I am feeling.

The fine point of this experience for me is letting go. I’m letting go of Dad. I’m letting go of Dennis. I’m letting go of the past. I’m moving forward. I strive to think of Dennis and Dad in terms of being gone, never to return. A fact. I deal with it.
The job of getting rid of all of their things, closing their bank accounts, settling up with funeral costs, their bills, etc. It’s tough to decide what to throw away, or to keep. I’ve found that I, too, will die, and then, where will the stuff of theirs go I keep? Life and death are unrelenting. So, I only keep items, objects, photos, and things of Dad and Dennis’ stuff that shows an abysmal respect for them. Otherwise, I move forward. It’s a tough job right now.

No one will ever quote me that I said this was easy. It is the hardest thing I’ve had to do in my life. It’s like moving through the night without a light. I probe and comprehend the essence of my five senses to find my way and latch onto the understanding that death is part of life, regardless of how much many of us, would rather pass on that.

R. I. P.
Dad
1914-2010

R.I.P.
Dennis
1940-2010

R. I. P.
Mom
1914-2011

Perrigrine Falcon by Pamela Cuming

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“Screenwriting Sitting Scenes”

by
Donald L. Vasicek

Film is a visual medium. Keep yourself aware of “sitting”
scenes. The dialogue has to be very powerful, or viewers
will become bored. You don’t want that. When writing
characters, show them in action scenes in order to show
more of who they are. For example, show Brad Pitt swinging
over the support bar. Show Tom Cruise pushing Meryl Streep
in a swing. Show Meryl Streep, barefoot, smiling, and her
hair streaming in the air.

This way, viewers see Brad Pitt as daring. They see Tom
Cruise as sensitive, like perceiving Meryl Streep as his
mother. And Meryl Streep is enjoying herself like a young
woman in love.

The fine point of screenwriting is show, show, show. Telling
is boring. Showing opens a larger and more exciting world for
viewers. Film is a visual medium.