I use to think differently -- But now... Now I know the only thing that separates us lot from the pro's is the wonderful teachings of Tony Ramirez from Tampa Florida.

It's been a while since I've been on the boards (quietly working on my craft, and nearly finished with a latest draft of my tv pilot).

But I saw this thread and started reading.  There are a lot of creative industries with the same problems you hear about here.  When I was getting a masters in polisci, most would-be political employers flat out told me they weren't interested until I graduated.  They then denigrated my day job as "volunteering" and thought I wasn't experienced enough for an entry-level receptionist type job.

For a different example, I also read recently about how one actor owed much of his career to being a childhood friend of Aaron Sorkin.  Not so much because he wasn't talented (he is), but because it gave him an even more successful contact with which to find work.

In many ways, no matter how talented you think you are, if you don't know the right people to give you a fair hearing, it's going to be very difficult to break out.

I've seen a lot of movies recently that suck.  It's gotten so bad, my roommate and I have adopted a "halfway-and-out" philosophy on movie rentals.  I had to do that recently with Get Smart, a spy-comedy I though I might like because of the Chuck series, but the comedy was dull and boring, Steve Carell really can't act, and they didn't really make us care much about the CONTROL/CHAOS fight.  (Although Dwayne Johnson and Ann Hathaway did good work on the flick).  I felt as disappointed by the Percy Jackson and Twilight adaptations, although suffered through them for genre-specific sequences that were good.

Anyway, point is, Hollywood has its own gradations of suck, mediocre, and success, just as we amateurs do.  There is bound to be some overlap.  And we generally don't benefit from writing full time, getting help on rewrites, or even working with a partner (a recommendation for serious screenwriters, supposedly).

It'll be interesting to see if any of us can rise above the mediocrity and find a way to bust through the glass wall separating us from Hollywood.

Quoted from kendg8r It's been a while since I've been on the boards (quietly working on my craft, and nearly finished with a latest draft of my tv pilot). But I saw this thread and started reading.  There are a lot of creative industries with the same problems you hear about here.  When I was getting a masters in polisci, most would-be political employers flat out told me they weren't interested until I graduated.  They then denigrated my day job as "volunteering" and thought I wasn't experienced enough for an entry-level receptionist type job. For a different example, I also read recently about how one actor owed much of his career to being a childhood friend of Aaron Sorkin.  Not so much because he wasn't talented (he is), but because it gave him an even more successful contact with which to find work. In many ways, no matter how talented you think you are, if you don't know the right people to give you a fair hearing, it's going to be very difficult to break out. I've seen a lot of movies recently that suck.  It's gotten so bad, my roommate and I have adopted a "halfway-and-out" philosophy on movie rentals.  I had to do that recently with Get Smart, a spy-comedy I though I might like because of the Chuck series, but the comedy was dull and boring, Steve Carell really can't act, and they didn't really make us care much about the CONTROL/CHAOS fight.  (Although Dwayne Johnson and Ann Hathaway did good work on the flick).  I felt as disappointed by the Percy Jackson and Twilight adaptations, although suffered through them for genre-specific sequences that were good. Anyway, point is, Hollywood has its own gradations of suck, mediocre, and success, just as we amateurs do.  There is bound to be some overlap.  And we generally don't benefit from writing full time, getting help on rewrites, or even working with a partner (a recommendation for serious screenwriters, supposedly). It'll be interesting to see if any of us can rise above the mediocrity and find a way to bust through the glass wall separating us from Hollywood.

THere is some truth in that. However a few points:

1) Acting is different from screenwriting. In screenwriting you have a product, a commodity, that can circulate to others without you ever being there. It can be copied, digitalized and distributed to millions at the same time. Acting is a performance, and you need to audition yourself to the right people.

2) Of course Hollywood movies suck. A lot of them anyway. But my point is that they suck in a different way than amateur scripts suck. Think of a bad Hollywood movie as a a bad band. Personally I think Celine Dion sucks. I would never buy any of her music. But she hits the notes, her songs have structure (albeit predictable), and the musicians on her album can play instruments. Celine Dion is a crappy Hollywood script.

Then there's the guy at the local pub who sings kareoke Led Zeppelin, but he can't hit the notes. He has aspiration to do something beyond the cookie-cutter mediocre crap of Celine Dion, but he lacks the basic ability to sing. He can't really play the instruments. This is a crappy amateur script.

Forgive the crude metaphor, but I think it's pretty apt.

No, DM, that's a poor metaphor...really poor.

You may not like Celine Dion, but she's a fantastic singer and has sold Bigillions of records worldwide.

A better metaphor would involve a good singer, singing in a bar for $50/night, wondering why he can't "make it", because he knows he has talent.

Shows like American Idol and America Has talent show that everyday "nobodies" actually can possess talent, and  can actually become bigger stars than the ones we think are untouchable.

No, your metaphor is quite apt.  I just think there's a lot of hobbyist karaoke singers who could do better than Celine Dion, but we never hear about them because they don't push themselves to get noticed, or just don't know how to get their demo tape into the right hands.

There are some in Hollywood who shouldn't be getting as much work as they are, and there are plenty of amateurs not getting a fair shake at doing better.

Even the widening array of contests aren't helping as much as they could, for they're starting to fill up with lower-ranking Hollywood staffers trying to end their internships or PA jobs and move into a career.  Which is all fine and dandy, but they already have something the rest of us don't - contacts in the industry - which is all the contests can offer long-term anyway.

Quoted from Dreamscale Shows like American Idol and America Has talent show that everyday "nobodies" actually can possess talent, and  can actually become bigger stars than the ones we think are untouchable.

Yeah, too bad there's no show out there like America Can Write TV.  (Or did I speak too soon?)

Quoted from Dreamscale No, DM, that's a poor metaphor...really poor. You may not like Celine Dion, but she's a fantastic singer and has sold Bigillions of records worldwide. A better metaphor would involve a good singer, singing in a bar for $50/night, wondering why he can't "make it", because he knows he has talent. Shows like American Idol and America Has talent show that everyday "nobodies" actually can possess talent, and  can actually become bigger stars than the ones we think are untouchable.

But that's kind of my point. You may not like Zombieland. But it's written by someone who knows the craft, and has earned over a hundred million dollars.

I think the problem is maybe the "good singer" in the bar...isn't. But he thinks he is.

Again, there are screenwriting competitions. It may not be the coverage of American Idol, but if you put in a stellar script. It WILL take you places. Inktip is great too.

Quoted from kendg8r No, your metaphor is quite apt.  I just think there's a lot of hobbyist karaoke singers who could do better than Celine Dion, but we never hear about them because they don't push themselves to get noticed, or just don't know how to get their demo tape into the right hands. There are some in Hollywood who shouldn't be getting as much work as they are, and there are plenty of amateurs not getting a fair shake at doing better. Even the widening array of contests aren't helping as much as they could, for they're starting to fill up with lower-ranking Hollywood staffers trying to end their internships or PA jobs and move into a career.  Which is all fine and dandy, but they already have something the rest of us don't - contacts in the industry - which is all the contests can offer long-term anyway.

Absolutely. Don't get me wrong, I wasn't saying that anyone who sings Kareoke is necessarily a lesser singer than Celine. I was simply drawing a comparison between someone who knows the craft, but doesn't put it to use in a way that pleases me, and then someone who doesn't, but tries for something more interesting. Both fail to me, but for different reasons.

As for contests, they also serve the purpose of finding collaborators. That's how I met the director I'm now working with. So we got a short film done, which we then got into festivals, and got contacts and a calling card to secure funding for our second short. Then that's gonna do the festival circuit, and we're gonna get more contacts, and so on. and you meet people who will ask you if you have scripts they can read.

I'm not saying that inktip or competitions takes you straight into the studio boardroom. But it takes you some of the way.

'American Writer' will never happen.  We came close with 'On The Lot,' but that show sucked because of judges who couldn't stop talking.


Phil

DM, here's the deal, and point I've been trying to make for years....

You say that Zombieland was written by someone who knows the craft...sure,  maybe.  It was written by 2 guys who seem to collaborate fairly often but really haven't written much else that stands out, unless you want to count Cruel Intentions 3 as stellar, original material.

If you want to say that the success of Zombieland was based on these 2 writers and their script, that's great.  They are Pro writers, and if you think they put together a real Pro effort here. I have no problem with that.

But what about all the Pro writers who put together abysmal scripts...like Troll 2, for example.  If you check out these "writers" on IMDB, you'll see that they are definitely "Pros" and have written numerous Pro scripts...that all most likely really SUCK.

These 2 examples are on 2 ends of the spectrum, obviously, but there are so many Pro writers and scripts that fall somewhere in between major success and ultimate failure.

The point I'm skirting around is that Pro writers can write great scripts, good scripts, decent scripts, bad scripts, and piss fucking poor scripts...just like non Pro writers.

This fact is what has me laughing about all the little tests that have been attempted in here with threads asking if the 1 page excerpt is Pro or non Pro.  It doesn't matter...if it's well written, then it's good.  If it's poorly written, then it sucks.

Pros can and do write shit.  Non Pros can and do write shit.

Someone mentioned earlier about people working on Troll 2 thought they were making a good movie; I see this happening in the music business for the last 15 years.

How can any of the people producing the garbage that passes for most music these days, think that what they are bringing out is actually any good? It makes me laugh and throw up!  Or is it because mthe standards of my favorite music are set so high?
I  reckon that all the best ever songs have already been written long ago and there will never be any more classic stuff.

But then it all comes back to the avergae dopey consumer demand factor, doesn't it? Same as movies.

All just MHO

stevie

Quoted from Dreamscale ...like Troll 2, for example.  If you check out these "writers" on IMDB, you'll see that they are definitely "Pros" and have written numerous Pro scripts...that all most likely really SUCK. The point I'm skirting around is that Pro writers can write great scripts, good scripts, decent scripts, bad scripts, and piss fucking poor scripts...just like non Pro writers. This fact is what has me laughing about all the little tests that have been attempted in here with threads asking if the 1 page excerpt is Pro or non Pro.  It doesn't matter...if it's well written, then it's good.  If it's poorly written, then it sucks. Pros can and do write shit.  Non Pros can and do write shit.

Jeff, you constantly fail to understand the difference between a bad film or a bad scipt on a critical / commercial level and a well written script, they are not mutually exclusive. A well written script can be a bad script critically, and vice versa.  

I have read plenty of scripts that I thought were crap, but still concede are well written. Until you understand what exactly people mean by a well written script you will never get it.

It is something you will never get from a single page, it is impossible to tell from a single page. The fundamental aspects of a well written scripts are great characters, great characters, great characters, good plot, great characters, structure and great characters.

There are many pro writers who write what I would consider crap films and yet are considered good writers in the industry and are constantly being turned to, and paid lots of money to do uncredited re-writes on scripts. This is because they know how to write a script, good or bad, they know how to write one. That separates them from the many thousands of other wannabe's filling Internet forums with bad scripts.

Quoted from Dreamscale The point I'm skirting around is that Pro writers can write great scripts, good scripts, decent scripts, bad scripts, and piss fucking poor scripts...just like non Pro writers. This fact is what has me laughing about all the little tests that have been attempted in here with threads asking if the 1 page excerpt is Pro or non Pro.  It doesn't matter...if it's well written, then it's good.  If it's poorly written, then it sucks. Pros can and do write shit.  Non Pros can and do write shit.

My point is it's different shit. It's like comparing a shitty Citroen CV to a box-car. It's shit on two different levels. One has grasped the rudimentary way to build a car, and just fucked up the execution. The other...isn't really a car yet.

I'll defer to Murphy's post above. He's pretty much said what needs to be said regarding this.

Quoted from Murphy Jeff, you constantly fail to understand the difference between a bad film or a bad scipt on a critical / commercial level and a well written script, they are not mutually exclusive. A well written script can be a bad script critically, and vice versa.

Am I failing to understand this, or are you?

The arguments here (for the most part) are saying that a Pro writer writes better than a non Pro writer.  They also say that the major differences have to do with character and story.

Yet, every time I (or someone else) brings up a Pro script (and/or movie) that obviously is terrible in every way, I'm told that I don't understand or get it.

How can this be?

DM, you say it's shit on a different level, and you're right for the most part.  But what about the non Pro scripts or writers that don't suck and aren't shit?  Are they not better than the Pro scripts and writers that do suck and are shit?

I just completely fail to see what the infatuation is with Pro writers and this really weird ideology that their shit doesn't stink, and they can do no wrong.

Quoted from Dreamscale Yet, every time I (or someone else) brings up a Pro script (and/or movie) that obviously is terrible in every way, I'm told that I don't understand or get it.

Firstly, there are always going to be exptions to a rule. These need to be ignored, as we a taking a more general view of the differences between "pro" scripts and SS scripts.

Secondly, check your definition of "pro", I am not neccesarily talking about whether it has sold or not. There are a couple of scripts here on SS that I woulda consider pro level and yet not sold.

Thirdly, how many screenplays do you read? seriously, I am talking about spec scripts that are considered pro level, be they unproduced or not, bought or not. Once you read a hundred or so you will begin to see what a huge difference there is.

Most scripts that are sold never get produced, there are loads of them out there, all well written scripts but with something holding them back, usually commercial implications. But they all sold for a reason, the writers know how to write a script and therefore there is a good chance they will write another one that actually will get produced or more likely they can be added to to the list of people who are paid to write scripts on assignment.

It is nothing to do with having a good idea and getting lucky, it is the ability to demonstrate a clear understanding of how a good story is constructed and written. This is still rare when you consider how many scripts are written a year from people all over the world.

My biggest problem with this debate is the fact that so many people here seem quite happy to belittle the role of the talented screenwriter. It is weird. It is something that most of us want to aspire to be, to work hard and become good at this game. Why on Earth would anyone want to bring it all down to luck or suggest that there is no great skill to learn?

It's the same mentality as football fans watching a game and thinking they could do better if only they were allowed on the pitch. The guys that actually made in onto the pitch realised early on that it would take a lot of hard work to get there so they did just that.

It may seem that there is little separating great writers from average writers, just a few words here and a plot point there, but that final 5% is the biggest gulf of all, and the vast majority of people will never cross it. Again, it is exactly the same in all walks of life. Screenwriting is no different from being an architect, a lawyer, a salesman or a shop worker. To get to the top takes hard work and means learning skills most don't even realise are there to be learned. And you can always spot the losers because they are the ones complaining that John Smith only got to be Manager because he plays golf with the CEO.