Moving Images, Understanding Media

268 Moving Images: Making Movies, Understanding Media

How to Draft the Story:

Formats for the Screenwriter

When a writer puts words on a page to develop a story for a motion picture,

there are a number of forms to consider. A treatment is a prose version of

the story that can run from about one to forty pages, although they have

been as long as entire screenplays (over 100 pages!). Th e primary diff erence

from a script is the general lack of dialogue that makes up a great deal of

the screenplay. In other words, treatments look quite a bit like short stories,

but written in a very direct plot-oriented style. Essentially, a treatment is a

longer version of a synopsis.

Another possibility for writers is to map out the unfolding of the story

scene by scene, in which case they can create scene cards for the motion

picture. Th ese are descriptions written on index cards (or sticky notes), one

per scene. If writers want to type the information onto full pages, they create

a step outline. Th is is a scene-by-scene description of the story that includes

a brief summary of each scene.

Summarizing the Narrative

Th e shortest summary possible is a logline. When making

a short fi lm, this might be the last step in writing: a one-

sentence description for Internet postings or festival listings.

For a feature fi lm, it is a single line to be placed in an

advertisement, or for a television show, it might be the selling

line for the series. For example: “A former CIA hit-man with

no memory of his identity tries to seek answers about his

past while preventing his own assassination.” (Th e Bourne

Identity, 2002, directed by Doug Liman)

For some writers, a logline might be similar to the essence

of the pitch for a project. When writers generate original

projects, they will oft en team with a director or producer

and attempt to pitch their idea to a studio or fi lm fi nancing

source to secure funds for the project. Th ey might pen an

outline or perhaps write the entire script, but they generally

need to be able to deliver their concept in a convincing oral

presentation, as you read in Chapter 5.

Standard Formats

For creators of fi ction motion pictures, the screenplay is the

format that is the most prevalent guide during production.

Scripts for individually produced motion pictures, whether

short or feature length, use a standard format that was

introduced in Chapter 3. Te l e p l a y formats, used for some

television productions, tend to follow diff erent guidelines

that can depend on the type of show and specifi c parameters

set up by the creators. Primetime dramas typically follow

Figure 7-16 A straightforward logline on

the poster for Ray, written by James L. White

and directed by Taylor Hackford. (Courtesy

Universal/Photofest)

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