Recent content by marktapiokines

Indeed! The link is in the YouTube video, but for the curious, the campaign itself is at: http://kck.st/1eMnCAH

This is how I'm trying to save my Kickstarter campaign for my new film DIAL 9 TO GET OUT. In the middle of the campaign, with tons of money left to raise, I spent about a week on this, which covers the first half of the movie. The animated video is enjoyable enough on its own. Hope you like it...

Thank you! And good luck to you as well!

Hi Aveek - Good question. I can tell you this: On my second feature "Claustrophobia", the only time I required the services of an attorney was after I sold the film to a distributor, and they required me to hire a lawyer to do a Title Search. A Title Search is where said lawyer combs through...

Hey all - So back in 1998, I accidentally invented crowdfunding for film. This happened with a website I launched in late 1997 for my first feature "Foreign Correspondents". I was deep in the red, and needed finishing funds, so I turned to the Internet for help. I knew back then that I was the...

maz, you are absolutely right. There is useful exposition, and useless exposition. Useful exposition moves the story forward. Useless exposition does not. That doesn't mean a movie that engages in offbeat tangents that don't propel the plot forward can't still be fun! Sorry if I came down too...

What, then, is "non-story", since you're counting exposition as story? What's going on in those scripts on page 1 that couldn't count as either exposition or action? Anyway, there is something more to this conversation than semantics. For the record, here's why I don't count exposition as...

I must have started my last message when you did. :) Anyway, thanks for the clarity. Again, this whole thing comes down to semantics, perhaps. But if exposition, as in the opening minutes of PSYCHO or BACK TO THE FUTURE, counts as story, then by this definition, doesn't pretty much every...

To be clear, I think it's bad advice to say that every screenplay's story must begin on page 1 (or, rather, during the first 2 minutes of a movie, after credits). But as I mentioned in my previous post, about PSYCHO, the concept of "story" seems to be defined differently by various writers...

Funny you should mention PSYCHO, as I was thinking of that very movie when considering replying to someone else here. I thought about what you said and watched the first chunk of my DVD of the film. This is a great example of how different writers interpret "the beginning of the story" as...

Thank you. I hope you enjoy the course!

In a recent thread here, I noticed a couple people stating, very confidently, that a screenplay's story must begin on page 1. (This was in response to the poor writer whose story began on page 17.) Frankly, I think this is bad advice. But it did make me curious about how individual writers...

I can't resist answering this. Forgive me, Indietalk gods, if it's too much of a plug. I did author a screenwriting course on Lynda.com. It's about 40 short videos of me telling you how to take your basic story idea and turn it into a dramatic narrative, step by step. Obviously, I can't...

Thanks for your insights. Yep, we're all in agreement that PULP FICTION is perhaps the best example of a major American film that throws the three act structure out the window. Regarding your statement, "if transformation doesn't epitomize the three act structure, I don't know what does"...

Thanks for the (sort of) plug, IndiePaul! I actually teach the Screenwriting Fundamentals course on Lynda.com. I agree, the site is a great resource (and not just because I'm on it).