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A script of mine got proofread and here's what the reader said.

H

harmonica44

She said she liked the ending, and it ends the opposite of how most action movies do. She said one thing she noticed was that how in some of the action scenarios, the characters have to throw logic out the window, just so the action sequence can happen, the way you want. She said that that's okay, though, and that most thrillers are required to do that. Is that good? Other movies have done that though for sure, not that I blame them, depending.
 
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Yeah you guys are right, that logic is not top of the list on action movie requirements. I was watching The Professional (1994) and Ricochet (1991), again, and after movies with some of the illogical character behavior there, mine is not too much of a stretch. Thanks for the input guys. Sorry if I got too last word-wish before, I was just worried about the script not being good because of that possibly.
 
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You can format your script however you wish if you're going to shoot it yourself.

But if you're trying to sell it, then there are standards it's better to follow. Script format is an accepted universal language (universal in American studios -- in other countries the format is often very different). If you're communicating an idea to other people, you want it to be as easy to read as possible. Readers and producers hate to work at interpreting your script.

Why is spacing important in scripts? Because it looks cleaner, makes reading it faster, and most importantly, how you break up your description suggests shots. Note that I said "suggests" -- if you are not going to direct your script, you don't get to direct it on paper, either. But it's surprisingly easy to point the way to how a film might be shot by what you focus on in your descriptions.

Paragraphs are bad because they seem to suggest a single master shot. As soon as you break them into single sentences separated by double spaces before and after, an action line now suggests a shot. Ideally, such single sentences should also actually work as shots -- in other words, you needs to visualize the film's edit in your head, and break your sentences appropriately and accordingly. This process is one of the real arts to screenwriting and formatting. It's also one of the least discussed. Master this skill alone, and you're halfway there.

If you want to see this process in action, follow a DVD along with a script of the actual film (make sure it's a screenplay and not a transcript, preferably a shooting script, but at least the latest draft possible), and you can see how the on-screen action does -- or doesn't -- follow the script.

Storytelling, now that's another can of worms.
 
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This is a script I wanna pitch later on, if I have already made a prior feature. If not, then I would wanna sell it. I realize that double spacing the sentences makes it look cleaner, but I don't know how to write an action movie and not have it go over 120 pages with double spacing the action. I had originally wrote it double spaced, and I kept rewording it to try to get it under and still couldn't get it past 124 pages at the least. So I had to single space. If it's that important I could try to rewrite the action scenes all over again and see.
 
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Action films should rarely exceed 100 pages, maybe 110. First-time screenwriters rarely sell longer films. The action genre requires brevity. Longer movies cost more to shoot, and don't have fast turnover times at theaters to sell more tix.

If your film hits 120 pages when single-spaced, your script is too long. Start chopping.

Dialogue takes up the most space. And descriptions should be pithy. Not every sentence needs to stand on its own, but your descriptions need to breathe. If you've got many blocks of text that take up a quarter of a page or more, then many of these are undoubtedly too long.

But don't believe me -- look at some action scripts with formatting intact. See how other action writers convey information.
 
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Yeah mine is at 117 which I knew was longer than most. I can try to edit it down to 110, if that's good, but there isn't much more to edit out that isn't important. I'll try to cut back on some dialogue and see. Then there is that whole cheating the margins method you can do, but I'm guessing a lot of script readers notice that.
 
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Beginners inevitably over-write, and add more description than is needed. 117 isn't too a bad length, but I'm curious how long your script would be if you spread it out. I'm betting proper spacing of your description would add at least 10 or 15 pages. Which means the real length is possibly closer to 130.

You can get away with very slight margin cheating. But the only time I would do such a thing is is, for example, you wanted to enter a contest that had a 110-page limit, and your script was currently 112. I won a short screenwriting contest that way once, with a script I cheated down about 2 or 3 pages so that it was exactly 60.

But cheating won't teach you how to write scripts. I haven't done it again since that contest years back. Instead, I learned how to write tighter, better scripts.
 
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I could try to make it tighter. But it will be hard to double space the action, and not go over 120 I think. When I first wrote it I double spaced the action, and yeah it went over 120, but I don't remember how many pages, since I wasn't finished. There is a lot of action, plot and more characters then the usual movie though so that's probably why it is long I'm guessing.
 
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"Hey, baby. I got your BOOM pole right... "

Aw, forget it.


("D@mnation! That cat certainly ain't dead!")

("Actually, No. There isn't a blimp in my pocket. The blimp is clearly in my left hand. But thanks for asking!")

("I wish you were footage, Beautiful. I'd keep you on my hard drive")

("Yeah, I'm real sorry about this, Angel. The lavalier mic keeps rustling inside your blouse. Let me just adjust it just the teensiest bit. Wow! You're warm. Are you a werewolf?")

("Oh! My! God! You give... CRAFT SERVICES... a... whole... new mean... ing!")

("Well, let me see... Where did I put that 500mm lens... ? Do you see it? Anywhere?")

("Surely if the DP will roll around his $100,000 camera on this track it's gotta be good. Just lay back down and enjoy it.")
 
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Could I fail to pitch or sell the script, just because if the action is not double spaced, and it's 117 pages? Not only would I have to edit down on dialogue but I would also have to make the action take up more space and keep it under 110 still if that's the least riskiest limit.
 
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harmonica44 said:
Could I fail to pitch or sell the script, just because if the action is not double spaced, and it's 117 pages? Not only would I have to edit down on dialogue but I would also have to make the action take up more space and keep it under 110 still if that's the least riskiest limit.
Click to expand...
To "whom" are you going to sell or pitch this script?
You're shooting this yourself.
Since it's for yourself you can use crayon if you want.
Industry standard spec formatting only applies if you want professionals, producers and investors to not politely say "No thank you".

If you're writing to sell, then:
http://www.indietalk.com/showthread.php?p=182344#post182344
http://www.indietalk.com/showthread.php?p=179730#post179730
http://www.indietalk.com/showthread.php?p=186753#post186753

There's some good format resources on that second link.
My fave: http://www.scribd.com/doc/12721428/Professional-Screenplay-Formatting-Guide
There's some good poop on that one.

Double spaced action? WTH izzat?
Don't really worry about the page count. The story is going to be rewritten fifty-eight bazillion times.
ShortNsweet: think of it this way - theater owner (as if!) can show a 90min show more times a day than a 120min show = more revenue/day.
Cultivate that pragmatic mentality.
Don't use four actors when three will do the job.
Don't crash two cars when you can crash only one and have the other drive off the road.
Locations require cast, crew and equipment to be transported, set up then broken back down. How many principle locations does the story NEEEEED?

Yeah, your screenplay has gotta "look" pretty to get people to read it.
There actually are professional readers.
Day in and day out all they do is TRY to read the sh!t crackheads scribble down.
It sucks up too much brainpower to interpret pre-Colombian Portuguese into English, so don't pi!ss 'em off due to plain laziness.

Learn industry standard spec screenplay format.
Tell your story.
Make it clean and tight.

Put a fork init. It's done!
 
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Okay well here are a couple of samples of how I have written the action:

PETER

Comes into the maze of containers with his gun pointed and heads where they went -- Henderson runs across a path between two rows of stacked containers -- Peter sees him and raises his gun, as Henderson runs behind a container, out of sight --

Peter runs in his direction to cut him off -- He squeezes in between two rows of containers, almost getting stuck as he struggles through -- He does it again in a second row of them and as he becomes free but does not see them --

GARRAND

Follows Henderson, with their guns, as Henderson gets on his cell phone, but it's shorted out --


Sample 2:

Joey runs towards Alonzo and tries to stab him -- He blocks and gets stabbed in the arm as Joey grabs a bottle from the bar and smashes it across his face -- Alonzo covers his face in pain -- Joey beats Alonzo to the floor as his men come at him -- He kicks one and grabs a piece of pipe right out of his hands -- He then starts beating them all with it --

Is this okay? Some scripts are written like this and some go for the double spacing method.
 
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harmonica44 said:
PETER

Comes into the maze of containers with his gun pointed and heads where they went -- Henderson runs across a path between two rows of stacked containers -- Peter sees him and raises his gun, as Henderson runs behind a container, out of sight --

Peter runs in his direction to cut him off -- He squeezes in between two rows of containers, almost getting stuck as he struggles through -- He does it again in a second row of them and as he becomes free but does not see them --

GARRAND

Follows Henderson, with their guns, as Henderson gets on his cell phone, but it's shorted out --


Sample 2:

Joey runs towards Alonzo and tries to stab him -- He blocks and gets stabbed in the arm as Joey grabs a bottle from the bar and smashes it across his face -- Alonzo covers his face in pain -- Joey beats Alonzo to the floor as his men come at him -- He kicks one and grabs a piece of pipe right out of his hands -- He then starts beating them all with it --
Click to expand...
Again: It depends upon what you're going to do with this script.

Shoot it yourself? Then it's fine. Beautiful. Wonderful.
As long as you have the information down so that you can shoot what you want and edit it then you're gold!

To pitch or sell to a non-friend/stranger producer?
Pfft. H3ll. It's a GD soup-sandwich.
Read the first two or three pages of any of these and tell me if you find anything that looks like that.
http://www.imsdb.com/latest/

You won't.

First sample should read like this:

(PETER should already have been introduced with brief description, so now his name doesn't require all caps).

Peter enters the maze of containers in pursuit, pistol at the ready.

Henderson and Garrand run between rows of stacked containers.

Peter runs to cut them off, squeezes between several container rows,
but looses sight of them.

Henderson pulls his phone to call, but the call fails.​

Now, they're clearly not written the same, but I dare say ten directors would shoot largely the variants of the same scene, but the latter version READS so much better.
Same information + Faster read = More bettererer

Quit with the double dashes thing.
Poke whomever taught you that in the eye.

Sample two:

Joey rushes Alonzo for an aggressive stab. His arm block is stabbed
instead.

Joey smashes a bar bottle across Alonzo's face. Alonzo covers his face
in pain only to be beat to the floor with pipes by Joey's men

Alonzo kicks one man and takes his pipe, beats them all with it.​
 
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I wanna pitch this one. The reason why Peter was in capitals is because the scene switched to him. In some action movie scripts when the scen switches bacjk to a previous scene with another character, that characters name will be capitalized, and on a separate line, indicating the scene change. Die Hard I remember was written that way. Is that bad while scene switching?

If I space it out like you said it will go over 120, but I'll try to rewrite some of it.

The Dark Knight and Casino Royale scripts are a similar page count to the length of those movies. So if I double space all the action and edit it down to 110 pages wouldn't that only come out to like 60 minutes on film?
 
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If you're going to pitch this for someone else to pony up the loonies then you're definitely going to have to learn to be proficient with spec screenplay format.

Quit referencing off screenplays A. over ten years old, and B. not spec screenplays.

This is just like dating: You really gotta clean up and look presentable to have a chance at banging the prom queen. After everyone's "mystery" is gone and people can start being comfortable you can begin peeing in front of each other while the other brushes their teeth. Until the relationship has achieved that status - be nice.

Deviate from this and you'll receive a smile and a "Thank you. We'll call you."

There's no capitalizing because the scene switched to him.
There's no dropping to a separate line indicating the scene change
There's no trying to rewrite some of it.
There's no double spacing any action.
One page of industry standard formatted screenplay roughly equals one screen minute. Obviously extensive dialog will print out longer than actual delivery just as action will take longer to describe than to perform. And the director should be wise enough to include all sorts of tiny pick-ups and establishing shots that the writer doesn't need to include.

Harmonica's Homework -
Read the screenplay for some current action movies: http://www.imsdb.com/latest/
The Next Three Days: http://www.imsdb.com/scripts/Next-Three-Days,-The.html (Paul Haggis. You may have heard of him). Ignore the scene numbers; don't include those.
The Tourist: http://www.imsdb.com/scripts/Tourist,-The.html Ignore the page numbers.
Ninja Assassin: http://www.imsdb.com/scripts/Ninja-Assassin.html Again, ignore the scene numbers; don't include those.

Go read all three top-to-bottom.
Halfway pay attention to the stories, mostly pay attention to format structure.
SLUG
ACTION
CHARACTER
DIALOG

Composition, not content.

I'm also guessing you're using a word processor and not a screenwriting program.

Goto Celtx.com and download a free copy.
Learn how to use it.

See you back later this week.

GL & GB


Ray
 
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