Analysing a Pakistani Script ??

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Hi friends

Allright i have a great question for great debate.

Actually today in class we were having a debate with our teacher and things step by step started to move further. Now i need your thoughts

Suppose i am making a movie in Pakistan while targeting the international audience. Now you know what is the current reputation of Pakistan in international world. So keeping it in mind tell me if i select a script how can i analyse that my script will engage the international audience? Keep one thing in mind that my script will be related to culture of Pakistan not to the hot topic of USAMA or TALIBAAN. So what can be the elements i should keep in mind??

I had similiar type of question before but this time its very different because i am talking about targeting the international audience as a Pakistani (which normally have a bad repu in the world)

So any expert thoughts?


I hope the question is relevent !

 

[wcmartell]

Three ways to go:

Go big - come up with a story that is a wild fantasy adventure-type story that will appeal to everybody, in the way superhero movies and RAIDERS OF THE LOST ARK and films of that type. The idea has to be *original* - not just the Turkish version of some Hollywood movie. I have seen movies from many other countries that have some interesting imaginative ideas in them.

Go genre - I *regularly* see action movies and thrillers and horror movies from all over the world. Over the weekend, my friend handed me 4 DVDs of horror movies made outside the USA that he told me I just had to see. I am seeing a French comedy spy film on Friday night (OSS117: LOST IN RIO). I go to film festivals to see action and thriller films from places like Iran. These films often are distributed on DVD in the USA, then later bought to be remade with Brad Pitt in the lead.

Go human - people are people no matter what country they live in. They have family problems and happy moments. If you can make a film that is interesting and inventive that deals with people dealing with the highs and lows of life, that film has a chance to travel. Look at SLUMDOG MILLIONARE... and AMARCORD. AMARCORD won Best Foreign Film Oscar - it is one year in the life of a village in Italy, seen through the eyes of a high school boy. I saw this film when I was in high school, and even though it was about Italians in the 1930s or 40s (I forget), a teenaged boy is a teenaged boy anywhere in the world. They fantasize about girls, they get into mischief, they have fathers that don't understand their dreams, etc. The film focuses on the human elements that connect us all - not what makes us different. Not about a specific culture, but about what makes us all human. AMARCORD starts and ends with the same scene, and goes season-by-season through the story. It is filled with all of the high points of the character's lives (it is not boring).

Hope that helps.

- Bill

 

[Zensteve]

Keep one thing in mind that my script will be related to culture of Pakistan not to the hot topic of USAMA or TALIBAAN. So what can be the elements i should keep in mind??

Pakistan's got a lot going on, and it ain't all about Taliban or swapping nukes with India.

Why not just keep it focused on the aspect of culture you're looking at?

FOCUS (and yah, that pretty much includes "Go human", mentioned above)

Examples such as Lords of Dogtown, Fast & Furious, Colors, To Live & Die in LA, Driving Miss Daisy, Hustle & Flow, The Outsiders, American Grafitti, Apocolypse Now, Stand By Me... heck, even First Blood (the first Rambo movie)

I don't think any could be called period-pieces, but they all focus on specific places, at specific times, with specific focus on the "here & now"... for whenever that time was. It's social engagement.

Some of them are crap flicks; others are great.

What they *don't* do is dwell on what is happening elsewhere.

The teens in Outsiders aren't getting all riled up about stuff that doesn't concern them.
The peeps in Hustle & Flow ain't reading the Wall Street Journal every day.
John Rambo does not have a subscription to some whacko militia call-to-arms newsletter.

All of them are too busy dealing with their immediate problems and situations, and *that's* what engages the audience.

Stop dwelling on what you consider others to be thinking of Pakistani issues, and make that script personal to you.

Seriously... there's no reason why you can't make a locally-set script, just showing what it is you want to say.

So... what do you want to say with your script?

 

[ad2478]

wcmartell
I go to film festivals to see action and thriller films from places like Iran. These films often are distributed on DVD in the USA, then later bought to be remade with Brad Pitt in the lead.

Thats a big news. Can i have names of few US Films which are remake of IRANIAN MOVIES.
By the way i will try to search this film "AMARCORD" looks like a great movie for me.


By the way

Zensteve and wcmartell

YOU PEOPLE ROCK

 

[cibao]

My suggestion would be to do something that utilizes what's different in Pakistan and Europe or the U.S. Don't try to be so original that you push yourself out of the potential markets that you want to go into.

Try a boy fights his way out of poverty story. Try a love story. The parents don't understand type of thing. Try a generational story. Traditional Pakistani family, and the fight for the son or daughter to get away from traditional Pakistani life. Country versus City story.

All have been done before, some several times, but could be done again and again.

Personally I believe that too often low budget indie films want to meet high budget Hollywood films with action adventure. It's next to impossible to match Hollywood in action, unless you put your entire budget into it.

Good luck with whatever you choose.

Chris

 

[wcmartell]

AMARCORD is a magical movie.

Though I don't know of any Iranian movies being remade by Hollywood (there may be some, I just don't know), films from Iran are shown in the United States... off the top of my head CRIMSON GOLD (crime film).

One of the films from Iran I think could be bought and remade in the USA is DEAD HEAT UNDER THE SHRUBS (English title) - which *is* about the country vs. city, and the evils of westernization... but told as a thriller like Spielberg's DUEL. Village boy witnesses city woman dumping dead body, she sees him, and the rest of the movie is a chase. The chase part makes it interesting to US audiences (and it is very well made) but it still deals with social issues. I saw this movie at a festival, and it is very much like an American movie - using the genre to explore an issue. I viewed it as a very exciting thriller movie.

The audience for "foreign films" in the USA is small - that is *our problem*. When I was young, films made outside the USA would play at a local cinema. Today, "foreign films" are usually only on DVD, and you usually have to search for the DVDs. When you see a good movie, you tell your friends about it.

Good luck.

- Bill

 

[ad2478]

Well i think i must see all the above mentioned movies

 

[directorik]

The Iranian movies I’ve seen here in the States include Samira
Makhmalbaf’s The Apple, The Blackboard and At Five in the
Afternoon. Marjane Satrapi’s Academy Award-nominated Persepolis,
Babak Payami’s Silence between Two thoughts andSecret Ballot
and in the 1980’s I saw several crime thrillers from Iran: Boycott,
The Tenants, and Kani Manga.

 

[sonnyboo]

I think the entire PAKISTANI angle will add a uniqueness, but it will not be by itself a good story. A good story is a good story no matter where it is set or what culture it is about.

The success of SLUMDOG MILLIONAIRE in the U.S. is a great example of that. At it's core, it is a great story where the culture fit the elements of story perfectly.

Find a story and let the culture of Pakistan be a backdrop, nothing more nothing less.

 

[wcmartell]

NEW YORK (Reuters) – An Iranian film about college friends reuniting for a weekend by the Caspian Sea and a U.S. documentary about teenage go-kart racers won the top prizes at the Tribeca Film Festival on Thursday.

Asghar Farhadi's "About Elly (Darbareye Elly)" won the Best Narrative Feature and Marshall Curry's "Racing Dreams" took out the Best Documentary Feature. The directors, who have previously shown films at Tribeca, were each awarded $25,000.

The world narrative competition judges -- producer Richard Fischoff, filmmaker Todd Haynes, and actors Bradley Cooper, Meg Ryan and Uma Thurman -- described "About Elly" as a "seamless piece of ensemble filmmaking."

"The universality of the characters and themes, and the directors riveting grasp of this story make 'About Elly' a film that collapses barriers and deepens our understanding of the world we share," they said.

I know that is Iran instead of Pakistan, but it shows what is possible...

- Bill

 

[indietalk]

You can make films about whatever you want, but if you make films about what you know, you can't go wrong... you can put your heart into it, as well as your experience. This shows in the final result.

 

[Spatula]

Persepolis - http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0808417/
French film with Iranian story and backdrop.... wanted to see it at the Toronto Film Fest 2 years back but missed it. Might be relevant, cause it's a film about a culture... got really good reviews.

Though personally, I like the suggestions above... a story is a story is a story.... made by humans for humans... culture is just a setting. Make sure your story transcends culture. Godspeed, young skywalker...

 

[ad2478]

Thanks a trillion to all of you for your guidance.And

INDIETALK as you said :
You can make films about whatever you want, but if you make films about what you know, you can't go wrong... you can put your heart into it, as well as your experience

.

Well this is a great tip for me.