How would you like a military sci-fi film?

Hello everyone,

As I've been saying, things are bubbling for me, and, after well over a decade, I may - repeat may - be willing to take that first step. I have spoken to my mentor, and we will meet to talk about forming my film production company, and perhaps finally getting one of my scripts together. The vaxx restrictions in the US may be lifting in May, so I can come down to the American Film Market in November to meet him and some of you, to discuss it.

As the regulars also know, I've been writing bits and pieces, which can be relaxing if not therapeutic for me. But none of them are really coherent.

There is one other issue.

I have said that I will finish my current journey before starting the next one. As of now, I am not sure when and where it will end - it may end in a few years, or it may end in a decade - I simply don't know. I will say that I have reached one benchmark, where I have proven myself, and I don't know if I need to prove myself any further. Again, I don't know. But, as my hero, Winston Churchill, would say, if it's not the beginning of the end, it's the end of the beginning.

With this in mind, I have begun a writing plan, which I will discuss with others in November, along with my business plan. One question about writing.

Most of the sci-fi battles are pretty asthetic, as in they go for a fight, then return home for a hot meal and a shower. That is, of course, very true for many war films, like, say, The Longest Day or Bridge over the River Kwai. But that is not reality. A better perspective would be Cornelius Ryan's reall account, "The Last Battle", about the battle for Berlin. It showed the gritty side of war, and is very powerful reading.

I am wondering if my PG-rated scripts should be aesthetic or gritty. I was originally going to be aesthetic, like Star Trek and Star Wars, but, as I write, I am wondering if I should be more like "The Last Battle". To think off the top of my head, perhaps I should do a 30-second short film of both versions, to see what I like.

Any thoughts? And who would like to meet me in November?
 
Most of the sci-fi battles are pretty asthetic, as in they go for a fight, then return home for a hot meal and a shower. That is, of course, very true for many war films, like, say, The Longest Day or Bridge over the River Kwai. But that is not reality. A better perspective would be Cornelius Ryan's reall account, "The Last Battle", about the battle for Berlin. It showed the gritty side of war, and is very powerful reading.

If all the war films are doing things one way, there's probably a reason...
People generally watch films to escape reality and they just care about how your film makes them feel while they watch it.

If you go out and you try to do things counter to the way all the seasoned professionals are doing it, i think you are significantly increasing your risk factor. You want to be a little original, but don't break the entire mold.

I think it's awesome you might finally take that step but it doesn't sound like your ready and your heart is still in your current career.
 
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@sfoster, thanks.

In terms of my current career, I am at least a couple of years away, if only because my juniors have said they want to continue to learn from me. But I can at least take some steps towards the next goal in my life.

As for the reality of film, how about "Platoon" or "All Quiet on the Western Front"?
 
I am thinking of scenes like the ones below. However, I would cover the soldiers' faces with dust, because the accounts mentioned their faces being so covered that the dust formed a mask. I would also have their uniforms dirty and in rags.




One caveat - I am just brainstorming, because I haven't got the funding yet. If I was to do it myself, as discussed previously, I would only be able to film two or more people talking of the war. But talking about filming is fun, and I can do a film about people talking about filming ...... you know the rest.
 
@sfoster, thanks.

In terms of my current career, I am at least a couple of years away, if only because my juniors have said they want to continue to learn from me. But I can at least take some steps towards the next goal in my life.

As for the reality of film, how about "Platoon" or "All Quiet on the Western Front"?

I've never been in a war so fortunately I am not qualified to comment on the reality of those situations.
I will however, reiterate that if your time is spent focusing on reality and how to capture and portray reality youre missing the point of movies entirely.

What happens if you've got a sorta entertaining scene thats very realistic?
the audiences eyes glaze over and they call your movie boring when its done.

You have to take those scenes and DRAMATIZE them, you have play up the reality of the situation to make it cinematic.
People want to be ENTERTAINED, and to have it not be so dumb as to break their suspension of disbelief
 
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Surely the question of "aesthetic" or "gritty" would be determined by the feel of the rest of the movie, and the place a/any battle scene had in the story as a whole?

Instead of showing a actual scene of fighting, for example, the severity of the conflict can be implied by the returning solidier's ragged, bloodstained uniform. To me, that'd be more "realistic" than the kind of ten-minute sequence of two Tough Guys mindlessly battering each other that seems to be part of the current "action movie" genre.
 
I've never been in a war so fortunately I am not qualified to comment on the reality of those situations.
I will however, reiterate that if your time is spent focusing on reality and how to capture and portray reality youre missing the point of movies entirely.

What happens if you've got a sorta entertaining scene thats very realistic?
the audiences eyes glaze over and they call your movie boring when its done.

You have to take those scenes and DRAMATIZE them, you have play up the reality of the situation to make it cinematic.
People want to be ENTERTAINED, and to have it not be so dumb as to break their suspension of disbelief

Agreed. My point, as you say, is to dramatize the scenes and play up to the reality. The question is, to dramatize the scenes, should I have their faces covered with dirt and their uniforms torn and dirty? Star Trek and Star Wars didn't have that.


Surely the question of "aesthetic" or "gritty" would be determined by the feel of the rest of the movie, and the place a/any battle scene had in the story as a whole?

Instead of showing a actual scene of fighting, for example, the severity of the conflict can be implied by the returning solidier's ragged, bloodstained uniform. To me, that'd be more "realistic" than the kind of ten-minute sequence of two Tough Guys mindlessly battering each other that seems to be part of the current "action movie" genre.

Also agreed, and I have been writing about people talking about the war, so this would fit right in.


Thanks, everyone! :)
 
The question is, to dramatize the scenes, should I have their faces covered with dirt and their uniforms torn and dirty? Star Trek and Star Wars didn't have that.
I think that depends on the nature of the fighting. Star Trek & Star Wars don't involve any sort of fighting in dirty fields/trenches, such as what's currently taking place in Ukraine. The nature of the "battlefield" that you set up will determine how the fighters look.
 

mark-hamill-quotes-06.jpg
 
I think that depends on the nature of the fighting. Star Trek & Star Wars don't involve any sort of fighting in dirty fields/trenches, such as what's currently taking place in Ukraine. The nature of the "battlefield" that you set up will determine how the fighters look.
Mara,

Star Wars had the scene at swamp with Yoda and Luke, and, somehow, they were both always clean, despite their environment. Star Trek had close-quarter combat in the deep space station and on spaceships, and, again, they had no torn clothing or lacerated wounds. As an armchair general, I like my battles this way, but, as an aspiring mogul, I'm wondering if I should do something different.

What do you think?
 
Star Wars had the scene at swamp with Yoda and Luke, and, somehow, they were both always clean, despite their environment. Star Trek had close-quarter combat in the deep space station and on spaceships, and, again, they had no torn clothing or lacerated wounds. As an armchair general, I like my battles this way, but, as an aspiring mogul, I'm wondering if I should do something different.

What do you think?
I think it's your project and you should write it how you see it.
 
@mlesemann, thanks for your encouragement.

As an aspiring writer, I would go for gritty, because, in print, you have to deal with sights, sounds, and smells; as a sci-fi fan, however, I like my episodes nice and clean. But, as has been discussed, I'll write it as I see fit and see how that goes.

Bladerunner is, of course, aesthetically very different from the original story, "Do Androids dream of electric sheep?".
 
I'm also approaching the topic of how to show a sci fi military in my project, the main one. It's a really interesting area, with a lot of room for creativity.

I don't have any definitive advice here, since there are a million ways to do this, and it comes down to personal style, but my personal approach is simply to really think about how technology will change the day to day operations of the military. I think what would be most interesting to sci fi audiences is a series of common sense shifts in combat and strategy reactive to the changes in technology.

In a quick practical example, soldiers in Save Point all operate in tandem with a neurolinked mini drone, allowing individuals to execute flanking manuevers. Flashbangs have been replaced with a high powered flashbulb on the drone that can be activated repeatedly, lidar scans can map rooms around corners, and the drone can fire tiny needle ammo from an internal rail system that introduces a paralyzing toxin. So I'm suggesting that it might be interesting to rebuild military strategy from the ground up, as opposed to a less inventive trope like simply putting a standard army onto a giant space ship. I'd also mention that Mecha of various types would be a likely replacement for tanks in the future, especially when they would be tasked to operate on multiple planetary environments.
 
Thanks, @Nate North. I was snowed in the last two days, so I went on Youtube to watch various martial arts flicks. Quite honestly, I prefer the clean aesthetic fight scenes to the messy version of reality, but reality may be a more effective way for me to tell my stories. I still have time, but I am writing what I want to write, so I will bide my time and see.

Does anyone want to meet me at the AFM this year?
 
I was snowed in earlier this week, so I watched some martial arts clips on Youtube. I like the aesthetic style of fighting, which is nice and clean, so I'm leaning towards aesthetic, as opposed to gritty and realistic. Maybe there can be a nice middle ground on that.
 
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