• Wondering which camera, gear, computer, or software to buy? Ask in our Gear Guide.

Too much narration / voice-over ??

drc

drc

Hey every one,

I'm working on a screenplay where the beginning has a lot of voice-over between two different characters, very similar to Casino.

The two voice-overs are of the protagonist and antagonist.



I would say that for the first 15 pages/minutes there is about 70% voice-over and 30% dialogue, as far as words go.

After the first 15 minutes, the voice-over drops to about 15% and there is a lot more dialogue.


The screenplay will be about 110 pages/minutes long.



In your opinion, do you think having as much voice-over as I do in the first 15 minutes is excessive? I would really appreciate any help and advice I can get, this has been bothering me.

Thanks.
 
Sort by date Sort by votes
You're describing what sounds like a radio play, not intended of course.

How are the pictures telling the story in your head? Does the VO just describe what the viewer is already seeing on the screen anyway, or is it a different perspective of what they are seeing?

I see your predicament, though. How is the audience drawn into the story very early? That would answer a lot of questions as to why the voice-overs are key to the plot.
 
Upvote 0 Downvote
CamVader said:
You're describing what sounds like a radio play, not intended of course.

How are the pictures telling the story in your head? Does the VO just describe what the viewer is already seeing on the screen anyway, or is it a different perspective of what they are seeing?

I see your predicament, though. How is the audience drawn into the story very early? That would answer a lot of questions as to why the voice-overs are key to the plot.
Click to expand...



Let me give you an example. The scene is at a popular upscale restaurant in New York. A limo pulls up and a few men in high-priced suits come out with women in fur coats..etc.

Character 1 is walking past the restaurant and in his voice over he is disgusted by these gangsters. Talking about how they poison society, and things like that. As his voice over is ending..he walks past character 2 (who he doesn't know) and as soon as he walks past character 2..the camera switches to character 2 and character 2's voice over starts..and he is really attracted to the gangster life..the flashy suits..hot cars..etc

I hope that helps.

Character 1 and 2 are from the same poor neighborhood..and the beginning is displaying how they react differently to the same experiences. After the beginning, throughout the movie..through pictures, actions, scenes, dialogue, we see how these early experiences shaped these two different characters.
 
Upvote 0 Downvote
Thanks. The conflict is what I was driving at and how it could be explained instead of demonstrated. It sounds like you have that well thought out. This is how new ways of story telling come about, or at the very least refined. I wouldn't worry about the nuts and bolts of the script if you see this as a vision of telling this story. The heck with percentages.

Go for it and keep us posted on your progress.
 
Upvote 0 Downvote
drc said:
Let me give you an example. The scene is at a popular upscale restaurant in New York. A limo pulls up and a few men in high-priced suits come out with women in fur coats..etc.

Character 1 is walking past the restaurant and in his voice over he is disgusted by these gangsters. Talking about how they poison society, and things like that. As his voice over is ending..he walks past character 2 (who he doesn't know) and as soon as he walks past character 2..the camera switches to character 2 and character 2's voice over starts..and he is really attracted to the gangster life..the flashy suits..hot cars..etc

I hope that helps.

Character 1 and 2 are from the same poor neighborhood..and the beginning is displaying how they react differently to the same experiences. After the beginning, throughout the movie..through pictures, actions, scenes, dialogue, we see how these early experiences shaped these two different characters.
Click to expand...

I tend to agree with Cracker here. Two good actors can encapsulate in their looks and gestures the contempt and disdain or appeal and desire without necessary voiceover. As a general rule of human nature, we attend more with the eye than the ear. We can process visually much faster and tend to color our opinions by what we see, not what we hear.

In the scene you describe, I see the procession having to go into slo-mo to keep pace with the voiceover unless the internal conversations are short. But if they're that short, are they saying anything that can't be visually seen?

I understand where CamVader is coming from, however, 15 pages of voice over is a lot. Have the guy pull off and chat to his girl or pal about it. I had to do a three page voice over (flashback sequence) but the images needed explanation for continuity within the story. I really tried to keep it minimal. You also need to be very careful in the narration to not describe what the audience is seeing. It's redundant. The narration needs to be clean and point out the non-obvious. When I had a friend read over my script, he pointed out several 'redundancies' that helped chop down the narration.

By all means, narration/voiceover can be a useful tool, just have a light touch. Just my opinion.
 
Upvote 0 Downvote
You must log in or register to reply here.
Back
Top