the film and fiction blog of David Sugarman

85 pages. Very rough first draft… but a complete first...

Thu, 24 Jan 2013 20:10:44 -0500

85 pages. Very rough first draft… but a complete first draft. Not available to read yet. I still have lots to do to it before anyone will get a peek at it yet. Lots that I’m unhappy or unsure with. None of which matters right this second, because I have completed a first draft of this screenplay!!!!!!!!!!!

I have spent a lot of the last 6 years learning and reading about how voiceover in fiction film is a...

Thu, 20 Dec 2012 19:18:44 -0500

I have spent a lot of the last 6 years learning and reading about how voiceover in fiction film is a relic of the novel, and to be treated, often, as lazy writing when encountered on the screen.

Yet writers like Charlie Kaufman (for wonderful irony & humour) and Terrence Malick (reverence & wonder) use voiceover and it works brilliantly.

Thinking about, really: is voiceover not inherently cinematic? In a book, one cannot reveal a character’s internal processes while simultaneously displaying external action. The two must be written to occur in a linear fashion, one following the other: only in film or TV can you do both at the same time.

Sometimes it’s important to remember that not all theories, however well known or oft-quoted, do not accurately describe what they claim. At least not in such water-tight fashion as you might have thought.

OUTWILD HUNTERS

Fri, 13 Jul 2012 15:15:33 -0400

OUTWILD HUNTERS:

infinitybuttons:

I’m no good at running.

I wrote this between 00:20 and 03:38 last night. Please enjoy.

So I'm writing something...

Sun, 17 Jun 2012 11:28:01 -0400

… and I’m trying to research the idea of Nazi occultism, an idea which is fairly prevalent in popular culture, but which seems to have been made up in the 1950s (which is interesting in itself). Unfortunately, wikipedia only has an article on the history (or, rather, cryptohistorical) idea that the Nazis were powered by/a front for occultists. What I’m looking for is evidence that the Nazis were interested in magic as an aid to their power, rather than an end to which they were working or based on.

Can anyone point me in the right direction? Does anyone know anything about Nazis seeking magic? I’d also be particularly grateful if anyone can suggest anything to do with Nazi attitudes towards traditional German fairytales, Brothers Grimm-type stuff.

Uhhh... Redacted.

Mon, 09 Apr 2012 18:00:55 -0400

Sorry about that. Didn’t realise that the photo was high enough resolution to read the notes. It’s not ready for looking at yet. It was more of a “this is a thing I am working on” post.

Anyway, here is the accompanying text:

So I started watching Buffy re-runs on SyFy. It’s an episode per day, so I’m in the middle of season 2.

And I started thinking about the benefits to longform serialised storytelling. I.e. tv drama, which I have thought about before.

And so I took an idea I already had for a tv show which I was describing as “Twin Peaks meets Hot Fuzz”, and turned it into a sci-fi teen drama. I’ve got like 2 seasons of storylines here, but I haven’t figured out how to execute the set-up. I.e. I have no pilot episode.

Giving notes

Sat, 25 Feb 2012 15:31:26 -0500

I do a lot of writing, particularly for the screen. My filmmaking friends recognise me as being pretty good at it, so they occasionally ask me for my opinion on something they’ve written, or something someone else has asked them to direct.

Twice already this year, friends have forwarded me bits of writing they have been offered which are, frankly, awful.

Being tone-deaf at dialogue is one thing, but dialogue polishes are fairly quick fixes. Structural and thematic problems are more difficult to fix.

The absolute worst thing that both pieces (one was a short script, the other a treatment for a feature) have in common was their resolute disinterest in adhering to the rules of spelling and grammar.

Now, for some, this may not seem like such a huge problem. As long as we understand what’s happening, what does it matter?

The problem is that, generally, if a writer takes such a careless and/or lackadaisical approach to the simple mechanics of language, it is often symptomatic of a further reaching carelessness. If you care about the story you’re telling, you should take the time to eliminate simple errors. Make sure that there is no room for ambiguity in your sentence construction; you want the reader to understand what you are saying. If you don’t care enough for that, why should I care about your story? In fact, neither story had anything to say about anything. They were not narrative, merely event.

I used the word “writer” before to describe the authors of these texts. That would be inaccurate. What makes someone a writer is not merely the act of writing, but the attitude which they take towards writing. A writer cares about what they are writing. A writer craves clarity. A writer wants to be understood.

The people who wrote these scripts were not writers. I don’t know what they were for sure, but a thought occurs to me: nobody ever calls themselves an “amateur writer”. You are either a writer or you are not. There is perhaps no better word for the way these things were written than “amateurish”.

David

- P.S. I’m not saying I expect all errors to be spotted and prevented; almost inevitably, one or two “their”s and “there”s will be transplanted, or “your” and “you’re”, or whatever. Mistakes happen and we can’t always catch them all. I’m talking about the chronic carelessness wherein almost every sentence contains multiple major errors. If you send someone some writing which you have not checked for errors beforehand, you are an asshole and you are wasting everybody’s time.

Strawberry Bootlaces (Sundance Version)

Tue, 31 Jan 2012 15:07:27 -0500

Strawberry Bootlaces (Sundance Version):

This is the final version ofStrawberry Bootlaces that screened at Sundance this year.

yawninglily: in case you missed it, click on the picture above...

Mon, 30 Jan 2012 13:21:26 -0500

yawninglily:

in case you missed it, click on the picture above to watch my version of ‘strawberry bootlaces’!

This is Tori’s version of the Strawberry Bootlaces film! I really like the cartoonish look of it.

Joseph Gordon-Levitt stars in a short film written by me.

Fri, 27 Jan 2012 09:17:44 -0500

Joseph Gordon-Levitt stars in a short film written by me.:

It screened at Sundance 2012 as part of the HitRECord live event. I can’t figure out how to directly post the video. I’m not sure it’s possible any more from HR.

Last August I finished the first draft of a feature film script, which is currently called Aurora,...

Thu, 26 Jan 2012 10:09:45 -0500

Last August I finished the first draft of a feature film script, which is currently called Aurora, though I expect that to change.

I was very proud of having finished that draft, but I always knew it still needed an awful lot of work. Until now, I hadn’t made any changes to it, because I wasn’t sure what changes to make. Except I knew it needed more songs.

Yeah.

Songs.

It’s a musical. Kind of. It wasn’t when I started writing it. Then two found their way in. I’m not happy with either of them, but I know I want more in there. So they’ll be re-written (or cut entirely and replaced with new ones). This is a problem though, because whatever talent I have for writing rarely seems to stretch beyond the words on the page. Lyrics are something else entirely, and I’m only an average musician. I suspect that if I could play the piano at all, that would help. I can’t, though; I play the guitar (& bass, ukulele and mandolin (badly)).

I’m constantly inspired by musical work, especially recent musical work: a decent amount of Scott Pilgrim vs. The World, Joss Whedon’s web musical Dr. Horrible’s Singalong Blog and Darren Criss’s A Very Potter Musical (Criss’s work is especially remarkable for the way that it uses the existing canon of Harry Potter as both a comic and emotional source from which he writes really great songs which are both extraordinarily catchy and narratively propulsive). These have the dual effect of inspiring and terrifying me (aaahhhhh how can I match this ahhhhh).

And right now I have a song on the go that… hey, might well work.

Dialogue This was shot over the course of about six months,...

Sat, 21 Jan 2012 12:22:51 -0500

Dialogue

This was shot over the course of about six months, starting with Hannah & Tash and ending with Andy & I.

Selected for the Newport International Film Festival (Wales), so it has an IMDb page.

The New This one I have mixed feelings about. It’s got...

Sat, 21 Jan 2012 12:20:58 -0500

The New

This one I have mixed feelings about. It’s got some of my best camera moves, but I don’t think it really works the way I intended it to, and some of my editing’s a bit gimmicky. Easter 2010ish.

Socks This was the first time I worked with Tash as producer,...

Sat, 21 Jan 2012 12:16:25 -0500

Socks

This was the first time I worked with Tash as producer, and the first time I made something under the name of Sixteen10 Films. This was around February/March of 2010.

OK I shot this in September 2009 with my friends Rob and Tim....

Sat, 21 Jan 2012 12:13:43 -0500

I shot this in September 2009 with my friends Rob and Tim. People laugh at the reference to The OC. Which is good.

Note: this is basically the only time that the production company referred to as “Strange Dream”. By the time we made Socks the next year we were already calling ourselves Sixteen10 Films.