Important advice before starting your script

by Fermín P. Pina

Are you thinking of putting down in paper that incredible fiction story you have been thinking about for quite some time now? Before jumping into writing it, at Filmarket Hub we want to offer you some advice so you start off on the right track.

The job of a screenwriter goes beyond being capable of capturing a fiction on a piece of paper. Along all the writing process, there’s a lot of moments where obstacles might arise. The famous writers block, fear of the blank paper, is a reality. But, in the end, it’s a matter of blockages that we can overcome, using the right tools for it. How can we minimize to the maximum those moments?

Acquaint yourself with the material

It is a common mistake to think that you need to do research only when we’re trying to write a historical piece, or with stories set in exotic places you don’t know very well.

The truth of the matter is, writing any fictional story means having to analyze, research and familiarize yourself with the subject matter. A laborious work which will bring enormous benefits to your writing.

Even though you might be inventing a space and a time in which your story happens, even though your story might not be inspired in any real event, you will ALWAYS be able (and should) to base it in reality, to feed your story. The best tales, in fact, are those which are born and draw from well known facts, which remind us and inspire moments which the audience will recognize as familiar.

Research similar spaces and times to the story you want to tell. You’re going to invent a land of fantasy and magic? Read on medieval Britain. You are going to take a group of gangsters to have an adventure in Mars? Soak in information on the space race and gangster Italy during the 1920s.

The more direct or indirect information you have about what you’re going to write, the more tools will be at your disposition when you face a blockage in your writing. The more context, the better.

Write the story of the lives of your characters

The main characters of our stories need a past. It is true that in your script you will only show a concrete moment of their lives, but one of the best pieces of advice I’ve ever gotten to learn to develop fiction skillfully, is to be able to create solid background stories to your characters.

What do I need for to know what was the main character like as a kid, if the story happens during the two days before he gets married? You’ll ask yourself. The answer is in the origin of the essence of the character: their personality.

If you know the characters lives in depth, you will know how they will react to each situation they are presented with in life. When the story takes you to a critical point, to a point you maybe weren’t expecting to arrive to, you will know exactly in what way your characters will respond to it.

Let’s continue with the same example. If your character is about to get married and you’ve given him a traumatic childhood, marked by the divorce of his parents when he was a child, you can have a pretty clear idea of how he will react if he discovers an infidelity.

But, for instance, if your main character is a war hero, courageous and decisive in the battlefield, who’s husband and children are waiting home, you know how compassionate she will be when she encounters an enemy surrounded by his or her family.

In conclusion, invest time, research and efforts to create a character’s file card with all the relevant details to his life. You don’t have to write an enciclopedia about them, but knowing their past will allow you to be coherent in their present.

The treatment

There are so many ways of writing scripts as there are screenwriters. The advice and habits of one might not be useful to another one, and both be great professionals. Nevertheless, there are a few common tools that, in general, will save you time and optimize your work.

Maybe you are the type to jump into writing the script, with a more or less defined mental plan of how you want the story to develop. However, the treatment of the script is one of the tools that is most useful for almost anyone. Understanding it and knowing to use it is one of the best advice anyone can give you.

You can find here a post on how to write a treatment. As a summary, I’m sure you know this is the previous document that many screenwriters use to structure the story they’re about to write. Simplifying the concept a lot, the treatment is a sort of narration of the action that happens in the story, where scenes and action is explained, without getting into too much detail, but telling the whole story, from start to finish.

If you are writing your story idea as a treatment first, you have a double advantage. On the one hand, you won’t get stuck with things like writing dialogue or describing precisely where the action is happening. On the other hand, you will have an overall vision of the story, structured by acts and scenes, which is very useful when having to work out the chronology of every event happening in it.

Is it worth dedicating time to write an in depth treatment? The answer is YES.

You’re not writing the final version

Let’s dig in to the last piece of advice to start writing your script. In this case, we have to take into account that what you’re about to start writing, isn’t going to be the final version of it, not even close.

ABSOLUTELY NOT ONE SCREENWRITER will finish its work on the first version. All scripts, without exception, go through a long and deep process of rewrites, analysis and changes. Some of the best films ever made in the history of cinema have gotten to its shooting on their 10th or 15th version.

To understand and internalize this concept when you start writing, is liberating. Write without fear. Jump into writing your story even though it might not be as great as you imagined. Further down the line, the moment to cutback an edit, rewrite and change stuff, will come; there you will be able to tighten up your story and bring it to its best version.