It can be scary to write a movie script. Still, it is also one of the most rewarding and enjoyable endeavours you can undertake. Writing your own script is the best method to learn how to craft a compelling story. Once you begin writing your own stories, it becomes easier to recognize what works and what doesn’t in a film. This blog will assist you in building your own movie-worthy concepts by breaking them into their fundamental elements: character, structure, goals, and challenges (and conflict).
CHARACTERS
First Let's Look At The Character of Your Story
A good film script includes both a primary character and a secondary character. Typically, the primary character is the protagonist, but there can also be an antagonist. The antagonist opposes the protagonist’s intentions and actions to prevent the protagonist from accomplishing their objective.
The hero must overcome hurdles to reach his or her objective, typically discovering love or defeating destructive forces (like aliens). These hurdles may be physical, such as being injured, or emotional, such as experiencing fear or anger management issues resulting from the story’s inherent conflict resolution dilemmas
THE BEGINING
Start with a Short Story
If you want to write a screenplay, there is no better place to begin than with a short story. A short story is an ideal template for developing the characters, conflicts, and objectives that will serve as the framework for a feature-length screenplay. It is also a great approach to begin writing in general and enhance your writing skills.
An excellent beginning point for a screenplay might be one of your favourite novels or films (or stories).
For instance: If you were filming an action movie with a lot of fighting between two central characters with opposite ideas on what should happen next in their life, one would desire to return home, while the other could wait until things became clearer before deciding what to do.
This could be a fantastic beginning point for a script, but even if it weren’t, you would still need to explain how these folks got into this predicament and what occurred.
OBJECTIVE
Goals, Obstacles, and Conflict
Goals are what your character wants to achieve. Obstacles are the things that get in the way of achieving their goals. Conflict is when obstacles and goals are at odds with each other, creating tension that makes the plot interesting.
Your character should want something more than anything else — even if it means going against social norms or breaking laws — because they’re driven by a strong sense of self-interest and ambition. A great example of this motivation is Indiana Jones: He wants treasure, but he also wants to rescue archaeologists from Nazis who have kidnapped them; this makes him highly driven despite the risks involved in his quest for riches!
The conflict between your hero’s goal (to find ancient relics) and their obstacle (getting caught by Nazis) creates tension within your story about whether or not he’ll succeed at getting what he came for before being acquired by authorities; this makes readers care about whether or not he’ll succeed!
STRUCTURE
Structure Your Movie Script
The first step to developing a story is to create an outline. This can be done in any format you like, but you must keep things organized and clear, so there are no surprises regarding revisions. There are many different types of scripts out there, but your movie script will always follow this basic structure:
- Act One: The inciting incident sets up the central conflict for your film (i.e., “this person needs something that another person has”).
- Act Two: Your hero faces this challenge or obstacle (i.e., “he can’t get into his house because someone else stole something important”).
- Act Three: He solves his problem or saves the day! You might want to include some epilogue here (i.e., “they got married”) just so we know everything ended well for everyone involved in our story’s resolution.
The script will be broken down into acts, scenes, and beats. The foremost page of your screenplay is called the “title page,” and it should include: the title of your film.
Takeaway:
The takeaway should be one sentence. It should include the main idea of the article, and it should also be a summary of what you read. And finally, it should have a call to action: What can I do next?
Next, you want to write some notes. You can use your notebook or a separate document on your computer. The goal is to take some time to think about what you read and how it relates to previous knowledge. This helps develop an understanding of the topic so that when it comes time for class discussion, you’ll be ready with something insightful to say!
Finally, you should consider the most crucial question: How does this article relate to my life? This is where you can start thinking about what you’ll do next. Maybe there’s a new skill you want to learn or a new topic for your following research paper. When you have an action item in mind, it helps keep this reading experience relevant and motivating!
THE CRUX OF THIS BLOG
To summarize, your movie script should contain three sections: characters, structure, and goals. These are the critical elements of any story. The character of your story is what makes it special and unique. The main objective of your hero or heroine will help determine their main struggles throughout their journey. Finally, the structure provides a structure for how all these elements unite into a cohesive whole—and how everything fits into an exciting movie plot!
FREE SCRIPT WRITING TOOL
STUDIOVITY
Studiovity will make the beginning of your adventure in the film industry much simpler and more affordable. Studiovity is a script writing software that allows writers to organize their projects, collaborate with others, and create professional-looking scripts. It offers a variety of features, which include script breakdown; you can add your cast and crew, call sheets, payment breakdown, standard report (PDF format), and shareable links to your production team. It can also be used to schedule and budget your production, and to manage call sheets and shooting schedules. Additionally, it allows to share the script with others, receive notes, and make revisions in real-time.
