TIPS 121 > 145

121. You don't have to modernise a period story > When director Elizabeth Allen was five and home sick with the chicken pox, her mother gave her the Ramona books.  Allen admits, "I think I actually stayed home from school an extra day so I could finish up the series!"Allen notes there was no need to make the film Ramona and Beezus more contemporary. "We did not 'modernize' the stories.  Beverly Cleary never time-stamped the books and intended for most of them to play a year apart, rather than the decade she took between writing each one.  With her guidance, I steered away from any technology, cars, fashion or hairstyles that would make the film too 'of the moment.' Every generation seems to think the Ramona books were written for them.    Beverly wanted it that way because she felt the books should be timeless and relatable to each generation.  We had the same edict on the movie."  Read more
122. Understanding the daunting process from page to screen > In 1998, Vincenzo Natali was riding high on the astonishing success of Cube. Ready to move on to his next feature, he had shown a script for a short film called Mutants, written in 1995, to producer Steve Hoban. They had become friends while Natali had worked for Hoban as a storyboard artist on Blood & Donuts and Ginger Snaps, and took the relationship to the next level when Hoban had produced Natali's Canadian Film Centre short, Elevated. Hoban, whose corporate Zen-like nature is to wait for the right project at the right time, offered friendly counsel, but felt the story was far from camera ready. By 1999, the script had morphed from short format to theatrical, complete with a name change to Splice, and attracted the interest of Robert Lantos, who had just left Alliance Atlantis and opened Serendipity Point Films. Read more
123. The Art of documentary filmmaking > To make a film such as Océans implies permanent research and I think that it is this desire to search in new directions which best characterises those who have accompanied the film right to the end.  For what 's it that Jacques Perrin finally asks of those who are lucky enough to work for him if it is not to go to the end of their dreams, since his dream is infinite…. Just as in Winged Migrants, two families of filmmakers are united : specialists of the animal world working with those used to fiction in order for Océans to become, more than a documentary, just simply a film for the cinema. Four years shooting led us to very specific places in our planet that one could classify in two wide categories : those where life appears to express itself as it has done for thousands, if not millions, of years and those where obviously the natural order has seriously changed. The abundant sea life that we are searching for no longer exists in places ruined by human activities : over fishing, pollution, cemented over seacoasts.…   Read more
124. Turn writing into a soul searching experience > Tyler Perry's inspirational journey from the hard streets of New Orleans to the heights of Hollywood's A-list is the stuff of American legend.  Born into poverty and raised in a household scarred by abuse, Tyler fought from a young age to find the strength, faith and perseverance that would later form the foundations of his much-acclaimed plays, films, books and shows. It was a simple piece of advice from Oprah Winfrey that set Tyler's career in motion. Encouraged to keep a diary of his daily thoughts and experiences, he began writing a series of soul-searching letters to himself. Since the debut of his first feature, Diary of a mad Black Woman, in 2005, Tyler Perry has emerged as one of today's chief chroniclers of African-American life, writing, directing and often starring in a total of nine films in only five years. His latest, Why did I get married too? is the first film of its kind for the writer/director/actor: a sequel that reunites and continues the stories of an entire cast of characters from a previous film.  Read more
125. Make the villian your protagonist > "The original concept of Despicable Me was pitched to me by Sergio Pablos, who is a Spanish animator based with a small animation studio in Spain," explains Chris Meledandri.  "We immediately knew that screenwriters Cinco Paul and Ken Daurio were the team to write the screenplay."  The writers had worked with the producer on the global hit Dr. Seuss' Horton Hears a Who!, and Meledandri felt they had just the sensibility to bring Sergio Pablos' original story to life.  From the beginning, it was important to Illumination to construct a tale that would put a trademark stamp on the types of films the production house would be creating.  That would not involve two-dimensional heroes or antagonists.  Reflects Meledandri: "The idea of making an animated film in which the villain is your protagonist is unusual and very challenging.  By the end of the film, Gru has undergone a transformation, and it's that transformation that's made possible by starting him in a place where there are aspects of him that are downright unlikable.  You would not have a sense of appreciation for the journey he's gone on as a character had we not started him at that point."  Read more    Interview with producer Chris Meledandri
126. Write a comedy that explores underlying social forces > The Switch is based on the short story "Baster," written by Pulitzer Prize-winning novelist Jeffrey Eugenides, author of "The Virgin Suicides" and "Middlesex." Screenwriter Allan Loeb discovered the story when it was originally published in The New Yorker in 1996 and believed it would be a great premise for a film. Loeb subsequently developed the screenplay with producers Albert Berger and Ron Yerxa of Bona Fide Productions. Producer Nathan Kahane, president of Mandate Pictures ("Juno," Stranger Than Fiction"), had an opportunity to read the script and became an enthusiastic fan. "We felt it had a totally fresh approach to a very unique subject, so we reached out to Albert [Berger] and Ron [Yerxa], whom we have worked with in the past, to let them know we were extremely passionate about partnering with them on this film." Albert Berger and Ron Yerxa have produced an eclectic roster of some of the most popular and critically acclaimed films of recent years including "Little Miss Sunshine," "Election," "Cold Mountain," "Bee Season" and "Little Children." Ron Yerxa explains why he and Berger were drawn to the premise behind "The Switch." "We like comedies that explore the underlying social forces in America. This project had a unique premise and it presented social ideas in collision."  Read more
127. Adapting a short story > When Writer/Director Richard Eyre was commissioned to write the script for The Other Man, he read Bernhard Schlink's short story and found that the themes drew him to the material in a number of ways: "It was about so many different things that meant a lot to me. First of all about love, betrayal and forgiveness, but more than that, learning about someone, and learning unpleasant things about someone you think you knew very well and then realising that it's possible to love the person you didn't know as much as the person you did know. So it's full of things that resonate in everybody's lives and apart from that it's about the relationship between a father and daughter." German Writer Bernhard Schlink is best known around the world for his novel The Reader which has been translated into 39 languages and was the first German book to reach the number one spot in The New York Times bestseller list. His short story 'The Other Man' on which the film is based is from a book of short stories entitled Flights of Love which depicts numerous aspects of love. Whilst keeping the bones and plot of the short story, Richard Eyre and Charles Wood had to move the story on and give it a film narrative.   Eyre also made the story resonate in a contemporary world: "In the short story, the main character uncovers letters from her lover; in the film he uncovers e-mails and photographs. Read more
128. Turn fantasy into reel magic > Acclaimed filmmaker Zack Snyder (300, Watchmen) makes his animation debut with the fantasy family adventure "Legend of the Guardians: The Owls of Ga'Hoole," based on the beloved Guardians of Ga'Hoole books by Kathryn Lasky.  In "Legend of the Guardians: The Owls of Ga'Hoole," Snyder and the gifted creative team at Animal Logic sought to open a window into a world that hasn't been seen before, with mythic environments and expansive terrains like nothing they'd ever imagined, and owls so wonderfully realized that you almost forget they're not real. "Zack brings a visual language to his movies that is distinctive, and so do we at Animal Logic, so the marriage between Zack's vision and our vision was easy right from the get-go," says the film's producer, Animal Logic CEO Zareh Nalbandian. Author and executive producer Lasky put her stamp of approval on the filmmakers' efforts.  "When I saw the film, it was a dream come true," she states.  "I couldn't believe how brilliantly Zack Snyder had realized the Ga'Hoole world on screen, yet remained so true to the spirit of the universe I created.  I was totally swept up in 'Legend of the Guardians.'" Lasky's first three books in the series were adapted into screenplay form by writers John Orloff and Emil Stern.  "The day I finished reading the first book, I thought, 'Oh, my God, it's a fantastic book and I have to do this,' Orloff declares.  "Then, as soon as I knew Zack Snyder was directing, I knew the movie was really going to be mind-blowing and that it would look like nothing we've ever seen before."  Read more
129. The art of collaboration > Writer-director Ryan Murphy, best known for his work with the Golden Globe-winning television series "Nip/Tuck" and "Glee," has garnered acclaim for his keen and realistic dialogue.  He wrote the screenplay for Eat Pray Love with Jennifer Salt, with whom he previously collaborated on "Nip/Tuck."  "Ryan and Jennifer did a very reverential adaptation," says Julia Roberts.  "Ryan was really in sync with Liz Gilbert and talked to her a lot - they tried to be very true to the book.  There comes a moment in any film adaptation where things have to be a little bit different, but we always protected the spine of the story - Liz's journey of self-discovery." As they penned the adaptation, Murphy and his screenwriting partner, Jennifer Salt, held brainstorming meetings with Roberts and Gardner, each contributing the parts of the book that resonated most with them.  There was much overlap, of course, but also some moments that each related to individually.  These intimate discussions became the grass roots for the making of the film script. Another important resource for Murphy and Salt, of course, was the author, Elizabeth Gilbert.  Read more
130. How to make a movie in 11 days without losing your mind > Like any great raunchy, sexy comedy, the story of the production always starts with the written word.  Ok, I kid, but in this case, it's true.," says director Glenn Gaylord of Eating Out: All You Can Eat. "I was handed a hilarious, heartfelt script written by Phillip J. Bartell (director and co-writer of Eating Out 2: Sloppy Seconds) and the Eating Out creator, Q. Allan Brocka and felt like a kid on Christmas, or in my case, Hanukah.  The Executive Producer on all three films, Michael Shoel, together with Allan and Phillip asked if I'd be interested in making the third installment my feature directing debut two years prior to that, and I'm pretty sure I blurted out a "Yes!" before the question was finished being asked. Once we finally started pre-production in early May 2009, we were on a very tight schedule.  We only had a little over a month and a half to find the perfect cast and crew before our incredibly short 11 day shooting schedule from late June to early July.  Read more
131. Write about wolves  > Screenwriter/creator of OPEN SEASON and Idaho resident Steve Moore was inspired to write about wolves after reading an article about a federal program designed to resuscitate the wolf population in the Idaho wilderness. "They were capturing wolves up in Canada and releasing them in Idaho so they would mate here," he says. "And I just started thinking, 'You know, what if they really screwed up?  What if they captured this mated pair - a supposedly mated pair - and they hated each other.  Like Humphrey Bogart and Kate Hepburn in AFRICAN QUEEN, just exact polar opposites, and they haul them down to Idaho and they let them go." Read more
132. Write an action film that appeals to a broad audience > While most movie fans believe Machete was born in a now-legendary "fake" trailer conceived by Robert Rodriguez as part of his and Quentin Tarantino's tribute to B-movies, "Grindhouse," Machete's inception dates back years before that film's 2007 release.  In the early-1990s, when Rodriguez was prepping his second motion picture "Desperado," he thought the time was right for a Latin movie hero, which he codenamed "Machete." "There weren't any action movies that with a Latin flavor that could play to a broad audience," Rodriguez explains.  "When I watched [director] John Woo's movies, they made me want to be Asian. Woo and [actor] Chow Yun-Fat's 'Hard Boiled' and 'The Killer' really inspired me to make films that would create that feeling in the Latin arena." The nascent idea for Machete began to crystallize when actor Danny Trejo reported to the set of "Desperado," which was shooting in a small Mexican town.  "Nobody really knew about 'Desperado,' yet the local townspeople would flock to see Danny, thinking he was the star of the movie, even though his part was very small," Rodriguez remembers. "He has incredible presence, and I knew I had found Machete.  So, I handed him a knife, and told him to start practicing."  Read more
133. Unconventional filmmaking > Working with Jay and Mark Duplass has always been a unique experience for both cast and crew members, and the brothers saw no reason to change their idiosyncratic approach for their first Hollywood film Cyrus. Their unconventional methods ranged from shooting the script in chronological order to allowing the actors to develop their own dialogue and blocking. Even the most experienced hands were surprised and energized by it. "I think we should write a book about the 'Duplassian Method,' because it is fascinating on every level," says co-producer Chrisann Verges. "For me, the most wonderful thing about the way they worked was that we shot in script order. We could see the story unfolding and watching dailies was like a soap opera. What's happening to Molly and Cyrus and John today? The actors told me they really enjoyed that because they were able to grow in their relationships, much as you would in real life." In another major break from more traditional filmmaking, the brothers don't set up specific action for their shots. "We bring the camera to the actors as opposed to bringing the actors to the camera," says Jay. "We found that we couldn't get the performances we were looking for by putting actors on marks, so we started fostering realistic experiences and capturing them like documentary filmmakers. In the beginning, Mark was holding a boom, I was holding the camera, and it was all literally going down right in front of us."  Read more
134. An image can launch an idea >As 2007 came to a close, Neil Jordan found himself in Los Angeles, a writer/director caught amid the uncertainty of the Hollywood writers strike, preparing a studio film that looked like it would be postponed. Without a foreseeable end to the strike, Jordan decided to head home to Ireland to work on a new screenplay. "I had this idea for a story of a fisherman who catches a girl in his nets. I wasn't sure where it would go, but I just decided to write it," he says. "So the story of ONDINE evolved from that first image: a fisherman who finds a body in his nets that seems to be dead but turns out to be alive. There was something in those initial images that suggested both a fairytale and an awful, harsh reality. I just let the ideas go where they would." The story Jordan wove is Ondine, a contemporary interpretation of a classic fairy tale that tells the lyrical story of a fisherman, his estranged daughter, and their encounter with a beautiful and mysterious stranger. The film creates its imagery and mythology from a realistic series of events taking place in the lush and haunting landscape of the remote Southwest Irish coast. The enchantment, darkness and mystique of the story come from the sea and the vistas of an Irish fishing village as viewed through the eyes of a sick child with an unwavering belief in the miraculous. Read more
135. Use sports as a tool >When screenwriter John Posey, who portrays Coach Tennent in the film, began writing Legendary nearly 10 years ago, he was inspired by an incident which occurred in high school with his younger brother.  "It was after a wrestling match and there was a lot of tension and the potential for a brawl between two teams.  And, my younger brother, who was a 98-pounder, broke a Gatorade bottle, and stood there with it in his hand, ready to defend the whole team.  He was going to take on everybody and he weighed 98 pounds soaking wet! That image just stayed with me. …When I started writing, I wanted to set the story in the prep wrestling world and I wanted to go back to the younger brother. 'What if the child tries to teach the adults how to behave because the adults can't figure it out among themselves?  What happens when the child is the real grown-up?' Read more
136. Turn history into reel action >Neil Marshall grew up at one end of Hadrian's Wall, in Newcastle upon Tyne, and worked for many years at the other, in Cumbria.  He recalls spending many hours driving on the old Roman roads which still run parallel to the wall.  It was here that the filmmaker of hit movies Dog Soldiers and The Descent began to consider the idea of constructing a story about this extraordinary man-made structure, that became Centurion.  "Somebody told me about the legend of the Ninth Legion, about this Roman legion that marched into the mists of Scotland and vanished without a trace - leaving this great mystery," says Marshall.  "This idea of an entire Roman army marching into Scotland and just vanishing, it immediately conjures up images of supernatural elements.  But I didn't really want to go down that road.  I wanted to find out what might have actually happened, if they did disappear."  What would drive such a powerful empire such as this to construct a wall so vast and impenetrable?  What on earth were they protecting themselves from? Marshall imagined that the legendary and powerful tribes known as the Picts, believed to have populated the Caledonian mountains around the 1st Century might have ambushed the Legion.  He began to plot the concept around this premise. Marshall centred the story on a lone member of the Roman army who might have survived the initial attack, and had to fight his way back home through enemy territory.  Read more
137. Patience reaps rewards >The story of Takers begins with Gabriel Casseus, an actor who had never written a screenplay before. After a night at Hollywood's fabled Mann's Chinese Theater, Casseus was struck by an inspiration. "The idea for the movie came to me complete from beginning to end," he says. "But I didn't know how to write a script. By chance, I had read a script written by Peter Allen a couple of years earlier. I'd never met the guy, never heard of the guy before, but after I read it, I said to myself, I'm going to find this guy and I'm going to write a movie with him."  Casseus tracked down Allen in Los Angeles and proposed they collaborate on a screenplay about a high-tech, high-style crew of bank robbers. "He had some very specific ideas," recalls Allen. "Gabe wanted it to be about a multiracial crew of guys who wear sharp suits and commit designer crimes, meaning they never get caught. He described the robbery that opens the film in great detail. And I said, 'Okay, we can run with this.' Read more
138. Casting can influence the writing of a screenplay > The author of the novel that Lewis Colick and Craig Pearce adapted Charlie St.Cloud into a screenplay had originally written Charlie as a 28-year-old man.  For the adaptation, Sherwood knew there would be changes and agreed with the casting decision of a younger actor.  He offers: "Zac is a great choice for Charlie.  He's younger than the character I wrote in my book, but when you watch Zac, you really feel all of his character's promise, potential and hope.  Casting him was a brilliant idea, and I'm thrilled that he's doing it.  I think that he'll break your heart and heal it too."  About the source material, director Burr Steers reflects: "Ben Sherwood has a very specific point of view.  On the one hand, you have to make the material your own, but I also wanted to be faithful to his intentions.  When I decided to tackle this project, I knew I wanted to make the relationships Ben created, especially between the two brothers, feel very real to our audience.  As a filmmaker, it's always my intention to respect source material and still create the tone and aesthetic I imagine for a project."    Read more
139. Make controversy funny > Says Four Lions writers Sam Bain and Jesse Armstrong: "In the world of terrorism there are a lot of comic angles to explore - grandiloquence, ambition, incompetence, male machismo, small-group hierarchies and dynamics, superiority/inferiority complexes, and through it all that brittleness you get when any kind of idealism hits the compromises of real life - that's very rich comic territory. What we came back to again and again when we felt we were drifting off was - what's the truth of this situation? And to that end we used Chris' extensive research a lot - court transcripts, newspaper reports, books, tapes, conversations, it all went into the mix as we talked about what appealed to us and what the attitude of the film was. The writers did not restrain themselves." Obviously all writing is about restraining yourself from writing a load of crap - but we didn't feel there was anything we wanted to write but couldn't or shouldn't. It's about what's funny. So we were only restrained in the sense that we didn't want to write anything that strayed from comedy."  Read more
140. Let real places influence your story >  Real places, says Mark Feuerstein, who portrays Eddie Sullivan,  Feuerstein, such as the desire to be successful or to find companionship and love -- while avoiding those "Knucklehead" mistakes that can or do derail many a dream.  "Everyone can relate to the experience of being a knucklehead.  I certainly can." For WWE Superstar Paul "The Big Show" Wight the real places often included real-life incidents.  After all, at 7-feet, 440-pounds, the "World's Largest Athlete," has a lot in common with Walter, especially, his size, strength and embarrassing run-ins with ceiling fans.  "When we were developing the script, I told a story about something that happened to me in high school and it was worked into the script," explained WightRead more
141. Make a difference in the world > Director Rupert Murray's The End of The Line is nothing short of the inconvenient truth about the devastating effect of overfishing on the world's ecosystems. "If you look at how simple and universally agreed the solutions are, that the fishing industry is a relatively small industry to regulate properly, that a global network of marine reserves would cost the same as the amount we spend on ice cream, then I believe you can remain hopeful and positive" says Murray. The first major documentary to reveal the extent of the crisis facing today's oceans, The End of The Line challenges us to imagine a world without fish…period. The End of the Line, the first major feature documentary film revealing the impact of overfishing on our oceans.   Read more
142. Increase the fear > Alexandre Aja, the director of extreme horror offerings such as High Tension and The Hills Have Eyes was first introduced to the script written by Pete Goldfinger and Josh Stolberg, but had other film commitments.  He was re-introduced to the property years later.  Aja recollects, "I said this is exactly the base of what I would love to do. I want to go back to that Spring Break under attack concept and I want to increase the fear, I want to increase the gore, I want to increase the action pieces, I want to develop the characters. I really want to make it feel really big. And Dimension and Bob Weinstein let me do that." "Can you imagine watching a real horror movie in 3-D?" That was the question Aja posed to his writing and producing partner Greg Lavasseur while in script development on Piranha 3D.  At the time, James Cameron's Avatar was still a highly secretive project, but the looming spectacle played on Aja and Lavasseur's curiosity. "When you making a movie," Aja says, "what you're working on is to create the best emotion possible for the audience. You try to make a film that's not only something that you want to watch on the screen, but something that becomes an experience, because fear and suspense is only about forgetting that you're watching a movie. " Read more
143. Let friends and family inspire your characters > Though Michael Meredith says The Open Road is not autobiographical, he admits that friends and family inspired his characters, and that there is much of him here, as well. Admittedly, too, there are elements of who he wishes he could be, saying, "It's fascinating to watch as father and son, Bridges' "Kyle" and Timberlake's "Carlton," express their feelings toward each other, because to some extent this is something I haven't been able to do in life. I think (with this film) I'm educating myself as I go along."  Meredith continues, "This isn't a story about a legendary baseball player and his minor league ball-playing son. It's about the father/son relationship and how we all struggle with that. And it's about family reconciliation. Every family struggles. And the people that you're closest to are the ones you seem to have the most problems with. The reconnection of all these characters is something I hope a lot of people will relate to."  Read more
144. Write what fascinates you > Writer/director/producer Derrick Borte explains the genesis of The Joneses in this way:"I used to work (and still do) in the commercial world.  I am fascinated by the resourceful ways advertisers use to get products into people's minds.  Many people know about the models hired to sit at bars to smoke certain brands of cigarettes.  I was very curious about how far advertisers might go to sneak their product into our brains.  Instead of the girl at the bar, I placed a family in a McMansion setting, and the Joneses were born." One of the first people who read the script was producer Kristi Zea, an award-winning producer, production designer, costume designer, and director.  Zea was given THE JONESES script by a friend, who also happened to be Borte's uncle.   Zea read it and called Borte and told him she thought it was a wonderful project.  They started developing the script together - he would send a draft, she would give notes.  They spent hours on the phone collaborating, until the script was ready to be shown to a few choice friends in the business. Read more
145. Write what you know > First-time screenwriter Moe Jelline wrote "You Again" four years ago from an idea she had based upon her own life experience. Jelline reveals, "I've always been fascinated how high school is a blip in your life--four years--and yet somehow the emotional ups and downs can stay with some people for the rest of their lives. Anyone who's ever thought twice about going to their high school reunion knows exactly what I'm talking about." She continues, "I have an adorable brother and, at the same time I was playing with this script idea, many of my friends were calling me asking if he was single, could they be set up, et cetera. And that thought was slightly horrifying--I mean, my brother dating one of my friends? Um, NO…."
Jelline considers, "Then, it occurred to me that it's better that he wind up with someone that I like versus someone I don't, and from that concept, another idea gelled that incorporated my high school experiences." "What if your greatest nightmare came back to haunt you in a very permanent way? What if your high school nemesis was marrying your brother?" proposes Jelline.And so, "You Again" was born. Read more

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