Today’s GUEST ARTICLE comes from stellar long-time contributor MulesandMud, who often offers the best advice on the board. Even I get jealous of his vast knowledge at times. Since some of you have been asking what the hell treatments are and how to write them, Mules has kindly offered to write a guest article about the elusive little buggers. Hope you enjoy it!

The standard look a screenwriter gives when told to write a treatment.

I know some of you think that loglines are the ugly babies of the screenwriting world, but a logline is an adorable toddler compared to the deformed, puberty-stricken creature that is a film treatment.

A treatment is by definition incomplete, even moreso than a screenplay. It’s a work in progress, an idea on its way to becoming a script (which in turn is on its way to becoming a movie).

That’s the reason that treatments are so much harder to find than screenplays. Most writers have no desire to show their treatments to anyone. They are almost always ungainly and imperfect documents, so seeing one is a peek behind the curtain of a writer’s process.

And as you all know, it’s not very pretty back there.

Still, whether we like treatments or not, a pro scribe needs to know how to write them, full stop. Anyone who claims to have a screenwriting career that doesn’t require treatment-writing is either lying or living a charmed life that has no relevance to the rest of us.

So, with that in mind…

WHAT IS A TREATMENT?

Like a lot of film industry jargon, the term “treatment” is intentionally ambiguous, so that important people can toss the word around without quite knowing what it means.

To understand what a treatment is, it’s helpful to understand it in the context of other story-building documents often used in the development process. Here’s a quick and not-at-all-comprehensive list:

BEAT SHEET – This is exactly what it sounds like, a list of the major story beats. That list might be just a series simple words or phrases at first, and rarely exceeds a page.

STEP OUTLINE – This is also essentially a list, only more elaborate, charting out each individual scene of your script with descriptions for each entry, often detailing things like locations, characters present, and dramatic or thematic developments.

SYNOPSIS – This is a short prose description of your story. It typically ranges from one to five pages in length. Depending on the size and the purpose of the document, it might also be called a SUMMARY or ONE-PAGER (hint: don’t call it a one-pager if it’s three pages long).

TREATMENT – This is a longer and more comprehensive prose version of your script, normally around 10 to 30 pages long; the level of detail varies accordingly. As with step outlines, longer treatments may attempt to detail each individual scene. The longest ones might also include lines of dialogue or scene headings, at which point the document is probably more of a SCRIPTMENT, a hybrid of prose and screenplay formatting.

Now, you’re likely to hear all of the above terms used vaguely or interchangeably. And to make things especially confusing, the word OUTLINE can be used to refer to any or all of the above. Don’t go crazy over the semantics, just try to be consistent about what you refer to as what.

Also, never be afraid to ask for clarification when someone requests a particular type of document from you. To paraphrase a great swordsman, they might not think it means what you think it means.

When asked to write a treatment/outline/whatever, your smartest move is to ask the asker to send you a sample treatment/outline/whatever that they’ve received in the past, to show you exactly what format they’re looking for.

Framed properly, this request won’t sound amateurish, it’ll prove you’re a pro who knows how unreliable these terms can be. Plus, it might give you a chance to see another writer’s treatment, which is always interesting.

WHEN TO WRITE A TREATMENT

Almost without exception, treatments are written early in the development process, before you start writing the actual script. If a producer asks you to write a treatment or outline for an existing script, they probably mean a synopsis (see above).

Here, we need to understand that there are two very different reasons why you might write a treatment:

1.) Because you find treatments useful for your own story development.

In this case, the treatment is a WORKING DOCUMENT, a writing tool for the eyes of you and your collaborators. This is a purely optional tool, and its value depends on each person’s individual writing process.

Personally, I tend to create all sorts of outline- and treatment-type documents before beginning a script. I’ve also been known to make look books, research binders, etc, plus unique documents tailored each project (e.g., for a TV pilot I made an elaborate family tree mapping the genealogies of my characters; for a contained horror script I used drafting software to mock up a small town police station).

Again, this is a completely optional version of a treatment, whereas the second reason makes a treatment trickier, if not impossible, to avoid.

2.) Because someone asks you for a treatment.

In this case, the treatment is a PITCH DOCUMENT, a selling tool designed to convince someone else that your story would make a great movie. Most often, a producer or exec will request one of these after a pitch meeting or development conversation.

This kind of treatment (or outline, or synopsis, etc…see above) is inevitable; sooner or later, someone will ask you for one. I’ve done a couple dozen of these over the years, both for ideas of my own and for ideas pitched to me by producers or execs. A few have gotten me paid in one way or another, but most of them haven’t. That’s the nature of the beast.

It’s important to note here that good treatments take serious time and effort.

Most folks who ask you for a treatment won’t want to pay for it, even though they realize it’s a lot to ask. In my opinion, once a tight treatment has been written, all of the hardest parts of the screenwriting process have essentially been done. You need to think long and hard about whether the project in question is worth that kind of commitment.

It may be seem worthwhile to write a treatment for a concept that a manager or producer has sent your way, even just for the sake of building a relationship. Depending on the situation, that may be true, especially for an unproven writer looking for industry access or representation.

However, make sure you don’t go in blind. Do your best to understand who you’re getting involved with, and what the realistic prospects are for the project.

HOW TO WRITE A TREATMENT

This bring us back to the distinction between a WORKING DOCUMENT and a PITCH DOCUMENT. That is, a treatment you write for yourself vs. one you write for someone else.

Though we could call both of these documents treatments, they have nearly opposite goals.

What’s the difference? In short, BULLSHIT.

When you write a working treatment, bullshit is your enemy.

Here, you need to be brutally honest with yourself. Lay your story out in graphic, unsexy detail, leaving nothing out. Identify all of its flaws. Make its weak points clearly visible. Figure out which beats you’ve left half-considered and which ones you may have overthought.

This way, when it comes time to write the script, you have solutions in mind, or at least a firm grasp of the problems. Otherwise, why bother?

On the other hand, when you write a pitch treatment, bullshit is your friend.

Let’s say a producer or exec was intrigued by your pitch, and is now asking for a treatment to see if your idea can go the distance. The document you present may decide whether or not you make a sale.

That means you need to bring the sexy in a big way.

You probably won’t know every detail of your story, but the treatment needs to read like you do. You’ll need to gloss over plot gaps or character issues, hiding any problems you haven’t solved yet (fact: no matter how much work you do, there will always be problems left to solve).

The treatment needs to be paced right, giving enough specifics to suggest that you know what you’re talking about, but not so much that it gets bogged down in a rushed list of plot and scene ingredients. Don’t try to cram everything in there: for the sake of clarity and rhythm, you’ll have to leave some things out.

These pages need to read like a movie, in some ways even more smoothly and cinematically than a screenplay does.

Most importantly, the treatment needs to nail the tone of your story. It can’t be just a list of characters and scenes. You need to get your script’s personality across. Give the thing a little sizzle, as they say.

The good news, sort of, is that you basically have to write a version of this document anyway as preparation for a good verbal pitch, which normally amounts to a 10-minute monologue in which you, the writer, introduce your concept and walk listeners through the entire story, hopefully without boring the hell out of anyone.

In most ways, a great pitch treatment reads exactly like a great verbal pitch sounds: as though someone were telling you the story a film so well that by the end it felt like you’d just watched the actual movie.

If that sounds hard, well, it is. Most treatments, even by great writers, tend to be boring reads, more functional than entertaining. In some ways, treatment writing is harder than scriptwriting, since you’re forced to accomplish a screenplay’s worth of story in just a fraction of the words.

Finally, a quick word on treatment length:

For a working treatment, the longer the better. That doesn’t mean pad the thing unnecessarily; it means make an effort to get everything relevant down on paper, without prejudice. There’s no such thing as too much information here. It’s all grist for the mill of the actual screenplay.

For a pitch treatment, less is more. Try to keep things short, around 15 pages, otherwise the treatment may get bogged down in minutiae. This may sound like less work than the longer version, but in my experience, it’s actually more work, since you usually have to write it all before you know what you can omit. Especially with complex genre plots, paring down a verbal pitch or treatment to a streamlined length can feel impossible at times.

Genre: Comedy (Stoner)
Premise: After accidentally losing her company’s mascot, an uptight junior food scientist reluctantly enlists the help of her pothead building superintendent and together they battle against a relentless vermin exterminator to recover the missing ferret before her career goes up in smoke.
Why You Should Read: With marijuana being legalized all over the place, it’s a topical subject, plus it has a fresh twist with the ferret angle. Stoners and ferrets go together like macaroni and cheese! I’ve directed several short films featuring ferrets, including a short called DUDE, WHERE’S MY FERRET? that is meant as a teaser for the feature version, featuring Bubbles from The Trailer Park Boys. I also directed THE MAGIC FERRET, which was Jacob Tremblay’s (Room) first leading role. I like working with ferrets because it’s something different than what most people are used to seeing – and I know something about them because I have one as a pet (used to have two, R.I.P. Falcor the Ferret). I think this is a great recipe for a stoner comedy – but we need some help to get it to where it needs to be. I say ‘we’ because I’m the director but not the writer – I found someone to write this for me while I learn the craft. We could highly benefit from a review by Carson and our peers. I’m smishsmosh22 and promise to participate in the comments if we get chosen!
Writer: Tim McS
Details: 93 pages

Dude, where’s my ferret?

It’s fun to say, right? Go ahead, try and say it without smiling.

Like a talking ferret, it’s impossible.

Unless, of course, you believe in talking ferrets. And in that case, you’ll like this script. In fact, one of the first things you’ll realize when reading today’s script is that Tim McS really likes ferrets. No, I mean like really really really likes ferrets. And while we’ve always supported the mantra, “Write what you know,” at what point has that philosophy gone too far???

26 year old Laura Frye is a junior food scientist. That means she designs food to taste better, last longer, or look more interesting. And her latest project is improving the lifespan of a pet food company’s ferret food line. As you might imagine, the CEO of the company, Peterson, is none too pleased with this development. The faster ferret food goes bad, the sooner the customer has to buy more ferret food. So Laura’s invention will lose the company money.

After dropping a couple dozen F-bombs on her, Peterson punishes Laura by assigning her to watch the company ferret (lovingly named “Ferret Bueller”) for the evening and bring him to his big ad photoshoot tomorrow. Ironically, Laura doesn’t even like ferrets. But she waltzes back to her apartment with the ferret and somehow ends up in 25 year-old All-Star stoners, Spoke and Noodle’s apartment.

After accidentally eating their pot cookies, Laura inadvertently lets Ferret Bueller loose. With her job on the line, Laura desperately enlists the help of Spoke and Noodle to find Ferret Bueller, who has since crawled into the walls and is running around the insides of the apartment complex.

Laura and Spoke team up, following the screams from apartment to apartment, while Noodle heads down to the basement, which he seems to think is the best place to find stray animals.

I should mention that Noodle lost his memory in a terrible accident years ago and has no idea who he is. So, of course, he starts seeing hallucinations of Ferret Bueller, who begins talking to him, revealing pieces of his past, from which he finally starts putting together his identity.

Meanwhile, unlikely sparks are flying between Spoke and Laura. She’s educated, driven, and organized. He’s jobless, dumb, and addicted to pot. But if you’re both high, none of that matters. And you can never predict how the search for an elongated rat-animal-thing can bring two people closer. But will they capture that little minx before it’s too late? Dude, read the script to find out!

Hey, I got a joke for you. How did one ferret receive money from another ferret? He inferrited it.

Haha. You get it?

Right.

Anyway, Dude Where’s My Ferret is a surprisingly well-constructed screenplay considering the subject matter. Typically when I read these kinds of wacky comedies, there is zero effort or even understanding of how to add structure to the story. The scripts are usually a series of loosely-connected sketches.

We’ve got some great GSU here (goal, stakes, urgency). Goal – find the ferret. Stakes – Laura’s job. Urgency – the photo shoot. So we’re always clear on what needs to happen and where we are in the story. That’s important. A lot of writers don’t know how to do that, causing their scripts to wander.

It’s a clever little plot too. The fact that we get to chase the ferret through the building allows us to go into the apartments of a varied cast of characters. It was basically a license to go crazy with character, and as anyone who writes comedy knows, crazy/weird/outrageous characters are key. Melissa McCarthy’s character in Bridesmaid’s. Mr. Chow in The Hangover.

I also liked the technologically sophisticated pest exterminator. An exterminator who uses drones to search for his prey – I’d never seen that before. But more importantly, McS was employing a classic storytelling technique. Figure out what your main character wants, then put as many obstacles in front of that “want” as you can. The more creative the obstacle, the better.

So with all this good, why didn’t I love Dude, Where’s My Ferret? Well, to put it plainly, I thought the comedy was too standard. One of my big red flags when it comes to comedy is excessive swearing. It’s not that swearing can’t be funny. With the right character, it can be hilarious. But usually it’s a sign of the writer not being creative enough. A guy who swears a lot (in this case, Peterson, who says “fuck” every other word) tells me, “I’m not willing to put in the effort to come up with genuine thoughtful comedy.”

I mean look at one of the movies this was inspired by – Ferris Bueller’s Day Off. Hilarious movie. Not a single swear word.

If it’s an organic part of the character (for instance, the character has Tourette’s), that’s fine. Otherwise, it’s a signal that you may be reading something where the comedy’s not going to rise above “swearing is funny” level.

Another issue with the comedy here is that it feels dated. These stoner characters could’ve been transplanted right out of a 1980s film. They talk, sound, and act exactly the same as the characters from those movies used to sound.

It’s fine to be inspired by movies from your past. But the difference between creating a movie that’s inspired by old films and movies that feel plain old is taking what worked in those old films then ADDING SOMETHING NEW.

Where’s the “new” in Spoke and Noodle? How have you made their stoner schtick different from past stoner schticks? I’ll give you an example – the movie, “Friday.” That was a movie about potheads, but told in a completely different cultural setting from where we were used to seeing potheads.

So all the spaced-out jokes were crammed up against new environments and fresh problems. In the past when a stoner got high, he ate cereal. In Friday when Ice Cube got high, he ate cereal with water cause they were too poor to buy milk.

That’s what I mean by fresh, and it’s something I discuss here all the time. It doesn’t stop with comedy. You have to ask yourself, “What am I bringing that’s new to the table?” I’m guessing McS would say that the ferret is the new element. But typically the “fresh” component has to be represented by the characters somehow, and that’s not happening here. These characters are exact replicas of 1980s stoner movie characters.

That’s why I read this with an occasional smile, but never laughed out loud (okay, that’s not entirely true. I did laugh at them trying to figure out if the exterminator was actually an “ex-Terminator”).

So moving forward, my suggestion to McS would be to add fresh angles to both Spoke and Noodle to bring them into the year 2016. I don’t know if you need to change their culture, their race, their ages, their sexual preference, but it has to be something. 25 year old white stoners is the most “first choice” of choices a writer can make, and therefore shows a lack of creativity.

Next, push yourself with the comedy. A lot of these jokes feel safe, and a bit dated to be honest. Again, it seems like you’re writing a comedy spec from the year 1988. You’ve got to modernize this somehow. Make it feel current. Or else I’m afraid people are going to label you with the dreaded “dated” tag like I just did.

With that said, losing a ferret in a building is funny. And while I’m not the biggest fan of stoner comedies, this is a prime situation to add pot to. So I think you have a foundation to build on. Oh, and I agree with that commenter who said you should change your title. You don’t want to use a variation of a mildly successful 10 year old movie title. Distinguish yourself. Show that you’re original by coming up with an original title. Good luck!

Script link: Dude, Where’s My Ferret

[ ] What the hell did I just read?
[x] wasn’t for me
[ ] worth the read
[ ] impressive
[ ] genius

What I learned: One of the best ways to avoid cliche characters is to ask yourself, “What kind of person would never be this cliche?” What this does is it places you on the other end of the spectrum as far as stereotyping, opening up new avenues to create unique characters. Stoners are one of the most cliche character-types out there. So ask yourself, “What kind of person is never a stoner?” A businessman with his shit together. An intensely religious person. A police officer. You don’t have to choose any of these but they’re great starting points for going against the grain and coming up with somebody original.

One of the most important skills in a screenwriter’s tool bag is being able to convey a character’s attributes through action. So if you want to show that a character is a dick, show him kicking a dog. If you want to show that a girl is kind, show her holding the door open for an old lady.

Where this skill becomes truly powerful, though, is when you use it to highlight a character’s fatal flaw. This combination not only has the power to tell the audience what kind of person your character is, but also highlight the thing that’s holding them back in life, and therefore the weakness they will need to overcome by the end of the movie.

Weak or inexperienced writers try and sell these flaws through dialogue. So if their hero’s flaw is that they don’t believe in themselves, they’ll make sure that character utters the words, “I just don’t think I’m good enough.” Or “I don’t believe I have what it takes.” Not only is this on-the-nose. It’s lazy. If you want to be a power writer, find an action to sell that flaw. A good example is Neo in The Matrix. Whether he’s fighting Morpheus in the dojo or about to jump between buildings, his demeanor is fear. He’s not sure he can do it. That action (or non-action) tells us he doesn’t believe in himself yet.

I’ve figured out a few things about conveying flaws over the years. In comedies and animation, we’ll see flaws expressed through action right when we meet our hero. The first moment we meet Stu in The Hangover, he’s being pushed around by his wife. The first moment we meet Joy in Inside Out, she’s obsessed with everyone being happy. Because these genres tend to celebrate the extremes, being more “in your face” with actions is acceptable.

However, once we get into more dramatic films, writers tend to take their time, exposing flaws gradually and subtly over a series of scenes. Going back to The Matrix, we don’t know that Neo doesn’t believe in himself for awhile. We spend some time getting to know his daily life first, and the Wachowskis drop hints here and there, but we don’t really know that that’s his issue until we get to his training.

I’ve also found that certain flaws are more “actionable” than others. For example, selfishness is a popular flaw in modern cinema at least partly due to how easy it is to convey through action. All you have to do is show Han Solo decline an invitation to do something for the betterment of the group and we know he’s selfish. Ditto with arrogance or stubbornness or envy. These are very “actionable” flaws.

The REAL writers out there can express even the toughest “non-actionable” flaws through action. And that’s today’s challenge. I want you to write a scene – it can be about anything – but you must convey the main character’s fatal flaw through an action. What’s the flaw in question? The character is emotionally distant. They don’t make emotional connections with anybody. Oh, and did I mention that the scene had to be entertaining? Yeah, that’s the thing with screenwriting. Just pulling off one thing in a scene isn’t enough. You have to do it while entertaining the audience.

Hey, I warned you this would be hard. So write out your scenes in the comments. Upvote your favorites. I’ll give a shout-out to the winner tomorrow. Good luck!

Guys, the submissions have to get better. I cycled through 75 submissions in a row at one point and not a single idea showed promise. Ideas either weren’t big enough, had no inherent stakes attached, or were unfocused to the point that I didn’t understand what the movie was about. If you’ve submitted to Amateur Offerings in the distant past and never got picked, it may have been because you got lost in the shuffle, not that your premise was rejected. So re-submit (carsonreeves3@gmail – include title, genre, logline, why we should read, and a PDF of the script). We need a better pool of scripts to choose from. P.S. If your script isn’t getting chosen, feel free to post the logline in the comments and ask for help. Just remember that the primary duty for today is to read and vote for your favorite script. Good luck.

Title: The Ballad of Will Scarlet
Genre: Action/historical
Logline: An older Will Scarlet leads the woodsmen of Sherwood Forest, protecting the lands from the sociopathic Robin Hood. Their frayed bonds are tested when the Sheriff of Nottingham hires a legend to rid history of Robin once and for all.
Why You Should Read: I’ve written and directed some short films and standalone TV projects, directed some commercials, got some moderate festival play, in all likelihood nothing you’ve seen. Professionally, I know just enough to tie my own noose. I also teach filmmaking on occasion, and as some of my students are now making features that are getting decent buzz and international distribution, I don’t feel my path is idly travelled. I have no complaints about being a Mr. Holland. — So, with all this on my mind, I figured I’d take a big ol’ swing for the bleachers with the first feature-length screenplay I’ve written in quite a few moons. Also, I’m deeply concerned about the dwindling supply in the National Strategic Reserve of Robin Hood spec screenplays and figured I should do my part.
Two things I’ve long found fascinating about the Robin Hood mythos are the elasticity of its timeframe before it was codified as being of the era of King Richard I, and the extremely brutal nature of some of the early Robin Hood ballads. This was the starting point for what I hope is an involving and idiosyncratic spin on the Robin Hood story.

Title: The Wrong Stuff
Genre: Family Comedy
Logline: A terminally uncool Dad accepts a mistaken invitation into NASA’s astronaut training program, believing it will redeem him in the eyes of his son, but sadly unaware of how much it will test him.
Why You Should Read: I think this will be a good example of the power of a great, simple concept. In the comments for Carson’s review of Pale Blue Dot, Scott Crawford jokingly suggested the title, The Wrong Stuff. I think it’s a brilliant title, but for another story. Why? Because it says so much in just three words. It immediately conjures up images of space flight training and daring test pilots, but the juxtaposition created by the word ‘Wrong’ suggests the irony of a trainee who is totally unsuited for the training. We can immediately picture some scenes: Imagine the G-force training centrifuge with a shit-scared passenger screaming his head off. — So the title leads to the concept which easily lead to the premise in the logline above. — And that ease continued into the planning and writing. I had way more material than I could use, so it allowed me to keep just the good stuff. (Hopefully I’ve done the material justice.) But I can say that though this is an early draft, it is easily better than anything else I’ve ever written.

Title: Dude, Where’s My Ferret?
Genre: Stoner Comedy
Logline: After accidentally losing her company’s mascot, an uptight junior food scientist reluctantly enlists the help of her pothead building superintendent and together they battle against a relentless vermin exterminator to recover the missing ferret before her career goes up in smoke.
Why You Should Read: With marijuana being legalized all over the place, it’s a topical subject, plus it has a fresh twist with the ferret angle. Stoners and ferrets go together like macaroni and cheese! I’ve directed several short films featuring ferrets, including a short called DUDE, WHERE’S MY FERRET? that is meant as a teaser for the feature version, featuring Bubbles from The Trailer Park Boys. I also directed THE MAGIC FERRET, which was Jacob Tremblay’s (Room) first leading role. I like working with ferrets because it’s something different than what most people are used to seeing – and I know something about them because I have one as a pet (used to have two, R.I.P. Falcor the Ferret). I think this is a great recipe for a stoner comedy – but we need some help to get it to where it needs to be. I say ‘we’ because I’m the director but not the writer – I found someone to write this for me while I learn the craft. We could highly benefit from a review by Carson and our peers. I’m smishsmosh22 and promise to participate in the comments if we get chosen!

Title: Hard Copy
Genre: Drama
Logline: In 1994, a narcissistic co-host of a tabloid news show struggles to keep his job and life from unraveling as a young challenger emerges touting a new form of media, the internet.
Why You Should Read: Look, this is a bit of a tough sell based on the logline, I know that. It’s my eighteenth script, and I’ve been writing for eight years now, so the pressure is starting to mount, especially with this one. I wanted to write a drama that was big enough for the screens I hope to see it on. I wrote it the way I felt it needed to be written, and I took chances whenever possible. Honestly, it was time to stop writing handcuffed and just trust that I know what I’m doing. Hopefully, you’ll enjoy this, and I look forward to all the notes. Good luck to everybody and thank you!

Title: The Odd Symphony
Genre: Comedy
Logline: An aspiring conductor who’s fallen on hard times starts a revolution by uniting New York’s various street performers into a misfit symphony.
Why You Should Read: This script was on the top of the blacklist for a long while (not the main blacklist but the web version). This is a funny, sad, uplifting, overly ambitious romantic, slightly expensive…independent film. A number of directors have courted this project and right now Trish Sie who directed all those wonderful OkGo viral movies is the latest suitor.

I recently submitted one of my TV pilots. I have written a ton of stuff over the years. I developed, wrote, and sold an adaptation of Kurt Busiek’s award winning comic book Astro City a few years back to Working Title. I am now back on the market with another comic book adaptation for Johnny Depp’s company. I have written 13 films and 5 or 6 pilots. The Odd Symphony is one of my favorites.

Today we’re going to explore one of the most important components in the craft of screenwriting – visual storytelling. If you can master this part of the craft, you’ll have seriously leveled up. That’s no joke. The best writers tend to be the ones who consistently convey things visually.

Why is this? Because ACTIONS SPEAK LOUDER THAN WORDS. The action of an unexpected kiss will always be more interesting than two lovers talking about how much they like one another. The action of a character turning his gun away from his enemy and towards his friend will always be more interesting than him telling his friend he’s betraying him.

Visual storytelling can be broken down into four components.

Action
Framing
Choice
Creativity

The heart of the visual scene is action. Instead of a character saying something, see if you can achieve the same thing with an action. So instead of a character saying, “You look cold,” have him take his coat off and hand it to the other character.

Framing is the process by which you re-frame what would typically be a dialogue scene and turn it into something that can be conveyed through action. So let’s say you’ve thought up this big blowout break-up scene outside of a night club. To write this same scene visually, why not put it in the night club? The noise will force you to show the breakup through actions.

Choice is like action on crack. You give your character a choice (or a series of choices) and those choices give us insight into the character (as well as push the scene forward). At the end of Nightcrawler, Jake Gyllenhaal’s character comes upon a murder where the victim is still barely alive. Does he call an ambulance or get the footage that’s going to net him his biggest payday yet? That choice is what makes the scene so compelling.

Creativity is the final piece of the puzzle. Come up with a neat or inventive way to visually tell your story. I’ll never forget one of the commenters bringing up Ben Kingsley’s movie, You Kill Me, where Kingsley played an alcoholic. To show this, the movie opens with Kingsley shoveling snow while drinking a bottle of vodka. He’d toss the bottle a few feet forward in the snow, shovel to it, take a drink, toss it a few more feet, shovel to it, take another drink, and so on.

999 out of 1000 writers would’ve shown the character in a bar getting cut off at the end of the night, or waking up on their couch with an empty liquor bottle nearby (and a bad headache). This writer’s desire to push beyond the obvious, to be creative, led to a way more interesting visual scene.

Now what you may notice is that a lot of great visual scenes have dialogue in them as well. The climactic scene of Luke blowing up the Death Star isn’t dialogue free. We see him make the choice to use the Force instead of his targeting system, but it still contains some discussion with the base. And that’s fine. Dialogue and action are teammates, fighting the same opponent, trying to win the same game.

All I’m saying is that scenes tend to be more interesting when they’re first approached visually. And if the scene still feels incomplete after that, you can always sprinkle dialogue in where it’s needed. If you only ever see a scene through the words the characters speak, you’re probably writing a lot of boring scenes.

Okay, now time for today’s scene challenge. In this pretend movie, our main characters, Claire and Nick, are a married couple who have been together for 20 years. But that’s not where we start. We start on the day they met, where Nick spots Claire on the street and is instantly smitten with her. I want you to show us, in a single scene, how Claire fell in love with Nick that day. Not just, “Oh, he’s cute, I’ll go on a date with him.” She has to FALL IN LOVE with him right then and there.

You don’t have to use anything I taught you today. You can make up your own visual rules. The only stipulation is that the scene can’t have any dialogue. Write your scene in the comments below and make sure to up-vote your favorites! Winner gets a shout-out tomorrow and Scriptshadow brownie points. Good luck!