"Words are sacred...

If you get the right ones in the right order you can nudge the world a little."
TOM STOPPARD

Proposal stage
The story The characters The message Main scenes Director Treatment Structure Mode Target Audience- producer motivation AudienceAccess Back ground Research

 Why you? What are your strengths? Write the story not the information Think opening shot, and what is the film about, not what is the plot. Hook the reader with innovative writing that fits the mood of the production and keep them wanting more with each line , each paragraph Write a one pager

Why tell stories

Why do we tell stories ? Hollywood Genres appear to question the rampant capitalism and offer pure romance, the moral spy, the gladiator who conquers the emperor, the spiritual leader over the dark forces of power. In Hollywood romance True love is seen to transcend market dynamics in order to embrace trust and a kind of commercial free activity that is actually not encouraged or mirrored in the real world!

The power of story

All stories help to evaluate ourselves in the world, to seek a certain kind of self reference to what we see on the screen. We compare and contrast ourselves to what we see on screen and sometimes we change. Most often instead of challenging the status quo we believe in true love, we believe that the poor and those of moral virtue will inherit the earth if only they work hard enough or have a robot or a space ship or a fast motorcycle or special powers at hand. We believe in the american dream DO YOU ?

 Decide on the form to tell your story Poetic? Talking heads? Asking questions - getting answers? Personal film ? Presenter led film? Artistic quality ? How to represent that Information these day from GOOGLE - does this mean film has another purpose?

The twist
What is your new TWIST: not always a new story! How are you mixing artistic view, intellectual challenge and entertainment African content is currently in short supply What is shrinking is leisure time and audience attention time - in europe teenagers struggle to attend to one thing for longer than 1.5 mins!

 Write a log line - the absolute distillation of what the film/TV show is about -(NOT what happens!) can do this after writing out the concept in full or after Tag line - the line on the poster, or in the TV guide Director intention Producer intention Writer intention

The expository mode GOD Speaking on behalf of someone

Mode

The observational mode INVISIBLE Non intervention of the filmmaker, we look and overhear social actors The Interactive mode YOU AND ME Monologue and dialogue dominate (interview) The reflexive mode ME & THE CAMERA The process of filmaking is in focus - the how of filmmaking is seen in the film, The Reflexive doc may use cinematic conventions only to disrupt them The poetic mode ASSOCIATIONS The performative mode ME

Structure
Chronological Conflict and solution - reaching a goal dealing with obstacles. Revealing Character Character going through change Episodic narrative structure - situations add up to a sum that is more than the parts Discursive - facts , logic, interviews build the story Poetic narrative - poetic associations of word and picture

 Find a way to tell a story your own way, be innovative. Find YOURSELF, dont try to be like other people. Practice telling the story until you get it to sound fascinating and exciting AND intriguing You might be the talent that everyone is looking for! No one knows what they want until they have it.

Documentary structure
Simply stated, a story chronicles the efforts of the main character to achieve his or her hearts desire in the face of opposition. Screenwriters understand that defining the heros quest is the foremost dramatic requirement of a three-act structure. Act One sets up the protagonists desire (boy meets girl), Act Two presents obstacles that thwart the goal (boy loses girl), and in the final act, the climax reveals whether or not the protagonist achieves his hearts desire (boy wins girl forever after).

Drama in documentary
Documentary filmmakers could do well to hone in on their protagonists desire in their earliest concept paper, a mandatory preamble to rolling tape. Do all documentaries follow this principle? What about dramatised documentaries or documentaries with dramatised sequences ? Can the subject matter itself be dramatic ? Can an ensemble of interviews create enough interest for the viewers?

Act 1
Launching the Story The function of Act One is to establish the world of the film, introduce us to the characters, and launch the protagonists quest. In a two-hour dramatic film, Act One (also called the set-up) runs about thirty minutes, or a quarter of the film. Whatever the length of your documentary at the start of the act, the audience is introduced to the films setting and characters. A protagonist emerges at the catalyst or inciting incident, when an external event upsets the main characters world.

 This mandatory structural device kicks off the real story, as the protagonist begins his quest to restore equilibrium to his life. For example, in the action movie Jaws (1975), a woman is killed by a shark, and the town sheriff finds her decaying body. This horrific discovery is the inciting incident, or catalyst, because it begins the sheriffs quest to kill the shark and thereby restore tranquility to the terrorized resort town.

Inciting incident continued..

The inciting incident plays such a critical function in the overall story structure that Hollywood screenwriters follow a rule: the inciting incident must be visually depicted on screen, preferably in present story time. In other words, the story should not be launched through exposition (boring) or backstory (too removed). This imperative presents a major problem for documentary filmmakers constructing a narrative arc.

 Frequently, by the time a documentary filmmaker gets interested in a film, the inciting incident has already happened. Equally problematic, this rousing scene was probably not caught on film. Sometimes filmmakers get lucky.

 Sometimes filmmakers set out to film one story, and a more powerful story unfolds in front of the camera. In The Revolution Will Not Be Televised (2003), Irish filmmakers Kim Bartley and Donnacha OBriain intended to profile Venezuelan president Hugo Chavez. Suddenly they found themselves in the midst of a coup. They caught the upheaval on camera and it became a visually riveting catalyst for a very different film.

creating inciting incidents

Shaping archival or news footage into an inciting incident is another solution. If a documentary filmmaker does not have footage of the actual inciting incident, how does she bring it to life on screen? A common solution is to comb through interviews for a sound-bite that reconstructs the inciting incident. Sometimes even a periphery character can recall a particular moment that will change the lives of all the characters forever.

 If an interviewee is going to relate the catalyst event, the filmmaker should choose an exceptionally charismatic storyteller. Remember, this is the moment the story is supposed to take off. If a lackluster soundbite cant fuel the launch, you may need booster material: narration, location footage, reenactments, animation, etc. Whereas a screenwriter can start the story with a single inciting scene, the non-fiction storyteller must often construct an inciting sequence. As long as the sequence gets the story off the ground, its fine to employ a slow burn rather than pyrotechnics.

Central dramatic question

The inciting incident gives rise to the protagonists quest-alternately called the heros journey or object of desire-as well as formulating the films central question. Will Romeo and Juliet stay together? Will the sheriff kill the shark? Will the Jordan family save their farm? The central question is always some variation of the question, Will the protagonist reach his goal? After a long period of struggle in act two, this central question is finally answered for better or worse in act three, at or just following the films climax.

 Like narrative films, documentaries are at their best when the protagonists object of desire and the movies central question are concrete and specific. In The Times of Harvey Milk (1984), the protagonist wants equality for gay people, but his quest is drawn into dramatic focus by his bid to get elected to the San Francisco Board of Supervisors. In Spellbound (2002), the central question that causes the viewer to hold his breath every time a child spells out a word is very specific: which child will win the national spelling bee contest?

 In Act Two, the protagonist encounters obstacles as she pursues her goal. The biggest challenge in Act Two is sustaining momentum. Since Act Two is the longest act (a little more than half the film), it is imperative to ratchet up the conflict. A screenwriter can plot progressive complications without being constrained by journalistic ethics, but what can a documentary filmmaker do if the actual chronology of conflict ebbs and flows rather than steadily escalates? How can the filmmaker ramp up the opposition to the protagonist while staying true to the facts?

 One solution is to shuffle the order of events, recognizing that a chronicle does not have to unfold chronologically to be true. For example, an editor can begin act two chronologically and then reveal a crisis that happened years earlier. The backstory is placed where it provides maximum impact, raising the stakes for the protagonist and contributing to an escalating sense of crisis.

The reversal
Another way to deal with the mandate of escalating suspense is to allow the protagonist a taste of success, or a respite from the fray, just before a particularly stormy turn of events.

The midpoint
In a two-hour feature film, the second act will typically last 60-70 minutes. This vast stretch of progressive complications, also known as development, lacks the guiding mandates of act one (set up, inciting incident, defining of the central question). as a result, many screenwriters attempt to gain their bearings with the help of a guidepost halfway through the long act called the midpoint.

Midpoint cont..
The midpoint is a crisis, often of life and death proportions, that provides the second act with both momentum and direction. In character-driven films, the midpoint may spell hazard to a characters old way of being, or to the life of a relationship.

Act 3
Whatever form the denouement takes, it should not drag on. Ambitious attempts to spell out the films meaning, or the influx of new conflicts that require a bumpy double climax, can fatally flaw a film. Audiences want one ending, not two. And they appreciate a denouement that will let them exit the theater with enough energy to ponder the storys meaning in their own company, not the directors. .

Audiences today bank on the promise that non-fiction cinema will thrill them with the heros call to adventurebringing them into a real world they have never visited before-and then safely guiding them through the obstacles, reversals and climaxes of a meaningful story. And while screenwriters no longer have a lock on what a good narrative will be, they can still offer invaluable structural guidance to todays emerging documentary storytellers

verit
While casting the right characters is critical in a documentary, many seasoned filmmakers wont undertake a film featuring even the most colorful cast unless they foresee that at least one characters quest will provide the film with a narrative spine. In an historical documentary, this is relatively doable with the advantage of hindsight. But the dramatic arc of a verite film, in which life is recorded as it unfolds, is understandably difficult to predict.

Verit cont..
At a minimum, commissioning editors and foundations require that a treatment for a verite film describe the protagonists quest, articulate the central question, and then envisage the conflicts the protagonist will face during the course of the production schedule.

Shooting script
Breakdown in scenes Characters Story Message Structure Mode Target Audience Access Interviews Voice overs Archive material

 Each act in the classic three-act structure concludes with a climax, an emotionally charged plot point that takes the story in a new direction and makes necessary the ensuing events. Exceptions to the rules Sometimes, the first act climax IS the inciting incident.

The weeping camel

For example, in the Oscar-nominated film The Story of the Weeping Camel, the first twenty minutes of the 88-minute film introduce us to a family of herders in the Gobi Desert. The real story begins a quarter way into the film (the textbook length for the first act) when the herders help deliver a baby camel-only to discover the mother will have nothing to do it. The films narrative arc answers the question: can the mother camel be persuaded to nurse her offspring and keep it alive?

Funding pilots
http://www.idfa.nl/industry/marketsfunding/vrijman-fund/other-fundsresources.aspx http://blog.starwreck.com/2011/04/01/therace-for-three-hunderd-thousand-eurosbegins/ http://www.internationalmovietrailerfestival.co m/trailers-2011/