inner game of screenwriting -review

88 journal of film and video 65.1–2 / spring/summer 2013©2013 by the board of trustees of the university of illinois

we embrace the very nature of writing and process. For me, writing is often a painful, labor intensive way to spend time, though a well-written line, scene, or script is, for me, a profoundly satisfying experience. (176, emphasis in original)

Need an exercise in the proper conception of strong scenes? Then read what Craig Kellem, an alumnus of Saturday Night Live, has to say in “Scenes as Concepts” (181–83): “Professional writers understand that all scenes count. And there is no room for filler or bridges when true excellence across the board is the standard. Each scene should have its own magic, raison d’être, veracity and power” (181). Kellem’s spare and cogent exercise on listing the ten best possible scenes in a potential story de-scribes how a writer can winnow out the myriad choices inherent in every scene. Madeline DiMaggio, herself an author of a scriptwriting book, How to Write for Television, offers advice on characterization in her essay “Approach Character Like an Actor . . . from

the Inside Out” (219–22). Considering that in her analysis of Lars and the Single Girl, she notes that “there is such visceral truth in the (isolated) character of Lars, we know Nancy Oliver somehow found that place of isolation somewhere in herself,” it is not surprising that DiMaggio’s essay focuses on how authors may use sense memory to recall feelings suitable to their project’s characters. The exercises can be complex, as in Pamela Gray’s multiple approaches to exploring char-acter through scene work, which she lays out in “Life before FADE IN:” (247–49), or relatively simple, as in Ken Rotcop’s six-step plan for building a strong start to a screenplay in his “The First Ten Pages” (309–11). Whatever the approach or subject, these essays and their authors’ critical support can be helpful to any screenwriter or instructor in the pursuit or con-sideration of this difficult and demanding craft.

DAVID BENNETT CARRENUniversity of Texas Pan-American

THE INNER GAME OF SCREENWRITING: 20 WINNING STORY FORMS

Sandy Frank. Studio City: Michael Wiese, 2011, 155 pp.

The title of Sandy Frank’s The Inner Game of Screenwriting evokes W. Timothy Gallwey’s classic sports volume The Inner Game of Tennis and its subsequent variations, which coach the reader to elicit peak athletic performance. But if the reader of Frank’s book expects a similar coaching experience for the screenwriter, he or she will be disappointed. The “inner game” Frank discusses in his volume is basically what others refer to as a “character arc.” A more accurate title might be “The Inner Workings of Screenplay Characters.” Frank’s basic premise is that a screenplay has an “outer game”—the plot—and an “inner game,” which is “what the main character goes through internally and how he changes” (10).

If this insight seems rather slight to occupy 155 pages, be assured that Frank takes us through many variations of the inner game that he calls “morph archetypes.” The most common is the “evolution”—a character with a flaw at the beginning of the screenplay overcomes it by the end. Next is “devolution”—a character suc-cumbs to his or her flaw. Then there is “staying the course”—a flawless character resists the temptation to succumb to a flaw. Beyond these are “unsuccessful evolution,” “fall & revival,” “evolve & maintain,” “staying the course with a pop,” “apparent evolution,” and “apparent devolution.” (In the book, Frank capitalizes these terms.) In addition, Frank details the “myth

Copyright 2012 by the Board of Trustees of the University of Illinois. Complimentary copy--not for distribution

89journal of film and video 65.1–2 / spring/summer 2013©2013 by the board of trustees of the university of illinois

archetypes”—“monster,” “nice monster,” “run away,” “wrong monster,” “killed by the mon-ster,” “Cinderella,” “Sherlock Holmes,” “Oz,” “Sleeping Beauty,” and “quest.” The difference between the morphs and the myths is that in the myths, there is only an outer game, not an inner one—the characters do not change. However, in order for a screenplay to qualify as a myth, “the Outer Game must symbolize the Inner Game” (53). For example, the mon-ster represents egocentrism, and in killing the monster, the screenwriter is killing the human flaw of egocentrism. If this is not complicated enough, Frank notes that “a clever screenwriter can create something unique” if he or she uses the various archetypes in combination (37). In order to help the writer come up with good characters, Frank introduces the use of the “enneagram”—the nine types of characters by which all human beings can be classified. Along the way, Frank cites various films to bol-ster his argument, often resorting to box office receipts to identify successful films (those that followed his scheme) and unsuccessful ones (those that did not). Frank thus constructs very complicated machinery, and it grinds and sput-ters readily under the weight of self-contradic-tion and inconsistency. On page 10, the inner game is defined as change within the main character, except for when it is a character “other than the main character” who changes (28), or unless the screenplay is of the “stay the course” type (30), or unless it is a “myth archetype” (53–75), except for the “Oz” myth archetype, in which a character can undergo a realization (68) (al-though the “realization” is a morph we should “stay away from” [83]), or unless the myth archetype or archetypes are combined with morphs (140–41). The morph archetypes are the “psychologi-cal/emotional issues” within the character (26), in contrast to myth archetypes, which are defined as “stories” (53). On pages 67 and 73, they are both referred to as a “stories.” The book frequently refers to character flaws, but in some places change is discussed in terms of “unhealthy” and “healthy” states,

and none of these terms are defined. After discussing the way the inner game is played out symbolically in myth archetypes (53), the phrase “symbolic message” is introduced (59) without explanation. Five times during the course of the book, Frank reminds us, in bold face, “A relentless focus on the Inner Game is the key to writing a successful screenplay.” He concedes, though, in chapters 16 (“Subverting the Model”) and 15 (“Sometimes the Outer Game Is Enough”) that this is not always true. He sees the deviations as part of an elitist trend in modern art and literature that rejects audiences. Yet the movies he cites in this regard—Unforgiven and Fargo—certainly did find audiences. They are ranked 97 and 124, respectively, on the Internet Movie Database’s list of highest-rated films; the IMDB is certainly no hotbed of academic elites. Frank’s conclusion: if you choose to abandon the inner game, just be sure you are as brilliant as the Coen brothers. Frank provides some tips for applying his method, including the following advice: “If you have a myth story, but it doesn’t quite work, you have to go back and change it so it does” (143). It is worth noting that the author help-fully provides his contact information at the end of the book for “script consultation ser-vices,” which may be a route for clarification of confusions. On the plus side, The Inner Game of Screen-writing foregrounds the problem of character in the writing of a screenplay, and from a peda-gogical viewpoint, the problem is a challenging one. His screenplay examples mostly track closely with the models he presents. And the problem of matching a character with an appro-priate story is central to the process of crafting an effective screenplay. The question is whether mastering the intri-cate scheme Frank sets forth will be a fruitful approach. The character types he identifies in his discussion of the enneagram are just that—types. And time spent trying to discern which of the many variations and combinations of myths and morphs one is writing is time not spent on whatever personal vision, experiences,


90 journal of film and video 65.1–2 / spring/summer 2013©2013 by the board of trustees of the university of illinois

or discoveries a writer brings to the creative process. Will so much focus on such external concerns undermine the “inner game” of the writer—the inner life a writer must bring forth to create work that is unique, fresh, and distinc-tive enough to have a chance of standing out among the oceans of spec screenplays swirling around Hollywood? At one point, Frank evokes Shakespeare, as-serting that his memorable work is due to his

focus on his “observations about the human condition” (130). My suspicion is that a relent-less focus on the human condition may actu-ally be the most promising approach to the problem of the inner life of characters written for the screen.

PAUL JOSEPH GULINOChapman University

WRITING IN PICTURES: SCREENWRITING MADE (MOSTLY) PAINLESS

Joseph McBride. New York: Vintage, 2012, 365 pp.

Joseph McBride has produced a novel, well-written, and entertaining guide to screenwrit-ing for fiction film. Perhaps best known as an accomplished film historian, McBride also has professional screenwriting experience, including cowriting Rock ‘n’ Roll High School and working with Orson Welles on dialogue for a character he played in Welles’s unfinished film The Other Side of the Wind. McBride also teaches screenwriting at San Francisco State University and states that this book arose out of his frustration with the field of screenwriting guides: “I couldn’t find a book that actually gets into the nitty-gritty of what’s required to learn the screenwriting craft in a systematic way and that does so concisely and without telling you how to write formulaic screenplays” (4). Al-though one might dispute the claim that there are no such books, McBride’s guide should be counted a success by his own criteria. The book is divided into three parts. The first part deals with a number of preliminary top-ics, including a refreshingly upfront admission about how unwise it is to pursue screenwriting as means to money or fame. Parts 2 and 3 are where this book really distinguishes itself from other screenwriting guides. McBride believes that beginners should learn screenwriting by

adapting a short story. He reasons that freeing students from the burden of coming up with an original, workable story idea allows them to focus on the craft of storytelling for the screen. This approach does not preclude creativity because of the distinctive requirements of cin-ematic storytelling and because adaptations can be more or less faithful to their original sources. McBride breaks down the process of writing an adapted half-hour screenplay into five steps. Steps 1 through 4 are presented in the second part of the book. The first step is to select a short story and write a two-page prose sum-mary of it. This “story outline” is a condensed retelling of the original literary work from begin-ning to end. A helpful feature of the book is that McBride presents a completed example of each step after he describes its requirements; he then provides instructive critical analysis of his example as a setup for introducing the next step. McBride chooses to adapt Jack London’s “To Build a Fire,” the story of a brazen young man whose arrogance to trek without human company during a harsh Yukon winter in the early 1900s leads to his death (the story is in-cluded in one of the book’s appendices). The second step is “the adaptation outline,”


inner game of screenwriting -review

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