by John Bucher (@johnkbucher) Even the most masterful storytellers can bring their narratives to a screeching halt when their dialogue strikes the audience as unnatural. It’s a common misconception that creating dialogue is simply about mastering the way people speak to each other in real life. Our conversations contain nuance and local colloquialisms that work well... Continue Reading →
9 Films to Watch for a Dialogue Bootcamp
[Editor's Note: This article originally appeared on WeScreenplay. It is reprinted here in collaboration with that site.] by Mark Stasenko (@WeScreenplay) 1. GLENGARRY GLEN ROSS written by David Mamet What we learn: Specificity makes dialogue work It’s hard to talk about dialogue and not include David Mamet, and Glengarry Glen Ross is quintessential Mamet in... Continue Reading →
New Study Looks at Gender Breakdown of Dialogue in Major Films
by Angela Bourassa Last year we took a look at a study out of the USC Annenburg School for Communication and Journalism on inequality in 700 major movies. That study covers current breakdowns of race, gender, and sexual orientation on screen and behind the camera. Now the good people over at Polygraph have some new... Continue Reading →
A Super Simple Hack To Improve Your Dialogue In A Week
by Alex Bloom (@ScriptReaderPro) [This guest post comes to us from Alex of Script Reader Pro, a great resource for script coverage and screenwriting advice.] An abundance of dialogue in a scene — specifically chit-chat between characters about events in the past or the future — often means the whole scene needs to be cut.... Continue Reading →
Quote of the Day: Curt Franklin
Not using dialogue can give a character an extra layer of personality. Think about the people in your life and their body language, the quirks they have and how it helps define what you think of them. One defeated shrug can speak to a characters entire philosophy of life... You've got the power to make... Continue Reading →
Quote of the Day: William Monahan
What I find really interesting is what characters don't reveal, what people try to conceal. Everybody is always trying to hide something, and you can show that through dialogue.
Quentin Tarantino on Letting Your Characters Take Over
This is an interesting clip of Quentin Tarantino trying to dissect his signature style of dialogue on Charlie Rose. Tarantino is always an interesting example, because he regularly has scenes where the action is compelling the story forward, but the dialogue has little or nothing to do with what's actually happening (consider the "Royale with... Continue Reading →
Quote of the Day: Kim Ki-duk
I have a process where I eliminate dialogue and replace it with actions that can speak the same truth, if possible.
Quote of the Day: David Mamet
A good film script should be able to do completely without dialogue.
Quote of the Day: Brad Bird
A screenwriter friend of mine said your number one goal is to get to the end. So write it fast; don’t look back.