Screenplays are about conflict and nothing kills conflict quicker than being nice.
The late William Goldman, the dean of American screenwriters, dealt with the issue in two of his Ten Commandments of Writing. They are:
"Thou shalt not make life easy for the protagonist."
"Thou shalt seek the end of the line, taking characters to
the farthest depth of the conflict imaginable within the
story’s own realm of probability."
Novelist Vladimir Nabokov sums it up very nicely:
"The writer's job is to get the main character up a tree,
and then once they are up there, throw rocks at them."
Movies tend to be about events that change of the lives of the characters in a fundamental way. The older you get, the more you realize that people do not change except under duress. Therefore, you must apply a great deal of pressure to make your characters arc seem legitimate to an audience. You can't let them off easy.
This is a major failing in most amateur scripts I read. Particularly the faith-based scripts. Those authors tend to be nice people themselves and don't want to make their characters suffer too much or possibly appear too unlikeable. As a result, their scripts tend to be boring and unrealistic -- with very low stakes.
That said, I understand why they do it.
Niceness killed many of my spec scripts of the 1990s. Let explain how.
Early in my career, when my work was plot driven, I didn't have a problem with niceness. The relentless plots confronted the characters at every turn. However, as I began writing character driven scripts, niceness began plaguing them. Why? Because I began loosely basing characters on real people I found fascinating. These people I wrote about often meant something to me. As a result, I didn't want to hurt their fictional counterparts or present them in an unfavorable light.
Here's an example, those of you who have read my memoir The Promise, or the Pros and Cons of Talking with God know I had a complicated relationship with a woman, with whom I was briefly engaged, during the 1990s. She suffered from issues related to abandonment and childhood sexual assault, which led to behavior damaging to our relationship. Partially in an attempt to understand her better, and my sometimes self-destructive attraction to her, I tried to create stories centered on a character built around my perceptions of her. However, because I wanted people to like her, I couldn't bring myself to convey any of the behavior I found troubling. As a result my two attempts to build stories around that character remained unfinished for nearly twenty years. I only recently completed one of them, with the aid of sufficient distance and a co-writer.
This tendency is one of the reasons why I caution people about writing about themselves and their own circumstances. (See my blog: Writing about yourself.)
Yes, you should love your characters. However, if you truly love them, you should mercilessly toss them into the maelstrom in order for them to emerge stronger!
You won't regret it.
And neither will your audience.
Other Writing Tips:
This is a major failing in most amateur scripts I read. Particularly the faith-based scripts. Those authors tend to be nice people themselves and don't want to make their characters suffer too much or possibly appear too unlikeable. As a result, their scripts tend to be boring and unrealistic -- with very low stakes.
That said, I understand why they do it.
Niceness killed many of my spec scripts of the 1990s. Let explain how.
Early in my career, when my work was plot driven, I didn't have a problem with niceness. The relentless plots confronted the characters at every turn. However, as I began writing character driven scripts, niceness began plaguing them. Why? Because I began loosely basing characters on real people I found fascinating. These people I wrote about often meant something to me. As a result, I didn't want to hurt their fictional counterparts or present them in an unfavorable light.
Here's an example, those of you who have read my memoir The Promise, or the Pros and Cons of Talking with God know I had a complicated relationship with a woman, with whom I was briefly engaged, during the 1990s. She suffered from issues related to abandonment and childhood sexual assault, which led to behavior damaging to our relationship. Partially in an attempt to understand her better, and my sometimes self-destructive attraction to her, I tried to create stories centered on a character built around my perceptions of her. However, because I wanted people to like her, I couldn't bring myself to convey any of the behavior I found troubling. As a result my two attempts to build stories around that character remained unfinished for nearly twenty years. I only recently completed one of them, with the aid of sufficient distance and a co-writer.
This tendency is one of the reasons why I caution people about writing about themselves and their own circumstances. (See my blog: Writing about yourself.)
Yes, you should love your characters. However, if you truly love them, you should mercilessly toss them into the maelstrom in order for them to emerge stronger!
You won't regret it.
And neither will your audience.
Other Writing Tips:
Preview my horrifying new novel Chapel Street on Amazon:
Listen to me read some chapters here:
Chapel Street - Prologue - My Mother
Chapel Street - Chapter 1 - RestingPlace.com
Chapel Street - Chapter 2 - Elisabetta
Chapel Street - Chapter 3 - The Upload
Chapel Street - Chapter 4 - The Kobayashi Maru
Let's stay in touch:
Chapel Street - Prologue - My Mother
Chapel Street - Chapter 1 - RestingPlace.com
Chapel Street - Chapter 2 - Elisabetta
Chapel Street - Chapter 3 - The Upload
Chapel Street - Chapter 4 - The Kobayashi Maru
Let's stay in touch:
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