Saturday, June 5, 2021

Tim Allen, Commencement Speech

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 I hate commencement  speeches. I loved this one.
Saturday, May 29, 2021

Moral Premise in Beijing Cafe

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A friend in Beijing sent me this picture of her afternoon tea in a Beijing cafe. Although there are two versions of the Moral Premise that h...
Friday, May 7, 2021

The Importance of Surprise, Revelation, Sacrifice, & Beauty in Successful Stories

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Recently I posted something from Chris Vogler on the importance of "wishing " in successful stories.  Here is something just as im...
Tuesday, May 4, 2021

Final Draft 12's Beat Board, Outline, and Script Insertion Function

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  You that follow the Moral Premise know I'm sort of a Story Structure freak. But then my Story and Script consulting clients encourage ...
Tuesday, April 27, 2021

Did You Ever Wish For....?

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Working on a script the other day I ended up reviewing part of Chris Vogler’s book THE WRITER’S JOURNEY (3rd Edition). Chris wrote the forew...
Monday, April 12, 2021

Final Draft 12 - Exciting Additions

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  [ Here is a later post about this Final Draft 12 function with a video from Storycraft Training. ] As a story and script structuralist I h...
Thursday, March 25, 2021

Moral Premise Video Podcast - GREAT IRONY

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Sunday, March 7, 2021

New Moral Premise Graphic Memes

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Wednesday, January 20, 2021

Brothers of the Wind

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  Tonight, Pam and I watched Brothers of the Wind  (2015) directed by Gerardo Olivares, Otmar Penker. It is a nature drama about a young boy...
Saturday, January 2, 2021

REVISIONS: Your Story's Emotional Roller Coaster & Intellectual Balance

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This is really a post about how to plan a REVISION to a manuscript once the first draft is complete.  Successful storytelling requires that ...
Thursday, November 26, 2020

Hollywood and History

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Controversy always swirls when Hollywood produces a movie about some moment in history and seems to get the facts all wrong, favoring instea...
Saturday, October 24, 2020

The Chosen - A Few Notes on Structure

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As many of you know I'm a Catholic Christian, although I was born and raised Evangelical-Protestant. Consequently, I've been exposed...
Thursday, October 15, 2020

Introducing the Beat Plate (8 Mini-Movie Template)

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The editable (and thus functional) Apple Keynote files used to illustrate this post can be downloaded for a small fee.   See this link.  Als...
Saturday, September 12, 2020

Writing Convincing Movie Dialogue - 20 Tips

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In preparation for a Zoom appearance at a film school where I was asked to talk on the topic "How to Write Convincing Movie Dialogue,...
Thursday, September 3, 2020

Hard Work Pays Off - Bragging Rights

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I've been working long distance with screenwriter Rich Mauro on a drama titled WHEN WE WERE GODS for about 4 years, the last two intense...
Wednesday, August 26, 2020

The Power of Production Design - Halal Gurls

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Production Design (which includes Art Direction) is about Color Palettes, Textures, Interior Decor, Set Architecture, Shot Selection, Props...

Low Budget Indie with Star Power

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As producer for a SAG moderate low budget indie we plan to shoot in Michigan in 2021, the attributes of other successful indie production...
Friday, July 24, 2020

OF GODS AND MONSTERS

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OF GODS AND MONSTERS is a short documentary about the unique WW2 story and the screenplay developed it titled WHEN WE WERE GODS. The screen...
Thursday, July 23, 2020

Bird of Prey - Good Short

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This just in from an aqutaintance, writer-director Dan Cortes. The structure here is amazingly good for such a short story. It has a num...
Monday, April 27, 2020

Kevin James's YouTube Channel

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This is some seriously funny stuff. Short films every week from Kevin James. My favorite so far is the I AM LEGEND SOUND GUY.  I have direc...