Good Scripts for Rookies to read

You can read scripts with camera directions - those may be the only ones available in many cases. Just ignore the camera directions and don't include them in your own scripts.

On simplyscripts.com, they have all three of the LOTR scripts. The scripts from Pirates of the Carribean are good examples of light adventure/fantasy. Lucas' Star Wars script is available, as is Kasdan's Indiana Jones.

Also try scripts for vampire movies, I think Blade is available. Also classic stuff like Matheson's I Am Legend etc.

Would X Files TV scripts be too far afield from what you're doing? How about Star Trek?

So, is it a good idea to read scripts in your genre or just scripts in general then????? Thanks in advance.

Both. Scripts in general, and in your genre.

You can learn from any good script in any genre. As you understand more about scripts and screenwriting, you'll be able to see common elements across genres, the way that the same story told slightly differently can be a comedy, a thriller, a western, a horror movie etc.

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You could ask yourself, for example, how Casablanca would work if it was a Western. What if Lawrence of Arabia was leading aliens on another planet instead of Arabs in the desert?

It occurred to me once that Tarrantino's Pulp Fiction was what you got if you mixed Monty Python with film noir. This may or not be true, I suppose you could make the argument. The point is, this is an interesting, unusual way to think about this film.

Thanks odo -- one more Q: how do you know for sure what genre your peice fits into? How important is it that it "fits" to begin with?

Visualize your film. The characters, their actions, the setting, the conflicts, the way the story unfolds. Ask yourself, what does my film have in common with other films I've seen? Also, what's the emotional core of your story? What part of it will make the most emotional impact on the audience? Following from that, who do you see as your audience? If your primary audience is teenage boys, your film maybe one genre. If it's middle aged women, your film is probably a different genre.

Genre is one of those things that filmmakers, writers, critics, and academics love to debate. A good film text book like Bordwell and
Thompson http://www.amazon.com/Film-Art-Introduction-David-Bordwell/dp/0072484551 can give you the standard formal definitions. But the definitions are never absolute, and a lot of great movies redefine and/or combine genres.

If you were writing, say, a vampire western with a strong detective story element, you'd want to study the vampire genre, and horror in general, along with Westerns, and detective stories.

Some readers and execs will only read dialogue. They aren't supposed to do this, but it happens. Too much action, as you note, can hurt your chances.

It can be useful to break up the action using mini slugs, one action line, skip a space etc. This can make the page easier to read, with the text being less dense.

You can also use small, vivid pieces of action to stand in for the whole, thereby condensing your script and giving a real flavor for what's really going on.

sspunisher said:

Another issue I had was that some of these "good scripts" are very very VERY heavy on action. I see pages and pages of action sometimes. Shouldn't this be avoided? I don't want to scare anyone off, but I could be wrong, not sure if that is viewed as acceptable or not.

Then there's also that Hitchcock rule, where action always overrules dialogue.

Then there's Joe's rule, I think the 50% Action / 50% dialogue, depending on what kind of a script it is....

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On Triggerstreet you shoud find plenty of amateur scripts in your genre. Can't think of any pro scripts offhand. Some scripts on Trigger are well written and you can learn as much if not more from reading them as pro scripts

Many thanks to the knowledgable folks here. I'm about ready to post my first, VERY ROUGH draft of a first try...can't wait for suggs on it.

I think you should be reading all the scripts you can get your hands on, regardless of genre, regardless of age. You wouldn't dream of being a novelist without soaking up hundreds of novels over years of reading, the same with screenwriting.

It's crucial to see what other people have done, to see how wide you can go, to get the frame of reference and the instinctive feel for the form you will need if you are going to handle your own material at all well.

Drews Script O Rama (http://www.script-o-rama.com/oldindex.shtml) is a great start...