John Badham on Directing PDF sample

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John Badham OnDirecting

Notes from the Sets of

Saturday Night Fever, War Games,

and More

John Badham

M I C H A E L W I E S E P R O D U C T I O N S

OnDirecting_sample1.indd 1 9/18/12 11:04 AM


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Published by Michael Wiese Productions12400 Ventura Blvd. #1111

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(818) 379-8799, (818) 986-3408 (FAX)

[email protected]

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Cover design by Johnny Ink. www.johnnyink.com

Interior design by William Morosi

Printed by McNaughton & Gunn

Manufactured in the United States of America

Copyright 2012 by John Badham

All rights reserved. No part of this book may be reproduced in any form or by any means

without permission in writing from the author, except for the inclusion of brief quotations

in a review.

Library of Congress Cataloging-in-Publication Data

Robert, Gerst

Make film history : rewrite, reshoot, and recut the worlds greatest films / Gerst Robert.

p. cm.

ISBN 978-1-61593-122-4 (pbk.)

1. Motion pictures--Production and direction--Study and teaching. I. Title.

PN1995.9.P7R53 2012

791.43023071--dc23

2012016311

Printed on Recycled Stock



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CHAPTER 1

ACTION

NOT JUST A PRETTY CHASE

You want to know how not to do an action scene? Let me tell

you. One bright Monday morning in Beautiful Downtown

Burbank, on the Burbank Studios lot I nervously gathered

together the Creative Team to see the Directors cut of my newfilm Blue Thunder. Dan OBannon and Don Jacoby the writ-

ers, the producers Ray Stark, Gordon Carroll and Phil Feldman

had assembled in Jack Warners Screening Room to see what

two years of work had yielded. Did we have a movie or six cans

of crap?

BLUE THUNDER trailer:

http://www.imdb.com/video/screenplay/vi1404764441/For the year 1982 Blue Thunderwas a very

expensive movie: 25 Million Dollars for a film

about a Super Helicopter secretly designed by

the government to suppress any riots at the

1984 Olympics in Los Angeles. As one of the

government stooges tells Roy Scheider, the

local police pilot picked to fly the helicopter,

We dont want any Munich massacres here,Frank, a reference to the terrorist attacks at



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O N D I R E C T I N G S J O H N B A D H A M

4

the Munich Olympic games in 1972 where eight Palestinian ter-

rorists belonging to the Black September organization broke into

the Olympic Village and took nine Israeli athletes, coaches andofficials hostage in their apartments.

In our film, the government, wanting to justify the expense of

the helicopter, sets in motion a series of mini-terror attacks on

the white community. Supposedly the attacks were perpetrated

by gangs from the African-American and Hispanic communities.

However, the terrorists were just hired thugs inciting racial para-

noia in the city.

Roy Scheiders character along with his partner played by Daniel

Stern get wind of whats going down and steal the helicopter from

the Feds while trying to let the media and the public know of the

conspiracy. The result is a frantic chase throughout the city with

the Blue Thunder helicopter flying at street level through down-

town Los Angeles 50 feet above the pavement, pursued by Police

cars, Helicopters and Air Force F16s. Buildings, busses and autos

are blown to shreds. A bit of comic relief in the middle of extensiveand frightening devastation was a heat seeking missile that goes

down the chimney of an Asian barbecue shack blowing thousands

of cooked chickens into the air and onto the homeless population

of downtown LA. No Asians, homeless people or live chickens

were hurt, molested or panhandled in this messy sequence.

INSERT LINK HERE TO BBQ CHICKEN SCENE IN BLUE

THUNDER. OR PHOTOGRAPH OF SCENE

Meanwhile, back at Jack Warners Screening Room the Directors

cut of the film started to screen for its elite audience to simulta-

neously criticize, condemn and hopefully praise. Lots of luck on

that last bit. As any filmmaker knows screening first cuts for the

producers is an experience more excruciating than a colonoscopy.

At least with a colonoscopy there is anesthesia to dull the pain.

Stories of directors throwing up before, during or after one of

these screenings are legion. However one of the benefits of suffer-ing this torture is that after being so close to the film for months



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guns ablaze. He flies Blue Thunder down into the LA River Bed,

which is more of a concrete flood control channel than a real river.

It serpentines its way through the city under bridges, buildings,and train tracks. Because of the obvious difficulty and the dangers

of flying helicopters 5 feet off the ground through narrow pas-

sageways, the action was terrifying to watch, not unlike William

Friedkins wrong-way freeway chase later in To Live and Die in

LA. Our scene ended with a spectacular crash as the pursuing heli-

copter crashes into a bridge abutment exploding apocalyptically.

SPOILER ALERT! Damn, I did it again. Sorry.

The scene ran for 4 minutes, plenty of time to have fun with it

and extract the goody from the action. What were Dan OBannon

and his partner Don Jacoby, who had now me-too-ed his opinion,

thinking? Have they no sense of fun? Shylock might have said,

hath not a writer humor, organs, dimensions? When you tickle

him does he not laughwhen you punch him in the nose, does he

not bleed? Grrr!

The editors traipsed back with me to the cutting rooms, happy

we had a pretty good film in the works. It should become better,

thanks to the feedback we had gotten. But we were troubled by

the River Chase comments because we didnt know where we had

gone wrong, if we had gone wrong, or even what to do about it.

But we thought WTH it wouldnt hurt to shorten it up a bit. So we

went through and trimmed a minute out. That should do it, right?

Wrong.

The next time we showed the film to Dan and Don, who we now

called the DDTs (Dan and Don Team), they said Wow! Much

better. The film is sharpening up quite a bit

beat, beat, beat.

DAN AND DON

But didnt you say you were going to

fix the River Chase scene?



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A C T I O N

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JB

(protesting)

We did. We took a minute out. What is

that, like 25%?

DAN

(never to mince words)

Yeh, but its still boring.

So again back to the cutting room, went we we did, and another

minute took we out. (I was so stressed I was starting to talk like

Yoda). Screened it again for the DDTs and got the same reaction

DDTS

Boring.

By now Im mad. These guys are cutting the heart out of one of the

most exciting parts of the movie. I tell producer Ray Stark that I

want to preview this last version with a full audience, composed

of real peoplewho dont belong to the Writers Guild! We add

in great sound effects and exciting music that Arthur Rubinstein

composed for us, one of the first totally electronic scores in moviehistory.

At the first public preview in Tucson, Arizona the film is playing

well. The audience is definitely taking the ride and having fun

doing it. And here it comes: a 2 minute version of the river

chase Ive all been waiting for (I know, thats ungrammatical, but

youre smart, youll figure it out). As the film unspools and proj-

ects onto the 70 foot screen in glorious John Alonzo color and

Dolby Stereo it hits me like a ton of bricks. Like Marlon Brando

in Apocalypse Now like I was shotlike I was shot with a dia-

mond... a diamond bullet right through my forehead.The horror,

the horror! (purple prose apologies).

The reason the DDTs said it was boring was suddenly obvious,

right in front of me all the time. Nothing was happening. Oh yes,

many choppers flew into the river bed and snaked under bridges

and fired a lot of fake ammunition. Oh yes, there was even a crashand explosion at the end. But! That was ALL there was. There



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were few clever maneuvers by Scheiders character to evade his

pursuers. He zig-zagged back and forth and a few bullets hit Blue

Thunder. But what the hell, it was heavily armored and the audi-ence knew it couldnt be shot down, so who gave a flying flop? All

the jeopardy was watered down; we knew Scheider would worm

his way out of it somehow. Not Good Storytelling! When the audi-

ence stops asking What happens next? the movie is in trouble.

What could we do? We couldnt re-shoot; we had spent enough

money already to feed a third-world country for a year. And we

had a release date staring us in the face. We did the only thing we

could do at that pointwe cut the scene out of the movie...Justkidding!

What we had to do was cut the scene down even more so that the

exciting parts of the scene did not become repetitive. One event

had to lead to a different event, not repeat the same old, same old.

Thats boring. And the next event has to be bigger and more clever

than the previous one, etc. etc. What I mean is if Blue Thunder

chopper comes whizzing by the camera and then the Police chop-per whizzes by, the next shot better not be the two choppers

whizzing by again. Somebody needs to do something differently.

One of them needs to try a different maneuver, or another chopper

has to enter the chase. In a comedy two men would be carrying a

giant pane of glass across the river bed and somebody would be

sure to fly right through it. You get the idea.

OK, so we shortened it down to 1minute, 45 seconds so that noth-

ing was repetitive and there was no time for it to get boring.

INSERT LINK TO BLUE THUNDER RIVER CHASE

The movie went out into the theatres on time, Memorial Day 1983,

and did great business. It was among the top ten grossing films of

the year and was nominated for several Academy Awards for edit-

ing and sound design. What was so bad about that?

What was bad was that the mistake shouldnt have been made inthe first place and we ought to have designed something that was



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A C T I O N

9

much more clever. We were shooting in an scary, dangerous loca-

tion and thought that would be exciting all by itself, just great, two

degrees shy of Fabulous.Well it needed more than we gave it and it was my fault. As the

director I blamed myself because who else is responsible for taking

the writers ideas and elevating them to be the most exciting they

can be? You cant just take a rough idea, like theres an exciting

Chopper chase in the River bed or the Indians take the fort and

literally transpose it to the screen as is. Hell, if that would work

the writer could just read the script aloud to the audience. Save a

lot of money.

Directors have to electro-shock all the moments alive so they jump

off the screen and grab the audience by the throat.

Thats what this chapter is about.

WHAT IS ACTION?

If I ask my grandson Milo what is action Ill probably get an answerlike what I heard from my 50 year old friend Scott last week. I rec-

ommended a lovely film Id just seen, The Best Exotic Marigold

Hotel. He asked, with tongue stuck in cheek, and smirk pasted on

face Got much action in it? Any explosions, or car chases? I said

there were some Tuk Tuks racing around. Like space aliens or

superheroes? he asked. No, TukTuks are rickshaws with engines.

Theyre all over Asia, I replied. Scott frowned. Somehow I got the

idea that he wasnt going to see The Best Exotic Marigold Hotelin the next 500 years, if that soon.

Action happens in films, as in life, when ordinary responses are

too tame to respond to a situation normally. Events have mush-

roomed to such a degree of intensity that behavior has to shift

into a higher gear. All the senses go into overdrive and adrenaline

amps up. Its the fight or flight response in action, so to speak.

Time even seems to slow down dramatically and we seem to have

a nano by nano-second recall of what went on.



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A C T I O N

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On photographic safari in Tanzania, my daughter Kelley and

I watched a solitary Cape Buffalo peacefully grazing in the

Ngornogoro crater as a pride of Lions crept up on him. This wasdefinitely Suspenseful in every sense. Kelley and I were asking the

key question for suspense scenes: what happens next? Our guide

Ally Mtumwa, cautioned us not to disturb the animals. Nature has

to take its course and its not for sentimental humans to interfere.

So the suspense built inside us, and probably inside the Lions as

well. They crept as close as they could to the Cape Buffalo until it

was put up or shut up time. The Cape Buffalo, who had seemed

oblivious to the approaching danger lazily raised his head at thelast minute and seemed to barely take note of the Lions surround-

ing him. Other animals like wildebeests would have been in full

OMG flight by now.

If this were a film, from a storytellers point of view the situation

is perfectly set-up. We know whats likely to happen, we can see

the jeopardy the Cape Buffalo is in: hes about to become lunch.

Because

hes outLioned he looks like the Biggest Loser of the week. Kelley

and I are seeing this from the Cape Buffalos point of view and

hoping he escapes. Interestingly, if we were telling this from the

hungry Lions point of view we would be rooting for them to kill

the Cape Buffalo for dinner and also share leftovers with the cir-

cling carrion birds.

The Lions were no fools. They were very cautious. They realized

this was no baby zebra, no newborn antelope, this was a BIG

MOTHER they faced. Not being their first Rodeo, they stood



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there on hyper-alert gauging their chances. And the Cape Buffalo

made no sign of running away. Something had to give.

And give it did. The leader of the Lions crouched, pawed theground, said F. it and charged. At that moment we went from

Suspense to Action. Everything speeded up dramatically. The

Cape Buffalo saw that he was being charged, made a decision in a

heartbeat, dropped his head low to the ground and charged right

back at the Lion.

The Lion faked to the right and then zoomed left around to attack

the hind end of his prey.



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A C T I O N

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The Cape Buffalo followed the fake and then reversed and went

on the attack after the Lion.

The two of them started to run in circles, chasing each other whichwould have been funny were it not a life or lunch struggle.

The other Lions just stood and watched this mano a mano fight,

just like the bad guys in Hong Kong action flicks who stand

around until its their turn to beat up Jackie Chan. All the Lions

were lacking were cigarettes to smoke.

Which way would it go? Cape Buffalo or Lion? Right now it was

an African standoff.

Until..

The Cape Buffalo faked right then surged up behind the Lion and

hooked a horn into the Lions side.

The Lion howled in pain, then started to flee.

The Cape Buffalo wheeled on the others who revealed their true

character and ran like hell.



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Kelley and I, safe in the Land Rover, started to cheer for the Cape

Buffalo who took his bows and went back to eating his grassy

lunch.

What can we learn from this True-life adventure that we can apply

to our own storytelling?

First, we have a story that has its own beginning, middle and end,

its own Act 1 setup, Lions sneak up on Buffalo. Act 2 development

Lions charge, Buffalo charges back, they chase each other and Act

3 resolution: Buffalo gores Lion, the Pride runs away,.

Second, the story can stand on its own. We dont need to know alot of back-story on the Lions or the Cape Buffalo to fully appreci-

ate the struggle.

Third, each of the animals has a clearly defined goal. Kelley and

I know the goals of the scene: The Lions want to kill and eat the

Cape Buffalo. The Cape Buffalo wants to ward off his attackers. If

it werent clear we might not understand whats going down. We

might not appreciate the different moves the animals are making

to get what they want. In a poorly written version of this story

there would have to be a narrator, like on NatGeo WILD, who has

to explain to us whats happening. The best film stories can be told

visually and need no narration to stand on their own. Show it,

dont say it is Mantra #1 for filmmakers

Fourth,We see a building of tension and suspense as the lions

get closer and the middle of the story develops. It bursts into

full action when it cant progress any further without one of the



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A C T I O N

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characters making a major move. Either the Lions are going to

attack or the Cape Buffalo is going to run away.

Then the head Lion makes his move and starts a charge. The CapeBuffalo is going to have to respond in some way: stand his ground

and maybe get killed and eaten, run away, or charge right back at

the Lion. At this point things have speeded up dramatically and

are happening very fast.

Fifth, The question becomes HOW do they go after their goals,

what are their tactics? What does the lion do when one tactic

doesnt work? Does he keep doing it or does he try somethingnew? In this case the head Lion starts to run in circles as the Cape

Buffalo turns the tables and charges him.

The Lion doesnt know what to do for a few seconds and keeps

going in a circle until he gets gored by the Buffalo horn. He

responds by getting the hell away. The Buffalo then turns his

attention to the other Lions who make no effort to stand and fight

but retreat ASAP. Resolution.

In films as in real life, there need to be different tactics to get to

a difficult goal. In directing and acting, these are what we call the

beats of a scene. They operate in any dramatic scene whether its

dialogue between two people, suspense scenes, choreography, or

action. Any scene that doesnt have distinct and interesting beats

will become repetitive and tedious very quickly. We know the

animals in our wild life adventure are not going to run in circles

forever. Not only is it boring, it isnt working as a tactic and oneof them needs to try something else if they are to reach their goal.

Lunch or Die. Which will it be?

Speaking of boring, lets move on and look at an example of an

action sequence fromNo Country For Old Men, 2007s winner of 4

Oscars, another 107 wins and 50 nominations for the Coen broth-

ers, their cast and crew. NO SPOILERS! I promise.

http://www.imdb.com/video/imdb/vi145883417/



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After finding $2 million in the desert from

a drug deal gone bad, a man finds himself

running from a psychotic killer determinedto get the money back.

At the beginning of the film the man,

Llewelan Moss is in the desert in the middle

of the night when the drug dealers come

back looking for their money. He sees them

coming and starts to run away on foot: Read

this carefully to see how the chase works.

Look for the goals and the beats.

INSERT NO COUNTRY CHASE link or PHOTO

EXT. RIVER GORGE - DAWN1

Moss tops the small rise and straightens and

flat-out runs. We hear the pickups engine

racing and see, behind Moss, its spot sweeping

backlight across the crest.

Moss is running towards the declivity of

a river gorge. Sky there is pink from the

un-risen sun.

Moss bears on the gorge, panting.

The pickup bounces up into view on the crest

behind him, roof, lights blazing. It is

pointed off at an angle. Its spotlight sweepsthe river plain.

It finds Moss. The truck reorients as it

bounces down in pursuit. A muzzle flash

precedes the dull whump of the shotgun.

Moss races on toward the river. Another

shotgun whump. Moss stumbles, turns to look

behind him.

1No Country for Old Men screenplay by Joel & Ethan Coen based on



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A C T I O N

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The truck, gaining ground. A man stands up out

of the sunroof, one hand on top of the cab,

the other holding a shotgun.

Moss is almost to the steep riverbank. Another

whump of the shotgun.

Shot catches Moss on the right shoulder. It

tears the back of his shirt away and sends

him over the crest of the river bank.

Moss airborne, ass over elbows, hits near the

bottom of the sandy slope with a loud fhump.

He rolls to a stop and looks up.

We hear a skidding squeal and see dirt and

dust float over the lip of the ridge, thrown

by the trucks hard stop.

As Moss pulls off his boots we hear voices

from the men in the truck.

There is the clank of its tailgate beingdropped and sounds of activity on the hollow

metal of its bed.

Moss tucks his boots into his belt and runs

splashing into the fast-moving water. A look

back:

Something shakes the scrub down the steep

slope. Moss backpedals deeper.

Bursting out of the scrub at the foot of the

slope: a huge black dog with a large head and

clipped ears. It bounds toward Moss.

Moss turns and half stumbles, half dives

into the river. Underwater a very dull whump

followed by the fizz of buckshot.

Moss breaks the surface of the water, gasping,

and looks back:



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Figures on the ridge. Below, the dog hitting

the water. Another gunshot from the bank.

Where it hits we dont know.

River current and Mosss strokes speed him

away.

The giant dog swims with the current and gains

on Moss

Moss looks back at the dog who is closing and

redoubles his swimming

The dog is very close now

EXT. RIVER BEND - DAWN

Moss finds his feet under him and staggers

onto a sandbar. The pursuing dogs head bobs

rhythmically in the water.

Moss pulls the gun from his belt. He takes

the clip out and ejects the chamber round.

The dog finds his stumpy legs much closer to

the sandbar: his massive head dips and waggles

as he lurches out of his swim. He emerges

from the river and bounds across the sand.

Moss shakes the gun and blows into the barrel.

The dog splashes through the riverwash that

separates him from the human.

Moss reinserts the clip. He chambers a round

as the dog runs snarling and as the dog leaps

he fires.

Moss fires twice more quickly, not waiting to

see whether the first round told.

The dog lands, stopped but not dead. It jerks

and gurgles.



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A C T I O N

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MOSS

Goddamnit.

He is looking out at the river.His boots are drifting by.

This sequence is so classic that it could be in the middle of a

John Ford western or a Raoul Walsh gangster flick. Yet there is a

modern sense of brutality and violence that keeps it from feeling

dated. Beyond that, the storytelling is spot on perfect.

Go back and re-read the sequence and see where the set-up hap-

pens, where it breaks into full blown action, how the action builds,and how it resolves. All the same questions that we asked in the

12 QUESTIONS YOU BETTER ASK chapter can be asked here.

Its not hard, its not String Theory, but it is critical to ask the

questions. Whats the goal, where are the beats, where is the tip-

ping point, whats the climax? Finally, is it exciting enough or is it

predictable?

DIRECTING ACTORS IN ACTIONThank God, theres an easy part to directing action: the actors.

Unexpectedly, they are the least of a directors worry. Scenes with

a lot of dialogue are the actors specialty. When they trained it was

with dialogue scenes from plays and films. They learned to analyze

motivations, character, back-story etc, etc, If they studied at a first

rate institution like the Yale Drama School, they will have learned

physical movement, fencing, even dance to be able to skillfully useboth their bodies and their voices as instruments. But Action is

still the directors domain. Hes the one that knows how a scene

needs to be shot, often like a jigsaw puzzle, made of individual bits

that have to fit together just so. Like submissive puppies actors

need to sit, stand or stay when it comes to action.

We often call actors players and action scenes take them right

back to a totally playful and childlike state. Its imbedded in their

makeup and begging to be released. Just like turning a bunch of

10 year old boys loose to play Cowboys and (pardon the political



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incorrectness) Indians. When we give directions to actors in an

action scene we dont have to worry about esoteric back stories,

we dont need to come up with huge character motivations, wejust have to tell them what their physical action is. Always express

it with an active verb: Run across the street to escape the man

chasing you, Slam the door in the pushy salesmans facetoreject

his pitch, Tear the office apart to punish the man who just fired

you. These are simple, direct, easy directions. Do THIS in order

to do THAT! SIMPLE. DIRECT.

Never make directions complicated. Its a waste of energy, waste

of breath and the actor stopped listening after the first sentenceanyway.

Of course the character will affect how the actor does the action;

a timid man and the Hulk will perform the same active verb poles

apart. Imagine how they would enact Tear the office apart to

punish the man who just fired you. This can be a lot of fun in both

drama and comedy. Watch some of the action in The Hangoverto

see how this works

http://www.imdb.com/video/imdb/vi2105934361/

It will come as no surprise to anyone whos spent much time

around actors that they are quick learners. Since their job is to

create the body, voice and mind of a character they become excel-

lent students absorbing like sponges what they need to know.

For example: Elizabeth Pea inRUSH HOUR 2 plays a bomb dis-

posal expert. It wouldve been easy/lazy for her to show up on the

set and let someone show her a few moves. But being a good pro-

fessional she made the effort to meet with bomb disposal experts

to learn as much as she could about how bombs and blasters and

wiring really work. Like all actors she wanted to look like she

knew what she was doing and not just pretending.

InPOINT OF NO RETURN, Harvey Keitel, playing a professional

assassin, actually managed to meet with someone who killedpeople for a living. Or so he said. But nevertheless Keitel returned



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A C T I O N

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from that meeting having a very strong idea of the kind of person-

ality that would do that.

Roy Scheider learned the basics of flying a helicopter from stuntpilot Jim Gavin on BLUE THUNDER. Gavin commented to me

at the time that he had always been able to teach an actor to fly

very easily, much more so than a non-actor. This was a godsend

one day in shooting when our cameraman nearly fell 2000 feet

from the helicopter. Seeing a gorgeous sunset one afternoon on

the set in downtown Los Angeles we rushed to get the helicopter

up in the air in order to photograph Scheider against the sunset.

The cameraman, Frank Holgate, would have to stand on the skidsoutside the helicopter handholding the camera, attached by a very

simple safety harness that he had made himself.

As we were scurried to get up in the air before we lost the sunset,

I noticed that Holgate was having difficulty setting up his harness.

Seeing an accident in our future I told him to slow down, if we

missed it we missed it. There would be plenty of sunsets that we

could photograph later. Always confident, Frank assured me hewould be perfectly safe.

Insert shot of Scheider against setting sun. Clip from blue thunder.

(Might be one in the Bound Blue Thunder volume or in the trailer

we can rip.)

Up in the air at 2000 feet we got some really dramatic shots of

Scheider against the setting sun. I was riding in the back of the

helicopter, and looked over the pilots shoulder at Holgate to see ifhe liked what he was shooting. What I saw was a look I had never

seen on any human being before. Frank had turned chalk white.

The straps of his harness were slipping and he was beginning to

fall away from the helicopter. Both his hands were holding the

camera, and he couldnt just drop it over a populated area.

Jim Gavin, the pilot, was sitting close to Holgate and quickly

reached through the open window to wrap his left arm around

him to keep him from falling. Then he ordered Roy Scheider to

take control of the



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helicopter. Like a pro, Roy grabbed the cyclic and landed us at

the heliport with only a little help from Gavin. Somewhere in the

excitement, the Arriflex camera had been thrown back to me, andI continued shooting so that we would have a documentary record

of Scheider landing the helicopter.

FORMATTING ACTION

Undoubtedly, you have noticed that the examples of action

sequences in these chapters are formatted like a screenplay, not

like a novel. This is very deliberate. When a writer conceives of a

scene its easy to separate the dialogue between characters. Even ashort line of action:

Lauren walked into her living room and turned

on the light

works in one line. When the action gets more complicated it needs

a different kind of formatting so that the Production department

can break it down and get a realistic idea of how long it will taketo shoot, what it will cost etc. Otherwise its hard to get a good

sense of how many shots will be needed to tell the story and what

angles will work the best. Writers are often in a hurry and are

eager to just get the scene down on paper. With apologies to my

friend Peter Lance who wrote this scene from his novel Stranger

456about a serial killer attacking his victim, lets see what it might

look like in an outline or first draft of a screenplay:

INT. LAURENS BEDROOM

Now in the distance, Karl hears the sound

of a siren. He lets go of Laurens neck

and grabs her by the hair from the back. He

spins her around and quickly unties the belt

from the robe on her wrists. With the skill

of a man expert in abduction, he grabs the

handcuffs from the Sheriffs belt on his waist

and slaps one on Laurens right wrist. Hesabout to cuff her left when she looks across



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A C T I O N

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the bed and spots her Search & Rescue kit

with the surgical scissors she used to pull

Karl out of the chopper. Suddenly, before he

can get the second cuff on, Lauren jerks awayand in one, swift move, rolls across the bed,

grabs the scissors and jams them into his

thigh as he lunges for her.

Karl pulls out the scissors and drops them,

lunging at her with his bloody hand and

catching the edge of her robe, flipping her

onto the floor. Lauren pushes back on the

floor with her feet to get away, but Karl

grabs her ankle, pulling her toward him.

For a novel or work of prose this might work. But screenplays are

really blueprints that are less meant to be read for pleasure, as

they are to be detailed guides to shooting. Peter Lance knows of

course to break down his action into basic shots:

INT. LAURENS BEDROOM

Now, in the distance, Karl hears the sound of

the siren. He lets go of Laurens neck and

grabs her by the hair from the back.

KARL

To be continued. Lets go...

He spins her around and quickly unties the

belt from the robe on her wrists.

With the skill of a man expert in abduction,

he grabs THE HAND CUFFS from the Sheriffs

belt on his waist and...

Slaps one on Laurens right wrist. Hes about

to cuff her left when, She looks across the

bed and spots her Search & Rescue kit with

the SURGICAL SCISSORS.

Suddenly, before he can get the second cuff

on, Lauren jerks away and in one, swift move,

rolls across the bed, grabs the scissors and



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24

Jams them into his thigh as he lunges for

her.

He pulls out the scissors and drops them,lunging at her with his bloody hand and

catching the edge of her robe, flipping her

onto the floor.

Lauren pushes back on the floor with her feet

to get away, but Karl grabs her ankle, pulling

her toward him.2

Whats clear is that when the scene is formatted even roughly its

easy to see the shots start to lay themselves out. Its easy for pro-

duction to break it down and for the director to see what other

beats might be needed to make the story clear.

Of course one thing that Peter Lance did not do here as he

adapted his novel was to specify the exact angles for each of the

shots. Since he doesnt know the locations, the casting, or what the

director might possibly have in mind he leaves that to the direc-

tor, production designer and cinematographer to create and fill in.Sometimes the writer may have a very specific idea for a shot and

will detail the idea in the script like a handheld shot, a low angle,

a steadicam shot or a tracking shot but as a general practice, its

wiser to leave this detailing of shots until later in the filmmak-

ing process. Nothing is more annoying to a director than scripts

where the writer has dictated every angle before anyone knows

what the locations look like or how the scene will be staged.

An exception would be the writer striving to make his script

extremely readable when selling his script. He may write it in

the form of a short story filled with descriptive details that would

ordinarily be left out of a screenplay. Nobody would ever sug-

gest that producers dont have sufficient imagination. Never. Its

merely to help the occasional Attention Deficit Disorder that some

producers flesh is heir to. Directors often take a screenplay like

this after its been approved and create a shooting version where

2 Adapted fromStranger 456by Peter Lance 2012



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A C T I O N

25

they strip out the extra detail, creating a shooting script, that is

much more bare-bones, easier to follow and more transparent to

the cast and crew.

SUMMARY

1. BLUE THUNDERs lesson was that action sequences need new

events and tactics to grow, and the events and tactics need to

increase in intensity.

2. Action happens when ordinary responses to any situation

are too tame to respond normally. Behavior goes into overdrive.Example of the Cape Buffalo and the Lions in Tanzania.

3. Action sequences are like individual stories within a larger story.

They have a beginning, middle and end. Not necessarily in that

order.

4. A sequence can usually stand on its own without much refer-

ence to prior circumstances.

5. The goals or objectives of a sequence must be understood by

the Audience either intuitively or from information given by the

filmmaker.

6. The fun of the action comes when we see the ways that

characters

go after their goal. What do they do when one tactic doesnt work?

7. Formatting action scenes should be as close to verbal story-boards as possible. If written like prose in a novel its unlikely to

be shot properly. Enough time wont be scheduled and shots can

be missed.

8. Actors are great learners. When they have to portray something

they will work hard to be authentic.

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