How Screenwriters Can Create Authentic Dialogue by William C. Martell

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#writing #screenwriting #screenplay

[storlach]

Dear people from FilmCourage, the content you put out is worth more than gold! Not only for newbys. I've been working in the filmbusiness for about twenty years now, wrote scripts, directed etc. But still, with the help of your series of Interviews, I can refresh my knowledge and, what's even more important, I can LEARN new stuff. AMAZING! Thank you, thank you, thank

[Biring]

The way he talks about outing exposition through misunderstanding is a simple, yet genius way of conveying it. Aaron Sorkin is a master at this.

[tag]

it's cool that, doesn't matter how many books or interviews you see, something new and interesting always shows up. Loved the tip about misunderstandings.

[thereccher]

The challenge of dialogue can be summed up as such: every line must be manufactured to push the narrative forward in some way, but comes together to form the illusion of two real people talking, and you cannot see how it's happening on an engineering level, but you know in the back of your mind. It's a very tough juggling act, where it only looks easy when it's done well.

[robbieclark]

I would love to have this guy as a professor

[jimman]

Great advice and he is very engaging. He seems like he just enjoys the process of writing and thinking about writing, it's really refreshing to see that sort of positivity around a subject that can be tricky and frustrating

[Thompa]

That part about the same dialogue but with different spins on it is really helpful.
I often find it hard to differentiate character's dialogue from each other and find unique ways for them to talk.

[KimTownsel]

Bill Martell has been supportive and helpful to me as well as other beginners. Grateful!

[codacreator]

"Input equals output." Every writer, every KIND of writer could learn from this. And dialogue "should be the icing on the cake." Brilliant.

[deanpapadopoulos]

These screenwriters are so smart. They explain our nature so well. The interviewer is great. She really lets people express their knowledge. Thank you.

[WanderingWeirdly]

This was great! Been struggling with one of my projects' dialogue but this has given me a lot to think about, especially confirming the age-old advice: Show. Don't tell.
Love this channel

[timplum]

I love how for his concept at 4:38 of people not hearing what the other person is saying, he demonstrates it perfectly with his own example at 1:16.

[undead]

Dialog in a movie can really be summed up as "less is more" Movies and TV are visual mediums, you should use the visuals to tell the story and the dialog to fill in the holes. A couple great examples of this would be the beginning of Up and Inside Out when Riley comes back home from almost running away.

With Up, you literally watch almost the entire lives of Carl and Ellie, all of their ups and downs, as they constantly pursue their goal of being able to go to Paradise Falls. During this whole scene, for about 5 minutes, not a single word is spoken, yet you understand everything that has happened in their lives. You know that they both worked at the zoo, that Ellie wasn't able to have kids/had a miscarriage, that life often happened, and prevented them from saving for their trip, and that Carl and Ellie were about to go on their big trip, before Ellie fell ill and died. All their life, all the emotions, all conveyed without ever speaking one single word.

With Inside Out, when Joy finally hands over controls to Sadness, it's a metaphor for her finally letting go of her control over Riley, knowing that what Riley really needed was to feel sad so that she could finally feel happy again. It's only about 1 minute long of silence, but we feel every emotion Riley is going through because we have all been Riley at one point in our lives. We have all felt that sadness of loss that we tried to deny, when in fact, it needed to be experienced and felt in order for us to finally move on.

In either scene, if the characters had said anything at all, it would have detracted from each scene and lessened the impact, because the scenes didn't need to be described, they needed to be felt, to be experienced. No words could have made the scenes better because emotions can't be described in words, you can only feel them.

[miketacos]

That's really cool way to think of it. *goes to rewrite every line of dialogue*

[frankservant]

This channel is gold. I am a Space scientist by profession I have a passion for filmmaking I am learning a lot, who knows probably more than what others would get from film school

[meg-k-waldren]

Awesome advice from an awesome guy. His perspective is always so interesting.

[ivansosa]

This content is gold. There's no other way to put it.

[TahtahmesDiary]

LOVED the barista dialogue example at the end!

[anilsrivastha]

"Paranoid barista" - rofl! Cracked me up!

[TahtahmesDiary]

SO glad I found this channel, it's like you have a video for all the questions I have but feel might be stupid or just literally have no idea who I would ask as I'm not a film student, just making my own.