The War of Art: Break Through the Blocks and Win Your Inner Creative Battles by Steven Pressfield.The 21st Century Screenplay: A Comprehensive Guide to Writing Tomorrow’s Films by Linda Aronson.Your Screenplay Sucks!: 100 Ways to Make It Great by William M.Pulp Fiction: A Quentin Tarantino Screenplay by Quentin Tarantino.

Writing for Emotional Impact: Advanced Dramatic Techniques to Attract, Engage, and Fascinate the Reader From Beginning to End by Karl Iglesias.

The 101 Habits of Highly Successful Screenwriters, 10th Anniversary Edition: Insider Secrets From Hollywood’s Top Writers by Karl Iglesias.

The Art of Creative Writing by Lajos Egri.

The Art Of Dramatic Writing: Its Basis in the Creative Interpretation of Human Motives by Lajos Egri.

The Complete Guide to Standard Script Formats by Hillis R.

How Not to Write a Screenplay: 101 Common Mistakes Most Screenwriters Make by Denny Martin Flinn.

Creating Unforgettable Characters by Linda Seger.

Making a Good Script Great by Linda Seger.

I don't your position, OrvilleWrite, so please don't be offended by my assumptions about what you do and don't know. To be actually helpful though, Syd Field's Screenplay is alright if you take it with a grain of salt. I learned much more about film and screenwriting pondering Coffee and Cigarettes than from the entirety of Save the Cat. I think it's a great exercise to watch it and consider if it works, and why or why not. A great exercise I've found is Jim Jarmusch's Coffee and Cigarettes. You'll probably find you do in fact need beats, but this way you'll be so much more aware of your rationale. Not where your beats should be, but whether you should even have any at all. I'd recommend looking into films/scripts that break all the rules and consider what is really entertaining in film. The three act structure isn't law, and some claim it's actually poisonous to screenwriting (I'm not decided, but it's good for people to know it's not actually something concluded on). There are no rules, just suggestions, some better then others. Just remember that structure is what you want it to be. Dipping my toes in 'rules' has hurt my creativity tremendously. This is granted I was in a very impressionable place at the time. I've found myself operating on the opposite of the spectrum from Blake, and his advice, for my temperament, is for the most part worthless and damaging.

I am still a little scarred from taking Save the Cat by Blake Snyder seriously. In case you're a no, you need to know that it's normal. These books aren't necessarily a good thing.

on here a lot, so I just want to present my opinion to show not everyone's in favour of these things. I'm seeing some Story, Save the Cat and co. So I'm curious how others have found it to actually use? Of course, it's my first script, and it's not finished yet! (also, I'm writing it for me to shoot, whereas the book seemed to lean heavily towards sales)īut I figure it's not going to be a masterpiece, so I may as well just keep simple structure and have fun and finish it! I'm also pretty sure I won't care if I have a Catalyst exactly on 12 or an All is Lost on 75. Then I intend to reread STC and apply anything I feel is missing/needed. Now I'm fleshing out the various sections, and it's taking shape surprisingly nicely! I find I am much preferring to write a rough outline, define my characters, then braindump all my previously accumulated notes into the outline. I didn't want to make pinboards and beatsheets and do the logline first and categorise as 'Monster in the House' or whatever. At the risk of unknowingly beating a dead thing (I'm new here), I just read that, and while I really enjoyed it, I found that when I went to actually use his advice it really didn't work for me at all.

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