I admit that I was overwhelmed, and my review is here.

Having thought about the film some more, I want to suggest that it’s got three traits that are worth pondering, and that illuminate problematic areas in much blockbuster screenwriting:

1 – Concept and consequence.
The world that Nolan creates in the film… The basic premise of the plot within this world, or rather worlds… There is so much setting up, and there is a seemingly endless potential for expansion. Indeed, the first hour of the film is dense with dialogue and set-ups, which need to be satisfactorily payed off in the second half of the film. Nolan elegantly by-passes stereotypical Hollywood storytelling in this area.

I’ve seen some comments here and there by people who were underwhelmed by the action sequences. But for me, the ultimate trick of the film is the expanding time frames in consecutive dream-worlds, and the way Nolan masterfully ties this concept to the very-slowly-falling van that drives off the bridge. The way time almost grinds to a halt here, at least in one layer of the story, and then the shock as the characters are plunged back into reality… I gasped more than once.

2 – Leaving the device alone.
The technology that enables the characters to travel between worlds is never properly explained. Thank God! It’s a given in the film’s story universe that all the characters are already familiar with it. Some will say this is chickening out from explaining the impossible. I would say that’s exactly the point, and Nolan is smart enough to understand that his audience would not accept any attempt at explanation, and trusts us enough to leave it alone and get on with the story.

3 – Character ambiguity.
A key point in the film. There is no real hero in Inception. DiCaprio’s character is a deeply flawed and often unsympathetic man. Nolan makes the best use of DiCaprio that I’ve seen in a long time. But added to this, Inception also lacks a villain. Ken Watanabe could be seen as the antagonist of the piece, but this assumption quickly falls apart. Thus, the film becomes something much more interesting than your common blockbuster, and provides a roller-coaster ride that is also deeply intelligent and emotionally complex.

The counter-point exists with Marion Cottilard’s very one-dimensional character. Which ties in perfectly with the intellectual concept of memories and dreams as the film unfolds.

I still think that Christopher Nolan is one of the three or four most interesting American filmmakers working today. David Fincher and Darren Aronofsky are others. And I still root for M. Night Shyamalan, although I have yet to see The Last Airbender…

I picked up the 7D later that winter. I decided to go for the 7D rather than the 5D mainly because of the price tag. The 5D was out of both my employers and my own price range, but researching the 7D online, I found that it would be more than good enough for my requirements. I worked on a short documentary back then, and was eager to see if I could put the 7D to work right away.

I decided to not use the 7D for that project. The reason was, I didn´t quite have the time to get to know the camera and get comfortable with it, before shooting began. So I decided to use our Sony HDR-FX7 once again. Not an amazing camera, by any means. But I´m quite content with its HD performance, and by now I´m so familiar with the camera that working with it feels easy. Most of the shooting was interviews, and to get a loose and easy feel I shot a lot of the interviews handheld. I used a Røde Stereomic, which gave me a good soundtrack. Had the budget been larger, I would have mic’ed the interview better. But to stay on budget I had to do both sound and camera myself, and so I opted for the easiest solution.

Now that I´m more familiar with the 7D – would I have used it for interviews at this point? Well, yes and no. I would have preferred to have two cameras covering the interview. One HDV-cam doing master shots, and the 7D for closeups and cutaways. That being said, it´s definitely possible to use HDSLRs for interviews. You just have to be a little more prepared than usual. Here are some key points:

• remember the 12 minute limit. Start and stop recording to start a new file on the CF-card

• have enough CF-cards

• backup batteries

• be very conscious about choosing your lens, and lighting your subject. Don´t go overboard with a shallow depth of field just because you can. With an f-stop of at least 5.6 you´ll be safe.

• You definitely need to record sound separately. The Canon DSLRs just aren´t good enough soundwise for professional use. I use a Røde videomic that I plug into my 7D, but that really isn´t enough for interviews.

• Finally, invest in a LCD viewfinder if that´s within your budget. This really helps your focusing, as well as giving you the stability to go handheld once in a while. I use the moderately priced LCDVF, while most people seem to prefer the pricier Zacuto Z-Finder.

Functionality of the LCDVF

This is painfully evident in Alice in Wonderland. From the first frames it´s clear that Burton is merely painting by numbers. The characters are bland cardboard cut-outs, flat and lifeless. Burton constantly underestimates his audience: witness the casting and characterization of Hamish, Alice´s husband-to-be. The movie is trying to hit us over the head with the message “Hamish is a dreadful bore, and Alice shouldn´t marry him!” But in the end it all just comes across as bad storytelling.

So what´s going to be Burton´s next project? Perhaps an adaptation of Winnie-the-Pooh, where Christopher Robin returns as a grown up, and goes into an epic battle with sword in hand to defend the Hundred Acre Wood? Or Pippi Longstockings, where grown up Pippi has been diagnosed as psychotic, and insitutionalized for 15 years, before she finally breaks out and reclaims her villa in an epic battle with sword in hand?

Count me out from now on. I´m not interested.

Nothing in the world can take the place of Persistence.
Talent will not; nothing is more common than unsuccessful people with talent.
Genius will not; unrewarded genius is almost a proverb.
Education will not; the world is full of educated derelicts.
Persistence and determination alone are omnipotent.
- Calvin Coolidge (1872 – 1933)

A few years back, Pål and I wrote a couple of stageplays more or less on assignment, meaning that we pretty much wrote them for someone else to produce. Most writers will find themselves in this situation sooner or later. After all, we don’t usually get to write scripts for ourselves to produce. So whether it is writing a script for a producer, in collaboration with a director, for a theater troupe to produce, or in a workshop situation of any kind – be prepared for the job to quickly turn into a negative assignment.

Few people are good readers and responders. Most people naturally focus on what they don’t like or what they would have done different themselves, and forget that they are not the ones writing it. If production is imminent, fear can easily seep into the process too, with directors and actors more or less unwillingly focused on what they don’t want to do. I certainly know that I am capable of this behavior myself, and I’ve had to train myself not to act that way. And you can’t force anyone to understand this, you can only lead by example:

The bottom line is that you’re not going to get what you want by telling people what you don’t want.

But your readers are sometimes going to insist on exactly that. Pål once likened the experience of discussing a first draft to discussing kitchen utensils. It becomes really hard to deliver when your partner, boss or whoever tells you: “I don’t know what I want you to find, but it’s not a fork.”

You’re clearly on a negative assignment, and it’s draining your creative juices really quickly.

This sounds obvious and perhaps a little childish when I read it back to myself, but I think this negative approach is all too common, from amateur theater and all the way to professional filmmaking.

What to do?

With our current projects we decided that we needed to nurture ourselves a little, and thus agreed that we were going to be hardcore about what we would love to write. We were going to give ourselves a positive assignment. Our early meetings and discussions on the period scripts we’re now writing centered on what sort of visuals we would love to see, and what sort of themes we felt were resonating with us, without any thought of structure or practicality or indeed whatever anyone else might think about what we are attempting to do.

We then spent a few months writing a first draft that’s now done, where we joyfully threw anything we wanted to see into the mix. We ended up around 150 pages. Some good, some not so good, but at least there’s a surplus of pages and somewhere to go. And I believe the script communicates a positive approach to the storytelling.

We’re not going to lose that when we start revisions.

Planet Origo is dedicated to science fiction and fantasy, and later in the year we’ll get started on a feature series about the “other” sci-fi milestones, meaning those you don’t always find on the Top 10 list.

INT. EMBASSY BALLROOM – NIGHT

COLONEL O´REALLY stands by the bar – a scotch in one hand while the other rests on the thigh of a young blonde. Her shapely behind is planted on a barstool, and she giggles noisily at one of his jokes.

COLONEL O´REALLY

...so then I said to Oliver North, I said: “Ollie...”

A young officer, CORPORAL WIMP, approaches behind the Colonel´s back. His face is flustered and beads of sweat cover his brow. He clears his throat nervously.

The Colonel ignores the young officer, moving even closer to his blonde prey.

CORPORAL WIMP

Sir...

COLONEL O’REALLY

I’m busy here, son. Take a hike.

But the Corporal persists.

CORPORAL WIMP

Sir, I’m afraid it’s an emergency.

COLONEL O’REALLY

So spit it out, what is it?

CORPORAL WIMP

Well, sir...

COLONEL O’REALLY

(bellows)

Spit it out, Corporal!

CORPORAL WIMP

I think you need to see this, sir.

How many times have we seen scenes like this? Disaster movies are sure to have at least one “you need to see this” – some have close to a dozen. Is it just a harmless cliche? Or is it a sign of something worse: screenwriting advice mutated into dogma?

One of the first commandments of screenwriting goes “Show, Don’t Tell!” To be sure, that’s good, sound advice. Film is audiovisual storytelling, so your writing should be all about what can be seen and heard. But all advice must be combined with conscious thought. Otherwise you end up with insanely annoying characters that are incapable of telling each other anything. And all they can say is “I think you need to see this.”

Disaster movies are all about the spectacle. We don’t want to hear about the explosions. We need to see them. That doesn’t mean that every disaser movie has to be strictly formulaic in every scene. Sometimes a young officer can actually just tell the Colonel what’s up. It’s not always: Volcanoes = good, dialogue = bad.

An unthinking attitude to show, don’t tell, may lead to some problems:

1. Fragmentation. All scenes get steeped in spectacle, so the story ends up getting “loud”. May lead to your movie ending up as a string of explosive pearls.
2. Fear of dialogue.
3. Fear of monologue.
4. Characters behaving like cogwheels in a screenwriting machine.
5. Avoiding getting close to characters, and giving them depth.
6. Fear of ambiguity (what really happened?)

Keeping all this in mind, I still consider show, don’t tell, one of the best pieces of screenwriting advice you can get. You just have to remember that it’s not dogma to be followed blindly.

And that sometimes it’s really okay to tell, and don’t show.