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Scene Description Spotlight: "Zombieland"

Posted on by of Go Into The Story

One of the most important things a writer wants to do when they begin a script is establish the story’s tone — and this is nowhere more important than with a cross-genre movie. A great example is Zombieland (2009). Written by screenwriters Rhett Reese & Paul Wernick, the movie crosses two genres: horror and comedy. And Reese & Wernick let the reader know straightaway their screenplay has heaping gobs of both:

We begin with a SONG: WOODY GUTHRIE'S 'THIS LAND IS YOUR'
LAND.' CATCHY. PATRIOTIC. WARM. Recorded in mono, played
on a scratchy old phonograph...

The following is shot gritty. Kinetic. Fast. Scary. Very
'28 Days Later,' 'Saving Private Ryan,' 'Children of Men.'

FADE UP ON:

An AMERICAN FLAG, filling the screen, flapping. A male
voice, belonging to FLAGSTAFF, a witty, anxiety-ridden
EVERYMAN, late-twenties, (THINK SETH GREEN), narrates:

FLAGSTAFF (V.O.)
This land is your land.

The camera rotates on its axis until the flag is UPSIDE DOWN,
then pulls back to reveal that it is one of those flags
flying on the hood of a PRESIDENTIAL LIMOUSINE, which itself
is upside-down, crashed and overturned ON TOP of another car.

The further we pull back, the more we see of a destroyed,
burning Washington D.C.

FLAGSTAFF (V.O.) This land is my land.

Suddenly, rapid FOOTSTEPS! The camera jiggles nervously,
trying to find their source. Rapidly, the footsteps become
LOUD, like someone running on sheet-metal

BOOM-BOOM-BOOM! A ZOMBIE, bleeding from the eyes, runs UP
the other side of the tangled mess of automobiles, plants a
foot on the underside of the limo, and LONG-JUMPS, arms
flailing, down onto the ground in the direction of the
camera.

It lands on its STOMACH, then scrambles up to its hands and
knees.

The camera jiggles, backing up quickly. The ZOMBIE regains
its footing and sprints spastically, aggressively toward the
lens.

The CAMERAMAN has seen enough. He turns and RUNS, his P.O.V.
bouncing wildly. Then the camera WHIP-PANS to face the
Zombie as it WAILS and ATTACKS.

The zombie engulfs the screen, TACKLING the Cameraman.

The camera FALLS to the ground, askew, shooting nothing but
treetops and sky. Offscreen, the CAMERAMAN SCREAMS and
SCREAMS and SCREAMS, accompanied by ripping, cracking,
CRUNCHING.

Something just God-awful is happening to this guy. Then he
gacks and falls SILENT.

We hear munching.

The zombie's superbly frightening FACE comes into frame
again, at an angle, staring into the camera lens as though
it's a bathroom mirror. The zombie curiously looks at its
reflection, twitching, trembling, smacking its lips.

The zombie BELCHES, long, loud, and animal-like, FOGGING the
LENS with its breath.

Okay, so with the zombie attacking and killing the cameraman, the script pretty much gets across the horror theme of the movie. But what about the comedy?

* “This Land Is Your Land” and the upended Presidential limousine — a funny contrast

* “The CAMERAMAN SCREAMS and SCREAMS and SCREAMS, accompanied by ripping, cracking, CRUNCHING” — the redundancy of the “screams” and the visceral sounds of the zombie assault, one we can only imagine, not see

* “Then he gacks and falls SILENT” — use of the word gacks

* “We hear munching” — that’s just funny

* The zombie belches which fogs the camera lens — zombie belch and a humorous visual touch by the writers re fogging the camera lens

So with their opening, the writers have (A) established the post-apocalyptic nature of things in the United States, (B) introduced the presence of zombies, (C) conveyed that this is a horror story, and (D) gotten across that it is also a comedy.

Not bad for 1 1/2-pages

A good lesson in using scene description to establish the tone upfront of a cross-genre script.

Here is a trailer from the movie where you see how they marketed both the movie’s horror and comedy:

[Originally posted April 29, 2010]

Scene Description Spotlight: “Raising Arizona”

Posted on by of Go Into The Story

I’ll always have a soft spot for Raising Arizona as it was the very first industry screening I attended back in March 1987. That and the fact it still ranks as one of the best Coen brothers’ movies. Here is an IMDB summary of the plot:

Recidivist hold-up man H.I. McDonnough and police woman Edwina marry, only to discover they are unable to conceive a child. Desperate for a baby, the pair decide to kidnap one of the quintuplets of furniture tycoon Nathan Arizona. The McDonnoughs try to keep their crime secret, while friends, co-workers and a feral bounty hunter look to use Nathan Jr. for their own purposes.

In this sequence, HI (Nicholas Cage) and Ed (Holly Hunter) try to steal some diapers. It’s long, but worth the read to see how the Coens stage the action. See you below the fold!

	INT. STORE

	A hand enters to take a package of panty hose from the
	standing rack.

	CLOSE SHOT HUGGIES

	A hand enters to take a big carton of disposable diapers
	from the shelf.

	CLOSEUP CASHIER

	A pimply-faced lad with a paper 7-Eleven cap on his head. He
	is looking up from a dirty magazine, reacting in horror to
	something approaching.

	HI'S POV

	Hi is approaching the check-out island with a gun in one
	hand, the carton of Huggies tucked under the other. The L'Eggs
	stocking is pulled over his head to distort his features.

				HI
		I'll be taking these Huggies and
		whatever cash you got.

	CLOSE SHOT CASHIER'S HAND

	As he presses a silent alarm under the lip of his counter.

	EXT. CAR

	Ed is reading to Nathan Jr. from a large picture book.

				ED
		"Not by the hair of my chinny-chin-
		chin." Then I'll huff and I'll
		puff...'

	She pauses for a moment, listening. We can barely hear a
	distant siren. She resumes absently, but her voice trails
	off.

				ED
		"...and I'll blow your house in..."

	We can definitely hear the WHOO-WHOO of the siren now, and
	it is definitely approaching. Ed hooks an arm around the
	seat and looks behind the car, then looks forward.

	HER POV

	Indistinctly visible through the semi-reflective glass are
	two figures at the check-out island. One is pointing something
	at the other.

	BACK TO ED

	As the siren is growing louder. Under her breath:

				ED
		That son-of-a-bitch.

	She unstraps herself and gets out of the car.

	INT. STORE

	Two-shot of Hi and the CASHIER, who is stuffing bills into a
	grocery bag. Beyond them we can see Ed, outside, circling
	the front of the car.

	Her shout is muffled through the glass:

				ED
		You son-of-a-bitch!

	With this Hi notices her. He turns to the Cashier.

				HI
		Better hurry it up. I'm in dutch
		with the wife.

	But Ed is already getting into the driver's seat of the car.

	BACK TO ED

	As she slams the car door shut. The siren is quite loud now.

				ED
		That son-of-a-bitch. Hang on, pumpkin.

	The car squeals out of the lot.

	WIDE SHOT THE STREET

	The squad car tops a rise to bounce into view, its siren
	wailing.

	BACK TO THE STORE

	Hi bursts out the door, still wearing the stocking. The carton
	of Huggies is still tucked under one arm.

	Bellowing hopefully after his departing car:

				HI
		Honey!

	We hear the SMACK-CRACK of a gunshot and glass impact, but
	the approaching squad car is still too far down the block to
	have been the source.

	Hi looks around the parking lot, bewildered.

	The wailing siren is becoming painfully loud.

	Hi looks behind him at the plate-glass front of the store,
	where a bullet pock mars the glass.

	HIS POV

	Through the glass we see the pimply young Cashier with the
	paper 7-Eleven cap pop up from behind the counter to sight
	down his huge .44 Magnum for another shot. The gun is so big
	he uses both hands to heft it.

	SMACK-CRACK - the bullet kisses another hole in the glass.

	Hi is off and running.

	The squad car is screeching into the lot. An officer tumbles
	out of the passenger side before the car is fully stopped.
	He rolls on the pavement, then hurriedly rights himself and
	takes up a half-kneeling shooting stance.

	At the same time the little Cashier is emerging from the 7-
	Eleven with his gun.

	The two bang away at Hi's retreating figure - the Policeman's
	revolver popping, the Cashier's Magnum booming.

	We hear the Policeman who is still in the car drawling over
	its loudspeaker:

				SPEAKER
		Halt. It's a police warning, son.
		Put those groceries down and turn
		yourself in.

	TRACKING ON HI

	Legs pumping, panty hose still over his head, its unused leg
	streaming behind him like an aviator's scarf. The gun is
	tucked into his belt; the Huggies are tucked securely under
	his arm.

	Behind him we can see the OFFICER and the Cashier squeeze
	off another couple shots, and then the policeman piles back
	into the squad car.

	ED'S CAR

	Driving. She hears distant gunshots.

				ED
		That son of a bitch... Hold on,
		Nathan. We're gonna go pick up Daddy.

	She hangs a vicious U-turn.

	TRACKING ON HI

	Huffing and puffing down the road with his Huggies.

	The cop car careens onto the street in the background, its
	siren wailing.

	The PASSENGER COP is leaning far out his window, one hand
	gripping the light-and-siren rack, the other pointing a gun
	at Hi, shooting away.

	Bullets whizz past.

	Suddenly, with a soft pthunk! the Huggies box pops forward,
	out from under Hi's arm - hit by a bullet. Still running, Hi
	reaches forward, tries to catch it on the fly, bobbles it,
	tips it - loses it. He overruns it a couple steps before he
	can bring himself up short.

	He turns and reaches to pick up the box but - PING-PING -
	bullets chew up the road near his hand.

	Leaving the Huggies, Hi takes off through a well-manicured
	yard.

	The police car is proceeding on down the street to catch him
	around the corner, the driver still drawling over his
	loudspeaker:

				SPEAKER
		That's private property, son. Come
		back out to the street and reveal
		yourself to Officer Steensma and
		Officer Scott - that's me.

	YARD

	Hi vaults a fence to land in the backyard.

	As he straightens to his feet we hear a horrible snarling
	and barking.

	A huge black Doberman is bounding across the lawn. It looks
	like it means to rip Hi's throat out.

	LOW TRACKING SHOT TOWARD HI

	The dog's racing POV as it bounds toward the paralyzed Hi.

	The dog leaps - camera flying up toward Hi's face - and:

	CLOSE SHOT HI'S FROZEN PROFILE

	The dog's slavering muzzle flies into frame and - stops,
	bare inches from Hi's nose, and the dog falls back, having
	reached the end of his chain.

	Hi resumes running.

	CLOSE

	On the dog, snarling and straining against the end of his
	chain.

	TRACKING

	Down along the chain toward the spike mooring it to the
	ground. As the dog strains, the spike starts to stir in the
	ground.

	Other dogs can be heard barking now, the Doberman having
	started a sympathetic wave.

	ED'S CAR

	Her jaw set, she takes a hard turn, looking this way and
	that.

				ED
		That son of a bitch...

	The police car approaches and roars by, the Passenger Cop
	still hanging out his window.

				ED
		...Lookie Nathan, a police car...

	She is looking in her rearview mirror.

				ED
		...Say, that looks like Bill Steensma.

	LOW TRACKING SHOT

	The camera is shooting forward at ground level, following
	the Doberman as it bounds along. The Doberman is dragging
	his chain and spike, which stretch into the foreground,
	bumping and scraping along the road.

	Far ahead we can see Hi running, then turning down an
	intersecting street.

	A second dog peels into the road to bound along with the
	Doberman.

	TRACKING BEHIND HI

	Running up a dark street. There is an oncoming pickup. Hi
	runs directly at it.

	INT. PICKUP

	The DRIVER screams and brakes - not quite in time.

	Hi rolls onto the hood, and off, and gamely trots over to
	open the passenger door.

	The Driver is leaning over to tell him:

				DRIVER
		Son, you got a panty on your head.

				HI
		Just drive fast...

	He is displaying his gun as he starts to climb in.

				HI
		...and don't stop till I tell ya.

	Before Hi can get his door shut the Driver is obediently
	peeling out.

	Hi is reacting to an oncoming car. He peels the stocking off
	to look, and leans across the Driver's lap to bellow as Ed's
	car passes:

				HI
		...Honey!

	Hi turns to look through the back window.

	HIS POV

	Ed's car is braking and spinning into a U-turn.

	BACK TO HI

	Leaning out the window.

				HI
		Mind the baby now!

	Next to him, the Driver is screaming.

	As Hi turns forward, the entire windshield explodes in.

	THEIR POV

	The pimply-faced Cashier from the 7-Eleven is standing in
	the middle of the road ahead, sighting down his .44 Magnum
	for another shot.

	We are rushing in.

	THE DRIVER

	Still screaming.

	THE CASHIER

	Ready to fire and - THUMP - he is bowled over by the arriving
	Doberman, still trailing chain and spike, and now accompanied
	by three other dogs, all braying at the top of their lungs.

	Still screaming, the Driver puts his body into a hard right
	turn to avoid the Cashier and hellhounds.

	NEW STREET

	Roaring up the new street, they are now directly in the path
	of the oncoming police car, its siren wailing, barreling
	straight at them.

	Still screaming, the Driver leans into another hard right.

	Wind is whistling in through where the windshield used to
	be.

	Two wheels hop curb as the car skids into the new street,
	fishtails, and roars away.

	ED'S CAR

	She hears dogs, siren, squealing brakes on an adjacent street.

				ED
		Hold on Nathan, we'll take a shortcut.

	She gives the wheel a hard right turn.

	But there is no cross street. The car hops the curb and roars
	up someone's nicely tended front yard, heading for the gap
	between this house and the one next door.

	POLICE CAR

	Recovered and turned around from its near collision with the
	SCREAMING; Driver, the squad car is now squealing onto the
	street the Screamer swerved on to - resuming pursuit.

	As the police car roars down the street, Ed's car appears
	from between two houses behind it, bounces down the front
	yard to the street and follows the police.

	SCREAMER'S PICKUP

	Raking two-shot of Hi and the Screamer. Hi is looking back
	over his shoulder at the pursuing police.

	Desperately pleading:

				SCREAMER
		Can I stop now?

	Hi looks forward.

	HIS POV

	They are rushing toward an imposing colonial house planted
	at the end of the dead-end street.

	BACK TO HI

				HI
		Maybe you better.

	CLOSE SHOT BRAKE PEDAL

	Stepped on hard. The brakes scream.

	EXT. CAR

	As the car squeals to a halt Hi is catapulted through where
	the windshield used to be, tumbling over the hood onto the
	front lawn.

	He rolls to his feet and, as he runs up the lawn, calls back
	over his shoulder:

				HI
		Thank you.

	INTO THE HOUSE

	We are tracking behind Hi as he runs up to the house and
	crashes through the screen door.

	Still tracking behind him as he runs through the living room.

	A middle-aged couple sits on the couch watching TV. They
	look up as Hi rushes by.

	Hi plunges down a staircase. As he does so we hear: ka-chick
	ka-chock ka-chick ka-chock.

	He emerges into a rec room where he and we rush past two
	kids playing ping-pong. He runs out the back door.

	TRACKING WITH THE POLICEMAN

	As he runs into the house.

	As he runs through the living room we catch a glimpse of the
	middle-aged couple gaping at him.

	OFFICER STEENSMA plunges down the stairs.

	TRACKING ON HI

	Outdoors now, running, crossing the street behind the house
	and entering the parking lot of a supermarket on the other
	side.

	BACK TO THE HOUSE

	As a pack of dogs thunders in. The lead Doberman with chain
	and spike has now picked up about a dozen neighborhood dogs.

	The dogs thunder through the living room and down the stairs.
	As they hit the rec room the thunder of their feet turns
	into the clatter of nails on tile.

	INT. SUPERMARKET

	As Hi bursts in. Tracking on him as he runs down the broad
	front aisle, head whipping as he runs, looking up each
	perpendicular lane, searching for something.

	He turns up one of the last lanes, races along it and grabs
	a carton of Huggies, still on the flat run.

	He emerges into the broad back aisle and runs along it, but
	at the first perpendicular lane he hits, we see Officer
	Steensma, gun leveled, at the other end. He fires.

	Hi keeps running.

	The Policeman is running along the front aisle, keeping pace
	with Hi running along the back aisle. He squeezes off shots
	at Hi as each lane gives him the opportunity.

	Hi abruptly stops between lanes and doubles back, losing the
	Policeman. He runs down the second lane he comes to toward
	the front of the store.

	The pack of dogs appears at the end of the lane and thunders
	up toward Hi, braying at the top of their doggy lungs. The
	lead Doberman holds in his teeth a paper 7-Eleven cap.

	Hi reverses again, and emerges into the back aisle.

	BANG! A pyramid of cranberry juice explodes at his shoulder.
	The Policeman has been waiting at the end of the back aisle;
	he aims once again.

	Hi plunges down the next lane but is brought up short as KA-
	BOOM! five jars of applesauce explode in front of him.

	Hi looks.

	Standing in the raised platform-cubicle at the front of the
	store is the Store Manager, a fat man in a white short-sleeved
	shirt with a lit cigarette dangling from his mouth.

	The Manager cracks open his shotgun and inserts two more
	cartridges - THOONK THOONK - in the smoking chamber.

	Hi doubles back once again toward the back aisle.

	He is still several paces from the end of the lane when the
	Policeman appears there, squaring to face him.

	The Policeman is in front of him. The MANAGER is blowing out
	groceries on the shelves behind him.

	CLOSE ON POLICEMAN

	As he coolly levels his police special and takes aim at Hi .

	POLICEMAN'S POV

	Still on the dead run, Hi is flinging the carton of Huggies.

	The carton rockets straight at the camera.

	BACK TO POLICEMAN

	Futilely raising his gun to avoid-impact: The Huggies catch
	him square on the chest. The force makes him stumble one
	fatal step backwards - into the back aisle - where:

	CRASH - He is hit broadside and bowled over by a rocketing
	shopping cart, propelled by an hysterically screaming SHOPPER.

	TRACKING ON SHOPPER

	Racing on down the back aisle, bellowing.

	HER FEET

	Tracking from in front. Beyond her we can see the pack of
	furiously barking dogs, nipping at her heels. They boil over
	the prostrate Officer Steensma, and this is the last we see
	of him in this movie.

	EXT. STORE

	As Hi emerges through the back door. Ed is just skidding
	around the corner.

	Hi scrambles in the passenger side.

	INT. CAR

	Raking two-shot with Hi in the foreground. The car peels out
	of the lot.

				HI
		Thank you honey, you really didn't
		have to do this-

	THWAK - Ed gives him a good hard slap and Hi's head rolls
	toward the camera.

				ED
		You son-of-a-bitch! You're actin'
		like a mad dog!

	Rubbing his jaw:

				HI
		Turn left, honey.

	Still at top speed, she leans into a hard left, tires
	squealing.

				ED
		What if me'n the baby'd been picked
		up? Nathan Jr. would a been accessory
		to armed robbery!

				HI
		Nawww honey, it ain't armed robbery
		if the gun ain't loaded-

				ED
		What kind of home life is this for a
		toddler?! You're supposed to be an
		example!

				HI
		Now honey, I never postured myself
		as the three-piece suit type - Turn
		left, dear.

				ED
		We got a child now, everything's
		changed!

				HI
		Well Nathan Jr. accepts me for what
		I am and I think you better had,
		too. You know, honey, I'm okay you're
		okay? That - there's what it is.

				ED
		I know, but honey -

				HI
		See I come from a long line of
		frontiersmen and - here it is, turn
		here dear - frontiersmen and outdoor
		types.

	Hi's eyes are fixed on something in the road ahead.

				ED
		I'm not gonna live this way, Hi. It
		just ain't family life!

	Hi's attention is still on the road. He is opening his door,
	even though the car is still racing along. He absently
	concedes:

				HI
		Well... It ain't Ozzie and Harriet.

	LOW ANGLE THE STREET

	In the extreme foreground sits the first carton of Huggies
	that Hi dropped in the middle of the road. The car is
	approaching.

	As the car passes the carton, Hi's hand reaches from the
	passenger door and snags it.

	REVERSE

	As Hi pulls the carton in and slams his door shut. Crane up
	in the car speeding away.

Notice how the Coens not only use Secondary Slugs to designate specific camera shots (CLOSE SHOT HUGGIES / CLOSE UP CASHIER / HI’S POV), but also to shift the action from one location to another (BACK TO THE STORE / ED’S CAR / YARD).

However the main thing I suggest tracking is how the Coens use individual paragraphs of scene description to suggest individual camera shots such as here:

The wailing siren is becoming painfully loud.
Hi looks behind him at the plate-glass front of the store,
where a bullet pock mars the glass.

HIS POV

Through the glass we see the pimply young Cashier with the
paper 7-Eleven cap pop up from behind the counter to sight
down his huge .44 Magnum for another shot. The gun is so big
he uses both hands to heft it.

SMACK-CRACK - the bullet kisses another hole in the glass.

Hi is off and running.

The squad car is screeching into the lot. An officer tumbles
out of the passenger side before the car is fully stopped.
He rolls on the pavement, then hurriedly rights himself and
takes up a half-kneeling shooting stance.

At the same time the little Cashier is emerging from the 7-
Eleven with his gun.

The two bang away at Hi's retreating figure - the Policeman's
revolver popping, the Cashier's Magnum booming.

Each paragraph matches up almost exactly shot-for-shot to what was shot and edited in the movie. It’s the same pretty much through the entire sequence and offers an excellent lesson: how to use scene description to suggest camera shots without technically directing the story.

You can go here to see how the scene plays in the movie.

Any fans of Raising Arizona? Where does it stand in your list of favorite Coen brothers movies?

[Originally posted May 13, 2010]

Scene Description Spotlight: “Rachel Getting Married”

Posted on by of Go Into The Story

Since I started this series of weekly Thursday posts, spotlighting good examples of scene description, much of the focus has been on action. But how to write about a moment where nothing much is happening visually (External World), but so much is going on emotionally (Internal World). There’s a great example of this from a movie I really liked Rachel Getting Married (2008) with a fine screenplay by Jenny Lumet (personally I thought it deserved a WGA nomination for Best Original Screenplay) and excellent direction by Jonathan Demme. Here’s a summary of the plot:

Kym is released from rehab for a few days so she can go home to attend her sister Rachel’s wedding. The home environment is always challenging for a recovering addict, no less so when the visit if only for a few days. While the sisters feel genuine affection for one another, there is tension in their relationship. Rachel feels that her father dotes on Kym far too much and Kym is upset to learn that Rachel has selected a friend to be her maid of honor. Their father is genuinely concerned about Kym’s well-being but doesn’t see the stress the relationship is causing. Both women also have to deal with their selfish mother who is clearly more concerned with her own well-being ahead of that of her children. Underlying the family’s dynamic is a tragedy that occurred many years previously and for which Kym is held by some to be responsible.

The tragedy is the death of Kym’s younger brother Ethan, just a child, killed in a car crash when Kym, while high, drove off a bridge. In this scene, set in the house of Rachel’s parents, Paul (Bill Irwin) and Carol (Anna Deavere Smith) Buchman, Rachel (Rosemarie DeWitt) has just finished complaining to her father about the likelihood of Kym (Anne Hathaway) ruining Rachel’s impending wedding. Then a group of wedding guests bursts inside, led by Rachel’s fiance Sidney (Tunde Adebimpe). For the record, Paul is famous for how masterfully he loads the dishwasher:

RACHEL
Sometimes I don't want her. It's my
fucking wedding, don't you get it?
I want my table to be perfect.

Paul kisses her on the forehead.

PAUL
Stop it. She's your sister.

They look at each other.

The screen door swings open as Emma, Carol, Sidney, Kieran,
and Norman Sklear carry the lunch plates to the kitchen. Kym
follows, carrying the salt shaker.

PAUL
Okay. Dishes? I'm going to load the
dishwasher.

SIDNEY
Paul! Paul, listen. I've been
thinking about it. I did some
preliminary sketches, I'd love to
show them to you...

KIERAN
(to Carol)
He's not kidding.

SIDNEY
And I think if you move the salad
bowls to the upper tier you can get
about 10% more stuff in the
dishwasher.

CAROL
Hee hee hee.

Paul gives him a look. Sidney starts humming PAUL'S
DISHWASHER THEME.

PAUL
Sidney, you're a nice young man.
You make a lot of money and the
world is your oyster. But you don't
know shit about loading a
dishwasher.

SIDNEY
Sir, with all due respect, the
mantle has passed.

Paul takes a moment to size Sidney up then spins on his heel
to the dishwasher.

TIME CUT--

Sidney has his sleeves up and starts to load.

KYM
What's the time limit?

CAROL
Two minutes.

SIDNEY
Are you comfortable with that, sir?
I could spot you thirty seconds.

PAUL
You young people should all go fuck
yourselves.

KYM
Dad!

CAROL
Ha!

SIDNEY
You see Paul, I think your problem
lies in lid placement. Inverting the lids
and stacking them in the upper level is
really for amateurs. It's passe.

PAUL
Rachel, you're out of the will.

SIDNEY
Observe.

With a flourish, Sidney presents a beautifully stacked
dishwasher. Paul pats his shoulder somberly.

PAUL
Clean out this machine please, boy.
So I can break out the whup-ass.

Screaming all around. Kym jumps up and down with her arms on
Rachel's shoulders. Rachel glances at her sister, laughing.

SIDNEY/KIERAN
(delightedly)
He's breakin' out the whup ass!

A SWEET MONTAGE.

Paul is loading the dishwasher like a champ.

Carol and Emma are smiling and giggling.

Kieran has his eye on the clock.

Sidney trash talks from the sidelines.

SIDNEY
You know one of the early signs of
senile dementia is an obsessive
need to organize.

PAUL
Rachel, go fetch me my dart gun.

SIDNEY
I find it touching but ultimately
sad when the warriors of yesteryear
are reluctant to lay down their
plastic containers from Zabar's and
retire gracefully

PAUL
Kieran, how's my time?

KIERAN
You have twenty-five seconds.

PAUL
I need more dishes. You amateur!

SIDNEY
What? No way!

PAUL
Somebody give me some dishes!

Kym yanks open a cupboard and passes a handful of dishes to
Paul. He begins to load them.

CLOSE ON PAUL

He has a bowl in his hands. We see the bowl is a plastic
child's bowl with Engines and Cabooses all over it. Paul
turns the bowl around in his hands like a steering wheel.

It dawns on Kym that she's handed her father Ethan's bowl.
She is stricken.

Paul looks to Carol. He seems bewildered. The kitchen falls
silent and Carol takes Ethan's bowl and places it in the
sink, out of sigh. She leads Paul gently out of the kitchen.

CLOSE ON KYM --

CLOSE ON RACHEL --

She turns and leaves the kitchen. Sidney follows her. Emma
and Norman Sklear step out onto the porch.

Kieran takes the Ethan bowl from the sink and puts it quietly
back in the cupboard and shuts the door. Kym doesn't know
what to do.

Check out the ‘room’ Lumet gives the characters and the moment with her scene description at the end of this scene. Simple sentences, but with power (“She is stricken”) and leaving much room for interpretation what a character can be feeling (“He seems bewildered”). And then that last paragraph: “Kieran takes the Ethan bowl from the sink and puts it quietly back in the cupboard and shuts the door. Kym doesn’t know what to do.”

By putting Ethan’s bowl back into the cupboard, Kieran tries to shut the Pandora’s box Kym has opened, but everything about the scene suggests that can’t happen – which looms over and under the final description: Kym doesn’t know what to do.

Powerful moment. But notice how it’s all set up with this description in the middle of the scene:

Kym jumps up and down with her arms on
Rachel's shoulders. Rachel glances at
her sister, laughing.

After Rachel’s concern about Kym ruining the wedding, this wonderful and human moment. Two sisters reveling as part of a family. Perhaps a turning point for the better, yes? Wrong! It turns out to be a turning point for the worse. So what Lumet does is (A) create a switch – this is not a happy scene, this is a painful moment – and (B) by elevating our expectations, the low we experience through the characters’ reactions at the scene’s end is that much lower.

This is a great example of how to write a powerful scene with emotions roiling all in, around, and through its ending, but not overwriting it, rather using restrained description to allow the moment to breathe.

Here is an interview with Anne Hathaway about her role as Kym in Rachel Getting Married.

[Originally posted February 11, 2010]

Scene Description Spotlight: “The African Queen”

Posted on by of Go Into The Story

Today a blast from the past: An excerpt from the shooting script for the movie The African Queen (1951), adapted from the C.S. Forrester novel by James Agee and John Huston (Peter Viertel’s name is on the script, but he received no formal credit). This script was written six decades ago and is a stark reminder of how different current screenwriting style is than that of yesteryear, particularly re scene description.

Here is how the script introduces one of the two lead characters, Rose (Katherine Hepburn):

EXT. A NATIVE VILLAGE IN A CLEARING BETWEEN THE JUNGLE AND
THE RIVER. LATE MORNING

LONG SHOT -- A CHAPEL

Intense light and heat, a stifling silence. Then the SOUND
of a reedy organ, of two voices which make the words distinct,
and of miscellaneous shy, muffled, dragging voices, beginning
a hymn:

VOICES
(singing)
"Guide me O Thou Great Jehovah..."

INT. CHAPEL -- LONG SHOT -- THE LENGTH OF THE BLEAK CHAPEL
PAST THE CONGREGATION, ON BROTHER, AT THE LECTERN, AND ROSE,
AT THE ORGAN

BROTHER, a missionary, faces CAMERA near center; ROSE, his
sister, is at side, her face averted. Everybody is singing.

"Pilgrim through this barren land..."

MEDIUM SHOT -- BROTHER:

middle-aged, rock-featured, bald, sweating painfully, very
much in earnest. He is very watchful of his flock. He sings
as loud as he can, rather nasally, and tries to drive the
meaning of each word home as if it were a nail. He is beating
with his hand, and trying hard to whip up the dragging tempo:

"I am weak, but Thou art mighty..."

CLOSER SHOT -- ROSE

early thirties, tight-featured and tight-haired, very hot
but sweating less than Brother.

She is pumping the pedals vigorously, spreading with her
knees the wings of wood which control the loudness, utilizing
various stops for expressiveness of special phrases, and
rather desperately studying the open hymnal, just managing
to play the right notes -- a very busy woman. She, too, is
singing her best and loudest, an innocent, arid, reedy
soprano; and she, too, is very attentive to the meanings of
words:

"Hold me with Thy powerful hand."

INSERT -- HALF-WAY THROUGH THE FOREGOING LINE, AN EXOTIC AND
HORRIBLE CENTIPEDE-LIKE CREATURE SLITHERS INTO VIEW BETWEEN
TWO OF THE ORGAN KEYS. WITHOUT INTERRUPTING HER PLAYING, AS
METHODICALLY AS SHE WOULD PULL OUT A NEW STOP, ROSE SWIPES
IT AWAY.

ROSE -- AS BEFORE --

completes "Thy Powerful Hand"; o.s. Voices of singers.
Unperturbed, Rose finishes her casual disposal of the bug
and pulls out a new stop.

And here is how the script introduces the other main character Allnut (Humphrey Bogart):

We close on the old dame with the bone singing --

"...my journey through." o.s., on "...fiery, cloudy pillar",
a queer SOUND, steadily louder: the absurdly flatulent,
yammering syncopation of a rachitic steam motor. Eyes begin
to wander from hymnals: CUT IN Brother frowning and singing
harder trying to impose order; attention to the hymn begins
to fall apart a little; FOLLOW the white, veering eyes to
FRAME, through the open window.

LONG SHOT -- THE AFRICAN QUEEN

whose WHISTLE lets out a steamy whinny, then REPEATS it,
with great self-satisfaction. She is squat, flat-bottomed --
thirty feet long. A tattered awning roofs in six feet of her
stern. Amidships stand her boiler and engine. A stumpy funnel
reaches up a little higher than the awning.

ON SECOND WHINNY,

CUT TO:

MEDIUM CLOSE SHOT -- ALLNUTT -- ON HIS BOAT

He is in worn, rather befouled white clothes. He is barefooted
and his feet are cocked up and he is sitting on his shoulder
blades, smoking a bad cigar. He wears a ratty boater,
slantwise, against the sunlight. He is attended by two young
Negroes so tall, thin and gracile they suggest black macaroni.
One is proudly and busily puttering at the engine, which
requires a lot of attention: the other is fanning ALLNUTT,
who is feeling just fine. Allnutt speaks to the fanner in
Swahili. The young man without breaking the rhythm of his
fanning, licks out one long, boneless arm and alters the
lashed tiller; the Queen begins to swerve toward shore. o.s.,
the hymn continues, all but drowned by motor noise.

LONG SHOT -- INT. CHAPEL

Rose pulls out all the stops, spreads her knees, and pumps
like mad in her effort to drown out the ENGINE SOUND. Brother
sweats and sings even harder, scowling, shaking his head.
The singing is fraying out half to hell; the congregation is
a solid black wall of wandering eyes; a few pious converts
frown or nudge at the less pious; a little group is coalescing
toward the window.

The hymn, meanwhile, continues:

"Feed me with the heavenly manna in this barren wilderness,
Be my sword, my shield, my banner, be the Lord my
righteousness."

Rose's sense of artistic propriety is too much for her. To
keep things going, she ought to play loud, but on the next
line --

"When I tread the verge of Jordan..." she shuts down to the
vox humana and the tremolo and maintains that through --

"Bid my anxious fears subside."

On this line, Allnutt appears and lounges against the front
door frame still drawing on his cigar. Rose lets everything
rip fortissimo on the closing lines:

"Death of death, and hell's destruction land me safe on
Canaan's side."

By the time of "hell's destruction," Allnutt becomes aware
that a lighted cigar in church is bad manners, and, nodding
casual apology to Brother, tosses it away onto the packed
dirt, out of our sight.

Rather than dissecting the scenes myself, let’s open it up for discussion. Critiquing these pages, what elements of scene description do you see as being similar and dissimilar to contemporary style guidelines?

[Originally posted June 3, 2010]