Resources

The Iron Claw – 5 Tips For Adapting True Stories!

True stories have been fodder for screenplays for as long as films have been made, in fact the very first feature film The Story Of The Kelly Gang made in 1906 depicted the true life and crimes of notorious Australian bushranger Ned Kelly.   I recently saw The Iron Claw ...
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3 Tricks To Make Your Screenplay Jump Off The Page

3 Tricks To Make Your Screenplay Jump Off The Page

“That was an easy read!”  is the sentiment you want the reader to have when they conclude your screenplay. No matter how good your story is you want your screenplay to be that easy read where your visuals, emotions and characters jump off the page and engage the reader with an enjoyable ...
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Writing The Next Draft Of Your Screenplay

One of the most important skills to master and an integral part of the writing process is rewriting. The following tips are for rewriting early drafts, eg going from 1st to 2nd draft or 2nd draft to 3rd draft.   As your script nears production you are polishing rather than rewriting significant aspects which is a different ...
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Surrogate 3 act structure

Surrogate 3 Act Structure

In my last blog I detailed the Act 1 Story Architecture for Surrogate. I received several emails from you asking for a breakdown of the 3 Act Structure Plot Points in Surrogates screenplay as I have done for other films in the past. For an in-depth breakdown and explanation of ...
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Surrogate SPM article

The 3 Act Structure and my latest film ‘Surrogate’

I have written numerous blogs on the 3 Act Structure detailing Story Architecture – my Act By Act breakdown of the 45 elements your screenplay needs to fulfil the 3 Act Structure, be engaging, surprising, build coherently and express the complexity of your story and characters. In this blog I wanted to show ...
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Want to write a Better Screenplay: 5 more quick tips

After an extended Australian summer holiday and focusing on writing a new screenplay I am back now in full swing for the new year and have 5 more quick screenwriting tips. Tip 1: Your main character must face set backs in the pursuit of their goal for without set backs ...
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The Importance Of Varied Screen Time – What I learnt From Making The Surrogate #3

With the release of my feature film ‘Surrogate’ I am doing a series of blogs on what I learn’t or what my writing process reiterated to me. Your screenplay isn’t just about creativity, it’s a working document that will guide the practicalities of a film production so you need to ...
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Another 5 Quick Tips To Writing A Better Screenplay

I got such a great response to my article titled “5 quick tips to writing a better Screenplay” I thought I would write 5 more. Tip 1 : Keep it secret When you start writing your first screenplay, don’t tell anyone, keep it to yourself and secretly plug away at ...
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‘The 5 Page Rule’ – What I learnt From Making The Surrogate #2

With the release of my feature film ‘Surrogate’ in 2022 I am doing a series of blogs on what I learnt or what my writing process reiterated to me. As I detailed in my last blog ‘Length Matters – What I learnt From Making The Surrogate #1’, when Beth King ...
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Length Matters – What I learnt From Making The Surrogate #1

With the release of my feature film Surrogate in 2022 I am going to do a series of blogs on what I learnt or what my writing process reiterated to me. When Beth King and I started writing Surrogate I set out a few parameters and one of those was ...
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5 Quick Tips To Writing A Better Screenplay

Tip 1: 2D = 1D – 10%…meaning…2nd Draft = 1st draft – 10% The first step of writing the 2nd draft of your screenplay is to cut out a minimum of 10%. If your 1st Draft is 100 pages then cut out 10 pages worth of scenes and dialogue. Trust ...
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5 Tips For Writing At Home

It feels like we are in Act 1 of an apocalyptic film! We are being bombarded with classic cinema images of overwhelmed hospitals once bustling cities now deserted medical staff covered head to toe in protective wear panic buying and fights breaking out over of all things TOILET PAPER and ...
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David Willing

David Willing is a writer and director and founder of Screenplaymethod.com

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