I'm taking a screenwriting course and as part or the curriculum we are required to watch small clips of multiple movies. The video pauses randomly and the instructor tells us to write what we see on the screen. I love that part of the course but found now as I watch movies, I'm forever talking to myself or whoever will listen as to the different transitions and beats of the movie. My wife looks at me strange when I say "Oh, that's the break into two part of the movie or now we're in the bad guys close-in portion. Makes watching a movie with me very annoying but I'm working on it.
Another benefit to some of these classes out there are the movies you get introduced to. During my current course, we viewed parts of the movie, "Once upon a time in the West", a classic western with Charles Bronson and Henry Fonda. I fell in love with the movie and the way it was written. Sergio Leone was a screenwriting giant. I probably never would have seen that movie had I not started dabbling in writing.
Anyone else find themselves dissecting movies you watch after your screenwriting journey?
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That’s a great idea, John Fife! Pausing randomly and writing what you see on the screen. I started dissecting movies after I became a screenwriter. I check when the inciting incident started, think about how I would’ve done a scene differently, etc. And sometimes I figure out things early, like who the masked person is.
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A small price to pay John Fife ! haha happy to hear you're enjoying the course!
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I'm probably lucky to still be somewhat ignorant and therefore not affected by the curse [too much] lol. That being said, watching as many film critiques as I have on YouTube (particularly by The Critical Drinker) I have been watching more actively and paying attention to the writing and noticing when transitions are used, and also how much work is put in the first ten pages in particular. Very pedestrian stuff, but nonetheless I'm starting to see :)
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I haven't had formal screenwriting education. However, I do break movies down, analyze the writing, the structure, look for the breath moments.
I like to turn off my captions and volume and ad lib dialogue for movies and TV shows.
I've also broken episodes and features down and reoutlined them, reworked dialogue. Downloaded scripts to edit.
It drives my husband crazy.
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Yep. It's very hard to switch off and I find myself overly critical now. But I probably appreciate those TV shows and films, which I can tell why their is an underlying genius to them.
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Movement in every shot -Kurosawa.
Look for rich backgrounds in great directing. Although I am only a beginning director, I tried in SETESH 2025 (youtube) to make each shot have so many unusual backgrounds in depth that you could watch it 1000 times and never catch every object in each location. The new netflix on President Garfield has wonderful and deep background panoramas so you could see it 1000 times and never catch everything.
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Absolutely. Every time I hear bad dialogue, I think, I can do better. And every time I hear great dialogue, I think, I hope I’ll be that good someday.
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It only gets worse but you wouldn't change it! A great way to develop your screenwriting is to explore parts of films that give you strong emotional responses, then explore how the filmmaker and screenwriter achieved this. Screenplayed.com has videos that show a rolling script next to the corresponding scene in the final movie so you can see how the scene translated from the page to the screen.
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Actually movies inspire me when I write my own scripts.
I consciously revisit many films to analyze their structure, so I can better understand what approach might serve my own writing.
There are many different narrative paths or structural frameworks a writer can adopt, but I gravitate toward a puzzle-like structure.
I often begin with a catastrophic disruption, then let the events unfold forward while integrating strategic flashbacks that gradually reveal what led to the disaster.
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I dissect films & TV shows constantly but don’t actually consciously plan to. It just happens. My friends stop me shouting at the screen, when I notice plot weaknesses or too many coincidences.
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You throw some producing/set experience in there and it's like being a builder looking at a house. You can't unsee things.
It's actually made me a lot more forgiving of low-budget movies, and I have a new-found respect for "bad" movies that serve an audience and the bottom line.