Screenwriting : Short time in screenplays.... by Victor Titimas

Victor Titimas

Short time in screenplays....

Can a screenplay's story happen in just one and a half days? If so, how can you write this and still reach the minimum page number and not getting it either too boring or with too much action? Thank you for reading and answering this!:)

Sam Bryans

Check out American Graffiti. The whole story takes place in less than a day. There's like 3-4 different storylines going on at once. I once heard George Lucas say he likes to have as many storylines going on as possible as once, but the trick is getting them all to resolve at the same time.

Mike Romoth

Isn't Romeo and Juliet just three days total? How about Groundhog Day? You can do anything you like, as long as you keep the audience engaged.

Bryan Yeater

Johnny Depp in Nick of Time. 90 minute film taking place over the course of 90 minutes.

Shawn Speake

"Love me some real time!"

Regina Lee

The "one crazy night" conceit is a very popular conceit.

Bill Costantini

"War and Peace" and "Les Miserables" take place in less than six hours. :) Just kidding - but the Bill Murray film "Quick Change" does. One of my favorite long-spanning films is Sergio Leone's classic "Once Upon a Time in America", which takes place over 50 years. All four are great films.

Craig D Griffiths

I am working on an adaptation of Shakespeare's two men of Verona. It is a story of love and love notes. I am making it Instagram and a party. The entire story is maybe two hours.

Kristopher Rickards

Hi Victor, please excuse me, but I'm unsure of the question here. Are you asking if a story can play out in full in a short time frame, EG. 36 hours? Because it is totally conceivable. the entirety of the original DIE HARD was just one night.

Victor Titimas

Kristopher, you're right. That was what I was asking about. I wasn't sure if it could work, but with your example and those of others I now realize it does!:) Thank you all for helping me with this!

Bryan Yeater

Polanski's Carnage takes place in one afternoon. Tsai Ming-Liang's Goodbye, Dragon Inn takes place in a movie theater for the sole duration of one screening of a film, that film being King Hu's 1967 film Dragon Inn. Regarding a day and a half, Abbas Kiarostami (an Iranian filmmaker) has Like Someone in Love take place from 9:00PM to about 3:00PM the next day. Hirokazu Koreeda's Still Walking takes place from mid morning on one day until midday the next day. And Heinosuke Gosho's The Neighbor's Wife and Mine takes place over the course of about 24 hours. On the opposite end of the spectrum, Stanley Kubrick's 2001: A Space Odyssey spans about a million years. But that's nothing compared to Terrance Malick's Tree of Life, It spans the age of the Universe, or about 13.82 billion years. Here's the trailer to Like Someone in Love: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=CBIDYcFOg3A Here's the trailer to Goodbye, Dragon Inn: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=zHMxMJ6qkOU

Other topics in Screenwriting:

register for stage 32 Register / Log In