ARE YOU USING THE DESTRUCTIVE “MOMENTS” PRACTISE OF SCRIPTWRITING?

There’s an idea in Hollywood called Moments. Moments are those scenes or happenings in a film (or television show) that are especially memorable and which we share with friends at a bar or the water cooler. Think: When Indy shoots the fearsome Arab sword fighter with a gun. When Darth Vader reveals who is his son. When ET says he wants to go home. You get it. No doubt you have many times excitedly shared such film Moments. We love, remember, and talk about our favorite Moments in our favorite stories.

But there can be a downside to Moments. For producers, writers, and creatives. And thus for audiences. (Special thanks to script doctor Dan Hoffmann for sharing with me his insights re this issue.)

Imagine if you think and act like this when creating a “story”:

I don’t need deeply motivated characters and a logical plot, all I need is 4 – 8 moments and then some way to stitch or clue them together. Then get an A star, an A writer, and I’m set. Bingo, I’ve got a hit film.

There are producers, execs, and writers who think like this. And at times they get away with it and have successful films. But not that often, and not with great stories. One big downside you see too often in current films and television series is the walking dead nature of messed up stories because of (in part) this fatally flawed Moments practise for writing screen stories.

Creative Takeaway

To help you create better stories, I want to briefly argue against this Moments “theory” of storytelling. And thus to indicate its opposite.

Foremost, Moments can only be compelling and evocative if they happen within some kind of story logic. That is, if the Moments are set up and if they mean something to the audience. In short: If they are part of a high-stakes logical storyline! Consider, for instance, the famous Indiana Jones sword-gun fight example cited above. Yes, in the film it works really well. Why? Because we know that Indy is on a quest to find the Ark of the Covenant, we understand its importance, we know why he is in Egypt, and we know the danger he is in during this particular sequence, and so forth. That’s a big dramatic context to make the twist of Indy killing the sword fighter with his gun really work. Take that context away and the gag would still kinda work but not be very dramatic, amusing, or memorable.

The best, most successful and talked about films generally are those with the best stories that have great Moments that serve the story. Don’t just be a story stitcher or glue master. (I was when I first started!) Instead, develop a great story concept and then logically develop from that big idea your characters and plot. That is, create motivated characters struggling to achieve some vital goal in a logical, escalating, high stakes, and climaxed conflict line. Then use your imagination to create ingenious Moments within that story context. Cause and effect. Logic. You will then create better stories, more fun Moments, and a bigger more applauding audience. Now that would be momentous!

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Read about the disaster of being in a story bubble.

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Snorri Þórisson, CEO Pegasus Pictures

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