Screenwriting 101: Lem Dobbs
“Everyone thinks movies are accessible to them, you see, everyone has spent their life going to movies, watching movies on television…
“Everyone thinks movies are accessible to them, you see, everyone has spent their life going to movies, watching movies on television, renting movies … They didn’t grow up performing appendectomies. No one seems to realize that the people at the very top, the ones everyone else would like to be — Spielberg, Scorsese, Tarantino — they know more about movies than you do, they’ve seen more. Thousands more. Movies are in their blood. It’s incredible when you read the bad screenplays of amateurs and aspirants, not only do they not resemble real life or human behavior, they don’t resemble movies. ‘Creativity’ is promoted now like it’s a civil right. But to mention the sordid subject of talent is unseemly and elitist and muddies the playing field. After all, America’s got talent.
The fools who write those unreadable HOW TO WRITE A SCREENPLAY books don’t seem to have any knowledge of movies beyond a superficial understanding of the same handful of classics or modern hits that everyone knows. Some director recently announced his attachment to some project and said, ‘I seem to be attracted to reluctant hero stories.’ Does he really not realize those are the only stories Hollywood has ever made? You have to inculcate movies, not ‘screenwriting.’ There are shapes and patterns and a certain commercial contract made with the audience at the dawn of time.”
— Lem Dobbs
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