Script To Screen: “The Thin Man”

A scene in the first in a series of successful Thin Man movies and, of course, it features drinking alcohol… or the aftermath thereof.

Occasionally. I like to feature excerpts from screenplays from eras gone by. First, I happen to love all movies, including old ones. Second, it’s interesting to compare how screenplay style has changed over the years.

Today, we take a look at a scene from the 1934 movie The Thin Man. Note, too, how even the writing credits were different back then: “screen play by Albert Hackett and Frances Goodrich, novel by Dashiell Hammett.” Screen / Play. Two words, reflecting how movies were still very much tied to their roots — stage plays.

Setup: Nick [William Powell] and Nora Charles[Myrna Loy], a former detective and his rich, playful wife, investigate a murder case mostly for the fun of it. Oh yes, it’s Christmas morning. And they are known to drink a lot. I mean a lot.

Here is the scene from the movie:

Two observations about script style in comparison to contemporary scripts: (1) Note the use of specific camera shots. (2) Note the extensive use of parentheticals. Both have fallen by the wayside.

One of the single best things you can do to learn the craft of screenwriting is to read the script while watching the movie. After all a screenplay is a blueprint to make a movie and it’s that magic of what happens between printed page and final print that can inform how you approach writing scenes. That is the purpose of Script to Screen, a Go Into The Story series where we analyze a memorable movie scene and the script pages that inspired it.

For more Script To Screen articles, go here.