Screenwriting

>>9785461
I don't know if there's a chart or anything, but if you want a rundown of some books:

John Yorke's Into The Woods - focuses on character development, structure, theme, dialogue/exposition and uses detailed and accessible examples from British television and Hollywood films. There's some nifty diagrams to help if his writing is a bit dry (which it is at times when he gets into Freud) as well as some screenplay extracts.

Joseph Campbell's The Hero with A Thousand Faces - discover story structure and its origins in ancient mythology and folklore. Although not necessarily a screenwriting book, it offers a lot of insight into how a story can be structured and is cited as an influence from many screenwriters.

Christopher Vogler's The Writer's Journey - Joseph Campbell's discussion of story structure but on a more accessible level.

Robert McKee's Story - take this guy with a pinch of salt because he treats his own teachings like gospel when really he offers some useful knowledge for beginners but don't be afraid to divert away from some of his advice too. Saying that, his notes on structure, characters and visual storytelling will be useful for a newcomer to screenwriting. Also see his newest book, Dialogue: The Art of Verbal Action for Page, Stage and Screen.

David Corbett's The Art of Character - a book focusing solely on developing characters. You don't need to follow it all like a checklist - he says so himself - but if there's anything in here you think will be useful (and it may just be, he covers a variety of topics from early character outlines, intricate personality flaws, psychological make-up of your character, quirks, etc) then it's a worthwhile book. It should be cheap too.

Ones that people often recommend (and although they're useful for beginners, they should really be taken with a grain of salt):
- Syd Field's Screenplay (as well as The Screenwriter's Problem Solver and The Screenwriter's Workbook). He offers simple and accessible ways of understanding how to develop and re-draft a screenplay. His books are usually cheap.
- Blake Snyder's Save The Cat. I want to say avoid this one because it feels very patronising and reads like a snake oil salesman trying to empty your pockets, but if you can find it cheap, you could read it in a day or two. Not particularly useful though unless if you want to write a Transformers movie.

Also check out William Goldman's Secrets of the Screentrade books. Funny, insightful, entertaining.

op, fuck that first poster. download some software that will show you the formatting. i assume you are well read because you are here and so probably know what a story looks like and have better aesthetic taste than most. now pick your two favorite movies or so, print their scripts and start writing yours using their's as reference.

this kind of this: >>9785734
is how you become a complete faggot

also, you should ask yourself why you want to write a script. if it is because you want to be a screenwriter, just stop. if it is because you want to "work in movies", just save yourself the hassle and don't.

>>9785751
Rude, dude. Your advice is pretty good though, reading screenplays to understand formatting is useful. However if you have First Draft, formatting becomes pretty easy anyway.

Not sure why reading books for beginners makes you a faggot.

>>9785461
Write a lot. Edit a lot. Write more. Read a lot. Everything else is bullshit.

>>9785767
because that stuff is super caught up with systematizing in a way, that i think, can be extremely detrimental to the beginner. learning that the protagonist needs to have a "mission" by 10% of the way through, etc. sounds at first just like a useful guardrail—people make analogies to poetic meter, but it is nothing like that—it destroys creativity.

the hero's journey is an induction of mythical structure. it is an imperfect retro-active description of one aspect of story. blah blah blah, i just think that books like that are part of the reason that movies are so terrible; even 'independent' films are breathlessly formulaic—not because that is just what a good story looks like, or that's what people want to see, but because writers have no imagination.

>>9785807
Fair enough, anon, that's a fair point. I do believe though that, for a beginner, to learn the basics and formulas that make basic screenwriting work can provide a useful foundation and then, once the screenwriter is comfortable with it, they can alter and manipulate structure into a more fluid and distinctive way. I still believe the books can provide a useful foundation for beginners but I also completely appreciate and respect your perspective too, anon.