by Steve Cuden ‧ RELEASE DATE: Dec. 23, 2015
A useful how-to guide for writing meat-and-potatoes Hollywood scripts.
Scribes will stand a better chance of joining, if not beating, Hollywood with the help of this shrewd screenwriting manual.
Cuden (Beating Broadway, 2013), a screenwriter with many television scripts and the Broadway musical Jekyll & Hyde to his name, devotes the first part of this guide to basic principles of good storytelling. They include letting compelling, active heroes with a clear goal drive the narrative, opposed by charismatic antagonists with equally strong motives; building every scene around moments of conflict and shifts in power; putting the protagonist through hell at the hands of an invincible villain; writing only what audiences can see and hear, including lively action and punchy, terse dialogue; and sending viewers home with stunning catharses. He throws in useful tips on the mechanics and formatting of treatments and scripts, and on surviving the Hollywood shark tank; for example, he says that when a producer gives boneheaded notes on a character, one should get used to “bending a little bit” to “the people with the money.” Cuden’s 150 tips are brief, lucid, and entertaining, and are sure to give budding writers valuable insights. From them, he distills a storytelling system influenced by Joseph Campbell’s mythopoetic quest theory. It features an eight-chapter plot-point structure that moves from a “Rules of the Road” chapter, which establishes the fictive world, to the revelation of a “Grand Goal” that propels the hero through a “One-Way Door” to “Great Discoveries” and a midpoint reversal from which “Destiny Beckons”; then it proceeds to a “Rabbit Hole” of despair from which the hero must “Claw Back” to reach “A New Home” and “A New Normal.” The last part of Cuden’s book tries to illustrate his ideas by breaking down 40 famous movie scripts into scene-by-scene synopses of “beats”—integrated moments of action and meaning—and fitting them to the eight-chapter frame. The result, unfortunately, is a series of lengthy but dry plot summaries with little interpretive context. Although the eight-chapter structure comports well with genre films and melodramas such as Star Wars and Rocky, it feels awkward when applied to less-formulaic fare, such as The Godfather, Being There, and The Bridge on the River Kwai. (For example, does Thelma & Louise’s death ride into the Grand Canyon constitute “the New Normal”?) Still, Cuden’s system does offer a workmanlike blueprint for writers seeking to hone their craft.
A useful how-to guide for writing meat-and-potatoes Hollywood scripts.Pub Date: Dec. 23, 2015
ISBN: 978-1-5152-3029-8
Page Count: 484
Publisher: CreateSpace
Review Posted Online: May 28, 2016
Review Program: Kirkus Indie
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by Steve Cuden
by E.T.A. Hoffmann ‧ RELEASE DATE: Oct. 28, 1996
This is not the Nutcracker sweet, as passed on by Tchaikovsky and Marius Petipa. No, this is the original Hoffmann tale of 1816, in which the froth of Christmas revelry occasionally parts to let the dark underside of childhood fantasies and fears peek through. The boundaries between dream and reality fade, just as Godfather Drosselmeier, the Nutcracker's creator, is seen as alternately sinister and jolly. And Italian artist Roberto Innocenti gives an errily realistic air to Marie's dreams, in richly detailed illustrations touched by a mysterious light. A beautiful version of this classic tale, which will captivate adults and children alike. (Nutcracker; $35.00; Oct. 28, 1996; 136 pp.; 0-15-100227-4)
Pub Date: Oct. 28, 1996
ISBN: 0-15-100227-4
Page Count: 136
Publisher: Harcourt
Review Posted Online: May 19, 2010
Kirkus Reviews Issue: Aug. 15, 1996
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by E.T.A. Hoffmann ; adapted by Natalie Andrewson ; illustrated by Natalie Andrewson
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by E.T.A. Hoffmann & illustrated by Julie Paschkis
by Ludwig Bemelmans ‧ RELEASE DATE: Feb. 23, 1955
An extravaganza in Bemelmans' inimitable vein, but written almost dead pan, with sly, amusing, sometimes biting undertones, breaking through. For Bemelmans was "the man who came to cocktails". And his hostess was Lady Mendl (Elsie de Wolfe), arbiter of American decorating taste over a generation. Lady Mendl was an incredible person,- self-made in proper American tradition on the one hand, for she had been haunted by the poverty of her childhood, and the years of struggle up from its ugliness,- until she became synonymous with the exotic, exquisite, worshipper at beauty's whrine. Bemelmans draws a portrait in extremes, through apt descriptions, through hilarious anecdote, through surprisingly sympathetic and understanding bits of appreciation. The scene shifts from Hollywood to the home she loved the best in Versailles. One meets in passing a vast roster of famous figures of the international and artistic set. And always one feels Bemelmans, slightly offstage, observing, recording, commenting, illustrated.
Pub Date: Feb. 23, 1955
ISBN: 0670717797
Page Count: -
Publisher: Viking
Review Posted Online: Oct. 25, 2011
Kirkus Reviews Issue: Feb. 1, 1955
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developed by Ludwig Bemelmans ; illustrated by Steven Salerno
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by Ludwig Bemelmans ; illustrated by Steven Salerno
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