montage – Page 3 – Scripts on Screen

Tom Stoppard

A truly gifted author who has achieved success on TV, film and stage, Tom Stoppard had to survive a tragic background before even having the chance of developing an interest in writing. After fleeing from the Nazi invasion in Czechoslovakia, he grew up in India and Singapore, where he lost his father. He would later become a journalist in England and began writing radio and television plays. Eventually he would become an acclaimed playwright with numerous Broadway performances and several Tony awards.

His first works for the big screen came in the mid-70s, with Terry Gilliam’s Brazil granting him his first Academy Award nomination. A highly intellectual writer with extensive knowledge in classic literature, he has proven his mastery outside drama in titles such as The Russia House and Indiana Jones and the Last Crusade, for which he rewrote the final draft.

Stoppard has been commended for his methodical research when writing historical scripts and his witty command of language, which results in a certain ideological playfulness that often shapes his characters and dialogues. He was knighted in 1997 and currently lives in London.

List of Tom Stoppard Scripts:

(1985) Brazil

(1987) Empire of the Sun

(1989) Indiana Jones and the Last Crusade (Final Rewrite)

(1990) The Russia House

(1991) Billy Bathgate

(1998) Shakespeare in Love

(2001) Enigma

(2012) Anna Karenina

The Plot Twist Gamble

Nothing like a sudden turn of the wheel that leaves the audience in disbelief. But what happens when the audience actually disbelieves? Screenwriters are aware of the double edged sword quality of plot twists: they can make a story successful almost by themselves, but can also turn against it if they come off as predictable or implausible.

In some genres (horror, thriller) they have become an expected, almost mandatory device. Robert Wiene’s The Cabinet of Dr. Caligari (1920) set the foundations for the use of narrative unreliability in films. And it’s already a great example of a twist that didn’t only aim for shock- it also tried to provide a solid justification for the visual and narrative styles of the film.

Night Shyamalan’s irregular career illustrates both the rewards and the risks of subjecting the story to a plot twist. The recent success of Split may have brought him to a second youth, but for many years, the ‘Shyamalan twists” served more as a burden than a perk, becoming the smoking gun that proves and defines the film’s failure.

So what makes a good plot twist? If Aristotle stated that good art should be both unexpected and inevitable, contemporary screenwriters like William Goldman have pinpointed a reality that Hollywood has exploited well: that a controversial ending may still work effectively if it’s at least satisfying.

Some examples of films with memorable plot twists are:

(1941) The Maltese Falcon

(1958) Vertigo

(1960) Psycho

(1968) Planet of the Apes

(1973) The Sting

(1973) Soylent Green

(1973) The Wicker Man

(1980) The Empire Strikes Back

(1987) Angel Heart

(1992) The Crying Game

(1995) The Usual Suspects

(1995) 12 Monkeys

(1996) Primal Fear

(1999) The Sixth Sense

(1999) Fight Club

(2000) Memento

(2004) Saw

(2006) The Prestige

(2016) Arrival

Film Scripts with Great Dialogue

Dialogues are just one of the many mechanisms that can move the plot forward. For some screenwriters though, it doesn’t seem to be a resource, but their chief weapon. While Quentin Tarantino may have become the ultimate modern reference, many other authors have also forged a reputation as masters of dialogue.

Aaron Sorkin has compared dialogue to music. There is indeed a rhythmic nature in the way his characters interact: from courtroom battles to rapid-fire Harvard computing chatter, Sorkin enjoys taking his characters to the limit not by physical, but argumentative exhaustion.

Always proud of his origins, Kevin Smith often uses real life friends as direct models for his characters. The Star Wars exchange in Clerks is both hilarious and genuine: Smith wasn’t afraid of driving the plot with the same kind of conversations he’d have with his own buddies- expletives and pop culture references included.

Which brings us to Richard Linklater, who inspired Smith to start his career. Watching Slacker or the Before trilogy, one might feel that those conversations are going nowhere. But they’re slowly, cleverly taking us to the next point.

Conversations are dynamic, and so are film dialogues, which are as diverse as the minds that crafted them. They can introduce us to the main conflict (Glengarry Glenn Ross), read a character’s thoughts for us (Juno, Fight Club), make outlaws be likable (Point Break, Butch Cassidy and the Sundance Kid) or just captivate us through absency (enjoy The Artist and There Will Be Blood’s brilliant opening!).

Some other examples of films with great dialogues are:

(1942) Casablanca

(1949) The Third Man

(1972) The Godfather

(1974) Chinatown

(1976) Taxi Driver

(1979) Manhattan

(1985) The Breakfast Club

(1989) Do The Right Thing

(1991) The Silence of the Lambs

(1994) Pulp Fiction

(1996) Fargo