Universal Pictures are offering an Emerging Writers Fellowship for "talented screenwriters who have the potential to thrive, but don’t have access to or visibility within the industry."
Those chosen to participate in the program will work exclusively with the studio over the course of a year to hone their skills. During this program, fellows will be given the opportunity to work on current Universal projects as well as pitch original story ideas. In addition to working on writing assignments, the fellows will receive industry exposure by:
- Participating in filmmaking workshops and studio seminars
- Receiving mentoring from established filmmakers
- Networking with top literary agents and managers
- Meeting with production development executives
- Attending screenings and premieres
Fellows admitted into the program will be hired under a writing service agreement and must be committed to working full-time for one year. Additionally, Universal Pictures has the option to extend a fellows’ contract for a second year.
You can find the eligibility criteria, details about the selection process, application forms, and frequently asked questions HERE.
The Emerging Writers Fellowship Application will be available beginning at 12:00 p.m. (PST) on Tuesday, Oct. 21, 2014.
Vashi Nedomansky is a film editor, born in Czechoslovakia, who defected with his parents at the age of four. He grew up in Toronto and Detroit before settling in Los Angeles. He is known as the editor of Sharknado 2: The Second One and An American Carol. Vashi was a professional hockey player for 10 years. He says,
This 101-second shot from Raiders of the Lost Ark is the single longest shot from the film. Using motivated camera movement, staging actors in different layers of depth and then altering the actor closest to camera... Steven Spielberg and DP Douglas Slocombe crafted an emotional scene with no cuts whatsoever.
Here is duet between an unlikely pair, Freddie Mercury and Luciano Pavarotti. This is one continuous performance from start to finish, shot in one take, using two cameras. No audio has been cut or replaced. The “Pavarotti” harmony for "Vincero,
Vincero!" was added afterwards. The man working the magic is Marc Martel.
Linda Aronson is an English-born, Australian playwright, scriptwriter, comic novelist and screenwriting theorist. Her book, The 21st-Century Screenplay
, is the leading text on how to write non-linear films. She teaches screenwriting to professionals everywhere, and is on a speaking tour of Europe, which will culminate in appearances at the London Screenwriting Festival on 24-25 October.
The following is drawn from an e-mail Linda sent out last September.
The first act turning point is a vital element of all stories, whether linear or nonlinear. It’s not an academic thing, it has a purpose. It is hugely important. Films that are perceived to have failed in their second act—in their middle—are films that don’t have a good enough first act turning point. They haven’t created enough of a problem for their characters, so there’s not enough story to fuel the rest of the film.
I’ve often said that the first act turning point is a surprise, that turns into the obstacle, that drives the rest of the story (that’s the Smiley/Thompson model). I also say that the first act turning point tells you what the film’s plot is ‘about’, as in ‘my film is ABOUT an actor who dresses up as a woman to get a job in a soap opera’ (Tootsie).
Another good way to think of the first act turning point is that it’s like the turntable on a railway line. It turns the engine of the film round and points it in a very specific direction—a direction which comes as a surprise, often an extreme surprise. For example, I’ve already mentioned Tootsie, so let’s look at how it works.
We start to watch a film that’s all about a very good actor who’s so difficult to work with that he can’t get an acting job. He’s obviously going to have some kind of adventure, maybe to do with being an actor, maybe not. Then suddenly, this man is dressed up as woman and getting a job as female character in a soap opera! Hello? We have swiveled in a logical but utterly surprising direction. In Thelma and Louise two women go off on holiday, stop for a drink—and suddenly they’re murderers on the run. Again, the film has swung in a completely different although logical direction, a direction that gives us the film’s real story.
Your railway turntable/first act turning point has to take your story on an interesting journey to somewhere even more interesting, or like the train, your film will come to a halt or go off the tracks completely. Unless you have that turnaround, that swiveling, that surprise, it will be predictable. Some films have a more striking first act turning point than others—the lesser the surprise at the first act turning point, the ‘quieter’ the film, the more ‘art house’.
Often when people say a script is more suitable for a telemovie, it will be because it doesn’t have a surprising first act turning point. I’m not saying that such films are bad—they can be very very good indeed. It’s just an observation of what is causing the ‘quiet’ and ‘art house’ effect. As a writer you need to know what creates a quiet ‘art house’ story and what creates something less subtle.
How to pick a good first act turning point
To know whether your first act turning point will work, check it against successful films. Does it tick all the boxes that are ticked in those films (art house or otherwise)?
Box 1. The first act turning point is what the film is ‘about’ in terms of plot.
Box 2. The first act turning point is a physical surprise that turns into an obstacle that creates the whole story.
Box 3. The first act turning point is an entry into another world.
Box 4. The film’s climax answers the question raised by the first act turning point.
Let’s try the check list with the film Tootsie. The first act turning point is when Dustin Hoffman walks down the street disguised as a woman to get an acting job in a soap opera.
Tootsie is about ‘What happens to a man who dresses up as a woman in order to get a job in a soap opera’. (Tick Box 1).
The first act turning point is a surprise, that turns into an obstacle, that drives the rest of the film. (Tick box 2).
The first act turning point puts the protagonist into a new world—the world as experienced by a woman. (Tick Box 3)
The film’s climax answers the question raised by the first act turning point of: ‘How is a man who dresses up to get a job in a soap opera going to get out of that one!’ (Tick box 4).
Arguably, the first act turning point is the most vital structural element in the film. So much depends on it!
David Anderson wrote:
This is a video from a while back that I had made during the build up toward the final Harry Potter film. It is a visual recap of all the installments of the series.
'Northern soul' was the the biggest underground music scene the UK ever spawned. It was a craze that took hold in the north of England in the 1970s, and was all about the music, the clothes and some flamboyant dance moves. A DJ-led movement at the tailend of the British mod scene, it focused on rare recordings released on obscure labels.
And now there's a film, directed by Elaine Constantine (who began her career taking photographs in clubs before working for magazines such as the The Face, i-D and Vogue). The film tells the story of two working-class teenagers from an industrial town who discover northern soul in 1974.
Constantine had been trying to get the film made for several years. She was turned down by all of the arts funding bodies. Her attempts to attract private investors failed, so Constantine and her husband remortgaged
their home and spent all their savings on the project.
To teach the young actors, as well as hundreds of extras, to dance to the music in the film, she and a few of her friends set up a monthly club night in a room above a pub in Islington, north London. After each session she would post footage online to attract new dancers and by now their Facebook channel has almost 50,000 followers.
“We needed to populate the club scene for the film. Kids started coming to the dance sessions, and then their friends. Lots of them would go, ‘What was that you played last week, can we get a copy?’ and ended up buying vinyl and DJ-ing themselves. It was really like the youth club situation that I came through when I discovered northern soul.”
It was expected to be a short-run release of a niche movie, but a wave of social media interest is turning it into a nationwide success beyond the dreams of its creators.
The film was planned to screen at a few selected venues, but there has been a surge in demand fed by social media sites. Cinemas have been overwhelmed with requests to show it.
More cinemas are being added through Ourscreen,
an online platform that allows film fans to influence
their local cinema’s programme.
Here's a video from 2011, showing one of the Dance Clubs run to find dancers who could be part of the film. The videos played a big part in attracting the interest of young people.
Admit it, you've never heard of the band Strange Tenants. They are Australian 'ska' legends, formed and led by duel vocalists and prolific songwriters, brothers Bruce (singer, trumpet player and 'RudeBoy' on Nicks) and Ian (singer and keyboards) Hearn. As one of the biggest Australian bands of the 80s, these boys toured with the likes of Style Council, UB40 and U2 between 1982 and 1986.
This reworking of Grey Skies (Strange Tenants's classic urban reggae song first recorded in 1983) appears on their new 6-track EP Coventry Via Kingston.
Written by Ian Hearn, Grey Skies is about the Tenants' hometown—the inner Melbourne suburb of Collingwood (the spiritual home of the Collingwood Football Club)—where several band members have resided at one time or another and four generations of the Hearn family grew up. The song is about a typical modern inner city urban environment (and could just as easily pertain to many such environments around the world), going through changes as generations come and go, and new migrants arrive to reside in the high rise public housing apartments.
