For the past several weeks, I have been reading scripts for a well-known international film festival. For the sake of non-disclosure, I'll leave it at that. So far, I have read 117 scripts, most of which were feature-length screenplays, along with a few dozen TV pilots and a handful of stage plays. While I cannot speak of the scripts themselves in specific terms, I can generalize.
It is encouraging to know that there are a lot of really good writers out there. I laughed, I cried, I was moved by quite a few of them, even if that just meant wanting to turn the page to see what happens next. Others had more room for improvement. Some had good ideas that didn't quite play out. That's how it goes.
Judging scripts is a lot like grading papers, which I think that I have learned to do objectively in my many years of teaching college. That is to say that my own tastes are not a factor in my judging criteria. When reading these scripts, I tried to focus on what works while offering constructive feedback on what does not. Having entered a lot of screenwriting contests myself over the years, it was an interesting experience to be on this side of the judging process. I tried to provide the kinds of notes that I might find useful as a writer.
Many of these writers were obviously still in the early stages of learning the craft, while others had it down to a science. Good stories came from throughout the spectrum. As a general rule, the best writing--and this is true in pretty much any form--is the kind that says more with less. Editing is a good place to remove all of the stuff that doesn't need to be in there.
Some of these scripts were overwritten; many offered descriptions that could neither be seen nor heard. These elements might work in a novel, but not in a script. Other scripts were simply too small for the big screen (no matter what size the screen actually is). By that, I mean that slices-of-life stories need to have some bigger idea behind them that people can connect with. The common advice of 'writing what you know' is reasonable when it comes to a first script, but after that, I recommend leaning on your imagination a bit more.
I say this as someone whose first feature-length screenplay was in fact a melodramatic slice-of-life turd that was loosely based on people I knew and true stories that I had accumulated over the years. It would not have made a good movie. I can see that now. However, in the process of writing it, I became a better writer. With these scripts that I recently read, most if not all of these writers have since gone on to become better writers as well. It's just kind of the nature of doing anything. The more you do it, the better you tend to get. Your worst work can provide the most learning opportunities.
While I did read all of these scripts (which works out to something like ten thousand pages, as my weary eyeballs can attest), in most cases, it was pretty obvious by about ten to twenty pages in if it was getting a yes vote or a no. I read all of them with an open mind, but most of the time, this was how it went. There is a clear difference between writers who have mastered the craft and those who have not, just as there was a clear difference between scripts that told an engaging story versus those that did not. Only rarely did a script do both of these things exceptionally well, and that skill was typically on display throughout.
I read a lot of well-researched biopics of historical figures where the story sometimes got lost in the details or in the mythology of that character. I read a number of coming out stories that were moving and real but which lacked a distinct voice or perspective. I read comedy pilots that no doubt seemed funnier in the heads of the people who wrote them, but they weren't quite able to capture that on the page. I read scripts that were good but which I also believed that the writer seemed capable of taking further. And then were the great scripts...
These were the scripts where the writer demonstrated mastery of both the craft of writing and the art of storytelling. They were like good songs where the musicians play their instruments well. Along those same lines, my advice to aspiring writers is to hone your craft through practice and exercise your artistry by telling the stories that don't yet exist but should. Make them your own and say something, but don't be afraid to step outside of your own ego in order to do so.
As a bonus tip: revise your work, even if it means trampling upon said ego in the process. There is a clear distinction between a polished script and a first draft. To that end, I recommend that you take out anything that doesn't add anything new and remove as many adverbs as possible. Distill the narrative to its essence and rebuild as necessary from there. With enough work, many of the scripts that did not advance to the next round could in fact be winners another year.
It was a joy to screen these movies, shows and plays in my imagination, almost like my own personal film festival, the opportunity for which I am thankful.
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