Okay in a nutshell…moved her, had a kid, made a film, my lead actress nominated for an Oscar, we locked picture last week.

That’s about it. My life for the last year in a simple sentence.

It’s been a tough year, but its also been an amazing one. Really. I’ve met and been places I never ever dreamed I would.

A part of me wishes I could ply my trade in the UK…but there’s no work back home…that’s not entirely true…there’s just no consistent work in the UK…and that’s no good.

So now I’m gonna try and do this everyday with whatever musings I can muster up.

I know I know. I am shit. Shit at keeping this up. But I am in the States just doing some scouting on a movie. We haven’t started working officially yet. I’m not getting paid or anything but I figured I’d fly out and do some work on my own steam. And man has it being very, very cool. More details tomorrow. I’m trying to put up a new/old short so let me know what you think.

Mark.

So library…ear phones listening to Alberto Inglesias’ score to the Constant Gardner. One of my favourite films, editorially, story wise and visually. When I first saw it I dissed it. Not impressed was I. But I wonder if some films when you watch them you have to be in the mood for them? Like I hated Wanted the first time I saw it. But saw it again recently and really appreciated it. Not as good as the graphic novel but the graphic novel would never have been filmed.

So a few weeks ago in the Guardian…Friday’s G2 the dog’s bollocks…there was an article by Paul Schrader (Taxi Driver and Exorcist II!) on narrative exhaustion.  Let me just relate some of it to you:

‘Writers have always known there are a limited number of storylines. Christopher Booker’s Seven Basic Plots popularised the number 7, but others have argued 3, 20 and 26…Rudyard Kipling said 69. That’s not new. We do tell variations of the same stories over and over. That’s not what I mean by the ‘exhaustion of narrative.’  What is new is the omnipresence and ubiquity of plot created by media proliferation. We are inundated by narrative. We are swimming with storylines.’

Schrader goes on to talk about how our Grandfathers might have seen 2,500 hours of audio visual narrative by the time they were 30…but today an average person aged 30 would have seen over 35,000 hours of plot. In part because I think film has replaced books as the main narrative well that we drink from. Which is a shame I think. Prose should be the foundation.

Schrader asks what does to mean to the storyteller? He argues that is incredibly difficult to get out in front of a viewer’s expectation. I’ll repeat that… he argues that is incredibly difficult to get out in front of a viewer’s expectation.

He goes on:

‘Almost every subject has been covered and covered exhaustively. How many hours has the average viewer seen of the serial killer plot? 50? 100? He’s seen the basic plots, the permutations of those plots and the permutations of the imitations. How does the writer capture the imagination of the viewer seeped in serial killer plot? Make it even gorier? Seen it. More perverse? Seen it. Serial killer with humour? Been there. A parody? Yawn.’

He goes on to argue and this happened with me in some Hush reviews…that people hear your story and immediately place it in a  box. Schrader thinks that the average Joe is so savvy when it comes to story he immediately upon hearing your idea labels it. ‘Oh that sounds like Memento.’ ‘Oh that sounds like Breakdown.’

And Schrader asks one pertinent question (he actually asks quite a few!): does the proliferation of media mean it is harder to be original today than 50 years ago? He says yes. And half agree with him. As he says ‘the bar of originality has been raised’ but notice how classic stories continue to be ‘rebooted’ for a new generation?

You see, in some reviews of Hush we were accused by SOME CRITICS…of being unoriginal. Well that’s because the basic plots of everything will be by definition be the same. But what makes something unique and original is its soul. And should be best typified by character and theme. Theme…what the film is about…not what the story is. Hush is about self interest verses social responsibility merged with that is the theme of being trapped. The car is literally Zakes’ prison. Zakes’ view on the World. His situation is totally unique. Totally. That journey…the one he makes…the one the coupe make is totally unique. And that is the point. What I have taken from inside me and put on screen that’s what gives a story a unique angle. Everything that happens in Star Trek has been seen before. Rogue outsider who goes good. (Kirk.) Time travelling vengeful bad guys? Seen that too. But what makes it unique is JJ/Orci/Kurtzman’s take on it. What they’re trying to say about friendship is what makes it unique.  Take away all the gloss that film could still have been filmed as a 2 million dollar film. Trust me.

Look at the Hangover. Again. A premise deceptively simple. 3 men wake up with a baby, a tiger and missing groom with no memory of the night before. They need to find the groom before he gets married.  Even this has a whiff of familiarity about it but what makes it unique are the characters and how they respond to the situation and the wonderful line Todd Philipps treads…he never lets the humour become puerile nor does he ever let the premise exclude women. Unique in my book. 

Hopefully next week I’ll get back on track on the story telling stuff.

Music: Johnny Greenwood’s Score to There will be Blood.

Brain Food: Pelecanos’ The Turnaround.

Gotta say THE HANGOVER is one of the funniest things I’ve seen in a looooong time. Class.

As I sit here in the British Library writing…for the 9^th weekend in a row (I took an afternoon out to watch Star Trek)…I think about the craft and how sometimes how much I despise it. I know I’m not alone in expressing this, I know many a writer feel the same way. It’s not about the sacrifice….last night I was invited to two parties but knew I needed a clear head for today so didn’t go…like I said it’s not about the sacrifice…I made a call long ago that my work would always take precedence over anything else and to my detriment I’ve probably lost many friends because of it.

I don’t advocate following this intensity your whole career but I know the only way I got a break was by obsessing about the craft. But let me be clear I think you need down time. How can you write about Life if you don’t live it? It’s about a balance. Which is another reason why I think reading is so important to writing. You can lead another Life for 350 pages and change without leaving your living room.

Why do I do this? Forsaking a stab at normality, spending an unhealthy amount of time alone? I can tell you one thing. It’s not for the money. It’s not about how many films I can direct. How many awards I can get. No. I believe we’re all put on this Earth to make some sort of a difference. Big or small. I believe that that the stories I want to tell have some sort of insight into the human condition. That’s not being arrogant. That’s just saying it as it is, much in the same way your experience has some sort of insight into Life too. Everyone’s does. The only difference is I have decided to put pen to paper.

I always think about my brothers when I think about differences. All of them in some way do exactly that in particular my older brother David who will always go out of his way to aid or help people. Sometimes at a cost. When I think about the amount of people he’s touched in a positive way…including me…frankly its humbling. So that’s why I do this. I want to touch people in what ever way I can. Thrill. Scare. Shock. Make them laugh. Make them cry. But doing that is a privilege and it comes at a cost…and that cost is why I hate the craft.

See anybody can write a story. Plot it out. But what makes it unique is the character and theme. Essentially its soul. That elusive element that gives a piece of work Life. But where does that come from? From within of course. Like some sort of parasite the work sucks on you, like a foetus, taking what it needs to grow. Once it has what it needs to survive and take its first steps, I think you then sit back and just describe what you see.

But this gestating. This incubating of the story. This bit for me personally is the hardest. Because you feed your mind with everything you can (the research bit I call gathering) your head swells so much with information it’s like angry bees are bouncing around in your cranium. 

I think because I am what my agent calls a ‘method writer’ (though aren’t we all?) I have to know every minutiae of what I’m doing. That means spending a great deal of time inside your own head. And I’ve said it before…there are places in a man’s head he shouldn’t go. I think that’s what drugs do. They allow you access to those places…I’ve never understood why a trip is described as mind altering. It should be described as mind revealing.

Before this comes over as some sort of self pitying blog, it’s not…all I am trying to do is describe my process with the hopes it may aid yours.  I should get to the point. The gathering bit of a project is the worst bit not just because of the soul searching/giving involved but also because of the amount of input. The amount of options you are presented with. You have lots of path (there’s that forest analogy again!) choices given to you…which way do you go?

Again though this is where I think if you have a vague idea of what you want to say…you won’t feel so lost. My latest project has taken just under a year to finish and I’m sure it’s because I didn’t quite know what I wanted to say. And because of this I stumbled and went up the wrong paths many, many times.

So…the point of this blog. Yes. The Gathering stage…the research. Write down everything you think may be of use. Every single thing. Always with a watchful eye on time and also do not get side tracked or become to self indulgent. It’s the road to Hell.

So next time we move onto the treatment…I’ll be using examples from Steve Cleary’s Arista programme…(great scheme…what happened to Steve?) plus some of my own devices…

Oh yeah…I don’t want to end on doom and gloom but this hate for the work…it does turn into love at some point…then when it’s all over to hate again as you can see all its flaws…then it starts all over again!