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If a bad screenplay gets made, it ends up being a bad movie. There's no magic that can make a lousy story a good movie. The only thing that could make it a good movie would be if it were rewritten into a good script, but then it wouldn't be a bad script anymore.
- Example #1 – The Dark Knight Rises
- Example #2 – Avatar
- Example #3 – Game of Thrones
- Example #4 – Gone Girl
- Example #5 – Signs
- Example #6 – The Wire
- Example #7 – Darkest Hour
- Example #8 – The Newsroom
- Example #9 – Riverdale
- Example #10 – Face/Off
Did the writers get lazy whilst wrapping up Christopher Nolan’s Dark Knight trilogy? It certainly feels that way in places during The Dark Knight Rises. The movie still has all the hallmarks of Christopher Nolan’s great direction. Thrilling set-pieces, impressive scale, amazing action. All these characteristics make it a great movie. However, the w...
Avatar changed the game when it came out in 2009. It feels unarguable that in the technology it pioneered alone it is a good movie. Add to that stunning visuals, massive ambition and imagination and it’s understandable why many people still love it to this day. However, that doesn’t preclude it from some bad writing throughout, mostly in some of it...
Yes we are mainly talking about Season Eight. It has been much publicised how much of a let down the final series of Game of Throneswas. This was particularly in the context of the writing. Bad writing can be found throughout the show’s eight seasons. Themes and story can be expressed in heavy-handed ways and often the plotting strains for believab...
As a thriller, Gone Girl is David Fincher at his finest. It’s a great watch. However, that doesn’t stop the writing from feeling contrived throughout, mainly in its plotting and characterisation. The narration is largely inconsistent throughout also. It seems to appear when it’s most convenient to reveal the plot. This is perhaps a hangover from th...
Signsis a compelling movie and successful in its primary objective – to terrify its audiences. Who can forget that birthday party video? Or the first interference heard on the radio? Or a terrifying scramble in the dark? Furthermore, the characterisation is brilliant. The family is so believable in its dynamic. In their backstory, individually and ...
Let’s be clear. The Wire is probably the greatest written TV series of all time (we see you Sopranos). However, some of the plotting within the fifth and final season of The Wire, strains at credibility. In particular we are talking about Jimmy McNulty’s arc. 1. Feeling at his wit’s end with the system, Jimmy decides to fake a serial killer. 2. He ...
Joe Wright’s Winston Churchill biopic, Darkest Hour, was nominated for Best Picture in 2018 and won Gary Oldman Best Actor at the Academy Awards. The movie largely serves as a compelling portrait of Britain during World War II. Furthermore, Gary Oldman’s performance is rich and entertaining. However, the movie contains a lot of bad writing. It part...
Perhaps not Aaron Sorkin‘s most widely praised work. But regardless, The Newsroom, in its witty and fast moving portrayal of cable news, remains vastly popular. A scene widely held up as an example of great writing feels, to us, like bad writing. We’re talking about the widely discussed ‘America is not the greatest country in the world anymore spee...
Guilty pleasure at its finest, Riverdaleis a great watch for those who love drama. The entire idea of the show is ridiculous – who looked at the Archie comics and thought, “You know, we could make a dark teen drama out of this”? Not just the overarching concept of the show is ridiculous, but practically every plot line is as well. Dialogue? It offe...
The very concept ofFace/Offfeels an example of bad writing. 1. The entire idea is that an FBI special agent goes through a procedure to literally steal the face of his terrorist enemy. 2. He does this in order to find out more about a bomb set to go off in a few days time. 3. Somehow the procedure also manages to change his voice, mannerisms, and b...
I think every good movie has a good final script, but that often incorporates ad-libs, last-minute rewrites by "script doctors", and changes by the director. For example, Russell Crowe alleges that he and Ridley Scott were so frustrated with the original script for "Gladiator" that some days they were writing or improvizing entire scenes from scratch, effectively LARPing his way to an Oscar.
- Joss Whedon Was Run Off The Set Of Buffy. No, not the TV show. Everyone knows that the show went on to become a massive success, but the movie that preceded it was far less celebrated.
- Psycho Remake Proves Copying & Pasting Doesn't Always Work. When Psycho was released in 1960, it went on to endure an outstanding legacy as a bonafide classic.
- The Director Was BloodRayne's Downfall, Not The Writer. BloodRayne is so bad that it seems preposterous to think that it ever had a good script, but alas, the screenwriter who wrote the movie was the same one who wrote critically praised movies like American Psycho and The Notorious Bettie Page.
- Caligula Is Nothing Like Its Original Script. Caligula had all of the ingredients to become a celebrated, award-winning classic. The talent was certainly there, with Malcolm McDowell and Helen Mirren starring in lead roles (giving magnificent performances, no less) and most relevantly, National Book Award-winning author Gore Vidal penning the script.
May 2, 2024 · Compelling main character. Escalating conflict. Three-act story structure. Snappy dialogue. Lean script. Realistic production values. Unbeatable logline. A sprinkle of magic dust. If you’re a first-time screenwriter and want to get your script noticed by the Hollywood elite, you’re up against stiff competition.
Oct 2, 2017 · 2) Consider everything around the script. Bad acting (or bad direction of actors) can make dialogue sound heavy or a sharp joke feel obvious. Inept cutting can make a script sound patched together ...
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Moreover, it is almost impossible to envision a good film with a bad screenplay. Syd Field, the “Father of Structure” and author of Screenplay (a book CNN once called “The Bible of the Film Industry”) has spoken at length on this issue. 2 Field said definitively, in an interview with ABS-CBN News, “You can never make a good movie out of a bad screenplay.” 3 Indeed, it is possible ...
