Favorite rom coms

I'm not an expert on this genre, but I've watched my share of them and here are my favorite rom coms, in no particular order.

• Perhaps my favorite movie of all time: His Girl Friday. This is in the public domain and can be found in several places, including youtube. I've raved about it lots of times on this blog, for example, here.
• Almost any Preston Sturges movie (where he's the writer/director). I'm going to put one of the most obscure ones, The Sin of Harold Diddlebock. I think it's in the public domain (in the US) because of some copyright law error, so might be available free on youtube. See also this review for more details on which this is such a wonderful movie.
  
• Not because it's super-romantic, but because it's such a great movie: Groundhog Day!
• Among several possible Billy Wilder movies, I'll pick two: Sabrina (co-written by Ernest Lehman, who's appeared elsewhere on this blog, for example here) and The Apartment
• IMHO, this is a no-brainer: The Big Sick. So funny, so very touching. Reminds me of the touching bromance Funny People.
• Hitchcock did only one movie that is purely rom com (Mr and Mrs Smith, 1941), but the thriller masterpiece North by Northwest has enough rom com elements, that I'm including it on this list.

If you haven't seen these, check them out!

Frank Daniel's 5 essential elements of a "good story well-told"

Frank Daniel (1926–1996) was a screenwriter, film producer, screenwriting teacher and mentor to many, including David Lynch, Miloš Forman, and Terrance Malick. He is the originator of the "eight sequence method" for outlining a screenplay.

"I am sorry to say he died not long ago, and I have to tell you that he was my only teacher. He gave much to other people, he helped many people. He was a noble-minded and non-egoistic man, and no one understood the art of film-making as he did. He understood it and truly loved it – his criticism was always constructive and never purposely offended anybody. He was open about saying what he didn't like, but he did it in a way that would help you. And that cannot be said about most of the critics in USA. I am very sorry he is not here." — David Lynch

In D. Howard and E. Mabley's book The Tools of Screenwriting, Daniels gives his essential elements of "a good story well told"

1. The story is about somebody with whom we have some empathy.
2. This somebody wants something very badly.
3. This something is diffcult, but possible to do, get, or achieve.
4. The story is told for maximum emotional impact and audience participation in the proceedings.
5. The story must come to a satisfactory ending (which does not necessarily mean a happy ending).

Exposition in "Executive Suite" (1954)

One of Ernest Lehman's first jobs as a studio contract screenwriter for MGM was to first write a treatment for an adaption of a Cameroc Hawley novel of the same namen. Having suitably impressed the studio heads with that, he was then given the assignment to write the screenplay for the 1954 movie Executive Suite, starring William Holden and directed by Robert Wise.

The movie starts with the sudden death of the president of a furniture company, a man named Avery Bullard who we don't evey see (except for his hands). After Bullard's death, there is a struggle among the directors (the head of development, of production, of sales, the CFO, and so on) to succeed him. The protagonist is Don Walling (played by William Holden), the idealistic head of development. The antagonist is Loren Shaw (played by Fredric March), the over-confident CFO of the company. Sound boring? Actually, it's quite fascinating thanks to the excellent writing by Lehman and the fine acting (Nina Foch, who played Bullard's secretary, got an Academy Award nomination for Best Supporting Actress).

While the pdf is (as far as I know) not on the web, I bought a scan of the screenplay from Script City. To learn from Lehman's style, I typed the screenplay into fountain format. In the process, I learned something very interesting!

Lehman does do an excellent job of hiding exposition (as he should - see this earlier post). However, some of the exposition appears as a scene which lacks (for lack of a better word - pun intended) "emotional energy", such as the following.

EXT. PIKE STREET PLANT - DAY 

Don walks through the gate to the sidewalk, on all 
sides of him factory workers, anxious, depressed, 
as they move towards lined-up buses, towards the 
nearby parking lot, towards wives and children 
waiting for them at the curb. Don looks up the 
street, then turns and faces the building, atop 
which is a flag at half-mast. As the men and women 
stream by, they glance at Don with questioning, 
worried expressions. Some of them greet him by name; 
others nod or waves some look away, embarrassed. 
An old Woman comes up to him, clutches his hand.

WOMAN
Mr Walling ...

DON
Hello, Liz ...

WOMAN
(anxiously) 
Everything's going to be all right, isn't it? 

Several workers stop to listen.

DON
(puts an arm around her shoulder)
Don't you worry about a thing...

WOMAN
You weren't here in Thirty-three. You don't know 
how it was in Millburgh when Tredway shut down.

DON
(sees the faces watching him tensely)
Nobody's shutting anything down around here. 
Mr. Bullard brought us a long way from *that*.

The workers glance at each other, then at Don, 
with gratitude on their faces. They begin to scatter, 
Liz the last to go. Don watches, deeply affected, as 
the men are joined by their women and children, and 
the family groups go off together by car and bus 
and on foot.

I read the scene quite impressed with the importance and emotinal impact of the scene. (It helps to set-up an important point Don Walling argues towards the end of the film in his confrontation with Loren Shaw in the Director's Room. So, I think this scene counts as being expositional in nature.) However, I couldn't remember seeing the scene in my viewing of the movie. I actually assumed it must have been cut in the final version. (Actually, Robert Wise often worked with Ernest Lehman and rarely cut scenes from his screenplays.) However, I was wrong - it wasn't cut. This made me realize, I don't read scenes with the same engagement that I view them on screen. Why? What engages my brain in a viewing? The answer, I think, comes from something Mike Nichols (who BTW also worked with Lehman) said: every scene must be one of three things: (a) a fight, (b) a seduction, or (c) a negotiation. IMHO, the scene above is none of these.

This is why, IMHO, it lacks emotional energy on the screen.

By the way, there is a well-researched and well-written, biography of Ernest Lehman out now:

Jon Krampner, Ernest Lehman: The Sweet Smell of Success, University Press of Kentucky, 2022 (396 pages).

Ernest Lehman's 4 credos of a good movie

Ernest Lehman is famous for writing movies made by Hitchcock (North by Northwest and others), Mike Nichols (Who's afraid of Virginia Woolf), Robert Wise, and many other greats. About movie screenplay structure, he said:

In the first act, it's who are the people and what is the situation of this whole story. The second act is the progression of that situation to a high point of conflict and great problems. And the third act is how the conflicts and problems are resolved.

In 1997, the WGA interviewed Lehman for their "The Writer Speaks" series (youtube link). On a more granular level, these are the credos for a good movie screenplay that he mentioned:

• It is a succession of scenes each with a definite conflict.
• The dialogue is as clever as can be without seeming clever.
• Exposition is always concealed.
• Never confuse an audience for even 5 seconds.

For more on Ernest Lehman, read the excellent book "Ernest Lehman: The Sweet Smell of Success" by Jon Krampner.

"Man on Fire" (2004) three act structure

Man on Fire (2004) is a Tony Scott film (IMHO his best) from a screenplay by Brian Helgeland, based on a novel of the same name by Quinnell.

Theme and background

In some sense, the theme is forgiveness for one’s past. This is Creasy’s dramatic problem. Creasy (the protagonist) starts the firm believing he can’t be forgiven (the anti-theme).

The story follows Creasy, a man hired to protect a young girl, Pinta. Creasy has flaws: he’s an alcoholic and suicidal, feeling guilty about the things he did years ago when he worked as a CIA operative. However, cheerful Pinta gives his life a sense of purpose.

In relation to the theme, Creasy sees Pinta as his path to the forgiveness he seeks, almost in a (christian) Jesus-like way as someone who will “wash away” the sins he committed as a mercenary. To emphasize the judeo-christian aspect, the script (omitted in the film version) even has the following VO from Creasy:

Ezekiel 25:17 Blessed is he who in the name of charity and good will shepherds the weak through the valley of darkness for he is truly his brother’s keeper and the finder of lost children.

Three act structure

Pinta’s parents are Lisa (mom, American) and Samuel (dad, Mexican), a couple in their 30s. Samuel’s lawyer, Jordan, tells him that he must get a bodyguard for Pinta in order for her to be driven to school in Mexico City (this is due to the spate of child kidnappings and the fact they, as rich parents, must have “kidnapping insurance” for Pinta). Creasy arrives in Mexico City to visit his old friend Rayburn. Rayburn is living in comparative luxury. Through a connection with Jordan, Rayburn offers Creasy a job as Pinta’s bodyguard. Creasy accepts, taking a bedroom in the Pinta’s family mansion in downtown Mexico City.

This is perhaps the inciting incident which starts Creasy on his journey. We are now into act 2.

Creasy soon becomes depressed, continues to drink in his room after work, and one night (drunk) he tries to kill himself. However, his gun misfires and the primer doesn’t discharge. Creasy calls Rayburn, asking if he’d ever seen something like this happen. Pinta watches him call Rayburn. Rayburn says “The bullet never lies” (a similar line is in the script, on page 32). To Creasy, it’s a sign.

This freak accident changes his attitude and he accepts the friendship (and potential forgiveness) of Pinta. He helps her with her schoolwork, helps her train for her swimming competition, and becomes devoted to her protection. As a nun at her private Catholic school says, he’s her surrogate father. There’s even a scene, one that seems minor at first glance, where Pinta’s parents are out-of-town and Creasy shares a dinner with Pinta and Rayburn and his family. It shows Creasy as a man with a family. He’s happy.

Then she’s kidnapped, during which time he is shot twice (almost killing him). This is the midpoint twist. Creasy now has lost the one person that can forgive his past sins. He reverts to his old ways and decides to kill everyone involved, especially the kidnapper (a man referred to as “The Voice”, later as Daniel).It turns out Pinta’s father and lawyer were both involved in the kidnapping scheme.

He (barely) recovers, gathers intel (sometimes by graphic tourture), and weapons helped by Rayburn and his money and connections. During one of the intell-gathering torture sessions, he finds one of the kidnapped girls alive. He thinks for a moment she’s Pinta. (This is on page 94 of the script). Not her, but this gives him a new sense of hope.

In some sense, this hope points a way for Creasy to possibly solve his dramatic problem - forgiveness. This is another turning point, and the start of act 3.

He finds where the brother and ex-wife of the kidnapper live and kidnaps them. Then he learns Pinta is still alive.

Now his path to forgiveness is (possibly) restored. Creasy offers to trade the brother’s life for Pinta. The kidnapper, The Voice, counters: Pinta’s life for Creasy’s. Creasy accepts, calls Lisa and tells her Pinta is alive. Now Creasy accepts the theme of the film, that he can be forgiven.

He relays instructions of where she should meet him (somewhere far out in the Mexican countryside). There, Pinta is released to Lisa and Creasy, finally forgiven, walks to accept his fate in the hands of Daniel/The Voice.

Notes on "Pericles, Prince of Tyre" by Shakespeare et al

Most scholars agree that William Shakespeare's play Pericles, Prince of Tyre was co-written with George Wilkins. It is believed that Shakespeare wrote acts 3, 4, and 5, while Wilkins wrote the first two. Their plot was, in turn, based on an earlier poem by John Gower (who is a character in the play), among other sources.

See wikipedia for links to where the text of the play can be found (free, online).

Characters Pericles main character list:

• Antiochus, King of Antioch (who's revealed early on to be evil)
• Thaliard, a Lord of Antioch (who is assigned to kill Pericles)
• Pericles, Prince of Tyre
• Helicanus and Escanes, two Lords of Tyre
• Simonides, King of Pentapolis
• Thaisa, Daughter to Simonides (who eventually marries Pericles)
• Marina, Daughter to Pericles and Thaisa
• Lychorida, Nurse to Marina
• Cleon, Governor of Tarsus
• Dionyza, Wife to Cleon
• Leonine, Servant to Dionyza (who is assigned to kill Marina)
• Cerimon, a Lord of Ephesus (and a skilled physician who saves the life of Thaisa)
• Philemon, Servant to Cerimon
• Lysimachus, Governor of Mitylene (who helps Marina and Pericles reunite)
• Pandar (male brothel owner, in Mitylene)
• Boult, his Servant
• Bawd (female brothel owner, in Mitylene)
• Diana, the Greek goddess (who helps Thaisa and Pericles reunite)

The protagonist is Pericles, but he has several antagonists, for example: Antiochus (and Thaliard), the fierce storms at sea, and Dionyza (and her servant Leonine, as well as her husband Cleon). He also has allies, for example: Helicanus, Cleon and Dionyza (who later turn against him), Cerimon, and the Greek goddess Diana.

Notes on the character of Antiochus (adapted from Asimov’s Guide to Shakespeare): In the time of the play (around 200 BCE), Shakespeare’s Antiochus fits the actual leader Antiochus III (“Antiochus the Great”). However, the text of the play suggests that Shakespeare’s Antiochus was modeled instead on his brutal son Antiochus IV Epiphanes. Some of the conflicts of Antiochus IV are described in the Book of Maccabees, for example, the revolt of the Jews (this is of course before the origin of Christianity). For example, Antiochus IV wanted everyone to worship the Greek god Zeus, which was unacceptable by the Jews. This revolt is associated with the Hanukkah holiday that everyone knows. As Helicanus says in Act II, scene IV:

"A fire from heaven came and shrivell’d up
Their bodies, even to loathing, for they so stunk
That all those eyes adored them ere their fall
Scorn now their hand should give them burial.”

Compare that with 2 Maccabees 9:9 in discussing the punishment and death of Antiochus IV:

The body of this impious man swarmed with worms, and while he was still alive in hideous torments, his flesh rotted off, so that the entire army was sickened by the stench of his corruption.

Locations The cities used by Shakespeare as locations for his play are, at the time the play occurs, real places - they are all located on the western part of the Mediterranean Sea. However, their use in the play may put them in ficticious locations.

• Actioch: Act I, scene I

  (There, Pericles meet the evil Antiochus and escapes, fearing for is life.) This was a city in modern day Turkey. Its ruins lie near the current city of Antakya.

• Tyre: Act I, scenes II, III, Act II, scenes IV

  This is a city in modern day Lebenon.

• Tarsus: Act I, scene IV, Act III, scene III, Act IV, scenes I, III, IV,

  (Pericles saves Tarsus from famine and later leaves baby Marina there to be protected and raised. It turns out the Governor and his wife cannot be trusted...) This is a city in modern day Turkey.

• Pentapolis: Act II, scenes I, II, III, V

  (Pericles meets his wife Thaisa there.) Pentapolis in the play is a collection of 5 cities located in modern day Egypt and Libya. Some are in ruins and some have survived until today.

• Ephesus: Act III, scene II, IV, Act V, scene II, III

  (The coffin Pericles' wife Thaisa is washes ashore and she is saved by a skilled physician there. She is unaware of where Marina is.) This was a city in what is not the country of Turkey. Its ruins lie near the current city of Izmir.

• Mytilene: Act IV, scene II, V, VI

  (This is where pirates took Marina after kidnapping her in Tarsus before she was almost murdered by the wife of the Governor there.) Mytilene is a city on the Greek island of Lesbos.

• On Pericles' ship: Act III, scene I, Act V, scene I

  (Pericles' wife Thaisa appears to die in childbirth there and is buried at sea in a coffin.)

Locations, in scene order More precisely, in the order of the play's acts and scenes, the locations, with characters, are as follows. The presence of Gower, the narrator of the play, in a scene is omitted.

• Actioch: Antiochus (king), Pericles, Thaliard (a lord of Antioch and one who wants to kill Pericles for Antiochus), the daughter of Antiochus, Messenger

  Act I, scene I

• Tyre (in the palace): Pericles, Helicanus (a lord), Escanes (a lord), Thaliard Pericles leaves Helicanus in charge, so Helicanus is now Governor of Tyre?)

  Act I, scenes II, III

• Tarsus (a room in Cleon's house): Cleon (governor of Tarsus), Dionyza, a lord, Pericles

  Act I, scene IV

• Pentapolis (by the seaside): Pericles, three fishermen

  Act II, scene I

• Pentapolis (by a pavillion): Pericles, Simonides (king), Thaisa (king's daughter, to be Pericles' wife), knights, their squires, various lords

  Act II, scene II

• Pentapolis (in a hall of state, a reception for Pericles): Pericles, Simonides, Thaisa, Marshall (organizer of the reception?), knights, ladies, various lords

  Act II, scene III

• Tyre (a room in Helicanus' house) : Pericles, Helicanus, Escanes, three lords

  Act II, scene IV

• Pentapolis (in the palace): Simonides, Thaisa, three knights

  Act II, scene V

• On Pericles' ship: Pericles, Lychorida (nurse to Marina), an infant (Marina?), two sailors

  Act III, scene I

• Ephesus (room in Cerimon's house): Cerimon (a lord of Ephesus), Philemon (In Cerimon's staff), two or three servants, and some shipwrecked sailors, two gentlemen, Thaisa

  Act III, scene II

• Tarsus (room in Cleon's house): Cleon, Dionyza, Pericles

  Act III, scene III

• Ephesus (room in Cerimon's house): Cerimon, Thaisa

  Act III, scene IV

• Tarsus (near the seashore): Dionyza, Leonine, Marina, three pirates

  Act IV, scene I

• Mytilene (room in a brothel): Pandar (brothel owner, male), Boult (his servant), Bawd (brothel owner, female), the pirates and Marina

  Act IV, scene II

• Tarsus (room in Cleon's house): Cleon, Dionyza

  Act IV, scene III

• Tarsus (near the monument/tombstone to Marina): Pericles, Cleon, Dionyza

  Act IV, scene IV

• Mytilene (street in front of the brothel): Two gentlemen (johns leaving the brothel)

  Act IV, scene V

• Mytilene (room in a brothel): Pandar, Boult, Bawd, Lysimachus (governor of Mytilene), Marina

  Act IV, scene VI

• On Pericles' ship: Two Sailors (eg, Tyrian Sailor), Helicanus, two gentlemen, Lysimachus, Lords (eg, First Lord), Marina, Pericles, Diana (as a godess in a vision)

  Act V, scene I

• Ephesus (temple of Diana): Thaisa, a number of Virgins, Cerimon, Pericles, Lysimachus, Helicanus, Marina, a Lady

  Act V, scenes II, III

How the audience relates to a character

I discovered a new podcast recently, Draft Zero, which has taught be a lot even though I've only listened to less than 10 edisodes so far.

One of their brilliant insights is on how the audience connects with a character. If I'm understanding it correctly, here's the idea.

Suppose the screenplay has already set up a character X who the writer wants the audience to connect with emotionally. Create a situation Y, without X in the scene yet, with some emotional impact. So the audience knows Y, but not X yet, and has enough time to create their our emotional response. At this stage the audience knows more than the character X. Now, let X come across the situation Y and X reacts exactly as the audience did a moment ago. Abracadabra, the audience has connected to X emotionally.

Here's an example. We, the audience, sees a poor kitty cat stuck up in a tree. The kitty is meowing and can't get down. We feel sorry for the poor kitty. Who's going to help save it? Now X comes along and here's the kitty crying. Here too, X feels sorry for the poor kitty and helps to save it. We bond emotionally with X, as X has reacted the same way we did to to kitty's plight.

Check out the Draft Zero podcast for more. I think this discussion was in episode 5.