This document provides guidance on writing screenplays with an emphasis on showing rather than telling, focusing on action, using concise and evocative descriptions, developing character through subtle details, and effectively structuring scenes. Key recommendations include using short, impactful sentences; focusing descriptions on what can be seen and heard; avoiding gratuitous sex and violence; and getting in and out of scenes as efficiently as possible to maintain conflict and momentum.

1. THE BIG PRINT
Showing the Action

2. SHOW – DON’T TELL !
 You don’t write a movie - you see it!!!
 The experience of reading a script should be less like
reading prose and more like actually watching the film –
 The writing should “leap off the page”.
 DEVELOP AN AWARENESS OF THE IMAGES YOUR
WORDS PUT IN PEOPLE’S MINDS.

3. The Word is ACTION !
 Don’t think of it as DESCRIPTION – think of it
as ACTION!!
 People and things MOVING!!!
 You are writing MOTION pictures!!!
 Don’t describe THINGS; describe THINGS
HAPPENING!

4. The Devil is in the Details
INT. JOE'S LOUNGE ROOM DAY
Pizza boxes and empty beer cans litter the floor.
INT. JOE'S LOUNGE ROOM DAY
A vase of fresh cut flowers on a doily atop the piano.

5. Hidden Descriptions
The best place to hide a description is within an action.
INT. JOE‘S LOUNGE ROOM DAY
Joe brushes away old pizza boxes, plops down
on the sofa.

6. OR….
INT. JOE’S LOUNGE ROOM DAY
Joe pads lazily into the candle-lit room, martini in
hand.
He eases himself luxuriously onto the large,
overstuffed white sofa, and takes a sip.

7. The SMS of Description
 Screenwriting is distilled writing.
 It works best when it evokes, when it multiplies the
meaning.
 The trick is to chose words that IMPLY other words!

8. WORD CHOICE
Find the EXACT word to match the situation.
This will help to create quick, easy to read sentences... & will
efficiently convey character-specific details.
e.g.: Joe saunters in, strides in, struts in, strolls in, marches in,
paces in, bounces in - not only does this give us a specific type of
walk, it adds to the action and character while removing boring
overused words from your script.

9. Writing with ATTITUDE
 Don’tdescribe how something LOOKS, but
how it FEELS.
 Put ATTITUDE into your descriptions…

10. for example…
EXT. URBAN JUNGLE, 2019 AD -- EVENING
Midst the wreckage of civilization, a emaciated figure (ALAN)
stumbles along a shadowy street of crumbled buildings, broken
glass and the detritus of war.
Downed power lines arc and spark over burnt out cars, casting
shadowy fingers that might reach out and grab anyone foolish
enough to be caught in this part of town.
The place makes Hell look like Beverly Hills... except the
battered twisted metal sign reads "Beverly Hills".

11. Avoid too much Black Stuff
 Observe the Four Line Rule.
No single passage of action should take up more than four
lines!!!
 Every four lines, put in a blank line (gap).
This instantly adds more "white stuff" to your
script!

12. STYLE
 Develop your own personal style of writing action
passages. Style breaks up the page and makes
your writing distinctive.
 Using sounds like "BLAM!" or "CLANG!"

13. Don’t be afraid to EXPERIMENT
For example…
One
Word
Sentences
Which
Draw
The
Reader
Down
The
Page

14. CHARACTER
 Write
ONLY THINGS THAT CAN BE SEEN
AND/OR HEARD!!
 Avoid describing back-story!!! e.g.:
SALLY is in her 40s. Now a stout, jovial
woman, she used to be a track star in
college. She has a good sense of humour, but
don’t push her too far or she’ll bite back.

15. Character, continued…
REMEMBER!!!
ONLY WHAT CAN BE SEEN AND HEARD!!!
Tommy sighs, remembering the conversation
from earlier.
The only thing we see and hear is Tommy
sighing.
Good screenwriting means finding the
OUTWARD SIGNS of the INNER
EXPERIENCE.

16. Character, continued…
 Describe your character in four words.
Lawrence Kasdan managed that amazing feat in his script for
Body Heat :
"Teddy Laurson, rock and roll arsonist."

17. Kill the Widows!
When the last word of a sentence carries over
onto a new line of print it's called a WIDOW.
Rewrite so as to kill all the widows.
Also - if one or two words from the end of a sentence end up
taking up on the next page, rework the sentence until you can
get it to fit entirely on the page where the sentence starts. This
will force you to eliminate useless or fatty words, and more
succinctly.

18. No Buts! Or Ands!
 The easiest two words to trim out of a
sentence are AND and BUT. Usually these
words are completely unnecessary. Cut them.

19. Confidence
 Know what every sentence and every
word means, and write clear enough so
that anyone who reads your script
understands what you have written.
 Write
strong sentences and strong
images.

20. Page Turners
 Little cliff hangers at the end of your page force
the reader to turn to the next page.
Add extra spaces or trim entire lines so that you
can end every page on a moment of suspense.
e.g.: If there is a moment where the hero is about to be
killed but saves himself, make sure the “about to be killed”
is at the end of one page so that the reader has to turn the
page and keep reading to get to the saves himself part.

21. Samples of BIG PRINT
WHAT ABOUT:
While Tommy works frantically to adjust the
steam valve, Nancy keeps lookout.
How effective a description is this?

22. Remember: Show! Don’t Tell!
While Tommy works frantically to adjust
the steam valve, Nancy keeps lookout.
 “Keeps lookout” does not give much of a visual image.
 “Keeps lookout” is telling us what she’s doing, not showing
us.
 Show, don’t tell.

23. Hence…
Tommy works frantically to wrench the rusty
steam valve shut.
Nancy stares nervously out the dirty window.

24. SAMPLE TWO
INT O’BRIEN HOUSE KITCHEN DAY
The O’Brien family has just moved into
their new house in Oak Street – small
bungalow outside Santa Cruz. But it hasn’t
helped. They’ve been on each other’s nerves
for days, and Tommy has been wishing they
were back in Sacramento.

25. SAMPLE TWO - Rewrite
EXT O’BRIEN HOUSE DAY
A small brick bungalow flanked by two sad palm trees,
sags into the dead grass dotted with complaining
seagulls.
INT O’BRIEN HOUSE – KITCHEN DAY
Some boxes have been shoved to one side of the counter,
power cords hanging out of them, to make room for three
days’ worth of dirty dishes.
The faucet is dripping.
AMANDA storms in, nearly tripping over a stack of
saucepans and lids.

26. Rewrite continued…
CATHERINE (O.S.)
Amanda!
AMANDA
I’m doing them!
CATHERINE (O.S.)
Aman-da!
Amanda clatters the last dish into the sink, runs to
the dining room side.

27. Rewrite conclusion…
AMANDA
I hate this house! I hate it! I
hate it! Why’d we have to leave?
CATHERINE slumps in. Tosses her cigarette in the
sink.
CATHERINE
(to herself)
I hate it too, honey. But it’s just
til your father finds a job.

28. SAMPLE THREE
The battle is cruel. The men fight
fiercely, outnumbered, digging in
with the little artillery and
armour they still have.
A dozen men hold off a half a
dozen tanks. Finally, carrying
satchel charges and claymore
mines, they hurl themselves at the
tanks.

29. SAMPLE THREE - Rewrite
YURI grabs a claymore mine.
IVAN
You’ll never make it! Don’t!
YURI
I have to try!
IVAN
It’s madness, comrade.
YURI ignores him, pulls the fuse, and darts down the
thirty yards of rubble to the lead tank.

30. Rewrite continued…
BOOM! A shell explodes, hurling him back.
Yuri staggers.
A GERMAN aims. BAM!
YURI spins, staggers. Another bullet rips
through him.He falls to one knee. Then forces
himself back up.
YURI staggers, dying, for the lead tank. He gets
close, starts to hurl the claymore at the tank’s
treads –

31. Rewrite continued…
BOOM!
Another shell explodes – YURI’s gone!
IVAN stares, stunned.
IVAN
Goddamn it.
The lead tank rolls forward, onto… YURI’s
claymore mine.
A HUGE explosion erupts.

32. Rewrite conclusion…
When the smoke clears, the lead tank’s
right tread is destroyed, torn clean off
the wheels.
The tank turns in a ragged circle, wheels
spinning aimlessly. This is one piece of
the Wehrmacht that isn’t going home to
Berlin.

33. DON’T Big Print the Dialogue
 Avoid writing big print that says things like:
Jim and Bob are discussing sports
when Tom comes in.
If the camera’s on Jim and Bob, we ought
to be hearing their dialogue. BUT…

34. If the characters are talking at the back of a
crowded bar, and the scene has Tom’s
point of view (POV), then…

35. INT BAR NIGHT
Tom pushes the doors open. Looks around.
In the back, Jim and Bob are speaking to
one another. Bob looks up, sees Tom,
and waves him over.

36. You can also get away with writing action that doesn’t literally
communicate something you can see or hear, provided it is
shorthand for something that you can.
Dylan looks the painting over, smiling. Nice.
We don’t know literally that Dylan’s been thinking “nice” but
it’s shorthand for saying, “with a relaxed and approving
smile”.

37. Directing the actors
The BIG PRINT can also be used very effectively to
signal actors as to the sort of behaviour, gestures
and/or facial expressions that communicate non-verbal
meanings within the action of the story.
For example:
Jack keeps pounding at the door, crying, but
we’re beginning to get the sense that his
heart isn’t in it.

38. OR
Nathan smiles in spite of himself.
Joe starts to say something. Frowns.
Something’s bothering him, but he
can’t quite put his finger on it.
What about DIRECTING the camera?

39. Directing the Camera?
BAD IDEA!!!
BUT…
What if you want to give a specific visual effect?
For example, what if you want to open a scene by
showing someone’s feet walking across the floor?

40. The solution is to show us only what you want us to see.
FEET walk across the floor and
disappear behind a door.
This is a virtual close-up.
The reader sees what you want him to see.

41. Directors will ignore explicit camera directions,
but you can still express the image in a way that
allows you to convey the image to the reader the
way YOU see it.

42. Consider the following:
JOE hits the ground rolling, firing the
.45 as he rolls. STEVE takes a slug in
the gut, smashes backward through the
showroom window, glass shattering. He
falls until he slams into a car roof,
arms sprawled awkwardly.
Is this the best way to express this action?

43. What about?
JOE hits the ground rolling, firing the .45 BAM!
BAM! BAM! As he rolls –
STEVE takes a slug in the gut, smashes backward
through through the window, glass shattering –
… falling …
… falling …
- THUMP! Steve slams into a car roof, arms
sprawled awkwardly.

44.  USE LOTS OF WHITE SPACE
 Remember, you’re trying to write a page a minute.
 A quarter page of action should take fifteen seconds of
screen time.
 As a general rule, if you want two events to be in different
virtual shots, they should be in different paragraphs. If you
want them to be in the same virtual shot, they might be two
sentences but in the same paragraph.

45. SEX AND VIOLENCE
 Gratuitous sex and violence don’t belong in your script
because they don’t belong to DRAMA!!!
Gratuitous means “for free”, and there shouldn’t be
anything in a well-told dramatic story that isn’t paid
for… EMOTIONALLY.

46. More SEX and Violence
 SEX isn’t gratuitous if it’s important to the story
(the emotions).
 Likewise, VIOLENCE isn’t gratuitous if it’s part of
the story, i.e.: connected to the emotional logic
of the characters.
 The question is: how graphic do you want to
get?
 Less is more. You should show as little as we
need to see for you to tell the story. Let the
readers’ imaginations fill in the details.

47. Ho hum….
The more outlandish the violence the easier it is to take…
LESS IS MORE… therefore
If you have a physically abusive husband who’s going to get his
just desserts later on, you don’t need to show him beating his
wife on-screen. Instead, you might use the point of view of their
daughter, who’s in bed in the next room. It will still convey
violence and at the same time provide character information
about the daughter.
REMEMBER!!! What we can imagine is usually more powerful
than what we can show.

48. MONTAGE
 MONTAGE - From the French word for “editing”.
 Describes a series of images, usually without dialogue,
edited together to show a bunch of things happening in one
place, or the passage of time, or two lovers having a good
time in the beginning of their relationship, or the progress
of a relationship from good to bad, etc etc (e.g.: Citizen
Kane).
 Do not use MONTAGE in the scene heading! When you
write the word you push your reader out of the experience
of seeing the movie.

49. Example of writing ‘Montage’
EXT GARDEN DAY
Two girls are skipping rope.
A man in a top hat is riding a unicycle.
The Devil is walking down the steps, whistling a
jaunty tune.
A fat man is ringing a bell and laughing.

50. EDITING YOUR SCENES
 Where do you start and end your scenes?
 The simple answer is: get into your scene as
late as you can, make your point, and get
out as soon as you can.
 On the simplest level, don’t show the guy
coming in the door.

51. For example…
INT MAX’S OFFICE DAY
Carl opens the door, strides over to Max’s
desk.
MAX
Carl?
Carl slams the piece of paper on the desk.
CARL
What the hell does this mean?

52. A better alternative
INT MAX’S OFFICE DAY
Carl slams the piece of paper on Max’s desk.
CARL
What the hell does this mean?

53. Don’t RESOLVE scenes
After a page or two of brilliant dialogue, ending with Max
agreeing, “What could possible go wrong?”, cut straight
to what goes wrong.
Don’t let the scene trail off with the guys shaking hands
and Carl going out the door.
Suggestion: Write each scene long and see how much of
the beginning and end you can drop without losing the
point of the scene…

54. Always ASK YOURSELF
Where does the CONFLICT begin and where
does it
end?
In the previous example, the argument can’t
begin
until Carl reveals the paper, so that’s where
you
start the scene/sequence.

55. CROSSING THE EMOTIONAL LINE
POINT OF VIEW
Point of view includes :
1. things that the character sees – his/her
literal point of view
2. things the character doesn’t see, but will
eventually know happened and/or
3. things that directly affect the character

56. EXAMPLE
In a thriller where the main character is a
detective investigating a series of murders, you
may often want to show the killer at work.
So long as the things we see the killer do are
things that the detective will eventually learn
about, the picture stays in the detective’s
emotional point of view.

57. EXAMPLE of things that directly affect the character
In a movie where the hero is a woman being stalked, we
might see the stalker making his preparations – say, finding
where she’s escaped to, heading over to see her (e.g.:
Sleeping with the Enemy).
What he is doing directly affects her, so we continue to
identify with her even though the camera is seeing things
that she doesn’t know about, and that she may never know
about.
The literal POV of the film is with the stalker but the
emotional POV of the film is with her.

58. REMEMBER
POV is maintained by:
1. things that the character sees and hears –
his/her
literal point of view
2. things the character doesn’t see, but will
eventually
know happened (emotional POV)
3. things that directly affect the character
(emotional
POV)

59. Breaking the emotional POV
You break the emotional POV of the detective
in 1 if you show something that the detective
will never uncover, or
in 3, if the stalker does something that doesn’t
affect the woman – if, for example, he takes a
break to have some ice cream with some kids.

60. Writing Point of View
CARRIE frowns
This merely shows us Carrie’s facial expression.
The emotional POV is either neutral or it belongs
to some other character who’s seeing it.
BUT!

61. CARRIE frowns, troubled.
Gets us into Carrie’s heart just enough
for
us to feel her emotion, without going so
deep into her mind that it can’t be
filmed.
This is EMOTIONAL POV!

62. Two ways of writing Point of View
INT OLD MAN’S HOUSE – CARRIE’S ROOM DAY
Carrie wakes up, alert.
SARA (O/S)
I just read this Wired piece you
wrote.
NICK (O/S)
Oh yeah? Damn, I must’ve left it
lying around.
Carrie sits up, eager.
continued…

63. Continued…
INT OLD MAN’S LIVING ROOM DAY
Carrie pokes her head in.
Sara is unfolding a piece of paper out of her back
pocket.
Nick is doing the crossword puzzle on
the coffee table.

64. Alternative Point of View
INT OLD MAN’S LIVING ROOM LATE AFTERNOON
Nick is doing the crossword puzzle on the coffee
table. Sara pulls a folded-up piece of paper out
of her back pocket.
SARA
I just read this Wired piece you wrote.
NICK
Oh yeah? I must’ve left it lying around.
He looks up. Carrie’s watching them from the doorway.

65. PRINCIPLES TO LIVE BY
 Never eat at a place called “Mom’s”.
 Never Play cards with a guy named “Dad”.
 Never go to bed with anyone who has more
problems than you do.

66. Dramatic Principles
 Less is More
 Simple is Difficult
 Writing IS re-writing
 There are no principles.

67. THAT’S ALL FOLKS!!!!