Tag: draft

The false McGuffin

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In fiction, a MacGuffin (sometimes McGuffin) is an object, device, or event that is necessary to the plot and the motivation of the characters, but insignificant, unimportant, or irrelevant in itself. The term was originated by Angus MacPhail for film, adopted by Alfred Hitchcock,and later extended to a similar device in fiction.The MacGuffin technique is common in films, especially thrillers. Usually, the MacGuffin is revealed in the first act, and thereafter declines in importance. It can reappear at the climax of the story but may actually be forgotten by the end of the story.

So you write and write and think about writing and you dream about writing and you write about writing and you mechanically answer to the inevitable question what you are working on at the moment:  “I am writing. Can’t really explain, too complicated. To give you a picture: You hold threads in all of your fingers and try to tie them together and sometimes you think you have a really, really good knot, only to discover that you have three loose ends and a muddy middle part.” With an intriguing regularity, the friend/producer/fellow filmmaker (if worse comes to worst: all of these three together) asks to read it, because “they would love to read it and maybe they can give you useful feedback”. You know, in your guts, neither you, nor your script is ready, but sometimes you feel flattered/curious/eager and so you send it to them. You formulate a mail where you stammer around, that the script is not done and you know work has to be done on this or that and that they should note that this is a very, very early draft of the idea and not at all set in stone…Aaaand: Sent!

And now the horrible part begins: waiting for a reply. Although you sent the script swiftly (for it is an ongoing process and maybe early feedback would come in handy!), the reply takes its time. By sending the script too early to a random person, a false need is created. You need the reader to understand that you are not done and that the script needs work, you may even cling to the feeble hope that the reader could suggest solutions to specific plot problems. In all your vulnerability you fill that McGuffin-suitcase with expectations, which the reader of your script cannot, by all means, fulfill. Additionally, you need them to like the script, to understand its full capacity and that they lovingly fill the blanks the unfinished draft contains. By having sent that script too early, you created your own need for their approval.

Finally, the mailbox blinks, the feedback is here. It says: “Really liked it, although I really don’ understand the middle part, it has this unfinished touch. Plus, I would prefer the girl to be a guy, who maybe steals a boat instead of falling in love with that other person I forgot the name of. Have a similar idea, would you maybe read? Great work, xoxo producer/friend/fellow filmmaker.”

I don’t say that feedback is not very helpful and one should consider giving the finished draft to a person, which you trust to be able to read screenplays of that particular genre and who is able to not only criticise it, but also to give it a constructive feedback. Don’t be demotivated by a false MacGuffin-suitcase full of expectations, don’t run after the approval of everyone, for you will never have the approval of everyone (there are people out there who dislike “the Joker” or “Parasite” or “Scarface” or “insert your favourite film”) The only critic you ought to satisfy in the end is yourself.

Interviewed in 1966 by François Truffaut, Hitchcock illustrated the term “MacGuffin” with this story:

It might be a Scottish name, taken from a story about two men in a train. One man says, ‘What’s that package up there in the baggage rack?’ And the other answers, ‘Oh that’s a McGuffin.’ The first one asks ‘What’s a McGuffin?’ ‘Well’ the other man says, ‘It’s an apparatus for trapping lions in the Scottish Highlands.’ The first man says, ‘But there are no lions in the Scottish Highlands,’ and the other one answers ‘Well, then that’s no McGuffin!’ So you see, a McGuffin is nothing at all.

Have you experienced similar feedback? Or did you get useful Feedback? Tell me in the comments, I would love to ‘hear’ from you.

‘Don’t start to write, it’s a trap!’ Baudelaire, 1867

Posted WhatsintheboxLeave a commentPosted in General

                                       

Writing about writing is probably the lamest thing a writer does. It seems very important to us to explain to people how hard writing is, comparable to drunk people who have to communicate that they are drunk (and worked hard for it). So, to defeat that cliché once and for all: Here is a piece about (screen)-writing.

You can find an endless stream of screenwriter tips, screenwriter books, screenwriter tutorials, screenwriter mugs and T-Shirts, but it always seems to me like this meme ‘how to draw an owl”. First you carefully start to outline the eye shape, the pupils, the eyelashes and then- you draw the rest until it looks like an owl.

Real ProTip: Before you start writing, do clean your house, re-arrange your books by colors and/or genre, ask the dog if he is a good boy and has to go outside (both times: Yes!), catch up with seven to twelve Netflix-series, bath in the blood of 12 virgins by moonlight, then but only then, you can start to write.  Maybe the dog has to go out again. But then.

I think, everybody has this terrible fear of the white page. This fear, let’s call it Earl, feeds from the following:

*fear of not being able to write down the idea you have in mind

*fear of not being able to write at all

*fear that the idea/characters/storyline turns out to be complete bs

*fear of you’ve written your shitty idea out, give it to a trustee (friend, producer, fellow screenwriter-producer-friend) and he/she/they say it is complete bs and why do you call yourself a screenwriter and that maybe you should look for a different job, maybe hand-model?

*fear of not being able to finish

Earl is an a-hole. A big one. Don’t listen to Earl. Tell Earl to fearl off. The trick I’ve found very useful to get rid of Earl is the following: You don’t have to write a whole script, or story line, character development or even scene. Just write for 15 minutes.

15 minutes is not that scary.  15 minutes you can fit in between anything: between meetings, between dog-walks, between a hot-dog-bun, between your ears. 15 minutes is do-able. Often I the write more than 15 minutes, sometimes I just set it aside and continue to stare at goats. I then look at it the next day. Sometimes I am relieved, because it turned out pretty okay and sometimes it is complete shite. But hey, no one saw it, except you (and maybe Earl) and you can just erase it and write another 15 minutes. You can not always write, but you can always work. And word after word after word, your treatment becomes alive. And you can join the writers’ ranks by chanting (in D):

“I hate writing, I love having written. (So fuck off, Earl.)”

                                                                          Dorothy Parker