5 moments can help you write your screenplay

I've written 31 screenplays, and since my college days I've always thought the creative process was like toast popping up out of a toaster. When it comes to writing you need subject matter - the bread. You need to put the bread in the toaster - the toaster being your brain, your heart, your spirit, emotions, all the energy that's inside you and around you. You need to heat that subject matter up with contemplation, memories, feelings, and everything else you use and eventually that bread will become toast and it will pop up. Hopefully you'll record it all down on your computer, your journal or a recorder.

Let's say what pops up is a movie title, or a premise, or a feeling that you express in a theme or basic idea. Maybe it's a lot of dialogue. Maybe you have a main character in mind, or an actor you'd like to write for. Maybe you remember some things that are important to you and you want to preserve them. Maybe you've got an idea after watching something or thinking about something. You may even have an outline or half the script written.

Remember that the 5 moments doesn't mean all movies only have 5 moments, it means some moments are more important than others in terms of story structure. Now, you're writing a screenplay. How can knowing about the 5 moments help you?

Here are the 5 moments:

25: the birth of something new

45: now that I'm aware

60: there's no going back now

-45: discovery

-25: the final turning point

With your new screenplay idea in mind, contemplate the 5 moments. Go over each of the 5 moments, study them, think how other movies used them. Go for a walk if you'd like. See if anything pops up. If you write a lot, keep going until you're exhausted and need to sleep or starving and need to eat and drink. If nothing is created, have as a goal to write a few ideas down for each of the 5 moments. So start with the goal of an outline with 5 moments.

To begin, write down the 5 moments. Below them, write down 25 and start thinking and feeling. Start with page 25 and The birth of something new. Start asking questions that focus on what could be born at page 25. Remember, this isn't page 1 of your screenplay. What new things could arrive? A new relationship? Is the birth of something new about journeying toward some new location? Is it the discovery of some new power or resource? An interview? A demonstration of how evil a new antagonist is?

Think of other movies and their moments at 25. Write everything down. Also write down 4 emotionally tense moments you and others in your story could experience between page 1 and page 25. If nothing comes up, just write down "My main character has an important and/or intense, turbulent talk with someone new or something new and it means the world to him," and move to the next moment.

Moving to Now that I'm aware on page 45, imagine what kind of thing or thought or activity that your main character or other characters may be aware of and could take action and how would this impact secondary characters? If you have a situation, here is where you escalate the situation. Write it all down. Even if it involves some other moment or character or situation or dialogue that came out of nowhere, put it down on paper or your computer or recorder. Also write down 4 emotionally tense moments you and others in your story could experience between page 25 and page 45.

Focus on There's no going back on page 60. Start thinking about things that could get very serious and tense, creating a sense or feeling that there's no turning around. You can also think about locations that could not be revisited. There must be a sense that things have really changed and conditions force our main character to pivot in some other direction, physically and/or emotionally. 60 is where things deepen so much there's no going back to where things were at the beginning of the story. Also write down 4 emotionally tense moments you and others in your story could experience in between 45 and 60.

Focus on page -45 and Discovery. Consider what could have happened at 45 that could impact what happens at -45. What seeds could have been planted at 45 that could sprout at -45? Write down lots of things that have to do with escalating action, showing how your protagonist is exerting himself or herself. Have others in the story impacted in some way by these escalating actions. The activity has to be more intense or spectacular than the activity at page 45. Also write down 4 emotionally tense moments you and others in your story could experience in between 60 and -45.

Now comes -25 and The final turning point. Things that you first wrote when you thought about writing a new screenplay could very well belong here. Consider any kind of ending or trend that indicates a particular ending. Do you want the audience glad or sad at the end? Let's say you want a glad ending. Now would be a good time to make up a sad ending and have your main character do something they could not do at the beginning of the story and use that new found power or evolution or change as a way of reversing the antagonism, whatever it is. Write down 4 emotionally tense moments you and others in your story could experience between -45 and -25.

From -25 to the end, think of 10 incredibly emotionally tense moments, moments that could not get anymore emotional for your main character and others involved in the story. One way to get 10 moments is to write out 100 moments and choose your top ten best moments. Something that works for me is to do a walkabout. Just walk around, doesn't have to be quiet. Remember that the quality and quantity of what goes in determines the quality and quantity of what goes out, meaning if you've filled yourself with subject matter you'll express yourself eventually. If you want to bring along a micro recorder and record dialogue and description, go ahead. Keep reading screenplays and books on screenplays and Internet content on how to write better. Continue to look at art, listen to music, be with people and interact with them, etc.

Keep things simple and keep everything you write down. Build on your ideas, get to specifics. Read about this, that, and the other thing so you get the notion and confidence you're the expert on this, and you're telling it like it is.

As you continue to elaborate and make adjustments to your movie title, premise, concept, characters, focus on accomplishing these things:

1. Write character studies for all your characters.

2. When you think of scenes, make sure that when you write your scenes that your characters have very different goals and attitudes and objectives. Focus on creating turbulence, and that usually means creating conflicting emotions within your characters and then have them go at it. Remember that things usually build with intensity, things usually should rise in tension and turbulence.

3. Make sure you have a core of emotion or feeling or intensity or value in your story that you don't want your antagonist to ruin. In other words, make sure there is something of great value to the audience that the antagonist is trying to kill in some way.

4. Have plenty of emotion and intense feeling in your protagonist so the audience will care about him or her.

5. What can the main character or characters do at the end they couldn't do at the start?

6. Get that outline done. Start with the 5 moments and keep building. Get it to around 20 to 30 pages. Have one line that describes all your major characters and know what they want and what they don't want and how they go about doing things. Keep making adjustments.

7. Write the screenplay. Reread your favorite book on screenwriting and see if any new ideas come up to make changes in the screenplay. Consider buying a new book on screenwriting and read it and during the process of reading see if any new ideas or dialogue for your screenplay come up.

8. Have an intention to write a great screenplay that will become a great movie that will improve yourself, your family, and the world. Intend to write the most creative, entertaining story humanly possible. Intend to do your best to get it sold or get a deal done to make it and get it made as well as humanly possible.

When you're finished, if you don't know what to do with it, just rest for awhile and do other stuff, then read or reread books on how to market screenplays.

Get it done.