Celluloid Blonde

Flipping Cars

There is this great moment in The Last Boy Scout. This car’s trunk is wired up with explosives and these two guys have to leap over a freeway embankment to escape the exploding car. And they make it, whew!

Except —

The blowing up car is blown over the side of the freeway embankment and they have to run for their lives from the spiraling churning burning blown up car.

That’s taking something to the next level. Shane Black is a master of that. It’s not enough to just out jump the exploding car and collapse, all safe from the explosion. Then you have to outrun the blown up car’s flaming carcass when it chases you down the freeway embankment.

Concept is a lot like that. And not to get all metaphoric but I am in that sort of mood, it’s not enough to just have an explosive concept that is great. You want that concept to not just explode, but chase someone down that fucking freeway embankment.

Terry Rossio wrote a pretty hot Wordplay piece on concept, The Second Concept, and keeping it going to the next level. Take a look at it.

Then if you’re ready to get serious about concept, come sign up for High Concept Writing. We flip cars pretty hard in there.

High Concept Writing is a six week online master class in screenwriting taught by Max Adams. High Concept Writing begins September 18th.

:::register:::

Posted September 5, 2012 at 11:32pm in writing screenwriting concept shane black terry rossio the last boyscout max adams online master classes high concept writing

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Pitch Mayhem

So here is how this is going to go down.

[It always goes down like this.]

I have these two online classes opening September 18th.

One is The Art of the Pitch. That’s about learning how to pitch a story so you don’t soil yourself in front of a crowd of spectators.

The other is High Concept Writing. That’s how to work on a story concept so it isn’t the first thing that popped into your head that felt clever at 2 AM on a Friday night with a few beers in you — and you just never got around to maybe bringing it up a notch — before tossing months of your life into the sand pit with it.

Both those classes start September 18^th and run through October. Right about the time people start showing up at the Austin Film Festival and pitching ideas in the big pitch rally at Austin Film Festival that sounds like a gauntlet to me but I have never watched it in person because it is just too painful to me to watch people crash and burn like that.

What will invariably happen is right about the time these classes are coming to an end, someone [or several someone’s] will email me in a panic, getting geared up for the pitch event at AFF, and want me to drop everything and leap to help [with no time to do it in] with a pitch –- most likely on a concept that wasn’t thought out all that well before starting the script in the first place.

And I’ll say, Look, I teach a class on this, Why didn’t you take the class? That would have given you five to six weeks to work on the pitch with me before this came up. Or better yet, to work on the story so you had a story worth pitching here? Now you’ve got three days, who do you think I am, Anne Sullivan?

[Even Anne Sullivan got more than three days.]

And they won’t have a good answer.

Don’t be one of those people. Go register for the pitch class.

Posted September 5, 2012 at 2:50am in writing screenwriting film festivals film conferences film pitching the art of the pitch high concept writing afw academy of film writing austin film festival max adams classes online

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News from Max

High Concept Writing

Begins September 13, 2011

High Concept Writing | Concept Stripped of the Mundane | Online 6 Week Master Course | Start Date: 09.13.11

UP YOUR GAME: You will learn techniques to identify and break down high concept — as well as build it up; how to kick start the five story elements that contribute to high concept; how genre can be used to increase your story’s concept level; how to recharge mundane story elements using arena, characters, and story stakes; how to use your story’s twists to raise your story’s concept; how to utilize mental real estate while formulating your concept; how to take a mundane concept to an extreme concept — and how to use extreme story elements to up your concept game.

Instructor | Max Adams

Reading Material | supplied in class forum & library. Some outside material is linked to.

Viewing Materials | posted or available via Netflix, iTunes, YouTube or your friendly neighborhood video rental.

Weekly Chats | Thursday nights | 8 PM EST | 5 PM PST.

class seating limit : 12 | a writing sample may be requested prior to acceptance | a course deposit is required for this class

course fee : $375 |

more info : CLASSES

•REGISTER TODAY - SEATING IS LIMITED

The Art of the Pitch

Begins September 13, 2011

The Art of the Pitch | Pitching Stripped of the Nonsense | Online 6 Week Master Course | Start Date: 09.13.11

GET READ AND SELL: You will learn how to encapsulate your story into one compelling sentence; the five essential elements your pitch must contain to sell to producers and studios; the two pitch models; action driven vs. character driven pitching; the six points your elevator pitch must contain to interest a potential buyer — and what an elevator pitch is; how to open your pitch; how to close your pitch; how to use your story’s turning points to make your pitch compelling; when film comparisons work — and when they don’t; how to address the specific concerns of different members of the entertainment industry; and how to condense and expand your pitch to take advantage of new pitching opportunities.

Instructor | Max Adams

Reading Material | supplied in class forum & library. Some outside material is linked to.

Viewing Materials | posted or available via Netflix, iTunes, YouTube or your friendly neighborhood video rental.

Weekly Chats | Thursday nights | 9 PM EST | 6 PM PST.

class seating limit : 12 | a writing sample may be requested prior to acceptance | a course deposit is required for this class

course fee : $375 |

more info : CLASSES

•REGISTER TODAY - SEATING IS LIMITED

Posted August 21, 2011 at 7:55pm in classes afw academy of film writing high concept writing the art of the pitch

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High Concept Writing: The Chrichton Model | The Academy of Film Writing

If there is —

One writer who regularly nailed high concept [and did it over and over again] it was Michael Chrichton. He was one of the first writers to write a story about a scientific and military response to a plague hitting the U.S. [Andromeda Strain]. Not to mention the only guy talking about space probes bringing back plagues. One of the first writers to address how organ harvesting could go really REALLY wrong [Coma]. Was the writer who took the concept of cloning and said, Forget cloning sheep and humans, let’s clone dinosaurs [Jurassic Park]. He took on the Japanese/American business clash [Rising Sun]. Looked at sexual harassment from the perspective of a man being sexually harassed in the workplace instead of from the [much more common] perspective of a woman [Disclosure]. If there is one thing Chrichton was continually capable of doing, it was looking at current trends and issues before anyone else did and not only nailing them before anyone else did, but taking them to their extremes —

[click the above orange link to continue reading]

Posted March 12, 2011 at 4:21am in film movie writing screenwriting high concept writing max adams