10 Tips On Writing Better Dialogue
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- čas přidán 30. 05. 2024
- In this Film Courage video series, several screenwriters and authors share their tips for writing better dialogue.
1) 01:33 - Starting Points
2) 05:00 - Cut 20%
3) 08:44 - What’s Real?
4) 15:16 - Subtext
5) 28:44 - Unique Characters
6) 35:58 - Contrast
7) 40:42 - Rewriting
8) 43:14 - Time Period
9) 47:19 - Listen
10) 53:21 - Exposition & Final Thoughts
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#writing #writer #screenwriting - Krátké a kreslené filmy
![The Idea: The Seven Elements of a Viable Story for Screen - Erik Bork [FULL INTERVIEW]](/img/n.gif)
Read it aloud. If you're bored saying it, so will your characters.
Then you're writing for a really small audience then aren't you?
Truth
@Abinav Tiku. I like that.
This is real great advice. Damn.
I don't need to do this. I hear the dialogue very clearly in my head. Some people supposedly don't have an "inner voice," if you're one of those people you might want to speak your lines _before_ you write *anything.*
Best dialogue: 33:02
- Can I curse in this?
- You may.
- Awesome!
"Story is a feast. Going to fridge to grab something to eat- That’s real life."
The kind of wisdom I search for.
I have done so many courses and read so many books and I learn from one video on this channel than anywhere else. I almost can’t believe how generous you are with this information. Thank you thank you thank you.😘
onkar5 . Agree. I've actually turned off ad block just because of FC.
(Don't know if it actually matters though. I'm not uploader knowledgeable) .
Same here 🙌🏼
What books have you read? Can you assist me with the process
Exactly! What's great is that they compile all interviews with parts related to a specific topic in just one video so that we can watch it in convenience
I'm not a film student but an oil painter and sculptor. But I'm learning so much more from this to inform my work than I did in my first two years of art school.
Some of the things I've found that helps is listening to conversations around me, when I go shopping or simply sitting at the mall.
I'll save everyone the hour watch with a 20-second dialogue masterclass: "Hi, can I help you? Can I have a dozen red roses please. Oh hey, Johnny, I didn't know it was you. Here you go. That's me! How much is it? That'll be $18. Here you go, keep the change ... Hi, doggie! You're my favorite customer! Thanks a lot, bye-bye. Bye-bye!"
Is that the room
Masterpiece
I’m fed up with this world!
Precise and to the point. Can’t write a better dialogue than this.
some say Sorkin isolated himself and studied this screenplay for months while writing The Social Network
I am a film student
and I think this is the best channel which teaches very crucial part of the filmmaking
Thank you very much film courage
don't stop uploading
So am I and I totally agree
anyone know of any similar channels?
@@gethighordiefiending Yes
"Can I curse in this ?"
"Ohh you may"
now that's Dialogue
All of this ”no one says anything unless they want something/want power” is great but it misses something important. Characters are not always going after things. Quite often they are because the story throws conflict at them: and they want that conflict resolved. But don’t forget characters also speak out of love for other characters or things. So they will compliment another character, not to gain something, but because they genuinely admire them. Or encourage someone else, not because they want something back but because they genuinely care.
Even with that there’s a goal. If you compliment someone the goal is to affirm them, or make them aware that you like what you complimented, etc.
i disagree. i think even when someone compliments another person, they're complimenting them to gain something, such as approval, a smile back, a thank you, etc.
👍
@@jakeelsner2963 what they gain doesn’t have to be personal though they’re gain could be the other characters happiness too
I find it fascinating how writers have a hard time using the spoken word but they can write it just fine.
Dominick: If someone is thinking about numbers during speech, they’re using the intraparietal sulcus (near the posterior parietal & occipital regions) of the brain.
They use the Wernicke’s area (posterior section of the superior temporal gyrus) to understand what they’re speaking or writing.
The inferior frontal gyrus is used for expressive speech (near the anterior edge of the temporal lobe).
Speech and writing at times use different aspects of the brain; certain functions overlap the same regions of the brain.
The greatest talkers are writers. The words are in our head but in the moment we can’t say it
and most actors are shy in reality
Jasper Jones Videos
Why can’t you say it?
A lot of it has to do with people's brains thinking too fast or too slowly for their own good. If you have a lot of ideas going on at once, they can come out jumbled if you don't have time to process it. Or if you're used to thinking through several options before choosing one, it may take a while to actually say anything.
Ironic that the "avoid repetition" guy says it like 10 times
😂
Lots of people putting down the writer of Sharknado. Well, that flick got made and the writer got paid, so what's the complaint? The thing spawned multiple sequels and has plenty of fans. It may not be Hamlet, but it wasn't trying to be.
Also, Bruce Willis' character wasn't saying "none" to the question about filtered cigarettes, he was saying "non" as in the French word for "no". He drops several bits of French throughout the film. He picked it up from his girlfriend, Fabienne. I've got the script on my bookshelf.
See that is exactly why I love Quint's work. His characters are alive and living their lives right there in the script.
I wonder how many of us scrolled down to the comments just after noticing that the Sharknado writer is out there spilling tips...
edd m Writers are like musicians there are a lot of great ones out there but they don’t all get to play in the successful bands. They are the equivalent of the Sharknado writer. In Hollywood it is all about who you know. His advice is still good.
@@michaelslater6839 "In Hollywood it is all about who you know" so true
What I picked up on were all the references to human beings thinking like psychopaths - only out there to manipulate others into getting what they want... very much a contemporary Hollywood/LA view of society.
Thank you. To be honest, I love writing dialogue. I think people or the character have more to say than what they do.
Man shoutout to the interviewer, she responds so encouragingly and just sounds super interested in what they’re saying... makes it so much more engaging to watch for me! :)
🙌 Thank you!
Really wish Dan and David would have watched this one before beginning to write Season 8.
We are still crushed by what happened in Season 8....
The whole season 8 felt very rushed.
I'd say dialog wise season 7 was worse, I don't think tyrion said a single thing in season 7 that wasn't him explaining the plot to the audience
With long videos like this I usually watch them in stop and go manners. Ten minutes here. Twenty minutes there. But, this is the second time I watched this video and I stuck with it all the way through without stopping because it was so inspirational and well edited that I was getting something new with each section. Film Courage is truly the best channel on screen writing.
Thanks Todd, nice to see this one still holds up. Going to be working on an updated version of this where we include some newer clips. We'll see if we can make it any better.
I liked the video at the sofa / misunderstanding bit- really good stuff, lmao. 🐱💖
-- Can I curse in this?
-- Yes, you can.
-- AWESOME.
This channel is where I've gained most of my knowledge in film making overall. I've applied what I learned in my work.
William Martell at 1.30-ish nails it. I'm a dialogue writer but he's got a point, and it's 100%. Again, starting at 10:57. Brilliant!!
62.39 minutes of gold, priceless.
Thanks Deborah! We had fun putting this together. Which part would you like to see us expand upon?
really its a gold
62:39
So many comments that read my mind. Most of these writers, while engaging and sincere, don't have significant credits -- however you define it. That doesn't necessarily invalidate their ideas or advice bu does limit its credibility if one is watching with the aim to write commercial films.
I also thought about their assumptions about how 'real' people talk and think is as much projection as reality.
Many types of professionals are quite concerned with communicating clearly e.g. writers. Not everyone is engaged in speaking in double entendres, passive aggressively, code, symbolically, metaphorically, etc. Conversation as gamesmanship isn't always a given -- as Freud is quoted to say ' sometimes a cigar is just a cigar'.
That doesn't mean that dialog must always be 'on the nose' but if its too contrived, it fails to connect. This doesn't mean the character must be either inscrutable or in-your-face.
Most people I know dislike dialog where everyone has the "perfect comeback". It's very unrealistic and cringy. But I liked most of the advice here.
909sickle It’s a specific style, but it doesn’t work in certain genres or with certain characters...
That's one of my biggest pet peeves! And it seems to me they also all have the same personality when they do that.
909sickle
I have a smart and witty group of friends and the "perfect comeback" is very realistic.
@@MrParkerman6 Translation: "You probably haven't heard of sitcoms, because there are a LOT of unrealistic comebacks. That's why real life feels more boring that entertainment: it takes time for most people to think of a clever quip."
If you want reality, you shouldn't be watching fiction.
And how many of the most memorable lines were ad-libbed?
I'm really digging William G. Martell's ability to explain things. He uses great examples to explain his meanings. I took a lot of notes from him.
Thanks for the upload.
We agree. Plus he's got great comedic timing. Thank you for watching!
I would love to see the speaker's name stay on screen while they are speaking. This is great info, some better than others and the name would be nice to easily reference whom I would like to research, when they say something that catches me. Or, even better would be in the description, give a time line of who is speaking. and next to it, their website or book info would, or a link to a profile page for each of these speakers. You could do video profile pages for these speakers. Especially if they are marketing books, coaching or classes. It would be a benefit to all concerned and offer multiple marketing potential along with value to the viewer. Ty
Thank you for watching the video, Adam.
Their names do appear along with titles of their movies.
I would love this!!
@@patrickfranks2734 But not at the moment that someone may be actively watching the screen to see who they are. It then becomes necessary for them to back the video up and find the five seconds where it is displayed.
I'm a dialogue heavy writer and I love it. I think it depends on the genre of the film. I'm cool with it as long as it makes sense. I just personally don't like a drawn out scene or a scene that wasn't necessary to add.
Hey hey hey..... What's wrong on my life??? I didn't know the existence of this channel until now. I am so fucking happy!!!
I clicked on this video because I'm writing the script for my senior college film project. Imagine my surprise when at 10:04 I saw Barbara Nicolosi...who taught my storytelling class my first semester. I can 100% say she is as much a bustling character in person as she is on camera in a video, lol! I couldn't get enough of the information, and she ended up picking my story as one of the top 10 in the class despite it being a mysterious, superhero, batman-y story pitch. She doesn't teach undergrad anymore, but her course remains the top class I learned from out of my 4 years of film school.
,, how people inhabit a space in a certain time'' I like that explanation..she says..it rarely makes it intact on the screen but that s the purpose..I like that approach..it adds Freshness
So glade you put this together, dialogue is one area I’m super interested in studying and also one of my weaker areas, such brilliant advice
This was a bunch of great interviews, especially when the host said "Roberta Flack" to the "Killing Me Softly" comment. Great music.
I was just watching a Quentin Tarantino documentary about script writing and I had enough of it so I clicked on this video as the top suggestion in the right pane. As the Tarantino video ended, his last line was, "then there was Pulp Fiction", and this video starts playing and Daniel says "and Pulp Fiction.." as the opening line! I'm likely too tired, but I doubted my sense of reality for a moment.
I spent a year moderating a live chat and the training from engaging in conversations, often with more people at once, and only having 200 characters limit per message. I developed a very snappy, condensed way of replying, that both was somewhat meta, to be engaging and encouraging replies, or tried to incorporate more ideas or interpretations into the same message, to not stuff the chat with multiple of my messages at once. So I've acquired a very direct open-ended way of writing dialog (probably not the best description), but putting down dialogue on paper now, I can stay ahead in the conversation with each line jumping the previous, introducing new perspective after each line. It might only be an epiphany to me, but that kind of clever dialogue has never been something I could figure out or only experienced rarely in my own real life conversations. I'd imaging my experience is similar to what one could get from a front tiller job, dealing with customers, but happening in writing, in a chat room, it has improved my dialogue writing skills tremendously.
For dialogue you must mention Dr. House ... I know it is not a film but the dialogue and demands of it being many years is amazing.
It just gotta be harder to write for a tv series than a one time film. You gotta "develop" the character, and yet keep him the same, "recognisable".
The amount of valuable information here is unbelievable. Many thanks
This is my new favorite
Podcast thanks for this content
This was golden. As someone looking to get a few stories stories out, this really gave me a different slant on how to tell them to make sense for others.
Al Pacino’s character in Sea of Love, when he says “catcha later” to a small time criminal that was late to the sting
The late Blake Snyder cited this as an example of his world-famous “save the cat moment” idiom demonstrated in a script.
Because that small-time criminal thought it was an actual ball game and brought his kid with him.
This is reaffirming to hear this from people who can make a living at writing. Thank you.
Film Courage you continue to help us grow! Fantastic advice from everyone 👏🏾🌹
Many, many thanks!
LOVE this - thank you!
Thanks so much for this. So helpful!
Film Courage is like the best youtube channel ever. So much information compressed in one video. Love it
Thank you, Daniel. Nice to hear. Glad you're enjoying the videos.
My deepest thanks to you and the people willing to give up their knowledge. This channel is my absolute favorite. It's packed with information you can't find anywhere else.
Great advice. I like that this was edited together.
This channel is the finest for screenwriters.
Great stuff ! Thanks !
U r great .giving compiled information in one video really helps begginer writers . This are the best tips for begginer writers .they can now understand ,what writting is all about
Awesome information in this video! Dialogue is more complex than it seems. I've learned so much from Film Courage videos.
I appreciate these actual professionals neither sugarcoat the writing process nor whine about how hard it is. When I started looking into becoming a writer, I found many articles online that either claimed anyone can write a perfect novel in 30 days or complained bitterly about the difficulty of writing a story. It was very disheartening for me as a beginner.
Fabulous. I have to pause very often to complete note-taking!
Bravo and thank you again for drumming all this home. I recommend everyone watch these specials regularly to make all of this come naturally.
I've seen all of these interviews. I watched this compilation when it came out and gave it a thumbs up. I'm watching it again because I still have things to learn.
Thank you, Lon!
Great Channel. I'm a comic book writer / artist and i love listening to your videos while i'm drawing, they're very stimulating.
Thanks Gordon, we love to hear that. How long have you been writing comic books?
@@filmcourage Ive been writing for the past year but i haven't published anything yet. I've written a fantasy saga called Dragon Soul Cycle and i'm doing the art for the first issue. When i started writing a year ago i was pretty amateurish, but as i've continued i devoured videos of film criticism by Hauge and Truby and Skelter and others and my writing skills have improved dramatically. I still try to expand my skills as a writer, i don't think i'll ever stop learning. Your channel is a fantastic resource for aspiring writers and i wish you all the best.
This video I’ve watched, what, four times now. It’s very inspirational.
You are the best channel
thank you for this!!!
This is fantastic. Thank you.
What a valuable piece of info
This really awesome. I have major issues with dialogue and while I don’t write scripts, I tend to use narrative as a crutch. Rather than use the opening cigarette bit, I’ll tend to say the man asked the barman for unfiltered Reds. It’s a bad habit and causing me to delete a lot of garbage so glad this showed up on my feed. Need to watch more than once.
Brilliant! Thank you for that!
A great collection of insightful experts!
So much gold in here. Thank you!
Thanks, glad you found this one!
Really good wisdom from really good writers, im most deffinelty going to use this, and spread this wisdom.
Great video 🙌 good job
3 thumbs up (borrowed 1) for Karl Iglesias, YOU ARE THA MAN. Gave alot of really great info.
Thanks also to Gary Goldstein.
Sensational insight
A wealth of information here from these writers - Thank you! I need William Martell as a mentor - so infectious.
I used to talk to him on the Shop Talk Writers IMDb board all the time. He was the only one claiming to be a professional who wouldn't blow you off entirely for rejecting the advice of the old guard. He took a lot of heat for writing low grade straight to video and TV thrillers, but he always insisted it was the nature of the business, and he'd learned to live with it. I always wondered if he simply compromised too much because he was a nice guy.
Thanks a lot for this.
Film Courage is a legit film school. Thank you all for your hard work!
Thanks Timothy! We appreciate your kind words and support!
What this film brilliantly exposes is how fictional narrative operates within a teleological world view: every action explained by its reason or its end, purpose, or goal. What neurology teaches us is that 90% of the time, we're operating within a habit loop of cue, routine, and reward. In many films, if the "desire line" becomes stretched too taut, I can no longer achieve suspension of disbelief. Hannibal's cue is nitwit arrogance, and his routine is to head to Le Marché for some fava beans and a nice bottle of Chianti. What makes Hannibal a true monster is that his cue+routine+reward loop is indistinguishable from his desire line. He's freakishly integrated. With most other characters, it's a mistake to confuse these distinct psychological systems. By the same token of "why is this word there?" you can ask the same questions of the character's minor desires. Why is this desire there? Because the screenwriter wanted to show us something.
Very usefully compiled commentary... from some of the industry's brightest. Can't get no better than this.
👌
Every time I watch these videos, I get so inspired! Thank you so much!!
Thanks Olga, it's great to see you finding so much inspiration here. Our best to you with your creative works!
@Eli Lis Yes, just one that's waiting to be edited and now I'm working on the second :)
@Eli Lis Thanks!! The finished one is about two people who go on a journey to find a cure to a zombie-monster apocalypse, but discover something even more sinister.
@Eli Lis Yes, for sure! Once I get a few polished, I'm going to try to pitch them :)
this is pure gold. thank you!
Cheers, thanks for watching.
This is an amazing video! Thank you this is 100% how I felt even with my second daughter
9:20 Why have I only just clocked that the lead character's name in a film about sharks is Fin? Why didn't I make that connection before lol? I promise that isn't my only takeaway from this video😂
I really enjoyed this interview...
Film Courage. Thank you 🙏🙏
45:02 - "going down to the mall" - 80s. "going to the skate park" - 90s. :D
54:00 This reminds me of the Will & Grace revival (I refuse to use the word reboot. Lol) in which the entire first opening scene is gratuitous expository, the characters unbelievably running down what's happened to them in the past 10 years. It was pretty funny
As with all Film Courage videos, this has been very helpful and revealing. Thanks so much. I've just finished my first screenplay adapted from one of my novels. It was almost as hard as writing the book, reducing 360 pages to 120. What a learning curve! And renewed respect for all screenwriters. This subject - adapting a novel - might make a good Film Courage video?
Congratulations on finishing your first screenplay, Mark! This would make a great video. Hoping to in the future. Thank you for the suggestion and for the kind words. We do have this from our website: filmcourage.com/2018/03/01/7-tips-adapting-novel-screenplay/
Thx for the video!
This just improved my short film ten times as much 😊👍
This is SO GOOD.
Great advice
Excellent Video
They should interview Tommy Wiseau
Would love to speak with him!
hahaha
Loving William C Martell's opinions. ... very enlightening .
+1
I love William C. Martell in these interviews. He says brilliant things in a brilliant way.
There is an amazing book called "Write Dazzling Dialogue," that will help any writer struggling with dialogue! It is on Amazon, just search the title.
I love this!
Really great discussions. Ended very abruptly while I was really into it. lol
Yes, it ended too abruptly! I agree.
Please make interviews like this on genres
Thank you. This video really got my creative juices going. I finished my rom-com in just two days. I integrated the new experience and it's called now: Untitled Sharknado sequel.
This is awesome. Im about 6 mins in. Never stop uploading lol
Thanks Tony. Never stop watching ; )
Gotta keep keepin on
Great tips
Love from my heart
Great Video!
Brilliant.