Third draft
Working on the third draft of Night Shift this week has not only been very productive creatively, but it has also been revealing in what I have discovered about myself as a writer and the way in which I tell my stories for screen. In particular, my use of visual metaphor within the script to encourage metaphorical insight in the viewer.
Windows, mirrors, glass is a motif I have used before in my writing. Though up until now, I have not given much thought to how and why I might be using it in my screenwriting. The motif appears throughout the script, at key moments within the story:
-
- a woman looks through an office window;
- a woman sees her reflection in a mirror;
- a woman stands in a shop doorway, framed by a large window;
- a woman breaks a glass bottle;
An arrangement of recurring images, inserted subconsciously as I assembled the rough draft.
What strikes me about this is not so much the fact that I have, once again, drawn upon this motif in my writing, but the effect it appears to have within this particular screenplay. Deciding to redraft the script from a purely visual perspective enabled me to engage with the story at a cinematic level, to redraft it with my mind's eye, as it were.
Cumulatively, these images of the woman and windows, mirrors, glass, build up into a composite portrait of a young woman trapped, struggling to break free. The image develops over time (Carroll 2001: 352) through repetition and variation, leaving a subliminal impression upon the viewer's imagination. The motif of 'window, mirror, glass' is being used as a way of prompting insight within the viewer, rather than stating it in language (Carroll 2001: 365).
After pondering the windows, mirrors, glass motif within Night Shift, I have discovered a meaning within the story that hadn't occurred to me as I was drafting the script: that Lanya is confined, hermetically sealed within her own glass bubble. She may feel safe within her bubble. But in the end, she must break the glass and set herself free.
References
CARROL, Noel. 2001. Beyond Aesthetics: Philosophical Essays. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press
Second draft
Although rewriting the rough draft was has been a very challenging experience, it was a time in the screenwriting process when I saw myself as a 'screen-wright', crafting and shaping a script. I began to see the story take on a life and form of its own. It was also a time when I had to be sure to keep an open mind, and let the ideas come to me unhindered, as I read and re-read what I had written.
I started by printing off the script and looking at it as a separate object. As a text that exists outside my computer, away from the ease and temptation to delete lines and change words on the screen. I took time to sit down and read it, first as if I was the audience, then again making notes on the script, as I identified issues within the scenes that I felt needed addressing, such as scene headers, scene descriptions, characterisation, dialogue, scene structure, cinematic qualities, and so on.
I went back over the key plot points, and adjusted the end of act climaxes and turning points to create a stronger framework for the story. John Finnegan's webinar on deep structure and the 'Story Structure Masterclass' handout were particularly helpful here.
There were times during redrafting when I couldn't find satisfactory solutions to the problems I had identified within the script. The first act seemed to set up the world and tone of the story, and introduce the protagonist and the initial problem effectively, but the second and thirds acts were patchy and incomplete. I have also spent a lot of time this week worrying about fitting the plot points to a rigid structure. What seemed to work in both the treatment and the step outline has proven difficult to achieve while writing the actual screenplay.