Writing a period piece w/o mentioning the year?

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  • Writing a period piece w/o mentioning the year?

    I'm working on a script that takes places in the 80's but I don't know how to show it with out using a title card. I feel if I do that readers will expect the story to eventually shift to the present. It will be obvious the story takes place in that era so I don't see the need to tell the reader. Is it necessary to blatantly write that it's the 80's? Thanks.
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  • #2
    Re: Writing a period piece w/o mentioning the year?

    I guess I don't feel your concerns about audience expectation is warranted. The title card is obviously the easiest way to go, and instantly cues the audience's subconscious as to the zeitgeist of the era and sets a tone.

    If you're dead set against that I've often seen films use tropes like something playing on TV that instantly identifies the time period (e.g. a Ronald Reagan speech or something), glimpses of news headlines, a conversation that places us there. But those always feel obvious to me for what they are.

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    • #3
      Re: Writing a period piece w/o mentioning the year?

      I specify the model and year of a car on the street. Sometimes I work a president's name into the dialog if it fits naturally.

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      • #4
        Re: Writing a period piece w/o mentioning the year?

        Nobody drives a K-car unless it's the 80s. Brick mobile phones, early Madonna also do the trick. If there's something specific to your location, even better.

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        • #5
          Re: Writing a period piece w/o mentioning the year?

          I think not mentioning the year might create confusion.

          What's the issue with telling us the year?

          Bill
          Free Script Tips:
          http://www.scriptsecrets.net

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          • #6
            Re: Writing a period piece w/o mentioning the year?

            A reader would already know when your script takes place from the logline.

            The person watching the finished film would need to know whether it was 1982 or 1985, though, so it has to be mentioned up front, either by card or dialog, which means it has to be in the script.


            Originally posted by canela View Post
            Nobody drives a K-car unless it's the 80s.
            http://www.cultjer.com/bill-murray-b...car-st-vincent

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            • #7
              Re: Writing a period piece w/o mentioning the year?

              Originally posted by kintnerboy View Post
              The person watching the finished film would need to know whether it was 1982 or 1985, though
              Why?

              Plenty of films are set in the past and there's no mention of date.

              Personally, I'd mention it in the script, but if it's obvious it's in that era, I don't see why there's a need for a title card in the finished film.

              Originally posted by TimAucoin View Post
              I feel if I do that readers will expect the story to eventually shift to the present.
              I don't think they expect that.
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              • #8
                Re: Writing a period piece w/o mentioning the year?

                Originally posted by Timmy View Post
                Plenty of films are set in the past and there's no mention of date.
                Well, obviously a writer can do whatever they want. This just seems like an odd place to plant a flag to me, is all. There is nothing negative in any way, not for the reader or the viewer or the production or the budget to have a title card up front.

                As far as the quote above goes, I don't think it's true. After taking a quick glance at a bunch of recent screenplays, including A Most Violent Year, Foxcatcher, Kill The Messenger, Wolf Of Wall Street, Philomena and Kill Your Darlings, every single one of them mentions the year, either by title card or dialog in the first couple of pages.

                A couple of others, Imitation Game and Theory Of Everything, use context to get the era across on screen visually but also put the dates in the sluglines for the reader's benefit.

                Again, there are so many other things to worry about when writing a script, I would let this one go.

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                • #9
                  Re: Writing a period piece w/o mentioning the year?

                  Although I do agree that a title card does not cause the reader/viewer to anticipate a time jump later.

                  If anything, the opposite is true. When I see a film begin in the 1980's, particularly if it features young people, I'm expecting the "25 years later...." super.

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                  • #10
                    Re: Writing a period piece w/o mentioning the year?

                    Originally posted by wcmartell View Post
                    I think not mentioning the year might create confusion.

                    What's the issue with telling us the year?
                    Agreed - it immediately solves lots of problems. Just tell us the year, or more generally describe the period as early 1980s or mid-80s or whatever. This allows the reader immediate insight into context and props, fashions, etc. Either a title card or a note in the first action lines, e.g. "San Francisco - 1983." To some extent it also depends on what it is that makes it "obvious the story takes place in that era" but don't be coy about it, it's more important to be clear and unambiguous.
                    "Friends make the worst enemies." Frank Underwood

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                    • #11
                      Re: Writing a period piece w/o mentioning the year?

                      I'm going through this exact same thing (funny how you find similarities when you search the archives).

                      What do you think of having no discernible time period a la Archer or It Follows where the technology, clothes, references, cars span decades?

                      It's for a one-hour TV drama if that makes a difference.
                      Last edited by EnsconcedinVelvet; 09-28-2015, 06:09 PM.

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                      • #12
                        Re: Writing a period piece w/o mentioning the year?

                        Originally posted by TimAucoin View Post
                        I'm working on a script that takes places in the 80's but I don't know how to show it with out using a title card. I feel if I do that readers will expect the story to eventually shift to the present. It will be obvious the story takes place in that era so I don't see the need to tell the reader. Is it necessary to blatantly write that it's the 80's? Thanks.
                        I put an earlier version of a drama set in the '80s on BL and got a note that if I set what they perceived as a love triangle in the '80s, I should show how things worked out in the present (which man the main character "chose"?) and that it should be in the pilot. So maybe people do expect this?

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                        • #13
                          Re: Writing a period piece w/o mentioning the year?

                          BL also said that if you're going to set something in a different time period that it should be justified by having the decade inform everything in the script and if you don't do that it should be set in the present. I guess I agree, but to me that sounds like Mad Men kind of standards and I'm not sure every script that's set in anything but the present adheres to that.

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                          • #14
                            Re: Writing a period piece w/o mentioning the year?

                            Another reason I want to set mine in an undefined time period is that I think period pieces are a much tougher sell for an unestablished writer. I do worry that it might look confusing though.
                            Last edited by EnsconcedinVelvet; 09-28-2015, 12:59 PM.

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                            • #15
                              Re: Writing a period piece w/o mentioning the year?

                              You can just write in when it takes place without making it a title screen.

                              After the cover page would work fine. Just a line saying something like, "The following takes place in the early 1980's." You could put it in your opening description as well, or the first scene heading.

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