Screenwriting gimmicks

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  • Screenwriting gimmicks

    What are some examples of screenwriting gimmicks?

    How about:
    • Examples of when a gimmick was rather clever and served a purpose?
    • Examples of when a gimmick failed and was just lame...
    • Are there any big named writers that use or possibly rely on gimmicks?
    Does first person and second person narration count as a gimmick? Has second person ever been used?

    What else is there to know about gimmicks?

    Yep, this thread is all about gimmicks, gimmicks, gimmicks baby...

  • #2
    Re: Screenwriting gimmicks

    Yea, I've got Passengers and White Jazz which are both in first person. Still haven't read them though.

    Trust me, I don't have the balls to try something that extreme but I'm just curious because I love it when someone breaks all the "rules" of screenwriting and gets away with it.

    That stuff really does interest me...

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    • #3
      Re: Screenwriting gimmicks

      Production is just the icing on the cake. To my knowledge, the writers got paid, people were impressed, thus leading to other writing gigs.

      Just like Zahler (Brigands of Rattleborge) and to a lesser extent Beacham (Killing on Carnival Row). Rattleborge has set Zahler up with a pretty sweet ride, same with Beacham.

      I think this is an important thing for all new screenwriters to learn. A script doesn't have to go into production, or even sell to serve a purpose. If it gets you noticed and your name out there, that sounds pretty damn good to me.

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      • #4
        Re: Screenwriting gimmicks

        In production doesn't count until you have a director and cast

        Yea, you're definitely right. It would be a risky move. But at the end of the day, a rejection is a rejection. Screenwriting is a risky and tireless business. If it was easy... well, then it would be easy... yea, that makes sense?

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        • #5
          Re: Screenwriting gimmicks
          • asides to the reader in the description
          • telling the story backwards(Memento)
          • Telling the story out of sequence(Pulp Fiction)
          • Having a big action opening sequence
          • Multiple scenes at the same time(Timecode)
          • Dialogue directed to the audience.
          • Dialogue consisting of grunts(Quest for Fire)
          • Redoing the same scene over and over(Groundhog Day, Run Lola Run).

          Last night in San Pedro

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          • #6
            Re: Screenwriting gimmicks

            I think the whole "massive action opening sequence" is just there to hook the audience in the first 10 pages. Everyone is always ranting about how your opening 10 pages need to be epic and blah blah blah.

            I'm personally rather over big action openings, because they rarely deliver. Example - Swordfish. That opening sequence was pretty awesome (even though the crap talk about Hollywood was lame...), but the film didn't deliver. The next biggest plot point was Halle Berry's nipples...

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            • #7
              Re: Screenwriting gimmicks

              Originally posted by Xnod View Post
              I'm personally rather over big action openings, because they rarely deliver. Example - Swordfish. That opening sequence was pretty awesome (even though the crap talk about Hollywood was lame...), but the film didn't deliver. The next biggest plot point was Halle Berry's nipples...
              They delivered.

              Last night in San Pedro

              Comment


              • #8
                Re: Screenwriting gimmicks

                Halle Berry's nipples you mean?

                Yea, they delivered.

                Anyway,

                I think Memento is the perfect example of a successful gimmick (whether or not you see it as a gimmick). The way Memento forced the character's flaw onto the viewer was genius.
                Last edited by Xnod; 12-05-2009, 04:10 PM.

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                • #9
                  Re: Screenwriting gimmicks

                  What about two characters turning out to be one person? Fight Club and My Bloody Valentine (crappy example) do it and Psycho was one of the early examples.

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                  • #10
                    Re: Screenwriting gimmicks

                    Some screenplay ideas may seem more unusual than others, but I'm not sure how we can decide to call any screenplay ideas gimmicks when you consider that every screenplay is an air castle built out of nothing but imaginings.

                    Telling a story forward or backward, using or not using voice over are simply part of that writer's imaginings while conjuring that story. A screenplay is considered a work of genius or a failure because of how well it's imagined and told. Voice over works beautifully in some cases, awkwardly in others, and the same goes for anything else we might call a gimmick, IMHO.

                    Originally posted by Xnod View Post
                    I think Memento is the perfect example of a successful gimmick (whether or not you see it as a gimmick). The way Memento forced the character's flaw onto the viewer was genius.

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                    • #11
                      Re: Screenwriting gimmicks

                      The twist ending. If done wrong, it can feel really cheap. Generally, it's not done right. Another related one is the bait and switch.

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                      • #12
                        Re: Screenwriting gimmicks

                        Yea, very true. In my opinion, most twist endings fail. The real question is can similar twists to Fight Club work now when it's been done so well already? If I remember correctly Identity made it its own, and even though it wasn't a twist I found Mr. Brook's alter ego hilarious.

                        I think foreshadowing is very important with any twists.

                        So here's my question to you, how would/could you put a fresh spin on the multiple personality twist?

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                        • #13
                          Re: Screenwriting gimmicks

                          The story takes place in real time(Nick of Time)

                          Last night in San Pedro

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                          • #14
                            Re: Screenwriting gimmicks

                            I once wrote a Multiple Personality story where the audience and the protag knew the "two people" were really one. That was my spin...and I could probably reuse it in a different story for better affect.

                            I don't see a lot of these as gimmicks though. Wouldn't a gimmick have nothing to do with the story but asthetically...like using anime and black and white scenes interspersed with colour live action as a gimmick (Kill Bill) or using Rotoscoping (Scanner Darkly) or even 3D as a gimmick?
                            One meets his destiny often in the road he takes to avoid it. - French Proverb

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                            • #15
                              Re: Screenwriting gimmicks

                              I have a treatment about identity theft with no twist end... but the protag's actual identity is stolen - there is someone who looks just like him who has taken over his life and is sleeping with his wife and using his credit cards and getting him fired from his job... and no one will believe that it is some other guy. And I guess if there is any twist to it - it *is* some other guy.

                              Hey, no one has mentioned Nic Roeg and those films that are connected, not by time, but by *emotion*. So the stories have scatter shot chronology - scenes completely out of order by time, but in a story order based on the emotional journey. PETULIA (shot by Roeg and directed by Richard Lester, and written by Lawrence Marcus) jumps all over in time, but the story is linear. That is, each scene logically follows the preceding scene as far as the story is concerned... even if it takes place *before* the preceding scene. Flashbacks and flashforwards and flashsideways.

                              I think what you want to do is make it *not* a gimmick, but the best possible way to tell the story. You are practically forced by the story to tell it this way.

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

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