I have trouble staying on task. Here I am trying to write a Noir screenplay and I start watching all these Noir films for inspiration, motivation and character. I get the first act down, a few later scenes and most of the ending. I rewrite some of the dialogue, change a characters name, move a few locations around, reorganize the outline to reflect said changes and here I am without anything finished. In fact, I've already moved on to a new project that has nothing to do with this one.
Sometimes I'm able to incorporate a new idea into the existing screenplay I'm working on, but right now, I can't focus on shit and I don't think the new material will work it's way into the Noir script. It's not like I have ADD or anything, at least not to my knowledge, but I'm not diagnosed so who knows. I just can't stick the the goddamn subject I'm trying to hammer out. I'm actually quite bored with my material, even though I believe in it.
So now I'll go to work on this new material, hoping I can finish it before I get bored with it too. This is how it usually goes: start something, get excited and full of creative bursts, get everything down and find out I need more, lose interest or get bored, start a new subject or work on an old one, repeat. Sometimes I come back around to an old script I had given up all hope on, only to finish it in its entirety. So, there is hope that I can come back to this at a later time and give it the gusto it deserves.
I can't stop watching movies. It's like a fucking addiction, no really. I get home from the ol' "9 to 5" and make a list of shit to do. It's usually comprised of the simple things: clean apartment, do dishes, feed cat, do laundry, yoga, kegal exercises, etc, etc. But then I'll make my "creative checklist" which is more or less compiled with wishful thinking: finish Noir screenplay, finish reading Crime and Punishment, read chapter of editing software, etc, etc. And then I do nothing. I put a film in and sit there watching it all night long. By the time the film's over, it's "too late" to do anything, so then I just go to sleep to do it all over again the next day.
It's probably just the climate change. Starting tonight, I'll get back into it. Into the groove, into the flow of working out the kinks of boredom and apathy.... tomorrow.
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1 comment:
You are in the learning and experimenting phase, I'd say. Is normal and you are lucky to be there. Lots of "writers" have one idea and don't even start writing the first sentence. Better to have a flow of ideas and one day, a really good one will stick long enough for you to finish it. It is not good to force yourself to the end of a bad idea, it is a waste of time. At a certain point, you have to recognize a great idea, though, and force yourself to the end of that, like a job. Putting time between ideas, letting them percolate, and then going back to them later is a good way to determine which ones are good. Most of my early scripts suck turds and are better forgotten. But now, my material is getting better and better and major projects are ripening.
You are definitely not apathetic, maybe a bit attention deficit disordered. Allow all the movies to sink into the brain, it is a necessary part of the process. No need to feel bad about it. Watching movies is your homework if you want to be a screenwriter/filmmaker.
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