The Screenwriter Activist

Writing Social Issue Movies

Marilyn Beker

• Publisher: Routledge
• Year: 2012
• ISBN:
  9781136506628
• Edition: 1
• Topic: Medios de comunicación y artes escénicas
• Subtopic: Escritura de guiones de cine

Hotel Rwanda. Philadelphia. Silkwood. Some of the most important films ever made have tackled real-world social issues, from genocide to homophobia to corporate greed. As storytellers, activist screenwriters recognize that social issues make great stories that can be gut-wrenching, heart-tugging, funny, tragic, and interesting to watch. The Screenwriter Activist helps screenwriters tell those stories in compelling, non-preachy, and inspiring ways.

The Screenwriter Activist is an in-depth, practical guide, appropriate for students in intermediate or graduate screenwriting courses in Film and English Programs as well as professionals who want to write a movie that can make a difference in the world. Using examples from classic and recent popular films, The Screenwriter Activist:

• Explores the motivation and sensibility a screenwriter needs to embark on a social issue project

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• Gives techniques for choosing compelling subjects

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• Provides historical context for social issue movies

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• Explains how characters legitimize social issue themes

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• Puts forward specific models for structuring advocacy screenplays

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  Lays out a roadmap for how screenwriters can get a social issue movie made

If you care deeply about social issues and recognize that films can be highly effective platforms for motivativng audiences to civic involvement and social action, this is the one screenwriting book you need to read.

1

MOTIVATION

Words to Write By

When John Lennon told us we all want to change the world, he was right. We all want to make our mark in some way. Each one of us wants our existence to count for something meaningful. Of course, as Frank Capra pointed out in his 1946 film It’s a Wonderful Life, each one of us does change the world just by being in it. In that movie, the James Stewart character (George Bailey), wishing he had never been born, is suicidal until Clarence (an angel) shows him how the community would have fared had he never existed. Just like George Bailey, each of us, just by being born, has altered the future.

Imagine what the lives of your family, friends, neighbors, and community would be like if you had never lived. If you take the time to do that, you’ll probably see that you have made a considerable difference, and usually, for the better. But sometimes, making an “unintentional” difference for the better isn’t enough. There are those of us who believe that it’s incumbent upon each person to actively try to improve the world in some way. Each one of us can fight in the ongoing war against oppression, evil, hatred, discrimination, injustice and inhumanity and we can do it in ways that don’t involve spending a lot of money, getting beaten up, or taking a bullet. Even small actions taken with great heart can contribute much.

We are inspired by the words of people who’ve made a difference. Their quotes could fill books but here are just a few of them:

Paramahansa Yogananda: “Seek to do brave and lovely things that are left undone by the majority of people. Give gifts of love and peace to those whom others pass by . . . As the vital rays of the sun nurture all, so must you spread the rays of hope in the hearts of the poor and forsaken, kindle courage in the hearts of the despondent and light a new strength in the hearts of those who think they are failures.”¹

Robert F. Kennedy: “. . . each of us can work to change a small portion of events, and in the total of all those acts will be written the history of this generation. . . . It is from numberless diverse acts of courage and belief that human history is shaped. Each time a man stands up for an ideal, or acts to improve the lot of others, or strikes out against injustice, he sends forth a tiny ripple of hope, and crossing each other from a million different centers of energy and daring those ripples build a current which can sweep down the mightiest walls of oppression and resistance.”²

Mother Teresa: “In these times of development, everybody is in a hurry and everybody is in a rush and on the way there are people falling down who are not able to compete. These are the ones we want to love, serve and take care of . . .

We ourselves feel that what we are doing is just a drop in the ocean. But if that drop was not in the ocean, I think the ocean will be less because of that missing drop.”³

Bishop Desmond Tutu: “So often when people hear about the suffering in our world, they feel guilty but rarely does guilt actually motivate action like empathy or compassion. Guilt paralyzes and causes us to deny and avoid what is making us feel guilty. The goal is to replace our guilt with generosity. We all have a natural desire to help and to care and we simply need to allow ourselves to give from our love without self-reproach. We each must do what we can.”⁴

Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr.: “When an individual is no longer a true participant, when he no longer feels a sense of responsibility to his society, the content of democracy is emptied.”⁵

“It really boils down to this—that all life is inter-related. We are all caught in an inescapable network of mutuality, tied in a single garment of destiny. Whatever affects one directly, affects all indirectly. We are made to live together because of the inter-related structure of reality.”⁶

“Every man must decide whether he will walk in the light of creative altruism or the darkness of destructive selfishness. This is the judgment. Life’s most persistent and urgent question is, “What are you doing for others?”⁷

The Dalai Lama: “We need to base our lives on altruistic concern aimed not just at our own private welfare but also at the good of society.”⁸

“Each one of us is responsible for all humankind. We need to think of each other as true sisters and brothers and to be concerned with each other’s welfare. We must seek to lessen the suffering of others.”⁹

Bill Gates: “Not everyone can go in the field, or even donate. But every one of us can be an advocate for people whose voices are often not heard. I encourage everyone to get involved in working for solutions to the challenges those people face. It will draw you in for life.”¹⁰

Karen Armstrong: “Compassion doesn’t mean feeling sorry for people . . . it’s not pity. We are putting ourselves in other people’s shoes to feel/ experience with the other. Realize we have an absolute responsibility to end the suffering of the world, to feel responsible for our peers and to try to alleviate suffering all around the globe. This is our duty as human beings.”¹¹

St. Francis of Assisi: “Lord, make me an instrument of thy peace. Where there is hatred, let me sow love; where there is injury, pardon; where there is doubt, faith; where there is despair, hope; where there is sadness, joy; where there is darkness, light.”¹²

Swami Sri Yukteswar Giri: “Those who remove our troubles, dispel our doubts, and bestow peace are true teachers. They perform a Godlike work. Their opposites (those who increase our doubts and difficulties) are harmful to us and should be avoided like poison.”¹³

Exercise

Find a quote that motivates you, write it down and keep it beside your computer as you write. When the writing becomes difficult or you doubt yourself and your work, read it over to keep you going.

2

TAKING ACTION

Lots of us have taken inspirational words to heart. We give money, we work in soup kitchens, we tutor, we join the Peace Corps, we help friends and neighbors in difficulty. Americans are among the most generous people in the world. We came to the aid of victims of the Japanese and Haitian earthquakes, the Indonesian tsunami, the Darfur tragedy and more.

A Tradition of Good Works

According to Giving USA, a report compiled annually by the American Association of Fundraising Counsel, Americans gave more than $307.75 billion to their favorite causes despite the economic conditions in 2009. Seventy-five percent of that amount came from individuals. But it’s not all about money. Many of us give our time and energy too.

The Corporation for National and Community service said that in 2009, 63.4 million Americans volunteered to help their communities by distributing food, working in education, health, civic services, sports, the arts and religious organizations. In fact, 35.6 percent of volunteering was based in religious organizations. It’s after all the fundamental teaching of all religions to serve and give. The Bible is often quoted as encouragement to tithe—particularly the book of Malachi (the last book in the Old Testament):

Bring all the tithes into the storehouse and there may be meat in my house, and prove me now herewith saith the Lord of hosts, if I will not open you the windows of heaven and pour you out a blessing, that there shall not be room enough to receive it¹

Hence the saying, “he who gives, gets.”

All Christians are urged to tithe 10 percent of their incomes. The Q’uran urges all Muslims to give to charity. The Torah requires all Jews to tithe as well. Buddhists are enjoined to practice compassion. But even atheists, taking humanism for their creed, can and do join the giving in the belief that, as a species, we need each other to survive and by helping each other, we can all make a contribution toward world betterment. As Sri Daya Mata says, “the once vast world is now more like a household, with each member interlinked and dependent on the others.”² Screenwriters are in a particularly advantageous position to make a significant contribution to world betterment. The films we write affect large international audiences and by writing movies about social issues we can inspire masses of people to take action that could truly change the world. That’s because all the movies that screenwriters write have a definite effect on mass consciousness. Every 35-foot image projected before an audience influences that audience in some way. Media theorists have written scads of books explaining just how films influence both our culture and our psyches. I won’t belabor their points. Everyone now knows that the images movie audiences see have an emotional effect which can cause specific actions. Movie images can incite audiences to buy products, dress in specific ways and even go to war.

The Influence of Movies on Trends and Fashion

Advertisers know this and push for “product placement” in films to up sales of their products. (Product placement “involves incorporating brands in movies in return for money or for some promotional or other considerations.”³) As an article in the Journal of Marketing reports, “product placement spending in the U.S. grew at an annual rate of almost 34% to $2.9 billion in 2007 and was projected to reach $5.6 billion in 2010.”⁴

Morgan Spurlock’s 2011 feature documentary The Greatest Movie Ever Sold is specifically about product placement—a behind the scenes look at how advertisers operate in today’s movie market. Spurlock (who made Super-Size Me—the 2004 movie about the fast food industry) entirely financed his film by advertising and product placement.

Fashion Designers know that movies set fashion trends. Regular folks, not necessarily into style, still want to look like characters in their favorite films. In the silent era all the girls in America imitated Louise Brooks’ bobbed hair. In the 1930s and 1940s, women wore pants like Katharine Hepburn, high heels like Joan Crawford and long locks like Veronica Lake. In the 1950s, they wore skin-tight dresses like Marilyn Monroe and pearls like Audrey Hepburn. James Dean made white tee-shirts popular when he wore them in Rebel Without a Cause. In the Sixties, Bonnie and Clyde had women wearing berets and guys wearing vests. Easy Rider mainstreamed hippie chic. In the 1970s Saturday Night Fever had every guy wearing a white suit (just like John Travolta) to his prom. Annie Hall made women dress Diane Keaton-like in over-sized men’s wear, hats and ties. In the 1980s Flashdance was...