11 Writing Quotes You Should Take Notice Of (Part 1)

This entry is part 1 of 2 in a series on Writing Quotes.

By the time any writer becomes successful, they’ve typically gathered a war chest worth of things not to do. If one is doing it right, you’re writing, reading, listening, and learning a ton of how to and not to write.

Let’s see what lessons successful writers have learned.

1) Don’t tell me the moon is shining; show me the glint of light on broken glass ~ Anton Chekhov

Chekhov was a playwright and short story writer. Neither television nor movies were part of his world but he knew this fundamental truth which can be said as show don’t tell – the number one commandment of scriptwriters. 

Both TV and features are visual media. And although TV has historically been called a ‘talking heads’ medium, that is no longer as true as it was with large screen TVs and multi-million-dollar budgets going to TV series these days.

The pilot for Game of Thrones cost upwards of eight million dollars. The production showed plenty and it was all gorgeously wrought. Sure, there are times when you must tell. We have both dialogue and narrative in our toolbox. An agent I worked for told me once if the scripts I was reading for her consideration didn’t have great dialogue, pass on it. 

But to understand the power of this trope, we can go to one of the best movies ever made, The Godfather. Two scene sequences spring immediately to mind that tell everything by showing. 

Michael Corleone (Al Pacino) has been attempting the entire film to avoid becoming involved with his family’s business. In the end, he has little choice, especially when his brother Sonny (James Caan) is brutally murdered after an attempt on their father’s life. War has been declared and Michael cannot avoid it. During the baptism of Michael’s sister’s baby, filmmaker Coppola intercut the baptism scene with Michael’s revenge. Countless enemies of the Corleone family are gunned down while Michael and his family attend the baptism ceremony. A stark contrast to be sure and one that tells you everything you need to know about the world that Michael is now fully immersed in.

Similarly, the ending coda with Michael assuring his wife (Diane Keaton) that he did not kill his brother-in-law (he did), and reassured, as she’s leaving his office, a shot of a man kissing Michael’s ring and the office doors being closed on that secretive world tells us, by showing, that Michael is the new don. Those sequences of mainly visuals just don’t get much better.

Director Alfred Hitchcock said it well, “If it’s a good movie, the sound could go off and the audience would still have a pretty clear idea of what was going on.”

2) No form of art goes beyond ordinary consciousness as film does, straight to our emotions, deep into the twilight room of the soul  ~ Ingmar Bergman

We cry, shout, smile, laugh, scream in fear at movies and watching television because the mediums lend themselves to a wide range of emotions that drills into our brains. I still can’t re-watch The Exorcist. That movie shook me to my Roman Catholic roots when I first saw it.

Creating memorable and moving cinema or television is difficult but doing some fundamental things eases the burden.

• Don’t be mundane. I see this all the time with my students’ work. They deliver on a scene we’ve seen a hundred times. Scream made fun of these common tropes, “Don’t say I’ll be right back!” “The killer’s right behind you” (especially if you’re looking in the medicine chest mirror in a bathroom and you close it. The scare-jump from a cat in the alley, and the “meet me at 1:00 AM and I’ll tell you who the murderer is” (and of course they end up dead), etc. These have become (and still are) clichés. Clichés are clichés because they work. But please, I beg my students, vary them, bring something new.
• Pace your scenes properly. Even a bravura action scene becomes tedious if it overstays its welcome. Time some of the scenes in Die Hard. I promise you they crackle and play out properly. Even though people come to the Fast and Furious franchise for cars drifting around corners at hell-bent speeds, an entire movie of that gets boring (well, maybe not if you’re a gear head) so those scenes are varied.
• Most importantly, pay attention to the emotional context of your story and especially your endingThe movies and television that move you (in any way) pay attention to the ‘B’ story which is typically the emotional context of the film. Do you wonder why you see some many films/ TV with love stories in addition to the main plot? That’s what gets us in the feels. No Time To Die broke our hearts because of the tragedy of what Bond (Daniel Craig) was faced with. In order to guarantee his family was safe, he had to kiss a missile and die. Wow. Long after he’s defeated Safin (Rami Malek) (the plot) we weep as Bond dies in a megaton explosion. The Daniel Craig Bond movies paid a lot more attention to the emotional context of the storylines and were less concerned with showing Bond bedding a bevy of beauties.

Film or TV will only work at the highest levels if you’re tapping into what makes us human – our emotions.

3) A special effect is a tool, a means of telling a story. A special effect without a story is a pretty boring thing ~ George Lucas

The road to box office failure is littered with the so-called special effects movies. Tone, genre, and wow factors are established with cool effects from CGI-generated images – not story and that creates a weak story. Too many movies and series rely on the effects and not the human story.

A writer friend once told me that you should be able to eliminate all the special effects and the script should still work.

The king of effects, Christopher Nolan could never be accused of soft-pedaling CGI. His films, which have grossed over six billion dollars, are big screen spectacles filled with insane visuals that bend the mind. But in Inception, it’s the reasons for the story which involve Leonardo DiCaprio’s character’s love interest (Marion Cotillard) and kids that truly propel the story’s existence. The ending moments where he sees his kids and heads for them, whether or not you believe he’s actually back with them or just in another mental illusion, grabs you by the heart and makes you care. It’s a brilliant, effects-laden film with human stakes. And if I eliminated all those crazy effects, I’d still have a touching, powerful story.

4) Drama is life with the dull bits cut out ~ Alfred Hitchcock

If there is one filmmaker who defined genre it was Hitchcock. His movies are white-knuckle masterpieces of suspense and terror. Whatever else he was, he epitomized pacing and tight, driving tales. You can hardly catch your breath in North by Northwest and then you’re propelled into another insane chase or thriller moment. The seminal scene with Cary Grant running away from a crop duster in a field is still one of the most exciting moments in cinema.

Scriptwriting is about big, action or suspense beats tied together with scenes that move the story to those beats. Nothing I hate more than what I call housekeeping scenes. You’ve seen them: characters waking up in the morning and doing their routines, getting a cup of coffee at the local coffee shop, driving to work, etc. Total nonsense. Unless you’re Ross MacDonald/ William Goldman writing about Paul Newman’s Lew Harper character in Harper – and bringing something new to making coffee – avoid the housekeeping scenes.

In case you’re wondering to what I’m referring, it’s the morning scene where Harper is first introduced. 

From the script:

Harper in the bathroom shaving. His face is covered with lather,. He takes an initial quick stroke with his razor, then scowls: clearly, the blade is dull.

HIS SHAVING KIT

Harper’s hand appears, grabs container of razor blades. As the container tilts, it is seen to be empty.
He tosses the container aside, grabs his razor and makes a long pull across his lathered face.

Though it clearly must hurt like hell, he does not grimace.

~~ cut ~~

COFFEE CAN ON TOP OF COOLER

The lid is pulled off revealing that it is empty. He grabs the coffee pot from hot plate, opens it, revealing grounds from previous coffee making.

~~ cut ~~

Harper takes a sip from large mug of scalding coffee, shudders et the taste, then reaches for a shoulder holster end carefully puts it on.

Morning routine and coffee but with a twist. These few scenes show you Harper’s character. He may be a crackerjack detective but a housekeeper he ain’t. Empty razor blades, no coffee but also no fuss – he just deals nonplussed with his lack of home organization which says he must have been there before.

5) Film is a beautiful thing because we can go into a world of ideas, and all of our senses are able to be involved in that ~ David Lynch

There is little doubt that the screenwriters of Scavengers Reign, Joseph Bennett and Charles Huettner, were channeling David Lynch in this weird and wonderful show based on their short film Scavengers. The world, the rules, the situations are all, without pause, strange and bizarre with a beauty that is unmatched in animation or live action. It’s as if all the Star Treks, Expanses and every other first contact sci-fi story were combined and unrolled at warp speed.

Watching the first episode brings you into a place of wonder and danger. You have no basis for normalcy. Truth told, it’s unnerving. And that is great. How many shows could you say that about and truly mean it? It’s visual and mental overload.

Same with Everything Everywhere All At Once that nutsicle feature by Daniel Kwan and Daniel Scheinert. You can’t just watch this once and absorb it. Multiple viewings are necessary to gain any traction in finding any sort of common ground. This film is an absolute riot of ideas, stories, and settings.

These examples would also fit the following definition by filmmaker Werner Herzog:

Filmmaking is a voyage into the unknown, a journey without maps. It’s like driving a taxi at night without headlights and with only one wiper blade, half broken.