Screenwriting Commons^™

A Screenplay For Bystander Intervention For Sexual Harassment Scenarios For College Students, Shanti Herzog

Journalism

This project was developed to describe the drafting of a screenplay for an interactive, virtual reality sexual harassment training module for students of the California Polytechnic University, San Luis Obispo. The research began with the examination of the prevalent and persisting issue of sexual harassment within college campus communities, and how to present college students with the tools to intervene as bystanders, thus encouraging them to intervene when encountering sexual harassment scenarios. The resulting screenplay was written to provide college students at Cal Poly with strategies to identify and take action when encountering sexual harassment, especially in small group gatherings ...

Developing The Screenwriter’S Notebook And Its Implementation Of The Adapted Comic Book Origin Story Of Solstice, Mohansingh Udhwani Jr.

Honors Theses

This thesis features three documents: The Screenwriter's Notebook Template, The Screenwriter's Notebook: Solstice, and a reflection paper. The Screenwriter's Notebook Template is a planning and pitch tool designed to help screenwriters tell better stories, faster. The template is designed so the user may start with one word (the thematic subject) and flush out their story through a series of guided diagrams inspired by the works of Robert McKee, Dara Marks, and John Vorhaus. The end result is the user developing a detailed scenic model outlining what is happening in each scene in conjunction with Marks' Transformational Arc ...

Bernadette: A Screenplay, Dain Bedford-Pugh

Master of Arts in Humanities | Master's Theses

'Bernadette: A Screenplay' is the first half of a feature-length comedy-drama road movie that centers on the relationship between Bernadette - an introverted IT professional in her late twenties - and her elderly father. When Bernadette makes a big change in her life by quitting the job that she has come to hate, she decides to take the trip of a lifetime by traveling across America. She also decides to take her father, who is on the verge of moving into a care home, with her. What follows is an exploration of their relationship, their facing up to long-hidden grief over the ...

Adapting To Adaptation: Turning Ya Literature Into Television, Adam Weinreb

English Honors Theses

I have always loved film and television, whether for casual consumption or academic pursuits. Throughout my time as an English and American Studies double major (and almost a Media and Film Studies minor), I have opted to study film and TV at every chance I could. In my junior year I began writing my own film, and I completed that film in the first half of senior year. When entering my final year of the English major and faced with making a decision surrounding my capstone, I was simultaneously deciding whether or not to pursue graduate studies in screenwriting. As ...

You Were There : An Exploration And Analysis Of The Filmmaking Process, Regan Emfinger

Honors Theses

This thesis explores the process of writing, shooting, and editing my short film You Were There. My process involved scriptwriting with several revisions, shooting with a cast and crew, and editing the raw footage. This paper will not only serve as a timeline leading up to the final product of the film but also will explain the function of each artistic choice. This paper will also outline the biggest lessons I learned about fictional narratives, and discuss the successes and failures of the film as a whole. I also plan on discussing how those lessons will further my academic and ...

The Portrayal Of Roman Gladiators And Slavery In Film, Megan Gingerich

Senior Honors Theses

This thesis project will endeavor to examine how prominent historical films set in the Roman Empire deal with slavery and gladiators, said research to inform a corresponding creative project. In studying and analyzing Ben-Hur (1959), Spartacus (1960) and Gladiator (2000), the three most prominent films that deal with the topics of slavery and gladiators in ancient Rome, I hope to uncover how films treat the topic, how the films are influenced by more modern values, and how accurate the films are. I will also identify commonalities between all three films, and supplement my discoveries with observations from two less successful ...

The Marduk Archives: A Take On Thresholds, Christopher Melton

Honors Theses

A fictional screenplay exploring the relationship between absurdity and convention as it pertains to the shifting cultural paradigms of our society. (Under the direction of Beth Spencer)

The Yellow Belly Anthology: Micro-Films About Humans At Their Least Impressive, Tommy Armstrong

English Honors Papers

In the fall semester of 2019, I worked with my adviser Dr. Jon Volkmer on writing sixty sixty-second shorts on the theme of human insecurity, based off of real-life experiences and stories. I wrote a series of micro-scripts satirizing human self-consciousness and anxiety — moments that are rushed over or lost in longer-form mass media and film. The scripts show humans at their most indecisive, insecure, and vulnerable. Each of these scripts give glimpses into one or two people’s interior lives as they find themselves in a particular nerve-provoking situation. In all of the shorts, a person must overcome, submit ...

“Putting Out Fires”: An Original Situational Comedy Pilot Episode Examining Modern Motherhood, Keely Gonyea

Honors College

Even in an age of easily accessible and ever-changing digital content, television remains one of the most influential modes of media. Shows, on television and on streaming services, play key roles in informing their audiences of societal conventions. Situational comedies are an easily identifiable genre on television and their popularity has not wavered as seen by their steadfast presence during primetime viewing slots. This thesis explores and analyzes how situational comedies have created spaces for potentially harmful stereotypes for their female characters, specifically mothers. The creative work of this thesis offers an original situational comedy pilot episode that looks to ...

All That Is Necessary, Jes Martinez

Honors Theses

Based on Real Events & the New York Times article "Rohingya Recount Atrocities: 'They Threw My Baby Into a Fire'" by Jeffrey Gettleman (Oct. 11, 2017)

Edmund Burke has been attributed the saying, “All that is necessary for the triumph of evil is for good men to do nothing.” I am in my second draft of a screenplay exploring the tangled web of factors which led to the ethnic cleansing campaign against the Rohingya Muslims, a minority group in Myanmar, which began in late 2016. Suu Kyi and her administration deny its occurrence.

A tumultuous history of empires, invasions, and migrations, brought different ethno-religious groups into proximity. Britain’s colonization entrenched pre-existing tensions. Assimilation attempts of a military regime against the minority groups incited tensions to turn to violence as the minorities sought to protect their identities. The government’s denial of the Rohingya’s citizenship allowed the violence to escalate into ethnic cleansing. Suu Kyi’s silence and implicit accomplice betrayed her image as a globally renowned icon of democracy and human rights by enabling the persecution of the Rohingya to continue, unpunished. World leaders denounce her and her administration, rescind her prizes, and call for the government to rectify the situation; yet they otherwise, effectively, do nothing. It is all too easy to sit in our relatively comfortable, safe lives and, without even attempting to understand them, condemn and demonize others, while not affecting any amount of real change. We didn’t start the fire, but we let it burn.

The Art Of The Game: Issues In Adapting Video Games, Sydney Baty

Dissertations, Theses, and Student Research: Department of English

On the face of things, movies and video games are similar mediums. Both engage extensively in visuals and audio, both can indulge in speculative fiction, and there is a healthy amount of sharing of inspiration and content. However, this does not guarantee successful adaptations from one form to another. Movies adapted from video games are notorious for being simply terrible, but little academic attention has been paid as to why these adaptations in particular seem so unsuccessful in every way, from audience reception, critical response, and monetary returns. This issue is based on fundamental differences in the medium. Games are ...

Transcendental Style In Film: Ozu, Bresson, Dreyer (2nd Edition), Michael Gibson

Journal of Religion & Film

This is a book review of Paul Schrader's Transcendental Style in Film: Ozu, Bresson, Dreyer, 2nd edition (Oakland, CA: University of California Press, 2018).

The Others (2001) By Alejandro Amenábar In The Light Of Valentinian Thought, Fryderyk Kwiatkowski

CLCWeb: Comparative Literature and Culture

The article offers a Valentinian interpretation of the Hollywood film The Others (2001). A particular attention is paid to the ways in which cinematic motifs and narrative elements of the film draw on myths, ideas and symbolic imagery present in Valentinian works, especially in the Gospel of Truth (NHC I, 3) and the Gospel of Philip (NHC II, 3). In the course of the heuristic analysis, the paper argues that although the film employs Valentinian ideas, it depicts different understanding of the world. This issue is addressed in the last part of the article by situating the film within broader ...

Binaural: Trauma And Disability Representation In Cinema, Joshua Grossberg

All Dissertations, Theses, and Capstone Projects

In the year 2019, the film business is undergoing profound change. Streaming services like Netflix and Amazon have become major distribution outlets, threatening the hegemony of traditional Hollywood studios and altering the kinds of movies that receive a theatrical release. Gone is the middle budget film, replaced by franchises like Marvel Cinematic Universe, The Fast and the Furious and Star Wars based on already popular intellectual property. But that's not all. In the wake of the fallout of the #OscarsSoWhite controversy and the #MeToo Movement, for the first time serious efforts are being made both outside and inside the ...

0566: Robert S. Tamplin Jr. Papers, 1948-1992, Marshall University Special Collections

Guides to Manuscript Collections

The Robert Tamplin Collection is composed of two broad series of materials: personal papers and professional papers related to Tamplin’s life as a CBS executive. Personal papers, comprising a portion of only one box, include greeting cards (mostly Christmas), personal correspondence, clippings, financial materials, and yearbooks. Professional papers and materials, comprising approximately 43 boxes, include correspondence and memos, planning materials for shows and events, show schedules and contact information, employee newsletters, script drafts for television and radio shows, professional magazines and publications, materials from Tamplin’s office, resumes, programs for plays and events, and audiovisual materials of programs that ...

Escaping Suburbia: A Study In Film Auteur Pertaining To Tim Burton And The Coen Brothers, Morgan Bedard

Undergraduate Honors Theses

This project will focus on the concept of “Auteur Theory” which is a particular film theory branch that emphasizes the filmmaker as the “author” of their work. “Auteur” is a French word meaning “author” in the sense of a person holding complete creative control. Studying Auteur Theory allows for viewers to better understand the filmmaker as a person by connecting visual patterns to the auteurs’ own life. The “filmmaker” in Auteur Theory is defined as the director and they must exercise almost or complete control of all aspects of a film. Distinct visual characteristics as well as repeated casting of ...

Pre-Professional, Sophia C. Doctoroff

Senior Projects Spring 2020

Sonya Sternberg, a former pre-professional ballet student, must navigate a new life and a shattered sense of self after an emotional breakdown forces her to leave the dance world in this eight-hour semi-autobiographical limited drama series. The action toggles back and forth between periods of Sonya’s life: her darkly eccentric and at times endearingly quirky childhood in suburban upstate New York, her deliriously joyous year as a ballet student in New York City, her tortured teenage years, and her soul-searching time at a rural New York college.

Fell Awake, Caleb M A Short

Senior Projects Spring 2020

“My birthday was yesterday, was it not?”

In my senior thesis film I explore the transience of life, of time, and interpersonal relationship.

We follow our central character, Elias, during the night of his 21st birthday party and the day to follow. In this new day, time, space, and the relationships with those closest to him have changed.

“All time is immemorial. The present is the future ignored, the past not remembered; but how can you hold on to thin air?”

Here To Win, Not Here To Settle, Sarah Kaino

Student Scholar Symposium Abstracts and Posters

Ethnic representation goes beyond color blind casting, the diversity of actors, or non-stereotypical casting choices. It is not just a matter of minorities being included in mainstream storylines, but minorities being able to tell their own stories as well. The relevance and relatability of storytelling in film and theatre transcends culture, which is in part the beauty of these mediums. But the impact of Asian Americans seeing stories from their own culture cannot be exchanged for anything less because there is no substitute for visibility. Movies are the source of inspiration for many. Movies can also reinforce a transparent ceiling ...

Pathos, Fall 2019, Portland State University. Student Publications Board

Pathos

Editor: Sadie Jordan