Screenwriting #8-9: The film finish line

This past week I did the unthinkable, I finished writing a full length film. The last time I blogged about screenwriting I had written 71 pages of Marathon Money. Originally it was going to be a 90 minute film and I got to 90 minutes and realised I still had lots to say. So it ended up being 120 minutes, which is 120 pages.

It was still easy to write although at the start of the week I did stall a bit. Even though you invest time into the characters they can’t always distract you from real life and I got a bit hurt. And it stopped me, but then I realised that I still needed to write and I still needed to finish the challenge. So I controlled the hurt, I let it control me for me 15 minutes, had a good cry and then powered on through and wrote.

With Marathon Money being about the marathon, towards the end I did struggle a little and I guess I had it easy the majority of the time writing. I then remembered the advice that author David Nicholls gave me; think of a film you want it to be like, watch it if you can or think of a beautiful piece of writing. So I thought of a film it would be similar to, and combined with putting my ipod on shuffle and get inspiration from different bits of music I got through the temporary block and finished the screenplay.

A few people have asked me what I’m going to do with it now that its done. Well I’m going to let it rest a little, and then go back and read through and make notes before I do a second draft. I haven’t got to the second draft stage so I’m a bit nervous about that stage!