ELEMENTS OF DIALOGUE
BAD DIALOGUE
-Long winded, draggy
-Unnecessary
-Cheesy
-On the nose (stating the obvious)
-Mundane
-Dialogue REVEALS CHARACTER
. A character will talk about himself and other people will talk about him.
-Dialogue also reveals background, his emotions (speak quickly- nervous), educational background,
-Dialogue ESTABLISHES RELATIONSHIPS BETWEEN CHARACTERS.
. Once you established your main character’s POV you can use dialogue with other characters to shown that they have other attitudes, creating opposite/alternative POVs.
. This helps to create and sustain the element of conflict
-GOOD EFFECTIVE DIALOGUE WILL MOVE THE STORY FORWARD
-DIALOGUE COMMUNICATES FACES AND INFORMATION TO THE AUDIENCE
. It conveys essential exposition.
. Characters will talk about what happened in the establishing storyline.
-DIALOGUE COMMENTS ON THE ACTION
-DIALOGUE SHOULD BE IN PRESENT TENSE AS IN PRESENT SITUATION.
-DIALOGUE TIES THE SCRIPT TOGETHER
BTW SCENE A AND B, dialogue ties the scene together.
. It is one of the devices that YOU as a writer can use to expand and enlarge your characters.
“IF YOU CAN SEE IT OR HEAR, DON’T WRITE IT.” Neville Smith
-DIALOGUE SHOULD BE USED SPARINGLY
-NEVER TELL THE AUDIENCE WHAT THEY CAN SEE FOR THEMSELVES!!!
<<Dialogue is no substitution for action.
In Hollywood when look at a page and there is too much black, too much ink on the paper, they say: “SHIT! IT’S FREEZE THE CAMERA TIME!!!”
-COMMON MISTAKE
. Students sometimes achieve a level of competence as they tend to reproduce conventional spoken language long statements of REAL TALKING and defend their decision by telling us that: “It’s how the character speaks.”
. Good dialogue is not somebody’s ability to write in authentic speech as heard in real life
If that was all to there is to it you can push a button on the tape recorder and then go collect your Oscar.
When giving a character his dialogue
NOTE: race age gender background educational qualifications physical looks
Biography
-GOOD DIALOGUE is the illusion of reality.
.You got to know how to edit what people say without losing any of the spirit.
-COMMON MISTAKE
. students TEND TO CREATE RADIO SHOWS WITH IMAGES
<<FILM IS A VISUAL MEDIA>>
A screenplay is a story told in pictures
Writing dialogue
Repeat the experiment but husband and wife are your own parents
Get two ppl to read the dialogue
Record the reading
Post it to your blog
Checked.