A Detailed Recipe For Hollywood Screenwriting?


"Summer movies are often described as formulaic. But what few people know is that there is actually a formula—one that lays out, on a page-by-page basis, exactly what should happen when in a screenplay. It’s as if a mad scientist has discovered a secret process for making a perfect, or at least perfectly conventional, summer blockbuster. The formula didn’t come from a mad scientist. Instead it came from a screenplay guidebook [by Blake Snyder], Save the Cat! The Last Book on Screenwriting You’ll Ever Need."

So begins a July 19th, 2013 post to Slate by Peter Sudman that explains - while criticizing the uniformity that comes from - the beat sheet that "lays out, on a page-by-page basis, exactly what should happen when in a screenplay."

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