Compelling Composition: Screenplays.

Script Frenzy starts in just a few short weeks. Their website has resources for aspiring script writers, and one piece of advice they had was to read screenplays of movies and then watch those movies to see how everything comes together. I never got to see "Despicable Me" in the theaters, so that's one of the screenplays I chose to read before Script Frenzy starts. I also chose "Toy Story 3," "Cold Mountain," and "Annie Hall." Quite the menagerie huh? If you want to participate, and want to read up on some movies the scripts I found were via Script-O-Rama.

Compelling Compositions

Image via Best Life Magazine via Books.google.com

"A former creative-writing student at Columbia, Janssen says the surest way to win her heart is to read to her in bed. 'I think that is so delicious,' she says. 'My dream is to find a guy who will actually make up stories for me, someone who can tell me a different bedtime story every night. I need to find the John Irving of my age.'" --Famke Janssen inerview in the June 2006 Best Life Magazine.

I am a quote-aholic, and I read way too many publications, subjects, and genres in a day to be normal. I found this quote and I could have easily written it. I didn't find that guy though. My husband won't read to me or make up stories, but it would be amazing if he would. That would be the epitome of perfect.

Compelling Compositions

Image via IMDB.

I watched the movie WALL-E again last night. I'd forgotten how terrifyingly, potentially real the movie's plot line really is. Corpulent, lazy people who let convenience take over their lives. I know I harp on it, but it's scary what is in other peoples' shopping carts at the grocery every week. Absolute JUNK (soda, chips, cookies, tv dinners, and not a fruit of vegetable to be seen). In WALL-E everything the people ate was 'in a cup,' and any more you can get anything "pre-made" from individually packaged frozen pb&j-s to 'baby carrots' (really, we can't whittle down a regular carrot ourselves anymore). I move for people to just try making a habit of making their meals from scratch. It isn't as time consuming as you'd think, and you know exactly what your family is eating. I still feel guilty that I go to the grocery store at all. I'm hoping within five years I'll be raising all our food right here on the farm.

The other factor in WALL-E is essentially they covered the Earth with trash until it wasn't conducive to supporting life. It would be ideal if the grassroots effort of 'back to the land' and just a waking up of the average person to realize that progress and convenience aren't always for the better would become popular culture. Just a re-invention of a 'do for yourself' mentality. Personally I'll clutch to the past. I read ag books from the early 1900s for my advice on livestock raising and gardening and I'm getting along just fine. People, me included, need to take a hard look at their choices and the consequences they have on ourselves and the big picture as well. I get into this sort of bad mood thinking about where the world is heading. I wish I could shout from my rooftop and get others to see things my way. I've got some world changing ideas, but they are pretty radical and it would require everybody to have to work really hard to make the changes happen. So, it's probably a slim chance that anybody would listen. I'll do my best to push them forward, and we'll see if they get off the ground around my town, and potentially on a grander scale (ha).

At any rate, WALL-E makes you think. It really makes me want to get up and do a few jumping jacks to keep me from looking like the people aboard the Axiom. The ending is nice though, and it is a very good movie, although not one I'd consider a kids' film. I think it's dark undertones are lost on many kids and adults alike. It should definitely not be taken lightly.

Compelling Compositions

I found this quote yesterday by Orison Swett Marden:

"We lift ourselves by our thought, we climb upon our vision of ourselves. If you want to enlarge your life, you must first enlarge your thought of it and of yourself. Hold the ideal of yourself as you long to be, always, everywhere--your ideal of what you long to attain--the ideal of health, efficiency, success."

I was curious if books.google.com had anything he'd written because he lived from 1850-1924, and sure enough there were quite a few. It looks like he wrote mostly 'getting what you want out of life' and 'living your best life' type books which I sometimes enjoy reading. They make you feel like you can accomplish anything when you finish them, and I think everybody needs a dose of that now and again.

I am so very busy at the moment that I get overwhelmed some days. I have hopes of becoming even more busy in the coming months (I'm trying to get enough inventory and such to sell at a few festivals next year), so encouragement (even if it's just a quote on the wall) helps a ton.

Compelling Compositions

I was glancing through The Writer's Almanac's archives and I found a poem that absolutely made me stop in my tracks. It's entitled Clara: In the Post Office by Linda Hasselstrom. She talks about how she is independent and capable not because she's a feminist but because life demanded it of her. I can relate.

Compelling Compositions

It's no secret that I'm a HUGE fan of National Public Radio's "A Prairie Home Companion" with Garrison Keillor. He is such an amazing writer, and I love his humor. I end up laughing so hard during every show. Anyway, I signed up for a daily email called "The Writer's Almanac with Garrison Keillor" and have been really enjoying the little blips about various authors who were born that day and there is a daily poem too. Best of all, I can click on the little icon at the top and Garrison himself will read it to me. I suggest you sign up for the email too. It will bring some intellect to your inbox.

Thinking about Writing.

I get The Writer's Almanac sent to my inbox, and Sunday was the birthday of playwright Harold Pinter. He was quoted as saying,

"You do have a leash as a writer. You're holding a dog. The great excitement is to see what happens if you let the whole thing go. And the dog or the character runs about, bites everyone in sight, jumps up trees, falls into lakes, gets wet, and you let that happen. That's the excitement of writing plays."

I am gearing up to write for National Novel Writing Month which is November. I love the fact that writing (good or bad) is yours. Your idea, your brain, your words. The crazy stories running around in my head have been finding their way to paper for years, and I'm hoping to pen one that is at least 175 pages or 50,000 words (which is the goal of NaNoWriMo). I'll let you know how it goes.

Compelling Compositions.

Image via hilaryupton on etsy.

"Time Lost and Found," Anne Lamott's article from Sunset Magazine, talks about finding time to live. I like her point that things we say we must do are not quite as important to us as they seem. I'm taking this article to heart. I want to raise a happy, un-hurried kid--so I should, myself, pursue a life that is full of wonderful things. I hope it inspires you too. Plus, Sunset's website has lots of great projects and articles besides this one.