October’s Buzz:

REINVENTING THE WHEEL: HOW TO TRANSCEND A GENRE
(Copyright 2002)

By
Kathryn McCullough

Executives and story analysts read so many romantic comedies, crime dramas and thrillers that they know the formulas for these genres by heart. While most successful Hollywood films can be easily classified by genre, if you look closely, the breakaway movies, the ones that excel both critically and commercially, are those that do more than just connect the dots.

Making your genre screenplay stand out involves attention to issues discussed in previous Buzz essays, such as avoiding clichés in plot and characterization, strengthening supporting characters, and not letting structure dictate the action. What follows are more specific suggestions to help you snag a reader or executive’s interest and keep him or her surprised from the beginning to the end of your genre screenplay.

1) Combine genres

A common use of this device is to reinvent a traditional genre as a science fiction story. BLADE RUNNER was a cop thriller set in the future. OUTLAND and STAR WARS were westerns in space. GALAXY QUEST was a screwball action-comedy with a “Star Trek” twist. The fun of such blended genres for the reader and audience is in seeing how the writer adapts the traditional genre’s beats to fit a fantastical world. However, it is not enough to just blindly follow the base genre’s formula, or the script will still be predictable. The new version has to work on its own, and feel organic to its futuristic setting.

While many crime dramas and thrillers have romances, these are usually just minor subplots. However, putting romance and suspense on equal footing can raise an ordinary crime story or romance to a new level. One example is CHARADE, which paired suspense and romantic comedy. Another is WITNESS, which combined a love story with a police thriller. This particular blend of genres requires careful attention to the development of the characters and their relationships, in order to prevent the romantic plot from coming across as just a melodramatic add-on.

One of the more unusual and therefore memorable genre fusions was the combination of murder mystery, drawing-room comedy and period melodrama that made up GOSFORD PARK, which won an Oscar for Best Screenplay.

Beware of just randomly tossing genres together. Your story must fit naturally in both worlds, to avoid seeming gimmicky and/or contrived.

2) Spin a genre plot around an unusual element.

The best example of this is MEMENTO, which took the concept of a man with short-term memory loss (ordinarily the stuff of a Movie-of-the-Week) and used it as the basis for a thriller. BUFFY THE VAMPIRE SLAYER revived the horror genre with its teen twist. A recent example is the new TV cop show, MONK, where the stock genre finds new life with a hypochondriac, obsessive-compulsive genius detective as the protagonist.

3) Complicate the plot.

TOOTSIE transcended the “man in drag” formula by combining the expected gags with a series of well-developed, character-driven subplots, which were cleverly woven into the main storyline. THE USUAL SUSPECTS ratcheted up the suspense by having flashbacks within flashbacks that shifted suspicion from one character to the next, confusing the audience while still managing to hold their attention up to the final twist. Most romantic comedies today feature lovelorn women looking for a man who will commit. However, in WORKING GIRL, Melanie Griffith’s character rejects marriage in order to pursue her career. She finds romance, but it is a by-product of her main goal.

4) Pick an unusual time period or location.

Similar to the idea of combining genres, this tactic can intrigue the reader (and later the film audience) by piquing curiosity about how a familiar story will play out in the new setting. IN THE NAME OF ROSE was a murder mystery/thriller set in a 14th century Benedictine Abbey. NEAR DARK was a vampire movie set not in a haunted Bavarian castle, but in the rural West. SHAKESPEARE IN LOVE combines historical and literary figures from Elizabethan times with romance, comedy and mystery.

5) Have your main character act “out of character.”

In LETHAL WEAPON, Mel Gibson was not the usual strong, stoic and moralistic cop. He was suicidal, foolish and careless. This gave the script and film an added level of tension; although the story was a typical buddy-cop plot, the behavior of Gibson’s character was unpredictable. In AS GOOD AS IT GETS, Jack Nicholson’s abrasive, neurotic loner is not the typical dashing romantic hero, yet he wins the heart of Helen Hunt as well as the audience by the end of the film.

In writing any genre story, you will have to follow the basic formula for that type of story, or else it is no longer a genre piece. What you want to avoid is having words like “pedestrian,” “predictable,” “formulaic,” “contrived,” “by-the-book,” “derivative,” and/or “generic” show up in the coverage of your script (or later in the review of your movie). The way to do this is to begin with a standard foundation, but build onto it an original structure – one that reflects your unique voice and style. Just as an inventive architectural approach to a traditional edifice catches your eye, an inventive approach to a traditional screen story will catch the attention of readers, agents and movie executives.