Time to have a little fun as I write my 27 spec. script. Can't help but think I oscillate a lot between "big canvas" and "small canvas" writing.
Big canvas stories are ones with sweeping premises, and are often times referred to as "high concept" stories.
Some examples of big canvas movies:
- Saving Private Ryan (1998: Steven Spielberg): D-day in France with the Allies taking the beach. Big opening battle, then the story gets a little more intimate as you follow the Allies search party deeper into France.
One of the best big canvas movies you'll ever see
- Promethseus (2012: Ridley Scott): An alien origin movie that involves the creation of man and a bunch of sophisticates who "engineered man". High concept then backed by the exploration of a new planet, and an spacious alien ship.
- Dances with Wolves (1990: Kevin Costner): Coming out of the civil war movie which involves a punch of different settings and an opening battle scene.
- The Dark Knight (2008: Christopher Nolan): Yeah, this is a comic book movie. But one with elaborate action, set pieces.
- Jurassic Park (1993: Steven Spielberg): Big high concept of dinosaurs being re-creaated out of synthesised dna, then that product wrecking havoc on the people on an island.
- Gamara vs. Guiron (1969: Japanese movie): Aliens kidnap two children and take them to another planet for the purpose of getting knowledge from their brains, but Gamera follows and tries to rescue them.
A guilty pleasure of mine as boy was watching the "monster fights" in monster movies
- The Poseidon Adventure (1972: staring Gene Hackman): Nine people explore a cruise ship at sea in a manner that turns their whole lives upside down.
Common elements of big canvas stories is that the adventure takes center stage. It's more about characters interfacing with a greater problem, that a detailed focus on the characters themselves. The central attraction is a big event: a war, an exploration of the unknown, monster fights .
Conversely here's some examples of small canvas movies:
- Black Swan (2010: directed by Darren Aronofsky): A ballet stars desire for the perfect performance becomes the catalyst for her descent into madness.
- While You Were Sleeping (1995: staring Sandra Bullock): A lonely woman's life changes when she saves a man from the train tracks in Chicago and gets taken in by that man's family.
- Three Billboards Outside Ebbing, Missouri (2017: staring Frances McDormand): A woman goes to extremes to put the heat on the local police to find the rapist and murderer of her daughter.
- Birdman (or the Unexpected Virtue of Ignorance) (2014: staring Michael Keaton): Self-absorbed man tries to rehabilitate his art as an actor and his relationship with his ex-wife and daughter.
Character arc of Riggan Thompson was the focus of this movie
- Halloween (1978: directed by John Carpenter): A masked man terrorizes a teenage woman on the anniversary of when he killed his sister.
Common elements of small canvas stories : a focus on a single character and the flaw the story sets up that they must overcome, few locations, dialog heavy movies with lots of drama.
Some movies blur the lines of small canvas movies movies that really want to be big canvas movies:
- There Will be Blood (2007: directed by Paul Thomas Anderson, staring Daniel Day Lewis): A ruthless oil tycoon carves out an empire for himself.
- Bohemian Rapsody (2018: directed by Bryan Singer, staring Rami Malek): The story of Freddy Mercury with the rock band, Queen.
- Arthur (1981: staring Dudley Moore): A millionaire, alcoholic playboy must choose between real love or an arranged marriage that allows him to continue to be rich.
- Sense and Sensibility (1995: staring Kate Winslet and Emma Thompson): Women enjoy and anguish over their romantic prospects in England of the 1800s.
Remember when Kate Winslet was like in a million of these "period piece" movies? I do. 1995-early 2000s
- How to Loose a Guy in 10 Days (2003: staring Matthew McConahuey and Kate Hudson): A pair of career-minded people place wagers on their mastery of manipulating dating.
Common elements of small canvas movies trying to be big canvas movies are big name actors playing someone famous in biography style movie that jumps all over the place. Period piece movies. Romantic comedies that have lots of elaborate set pieces in multiple locations.
As a I writer I like wring stories on both canvasses. The spec. script I'm first drafting up deals with two infantrymen fresh from trench warfare in World War I going to antediluvian times to catch the Greed gods at the apex of their power.
To date I think I've written a pretty even slate of big canvass vs. small canvass scripts . Let's see...
E.C. Henry's big canvas scripts (10):
- Preytorium : Explorers go to a foreign planet and fight gigantic, monsters.
- Indians of the Ancient Plains : Native Americans due battle with the last of the dinosaurs in the Badlands.
- The Commune I-III : A man weaves his way through the greater story of other people's dabllings in alien bio-engineering.
- A King for God's People THEN The Rival Kings of Israel : Epic story of the David & Saul of the bible.
- The Beautiful Kingdom (coming soon): A celestial castle, the ocean, and Heaven; plus with dinosaur affects.
Yeah, you can expect something akin to this in The Beautiful Kingdom
- The Chosen Redeemer of Thars : This is a lot like Lord of the Rings or Chronicles of Narnia.
- Beyond the Apes : Sci-fi world, creature affects at actor and blue-screen level.
E.C. Henry's small canvas scripts (9):
- A Heart Built on the Sand : Follows the dissent of a sexually charged woman after she rejects the Lord.
- The Judas Project : Centers around a Mexican young man who is dissatisfied with his life, then commits a robbery that forever changes his life.
- An American Princess : A love-starved girl watches as her high school sweetheart moves on into stardom as a writer.
- Puppies? Puppies?! Puppies!!! : A slouch must deal with puppies and an overbearing friend as he works up the courage to ask out a girl at the pound.
Cute, right? Who wouldn't want to see a script like that?!
- Cupid's Helpers : A writer's helper accompany's him to his hometown for his high school reunion where he meets the girl who was the inspiration for all the stories he wrote that made him famous.
- Cupid God Stupid : A construction worker faces a crissis of conscious when his wife learns about his extra-marital affair.
- After the Glory : An ex-athlete bums around town as he re-interacts with people he grew up with and slowly finds a new focus for his life.
- Revenge of the Fat Chicks : girls teen comedy mostly filmed at houses and a school.
E.C. Henry's small canvas scripts that really want to be big canvas movies (8):
- Bubblehead Saves the Day : A high school senior pines for a girl, has his life complicated by a robot from outer=space and aliens.
- Give It Up for Chimpy I and II : A man uses the monkey he can interpret for to woo the girl of his dreams.
- Gravesite Crows : A Halloween-eque story yet with considerable more special affects.
- Hometown Professional Football : Athletes in romance, yet will too many football scenes in action to make this low budget.
- When the Motorcycle Calls : A rural hick uncovers a robbery attempt in a small town made bigger by all the outside actions shots on dirt bikes. What the main character's dirt bike jam is:
- Cowboy Alien Diaries : A husband winning back his wife story complicated by alien abductions and differing locations.
- Kathy Smith Conquers Duboose High School : Mostly low budget teenage rom-com material, but there are some callouts for mixed real-life and animated scenes.
Well, it looks like a fairly even 10-9-8 split: big-small-mixed canvas. Still, overall, I think writing big canvas stories more. They're definitely more challenging to write than a drama heavy, small canvas script .
Oh, before I close this post don't forget to visit Antonio Sabato Jr.'s movie fundraiser site for his new movie Trail Blazers. Its been almost a year since I've heard anything from either he, Kaya Jones or Nicholas Tizekker. Sounds like Antonio and Nicholas are still trying to make this movie, I THINK Kaya dropped out. Anyway, I gave 'em $500. When I get back to work I'll try to give them more, if they're still trying to drum up founds in 2022. Gotta support our fellow artists! *Strike-through the campaign for Trail-blazers, got an e-mail, 12-28 that my contribution of $500 had been refunded, then checked on the campaign and saw a $150,000 had reached a little over $4,000, but the crowdfund had been canceled. :( I feel bad for Antonio, as this was a script that he had written.
Tried to graft a little "lit expression" in this post--and in my script logline page. Till we talk again, I would like to wish you a merry Christmas and a happy New Year . Will try to do another post before the end of 2021, but no promises. Till then, as Kaya Jones would say, love and light ,
E.C. Henry from Kingsport, Tennessee