How to proceed?

Premise Wars seems to be a conflict about how to devise a set of words that will cause a viewer to click.

We already see that, "Click or I'll kill this dog," doesn't work.

Any more ideas?

Our protag develops a neurological problem, Neuro'obsessivescriptamosmania, caused by reviewing Amazon scripts. Symptoms are compulsive reviews and deep belief that the scripts are true.

Can we finish this in time for the May deadline. I put my five pages up, now we need ninteen guys to each do five pages. Then we got it. MAKE IT FUNNY. Steal comedy from scripts already here. I stole from Pa Co, and Lay Lady Lay.

Neuro Obsessive Scriptamos Mania seems more to cause script reviewers to become like the characters in the scripts they review.

In keeping with the purpose of this effort, I reformatted the RTF version of PREMISE WARS with paragraph styles. It can now be used as a template for writing correctly formatted RTF scripts.

To use it as a template, just open it in MS Word, then select all, and push delete to get rid of the text. You then will have a set of paragraph styles for scripts. Each style automatically formats a script element.

For example, the style, "Slug," correctly formats a slugline with the correct indent, all caps, etc. Same with the Character style, Dialog style, Action style, and Center text style.

P.S. The set of styles also works in Open Office. I tested it all morning with Linux Open Office and the only thing that is off is that page numbers only show up on odd numbered pages.

Oh, and BTW, if anyone uses jokes from another script, be sure to reference the source in keeping with normal literary etiquette.

Great! The style set comes down with the RTF download.

Congrats; first Amazon RTF that actually looks good with wordpad. I can actually edit it.

With this set of styles, Word 10 works slick as owl poop!

We need to expand this out to a hundred words before the end of may. If we stay with the styles it'll be a snap.

I mean a hundred pages, not words. Good grief! Oh for the ability to edit posts.

Okay; I got the latest RTF and added my take on it.

Downloaded it. RTF style sheet is still intact.

Both style sheets format the same. I'll call mine script02. The other one is script01. But, I don't think the name of the style downloads with the file.

The style that downloads with the document is local to the document. If you want to use it on another document, you have to save it to the global STYLE GALLERY. Then you can click in the, "Change Styles," box and it will show up there.

Okay; style set restored. I HOPE.

If only Amazon actually had a premise Zone contest :(

Or a "trailer for for screenplay" contest, I'd love to make one of those.

I'll vote for that.

Maybe it is a secret contest. Except it's a loser contest and seal team 6 comes for the bottom guy each month.

Oh yeah; didn't you realize. Amazon is in cahoots with them.

I can attest to the Premise Wars success. I looked at all of my log lines and tried to improve them. That alone is worth the experiment.

It works!

And another thing. There are great movies here. It is not that we do not have capable writers. It is that we have incapable readers.

We don't know how to spot the block buster potential. That is where the talent is. Good movies get produced only after the producers have been beat over the head with them for a while.

Star Wars had to smack producers hard and endure rejections before it was produced.

So Amazon. FIND THEM. They are here.

Premise Wars comes right along. Come on Guys, I can't wait all day. I have more stuff but I don't want to hog the show.

We need to save Amazon Script Premise Wars from the evil Gaggle Earth Nemesis that threatens to take over. Our hero, Dave, must defeat the evil Malak and save the day.

We only have about 90 more pages to do it in.

But plenty of time for them to get into a lot more trouble.

Okay, guys, we need some participation here. So, if the other guys will agree, here are the rules of engagement.

1. Feel free to shamelessly promote your own interests in your draft.

2. Use any script that interested you as reference in your draft.

3. Have as much fun as possible; use jokes from other scripts, but when you do always reference the source.

4. Have fun.

Now GO!

The previous draft 10 was converted to RTF with OpenOffice and used a courier open source font that caused some problems with paragraph styles.

Latest draft was converted with MS Word and used Word compatible paragraph styles that should download with the file.