Yo Writers! How can I develop great and interesting characters in a short film?

[CelticPredator]

No...please dont move to the fan fic stuff...cuz its not.

But I want to do a short film with a group of random people...but have the audience care about them.

How would I? It'll be a short film, so I dont have a lot of time, but i've seen it before. I just dont know how.

Any help?

 

[Darthphere]

Have talent.

 

[CelticPredator]

I can shoot movies.....I have Michael Bay Syndrome.

I can write a decent story....but my characters are ****.

 

[Darthphere]

Then get someone who knows how to write characters.

This really isn't a difficult question.

 

[CelticPredator]

No, it's not...but I want to know how. I want to know how people go on about writing something.

I dont know any writers.


Or how about this. What makes an interesting character?

 

[StorminNorman]

Have you tried www.brentwrites.com?

 

[CelticPredator]

Que?

 

[The Guard]

You don't usually develop characters much in a short film, because it often feels forced. It's best to use a short film to illuminate ideas more than anything else. If you do want to develop them, you give them some major "change" to undergo and a reason to undergo it, a test, a trial, something along those lines that makes them reevaluate who they are and how they live. How short a film are we talking?

 

[CelticPredator]

It all depends really.

My story isnt that original. A bank robbery gone wrong causes the robbers to take refuge in a store, with people in it. Becomes a hostage situation...heroes over come, small twist...

Could be anywhere between 15-40 minutes.

 

[Eggyman]

It all depends really.

My story isnt that original. A bank robbery gone wrong causes the robbers to take refuge in a store, with people in it. Becomes a hostage situation...heroes over come, small twist...

Could be anywhere between 15-40 minutes.

I agree with The Guard and it sounds a lil vague so far. There's a massive difference between 15 and 40 minutes. Maybe try some internal conflict between robbers... and plenty of dialogue. Darth had it right too. It takes talent to bring characters to life - it's not something you can bottle really.

 

[Immortalfire]

Base your characters off Hype members.

 

[LiveWire777]

It all depends really.

My story isnt that original. A bank robbery gone wrong causes the robbers to take refuge in a store, with people in it. Becomes a hostage situation...heroes over come, small twist...

Could be anywhere between 15-40 minutes.

Try and give some o the characters a small back story, example would be like a man is going to the bank that day to get a second mortgage on his home after he wasted all his money on cocaine and telephone sex conversations.

 

[CelticPredator]

Hmm...interesting.


Although I used to like writing , but I stopped, and never "recovered". Every backstory I came up with was the most cliched thing ever.

So good dialog is what I need? I can keep at it....i'll have a go at writing it today, see if anyone wants to crit it.

 

[CelticPredator]

Bah.....double post.

 

[Manic]

Read.

Also watch movies.

Find anything you can, really. If there's a movie you watched where you felt like you knew who the characters were as people, go back and watch it again. Try to figure out what it is about those characters that makes them feel real to you. Do they have backstories? What about their actions?

In a short film, you might have to rely on the smaller things about your characters. Stuff like someone hesitating before doing something, habits, and of course dialogue. If you can't let us know who these people were in the past, at least let us know how they think.

 

[CelticPredator]

I do read. A lot actually....but I guess i'll have to look a bit deeper.

 

[Erzengel]

Make your characters have shifty eyes like this.

 

[LiveWire777]

>_>

 

[Manic]

Be sure to put shadows around the shifty eyes, and play a dramatic chord on either a piano, horn, violin, bass, or a combination of the above.

 

[CelticPredator]

^>
o

 

[ttotheusher]

One tip I learnt from making short films at college: NEVER show a bank robbery unless you have some serious funding. It's nigh on impossible. At least, it was for me and my friends.

 

[chaseter]

I am writing a novel Or trying...

 

[CelticPredator]

You dont need to see the bank robbery because it isnt the main part of the story. Its the event that spawns it. Kinda like Res Dogs (cant spell for **** ok? ).

 

[chaseter]

Reservoir isn't that hard of a word

If you aren't good at spelling...might as well quit writing

 

[Silvermoth]

Alan Moore used to say "Start off with the saddest day in your character's life then work from there"