Tag: writing

Once More, With Vigour #AmWriting #WritingLife

Shelton Bumgarner

by Shelton Bumgarner
@bumgarls

I am again in the second act of an intended first draft. I have been at this point so many times that I’ve lost count. But I’m going to give it another go. I think, maybe, this time will be different.

The structure of the story is stronger than ever before. I’m also kind of worn out from rewriting so much. As such, my desire to finish first draft is strong enough that I hopefully will just do it, no matter what.

You can’t edit a blank page, as they say.

One issue is structure and the duration of time involved. The first act dealt with days. This second act deals in weeks and months. So, it’s going to take a little while to lay scenes over the time allotted. But I’ve tried before and it worked out. Now, to take a deep breath and do it again.

The first half of the second act is called “fun and games” in Save The Cat Writes A Novel. It’s the portion of the novel you often times buy the novel for in the first place. I have everything laid out in my mind. Now to do the hard work of making my vision a reality.

It will be interesting to see how everything works out.

V-Log: Some Thoughts On Where Things Stand With The #Novel #AmWriting #WritingLife

Shelton Bumgarner

Some thoughts.

The Strange Case Of Pop Culture’s Difficulty Processing The Trump Era

Shelton Bumgarner

by Shelton Bumgarner
@bumgarls

I have written some before about how difficult it is for pop culture to process the Trump Era. I’m trying to do my part to help the cause by writing a novel that is meant to be an allegory about the Trump Era designed as a political thriller.

I’m of the feeling that at some point in the next two years the dam will burst. I think there’s a chance that a lot of Trump-influenced pop art is simply in development now. As such, they are all likely to come out at the same time.

One problem about the Trump Era as someone trying to explain it in pop art is you don’t know what the context of it all will be whenever your movie, novel or what have you actually comes out. So, I suspect that has been a head wind for a lot of projects that might otherwise come out.

I’m a nobody, so I’m simply throwing myself at the problem, damn where things may be when I finish the novel. Really, all I care about is telling a great story. If I manage to sneak in a rant against systemic problems of the Trump Era, all the better.

All this does make you think that some movies from the past should be rebooted. I would suggest Being There, for starters. If ever there was a tale that could be redone to fit the modern era, that’s it. You would have to turn Chauncey Gardner into a deranged psychopath, but the general premise could be used.

I don’t know. I need to shut up and keep working on the novel.

We’ll See

Shelton Bumgarner

by Shelton Bumgarner
@bumgarls

I have repeatedly gotten to the point I’m currently at with the novel, only to find some structural problem so severe that I feel I have to start all over. So, I don’t know. In a sense I think the go round is make or break.

I’m simply not going to start all over again at this point. I’d rather finish a flawed first draft than just keep re-writing over and over again. The premise is really, really strong. As such, the key issue is to simply finish a first draft. You can’t edit a blank page, as they say.

I am just about to finish the first act. I’m just about to enter the “fun and games” aspect of the story. I finally feel as though things are structurally good enough that all I have to do is physically put the work into writing. This has always been something of a Hail Mary pass for me creatively.

One thing that don’t tell you about writing a novel seriously is how it simply takes physical time to write a novel. Unless you’re Phillip K. Dick and on crank, you are going to have to manage your expectations about how long writing a novel roughly 185,000 words is going to take.

It’s really only because of a very specific set of circumstances that I find myself in a position to write a novel. It’s very possible things could change early next year and I will find myself with considerable obstacles. Thus, I’m shooting for Jan. 1 for finishing my first draft. So if the worst happens, at least I will have finished a first draft of a novel.

We’ll see, I guess.

Well, This Happened

Shelton Bumgarner

by Shelton Bumgarner
@bumgarls

My little hometown for some reason had a unusual connection to a number of successful writers and artists. I would guess there are at least half a dozen such people. Among them is Washington Times reporter — and recent author — Charlie Hurt.

Now, let me get some things out of the way. Mr. Hurt is a demonstrable success in his chosen profession. I, alas, to date, am not. And in person he’s a reasonable enough fellow. So, on a personal basis I am rather indifferent to him and wish him only the best professionally.

Having said all that, I would like to note something. Mr. Hurt’s new book “Still Winning” is apparently some sort of apologia of Trump. He has close family ties in my hometown so I thought I’d cruise on by his book signing. That’s where I got this picture:

There’s a scene in one of The Pirates of the Caribbean movies where Capt. Jack Sparrow realizes he’s not going to hook up with the two women he’s with and goes through all the things about them that bugged him during the night before.

I overheard Mr. Hurt made it very clear to someone that he thought Trump was joking when he made his recent “chosen one” comment. It took a lot of willpower on my part not to laugh at this statement. All I want to say is, “Charlie, he wasn’t joking. You and I both saw the footage, he was not joking.“

Anyway, other than that, I don’t care. Good luck Charlie Hurt.

The Artist’s Dilemma

Some thoughts.

Back To Work On The #Novel

Some thoughts.

The Plan

Shelton Bumgarner

By Shelton Bumgarner
@bumgarls

Things are moving faster again with the novel. At the same time, however, I find lingering frustration. Something happened recently that left a bad taste in my mouth. I suddenly find myself interested in writing a screenplay. As such, I’m probably going to buy FinalDraft sometime in September. I also hope to buy a few screenwriting books as well.

In the past, my biggest problem has been thinking up plots. I have plenty — plenty — of great ideas for movies. But I’ve always struggled with plots. But using the skillset I’ve developed from working on the novel, I believe I have a better chance at writing a successful (relative to me) screenplay. Or two. Or three.

I’ve vowed to myself that whenever I finish a screenplay, I’ll give myself permission to head to LA for a few days to poke around. But I won’t do so without a least one screenplay I can show people. While I’m quite pleased writing a novel and that’s my main creative project right now, I want to at least attempt to write a screenplay as well.

The issue is I have numerous ideas for movies because they lend themselves to something visual, something seen on the big screen. Add to this that I natively have a very extroverted personality, I believe if I put in the hard work of writing a screenplay or two, I might have at least a slim chance of being able to find someone in LA willing to take a look at it.

But, of course, I realize this is being extremely naive. Given my age, where I’m from and pretty much everything else about me, the possibility I would actually manage to pull this dream of is, in real terms, slim to none. But, if nothing else, it gives me something productive to do with my spare time as I work on the novel.

‘Hobbs & Shaw,’ A Political Review

by Shelton Bumgarner
@bumgarls

When I was living in South Korea, I once found myself near the DMZ at a English Camp designed to give a young Korean the experience of living in an English speaking nation. While I was there, I saw in a waiting room a video of a kid’s show. What was notable about the cartoon was the name of the villain — Darwin.

This little bit of creatist propaganda has lingered with me over the years. That the show’s writer thought they could get young, impressionable minds to associate Darwin and by extension evolution with villany was both extremely annoying and impressive.

Before I begin, I would also like to note the “explanation” of Top Gun in the movie Sleep With Me.

Anyway, let’s get the point — the deeper political meaning in the otherwise summer popcorn movie Hobbs & Shaw. It has taken me a few days, but I feel as though there is a lot more going on with this movie than initially meets the eye. There’s a lot of sly politics in the movie that is so open to interpretation that it might leave one scratching their heads.

Let’s talk about the general plot. — spoilers ahead.

The plot, as much as there is one, is about a nebulous “deep state” type of company that wants to use its Snowflake programmable virus to kill off the weak and do a very Thanos-type restructuring of society. Two guys who ostensibly hate each other — The Rock (Hobbs) and Jason Statham (Shaw) join forces to defeat the bad guys and save the day. From what I saw of the movie, the only reason why I don’t think this movie’s politics is quite what you might this is comes from the people involved.

Given the fan service the movie does to The Rock’s WWE fandom, I’m led to believe the producers of this movie see its market as center-Right. At the same time, given how liberal-progressive Hollywood is, I am reluctant to believe that there aren’t air quotes around the movie’s superficial politics. I don’t know The Rock’s politics, but I struggle to believe he’s anything more than closer to center-Left than center-Right

Let’s break down some of the plot to see what’s going on.

The McGuffin is a woman — the sister of the Shaw character (22 years younger than he is, natch)– who has shot the virus into her bloodstream. If you REALLY wanted to get deep about the politics of this movie, you could say that it’s supposed to be, in a sense, about the “special relationship” between the United State in post-Brexit, post-Trump geopolitical world. I only say this because The Rock obviously represents America and Statham the UK. They are alone in the world and have to work together to save the day. (That a Russian helps save the day is an interesting twist to all of this.)

Anyway, there are some other things I noticed. That the programmable super virus is called “Snowflake” can be interpreted two ways. Either we’re meant to think of that obviously the Bad Guys are evil liberals (snowflakes) or we’re meant to laugh that the thing that could end the world is a bunch of snowflakes.

The reasoning that the villain gives for ending the world a very conservative-interpretation-of-the-liberal-worldview. Hollywood these days they find themselves having to square the circle. They want to appease a center-Right audience (to make money) but they also have to do so in a way that allows them not to hate themselves. That’s why, I feel, the politics of this movie are extremely muddled, but obviously there.

And, yet, I simply am not prepared to accept that this is Brad Bird Hollywood conservatism. For starters, Bird’s work is much more nuanced than this movie and has a stronger idology. This movie, meanwhile, seems to want it both ways. It wants to appease its center-Right audience, while at the same time looking slant eye at center-Left people in the audience in a way that suggests, “Can you believe what we have to do to appease the Right?”

I liked this movie because it did want it set out to do — entertain you in a cool theatre for a few hours on a hot summer day. I find it interesting, however, that the corrosive politics of the Trump Era has even seeped into what might otherwise be just a dumb summer movie.

Anyway, I probably will never know how close to the truth I am on this subject. I would like to believe I have dug up something interesting, however. There’s no way they would name the super virus “Snowflake” without there being an ulterior motive.

Shelton Bumgarner, a writer living in Virginia, is working on his first novel. He may be reached at migukin (at) gmail (dot) com.

Well, At Least I Know This Novel’s Universe Really Well

by Shelton Bumgarner
@bumgarls

The more I think about it, the more I really like the Hobbes & Shaw screenplay. I say this because it did was a screenplay is supposed to do — be invisible. Only the greats can write a screenplay that is conspicuous enough that the average person notices it. A screenplay, in my opinion, is simply the framework for the producer, director and actors to tell the story.

The more I write this novel, the more seriously I take structure, character and plot. Your job as a storyteller is to get out of the way. You lay out a universe with interesting characters and then smash them against each other in a way where you have increasing tension. If shit blows up and people have sex, all the better.

But the main point is that the audience cares about the characters. I cared about what was going on with the characters in Hobbes & Shaw, even though it was meant to be mindless summer fun. I thought there were some pretty big plot holes, but the overall effect was interesting and entertaining.

As I said, I liked the screenplay because I did not find myself thinking about it. Things moved along at a brisk pace. You meant interesting people with believable rationales. I did not want to walk out once, which is saying something for me.

Compare this to Booksmart. I walked out with the inciting incident occurred. Way too much screeching over things I did not want to sit through two hours worth of hero’s journey. I understand you’re supposed to give the Hero room to grow, but when all the screeching happened, I bounced. I had better things to do with my time.

But, again, I was not the audience. The audience seemed to be bi curious girls seniors in high school. Or something. Something I’m not. The thing about Once Upon A Time…In Hollywood was I really, really cared about the characters even though for much of the film they didn’t do all that much. That’s a testament to good writing, if ever there was one.

Anyway. I need to read more. And watch more movies. I need to hurry up and finish the first draft, if nothing else.