About the screenplay
Posted: Tue Jan 19, 2010 2:47 pm
Hi again. John Ajvide Lindqvist here.
Yes, I know what I said about not posting anymore, but I can´t help myself. I suppose that this username (That Wolf corroborated with my publisher) is enough to prove that I am me, yes?
OK, here we go.
I read the discussion about the screenplay - how could I not, with such an intriguing title for the thread – and I just wanted to shed some light on the process.
Our initial ambition was to make tvo movies, a part one and a part two, part one ending after the scene with not mixing blood in the cellar, part two starting with Oskar going to his father. This never happened, due to different reasons, but the first draft of the screenplay was about 240 pages long!
Quite early in the process it was decided that this was only going to be one movie after all, so I cut down the screenplay to half its length. Not as difficult as it may sound, actually.
Very early on we hade decided to focus on the relation between Oskar and Eli and everything that didn´t add to that story had to go. The storyline with Tommy was for example never included at all.
So, now we have a 120-page script and this is where Tomas really gets into the picture. Him and me sat down for three or four days and read through the entire script. Tomas reading out loud and me listening to my own words through someone else´s mouth (Before that I had already read the script through aloud to my wife and changed things because of her viewpoints)
Naturally it didn´t take all that time just to read, but after each scene we discussed its content, Tomas telling me what he had problems with, coming with suggestions on how to change it and so on, me making notes. I remember that we had a lot of trouble and different suggestions on how to make it clear that the acid in the jar actually was acid, until someone came up with the solution of letting some of it spill on Håkans jacket, for example.
Small things like that we discussed, and bigger issues about emotional content of scenes, flow of dialogue and so on. When those sessions were over, I rewrote and also shortened the script. Then we had further meetings where the producers John Nordling and Carl Molinder also participated, and towards the end of the writing process we also brought in an excellent guy, Dennis Magnusson, who made some further suggestions on how to make the script more tightly structured.
That´s it. In the end I did write the script, but with a lot of input from Tomas about how to change things, make them more filmable. And then some further things from Dennis. And my wife. But it was always me going back to my writing desk to try to make those changes work.
There is also the fact that the film you see on screen is only perhaps 80% of the 90-page script, since Tomas cut some things out (Including myself!), added his own touches and did quite a few scenes in a way I never envisioned. If you count pages, the original 240-page script is down to maybe 75 pages seen on the screen. And in all important aspects it´s still the same story!
The thing I´m most proud of is the bedscene, which is played out exactly as written, as well as all dialogue between Oskar and Eli (only with a few lines cut out.) I´m grateful to Tomas for insisting on the candy-eating scene, which turned out so lovely in the movie. The poolscene is written as seen from under water, but Tomas added that we se Oskar in the frame, which is of course much better. (Also, you can never give enough kudos the photographer, Hoyte van Hoytema, probably the best man with a camera in Sweden right now.)
And so on, and so on …
That´s all for today. I might pop in some day in the future if there is something that I feel should be elaborated. But please don´t ask me any questions, I will just feel bad when I don´t have time to answer them.
Congrats to Wolf for all the new puppies in the den. Keep up the god work.
John
Yes, I know what I said about not posting anymore, but I can´t help myself. I suppose that this username (That Wolf corroborated with my publisher) is enough to prove that I am me, yes?
OK, here we go.
I read the discussion about the screenplay - how could I not, with such an intriguing title for the thread – and I just wanted to shed some light on the process.
Our initial ambition was to make tvo movies, a part one and a part two, part one ending after the scene with not mixing blood in the cellar, part two starting with Oskar going to his father. This never happened, due to different reasons, but the first draft of the screenplay was about 240 pages long!
Quite early in the process it was decided that this was only going to be one movie after all, so I cut down the screenplay to half its length. Not as difficult as it may sound, actually.
Very early on we hade decided to focus on the relation between Oskar and Eli and everything that didn´t add to that story had to go. The storyline with Tommy was for example never included at all.
So, now we have a 120-page script and this is where Tomas really gets into the picture. Him and me sat down for three or four days and read through the entire script. Tomas reading out loud and me listening to my own words through someone else´s mouth (Before that I had already read the script through aloud to my wife and changed things because of her viewpoints)
Naturally it didn´t take all that time just to read, but after each scene we discussed its content, Tomas telling me what he had problems with, coming with suggestions on how to change it and so on, me making notes. I remember that we had a lot of trouble and different suggestions on how to make it clear that the acid in the jar actually was acid, until someone came up with the solution of letting some of it spill on Håkans jacket, for example.
Small things like that we discussed, and bigger issues about emotional content of scenes, flow of dialogue and so on. When those sessions were over, I rewrote and also shortened the script. Then we had further meetings where the producers John Nordling and Carl Molinder also participated, and towards the end of the writing process we also brought in an excellent guy, Dennis Magnusson, who made some further suggestions on how to make the script more tightly structured.
That´s it. In the end I did write the script, but with a lot of input from Tomas about how to change things, make them more filmable. And then some further things from Dennis. And my wife. But it was always me going back to my writing desk to try to make those changes work.
There is also the fact that the film you see on screen is only perhaps 80% of the 90-page script, since Tomas cut some things out (Including myself!), added his own touches and did quite a few scenes in a way I never envisioned. If you count pages, the original 240-page script is down to maybe 75 pages seen on the screen. And in all important aspects it´s still the same story!
The thing I´m most proud of is the bedscene, which is played out exactly as written, as well as all dialogue between Oskar and Eli (only with a few lines cut out.) I´m grateful to Tomas for insisting on the candy-eating scene, which turned out so lovely in the movie. The poolscene is written as seen from under water, but Tomas added that we se Oskar in the frame, which is of course much better. (Also, you can never give enough kudos the photographer, Hoyte van Hoytema, probably the best man with a camera in Sweden right now.)
And so on, and so on …
That´s all for today. I might pop in some day in the future if there is something that I feel should be elaborated. But please don´t ask me any questions, I will just feel bad when I don´t have time to answer them.
Congrats to Wolf for all the new puppies in the den. Keep up the god work.
John
...