genre or die series

Genre or Die, pt 3: Thriller

April 18, 2008
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SPOILER ALERT The Thriller genre is pretty varied: unlike Horror where there are conventions aplenty to pay tribute to (or break), or very specific role functions in Rom-Com that you can use (or not), I would argue that in Thriller the only thing a script really needs to do is be, well, thrilling. Yet so many of the thriller specs I read are NOT thrilling. Sometimes they don’t make sense, especially if they’re conspiracy thrillers – I will end up questioning a character’s particular motivation usually (along the lines of “Why not go to so-and-so and avoid all this? Or… Read More »Genre or Die, pt 3: Thriller

Genre or Die, pt 2: The Romantic Comedy

April 17, 2008
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SPOILERS PRESENT Having had a good look at Horror under the microscope then, let’s go the other end of the scale and examine the Romantic Comedy… Here’s my take on the types: The Wedding Rom-Com – does exactly what it says on the tin, bringing the protagonist and love interest together usually through a chance meeting as mutual friends of the bride and/or groom of an otherwise unrelated wedding like Four Weddings & A Funeral, though sometimes for other reasons, as in the Wedding Crashers, where the characters’ job is to well… crash weddings, unsurprisingly. The Supernatural Rom-Com – the… Read More »Genre or Die, pt 2: The Romantic Comedy

Genre Or Die, pt 1: Horror

April 14, 2008
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SPOILERS! So genre movies are what’s-what at the moment: it’s apparently what audiences want, so it’s what prodcos want. Yet so many specs out there have no genre to speak of; yes they have generic elements but they’re not a GENRE FILM in the classic sense. They pay little attention to convention or classic characterisation; they have no set pieces to speak of, nor do they give us something that’s the same….But different. Speaking to writers, it would appear the notion of the genre film gets the thumbs down, big style: some writers seem to think of them as formulaic,… Read More »Genre Or Die, pt 1: Horror