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Fight Club
Pondered the fight scene I wrote last night. I wasn't too happy with it--it had deviated wildly from the one I had originally envisioned, which had drama and the threat of imminent demise and ended with a bitten-off ear and a smashed windpipe. The usual. But it was 11 pm or so, I was falling asleep over the keyboard, and I didn't have the energy to choreograph the damned thing in my head. Because fight scenes between people who supposedly know what they're doing are hard, especially when you yourself, the nominal choreographer, are not trained in the art. I've read some good articles by martial artist/writers who explain that so much is running through the head of a trained fighter--moves and countermoves and thinking five moves ahead--that to write it all down would slow the scene in a manner unacceptable to anyone who was not another trained fighter, ie, most of us. This is paradoxical considering that the pages of internal thought usually amount to no more than a minute of actual action, if that.
So I could justify shortcuts in the interest of Drama. But it was still an involved three-party scenario, and as I said before, I was too tired to deal. So I spla'd out a filler scene with the promise that I would rewrite it next week. Except it bugged me enough that next week became today, so I lugged out the iBook, fired it up, found the scene, read it over in preparation for wiping it out...
...and found I liked it. Because it's short. To the point. Justifiable, I think, given the circumstances. Would this character do what he did in this instance? Yes, I think he would. So it will stay, a tribute to the short/sharp/shocked nature of the violence that touches Jani's life.
Just an example of a channeled scene that worked out. They don't always--sometimes the scene that bypassed the brain during the transit from fingers to keyboard really, really needed to sit and cure for a while. But sometimes they work out better than one might think.
So I could justify shortcuts in the interest of Drama. But it was still an involved three-party scenario, and as I said before, I was too tired to deal. So I spla'd out a filler scene with the promise that I would rewrite it next week. Except it bugged me enough that next week became today, so I lugged out the iBook, fired it up, found the scene, read it over in preparation for wiping it out...
...and found I liked it. Because it's short. To the point. Justifiable, I think, given the circumstances. Would this character do what he did in this instance? Yes, I think he would. So it will stay, a tribute to the short/sharp/shocked nature of the violence that touches Jani's life.
Just an example of a channeled scene that worked out. They don't always--sometimes the scene that bypassed the brain during the transit from fingers to keyboard really, really needed to sit and cure for a while. But sometimes they work out better than one might think.