Category: Opinion

Herbie J Pilato: Is It Happening or Has It Happened? News or Entertainment? Fast or Faster? Aargh!

Blurry-Speed-Skateby Herbie J Pilato

Reality shows, scripted TV, talk shows, documentaries, and infomercials.

You never know which you’re watching anymore these days.  Everything seems to be almost a blur, with each form melding into the other.  Many television programs today are presented at such a hectic pace, in execution and as well as from an organic standpoint within their “premise,” segment, or episode; be they a sitcom, drama, TV-movie, mini-series, news or magazine show, on either broadcast or cable television.

A prime example of this development takes place on the talk show. read article

Leesa Dean: Adventures of a Web Series Newbie

Chapter 72 – Guerilla Filmmaking
by Leesa Dean

This week I had planned to attend two YouTube workshops and ended up blowing both of them off. Why? Instead, I took a 3 day, 21 hour online course with Ryan Connolly called Guerilla Filmmaking held by Creative Live. It was intense. And GREAT!guerilla

Ryan, for those who don’t know, is the guy behind the wildly successful web show Film Riot. He gives indie filmmakers tips, tools, strategies and opinions. It’s been going on since 2007 and it’s terrific.

The class covered everything from scripts, to coverage, cameras, motion, lighting, direction, SFX, tips, tricks and more. Hands down, it was the best camera/directing class I’ve taken and I bought it after so I could watch it over and over when I finally get my camera. read article

GUARDIANS OF THE GALAXY is Great Fun

A couple of days ago we posted a critique of the storytelling in GUARDIANS OF THE GALAXY, from the L.A. Times. A lot of readers disagreed. Even most of us here at TVWriter™ disagreed. So it’s with great relish that we bring y’all a different viewpoint from one of the pickiest writers on the web: (Nah Ne Nah Ne Nah Ne, LA Times!)

Guardians_of_the_Galaxy-comic

by The Bitter Script Reader

I really didn’t think this one was going to work.

Marvel has had such a string of hits that it’s really easy to forget just how unknown many of their franchises were to a mass audience. Iron Man and Thor had always been second-tier, Hulk was seen as damaged goods after the failure of the Ang Lee-helmed film and Captain America was a dudley-do-right whose history necessitated the first film being a period piece.  There are reasons that any one of those franchises could have struggled to find an audience, to say nothing of the risk of having all those franchises feed into one film with all the heroes? read article

‘Guardians of the Galaxy’ and the rise of post-plot cinema

We’ll tell you straight out: All the TVWriter™ minions loved GUARDIANS OF THE GALAXY. We aren’t saying it’s a great film, but it certainly was the most enjoyable film all of us saw so far this year. Reminded the old-timers (sorry, LB) of the first time they saw STAR WARS.

But when you think about it, there just may be a tad off about the writing, in terms of traditional story structure, we mean. Or maybe more than a tad. (Or maybe less…cuz so much fun that who cares, you know?) Read on:

cavil-with-guardians-of-the-galaxyby Steven Zeitchik

Like many people this past weekend, I went to see “Guardians of the Galaxy” at a nearby multiplex. I bought some concession snacks, donned a pair of 3-D glasses and sat through the half-hour of previews that preceded the James Gunn romp with a fair bit of anticipation, stoked by my returning to the U.S.  after three weeks of work abroad to a stack of effusive reviews, as well as email bulletins that the Marvel movie was killing it at the box office. read article

LB: Why I Never Write for Actors Whose Work I Adore

freddie_prinze_jrIt’s a sad fact of my professional life that over the years, the actors I’ve most admired for their acting skill have almost always turned out to be thoroughly disappointing (as in detestable) human beings when I’ve actually worked with them.

For a long time now I’ve thought that the problem was within me. Maybe I expected too much? Maybe my writing was suffering because of the awe I felt in the very presence of the Great Ones? Or was there more to it?

Recently, I encountered a quote from Freddie Prinz Jr. on the very same subject: read article