Jule Selbo - Film Genre for the Screenwriter

Want to write a screenplay that will appeal to your audience? Youd better know the genre youre aiming forand Jule Selbos Film Genre for the Screenwriter is the best guide out there to all film genres.

Diane Lake, screenwriter of Frida, Emerson College

Attention Screenwriters: whether you are writing a horror movie, rom-com, or sci-fi epic, Selbos book will give you a roadmap of how to embrace the conventions of your genre and give them a fresh twist!

Pat Verducci, Writer/Director of True Crime, Co-producer of Somewhere Between, UCLA Extension Screenwriting Instructor

In Film Genre for the Screenwriter, Jule Selbo insightfully reveals how disparate film genres blend into and enrich each other, bringing a gifted screenwriters clarity and concision to her task and encapsulating the full spectrum of commercial films without becoming reductive. This book is an invaluable tool for film teachers and for working screenwriters, one that enables them to truly see the big picture.

Guy Nicolucci, Screenwriting Instructor at NYU

As comprehensive in scope as it is exhaustively researched, Jule Selbos Film Genre for the Screenwriter succeeds in doing what few books of its kind usually can: be as fine a textbook for students as it is a practical instruction manual for working screenwriters. Explicating the ever-elusive aspects of storytelling style and craft with scholarly flair, Selbo has written a book that is every bit as entertaining as it is analytical. Covering every film genre and subgenre in great detail, she deftly synthesizes the thinking of a great many great minds, all the while adding a good deal of penetrating analysis of her own. The result? A smartly organized, easy-to-read, authoritative manual for understanding exactly what genre isand what it isntand why knowing the difference matters. Which is why it belongs as much in the classroom as it does on the bookshelf of the most accomplished screenwriters.

Jim Jennewein, screenwriter (The Flintstones, Richie Rich, Major League II), novelist and current Chair of Screenwriting at the Burbank campus of The New York Film Academy

Jule Selbos book is a must-read for the working professional or even the newcomer contemplating writing their first screenplay. Her clear and concise understanding of the fundamentals of every film genre will not only help everyone tell more satisfying stories, but also allow them to have fun while doing itSelbo literally gives the reader the inside scoop on how to play with the conventions of any particular genre, and even turn them on their head. With an industry that is becoming more and more obsessed and defined by genres, I dont see how anyone can pass this up.

Keir Pearson, screenwriter of Hotel Rwanda and Cesar Chavez

Jule Selbos text is an unpretentious and practical guide to screenwriting that never loses its sense of history. She successfully draws from her own experience and expertise to make screenwriting relatable and exciting. I highly recommend it.

Liz Manashil, filmmaker and national film critic for Just Seen It

Film Genre for the Screenwriter is a practical study of how classic film genre components can be used in the construction of a screenplay. Based on Jule Selbos popular course, this accessible guide includes an examination of the historical origins of specific film genres, how and why these genres are received and appreciated by film-going audiences, and how the student and professional screenwriter alike can use the knowledge of film genre components in the ideation and execution of a screenplay.

Explaining the defining elements, characteristics and tropes of genres from romantic comedy to slasher horror, and using examples from classic films like Casablanca alongside recent blockbuster franchises like Harry Potter, Selbo offers a compelling and readable analysis of film genre in its written form. The book also offers case studies, talking points and exercises to make its content approachable and applicable to readers and writers across the creative field.

Jule Selbo, PhD, heads up the M.F. A. in Screenwriting Program in the RadioTV-Film Department at California State University, Fullerton. She is an award-winning playwright and screenwriter with work in theatre, feature film, network and cable television and animated series; produced credits include projects for Disney, Columbia Pictures, Paramount and Universal.

Jule Selbo

First published 2015

by Routledge

605 Third Avenue, New York, NY 10017

and by Routledge

2 Park Square, Milton Park, Abingdon, Oxon OX14 4RN

Routledge is an imprint of the Taylor & Francis Group, an informa business

2015 Taylor & Francis

The right of Jule Selbo to be identified as author of this work has been asserted by her in accordance with sections 77 and 78 of the Copyright, Designs and Patents Act 1988.

All rights reserved. No part of this book may be reprinted or reproduced or utilized in any form or by any electronic, mechanical, or other means, now known or hereafter invented, including photocopying and recording, or in any information storage or retrieval system, without permission in writing from the publishers.

Trademark notice: Product or corporate names may be trademarks or registered trademarks, and are used only for identification and explanation without intent to infringe.

Library of Congress Cataloging-in-Publication Data

Selbo, Jule.

Film genre for the screenwriter / Jule Selbo.

pages cm

Includes bibliographical references and index.

1. Motion picture authorship. 2. Film genres. I. Title.

PN1996.S3846 2014

808.23dc23

2014004469

ISBN: 978-1-138-02081-8 (hbk)

ISBN: 978-1-138-02083-2 (pbk)

ISBN: 978-1-315-77817-4 (ebk)

DOI: 10.4324/9781315778174

Typeset in Stone Serif

by Apex CoVantage, LLC

I would like to thank those who have encouraged and helped me in the constructive phases of this book, especially William Higbee PhD at the University of Exeter for his guidance and encouragement and Susan Hayward PhD, Graeme Harper PhD, Sam North PhD, Mark Winkworth, Caroline Lindy, Lisa Kettle, Austin Farmer, Lilliana Winkworth, Bill Walden, the fine folks at Routledge and my comrades in the International Screenwriting Research Network who, like myself, have a passion for film genre. I would also like to thank all my students who explored film genre in my classes and shared my excitement in learning how to use film genre in building their screenplays.

As an American screenwriter working in Hollywood for nearly twenty years I have worked in film and television, writing live action as well as animation projects. I resisted categorization of my capabilities or strengths as a writer; I wrote a romantic comedy for Columbia Pictures, drama/fantasy for Paramount, a bio-pic for Disney, action/adventure/coming-of-age scripts for George Lucas Young Indiana Jones Chronicles, melodrama for Aaron Spellings Melrose Place, sci-fi for 20th Century Fox, horror and sci-fi for George Romeros Tales From the Darkside and Monsters, comedy for Comedy Network and adaptations of childrens literature for Disney, Fox, PBS and others. I jumped into writing in these genres relying almost entirely on the surface knowledge I had gained over years of reading literature and viewing films. Because I enjoy the analysis of film, even as I worked as a professional screenwriter I continued studying my craft in classes in the area of story structuremostly because I never came across classes dedicated to the understanding or dissection of film genre for the screenwriter. To my mind, an analysis of genre was a blind spot in the teaching and writing on the craft of screenwriting. This lack of attention to the question of genre became even clearer to me when I began my academic career and it became my task to instruct students in screenwriting. Popular American screenwriting how-to books such as those by Syd Field (1987, 2005), Robert ), I dedicate forty pages to explication of classic film genre components but do not explore the use of genre during the constructive phase of a screenplay. Neill D. Hicks book,