BSA 104 (Scriptwriting) Week 12 : Treatment Writing

The next step in our writing process is the treatment. In class we learned a bit about effective treatment writing and put it into practice. 

Writing a treatment is like writing a short story, it goes into detail about the plot but completely lacks dialogue. The treatment is basically written completely in big text.

Some things to keep in mind when writing a treatment:

- No use of personal pronouns in describing the scene (classic example: "we see")

- No specific dialogue, say what the characters say/reveal ("he tells her that he's pregnant, she cries with tears of joy") 

-  Use evocative language (being clean and precise is important)

- Don't describe anything that the audience cannot infer from the visuals/sounds alone ("We see Dave, he's just found out he's pregnant" should be "A young man looks down at a pregnancy test with a positive reading, he looks down and caresses his belly") 

- Don't describe shots or use cinmeatic language, infer it with the writing (unless absolutely vital)

In class we were given the task of making a treatment out of a nursery rhyme, I got Jack and Jill Went Up The Hill

(Jack and Jill went up the hill
To fetch a pail of water
Jack fell down and broke his crown,
And Jill came tumbling after)

I liked both the freedom and constraints that this task gave us, my treatment below:

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Jack and Jill Treatment

Screaming can be heard. A small hill stands in the middle of nowhere, it’s twisted spiral distorted by heat waves. It’s a girls wailing, she’s calling for help. There is no one around, the only movement is sand being blown across a plateau, the only vertical presence is the hill. It’s a desert, all greenery is absent. In the distance the run-down roof of a shed can be seen, far beyond the silhouette of the town. Between the yelling, half sobs can be heard. A girl on her knees holds a boy in her arms, tears streaming down her dust-covered face. They sit on the side of the hill, a particularly steep bit. A bucket lays on it’s side in the dust, it is completely dry. Blood gushes out of the boy's head, turning brown in the sand. A small river of blood makes it’s way down the hill. The screaming continues, but there’s no one around to hear. Atop the hill there sits a stone well. A rope leads it’s way down the well, it is deep but the stones are visibly wet. The girl’s wailing echoes, she’s desperately crying out for someone to help her. A vulture lands on the rocks nearby. It looks inquisitively at the two children, craning its neck.

The girl’s voice is raspy, she realises no one will come to her aid. She sits silently for a moment, no longer crying but sobs can still be heard coming from her throat. She wipes away the tears, blood and dirt from her cheeks. For a while she sits silently, accepting the reality of her situation. The boy isn’t breathing, he’s motionless, the gushing of the blood has stopped. With a sudden new strength the girl stands up, picks up the bucket and makes her way up the hill. She has no shoes on, her feet are worn-out and the heels are split. Her legs shake as she struggles to get up the hill, she bucket in fastened in her fist. Again her eyes fill up with tears, she makes a misstep. She corrects herself and wipes at her eyes. She starts crying freely, not looking back. Behind her the boy’s body lays out of focus. The vulture gets closer to him. The hill gets steeper, the girl has to claw at a rock. The bucket is safe in her right hand, her left secures itself around a large rock. The rock comes loose. The girl falls. A final scream and the vulture snaps it’s head around in shock. The mountain towers over the falling body of the girl. She breaks her arm on a rock, she rolls past the boy and hits a pile of rocks where the boy’s blood have started to accumulate. The bucket flies through the air, there isn’t a cloud in the sky. On the rocks the girl lies mangled, her broken arm twitches.

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I wanted to avoid phrases like "we see" or "we hear" at all costs, and while I successfully managed to do so I think saying "can be seen" or "can be heard" isn't that much of an improvement. instead of saying "Screaming can be heard", I could just as well have simply stated "Screaming."

We got some feedback in class and another thing I could change is "with a sudden new strength the girl stands up", in my mind I imagined that this would be communicated through the performance. I should have described what this part of the performance is, e.g. "the girl shoots up, a look of determination on her face".