After the mid-season break 'The Walking Dead' returned with a very uneven, mostly unsatisfying episode. The narrative and directorial style of 'The Walking Dead' desperately needs to be addressed. The episode opened with the same kinds of scenes I have repeatedly commented upon in these blog posts. The tight shots of character's faces, followed by a series of flashbacks detailing 'how they got there' is a device the writers and directors overuse so much that each episode is starting to feel like the last. I find myself watching each episode with an ongoing sense that I have seen it all before. After the predictable opening shots, we revisit Carl in the aftermath of that fatal bite (the scene
Hyped and Wrong React? : Should you trust festival feedback and early critical reviews? Along with all the annual award shows the festival season has started in earnest, and those lucky media journalists who get to attend them are telling us all about the big films to watch out for. Every year seems to have a genre film highlighted as being “the one to watch” or one that has a weird effect on the audience. This has been especially true recently with films like “Don’t Breathe”, “Get Out”, and (obviously) “IT”, making studios aware of how influential horror can be. And whilst we’ve always loved home-grown film showcases like Frightfest and Grimmfest, the horror selection in TIFF, Sundance, and
(SPOILERS: Get Out, The Big Sick) If you ask producers and development executives what they’re looking for in new writers, among the top answers will be, “Someone with a distinctive voice.” But what do they really mean by the term “voice”? A writer’s voice is a combination of style, thematic content, and point of view. It is part of a writer’s brand, which also includes things like the genre and format they are known for. For some writers, the style part of their voice is readily apparent. You can tell the difference between scripts by Quentin Tarantino, Nancy Myers, Shane Black, Aaron Sorkin, Woody Allen, and Judd Apatow by such stylistic elements as the way they use dialogue, humor, and
