The Valley Of Gwangi (1969), The Dinosaur Is The Father Of The Man
(article originally written for Mark Deniz’s “Monster Appreciation Month”) I first saw The Valley Of Gwangi in 1973 or 1974, well after its 1969 release. I was about 5 or…
Dialogue Is Just Another Sound Effect
When a civilian meets a screenwriter, usually the second thing they say is, "Oh, so you write all the dialogue then?" (first thing is "Have you written anything I would've seen?")…
I Ask Inga von Staden: What IS Transmedia?
The term “transmedia” seems to have originated in 1991 with Marsha Kinder, the critical studies dynamo of USC’s cinema school. When I was at USC, cinema students were divided into…
A Tale Of Two Star Warses, or Why The Phantom Menace Gives Us A Bad Feeling
(this article originally appeared at screenwriting website Twelvepoint.com, July 2010) I stepped out of Star Wars: Episode 1 - The Phantom Menace (1999) onto the sidewalk in front of Mann's…
Full Spectrum Story Dominance
I'm on my way now to the third and final day of the Transmedia Next Training For Media Professionals, where the Pickfords, Chaplins, Fairbankses and Griffithses of the 21st century…
Martin (1977)
(article originally appeared on Mark Deniz's "Vampire Appreciation Month" site as "George Romero’s Martin: Portrait Of An Honest Vampire”) My first exposure to George A. Romero's Martin (1977) came via…
Introduction To Sequence Structure
(this article originally appeared at screenwriting website Twelvepoint.com, March 2010) I always pat myself on the back for having written a great scene, but writing a great scene doesn’t help…
Escape From L.A., Pt. 2
(this article originally appeared at screenwriting website Twelvepoint.com, Jan. 2010) - Read Part 1 of "Escape From L.A." - And so, with growing dread, I came to understand that this…
Escape From L.A., Pt. 1
‘(Los Angeles) is a country coming down from its trip. We are 91 days from the end of this decade, and there's gonna be a lot of refugees. They'll be…
The V&A’s Decode, Dreaming The Future Of Digital Media
(originally printed in Videography magazine, Feb. 2010) London’s Victoria and Albert Museum, generally acknowledged as the world’s largest institution of decorative arts and design, was founded by Queen Victoria in…