by Blake Snyder Save the cat! It could be the most dangerous book there is for writers.
And you should read it.
But first, you must recognize how to take advantage of what is valuable in Save the cat!while understanding the principles that make it so potentially destructive.
Blake Snyder is not dangerous because he is wrong. He is not. He’s not dangerous because his ideas about how to build a script around a great premise aren’t brilliant. They are.
Blake Snyder is dangerous because he doesn’t teach you how to be a writer. He teaches you how to be a salesperson.
What good is saving the cat?
You’re going to need a lot of money to turn your script into a movie. That’s true whether you’re writing a small indie movie that you’re going to shoot in your backyard. Or the next incarnation of Avatar.
Unless you’re ridiculously rich, or have a generous uncle waiting with a check in hand, making your movie will probably require more money than you have. And that means you’ll have to convince people that they should put their own hard-earned money behind your production.
We call these people producers. They tend to make writers pretty angry. That’s because they couldn’t care less about your artistic vision, the integrity of your writing, or how your script is going to change the world.
When a producer invests in your movie, he or she is investing in one thing: the chance that your movie will put butts in the seats.
Without cigarette butts on the seats, your movie will lose money. And no matter how brilliant your artistic vision is, it’s not going to change the world, make you laugh, cry, or buy an overpriced barrel of popcorn. Because no one will ever see it.
And that’s where Blake Snyder is right. No one will go see your movie unless the producer knows how to sell it. That means you need a great premise, one that will grab the audience’s attention and make them want to watch your movie. And once they’re at the theater, you have to exceed the promise you made to your audience, so they can go and talk to their friends about how great your movie was and drive even more asses to the theater.
Save the cat! The approach is basically turning your script into a giant sales pitch. A living advertising device that looks so compelling that audiences can’t help but see it, and producers can’t help but buy it, good or not.
Sounds like a really good idea, right?
Except it’s not going to work for you.
That’s because unless you’re born into a Hollywood family (Snyder’s father was producer Kenneth Snyder) or already have a multi-million dollar hit in your back pocket, no one who’s anybody is going to take a chance on your bullshit script. It doesn’t matter how good the premise is.
Selling is for professionals
It’s true. Hollywood is full of writers who sell bad scripts with great premises and make a lot of money doing it.
And you can too.
That is, if you’re already a great writer.
The problem is, if you’re like most writers, that probably means you don’t have a multi-million dollar hit in your back pocket. And in that case no one who is no one is going to risk it with your bad script.
This may seem like an unfair double standard. But is not. And if you don’t believe me, just answer this question:
Whose next script is more likely to make you money on your investment: Quentin Tarantino’s or Joe Smith’s?
You don’t even know what the script is about, but you already know the answer. Tarantino has quite a track record to point to. Joe only has his script.
If Joe is going to convince someone to take a chance on him, that script had better be a good one. Very good. It would be better to make them believe in him so strongly that they would put his own reputation and their own hard-earned money on the line to achieve it.
The truth is that “big ideas” in Hollywood are a dime a dozen. And so are writers with impressive track records.
But genuinely good scripts are incredibly rare.
A good script is gold in Hollywood. And you can write one.
Blake Snyder can show you how to sell it. But he can’t show you how to write it.
There’s a reason Blake Snyder’s masterpiece was Stop or my mom will shoot.
Whether the movie you’re writing is a deeply moving drama, popcorn-eating action flick, or teen sex comedy, there are no shortcuts in the writing process. At least not if you want to write a good movie.
The four phases of writing
In my classes, I divide the writing process into four phases. I’ll detail them more in future newsletters, but for now, here’s a brief overview:
1. The ME draft
2. The HEARING draft
3. The PRODUCER Project
4. The READER eraser
What Blake Snyder is describing in Save The Cat! it’s really just the PRODUCER phase of this process: the adaptation and revision stage that focuses on amplifying the most marketable elements in his script to make it sweet for the producers.
It’s a great place to end. But it’s a lousy place to start.
Don’t Spend Your Writing Life Feeling Like a Used Car Salesman
No offense to used car dealers, but you’re not going to get into an industry as competitive as the movie industry by selling a beat-up jalopy with fancy paint.
You can fool your Aunt Ida. But a true producer can tell when an engine isn’t running.
open yourself to the process
If you let yourself be seduced into thinking about the pitch before you have something worth selling, you won’t get where you want to go.
Just like the kid who swears the most on the basketball court probably won’t make it to the NBA. At least not until he learns to shoot.
Learning how to film in the world of screenwriting starts with discovering your character and taking it on a deep journey.
It means getting in touch with your subconscious creative mind, which could care less about marketing and sales pitches, and creating a story that exceeds your own plans and expectations.
Then, when you decide to “Save the Cat,” you’ll do it for the right reasons: to amplify and focus what already makes your script great, and shape it in a way the producer can salivate about.
Don’t worry, you’ll have plenty of time to sell later. But first you have to become a writer.
Learn to understand the four phases of writing
Curious to learn a more effective way to “Save the Cat” in your own writing? Come see my next script workshop: Adaptation and Review.
Instead of imposing a cheesy sales pitch from the outside, you’ll learn to identify the underlying hook that already exists in your work and focus your writing on bringing it to the surface, intensifying your character’s journey, and shaping a story that engages your character. attention. public and will not let them go.
Sign up now and watch the first session for just $20!
