Hello all,

I've written a short film script that I'm hoping to direct, but it is very dialogue heavy, and I'm worried it will be visually dull. I have no budget, and am relying entirely upon friends and favors to get this done. Because of this lack of costumes, props, or locations, I've had to rely pretty much entirely upon dialogue. It's roughly 7-8 minutes in length, and pretty much all dialogue for the full duration of that. I'm starting to have self doubt about it. Will a potential internet audience want to sit and listen to essentially just an 8 minute conversation? How can I bring interesting visuals to 2 people just sitting in a room?

I'd love to hear your thoughts on this as a creative community. Any ideas or input to do with dialogue heavy scripts would be very welcome.

Thanks.

If the conversation is interesting. But usually 'friend' actors are not good actors. Thry probably can't deliver the lines the right way. But why don't you post the screebplay so we can take a look at it?

The friends I mentioned are actually the crew. The actors will be auditioned and chosen from local drama schools, acting groups, etc. While they won't be of a professional standard, it is my hope that we can find 2 leads who are a step above the usual 'force my friends to be actors' route.

I may well post the script up. It's currently off with a script editor who is kindly having a read and providing me with some notes and feedback, so I will probably do another re-write after that, and then maybe it will be at a level where I'd be happy to share to the world.

In the mean time I didn't know if anyone had any examples of dialogue heavy shorts they particularly enjoyed, or had any experience with working on something of this nature that they'd be willing to share. I'd love to see some examples of other people who have triumphed in this sort of short making. It always helps to make things feel more achievable when you know some one else has done it.

For comparison comes Tarantino's segment from Four Rooms to mind. A 20 minute short that is heavely based on dialogue. However, that is Tarantino, master of dialogue. Soneone like us should not compare himself to him.

Erik wrote:For comparison comes Tarantino's segment from Four Rooms to mind. A 20 minute short that is heavely based on dialogue. However, that is Tarantino, master of dialogue. Soneone like us should not compare himself to him.

Of course, I wouldn't dream of it! I will check out his short though.

That's a very good question. It is hard to make dialogue heavy movies interesting visually, unless you're called David Fincher (The Social Network).

You can try to break from the usual over the shoulder shots, and spice it up a bit, break the rules. I don't know, you could use dolly shots (if you have the equipment to make smooth, stable shots) as if creeping up on your protagonists while they're talking, do a kind of circular dolly (dont know the term for this shot, Michael Bay loves it), where you kind of spin around your characters as they're talking.

I think the key really is trying not to get too repetitive, which is obviously easier said than done. The problem is, you can't mix it up too much because since what you're doing is dialogue-heavy, you have to serve the performances, so you need to be able to see the character's facial expressions, or you could break that too, and just go with shots where the characters are talking, but you don't see their faces, just their backs as you're moving towards them with a dolly shot.

Jax_Teller wrote:That's a very good question. It is hard to make dialogue heavy movies interesting visually, unless you're called David Fincher (The Social Network).

You can try to break from the usual over the shoulder shots, and spice it up a bit, break the rules. I don't know, you could use dolly shots (if you have the equipment to make smooth, stable shots) as if creeping up on your protagonists while they're talking, do a kind of circular dolly (dont know the term for this shot, Michael Bay loves it), where you kind of spin around your characters as they're talking.

I think the key really is trying not to get too repetitive, which is obviously easier said than done. The problem is, you can't mix it up too much because since what you're doing is dialogue-heavy, you have to serve the performances, so you need to be able to see the character's facial expressions, or you could break that too, and just go with shots where the characters are talking, but you don't see their faces, just their backs as you're moving towards them with a dolly shot.

Oh man, this is super lucky. I am actually David Fincher!! Haha, I wish. You're right though, the social network is a bit of a master class in dialogue heavy movie making in my eyes.

I'm actually feeling a little better about it this evening. I've settled on the concept of having a unique visual signature for each of these two characters. One is very cold and detached, so I want to shoot him relatively far and wide. Keep distance between the audience and him. The other one is warm and likeable, so I want to shoot him up close, keep it intimate. Lots of shots on the eyes and hands. Combining this visual back and forth, with a couple of trick shots that intro and outro the piece, and I think I can keep it interesting for the duration.

I have a great DOP on board, and a pretty talented story boarder to help me plan all this out, so maybe, just maybe we'll get there.

Still would love to hear some more suggestions and see more examples though. Nothing is set in stone yet!

I suggest some interesting framing that complements the actors as they speak.