Steven Maras,
Screenwriting: History, Theory and Practice.
Wallflower Press, 2009
ISBN: 978-1-905674-81-7
UK£16.99 (pb)
227pp
(Review copy supplied by Wallflower Press
http://www.wallflowerpress.co.uk)

From his initial point which suggests a problematic arising from the separating out of (manuscript based) screenwriting and screen writing (“writing” for the screen through cinematography and sound for example), it becomes evident that what Steven Maras is seeking to do is a to create a conceptual synthesis through an examination of how screenwriting has come to be historicized as an autonomous practice. This is a key theme which is reinforced throughout the book. Reminding us of Derrida’s observation that cinematography and photography are etymologically speaking forms of writing, Maras emphasises the importance of writing as a concept, not “for the screen but with or on the screen” and in doing so underlines the importance of this second category when considering the creation of a film so that it “helps draw attention to the tensions between different ideas of writing”. (p. 2) This volume seeks to address what Maras calls the “object problem” (p. 185) by proposing an analytical model which includes a wider definition of what screenwriting is. In doing so he invites us to reconsider some well established notions of how film production and film history have evolved. The book revisits some key concepts in film history and seeks to provide a different conceptual model for examining screenwriting, along with an examination of some alternative models for screenwriting practice in a contemporary context. It also touches on some elements of film theory. It may be already evident that the title is somewhat misleading, suggesting history, theory and practice can be considered separately from each other, whereas Maras invites us to view these collectively.

It would be wrong to suggest that this is an alternative history of screenwriting. Film historians with an interest in the role of the screenplay will find this an invaluable resource which draws on early ways of approaching screen production with a written plan, debates in the Soviet Union in the 1920s, through to the evolution and role of the continuity script in Classical Hollywood Cinema. Maras also reminds us of the importance of the screenplay as a dynamic in how various historical stages in Classical Hollywood have been defined and casts a new inflection on the important work of David Bordwell, Janet Staiger and Kristin Thompson.

Although the book should ideally be read as an evolving argument, the ten chapters are nevertheless easily navigable, with italicised abstracts at the beginning of each one.
In “The Screenplay as Literature”, Maras offers up an especially interesting discussion on the question of whether the screenplay might be regarded as an autonomous or an intermediate work; on the evolution of the arguments associated with this area of screenwriting aesthetics, from Dziga Vertov through Brik and Balázs in the 1930s, to Bergman and Pasolini, and in Hollywood, the publishing projects in the 1930s and 1940s of John Gassner and Dudley Nichols. The chapter also presents an especially useful survey of the critical literature in this area since the early 1970s.

I am a little uncomfortable with Maras’s claim that “many screenwriters are already consumers of theory” and that “theory is embedded in many screenwriting manuals”. (p. 10) It is true that the ‘canon’ of post 1970s screenwriting manuals (Field, Segar, Vogler and McKee) are overwhelmingly built on Aristotelian narrative models. But this has been, after all, the dominant mode of storytelling in the Classical Hollywood Cinema along with its successors (see Kristin Thompson’s Storytelling in the New Hollywood), through to the present. So it should come as no surprise that the manuals might reflect this. It is true too that Christopher Vogler’s The Writer’s Journey is based substantially on a Jungian paradigm (through pop anthropologist Joseph Campbell), but save for central conflict theory (which is imbedded in the ideology of these manuals rather than presented as a theory as such), this is pretty much where the theory ends. They are not replete with literary theory as Maras suggests. McKee addresses genre but only insomuch as it relates to narrative. My own personal gripe is the lack of the manuals’ discussion of genre, or any recognition of how genre theory might successfully inform screenwriting practice; why so many films (and scripts) fail or conversely, why we rejoice in the playful, inventive and disparate combinations of narrative, characterisation, style, tone and iconography which are present in so many films. The interactive triumvirate of artist, audience and text from inception (my emphasis), which is the basis of genre theory must surely have some utility in addressing Maras’s “object problem”. As Derrida has famously noted, “Every text participates in one of several genres, there is no genreless text.” So one might ask if a discussion on the auteur theory has a place in this volume; and it is an interesting one in that it posits some area of common ground between screenwriters and the original proponents of the politique des auteurs, what of genre?
The answer to this can be found, to some extent at least, in the final chapter where Maras offers up one manual Alternative Screenwriting (Dancyger and Rush) as a “seminal work”, along with some important critics of traditional film development practice, Adrian Martin and Kathryn Millard. Not surprisingly, Jean-Claude Carrière and Raúl Ruiz loom as important influences here. And through his discussion of the workshop based approaches of Mike Leigh and John Cassavetes and the contemporary approaches of “digital scriptings” (p. 179), Maras asks us to reconsider the traditional separation of conception and execution.

Maras has drawn on a wide range of sources beyond the academic literature including AFTRS, USC Film School, practicing filmmakers and screenwriters. He suggests that the book is written for “students or teachers of screenwriting craft, and readers with an interest in media studies” (p. 1), and that those interested in film issues and film history might also gain a new perspective. This first group might benefit from a rethinking of the idea of “screenplay as blueprint” as a normative practice. To some extent this is already going on in film schools such as the Australian Film, Television and Radio School where “resonance sessions” between key creatives (directors, production designers, cinematographers and sound designers) are conducted at the early draft stage. Film development practices are changing also, with an increasing emphasis on teams, in Australia for example, government funded “hothouse” schemes such as Aroura and SPARK which seek to develop screenplays as a dynamic process between creative personnel. (Whether history acknowledges these processes is of course another matter.) Within the academy where practice as research (my italics) is gaining increasing popularity, not only the conceptual framework provided by the book but the extensive bibliography and endnotes are an invaluable resource for those seeking to frame their creative practice within the academy. (For time poor supervisors, the note on special issues on screenwriting in scholarly journals since the 1970s for example, is almost worth the cover price alone.) (p. 187) For film scholars and especially film historians, the rigour and attention to detail in the discussion of the history and evolution of screenwriting practice is invaluable. In these contexts Maras’s hopes for the achievements of his the book might seem a little modest.

Harry Kirchner,
La Trobe University, Australia.

Created on: Thursday, 10 December 2009