Edinburgh Napier University

  Modern screenwriting handbooks by self-styled gurus have been broadly criticized within the academy for restricting and revoking screenwriting practice, both noticing and concretizing a delimiting doxa, and in doing so presiding over a profound conventionalisation of film product at the script level. What has perhaps received less attention is the hostility towards unconventionality and experimentation within these texts. McKee, Field, Vogler and Yorke alike delegitimize unconventional practice in the screenplay, either framing it as inferior or ignoring it altogether. The influence of these texts both within screen industries and higher education has been enormous, certainly informing the way nascent screenwriters learn their craft as well as how they are coerced to practice once they enter industry.

Joshua Oppenheimer (2014) has called upon pedagogues to make it very clear when they are teaching conformism, and ‘not disguise it as art or creativity’, and argued for instructors to create ‘a space, a preserve, a sanctuary, where students are encouraged to translate their dreams, their nightmares, their most passionate explorations into works for the screen.’ This video essay will explore how screenwriting teachers can develop such a space, and why we should.