Movie Production Blog #15: Script Development

We’re back! We never really went anywhere really, we’ve just been slaving over a hot script for the past eight months. Or eighteen+ months in total.

Script development is one of those stages where people ask how long it’s going to take, and you say well, how long is it to the nearest dwarf star? (it’s 4.2421 light years, which is about how long movie scripts take to reach the production stage, coincidentally.)

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But we’re done. At least, for now. We’re hoping this doesn’t mean another eight months until we’re happy with the script but then this is less to do with pickiness and more to do with a long, hard slog. We don’t just sit around writing the Zomblog script and eating donuts, believe it or not, we also have to have lives and pay bills and arrange meetings around those. And other movies we’ve made...

The script, eight months ago, just wasn’t cooked. It didn’t have the best jokes, the best supporting characters, the best set pieces, the best plot or the best Zomblog moments we could come up with. Now, thanks to some great friends of ours who helped us with many read throughs, it does, and we feel the time has come to send it off, so off it is being sent this very week, along with production art by the marvellous Dean Hopkins, a teaser poster we shot at the back end of last year, and a heap of production notes and location photos; everything to make the money people go WOAH THIS FILM HAS TO BE MADE AND IT HAS TO BE MADE NOWWWW.

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We want the answer to come back that the investors are keen to get rolling on the next phase. If they’re not, we go to Plan B. If Plan B falters, there’s Plans C to F, and then onto the (muttered in hushed tones) Plans G-T, with U-Z being that we actually rob a series of banks to fund the movie. Suffice to say, things are looking good at the moment for Plan A but we will get this movie made using some sort of PLAN.

We want the Zomblog movie to be big, bold, hilarious, loud, relevant and amazing. So, you know, no pressure, but that’s why we’ve taken so long to send this draft (14.2) of the script off. That, plus the inconveniences of trying to get four busy people to meet once a week, is also why we’ve taken so long to get the IndieGoGo perks sorted. You’ve probably forgotten what they are. Actually we’re not sure we haven’t, now you mention it. Was it something about a badge and a kiss blown from a passing car? Who knows. Anyway, they’re going out soon too.

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But the script is done, at least until the people with all the money tell us to do something else with it. So until then, loyal Zombloggers, look at the pretty pictures, rest assured there are rumblings in Zomblog land (although that’s probably to do with a bunch of bad donuts we ate at the last script meeting) and there will be more soon on the next phase of production.

For now, we can confidently say that Phase One of script development is done. That may not fill you with a lot of confidence, since there can always be a Phase Two, but we’re now waiting for more important people than ourselves to feed back. Then we’ll know both where the movie is at and where the series of specials – that we’re planning to link the series to the movie – are at.

Keep on Zomblogging.

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To be continued…

 

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