Subtlety has escaped Hollywood. Hollywood, however, is a representation of what the market will bear. Market being the peeps. Us. What we’re likely to pay a whopping twelve bucks to watch.

To be more homogenous, movies must have:

• Action
• Suspense
• Romance
• Mystery
• Redemption
• Revenge
• Comic relief
• Strong female lead
• Coupled by a backward-thinking male lead who learns to love the strong female lead finally realizing that she’s his everlasting soul mate for all time and beyond
• A chase scene either by foot, car, truck, or air, with shoot outs that lead to a climactic battle between God and Satan, where armies of orcs, elves, muggles, wizards, witches, followed by mere men and women, and a child who was born with a butterfly tattoo preordaining her to cure the virus that has threatened life as we know it and must complete a special training that will make him (wasn’t it a her?) nearly invincible (nearly because we have to have tension in our epic fog of a story)
• And a Hollywood ending where the child cures Satan of his issues, and both God and Satan float off into the sunset
• The End

One of the things I do is read reviews of movies, Roger Ebert being my favorite. They don’t have any bearing on what I watch. But I can learn a lot about story telling by people’s likes and dislikes, and they’re fairly common. As a story teller, the market is important to a certain point. But as J.K. Rowling and Stephanie Meyers has proven, good content creates the market. We see this in the explosion of wizardry and horromance in the media today.

When reviews are either good or bad cohesively, there may be some merit. On Fandango, I had looked up the times for Hereafter, directed by Clint Eastwood, starring Matt Damon. Part of the movie was filmed in San Francisco in an apartment building my friend lives in. So it was cool hearing stories of how filming went.

Fandango had a rating of yellow, meaning most of the people who saw the movie thought it was “so-so”. That’s the middle rating. But Jackass in 3D got a bright green rating, the top, a “must go”. A red means “oh no”, stay away or lose two hours of life you can never get back.

Most people complained Hereafter was slow and uneventful. But you can’t have a good story with substance based purely on the afterlife. You may point out Paranormal Activity, but it’s just cheap thrills. Would you stay in a house that haunted you for any length of time? I’m brave. But I ain’t that brave. And none of the Paranomal movies explored why they stayed or what issues being haunted brought up. It represents nothing. It’s like going to a strip club, paying to get a hard-on, then walking home with with no relief.

Not that I know of those kinds of naughty, naughty things.

A good story with substance uses something as the backdrop, like the afterlife, to show case interpersonal issues. Hereafter does that from three different perspectives: a psychic who can communicate with the dead, a journalist who had a near death experience, and a boy who yearns for his dead twin.

A good example of backdrop is Casino Royale. I’m not a huge Bond fan. I never knew why until I started to study story. James Bond is a classic character. He’s suave. He likes all women. He sleeps with all women he desires. He likes his drinks to be shaken, not stirred. He can get out of any situation. He’s a master fighter, can wield any weapon made available, and is witty.

But as a character, he never changes.  He doesn’t go from having no confidence to being confident. He doesn’t realize the error of his ways. He doesn’t learn to be loyal because he already is. He doesn’t have any bad qualities.  Qualities that a writer can hang his hat on to change.

Except for one. He’s emotionally detached to the women he’s intimate with. He never falls in love. Then Vesper Lynd, played by Eva Green, shows up in Royale. She’s confident, brash, reads Bond for who he is, and just as every bit competitive. Through their competitiveness, Bond falls in love with her. A huge change in both character and in the movie. When Vesper dies, he must struggle with the pain, something all humans go through. As a result, Casino Royale is one of the best reviewed Bond movies.

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I’d just watched a great movie called Man From Earth.  The premise is awesome, and without it I wouldn’t have watched it.  But during a good-gye party, friends learn that the honorary guest is a caveman who has lived for 14,000 years.  That’s right.  A bonafied caveman, cro magnon, to be exact.

It was written by famed science fantasy writer, Jerome Bixby.

It’s a fantastic premise because what the caveman reveals is just earth shattering.  I’d suggest watching.

One of the things John, the caveman, reveals is that he was a well known religious figure.  Everyone in the party at this point doesn’t really know whether to believe his story so far, but to claim to be this certain figure seems heinous.  Until John explains how this religious figure got his mythical status.  How history can apply layers of mythicism on an individual.

And that got me thinking.

I’d had the pleasure of pitching to Donald Maass, the famed New York agent who wrote How to Write the Breakout Novel.  This was my first book on writing.  I’d attended his one hour lecture at the San Francisco Writer’s Conference.  His whole thing is to write with emotional depth and make your story big.  Big with emotions.  (Wow.  I’m using a lot of fragments today.)

Some examples are betrayal, retribution, and the all time favorite “I hate you, dad!”

In my book, my hero has severe issues with his father.  His father left him without saying good-bye after being convicted of a murder.  With this, a lot of people assumed that the father was guilty, despite his fervent attempt to prove his innocence.  Kinda like OJ hurling down the freeway at 152.5 MPH.

My hero is left with the question of why.  Was his father guilty?  Did he not love my hero enough?  What did my hero do to make his father leave?  As the days pass, my hero is forced to answer these questions and begins to layer greatness upon his estranged father.

Sorta like someone breaking up with you, and you can’t stop thinking about all the good times you both had, even though there may have been a lot of bad.

Maass said these past parental issues tend to manifest themselves in other parts of your life.  For example, if your father was a perfectionist, forced and punished you to be a perfectionist, then you grow up and torture yourself to be a perfectionist at work.  Your relationships go bad because you’re trying to find the perfect man or woman.  You can’t seem to settle on any home that you visit, driving your real estate agent crazy.  You go into deep debt, buying every electronic device because they keep getting better.  You get ten plastic surgeries trying to fit the perfect mold.  All because your father prodded you to be perfect.  Then, all of a sudden, you yell at a picture of your father, “I hate you, dad!”  But what you actually hate is the person you’ve turned into, and, hopefully, as up-lifting stories go, you realize that his world of perfection doesn’t have to be yours.  And you begin to live a life that’s true to you.

The point is, when writing stories, sometimes childhood issues bubble up without the character knowing it.  He may never know it.  She may scream at a jar of honey and remember when her mother yelled at her for spilling honey on their new carpet.  It’s a great way of deepening a character.

A couple of weeks ago I’d met up with a friend I hadn’t talked to for over a decade. He used to be an instructor at the martial arts school I’d taught at. Read about my opinions about that in my bio.

We’re both writers and we’d talked about writing the story that calls to us. With all the vampiric stories that are being churned both in the publishing and film industry, I don’t blame people for jumping on the band wagon.  But the point of being an artist is to express your soul.  And if your soul says write a vampire story, then write a vampire story.

When it comes to finding out what you want to do with your life, what story should be written, what path you should take, you need to be honest with yourself.  How do you be honest with yourself?

First of all, are you honest with other people? I’m not talking about being a saint, never telling lies, never doing anything wrong. Were human. But do you care about what other people say about you? Do care about what other people think about you? Do you put all your stock in your status in life?

Why is this important?

Because any of this, namely your ego, can block your true self.  You become motivated by the things that seem important–the size of your house, the German car in your massive garage, the name brand clothes you wear, the title of your job, bottled water.  Do these things matter?  That’s for you to decide.  Do they matter when it comes toexpressing yourself honestly? No.

When I went to the San Francisco Writers Conference, Richard Paul Evans, one of the keynote speakers said something that really hit home. Especially since he’s a New York Times bestselling author.  He said write your truth.  Don’t hop on the bandwagon. Don’t be a follower.  Lead by leading.

Bruce Lee said the same thing. Honestly express yourself.

Look at the things that you’re drawn to.  Do you love music?  Any particular kind?  Try that out.  Do you love software programming?  Try that out.  Do you love selling?  If you have an affinity for houses, maybe you should be a real estate agent.  Or if you love helping people get healthier, maybe you should try physical therapy, personal training, nursing.

Is there a common theme that runs throughout your life?

For me, I’ve always loved stories.  And I always loved fantasizing, putting myself in action movie roles, imagining what it would be like to be betrayed by a close friend, finding myself in a fantasy land where I’m a warlord.  Since my sophomore year, I’ve tried to write novels.  But when it came to deciding a major in college, I never thought of majoring in English or creative writing.  Why?  I’m not sure.  Maybe the things I had to go through as a person lent itself to writing the series of novels that I’m writing now.

I’m not angry about it.  Nor do I judge it.  I realize that I have stories to be told, and I’m telling them.