Paper Man
This afternoon I watched Paper Man, the 2009 film with Lisa Kudrow, Emma Stone, etc, after my housemate had recommended I watch it, and now I understand why! What a good film! The central character Richard is a struggling writer who is trying to write a novel. I understand so many of Richard's struggles with writing, his issues with balancing his work and life situation and his issues with writers block which I am dealing with at the moment. Oh, and the need to do everything perfectly, for my work to be amazing first time, I understand this entirely. I always expect my writing to be perfect first time, but this is mainly because I hate editing.
Richard attempts to use solitary confinement to help develop his work by travelling to a house out in the woods to get away from the city and write. I am currently writing this (and my assignment and rationale) behind my closed bedroom door, locked in my brain with no one near to distract me or read my work before I am ready for them to. I have already had a freak out this week about my work being read. My mum read my assignment yesterday too which was no less than a mildly traumatic experience. But, I digress. Richard also stumbles over the first name of his character for a long time, which I can relate with also. Names are so important in writing! I am working through some character development stuff at the moment and it is crucial for me to understand the whole life of my characters, why do they behave in this way? Is it linked to their childhood? What happened there? How did they get here? etc, etc. Richard is wildly protective over his work and I get that also, my work is my own until I am ready for someone else to read it and not a second before. Writing is intensely personal and sometimes private, i'm amazed I even write this blog and put it on the internet sometimes.
The final idea which I like from the film is Ryan Reynold's character of My Excellent. He is, not only, wonderfully written and acted, but I envision him as a part of Richard's imagination/his muse/his working mind/his own worst critic/his inner voice/hindrance/guardian or all of the above. I like the idea that I have an imaginary person helping me write when I sit down at my desk. In fact I probably have every single one of my characters sat on my shoulders yelling at about how they wouldn't act in that way because of...
In any case, I loved it, but should probably get back to working now.
A working soundtrack today: Hans Zimmer
Richard attempts to use solitary confinement to help develop his work by travelling to a house out in the woods to get away from the city and write. I am currently writing this (and my assignment and rationale) behind my closed bedroom door, locked in my brain with no one near to distract me or read my work before I am ready for them to. I have already had a freak out this week about my work being read. My mum read my assignment yesterday too which was no less than a mildly traumatic experience. But, I digress. Richard also stumbles over the first name of his character for a long time, which I can relate with also. Names are so important in writing! I am working through some character development stuff at the moment and it is crucial for me to understand the whole life of my characters, why do they behave in this way? Is it linked to their childhood? What happened there? How did they get here? etc, etc. Richard is wildly protective over his work and I get that also, my work is my own until I am ready for someone else to read it and not a second before. Writing is intensely personal and sometimes private, i'm amazed I even write this blog and put it on the internet sometimes.
The final idea which I like from the film is Ryan Reynold's character of My Excellent. He is, not only, wonderfully written and acted, but I envision him as a part of Richard's imagination/his muse/his working mind/his own worst critic/his inner voice/hindrance/guardian or all of the above. I like the idea that I have an imaginary person helping me write when I sit down at my desk. In fact I probably have every single one of my characters sat on my shoulders yelling at about how they wouldn't act in that way because of...
In any case, I loved it, but should probably get back to working now.
A working soundtrack today: Hans Zimmer
Comments
Post a Comment