When creating any media piece for people to consume, there will always be a bit of writing involved. Whether you’re creating a stage play, music, or movie, you will need writing skills to pass your idea across. What the actors and instruments do is just breathe life into your written ideas.
This means that to create a good movie in any genre, you need to have great writing skills. This is especially true with horror flicks. Even if you prefer to use an essay writing service for all your written parts, the idea is still yours.
It’s necessary to cultivate some skills to help you pour your soul into your movie. Sometimes, this is what sets a movie apart – how well the plot is written. This article will uncover the writing skills you need to have to produce a scare film, so stay behind.
What Viewers Want to See in Action Horror Movies
Before you write horror movie scripts, you need to know what your audience is looking forward to seeing in your movie. Because of the nature of these movies, you may think a bloodbath here and a chainsaw there will set you up nicely for a blockbuster. Kindly dispel that naive notion because you’ll need more.
Viewers need you to tell a story – a coherent one without the gaping plot holes we’ve gotten used to recently. You need to scare the audience and bring unexpected twists into play. They expect an adrenaline rush, so up the ante and give them that rush.
Usually, your audience wants to see less dialogue and more action. They want you to build up the suspense from the action, the movie score and background noises. They are not there for the actors to spend the entire day talking. So, if you are writing horror scripts, cut back on the dialogue a little, and crank up the action.
The Writing Skills you Need to Make Use of in Your Horror Writing
Having understood what the users want to see in your movie, you need to know how to achieve that in your writing. It will make all the difference when the actors start playing your ideas out. When writing your plot, consider building these skills.
1. Storytelling
As action-packed as a horror flick is, you must remember that your audience will consist of adults mostly. These adults have seen a thousand other movies and for them, what sticks is the ones with the best storylines. If you have to craft storylines from actual happenings, you can do that.
When telling a story in your script, ensure it has a definite sequence of actions. Your story should have a distinct beginning, text body, and conclusion. It’s okay to use flashbacks when necessary, but not a lot, or else the audience may get confused. Excessive use of flashbacks leads to frustrated viewers and negative movie reviews.
2. Suspense creation
In horror films, suspense is everything. There are several ways you can infuse suspense into your writing. You can use cliffhangers, especially if you intend to create a sequel to your movie.
Cliffhangers are usually deployed at the end of the movie. They leave the audience asking questions and thirsting for more. Questions like, “Wait, did you see that?” “Is she still alive?” “Is she going to become one of them now?” are great for your film.
You can use suspense anywhere throughout your movie. Write scripts portraying your character(s) as being oblivious to something. Then let it ‘hit’ them and your audience like a wave, and have them jumping out of their seats.
3. Humorous writing skills
Don’t fall for the temptation of using too many horrific scenes one after the other. Sometimes, you need to give the audience a breather. This also relaxes them, which is the state of mind they need to be in for the next gory scene to rattle them.
Writing humorous scenes is a great way to do this. Be a little funny in your script. Throwing in a couple of jokes, or using locations where the audience least expects gore (like a playground) can keep the story entertaining. It’s the ‘buffer’ the audience needs to keep seeing the movie as realistic.
4. Analytical skills
Adults are not as gullible as kids – or at least we’d like to believe that. This is why you need to see your script from the eyes of a skeptical member of the audience. Analyze your story and fish out parts that don’t exactly ‘connect.’ Don’t be too cocky and think there are none because every script has them.
Having an analytical mind means asking a lot of questions. When writing your horror script, ask a lot of ‘Why’, ‘How’, ‘When’, and ‘What’ questions. Is your protagonist showing unparalleled bravery after his child just got murdered? Why is that? Is that what the average person would do in a similar situation?
Asking these questions and answering them within your script will make your horror movie more believable.
5. Effective Conclusion
A movie is only as good as how it ends. In movie reviews, you’ll see many people rate a movie poorly only because it had an underwhelming conclusion. A sub-par ending will mess up your entire work, so you need to work on writing the ‘perfect ending.’
As romance movies usually end with happily ever after scenes, your horror movie should do the opposite. End with a bang and don’t try to play to the gallery by making the ‘bad guy’ lose. This movie genre is the one where it’s great to see the good guy lose. Combine this approach with the use of cliffhangers, and your script will be much better.
The Bottom Line
As a movie producer, it’s easy to miss out on some of the necessities when writing your movie script. But, if you build up the skills outlined above, you will certainly see the quality of your scripts improve.
