A captivating screenplay draws from the author’s lived emotions. By exploring their own fears, joys, or sorrows, the writer creates authentic and powerful situations that resonate deeply with the audience. Writing then becomes an introspective, revealing, and universal journey.
Reconnecting with Emotions
The screenplay, which structures the future film, must speak to the audience’s emotions. Otherwise, the film will lack interest. Emotions cannot be invented; by definition, they are lived and felt. Thus, to craft a screenplay around genuine and engaging emotions, the most effective and rich approach, in my view, is to delve into one’s own emotional core.
Embracing Discomfort
The writing process can be particularly uncomfortable, as it requires reconnecting with our lived emotions. Even joy can bring nostalgia, while fear, shame, or deep sorrow may force us to relive difficult moments. Yet, it is from this lived experience that we can write true and compelling situations.
It is through risking ourselves in the writing that the work will contain a humanity felt by all, even if only on the surface. As if by magic, starting from an emotion—not by recounting one’s life, but by exploring, for example, a character’s fear through our own experiences of fear in real situations. This allows us to find the right dialogues, attitudes, gestures, glances, contradictions, and lies that the character must produce to navigate their situation.
Drawing from our lived experiences is particularly enriching. We rely on our emotions and the actions they’ve driven us to take, crafting characters and situations that are true, powerful, and captivating for others—and for ourselves. This is where writing becomes even more thrilling. Through this process, we explore ourselves more deeply. These characters reveal things about us, and if they do, it’s a sign they will also reveal things to others.
Evaluating Through Our Experience
I propose this perspective as a framework for analysis: Have I truly drawn from myself? Do I discover new aspects of myself through what I’ve written? Or do I feel a sense of control and mastery? The latter is a bad sign, as it means we’ve created something external to ourselves. And if it’s external to us emotionally, it will also be external to the audience.
