[Watch the video interview on YouTube here]
Film Courage: What’s one truth that no one can teach you about screenwriting?
R.J. Hanna, Filmmaker: I think it’s your own truth really. I think the thing that no one can teach you is what is it that compels you to want to write it, to make it? I think the one truth it’s more about the industry exactly but relates to screenwriting that I think you do have to learn for yourself in terms of looking at other people’s work is how something that’s a good version of something you’ve seen before isn’t always enough to get people excited. Even if it’s just a little bit, you have to have your own spin on it.
I briefly did when I was in school. I interned at a company and was reading scripts, reading scripts from people that had written great movies I’d seen, maybe they had a spec or they were co-writing something. You do realize really quickly there that it reads like a cop drama or crime drama or something and get to the end and think that was a pretty good version of that and then think that’s not enough to propel all the forces that need to go into action to make this movie. That was eye opening for me. I was reading things that were really good but that wasn’t enough to excite people. I think that’s something that’s hard for people to come to terms with related to their own work perhaps. Maybe they’re doing good work but it doesn’t mean that other people want to dedicate two years of their life and millions of dollars to getting it made.
Film Courage: So “good” is not good enough? It’s got to be something where you’re just Oh wow! I didn’t even see that coming?
RJ: Yeah, exactly. I forget who, there’s two writers that had a thing it was: Crap plus one of this this fallacy where people would see a movie and they would…(Watch the video interview on YouTube here).
About:
Maybe it was growing up in Arkansas as a Canadian, or the summers in rural Ireland with his grandparents, but Daniel has always been drawn to out-of-place characters, strange environments, and the unique rhythms of how people talk. He just completed post on his horror film “Succubus,” starring Ron Perlman and Rosanna Arquette, to be released in 2024. Crossing over 500 screens in the U.S. and beginning its run in the U.K. is his feature “Hard Miles,” starring Golden Globe-winner Matthew Modine and Oscar-Nominee Sean Astin, which has won multiple awards and screened at prestigious festivals including Chicago International, Heartland Film Festival, and Cinequest. Prior to that, Daniel directed the true-story feature “Miss Virginia,” starring three-time Emmy-winner Uzo Aduba, Oscar-Nominee Aunjanue Ellis, and Vanessa Williams. The film was listed as a New York Times and USA Today Must-See Fall Movie, won the Audience Award at The Naples Film Festival, and received a limited theatrical release, cable premiere on BET, and streaming deal with Netflix. As a writer, Daniel is a winner of The Academy of Motion Pictures Arts and Sciences Nicholl Fellowship in Screenwriting, as well as the Slamdance, ScriptPipeline, and Screencraft writing awards. He also explores storytelling as an editor, with ten features under his belt, including horror film “What Lies Below,” starring Mena Suvari, which hit #1 on Netflix, and “Supercell” starring Alec Baldwin, Anne Heche, and Skeet Ulrich, which hit #1 on Hulu. Daniel hopes to continue telling cinematic, character-driven stories long past the time any sane person would have retired. He lives on the east-side of L.A. with his excessively-vocal cat “Dottie.”
MORE INFO ON HARD MILES MOVIE:
https://linktr.ee/hardmiles_movie
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