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| Cynthia Sharp |
Analyzed by Cynthia Sharp
Abstract
A look at Melissa Rosenberg’s
screenwriting techniques in key scene adaptations to distill the essence of
Stephenie Meyer’s long, first-person novel Twilight to a feature length
script, using Blake Snyder’s beat sheet from his book Save the Cat as an
analytical guideline.
Twilight
The Art of Adapting a Novel to a Screenplay
Twilight is a classic teen love fantasy
that hits all the marks for a twenty-first century audience. Based on Stephenie
Meyer’s four book series, Melissa Rosenberg created screenplays to take the
story into the film medium, starting with the first book Twilight,
released on screen in November, 2008. In moving the story from solely
protagonist Bella Swan’s point of view in the novel to work as a mainstream
film, Rosenberg cuts to the heart of the drama, portraying vampire Edward
Cullen as possibly more dangerous than he is in the books, which describe him
as an angel, making slight chronological changes to details, such as when Bella
reunites with family friend Jacob Black, introducing him in the early moments
of her move to Forks, and selecting which scenes to place in key slots on a
Hollywood film beat sheet.
The screenplay opens
with a short voice over from Bella, blending the first-person voice of the
novel into film, with the first spoken line straight out of the preface of the
book, “I'd never given much thought to how I would die,” narrated over a deer
running for its life from an unknown predator. The chase scene is fast-paced,
then amplified in the final moments with slow motion as the audience sees the
flash of white light of a supernatural predator killing an innocent. “But dying
in the place of someone I love seems like a good way to go,” Bella continues in
voice over (Rosenberg). The second bit of narration is condensed from a longer
version in Meyer’s preface. Rosenberg is able to get the essential components
of 498 pages of a novel into a feature length screenplay with careful
selection, intensifying the tension with visual metaphor she creates of a
nearly invisible vampire, Edward, dissolving into the deer he feeds on,
symbolic of the fact that Bella will be hunted hard by the sadistic vampire James
in Act 3, one of the vampires responsible for the death of the security guard
in Act 1 and Bella’s family friend Whalen in Act 2, but letting us wonder if
Bella is alluding to the possibility of dying at the hands of her vampire love
Edward, to keep an edge of drama.
From the opening
image, the set up covers a theme of altruism, especially for loved ones,
introduces Bella’s mother and stepfather in their sunny Arizona home as they
take Bella to the airport for her move to Washington State, where she awkwardly
reconnects with her police chief father, referring to him by his first name
Charlie, which helps normalize the vampire Cullen family referring to their
parents Esme and Carlyle by first names. In order to get key characters
introduced in the first twelve pages, Jacob Black and his father Billy come
over to deliver the secondhand truck Charlie buys off them for Bella,
introducing the guy who’ll go on to form a love triangle of attraction to Bella
in New Moon, the next film.
At about nine minutes
into the film, the dramatic attraction between Bella and Edward occurs in slow
motion, with a buildup to Bella seeing Edward, the most riveting of his
adoptive family. The screenwriter’s instruction to have the supermodel-looking
vampires enter the cafeteria in slow motion, “all chalky pale, purplish shadows
under their eyes,” (Rosenberg) followed by Edward coming in last on his own
marks the fact that the scene is important, the screenplay doing everything it
can to focus audience attention on the captivating moment when Bella first sees
Edward. “Who are they?” Bella asks as Rosalie, Emmett, Alice and Jasper
approach, then “Who's he?” (Rosenberg) as Edward enters. The buildup lets us
know how important the moment is to the story. Rosenberg infuses the debate
section of Act 1 with as much tension as she can, Edward having given Bella an
initial rude look, then being away for days, right when a security guard in
Mason County is killed, causing the audience to wonder if Edward might be the
killer and Bella to grow increasingly frustrated with the mysterious guy’s
absence.
The next crucial
scene, the moment when Edward saves Bella from Tyler’s oncoming van losing
control on the ice in the school parking lot is changed to after class instead
of in the morning as it is in the novel, so as to flow more easily with their
biology win as lab partners, complete with the onion prize being crushed like
Bella would have been if Edward hadn’t leapt with super speed and strength to
save her. That montage of actions is played over and over to lock itself into
the audience’s mind—Tyler’s van coming at Bella’s orange truck, Edward on top
of her, electric tension, then Edward stopping the van with his hand creating a
dent. Repetition of key visuals gives them a position of crucial importance in
the narrative. Edward is then portrayed as possibly dangerous, more so than in
the novel, with behavior like trying to intimidate Bella at the hospital,
though she is more curious than scared as they enter the flirtatious Fun and
Games section of the script (Snyder), which maintains an eerie tone with teens
screaming and joking around grossing each other with worms and seaweed on their
science class field trip.
The midpoint montage
where Bella affirms that Edward is a vampire and chooses to be with him anyway,
leading him into the woods and letting him carry her up the mountain to the
meadow for their midpoint dialogue where he confesses, “And so the lion fell in
love with the lamb” (Rosenberg) is a wonderful strength to the screenplay, the
moment that seals their human-vampire romance. A midpoint montage is an
excellent tool for high-passion, dangerous love stories and can be found in
films such as Mr. and Mrs. Smith (Kinberg, Simon, 2005) as well. The
technique evokes the momentum of sizzling chemistry in playful ways and
imprints it in the audience’s memory with the added benefit of music in the
final product.
The post-midpoint
section of what Blake Snyder (Save the Cat, Snyder, Blake, 2005) would
call Bad Guys Close In begins with a powerful voice over from Bella
interspersed with actions such as looking in the mirror with a worried
expression at the word “vampire,” then beaming at him leaning against his Volvo
waiting to take her to school, “About three things I was absolutely positive.
One, Edward was a vampire. Two, there was a part of him that thirsted for my
blood. And three…I was unconditionally and irrevocably, in love with him”
(Rosenberg). The power of Stephenie Meyer’s phrasing from the novel combined
with actions makes this a strong assertion in the progression of the story. The
sparse use of short voice over keeps it meaningful when it occurs in the
opening shot, Step into Act 2, “That was the first night I dreamt of Edward
Cullen” (Rosenberg), just after the midpoint montage and in the final scene,
where Bella alludes to wanting to be a vampire while Edward could never risk
taking her soul by changing her, “No one will surrender tonight. But I won't
give in. I know what I want” (Rosenberg), giving closure to the first film
while suggesting a continuation of their journey.
What Blake Snyder
refers to as All is Lost at approximately three-quarters into a feature film
and Dark Night of the Soul, the approximate ten minutes following it as there’s
no going back, are layered well with Bella seeing the life she could have had that
is no longer available to her as Edward drives her past her friends, two girls
and three guys, one of whom could have been for her, as they try to escape the
evil James tracking them.
Rosenberg finds the
strongest points in the novel, places them in key beats, slows them down, plays
them more than once and develops montages to strengthen their impact on the
audience. Those extra touches bring the heart of Meyer’s 498 pages onto the screen
in a fast-flowing romance-action film, a testament to the power of minimalism.
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