Snyder, Blake
Blake Snyder
In his twenty-year career as a screenwriter and producer, Blake Snyder wrote and sold dozens of scripts, including co-writing Blank Check, which became a hit for Disney, and Nuclear Family for Steven Spielberg—both million-dollar sales. A member of the Writers Guild of America for over two decades, he has provided script analysis to studios such as Disney, DreamWorks, and Nelvana, and his writing and structuring methods have become the secret weapon of many development executives and film producers. Snyder has taught at Chapman, UCLA, Vanderbilt, and the Beijing Film Academy, and his books are the basis of screenwriting courses at many major universities in the United States and Canada.
From one of the most well-known writing mentors in the film industry comes the third in the successful Save the Cat! series of books on screenwriting
A “save the cat” scene—as coined by author Blake Snyder—is one in which the protagonist of a film does something that invests the audience in the character, a crucial moment Snyder felt many modern films lacked. Building on this idea, he wrote the first Save the Cat! book, which is now in its eighteenth printing. He followed with a second book, branded story-structure software, an iPhone app, and a Save the Cat! system presented in workshops and seminars. In 2011, Snyder Enterprises will launch Save the Cat! University, an online school that will make Snyder’s workshops available year round to writers around the globe.Inspired by questions from his workshops, lectures, and emails, Snyder wrote this book to deliver new tips, tactics, and techniques to solve writing problems—many of which also apply to novelists, playwrights, and other writers. Snyder shows how to
- Craft a great pitch, and then beat a full story out of it
- Overcome writer’s block and that “all typed out” feeling
- Negotiate with problematic producers and executives, and deliver successful rewrites
- Successfully sell scripts in meetings with agents
- Supercharge your storyline, including insights into “The Magical Midpoint,” “The Five-Point Finale,” and many other helpful concepts