Why is ‘The King’s Speech’ a good movie?
I’ve just watched the movie ‘The King’s Speech’ and thoroughly enjoyed it. For me to enjoy a movie is in itself a rare and wonderful thing. I don’t as a rule watch movies and my taste is limited. I loved the original ‘Star Wars’ films and the LOTR films. And ‘Bambi’. So now, days later, I’ve begun to wonder why I enjoyed ‘The King’s Speech’ so much. And I think we, as writers, could learn from the answers.
In essence this is an exceedingly simple tale. The man who will be king has a speech impediment. When the story starts, he is a young prince whose stammer leads to public humiliation as his failure on the wireless is broadcast to millions. Then he meets a man who fixes him. In the end he delivers an important speech to the world and does so effectively.
This is a story set in the 1930′s, when the British Empire was still a powerful entity and when Adolf Hitler was a rising threat in Germany. George V was still on the throne, his oldest son, David (who would become Edward VIII) was next in line and Bertie, the stutterer, was the Duke of York. Then David has his fateful love affair with Wallis Simpson, almost bringing down the Monarchy, a stalemate finally ended when he abdicates. The movie includes cameo appearances from Winston Churchill, Alec Baldwin and Neville Chamberlain, all pivotal players in the inevitable spiral into war in 1939. But all of this is just scenery, backdrops to the main play which is the relationship between two men who could hardly be more different. The prince, born into royalty and Lionel Logue, the self-taught Australian speech therapist who refuses to call his client anything but Bertie.
So much of this movie is simply conversations between two men as Lionel breaks down Bertie’s barriers to discover the reason why he stutters, revealing a tyrannical father, abuse by a nanny, over-expectations. All of this has resulted in feelings of total inadequacy, which Bertie must confront as the horrifying possibility of him having to be king edge toward probability.
There is conflict between Logue and Bertie, of course. But also between Bertie and his brother and his father. Bertie’s wife, Elizabeth, is unfailingly supportive and we are given a glimpse into the relationship between Bertie and his two daughters – one of whom is now Queen Elizabeth.
Why does this movie work? There are no gruesome deaths, no car chases, no violence of any sort. Nobody steals anything. The background facts are well known. There is no suspense, no horror; just a man with a speech impediment and a man who treats him.
The screenwriters have created conflict in a number of ways, the most important being the differences between the two men, one a Royal Prince, the other an Aussie larrikin. To start with we are shown Bertie’s excruciating first radio speech, then Bertie’s initial reluctance to play by Lionel’s rules in his home (‘my castle, my rules’). But the screen writers have, I suspect, bent the truth just a little to increase the tension. For instance, in the movie Bertie learns at his rehearsal for the coronation in Westminster Abbey that Lionel has no formal qualifications, that despite his Harley Street address, he is no doctor. I find that a little bit hard to believe, but it adds to the tension. In similar vein, there are several countdowns to Bertie having to make a speech and we’re along for the ride. In the end, when Bertie delivers his ‘we are at war with Germany’ speech, the audience inevitably remembers that first speech which he completely mangled. And so, indeed, does he. After a slow start, Bertie delivers. One of the great things about this movie is he is not miraculously cured. Lionel enables him to function, but he hasn’t waved a magic wand. So for writers, use conflict, contrive conflict even if it is conflict within an individual and you can have a gripping story.
Of course, the acting is just terrific. Colin Firth does a wonderful job of showing Bertie’s shyness, his lack of confidence and his desperate attempts to overcome these characteristics as a Royal Prince. I cannot imagine how hard it must be for an actor to convey a man with a stammer – for me it was absolutely convincing. And Geoffrey Rush is great as Lionel Logue.
One other little tip for us writers – the way detail was sprinkled in. The wonderful scene where a man leads a car containing the Duchess of York up Harley Street through a London fog, Bertie storming off through a park with a horseman riding the other way, glimpses of Lionel’s family – most especially his intelligent oldest son who drives the car to take his father to meet Bertie before the final speech. That boy would be caught up in the coming war. And the scenes of Bertie with his daughters, the dying king, David and Mrs Wallis.
Just a simple little movie about two blokes talking to each other. Wow.
Is writing a bit like prospecting for gold?
You know, there’s a lot of similarities between the business of writing books and prospecting for gold. Think about it. There you are in London trying to scrape a living doing something or other and you hear the news they’ve discovered gold in Australia. A place called Ballarat, quite near Melbourne (wherever that is). It’s 1851, life’s hard, cold and grim in England. Why not go off on the Big Adventure? Somewhere new and warm. Sure, it’s a long way but you’ll only be away for a year or so. They say you can pick up nuggets as big as your fist, just lying there for the taking. A few weeks and you’ll come home a millionaire.
But it isn’t like that. You join the other thousands intent on the same purpose, enduring bad food, harsh weather, unsanitary conditions. Sure, a few people make it big and find a large nugget. But most of the people who make it big are the people who supply the miners with everything. Food, safe drinks like lemonade, mining equipment, sex.
For us poor writers the conditions may be a little better, we’re not at risk of a cave-in or typhoid (I’m not, anyway – don’t know about you). But I’ve paid an awful lot of money to attend courses, join writing groups, buy ‘how-to’ books. I’ve sold a few books – panned some gold dust from the river, you might say – but I haven’t found that nugget yet.
I hasten to add I never expected to earn a mint from this (nice to have but not a requirement). I enjoy the courses. I tend to treat writing as a hobby and (generally speaking) it’s fun. I reckon if I wanted to make money out of this, I’d be offering a service to writers.
What do you think?
Clear your throat – then write
My guest today is Meredith Lopez who shares with us her first encounter with getting those words on the page. It isn’t always the wonderful experience we imagine it will be. Over to you, Meredith.
The first time I sat down to write my novel I pounded out a first chapter in about an hour. This was going to be Epic, with a capital E. Mine would change the face of urban fantasy forever. Maybe even get made into a movie! After hours of researching the historical time period and crafting a simple outline, I felt ready to finally – FINALLY! – bring my characters to life on the page. I let the words flow through my fingertips, as if prose were air and my fingers lungs. My characters whispered into my ear and I dutifully transcribed the scene, the richness and fullness of the settings, the smell, taste and feel of the world around them, the world I had created.
Satisfied, nay, smug, I emailed my chapter off to my writing mentor, sat back, and awaited the hot, gushing praise she would surely heap upon my masterpiece.
She wrote back, “Great, you’ve cleared your throat. Now get writing.”
You know that scene in “Amelie” where she is so devastated she turns into water and melts into a puddle? Well, you could have mopped me off the floor.
What happened?
Back in college I had a Dramatic Literature professor who was kind of full of himself, but we all forgave him for it because he was also kind of brilliant. Sure, sometimes we had no idea what he was trying to teach us, but we knew whatever he said was important. Of course, years later I’ve forgotten most of his “brilliance,” but one thing stuck with me: when writing papers, he said, do not go with our “Aha!” moments. He did not mean, do not let inspiration guide us, but rather, when inspiration strikes, don’t simply regurgitate it onto a paper and hand it in.
In other words, do not let your first idea be your only idea. If you have an “Aha!” moment, write it down, then think on it for a while. What else could work here? Does this idea lead to others? Can it be fleshed out, made whole?
My professor did not want half-baked musings. He wanted well-developed theories with cohesive, backed up logic. He wanted to be lead on a journey of discovery, rather than handed some undergrad’s fleeting moment of insight.
As a writer, that has stuck with me. The difference in my work between those written from “Aha!” moments, and those written as fully developed stories is staggering: I have several short stories that will never see the light of day because they were written based on a turn of phrase that came to me, or an anecdote I tried to mold into a story. I’m sure most writers can relate to the well-meaning friends and family who point to every clever anecdote and say, “Wouldn’t that make a great story?” Well, no, but it might inspire a good scene in a story. If writing were that easy – you take an idea, put it to paper, and voila, you are a published billionaire – everyone would do it.
My writing mentor turned out to be correct. That first chapter was terrible. For all my hours and days of research and plotting, I hadn’t come up with more than two characters in a room, talking. I had a set-up; what I lacked was the follow-through. No amount of preparation could turn my simple idea into a compelling story that would immerse my readers in the world I had in my head. Only I could do that, but it would take more than a few trips to the library and a simple plot outline to accomplish that. I had to really get to know my characters: who they were, where they came from, what their desires and hopes and fears were. I had to create a world with rules and laws and force my characters to obey. I had to learn how to plot a novel with enough action and suspense to keep the story moving forward without white-knuckling the pace. I had to invent subplots, and supporting characters, and red herrings, and surprises. I had to be sure of payoffs by the end, remember to fire every gun left on the mantle in chapter 1. And all of that had to come after I cleared my throat of my basic idea, got over myself, and sat down to focus on the journey of discovery I wanted to write.
Once you clear your throat, you are ready to say what you need to say. Get rid of all your false starts and flashes of “What if?”s. Take your inspiration but don’t stop there: follow it deep down, as far as you can go, past your comfort zone and into the sweet spot of creativity where ideas turn into tales, where moments become worlds, where “Aha!” becomes “Oh, WOW!”
Meredith Lopez is a stay-at-home writer and mother. In addition to reviewing budget wines for Moms Who Need Wine she drinks and complains over at her blog, Grey Skies, and has a historical urban fantasy novel-in-progress. Meredith was born and raised in Miami, and now lives in Park Slope, Brooklyn, NY with her husband and their son, the Juban Princeling.
You can catch my wine-ing here: http://www.momswhoneedwine.com/author/meredith
And keep up with my whine-ing here: http://greyskiesnyc.blogspot.com
Are all critiques useful?
Like most authors, I’ve belonged to my share of writers’ critique groups in my day. Authonomy was one but there have been others. There are certain difficulties with being a member of these sites and those difficulties will inevitably affect the value of the critiques you receive for your work. I recently posted a book to a writers’site. I did this because I had diverted into a genre I hadn’t written before and even then, I felt my novel was a little bit different to the usual types of plots I’d seen.
Leaving aside the wide range of technical competence and the gamesmanship inherent in such groups, I think the biggest issue is that comments can come from people who don’t, in the normal course of events, read the genre. Some people will immediately say ‘yes but writing is universal’. But is it?
Romance novels may be the biggest sellers on the planet but many, many people heap scorn on the very notion. Some are afraid of science fiction, others shudder at horror. Personally, I don’t understand and would not read vampire or zombie stories. So if I encounter a vampire story on a writers’ site, what do I do? (Assuming I have an obligation to read and comment) I don’t like the subject, I haven’t read other such books, I don’t know what an avid reader expects or would find acceptable. So all I can usefully say is whether or not the story engaged me and why.
Normally judgement is passed on a section of the book which may be as small as the back of the book blurb and three chapters. After all, that’s what a query to an agent or publisher would offer. So would I read on after 3 chapters? Come on, let’s be honest here. This is a vampire story. I wouldn’t even have picked it up off the shelf. Sure, if I read the whole thing I might be able to suggest changes to structure or weaknesses in characterisation and such. But I think I’m going to be in much better hands, talking with people who actually read the sub-genre I’m writing.
What do other people think? Please share – I’m genuinely interested.
Born in Ice
Today, my guest is Linda La Roque who is stopping off on her blog tour of her new book, Born in Ice. Over to you, Linda.
This futuristic romantic suspense story grew from a dream, one of a woman frozen in a block of ice and found by fishermen from an undersea world. She’s taken to their home and with the help of advanced medical technology, she recovers. In time she learns she must learn to fit into their social system, one different from what she’s known.
Blurb:
Pulled from an icy grave…into a world of doubt and danger.
Frozen in ice for seventy-five years, Zana Forrester suffers the agony of rebirth to learn her son is dead, and her daughter’s whereabouts is unknown. The year is 2155. A man’s soothing voice and gray eyes haunt her drug induced dreams. When she recovers, she meets their owner and finds her heart in danger. But, a relationship isn’t a consideration; she must find her daughter.
Brock Callahan is drawn to the beautiful woman taken aboard his salvage ship. He’s determined she’ll be his wife and a mother to his young daughter, but he vows not to love her. All the women he’s loved died. While Zana searches for her daughter, Brock must protect Zana from the evil that threatens.
My editor for Champagne Books has graciously given permission for me to post the Prologue and Chapter One of Born in Ice, so for 10 days I’ll be sharing another instalment.
Prologue – part 1
2080 A.D., St. John’s, Newfoundland
“You don’t love me else you’d take me too. Nana can watch Jonathan. You just love him more.”
“That’s not true, honey. You know that.” Zana tried to cuddle the girl, but she’d have none of it.
Her daughter shoved away and screamed, “I hate you.”
Zana looked up and pleaded with the heavens for help. As she stood, she heard Gran’s soothing voice from the other room. “Child, you know you don’t mean that. You’ve got to be big and help Mama. She’s doing all she can to provide for us all by herself.” What would she do without the older woman?
“But… Jonathan always gets to go.”
“I know honey, and that’s my fault. I can’t keep up with the little bugger. You’re my big girl. You can help old Gran get around when Mama’s not here.”
Leaving Katy at home always made Zana feel guilty, and today was no different. But no way could she manage both kids at the store. At six years old, Katy wasn’t a problem for Nana to watch. Jonathan was a different story. He was too active and wore the older woman out. She worried the child might suffer from serious emotional problems. Not that she blamed her. After losing her father to an avalanche, having every moment of her life dictated by the elements had to be hard on an energetic child.
How had they come to such a sad state and would it continue to get worse before it got better? Since the 1990’s, alerts had been issued about global warming. Suddenly, in 2045 warnings became fact. One of the sea’s conveyer belts stopped working, causing a chain reaction, affecting others and throwing the Earth’s weather patterns out of balance. Would nature be able to reset the ocean currents back on a normal course or were they in for even worse conditions?
Not knowing what was in store for them terrified her. It was all she could do to keep the four of them fed. Fortunately she worked from home as a computer programmer, but if she were to lose her job… she shuddered.
Don’t buy trouble, Zana.
Tune in tomorrow for the 2nd installment. I’ll be on Linda Kage’s blog at http://www.lindakage.com/index.html
Please leave a comment today to be entered into a drawing for an ecopy of A Way Back, my time travel set in the 1930s oil fields of Texas. Your name will also be entered in the GRAND PRIZE drawing for my blog tour—a KINDLE. A name will be draw at the end of my tour on December 16th.
I also have a release contest going. Sign up for my newsletter by emailing me at linda@lindalaroque.com with Born in Ice in the subject line. Your name will be added to the drawing for this rhinestone frog pin. For each of my releases I try to find a piece of jewelry significant to the story. After reading Born in Ice you’ll understand why I chose this frog.
Thank you, Greta, for having me here today, and thank you readers for stopping by. Good luck in all the give-a-ways!
Happy Reading and Writing!
Linda
Linda LaRoque is a Texas girl, but the first time she got on a horse, it tossed her in the road dislocating her right shoulder. Forty years passed before she got on another, but it was older, slower, and she was wiser. Plus, her students looked on and it was important to save face.
A retired teacher who loves West Texas, its flora and fauna, and its people, Linda’s stories paint pictures of life, love, and learning set against the raw landscape of ranches and rural communities in Texas and the Midwest. She is a member of RWA, her local chapter of HOTRWA, NTRWA and Texas Mountain Trail Writers.
http://www.lindalaroqueauthor.blogspot.com
A dark, warped mirror
I’ve just finished reading Sir Terry Pratchett’s latest, “Snuff”, a Discworld novel. Most people who know me are aware that I am a one-eyed, besotted Sir Terry fan and some people wonder why? I mean, let’s face it. The Discworld is a flat expanse riding on the backs of four elephants which stand on the back of a turtle. The place is so unlikely that only a powerful magical force keeps it going at all. And there’s witches and wizards. Pure, unadulterated fantasy. And he uses adverbs and long passages of exposition. Good grief, the man even has footnotes.
Right, you’ve had your sneer. Now consider yourself grabbed by the scruff of the neck and look at the Discworld. Look at its Dwarfs, Trolls, Werewolves, Vampires and Nac Mac Feegles. Look long and carefully at their lives and struggles, their politics and prejudices and what you will see gazing back at you is us. It’s a dark mirror, perhaps a little bit warped but you’ll recognise the players.
In this book I giggled at a six year old boy besotted with poo (well, they are, aren’t they)? I read the conversations between Sam Vimes, reluctant Duke of Ankh, Commander of the Watch, reformed alcoholic and one-time blackboard monitor from Cockbill Street in the Shades, and his patrician wife Lady Sybil, and giggled some more. They reminded me in many respects of my own conversations with my husband, accompanied by ‘yes, dear’ and knowing when to say nothing. Sir Terry described the machinations of a country manor house not with meticulous description but by playing out the interactions of the characters. He did the same with a country pub. As always, there is a mystery, which Sam notices because while he’s supposed to be on holiday, is a policeman ever on holiday? We have unlikely characters who discover that they could be heroes, prejudice in its most ugly form and politics at every turn. Vimes is the hero, of course, but he’s no Captain America. He is on the side of Justice despite having to prevent the dark side of his psyche from winning the internal battle. I was along for the ride, every step of the way.
And this without strict adherence to the Rules of Writing. There are no chapters, he uses adverbs and adjectives (although, it must be said, not excessively), he’ll tell you what the mood of the crowd is even though that’s outside the immediate point of view of the character, he’ll have sections of pure, unadulterated narrative as he explains certain points. And the footnotes; if you’re a fan like me, you’ll almost always read the footnotes as soon as they appear on the page. They’re always funny.
Sure, Sir Terry’s books are not to everybody’s taste. I’m sure he’d smile and shrug. When you’ve sold in excess of seventy million books, I guess you can afford to be magnanimous. One thing’s for sure – he’ll sell a hard back to me every time he has a new release.
First create your trail (then your hero can follow it)
(© Greta van der Rol)
I’m busy finishing a book. It’s that one about the tigers which I’ve mentioned before and it’s a paranormal romance with some thriller type smuggling elements. So now I’m back to basics. If a substance (in this case tiger parts) is being smuggled, how does the chain work from living tiger to retailer of Chinese medicines or tiger pelts? Because if I don’t know, how is my hero supposed to unearth the trail?
Mind you, I can only find out so much from the net about how these things happen. A search will show you how tigers are killed by poachers. It isn’t pretty. But from there, the skin, bones and organs have to be transported out of the country. I made up my own trail – shonky medical labs, bent airport freight handlers in several countries, dealers, couriers. It’s a money trail; it always is.
Are you wondering about that picture up there? At low tide, water runs down the beach into the sea, creating a myriad of channels. Some go somewhere, others disappear into the sand.
A bit like smuggling, really.
I know I said I’d never do it again but…
I’ve loaded a book to Authonomy. Yes, I can see you pointing your finger at your temple and drawing tight circles in the air. Why, you ask?
I’ve written this book – or should I say I haven’t quite finished it. The genre isn’t my usual SF Romance or a hist fic. And I’ve kind of ground to a halt. I know it needs a few more chapters to round off the conflicts but I’m beginning to wonder if it works at all. Have I expanded something that should never have been expanded?
Sure, I could ask the usual crowd and to some extent, I have. A few new folk have seen the opening chapter and given approval. But everybody’s busy, so I figured I might get a different audience on the Big A. Besides, a few other people I know have tested the water since the latest reorganisation. What the hell. If it’s awful I’ll just run away.
So. Book is up, low-key profile created. Yes, things have certainly changed. I was not set upon by a squillion people fighting to be first to back a book they could not possibly have read. I was not inundated with spam (a couple – but I can live with that). I set about reading and commenting on other people’s books, I admit books I knew were there. When the first comment appeared on mine, it was a long and thoughtful consideration of the blurb and the first chapter. The writer did not back the book and assured me a return read was not required. How very different to the last time I splashed about in this puddle. I was surprised to see how many folks from the Old Authonomy (said with the same respect as the Old Republic in Star Wars) were still on the site.
I shall not be wasting my time on the forums. I never did like the endless sniping and rudeness. To be sure, there’s still plenty of gaming going on and the same spectrum of quality from excellent to unreadable. I received a message from one person whose book is highly ranked, urging me to read and back and reinforcing the message with an extract. I cringed. To me, this person would fail writing 101. The misuse of grammar, mixed metaphors and overwriting meant I wouldn’t be reading that book in a hurry. But obviously, others don’t agree. Me, I still can’t be bothered with the desk nonsense. That’s not why I’m here. Just want to see what people think of my work.
Hey ho. I’ve floated my little MS boat on the Authonomy ocean. Let us see where the venture takes me.
GASP!!! What’s happened to my website???
Just the other day I clicked on the link to my website that I’ve got set up on my browser – and got the shock of my life. Instead of my sexy spaceship-and-planet header I got a picture of her (left). With MY name all over the website that wasn’t mine. It’s not a good feeling.
Yes, of course I panicked. Need you ask? My first thought was that my URL had been redirected or somehow hijacked, so I asked the first computer-savvy person I could think of on Facebook (as you do). It wasn’t until somebody said ‘but if you own the domain how can they do that?’ that the awful truth started to percolate into my fevered brain.
Like many people, I have several email accounts. The one I rarely used was the one to which the reminder notices were sent about my imminently expiring ownership. Sure enough, the domain had expired. Bummer. Expletives deleted. Well, I sure as hell wasn’t going to pay any pirate money to get my name back. I girded my loins (how do you do that?) and changed from gretavanderrol.com to gretavanderrol.net. So there. Easy peasy.
Er… no.
I’d have to go around to every site I belonged to that had a profile and change the link. Amazon, Twitter, Facebook, Facebook Author page, Goodreads, Savvy, TRR, Smashwords, Manic Readers… who else?
Then I’d have to contact everybody who had ever hosted a blog post of mine and then I’d have to contact anybody who had a post on my site (the link back to my site wouldn’t work any longer, you see). Then I’d have to contact owners of sites where I couldn’t update the info myself and ask them to make the change.
I was lucky; an online friend told me the smarmy tart at top left is a spambot that latches onto expired domain names and that the domain name itself was probably still hanging around with the people I bought it from and would remain so for a few month. Thanks to her, I went and recovered gretavanderrol.com and I also have gretavanderrol.net.
I’ve learnt a valuable lesson.
I’m off to document my online network. I have a spreadsheet where I record email addresses and resulting page references for sites where I have done guest blogs. I shall expand that SS to include every site where I have a profile and every guest post I host.
Take a tip from me – DON’T let your domain name expire. Even for a little author’s blog like mine, the amount of work in changing is much larger than you could possibly imagine.
Reflections in still water
Photography is so very much about light and its effects. A late afternoon visit to a dam in the forest gained me this shot. A slight breeze ruffled the water. Hope you like it. © Greta van der Rol
