• Workshop Sessions /
Dates and Locations
The program consists of 2 on-location workshop sessions
and 2 on-line sessions per year:
- the first on-location workshop will take place in the Greek
island of Nissyros (Dodecanese, Eastern Aegean) from June 22nd
to July 5th 2005.
- what follows is an on-line session that will last for the
whole September 2005.
- the second on-location session will take place in the Greek
island of Samos (Eastern Aegean) from October 22nd to October
28th 2005.
- the program will be concluded with a final on-line session
in December 2005.
• First session: Nissyros, June
22nd - July 5th 2005
The intensive 1st workshop in June-July consists of presentations,
group workshops, lectures, script/film analysis and individual
tutoring.
As a special feature, during the first two days of the workshops
the participants present their draft scripts and have the opportunity
to receive extended and deep critique coming from all trainers
and experts present. The third day they start the intensive
group sessions.
The workshops are conducted in small groups (5 participants
with project and 2 observers per group) under the supervision
of a senior trainer and an assistant trainer. The daily program
consists of intensive, six-seven hour meetings, where a systematic
study of the participants’ scripts takes place through
the presentation of the scripts, their break-down/analysis,
group discussions and development of solutions. A re-writing
process takes place throughout the duration of the workshops,
depending on each screenplay’s specific needs, changes
suggested by the instructors, or ideas developed during the
workshop.
This first session is enough for the participants to return
with a complete sense of the story’s structure, the development
of the internal and external conflict and the elaboration through
dramatic action of the narrative’s themes. Towards the
end of the session time will be devoted to projects on an individual
basis, in the form of private, one-on-one sessions between tutors
and participants.
The lectures explore a wide variety of issues such as: image,
character, theme, arc, and circumstances as action, secondary
characters, the dramatic demands of beginnings, middles and
ends, breaking down (and building up) of story into dramatic
sequences. Special lecture sessions are devoted to viewing and
to analysis of known films from various perspectives such as
principles of dramaturgy, 3-act structure, dramatic unity, narrative
style, etc.
• Second session: On-line, September
2005
The
second, on-line session follows in September for duration
of 30 days. Participants are required to have progressed with
their projects to the stage of an extensive treatment or a
rough first draft and to send the product of their work to
their tutors and fellow participants via e-mail. Afterwards,
as in an ordinary on-location session, group discussion on
the projects “takes place” in four private internet
forums hosted in MFI’s web site.
Each workshop group is placed to a private forum of its own,
accessible only with a special password assigned to the group’s
members and their senior and assistant trainers. Tutors and
participants have to log in to their individual forum on a
regular basis throughout September and take part to this virtual
group session, commenting thoroughly on every project and
discussing problems and solutions, as they would do in a "face
to face" session.
Considering the time delay for all responses and the subsequent
cross commenting to occur, this session lasts for the whole
month of September, providing an adequate time frame for group
work. The whole process is monitored by the MFI.
• Third session: Samos, October 22nd - October 28th
2005
The third session is designed as a workshop for a deep
review and critique of the first script drafts. It functions
as an opportunity to make final revisions and work towards
a final draft. It also introduces directing concerns into
the writing process, and methods to investigate this text
from the standpoint of the director. During this session lectures
are given on the various narrative techniques and on the process
of re-writing.
• Fourth session: On-line, December
2005
The fourth session is yet again an on-line one and aims to
give the participants an opportunity to have a final feedback
from their tutors. By the end of December, participants are
expected to have rewritten their drafts so that their tutors
can comment and provide final consulting. This final session
is also closely watched by the MFI.
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