The Idea: The Seven Elements of a Viable Story for Screen, Stage or Fiction

There are many books on screenwriting and even more opinions on which are good and which are junk. My opinion is that this is one of the better books, if not along the best. Any screenwriter worth their salt will tell you, you never stop learning. That comes through writing, reading scripts, and learning from others: books, seminars, classes, or simply taking to and listening to those doing it. There are bits of wisdom out there. But those same screenwriters will tell you they only have so much time in a day, so they look for something or value. This book is among the worthwhile. Perhaps I like Botk’s approach because I come out of the UCLA system where he teaches. Perhaps it’s the clear, well written, enjoyable read with outstanding points, ideas, and explanations for how to enact what he’s offering. Perhaps it’s simply because it’s a good, well written book that offers outstanding ideas. For all the books I’ve read (around a dozen in screenwriting) this is one of my top two - and they are tied. But where even that other book I couldn’t take all on board or agreed with - for myself - Bork speaks to me and I’m with him all the way - again for me. I’d already begin reading articles from his blog before I put the two together, then through that found his book, and I’m glad I did. Well worth the read.

For a while now, I've shared Bork's sense that the basic premise of a script is the most important part, and doesn't get nearly enough attention in screenwriting pedagogy. I bought the book to see what he had to say on this subject, though I expected to be disappointed—like many, I thought that "having good ideas" was a talent one either has or doesn't, and that a craft book would have very little to say about it that was generalizable enough to be useful. I couldn't have been more wrong. This is the book every screenwriter should start with. Not Story, not Save the Cat. As Bork very convincingly lays out, the basic idea IS what usually makes or breaks a script, and there ARE principles for what makes a good one—principles that are specific enough that they're hardly ever done right, and general enough that they apply to almost any project, not just the "mainstream Hollywood" movies that many of us writers deride. These principles are the Seven Story Elements, which brilliantly add up to the acronym PROBLEM. Some of them are well-known, like the fact that we need a relatable character facing a problem that's really, really hard. Others are genuinely new, like the idea of shooting for a specific entertainment, which in all my study of screenwriting I've never seen anyone break down as well as Bork does here. And whether they're old hat or new insights, they're all absolutely, 100% on-point, and will make you see your writing far more clearly. I can't stress this last part enough. This is truly 200 pages of just the good stuff, the stuff that matters to us writers and can help us understand what we need to do to improve our work. A huge reason for this, counter-intuitively, is that Bork only tells us how things should work, and why they often don't—he doesn't spend a lot of time on "how to fix it." I'd have thought I'd want more of this, but in retrospect, I realized these have been some of the least helpful parts of other books. Everyone has they're own process; I don't want to be told to change the way I think, or even how I approach my writing, for the most part. What I want is clarity on my overall goals—what I should be shooting for in trying to develop solid, viable script ideas. And this book is nothing less than a bible on what we as aspiring professional writers should be looking for in our concepts. I also hugely, hugely appreciate how this book is written. It's incredibly clear and simple, distilling each of the seven points down to their most basic and fundamental tennants. Bork, more than any other screenwriting author I've read, has a great sense of just how specific to get without crossing over into his own personal tastes or proprietary theories of drama. He's also the only screenwriting author I've found who writes with real humility and empathy. I could barely get through Story and Save the Cat, because these writers came off as such jerks—unlike them, Bork doesn't make you feel like he's better than you, or that you're stupid for not already knowing what he's telling you. He just shares his insights, accumulated through years of experience, about "what audiences tend to want." And he acknowledges at multiple points how hard it is to do what he's telling you to do, sometimes even for him. This tone made it easy, even pleasurable, to absorb all the brilliant wisdom he had to offer. If you're on this page for any reason, buy this book now! I personally guarantee it will be some of the best $8 you ever spend.

Many screenwriting books make an assumption that you are starting with good story material. But that’s not always the case. So while many books spend lots of time on structure and timing, very few books discuss the possibility that your story is simply not compelling or believable. Bork very politely asks the writer to consider the source material first before spending months or years reworking dried-out clay. His discussion on reality based stories is also very informative for those writers who often say, “but that’s how it really happened.” Bork has created a concise, tight and informative checklist for writers to make sure their ideas are ready and worthy of running through the gaunlet of screenwriting.

I have lost track of how many books I have read or listened to on this subject. Among them all, this one stands out as the best for guiding you in your early story planning (figuring out the core elements of your story, the characters, overall structure, etc.). Another book that comes close (I recommend them both as a pair) is "Save the Cat: The Last Book on Screenwriting You'll Ever Need." Both these books are oriented toward screenwriting, but I think most of the lessons are very helpful for book writing too. The "Save the Cat" book was such a huge hit that a different author adapted its recommendations for novelists, in "Save the Cat! Writes a Novel." If you prefer listening to books but cannot find an audio version, you can buy a Kindle version and have your computer or mobile device read it to you (computer-generated voices are getting better each year, and your device may allow you to select a preferred voice for listening).

Read this book before you start writing. This is the book that will help you get that amazing idea out of your head and on to the page with the solutions to all the challenging and confusing comments you're bound to receive down the road if you do not. When I first tried my hand at writing both in screenplay and novel format, I would write my ideas directly to the page. The common feedback I heard when I shared that work was, "I am having trouble rooting for your main character." This was a serious problem. On several occasions, I scrapped everything I had and rewrote those pieces, presented them for feedback again and was told "I'm still not rooting for him." The frustration to solve this issue compounded every time because the feedback I never received was how I could make my audience root for my character, and I had already put in so much work without properly fleshing out this issue, which I should have addressed before putting a single word to page. "The Idea" guides you to do exactly that. In my latest project, a novel, I was fortunate enough to work with Erik before I ever even got started, and the advice he provided actually told me how to get the audience to root for my character and to solve every other problem I was going to run into that could have been fixed well before writing as many pages and putting in as much time as I have now. The best thing for me about reading this book has been that all that incredibly useful advice he gave to me is now captured all in one place. And his guidance is easily understandable. Before I ever worked with Erik I found myself not being able to understand feedback because of phrases like "on the nose" for example. Erik does not use that kind of language. Instead he uses anecdotes and examples that anyone with an idea can understand. His anecdote about an exciting game in sports was the one piece of advice he told me years ago that has resonated the most in how I craft my stories now. My current work is dramatized nonfiction. Erik gives a lot of great advice within his book for anyone attempting to do the same. If you have an idea for a dramatized nonfiction piece, this book is a must-read.

I was happily selected to get an advance reading copy of this book before I purchased it. Screenwriting books represent a pretty crowded field, and as a person within the business Mr. Bork writes about, I found it pretty cool how this one separated itself from the pack by choosing an approach no one seems to have taken yet: is one's basic story idea distinctive and worth pursuing? Although we have seen books with acronym layouts before, here the author uses an organizing principle on which he never fails to elaborate fully. A few highlights: the concept of making your hero's story a punishing one--after all, we don't watch films or TV to see people have it easy. The 8 types of story problems are very helpful, and the basic truth that, in stories set in a fantasy world, we only get one buy-in from the audience about the rules of the world (plus, that applies to all stories, really). There's also a great list of stakes, and my favorite was the definition of something that is entertaining as containing feelings we like to feel. TV is always covered in each chapter in an interesting separate section, and there are even effective sports analogies--which is rare in any kind of writing! Finally, a nice real-world wrap up provides some nice advice on how to make use of all these ideas and still be creative. The only small criticism was that some of the movie examples could have been more 21st Century (like a lot of the TV examples), but the advice here is very solid. An Informative and out-of-the-box book.

With a sort of “been there, done that” attitude that is is not dogmatic, but empathetic and sympathetic for the aspiring writer, the book cuts to the heart of what is needed to make something that “may” work. Obviously the checklists provided in the book are not foolproof; that’s why you should read the book: it walks you through some of the pitfalls surrounding the checklist items. (Note: my initial interest in the book was simply to get to the checklists.) But the voice and tone of the author is authoritative and colloquial which makes it educational and entertaining as well. I also enjoyed the fact that he did not stray into too much of the comedic or anecdotal like, say, Blake Snyder, whose “Save the Cat!” the author references several times, or as Jessica Brody does in her STC! novel writing book does (both of which are also very good for screenwriting and/or the novel writer). As I read the book, I came to trust the author like an older brother providing genuine, pragmatic advice to his younger brother.

Spending adequate time pondering ones idea and getting reputable feedback on the marketability of a potential script before laboring over constructing all of the details is efficient use of time! However, I'm not sure I agree with the 60/30/10 rule of what makes a great script. While having a good idea is important, well structured scenes with likeable characters engaged in interesting conflict and well crafted dialogue are equally fundamental to what makes a movie compelling! Hollywood likes to pompously assert with its alleged powerful informed authority that 99% of the scripts received are rejected on idea alone, not even factoring in the unsolicited scripts they'll reject, or other rejection mechanisms utilized such as the First 10 Page Rule ( shouldn't that apply to established writers as well?) But these are just the rules pontificated by the "powerful gatekeeper" which are merely subjective misinformed authoritarianism! Their unclever sophistry continues with the argument as to why bad movies are made: Why does Hollywood claim it's looking for great scripts when even when they find one they'll only make it 1% of the time? So they can identify someone who wrote a great script and then possibly consider having him/her try and write something which may or may not be good? If something is great, why wouldn't you just make it instead of utilizing this convoluted movie making system? To try and hide the fact that Hollywood isn't a reputable industry but has inherent biases against what should be a true American foundation espousing 1st Amendment philosophy of free integration of all opinions! (Despite being annoyed by some of the Hollywood pontification nonsense I still think this book is worth the $13 price, and has some insightful comments worth considering.)

I'm a theatre actor and lately have been wanting to put to paper some ideas about films I've been having. So I started reading some books on screenwriting. I'm glad I didn't miss this one, as it will help me select the ideas that will have the best chance of engaging the audience. Now I'll run every idea I have against the PROBLEM elements described in this book.

The concepts discussed may seem simple, but they are the basics of telling a compelling story, regardless of the medium you choose (books, film, theater, etc.) Highly recommended.

Who would have thought that after all the books already written on screenwriting someone could still come up with an IDEA as fundamental & ground-breaking as Erik did? What a fantastic method! Got a great idea for a movie? Read this book first before doing anything else - it will save you precious time, probably some money but definitely a ton of frustration!

The idea is one the book I consider in the domain of screenplay as the new generation lense. A lense through which future writers can look through so as to generate more ideas and new approach of film writing. It soo short and soo efficient. Everything is so breifly explained with a lot of facilities that any curious reader can easily learn from it. The main idea "PROBLEM" that it defends for me is just an explicit explaination of great books in screenplay domain made simple by Mr Erik Bork the author. Punishing should be a Relatable story which should have a kind of Originality while being Believable with Life Altering circumstances related in an Entertaining and Meaningfully way. It's a book to be read by all aspiring writers even though I would have expected more in it on dialogue, structures and etc

The craft aspects of the book were applicable. Three particularly memorable, applicable parts stood out to me as clear-cut positives 1.) The approach the author takes in the introduction, describing why and where it's difficult breaking through, the importance of the logline, and the general challenge in the industry of getting noticed. He answers questions on a lot of writers' minds, and he sets out to solve the PROBLEM -- an acronym for key elements to a successful story -- in the chapters that follow. 2.) The section titled "Sticking to the Audience's Ribs" is gold, listing specifically and explicitly ways in which an audience might emotionally react to a story or theme. These are all takeaways that make it very clear what it is we're trying to achieve, and provides a great basis for evaluating ideas. 3.) The process of ideation is actionable. The basic principles listed out from page 208 -- "Note things that you like and are interested in, in the world and in other stories. Keep track of these" etc. -- aren't particularly novel or scientific, but they're presented in a way that leads believably to results: more ideas, habits and discipline in generating them, and ways to filter through the bad ones early. I appreciate the cut-and-dry approach. The one thing that hinders the message is a viewpoint permeating the text that "Writers almost never break in with a green-lit movie. Rather, breaking in means impressing a manager, an agent, or a producer with a script that likely won't even sell, let alone get made, but that puts them on the radar of the industry, gets them fans, and starts to give them some momentum toward future sales or employment." The realism comes from a good place, a position of setting expectations, but in the end, not all writers are seeking mere "momentum" or "future sales or employment." Point being: Some writers just have an idea (for a book, a movie, or a project), and their sole purpose is to get that idea out there in a consumable form, business-plan and long-term "career" be damned. I don't think the author does enough justice to the creation of singular, standalone pieces of art, whether that be an independent film, a breakthrough novel, or the successful completion of a personal project that may not even fit an existing medium. The idea of submitting ideas just to get employment isn't that appealing; writing a single, timeless piece of work can be the end goal, and that level of singularity isn't addressed with enough respect in this book. Having said that, I still found the book enjoyable and enlightening to read, and I'd recommend it to writers under the caveat that, like a TV series, it focuses a bit too heavily on building a career, or developing one's idea filter, rather than advancing an idea.