Screenwriting: Building treatments and sequences

Mark McIlrath presents practical guide to treatment-writing and sequencing for screenwriters.

Why do you need to write a treatment? The simplest answer is that Producers won't want to sit down and read your 120 page script if they don't know you and don't know what your story's about. The treatment is a written pitch to sell your story. It opens doors. A screenplay is the plan of a film, a treatment the plan for a screenplay. But the treatment is more than a sales tool, it should be a way of working out in cinematic form the story you are going to write.

Getting things right at this stage makes the whole development process more organised, more purposeful, and will help you to use your time better. Making changes to a story idea when it is still 5-10 pages is less daunting than on a full script with dialogue, where each alteration in character can impact every further scene. Get used to writing treatments – to putting the bulk of your effort into this stage of the creative process.

The full article is printed in Film Ireland 102