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Our Support System (In Honor of Valentine’s Day)
In Outliers, author Malcolm Gladwell identifies many factors that contribute to an individual’s success. One of them—a standout—is that no one succeeds alone; meaning, everyone has someone who helps...
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Jennie Giving Workshop at FWA Conference (News)
Five Writer’s contributor Jennie Jarvis will be conducting a workshop at the Florida Writer’s Association Conference. Let’s Talk About the Movies (Friday, October 18th at 3:30pm – exact workshop time...
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Presenting at Conferences (Special Edition)
Earlier this month, I presented a workshop at MegaCon 2013, a comic book convention in Orlando, Florida. Keeping this in mind, we here at 5writers thought it might be a good idea for me to share my...
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Screenwriting Structure – The Three Act Paradigm
This month on 5writers, we’re going to be talking about structure, and what better way to kick us off than to talk about the most structured writing that exists – screenwriting! Not only do film...
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Trance: A Mosaic of Memory (Review)
I can’t tell you how many times I have seen beginning screenwriters cling to the notion that they HAVE to use flashbacks in their work in order to tell their story. “How else can I show that my...
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Community Not Competition
Once upon a time, I was convinced that I had all the answers. I knew everything that I needed to know about getting my work out there for the world to see. Those other writer/directors out there were...
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The Way, Way Back: A Love Letter To Actors Everywhere (Review)
The Way, Way Back This evening, I had the opportunity to attend an advance screening of the film The Way, Way Back, which will open in theaters everywhere on July 5th. If you follow film news at all,...
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The Importance of Branding
“I’m getting discouraged,” I finally broke down and confessed to my agent. It had been three months since we started submitting my first novel to publishing houses, and even though she told me that...
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Special Edition: So You Want To Write A Textbook
I’ve been teaching a workshop entitled Crafting the Character Arc for about five years now. In this workshop, I teach a step-by-step process for creating a goal-based character arc for the protagonist...
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Special Edition: Give Tweeting A Chance
“I refuse to tweet.” That was my motto for years. I thought that the idea of Twitter was ridiculous. It’s like Facebook, only it’s just status updates? What’s the point? It’s a bunch of teenagers and...
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Jennie Jarvis in Writer’s Digest Magazine (News)
5 Writers co-owner and contributor Jennie Jarvis is one of several writers appearing in an article in the current issue of Writer’s Digest Magazine. The article, titled “Game-Changing Moves,” quotes...
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“It Has To Hurt If It’s To Heal”
By Jennie Jarvis Do you remember The NeverEnding Story? While being chased by bullies, young Bastian (Barrett Oliver) hides in a small bookshop where he discovers a book unlike any of the “safe” ones...
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The Light in Barcelona: Setting in Screenwriting
By Jennie Jarvis In 2006, the Keanu Reeves and Sandra Bullock romance The Lake House came to theaters. For the most part, the film was mediocre as far as romances go. I cared about the characters, and...
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Timey-Whimey: The Biggest Secret of the Publishing Industry (Special Edition)
By Jennie Jarvis As an aspiring writer, I’ve been given a lot of advice to consider as I pursue my writing career. While there were a few positive things conveyed to me along the way, most of what I...
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Working Within The Restrictions of Film Writing
By Jennie Jarvis More than any other form of writing, I believe that screenwriters, especially those writing for mainstream and not independent movies, have the most difficult time working within the...
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Passing The Flip Test
by Jennie Jarvis Here on 5writers.com, we spend a lot of time talking about what’s on the page – characters, structure, plot, etc. But this month, we decided to do something a little different. We’re...
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Don’t Let Go – Gravity (A Review)
by Jennie Jarvis In his book Write Screenplays That Sell The Ackerman Way, Hal Ackerman argues that Theme is the enemy of a screenwriter. “Theme leads to predictability,” he states, and while I don’t...
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Special Edition: Do you NaNo? – A beginner’s guide to NaNoWriMo
By Jennie Jarvis Have you heard about NaNoWriMo? In a nutshell, it’s National Novel Writing Month, and it’s an internet based challenge whose purpose is to give writers the motivation and deadlines to...
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Saving Mr. Banks – and the Audience: The Cathartic Release of Motion Pictures...
by Jennie Jarvis Recently, I had a chance to view a sneak preview of the upcoming Disney movie Saving Mr. Banks. In this film, the “Man Behind the Mouse” – Walt Disney himself (Tom Hanks) – fights to...
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Those Who Can’t… Growing By Teaching
By Jennie Jarvis If you’ve worked in academia in any capacity, then you’ve probably seen some form of this image: It’s called the Learning Pyramid, and it’s supposed to be a pictorial representation...
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