TODAY'S NUGGET: The Driver (1978) - Three Helpful Tips on Attempting Walter Hill's Minimalistic Style

[Quick Summary: A very successful getaway driver, who is set up by a detective, decides to turn the tables on him.]

THREE THOUGHTS:

1) STYLE IS NOT ONE-SIZE-FITS-ALL. Over the years, I've been impressed by Walter Hill's terse, every-line-a-shot style.  But why couldn't I imitate it well?

Hill illuminates here that it's not a style that fits all materials:

"The Driver, which I think was the purest script that I ever wrote, and The Warriors. The clean narrative drive of the material and the splash-panel approach to the characters perfectly fit the design I was trying to make work. Of course all this depend on the nature of the material; I don’t think the style would’ve worked at all had I been writing romantic comedies.” (emphasis mine)

2) WHAT IS HILL'S MINIMALISTIC STYLE? The best description I've found is when Hill descries the feeling he got from reading the script Point Blank (1967):

"Alex’s script just knocked me out (not easy to do); it was both playable and literary. Written in a whole different way than standard format (laconic, elliptical, suggestive rather than explicit, bold in the implied editorial style), I thought Alex’s script was a perfect compliment to the material, hard, tough, and smart—my absolute ideals then." (emphasis mine)

3) WHAT DO I NEED TO KNOW ABOUT MINIMALISTIC STYLE?
- It is well suited to action films.*
- Everything is purposeful, even the punctuation.**
- Because this style is so terse, words are precious. 
- Since there are so few words, information is only given on a need-to-know basis.
- Since information is on a need-to-know basis, the story relies heavily on the reader to supply additional information.
- Since the reader has to supply certain information, the writer must respect what are common understandings. 
- In other words, any kind of wild non sequiturs that require long explanations are forbidden, otherwise the reader will revolt and stop reading.

For example, in the scene below:
- PURPOSEFUL WORD CHOICE: "Wrecking yard" instead of "junk yard" sets up our expectations (see 4th point below).
- PURPOSEFUL PUNCTUATION: "Pulls up, stops" are two actions in a whole shot.
- NEED-TO-KNOW: I didn't know the Driver had a coat on until he takes the hammer out. This didn't disturb our understanding, as it is a minor detail.
- SUPPLY ADDITIONAL INFO: Note that Hill doesn't tell you there's an overhead crane ahead of time. But it's not bothersome to the reader because we EXPECT a crane in a wrecking yard.
 

WRECKING YARD - NIGHT

A Camaro parked along the otherwise deserted roadway.
Lights of the city beyond.
The LTD pulls up, stops.
Blue Mask and Green Mask climb out.
Head for the Camaro.

THE DRIVER

Gets out of the car.
Takes a ball-peen hammer out of his coat pocket.
Walks around the LTD, breaking out the windows and headlamps.
Throws the tool inside.
Attaches hooks from an overhead crane to the LTD's roof.
Hits the button.

THE LTD

Lifted off the hillside.
Carried out over yard.
The Driver hits a second button.
The LTD crashes a hundred feet below.
Becoming one of the myriad abandoned vehicles.

WHAT I'VE LEARNED: This style relies heavily on action and information within a common understanding (ex. crane in a wrecking yard).  

It wold not work as well for material that relies on complicated emotions, ex. push-pull of a relationship.  

The Driver (5/23/77 final)
by Walter Hill

*Hill said movies favor the action genre: “I love comedies, musicals, and thrillers like everybody else, but I confess to believing action pictures are what movies are most essentially all about. It’s the work they do best and uniquely best. I don’t mean action movies are better; in fact, most of them are actually a lot worse than the norm. But the few that really work are sublime."'

** “My scripts have always been a bit terse, both in stage directions and dialogue. I think I’ve loosened up in the dialogue department, but I still try to keep the descriptions fairly minimal, and in some cases purposefully minimalist. I still punctuate to effect, rather than to the proper rules of grammar. I occasionally use onomatopoeias now, a luxury I would certainly never have allowed myself when I was younger. My favorite description of the dilemma of screenwriting comes from David Giler, ‘Your work is only read by the people who will destroy it.’” (emphasis mine)