Dumbing Things Down

[Eliseu Gouveia]

i remember one morning when I was heading for school (yes, it was that long ago) in a bus and a couple started talking about the movie they saw the previous night on the tv.
"- Aliens!" - I thought to myself, smiling. It was the very first time I had seen the movie as well.
And then they started trashing the movie.
I don´t recall their conversation verbatim or whatever possessed me not to bite them on the necks on the spot but a detail of the converstion was engraved in my memory.

They nitpicked the fact that Corporal Hicks was able to burst through a window when previously Ripley failed to break it with a chair.

The fact that Hudson had fired upon the window just before Hicks jumped through seemed to have escaped them.

If anything, this memory worked as a wake up call to me.
Sometimes, you have to spell it out for the viewers/readers, otherwise they simply won´t get it.
You have to draw a map with big fat red letters.

The problem of course is that when you dumb it down so that everyone can get it.... actualy smart people who can get it without the help of a roadmap may feel insulted.

So, my question is... how much should you dumb your story down for the viewers/readers?
On one hand you don´t want to explain everything away because many will feel much happier if they can get there all by themselves.
But then there´s the large masses who can´t add 2 plus 2.

So, what do you do?

[Sarah Beach]

You make sure all the evidence/justification is there, but you don't stick big neon signs on it.

The Sixth Sense is a great example of refusing to dumb it down for the audience. The evidence is all there, even to the point of things the kid tells the doctor.

But you can include things without focusing attention on them.

Some people are just not going to be observant, no matter what you do. I once read a screenwriting book, where the author was discussing things that audiences "just have to accept". As his example he cited The Great Train Robbery and the sequence where Sean Connery's character has to go the length of the train on top the cars. He said it made for a neat action sequence, by what was the point? Why not just have his compatriot open the baggage car door and throw the gold out.

It was obvious to me that the author had NOT rewatched the movie before writing this, because the reason for the top-of-the-train walk was a major plot point! The thieves had rehearsed the robbery just that way. But between their rehearsal and the robbery itself, the cops changed the security measures, and the car was padlocked from the outside for the duration of the trip. Hence the over-the-top (literally) sequence.

Some people just will not pay attention, no matter what you do.

So, as a writer, my answer is to write as smart as I want, make sure all the data is there for anyone to pick up, and just go forward as I want. I'm not going to slow things down "just to make sure you got the point".

:)

[sk716]

The way I see it, you can either write for the smart people or write for the masses.

There really isn't a middle ground.

I was a journalism student for a couple of years and the first absolute is to always spell the name right, they don't care what you say about them as long as you spell their name right. The second absolute of journalism is to write as though you're writing for idiots, because there are going to be a lot of idiots reading it and they hate it when you make them feel stupid because they don't understand your fifty-cent words.

Film gives writers more leeway. A film can be targeted to people with a higher intelligence. But you'll notice most "summer blockbuster" type movies are typically dumbed down for the masses.

[WOLVERINE25TH]

Actually, I'm against dumbing down. We keep dumbing down, that's the less people will HAVE to use their brains and we'll just have to keep on doing it. However, if you present everything that's needed for them to make a (hopefully) logical conclusion, then maybe we can start getting intelligence back to where it SHOULD be.

[The Confessor]

Hmmm....I'm a music journalist and I'm constantly having this debate with my sister. She often compliments me on my writing but sometimes has a problem with my use of uncommon vocabulary and by uncommon I mean words like 'cataclysmic' or 'eponymous' for instance.

Now, although she knows what those words mean, she feels that a lot of people might not and that as a journalist I should write for "everyman" and not just for those with a decent command of the English language.

Although I can see the merit in what she's saying I happen to disagree. When I'm writing I will express myself to the best of my ability and attempt to make what I say as clear and readable as I can BUT...I will not dumb things down by talking in small baby words, just in case there's someone out there who can’t understand me.

It's a tricky one though. Is my sister right? Am I right? It’s a writer’s dilemma.:rolleyes:

[Alan Lynch]

I've always been a "show, don't tell" guy. If you put everything in there to explain a situation and folks don't get it, then you've done all you can. Making things really, super-obvious can detract from the overall impact by drawing attention to something else.

Besides, the Aliens example is just people being really stupid. There's a full-screen shot of the window being shot up; anyone missing that is just fucking daft.

[Solaris]

You make sure all the evidence/justification is there, but you don't stick big neon signs on it.

The Sixth Sense is a great example of refusing to dumb it down for the audience. The evidence is all there, even to the point of things the kid tells the doctor.

But you can include things without focusing attention on them.

Some people are just not going to be observant, no matter what you do. I once read a screenwriting book, where the author was discussing things that audiences "just have to accept". As his example he cited The Great Train Robbery and the sequence where Sean Connery's character has to go the length of the train on top the cars. He said it made for a neat action sequence, by what was the point? Why not just have his compatriot open the baggage car door and throw the gold out.

It was obvious to me that the author had NOT rewatched the movie before writing this, because the reason for the top-of-the-train walk was a major plot point! The thieves had rehearsed the robbery just that way. But between their rehearsal and the robbery itself, the cops changed the security measures, and the car was padlocked from the outside for the duration of the trip. Hence the over-the-top (literally) sequence.

Some people just will not pay attention, no matter what you do.

So, as a writer, my answer is to write as smart as I want, make sure all the data is there for anyone to pick up, and just go forward as I want. I'm not going to slow things down "just to make sure you got the point".

:)


Troy and I were watching the 2nd season of Heroes on Netflix. ***SPOILERS***

At one point I turned to him and said, "You know---it would've made much more sense, in dealing with Adam, if they'd just had the Haitian take all his memories---then he wouldn't be such a problem." A few minutes later, I realized why that wouldn't work: with his cellular regeneration, he would've regained his memory, just as Peter did.

But... there IS one thing that still sticks out: they keep saying that the Company imprisoned Adam because "there was no way to kill him;" yet later when they send Nathan and Matt after him, they say "one bullet to the head will kill him." If that's true, why didn't they kill him ages ago?

Honestly, if I was supposed to see that Adam, or Silar for that matter, was dead, if I managed to "kill" them, I'd then chop off their head, cremate the body and head, and scatter the ashes all over the world.

As said in "Under Siege 2": "Did you see the body? Assumption is the Mother of all Fuck-ups."

:D

And here's one for you:

The Company's spent all these years "trying to save the world"... and part of that involved deriving other viruses from the Shanti virus. Now, they've had Adam for years, and it's quite obvious that his blood will heal anyone of anything. Instead of working on creating new strains of virus... why weren't these idiots taking samples of Adam's blood, and working on replicating it artificially? No more amputations, no more para/quadriplegics, no more brain damage. You could heal any injury or ill, with a simply shot.

Yeah, I've thought about overpopulation concerns, etc., and I can see that as a point... but still, there are ways to deal with overpopulation. Anyway, it would've been a good use to put the company towards, rather than seeking ways to kill people. Bullets work just fine, for the latter.

[/SPOILERS]

Back to the main subject, I agree with Sarah.

And Confessor---I think YOU are right, not your sister. You don't want "thesis paper" terminology, filled with 25 cent words... but using an occasional 25 cent word, among the nickles, is good for readers. :D