Scripting

The first act of a standard three-act movie is used to introduce the audience to the story and the characters, in the most interesting way possible. The first 10 pages of a script, which equates to the first 10 minutes of the movie, are the most important.
Why are they most important? The first 10 minutes of the movie are when most people decide if your film is worth watching or, in the case of producers and studio heads, worth making.
The first scene is one of the most important, not only of the first 10 minutes, but the whole movie. It needs to have strong imagery and set up the movie. People need to know what they are getting into for the rest of the film. If it’s an action movie, start with action or an explosion, etc. Here are the elements that the first 10 minutes need to explain:
The Main Characters
If your movie is called Spider Man, then you don’t wait until the middle of the movie to introduce Peter Parker. The primary players need to be introduced first thing. The hero, love interest, and important supporting characters should be identified. Not all supporting characters will be introduced here, but the most important should be. Viewers need to develop a connection right away, and they can’t do that if you hold off telling them who the important characters are.
The Bad Guy
Every story, regardless of whether it’s a rom com or horror flick, has a bad guy—Darth Vader, Lumberg, the hurricane, etc. People want to know who the foil is for your antagonist right away. You don’t need to go into too much detail yet, but he needs to be shown. You can do the Vader grand entrance or a simple photograph and description. (I like the grand entrance myself, a la Orson Welles in The Third Man.) If the antagonist is a mystery and you want to keep your villain a secret, that’s fine, but we need to know he exists. In Se7en, we don’t see Kevin Spacey until the end, but we know the killer exists from the beginning. In Ghost they introduce the friend right away, but we don’t understand he is the bad guy until the very end.
Backstory
If there are events that happened beforehand that have a significant impact on the story, then you need to provide details. It could be something major, like an alien invasion that enslaved the Earth, or something more mundane, such as a divorce that separated the main character and his estranged spouse. Try and tell this through imagery and dialogue rather than voice over as it can bore the audience. Voiceovers are certainly used, but should only be done as a last resort.
Setting
This may sound obvious, but people need to know where and when the movie is taking place. Your imagery and background generally provide this. You can also be overt by putting that state directly on the screen. In The Wedding Singer, we get to know the 1980′s setting not only by the music, clothes, and hairstyles, but also through dialogue. If a movie is set in the 1940′s, then the events of the time, vehicles and other props can help describe the scene and setting.

By  Brock Cooper