Screenwriting starts here. 

Reports of the movie theater’s death have been premature.

For the better part of the last decade, a familiar panic settled over Hollywood. People were crying, “Streaming is killing cinema!” “Audiences are choosing to watch movies at home!” Many started claiming the theatrical experience was a relic on life support, and anyone who didn’t accept that reality was fooling themselves. It was a story that got repeated so often, it felt like a foregone conclusion.

Now, the anxiety wasn’t irrational. There was data behind the pessimism. Theater attendance numbers had plummeted. The pandemic accelerated viewing habits that were already forming. Franchise fatigue was real, and superhero sequels that once felt like guaranteed performers started underdelivering. The culture war had also spilled over into Hollywood and turned off large sections of the country.

But as it turns out, audiences weren’t done with movies. 

They were done with movies that didn’t give them a reason to leave the house.

The Numbers That Changed the Conversation

The first quarter of 2026 has made the case clearly. The domestic box office posted $1.77 billion through Q1: the strongest start to a calendar year since before the pandemic, and an 11% increase over the same period last year. That number reflects a genuine shift in audience behavior, not an anomaly driven by a single opening weekend.

The standout of the quarter is Project Hail Mary (based on the Andy Weir novel and adapted by screenwriter Drew Goddard). The sci-fi hit starring Ryan Gosling crossed $217 million domestically, on pace for $300 million or more, with a remarkably strong third-weekend hold. It set a record as the first 2026 release to cross $200 million. What makes that figure noteworthy is the nature of the film: a new story, not a sequel, not a reboot or franchise extension. 

In addition, Hoppers added another $149.6 million for Disney’s animation slate. Scream 7 hit $120.5 million, a series high for the horror franchise. GOAT crossed $102 million. Taken together, Q1 built its record not on one massive performer, but on consistent theatrical attendance across multiple genres and audience demographics.

And Q2 is already shaping up to be strong with The Super Mario Galaxy Movie amassing a whopping $190.8 million domestically over the holiday weekend. This shows the momentum from Q1 is still going strong. 

The Holdovers

The Q1 story didn’t begin in January. Some of it was written before the new year even started.

Avatar: Fire and Ash carried its late 2025 momentum well into Q1, contributing $137.9 million to the domestic total and pushing its cumulative past $400 million. A sustained theatrical run like this — months of audiences continuing to buy tickets — is the kind of performance that reminds studios why the theatrical window still matters. Arguably more impressive, The Housemaid crossed $399 million worldwide against a $35 million budget. That return on investment didn’t go unnoticed. And Marty Supreme quietly became A24 studio’s highest-grossing film at $179 million globally, built almost entirely on word of mouth from an opening of just six theaters.

These three films couldn’t be more different: a sequel to a sci-fi/fantasy blockbuster, an erotic thriller, and an indie sports dramedy. But what they have in common is that audiences kept showing up for them.

It's Not Just the Big Tent

The success of The Housemaid and Marty Supreme are significant because they show this rise in theater attendance isn’t reserved for big franchises and family films. In addition to The Housemaid, other female-led psychological thrillers, Wuthering Heights and Send Help, posted solid Q1 numbers as counter-programmers to the bigger event films around them. This proves that 2023’s “Barbenheimer” phenomenon wasn’t a fluke, but a foreshadowing.

The success of The Housemaid and Marty Supreme are significant because they show this rise in theater attendance isn’t reserved for big franchises and family films. In addition to The Housemaid, other female-led psychological thrillers, Wuthering Heights and Send Help, posted solid Q1 numbers as counter-programmers to the bigger event films around them. This proves that 2023’s “Barbenheimer” phenomenon wasn’t a fluke, but a foreshadowing.

In addition to the four quadrant sci-fi and animated hits, A24’s The Drama, starring Zendaya and Robert Pattinson, opened this past weekend to $14.38 million domestically and $28 million globally. This effectively recoups the film’s entire production budget in three days, with 68% of its audience being women under 35.

The public’s appetite isn’t narrowly calibrated to tentpoles and familiar characters. When a movie looks intriguing or dynamic, it’ll find an audience.

This Was Predictable

A couple years ago, when many of my peers were convinced that streaming would lead to less work for screenwriters, I had a different take. I also argued that streaming wasn’t going to destroy theatrical cinema any more than television destroyed movies in the 1950s, cable destroyed them in the 1980s, or home video finished them off in the 1990s. Each of those technologies was predicted to make the theater obsolete. In retrospect, television, cable and home video expanded the overall audience for filmed entertainment and ultimately created more demand for content, not less.

And sure enough, streaming is proving to be following suit.

The relationship between streaming and theatrical isn’t antithetical. A great film can perform well in theaters and then extend its life and audience on a streaming platform. And even if a film is solely a platform hit, it can generate the kind of cultural conversation that drives people to seek out a filmmaker’s next theatrical release. Streaming and theatrical can function together, almost symbiotically, when the material is strong enough to justify both.

What streaming accelerated was audience selectivity. When thousands of titles are available at no incremental cost, the bar for what earns a trip to the theater naturally rises. Audiences became more discriminating. Films like Project Hail Mary, Marty Supreme, and The Housemaid were hits because they gave audiences something they couldn’t get by staying home. That’s not a crisis for cinema. That’s cinema doing exactly what it's supposed to do.

What This Means for Screenwriters

A healthy box office has a cascade effect that reaches every level of the industry. Studios tracking these Q1 numbers are going to be green-lighting more films. Producers who’ve been cautious about bringing material to market will start moving faster. Development slates will expand. The pipeline that runs from a screenplay on someone’s computer to a movie in front of a paying audience will get more traffic, more investment, and more urgency behind it.

More films being greenlit means more writers being hired for assignment jobs. Even if many of the films that topped the last two quarters were adaptations of books and other IPs, they still required screenwriters to translate them from one medium to another. Also, franchise films need fresh voices to push the material somewhere audiences haven’t already been. If you're a working professional or a writer with heat, the revitalized box office is likely to create a fuller job market. In many ways, the current marketplace is much healthier for screenwriters than it was pre-pandemic when everything was about superhero films and slick remakes.

But the opportunity doesn’t stop at the assignment level, and this is where this story connects to something I’ve been watching build for the past year.

Two Trends, One Direction

In my article, “The Return of the Spec Screenplay Sale,” I wrote about 23 feature spec sales and pitches closing in a single summer, with nine of them in August alone: the highest monthly volume since March 2017. Studios and producers are buying original material again. Some of these deals were in the high six figures and a few even crossed seven figures. A hot spec is once again a commodity.

That trend didn’t appear out of nowhere, and it’s not separate from what’s happening at the box office now. Spec script purchases are a bet on where the audience is heading. Studios and producers reading the cultural signals in 2024 and 2025 — growing streaming fatigue, renewed interest in the theatrical experience, audiences increasingly hungry for fresh material — started investing in original material ahead of the demand curve. Don’t be surprised if next year some of these specs join the ranks at the theatrical box office and further expand the marketplace.

Spec scripts are the movies of tomorrow. The films opening in theaters two and three years from now are being written today. The specs circulating right now, the ones getting read by managers and production companies and development executives, are the raw material that becomes the next wave of theatrical releases. When the box office is strong and studios are confident, that pipeline accelerates. Material that might have sat in development limbo for years gets pushed forward. Projects that needed a green light, get it.

This is why the spec sale resurgence and the box office recovery aren’t separate trends that just happen to be occurring at the same time. They’re the same trend viewed from two different points in the process. The industry was already signaling its confidence in the future through the spec market before Q1 confirmed it in ticket sales. Writers paying attention to both markets have a clearer picture of the landscape than writers watching only one.

More Movies, More Screenplays

More movies are going to be made in the coming years, and this naturally means more screenplays will need to be written. If you’re a beginner screenwriter, the spec is your entry point into this expanding marketplace. Whether it’s through a sale or your spec working as a writing sample, it’s still one of the best ways to break into the industry. 

The return of the box office and spec sale, especially when viewed alongside one another, confirm the industry has moved past the period of uncertainty. It isn’t operating exclusively around a few safe bets. It’s embracing new material, different genres, fresh voices, and scripts that haven’t been written yet by writers who haven’t had their break yet. The pipeline is open and the appetite is real.

People are going back to the movies. 

Now write something worth the ticket.

In 1978, Faces of Death shocked audiences by blurring the line between real and staged violence, becoming one of the most controversial cult films ever released. It came out of the mondo film tradition, a genre of shock-driven, fake documentary films sometimes called “shockumentaries.” Today, mondo films are often dismissed as an exploitative, cheap-thrills way to manipulate a less savvy audience, but what’s surprising is how much they feel like a precursor to today’s digital landscape where you never really know if you’re watching content that’s real, or generated by AI.  

The new version of Faces of Death centers on Margot (Barbie Ferreira), a young content moderator whose job is to filter violent footage online. When she begins to suspect that a series of videos may depict real murders imitating the ones in the original Faces of Death, she takes it upon herself to investigate the elusive content creator, Arthur (Dacre Montgomery). We sat down with director/co-writer Daniel Goldhaber and co-writer/producer Isa Mazzei who have reinvented Faces of Death for the TikTok age.

The Internet Is the New VHS

Mazzei says she and Goldhaber were approached by Legendary Entertainment, who had acquired the rights to the original film in hopes of making a remake. What they discovered doing research for the project surprised them. 

“We had never seen the original. It was a little bit before our time, so when we watched it, we started recognizing pieces of it that we had seen online growing up. And that was a really cool experience and a realization that this film has really had an enduring life. We were really excited to figure out our space inside of that,” she says.

They asked themselves the same question any writer might ask when rebooting an older franchise: What does Faces of Death look like now? 

“We realized that Faces of Death is online,” Goldhaber says, inspiring him to draw on his experience working as a content moderator after college. He thought this could be a way to explore the psychological toll of moderation work, which is a largely invisible job where people review and approve or dismiss the worst content the internet has to offer.

Pairing that with the original Faces of Death unlocked the new film’s premise: A high stakes predator vs. prey thriller between someone creating violent content and someone trying to stop it.

“We were also interested in the complicity that social media companies have in escalating the violence and anger of our world right now,” Goldhaber says. 

That theme elevates the material beyond shock value. Instead of wondering, am I watching something real? The question shifts to, why am I watching this in the first place?

Josie Totah in 'Faces of Death'

When Reality Is Easier Than Fiction

One of the most disturbing discoveries during production had to do with licensing real footage. To depict Margot’s job authentically, the filmmakers incorporated real death footage into the film, navigating a long legal and ethical process. 

“To put it in a movie, we had to go through all these channels,” Mazzei says. “But when I go home and open my phone, I’m just served this content every day without any of those checks in place.” 

It’s not just that violent videos exist, it’s that they are curated and delivered to you on your phone every day, both real and AI.

Writing the Algorithm as the Antagonist

One of the film’s freshest ideas is treating the social media algorithm, not just the human killer, as the antagonist.

Mazzei says the way platforms are designed to amplify the most emotionally charged content is what’s so harmful. “It’s the content that keeps us engaged. It’s the attention economy.” 

This goes back to the theme of complicity, where the “villain” is a structure we all participate in. Just the film’s existence as a remake becomes proof of that concept.

Goldhaber notes the irony: just as Arthur, the film’s killer, is driven to recreate Faces of Death, the industry itself is driven to remake it.

In the film, Arthur chillingly says, “The algorithm loves remakes.” 

It’s this clever layering of relevant, meta themes, that gives such a gruesome film a reason to exist and be examined. 

Kurt Yue in 'Faces of Death'

Keeping a Collaboration Alive

Goldhaber and Mazzei have been creative partners for over 20 years. To keep the partnership strong, they have one key rule: If they disagree on something, neither idea wins. Instead, they search for a third option, something both of them can stand behind. 

“What we started finding was that the best ideas were something that both of us liked,” says Goldhaber.

It’s a simple principle, but one that gets to a larger truth about collaboration: great ideas don’t always come from compromise, but from pushing forward.

Fighting for the Film

Ironically, a film about censorship and control faced its own battles getting released.

“We’ve dealt with a lot of attempted censorship of the film and our marketing materials,” Goldhaber says. 

Despite finishing the film two years ago, the team had to fight to bring their intended version to audiences, ultimately refusing to make major concessions. Their advice to filmmakers facing similar censorship is blunt.

“Stick to your guns. Have dogged persistence,” says Goldhaber. 

Barbie Ferreira in 'Faces of Death'

We’re All Complicit

We asked the filmmakers what they hope the audience will take away from this film. Goldhaber was very clear. 

“That social media is truly evil,” he says. 

So, will the film be promoted on social media platforms? Absolutely.

“I'm posting constantly,” says Mazzei, adding, “I literally am making content to promote. And I think that's part of the conversation we're having, right? No spoilers, but the end of the movie. That's kind of what we're saying. You cannot exist in modern society without being on your phone, but at what cost? And we're all kind of complicit in it. We're all stuck in this loop, we’re stuck in the same place that everyone else is.”

If there’s a central idea behind remaking Faces of Death, it’s not just that social media is dangerous, it’s that participation in it is unavoidable. And the serpent eats itself. 

Faces of Death was written on Final Draft, and opens in theaters April 10.

When Jeff Williams won the 2024 Final Draft Big Break Action/Adventure category with his script ‘Deafblind’, a whole new world of possibilities opened up. That may sound like exactly what you’d expect to happen after winning a major contest, but at 67, when many are slowing down, Williams is just getting on the horse. He’s now holding on tight for the bucking-bronco ride of getting a movie made.

‘Deafblind’ is a Western set in 1868, and the story follows a young woman who’s both deaf and blind. When her sister is kidnapped by a ruthless killer, she’s forced to navigate the wilderness on horseback, with only her instincts and her dog, to save her. It’s a concept that immediately raises the dramatic question: How can someone who cannot see nor hear survive rescuing someone in such an unforgiving environment? Williams, himself, was unsure if it would work.

“I entered it in two contests, just to kind of gauge if I was insane or not with this concept,” he says. “The challenge, as you can imagine, was trying to make this realistic and believable. That something like this could actually take place.”

The premise hinges on tension between the limits of not being able to see or hear versus a strong survival instinct. The protagonist is not portrayed as fragile, but as fiercely self-reliant. She’s a woman who, despite her disabilities, has learned to survive in the harsh terrain of the North Carolina mountains.

That balance, between authenticity and life or death stakes, is where the script lives or dies. This script is alive like wildfire. 

The Final Draft Big Break win not only validated the concept for the script, it gave producer Jason Dubin of Perry Street Pictures, the confidence to option the screenplay. 

Dubin had already responded positively to the material, but like many industry professionals, he was watching closely to see how it performed in a competitive, professional arena.

“He kept asking me, ‘Have you heard yet? How’s it doing in the competition?’” Williams says. “And I would tell him it’s in the quarterfinals, the semifinals. And then it won.”

The win also proved that Williams’s commitment to keep writing is paying off. 

Persistence is the key

By day, Williams is a successful architect, living in North Carolina. “I am the poster child for perseverance with screenwriting,” he says. Though forging a career as an architect seemed like the pragmatic thing to do, he says he’s absolutely loved movies his whole life. But it wasn’t until 2007 that he actually read a screenplay for the first time.

“Just by happenstance, I read the screenplay for the movie Collateral, and I fell in love with this way of writing.”

He says he tried writing novels in the past, but it just wasn’t for him. Somehow, screenplays felt more accessible because they were similar to a blueprint, something he knew a lot about being an architect. 

“Reading the screenplay tapped into sketching for me and designing a building. It's the same muscles. You’re taking something three-dimensional and putting it in two dimensions on paper,” he says.

In architecture, that means envisioning a beautiful building in your mind, but then mapping it out in flat drawings that a contractor can use to build something out of steel and wood. Screenwriting operates the same way because a script is not the finished product. 

“The saying that a screenplay is a blueprint for a movie is very accurate.”

He says that from there, the director becomes the builder, the one responsible for shaping those words into a living, breathing world.

“It’s their job to take what’s on paper and expand it to that three-dimensional visual medium.  Actors, lighting, music, camera, it’s overwhelming.”

That understanding of structure, how something is built and supported, helped Williams approach crafting a story.

“The structural aspect, the three acts, the beats you have to hit, that’s what attracted me,” he says. “It’s very similar to architecture.”

Just as a building requires a sound framework before aesthetic choices are made, a screenplay depends on the integrity of the story.

“You have to know the nuts and bolts,” he says. “What makes it stand up.”

The importance of screenwriting contests 

Williams is a veteran of the screenwriting contest circuit. His earlier screenplay ‘Pure’, a sports drama set in the world of professional golf, won both the Nicholl Fellowship and the Austin Film Festival in 2009. But his approach to competitions has evolved since then.

For Williams, contests are effective tools for someone outside the Hollywood landscape. “They gauge how well you’re doing and if an idea’s worth pursuing.”

He says that competitions offer something like a consensus. If a script advances through multiple rounds it’s a signal that a script isn’t just resonating with one person, it’s working across multiple readers.

In Williams’ case, it helped move a producer from interest to action and positioned the project for its next step: Attaching an A-list director and going out to actresses. 

“After starting this in 2009, something may actually get made,” he says. “I don’t give up.”

That persistence is central to his advice for emerging writers, especially those coming from outside of Hollywood.

“Find a community. Read scripts. Write a lot of bad ones,” he says. “That’s how you learn.”

Final Draft’s 2026 Big Break Screenwriting Competition is now open for entries. 

The End.

For a screenwriter, there’s no better feeling than finishing that screenplay, and the pride in knowing you accomplished a difficult, often months-long task. And while the 100 pages that preceded the end are important, the resolution in a story is absolutely imperative and should be designed to stick with the audience long after they leave the theater.

As the last impression on an audience, the resolution is memorable as long as it maintains consistency with the story and makes sense in the context of the film or TV show. In order to explain the resolution there might be spoilers ahead, but I’ll try to keep those to older movies and TV shows.

While the ending of the story may go by many names, such as The Return in the Hero’s Journey, the concept we’re going to focus on comes from Freytag’s Pyramid.

Explained: Freytag’s Pyramid

For the Three-Act Structure, made famous by Syd Field’s 1979 screenwriting guide, the entire third act is considered the resolution. However, in Freytag’s Pyramid, the resolution is the final part of the story where all loose ends are tied up.

Freytag's Pyramid is a classic storytelling framework that maps a narrative arc into five parts:

Exposition Rising Action Climax Falling Action Resolution

The resolution begins immediately after the falling action, which involves the characters processing their journey after the climax of the story. Think of resolution as the period after the end of a long sentence.

The resolution has an important role to play in the overall story. After the spectacle of the climax and the emotional exhale of the falling action, the resolution provides emotional closure, not just a narrative closure, as it indicates what the journey meant for the characters and allows the audiences to process the story as a complete experience.

A satisfying resolution doesn’t just end the plot, it gives insight into how the audience should feel about everything that came before.

An example of a resolution is in The Shawshank Redemption after the climax when Red (Morgan Freeman) reunites with Andy (Tim Robbins) on the beach. Although the plot has already concluded, the resolution delivers the thematic payoff, which includes hope and redemption.

Think about if the movie ended after the prison break or with Red living life after his parole. The resolution wouldn’t be satisfying. Without that final reunion, the story would feel incomplete, even though the central conflict has been resolved.

What is the Resolution in a Story?

The resolution is where you reveal what the story was truly about. It’s not just about the conclusion of the plot, but its meaning, and it shapes how the audience remembers everything that came before.

Everything may lead to the climax of the story, where the protagonist is forced to make their final choice based on the journey that came before, but after that, it’s up to the character to reckon with the resolution of their actions. Without character arcs, setups and themes, the resolution won’t have the meaning it should.

To emphasize: a resolution is only as strong as the setup. If the ending feels unearned or lackluster, the problem usually lies earlier in the story.

How Resolutions Tie Up Loose Ends. Or Not.

Even after all the efforts of building arcs and leading to an epic climax, the first thought is that everything should be wrapped up in a nice little bow. However, that’s not always the case. In fact, it shouldn’t always be the case.

A common misconception is that a good resolution resolves every subplot and answers every question. In practice, over-explaining can weaken the emotional impact. That being said, ambiguity can fail when it feels like avoidance rather than intention. It’s a matter of finding the resolution that works best overall.

Famously, the TV series Lost was regarded by some as having a disappointing finale. The resolution of the show had failed at answering the many mysteries that kept audiences engaged season after season. To the viewer, it felt like the creators raised questions and presented mysteries that were never intended to be answered or solved.

When a Resolution Doesn’t Work

Unfortunately, some resolutions don’t work. If so, here are the common culprits:

They contradict the story’s internal logic. If characters suddenly act differently because the writer needs to wrap things up quickly, the audience will notice the difference and feel it. They introduce new solutions too late. A last-minute twist or device that wasn’t set up can make the audience feel like they’re being cheated. They ignore the emotional arc. Even if the plot is resolved, the audience may feel disconnected if the character’s journey isn’t. Sometimes the writer has no control over this, such as if TV shows are cancelled without much notice or an actor passes away and there isn’t a way to resolve the emotional arc. Examples include the TV series Las Vegas which ended its final season with several cliffhangers because they didn’t know they were not going to be renewed. Another example is Heath Ledger’s death after filming The Dark Knight, so there was no return of the Joker in the third film.

Tips for Writing a Resolution in a Story

How can you ensure your resolution lands effectively and gives you the confidence that the audience will remember the fantastic ending of your movie? Here are ways to make your resolution pay off and some examples of resolution in stories.

Pay Off What You Set Up. If your story emphasizes a particular relationship, theme or question, your resolution should address it directly. Audiences will remember what matters so if you don’t resolve it, they won’t be happy. In Cast Away, the fact that Chuck (Tom Hanks) is a Fedex employee at the beginning makes his desire to deliver the package in the resolution more meaningful. Let Character Drive the Ending. The resolution should emerge from the protagonist’s choices, not external forces. A satisfying ending happens organically from who the character has become. In Avengers: Endgame, Tony Stark’s (Robert Downey Jr.) years of being selfish and cocky makes the resolution after the epic climax more profound after he sacrifices himself for the universe. Know the Emotional Goal. What should the audience feel in the final moments? Relief? Bittersweet acceptance? Triumph? Shape the resolution around that emotional goal. In Rocky, it wasn’t a matter of winning or losing but rather Rocky (Sylvester Stallone) wanting to prove that he could go the distance against Apollo Creed (Carl Weathers). Embrace Simplicity. Resolutions don’t need to be elaborate. Often, the most powerful endings are quiet and focused. A single image or moment can carry enormous weight when properly set up. Remember the resolution of Brokeback Mountain, how powerful it was when Ennis (Heath Ledger) pulls Jack’s (Jake Gyllenhaal) shirt from his closet. Or the resolution of Butch Cassidy and the Sundance Kid when they bust the doors open to shoot it out with the Bolivian army – the film ends in a still frame of them shooting with the audio still playing. Echo the Beginning. Strong resolutions often mirror the opening in some way; visually, emotionally or thematically. This creates a sense of cohesion and completeness. Think about the circle of life in The Lion King and how the beginning with the birth of Simba (Jonathan Taylor Thomas/Matthew Broderick) echoes the ending when the animals meet again at Pride Rock.

A satisfying resolution is more than writing an ending. It’s about wrapping up the story in a meaningful and memorable way. Whether you choose to tie up every loose thread or leave room for ambiguity, the key is intention in your resolution. The ending should feel appropriate based on everything that came before and meet the expectations of the story; that doesn’t mean there can’t be twists, but they must be earned.

When the resolution pays off, the audience will remember your story long after the credits roll.

Screenwriting contests are a strategic opportunity for emerging screenwriters to have their work read by Film/TV industry professionals and decision-makers. Contests like Final Draft’s Big Break (now open for entries) give screenwriters access to industry insiders, creating opportunities for emerging writers to gain further exposure for their film, TV or short film script. 

Over the past 25 years, many winners and finalists of the Big Break Screenwriting Contest have signed with agents and managers, sold and optioned their winning scripts, and been staffed in TV writers’ rooms (you can view more Big Break success stories here). 

Here are some ways to increase your chances of having your script be successful in a contest. 

1. Hook Readers Within the First Few Pages

A surefire way to grab the attention of the contest reader is to sink your cinematic storytelling hooks into them as quickly as possible. If you can do it from Page One, amazing. If you accomplish that within two-to-three pages, perfect. If by Page Five the general protagonist, concept, genre, and core conflict are all present, that’s even better. 

Readers love a good hook, no different than an audience watching a movie or episode of a TV show. If you can hook them fast, you’re a step ahead of other submissions. 

Hooking a reader early is all about presenting intrigue, character and story potential, and excitement. Some screenwriters mistake this as needing a big shock, scare, or action sequence in the beginning of the script. While having those elements do qualify as great hooks, it’s really more about getting the reader invested in the story and character early on. 

The best way to accomplish that is by presenting a high level of conflict. Putting a character into a high level of conflict intrigues the reader and showcases character and story potential that will excite them enough to keep turning the pages with heightened anticipation and curiosity. 

2. Know What Genre Your Script Is

It’s always helpful to really know and embrace the genre of your screenplay. Most contests these days have genre-specific categories. The readers and judges for these categories have been selected because of their background, expertise, and/or preference within those specific movie genres. Because of that, you want to select the right genre category to enter your script in. For example, you don’t want readers and judges who have no interest or experience in horror reading your terrifying horror script. 

What If You Have a Blend of Genres?

Genre-blending can actually be a great thing, and another way to increase your odds in screenwriting contests. Why? Because you’re bringing in two different audience bases and two sets of audience expectations. In short, genre blends offer something for even more people.

Ghostbusters is Horror meets Comedy.  Alien is Horror meets Science Fiction.  Project Hail Mary is Science Fiction meets Comedy. Everything Everywhere All At Once blended Martial Arts, Science Fiction, Fantasy, and Melodrama. 

If your script is a perfect balance of genres, making it difficult to determine which genre category to choose, you can always enter your script into multiple genre categories as well, increasing your odds of success. 

3. Do a Final Polish Draft

Before you submit your script to a contest, do one last read through and polish draft. 

Remember, readers and judges aren’t just tasked with looking for the best scripts possible - they need to find the best of the best. If two scripts are being compared and considered for advancement, and one of those scripts is clearly a more polished draft, the one with fewer formatting issues will likely be the one that moves forward. 

So what does a polish draft entail? Just when you think your script couldn’t be written any better, do one final read of it with a rewrite-as-you-go approach. 

A dealership may have a beautiful sports car parked on the lot, waiting to be purchased. It’s sleek. The paint job is amazing. The design is near-flawless. But what stands out the most? That smudge on the hood? That smeared bug on the windshield? The bird droppings on the windows? Presentation is everything when it comes to sales. 

Performing a polish draft is all about doing those final touchups to make that sports car of yours shine brighter and better - and we’re talking about the back, front, top, bottom, and inside. 

As you read your script line-by-line:

Do a final check for spelling and grammatical errors.  Shore up any plot holes.  Trim down dialogue to its core.  Edit scene description down to one-to-two sentences or fragments per block.  Make sure your location sluglines are consistent.

It’s all about polishing your script and trimming the fat away so you have a script that’s easy to read and even easier to visualize. 

4. Make Sure Your Script is the Right Length

90-120 pages is the sweet spot for readers. An age-old Hollywood metric is the One Page=One Minute scale. While it’s a generalization, it actually ends up being fairly accurate. So a 90 page script would be a 90 minute movie, a 120 page script a two hour movie, and so on. 

If the script is under 80 pages, that could be a red flag that it’s underwritten. If the script is 130 or 140 pages long, that’s a telltale sign for readers that the script is overwritten. 

Here’s an insider point of view from a script reader’s perspective: the first thing a reader sometimes looks at is the page count. They’ll still read all of those pages no matter what the page count may be (as long as they stay within contest rules), but you can increase your odds of success by having readers go into the script without any red flags or natural stressors registering from the page count alone.

Trim pages however you can. And most of the time it’s not about just making a page count. It will also help your script’s pacing and readability.

Screenwriting Contests Can Open Many Doors

Contests are a powerful entry point for new writers that have yet to build a strong industry network. By following the above tips, you give your script a better chance of standing out with screenwriting contest judges.

Good Luck!

You’ve built the tension, increased the stakes for the protagonist and delivered a powerful climax. Now what? 

Screenwriters tend to take two approaches: they either rush through the resolution or spend too much time getting there. However, falling action—the space between the climax and the final resolution—is where the story earns its emotional payoff. When done right, falling action doesn’t just wind things down; it deepens meaning, reinforces character arcs, gives audiences closure, and pushes the protagonist into their new ordinary world.

Falling action is mostly associated with Freytag’s Pyramid, which is a storytelling structure similar to the classic 3-act structure, or the Hero’s Journey.

What is Freytag’s Pyramid?

Freytag's Pyramid is a classic storytelling framework that maps a narrative arc into five parts:

Exposition Rising Action Climax Falling Action Resolution

Falling action begins immediately after the climax, and signals that the narrative is heading toward its conclusion. It gives the chance for the hero of the story, as well as the audience, to emotionally exhale after the story’s most intense moment. Without it, the narrative risks feeling abrupt or incomplete.

In the Hero’s Journey, it can be associated with the scenes after the Ordeal.

What is Falling Action?

Specifically, falling action is the portion of the story where the immediate aftermath of the climax plays out. At this point, the conflicts begin to resolve, characters process what has happened, and lingering questions start to get answered. There may even be a little journey back to where the story originated, only now, the protagonist has been on their adventure and is returning as a new person.

Falling action gives the audience time to absorb the full story and understand what it means for the characters, and acts as a bridge from the climax to the resolution.

One example of falling action comes from The Shawshank Redemption, after Red (Morgan Freeman) is released on parole. He goes through many of the same actions that Brooks (James Whitmore) had earlier in the film; only he has a goal to reunite with his friend in Mexico. Imagine if the film ended after Andy’s (Tim Robbins) escape—without the falling action, the end of the narrative would feel abrupt or incomplete.

Morgan Freeman in 'The Shawshank Redemption'

What Comes Before and After Falling Action?

Just like any other part of a movie, what comes before and after a part of the story is important in telling the full story.

Before the falling action

The climax is the moment the audience has been waiting for. Everything in the story leads to this moment where the protagonist is forced to make a choice and live with the consequences. Because this is the part of the movie with the highest tension, the falling action follows as an emotional exhale.

After the falling action

This is the resolution of the story. It can be extremely short, and shows what life is like in the world after the protagonist concludes their journey.

How Long Should Falling Action Be?

There’s no fixed rule to how long falling action should take, however, it should be proportional to your story’s complexity and emotional weight.

In fast-paced genres like action or thriller, falling action may be brief. It could be a couple minutes or a few scenes. In character-driven dramas, it might be longer. The Shawshank Redemption has falling action that takes up quite a bit of time.

Generally, the bigger the climax, the more space you need to process it. Think about films like Titanic or Wicked, stories that have major emotional or thematic stakes, such as loss, transformation and sacrifice. The falling action takes a lot longer than Armageddon or John Wick, which tend to be shorter.

Examples of Falling Action in Movies and TV

Titanic

The climax of Titanic comes with the sinking of the unsinkable ship and the aftermath of Rose (Kate Winslet) and Jack (Leonardo DiCaprio) in the water. The falling action, therefore, is when the older Rose completes her story in front of the treasure hunters, drops the necklace into the water, and lies down to die.

The falling action gives Rose the time needed to process her trauma and find peace in her journey of life and the audience to see how she lived the life that Jack wanted for her. The resolution comes when Rose meets up with Jack after she passes away.

Gloria Stuart in 'Titanic'

The Dark Knight

The climax of The Dark Knight is when Batman (Christian Bale) finally captures the Joker (Heath Ledger) and Harvey Dent (Aaron Eckhart) completes his transition to Two-Face. The falling action occurs when Batman confronts Dent followed by Commissioner Gordon (Gary Oldman) delivering his closing speech. The falling action helps reinforce the themes of heroism and sacrifice, and the costs associated with them.

Jurassic Park

After the humans escape the raptors and the T-Rex, the falling action occurs when they escape the island and the reflection moments in the helicopter. This falling action provides the calm after the storm, and reflection after chaos.

Is Falling Action Necessary?

Traditionally, falling action is treated as an essential part of story structure. But in practice, many modern stories compress or even skip it altogether. Some writers argue that falling action can be specific to certain story arcs, particularly those that closely follow Freytag's Pyramid.

The thing is, some form of falling action usually exists even if it’s not labeled as such.

Falling Action vs. Resolution

Falling action is used for the characters and the audience to process the story The resolution is the final outcome of the story  Ariana Richards, Sam Neill, and Joseph Mazzello in 'Jurassic Park'

How to Write Falling Action

Here are a few tips when writing falling action.

Keep Pace with Your Story: The time it takes for your falling action to happen will be dependent on the pace of the entire story. After the climax, you shouldn’t be far from the ending, but don’t rush it. A good question to ask is, ‘Have I given this moment enough space to land emotionally?’ Tie Up Loose Ends: Falling action can help tie up loose ends. While not everything needs a neat bow, the major plot points and character arcs should be resolved. Keep track of character arcs, subplots and emotional conflicts and ensure they get resolved during the falling action. Keep the Energy Going: While the climax would be the most exciting part of the movie or TV show, it doesn’t mean you should lose the energy afterward. In fact, falling action can reveal new information, such as a final twist, deepen character relationships, answer questions or highlight consequences.

Falling action can be overlooked because many writers consider it part of the resolution. However, it can be used to help bridge that moment between the climax and the resolution. The key to making it strong is intentionality. Whether it lasts one minute or several scenes, it must be relevant to the story and give the audience the space they need to process the climax. This will help leave a lasting impression.