In Praise of Sentence Fragments in Screenplays
By using this grammar faux-pas to your advantage, your script will be stronger.
Sentence. Fragments.
“Never use ‘em!” your English teacher drilled into your ninth grade noggin.
Yeah, that’s generally true, but your teacher wasn’t a screenwriter. I’m going to tell you a scriptwriting secret: Sentence fragments should be used whenever possible in screenplays!
Rules
A sentence — a good one, that is — is typically an independent clause. That means it’s a complete thought with a subject and a verb. You can add dependent clauses if you like, but if you don’t have at least a subject and a verb, your sentence won’t be…complete.
For example, here’s an independent clause:
The jet-black cat languishes on the sunny porch.
Here’s that same clause missing the verb, making it a fragment:
The jet-black cat on the sunny porch.
That’s the bad kind of fragment. Don’t ever remove the verb. Now, let’s talk about the good kind that can make your script pithy and quick to read:
Languishes on the sunny porch.
Explanation
It still sounds weird. Why are you allowed to do that in a screenplay? Why is it even encouraged? Screenplay formatting — and the visual language pervading it — is all about brevity. By dropping an article or a subject (whether a noun or pronoun) from an independent clause, you can shorten a sentence to be as direct as possible.
Screenshot by the author.
Concerning the lazy cat, the only way you’re allowed to remove the subject for the scriptwriting fragment is if there’s enough context from previous lines that we know it’s the cat languishing. However, if the sentence becomes unclear, then don’t make it a fragment. You’ll do more harm than good.
Examples
Let’s look at some other examples of pithy sentence fragments at work in screenplays:
Screenshot by the author.
Screenshot by the author.
If you prefer an example from other writers, here’s an older one from Ridley Scott’s Alien (1979):
Alien (1979) | Written by Walter Hill and David Giler. Based on screenplay by Dan O’Bannon. Story by Dan O’Bannon and Ronald Shusett.
To learn more about how Alien uses this groundbreaking technique, watch this script analysis:
Here’s one from a more recent film, Scorsese’s Silence (2016):
Silence (2016) | Written by Jay Cocks & Martin Scorsese. Based on the novel by Shusaku Endo.
Summary
Screenwriting requires the most depth with the fewest words possible. To create a proper fragment for this style of storytelling, remove the pronoun, not the verb. By using sentence fragments with inferred subjects, screenwriters can embrace brevity in a fashion unique to this storytelling form!
—
Watch the Visual Screenwriting Masterclass: How to Write INVISIBLE Camera Angles!
