Die Tag

Several days go by and no entry.  Harumph.  Many things to report.  First, The Gift is a very moody, moving, character-driven film.  I recommend it.  Cate Blanchett plays a very credible deep south psychic.  The only thing I didn't like was the use of the Rhine symbol cards in divination (sometimes called the Zener cards).  The Rhine symbols were never divination devices, they were designed to test telepathy and precognition.  That made me think Annie (Blanchett's character) was a fraud.  Film is not like fiction.  When you get something wrong it's not easy to go back and fix it, like it is writing a novel.

Novel writing goes well.  I've decided to place the action of the story around a film shoot--rather than a discotheque.  That is a much more active choice, and the connection between the characters make much more sense.  It comes as a result of a comment by one of my fellow writing students.  Funny how an off-hand comment by someone outside the process can be so on target.  Sometimes you are so focused on maples, elms and firs, you can't get a very good view of the national park. 

Looking forward to the weekend.  I've rewritten though scene 11 and now I've got to tackle scene 12, which needs major revision.  The rest can be glued together pretty easily, but I didn't really know what direction Steve Sims was going to go at that point, and as written, that scene doesn't work now.