Movie Games | Contact Us | Site Map | Links
An Interview by William Roberts, July 2004
Now, a year on, Conflict Scripts have a whole new identity.
www.geocities.com/conflictscripts:
Stuart:
�About seven months ago Mark sent me an email with a link to a homepage he had created for Conflict Scripts. Up until this point the thought of having a website hadn�t even crossed my mind.�
Ben:
�Seeing a �Conflict Scripts� website was certainly a buzz, but I was a little daunted by it. Firstly because I hadn�t the first idea about how to write HTML coding, but more importantly because I�m simply not that good at graphic design and art, something I thought we would have to get involved in at some point.�
Due to this lack of creative website know how, which submersed the group, the project was subsequently dropped for the time being.
As Conflict Scripts moved into 2004 the creative process hit another brick wall from a writing perspective. Their attempt at a re-write of their first collaboration �Conflict� was shelved, as a story worthy of a 2nd draft couldn�t be agreed upon.
Ben:
�We spent many hours and days thrashing out ideas as to how we should write the 2nd draft but no answer, that suited us all, emerged from these discussions. We all had slightly different ideas about the writing process, but more importantly the story!�
Stuart was about 30 pages in on his 4th screenplay, the working titled �Love or Country� when he decided to take Mark�s website idea to the next level.
Stuart:
�I had what I felt was a really good idea for a story with �Love or Country�, however I was beginning to notice a trend in my writing which wasn�t doing justice to the story. I thought it might be wise at this stage to put it to one side and concentrate on getting the website off the ground.�
Never one for sitting in front of his PC in the hope that piece of dialogue or narrative might suddenly appear Stuart felt his uses would be more beneficial to Conflict Scripts via another medium. So he set out to build www.geocities.com/conflictscripts.
Stuart:
�Both Mark and Ben were busy with various screenplays and contributing towards Conflict Scripts in their own way. I felt I wasn�t so I plunged myself into the unknown. My belief was that it would do us no harm to pick up where Mark left off and have a source where we could showcase our screenplays.
On that note I can also appreciate that screenplay reading is something which not a lot of movie fans tend to throw themselves into so I suggested to Mark and Ben that we try and pack out the site with other movie related topics to hold visitors interests.�
The website now hosts a movie review, book review, trivia and games section and even though it is still in it�s infancy you can see where they hope to take their new identity.
Outside help is also an option Conflict Scripts are looking into.
Stuart:
�The ideal scenario for us would be to have resident movie/book reviewers to keep the database full and up to date whilst we concentrate on writing. We�ve made numerous attempts at finding interested parties and are still looking. This process has proved beneficial to us as we�ve received both positive and productive feedback regarding the site whilst searching for reviewers and contributors.�
Unaware at the time Ben was slowly getting into the creative side of things regarding the site. He began submitting reviews and sub-consciously commenting on how pages looked and the actual functionality of the site.
Ben:
�At this point I was still unwilling to devote time to the actual design and layout of the site. I was more than happy to write reviews, but wanted to pass them over to Stuart and let him put them up on the site.
As time went by and it was clear that Stuart was doing a fantastic job on the site I felt less and less willing to get involved. I was pretty convinced that my getting involved would hinder, not help the site.�
Stuart:
�Haha, yeah at the time he didn�t realise he was getting deeper into the productive side of things. His destiny was clouded shall we say.�
Html coding and editing would become a huge part of Stuart�s life over the next few months. Ben, who by now had accepted his fate, started to pour his efforts into the project by setting up the games page, site map page and inputting numerous html/java codes, which they felt the site required.
Ben:
�As the site began to grow my outlook began to change. I started spending more time looking into how Stuart had designed the site, and started talking to him more about the direction I wanted the site to go. We spent many hours discussing ideas, trying them out only to scrap them. We both agreed the site should be friendly but at the same time as professional and well designed as possible. The past few months have been a real eye-opener to both of us; the learning curve has been fairly steep at times, especially as I decided to look deeper into HTML and Java coding. Despite this we have both overcome most of the hurdles we have met.�
To celebrate a year of Conflict Scripts Ben and Stuart have decided to get the website into a state they will both be happy with by the end of July so they can focus their energies back to their screenwriting.
Ben:
�Hopefully the site is now in a stable enough position that we can back off and just update it regularly, and therefore spend more time doing what we set out to � writing screenplays. That�s not to say I won�t be suggesting new, more adventurous coding scripts to Stuart!�
Whilst all this was going on Mark absorbed himself in his writing taking on his first solo effort.
Stuart:
�Mark pulled a �Stone Roses� on us. I didn�t know if he was alive, dead or playing Tiddlywinks with the horses in his garden. After finally getting in touch with him it became apparent that he felt he needed to step back and get his head down.
The outcome of this is that he has two screenplays near on completion; a solo effort titled �Little Red Book� and �Made of Stone�, which he has co-written with friend Simon Howlett. I was also glad to hear that he�d been putting some productive thought into a re-write for �Conflict�.�
With a collaborated effort from Stuart and Ben, due to begin next month, Conflict Scripts hope to at least double their number of current screenplays by the years end.
Copyright � William Roberts 2004
Copyright � Conflict Scripts 2003-2009. All Rights Reserved.