Kill your Darlings – Love your Characters! Script constellations and the theme of love

Kill your Darlings – Love your Characters! Script constellations and the theme of love

Anja Siepmann, Julia Grünewald

Why should (women) fi lm-makers know about love – even if they are not telling a love story? Because love is a mainspring of human activity. It is appreciation that we all fight for, that others demand of us. Their refusal can annoy us but giving it isn’t all that easy either. When people resort to marital or neighbourhood or economic war, when they challenge rivals or win friends, when they are looking for themselves or fi ghting themselves … essentially it’s all about love. The struggle for love and recognition is revealed to be as full of variants in the case of interesting protagonists as is the case with their authors themselves. In this workshop, film-makers can examine what (love) potential might be residing in their material. Specific constellations will highlight which behaviour patterns are important for a system. They divulge who feels connected to whom and who feels rejected or excluded. Constellations also show which feelings and impulses the parties involved will re-act with. In other words, script constellations reveal the psychology of the characters and the basic themes of a story. Important information is thus provided as to whether characters are true to life, which emotional impressions they leave with the viewers, how they reinforce a conflict and/or might solve it and what is missing in order to drive the narrative forward. Any insights gained will be pooled and refl ected in a ›dramaturgical conversation‹ during the workshop. It can happen that, in the briefing prior to a constellations, diffi culties related to the fi lm-makers themselves will emerge: a blind spot, antipathy to a given character, writer’s block or conflicts of interest within the project team. If so wished, we can look for solutions to such issues.

Anja Siepmann

After completing her studies in film and television production at the Filmakademie Baden-Württemberg in 1997, Anja Siepmann worked for five years as an independent producer and was involved in this period in international cinema productions, including Dancer in the Dark. From 2002 to 2010, she was in charge of education and further education at the ifs internationale filmschule köln. After practising yoga and meditation for ten years and acquiring various qualifications (a healing permit for psychotherapy, MBSR teacher) and taking various courses – including some in the field of systemic constellation work – she has since 2010 been offering courses in attentiveness, personal and team coaching and psychotherapeutic guidance in her own practise.

Julia Grünewald

After ten years as Head of the Script Department of Cologne Film School, Julia Grünewald now heads the drama department of the script funding agency of the Federal Government Commissioner for Culture and Media (BKM), an offi ce which
advises professional writers on a dramaturgical basis and helps them to fi nd producers for their materials. At the same time, she also works as a dramaturge on individual cinema projects and for Cologne Filmhaus, among others.