PLOT:  The original idea worked into a compact number of scenes and individual situations, all of which in a series carry out the general idea.  Sometimes this “plot” is referred to as the “skeleton” of the photoplay.  “In its simplest, broadest aspect, plot is the scheme, plan, argument or action of the story."[3] Henry Albert Phillips calls it “the ‘working plan’ used by the building author."[4]

[Footnote 3:  J. Berg Esenwein, Writing the Short-Story.]

[Footnote 4:  The Plot of the Short-Story.  See also our later discussion of the nature of Plot.]

POSITIVES:  The copies printed from the negative.  These positives bear the same relation to the negative as “prints” do to a photographic plate.

PRINTS:  The “copies” or “positives.”  The profit to the manufacturer lies, of course, in selling as many prints as possible to the exchange managers of the world.

PRODUCER:  See Director.

REEL:  A full reel of film contains, approximately, one thousand feet.  Sometimes two pictures of five hundred feet each, or of different lengths, may constitute a full reel, and it is then termed a “split reel.”  If a photoplay is produced in two or more reels, it is put on the market as a “two-reel” or a “——­ -reel” subject and becomes a “multiple-reel” subject.  The term “feature” is usually applied to a picture of five parts and upward.  When referring to a multiple-reel play, photoplaywrights now favor the use of the word “part” instead of “reel” and say “two-part,” or “three-part” story or play.  Incidentally, it is well to use “picture” in place of “film” as much as convenient.  Earnest workers in the photoplay-writing profession are anxious to eliminate the old atmosphere of cheapness.

REGISTER:  To register an effect is to “show” it to the spectators in a way which cannot be mistaken.  It is sometimes said that an effect, a bit of “business,” or an emotion which an actor is endeavoring to portray, “will not register,” meaning that it will not be understood by the audience in the way intended by the director.  Very often a lighting effect does not “register” as it was thought it would.  Again, an actor may wish to “register” disgust or hatred, and yet he may convey the idea that he is portraying only fear.  The word covers various meanings.  In writing your story in action (in the scenario or continuity), if a character is hiding behind a curtain, watching an exhibition of cowardice in another character, instead of saying “Tom shows by his actions that he considers Jack an arrant coward,” thereby using twelve words, you may write, “Tom registers disgust at Jack’s cowardice,” which uses only six words; but do not use this technical term too frequently in this manner.

RELEASE:  Each producing company “releases” or places on the market a certain number of films every month.  Each of these films, therefore, is termed “a release.”  The “release date” is the day upon which copies of the film are given out to different exhibitors, to be shown to the public for the first time.