Functions of Dialogue:
- Convey messages of the story
- Explore character’s emotions
- Explore character’s personalities
- Creates mood
- Show relationship between characters
- Makes the film more interesting

Elements of Dialogue:
Dialogue reveals character.
• A character talks about himself or herself
• Other people talk about that character

Dialogue establishes relationships between characters.
• Characters express attitudes and opinions that are in opposition to one another.

Good effective dialogue will move the story forward.
• It conveys essential exposition.
o Exposition could be dangerous. (Too much information)
• Characters will talk about what happened, establishing the story line.

Dialogue ties the script together.
E.g. the usual suspects – e interrogation, which brings us back to the story.

Dialogue should be used sparingly, never telling the audience what they can see for itself.
• Dialogue is no substitute for action.

When the dialogue is bad,
• No point for that dialogue
• Language (singlish???) – not everyone speaks like this
• They are just talking (not showing)
• Sentence structure that creates ambiguous meaning
• People always express themselves exactly how they feels
• Is not realism
• Sometimes amp it up too much (too dramatic, builds up too much tension) that makes it seems not a little real.
• What if everyone talks exactly like real persons talking, it’s not interesting!!!

Write realistic Dialogue! Neither fake nor real!!