(Otherwise) Smart Characters Doing Stupid Stuff
With that as some background, I write to tell you, dear readers, that I have a new found sympathy for Hollywood script writers who find themselves in need of something to advance the plot. Under (no doubt) significant time pressure, they let one of their characters do stupid things so they can get their characters where they want them to be. I ran into this problem recently in writing The Long Squeeze. I found myself gazing across a yawning chasm in the plot, able to see where my characters should be, but no idea how to bridge where the plot was with where it had to go. After expending some time (a luxury script writers mostly don't have)simply thinking about it, running through several now disposed of drafts, and then thinking some more, the answer was solved very simply, and I didn't have to have my characters do something really stupid to get there. At least I think so. You will have to wait for the finished work and then let me know if you think I succeeded. Anyway, I think we are just a month or so from editing.
All the best. Paul
P.S. If you think of other films that use the "smart characters acting stupidly" device, please post it. Perhaps we can develop the definitive list of such films.