The Art and Craft of Screenwriting: Practice and Prospects of Screenwriting in Pakistani Film

Pakistani feature films are on decline for last three decades. In filmmaking, screenplay plays the pivotal part, without which the idea of making film is absurd indeed. The academic learning of art and craft of screenwriting has actually been taken for granted in Pakistan. This overlooking serves one of the reasons owing to which Pakistani Cinema could not get along with its contemporaries. This qualitative study throws light on the significance of screenplay in the whole process of filmmaking and nudges to the pedagogical needs of screenplay writing to be met in Pakistan. For the purpose, in-depth interviews of academician and practitioners of film and communication studies in Lahore have been conducted by the researcher.