Film treatment: History and Key Facts

A film treatment (or simply treatment) is a piece of prose describing the story of a planned screenplay for a motion picture or television program, or a script for a radio play. It is typically written during the development stage, before the first draft of the screenplay. It is generally longer and more detailed than a logline or one-page synopsis, and it may include details of directorial style that an outline omits. A treatment may also be created in the process of adapting a novel, play, or other pre-existing work into a screenplay.

A treatment differs from a step outline, which lists the story scene by scene, and from a beat sheet, which breaks the story into its major dramatic turning points.

Source and attribution

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