The second most common struggle writers face is starting their scripts, and it's not that hard, once you have the proper tools in front of you. Before you can even begin writing, the pre-production part comes first. Once you have everything laid out, then you can use your tools during the writing process, also known as "production". After completing the first draft, then the editing process, or "post-production" can commence.
Ready
If you're unsure what your film is going to be about, it's always best to brainstorm a few loglines on a piece of paper. For more on that, check out my blog on loglines and how it should be formatted. Once you have at least a page full of loglines, then pick one that you're drawn to the most and make a few edits to it, and see if you can smooth it out.
After you have a polished logline, the next step is to create a beat sheet. Sometimes not every writer uses a beat sheet, and that's fine, but would you build a house without having a blueprint? i don't think you would, unless you're really skilled. As a writer myself, I find the writing process much easier when I have a beat sheet in front of me so when I'm stuck in my script, I can easily refer to my beat sheet and figure out what scenes need to happen that will lead to the next beat.
Set
Now that your logline and beat sheet are in front of you, the next thing you might need is an outline of your scenes from start to end. Of course, this is optional, but it never hurts to plan everything out before you can start your project.
When mapping the scenes out, make sure each scene answers the following questions: Whose scene is it? What do they want? What prevents them from achieving their goal? How do they feel?
Of course, you can go into as much detail as you want when you're going through each of the scenes, just as long as the questions are answered and shown in each of the scenes. Remember, each scene should contain conflict and move the plot forward. If there's a scene that doesn't contain conflict, remove it.
Write
Now that you have the tools in place, you can begin your first draft. Don't worry about trying to make every scene perfect, because you're more than likely going to go back and make edits in numerous drafts. Perhaps one thing to consider is having a writing goal or schedule for your first draft. For example, before I wrote my third feature, I gave myself a goal of having it complete within a month. So once the first of the month rolled around, I promised myself to write at least 5 pages a day to achieve my goal. Luckily, I was able to complete it in 21 days, and I dedicated the rest of the month to editing the script!
So, if you haven't started writing, I hope this has helped you out and I'm sending positive vibes to you! If you have any questions, don't hesitate to ask!