For many authors today, film and television make up just as much of their exposure to stories and plots as books do. In addition, the books read are often books written by other authors who are influenced by film and television, perpetuating the techniques mistakenly taken from audio-visual media.

While exposure to any medium that helps you to think about plot and characterisation is good, the problem that arises with over-exposure to film techniques is that writing a book requires completely different techniques of story-telling to film.

The saddest part is that the book format allows for tools that are far more powerful than those available to film makers. New authors are becoming less aware of the great effects that written techniques can produce, while believing that the film techniques they see are the only ones available to them.

Perceptive First or Third Person Point of View

Point of view is the most important of the tools that an author uses to draw a reader deeply into the experience of the book. By focusing closely on just a few perspectives – or, better yet, only the protagonist’s viewpoint – the writer creates an experience where the reader can give in to the illusion that she’s not simply reading, but actually involved in the story. She allows herself to feel what the protagonist feels, sees what she sees, and, importantly, not know what the protagonist doesn’t know until the same moment that she discovers it.

Switching point of view mid scene on your reader jars her out of this illusion and breaks the trust she has placed in your writing. So why would any writer ever do this? Why do even well-known authors fall into this trap?

A major reason for copying film technique is because, in the medium of film, the audience cannot experience the protagonist’s thoughts and feelings except through brief voice over (too much would be annoying). Following one character purely on sight and sound in a movie format will begin to feel claustrophobic (think Blair Witch Project).

So the medium of film lends itself far better to cutting omnisciently from character to character, and even showing events occurring that the main characters don’t know about. In film this builds tension, in a book it breaks tension and distances the reader.

In film, it is the actor’s job to make the audience feel empathy for the character. Books have no actors to hold the reader’s attention, to show through facial expressions and body language what the character is feeling – the empathy must come from sharing the point of view of the protagonist.

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For more help getting to grips with viewpoint in your novel, try Write Great Fiction : Characters, Emotion & Viewpoint (Techniques and exercises for crafting dynamic characters and effective viewpoints) by Nancy Kress

Or, if you feel your writing style lends itself more to writing screenplays than novels, this book will help you make that transition:
Save The Cat! The Last Book on Screenwriting You'll Ever Need by Blake Snyder