a screenplay
by olufemi
After creating a civilization of intelligent apes, Rex fights to keep two worlds from destroying each other.
olufemi
member since 03/04/2010 |
last login 05/20/2013
When it comes to reviewing/critiquing, I'm incredibly critical. Not trying to be malicious; it's just my nature. But I'm always honest, and always constructive. If your ego can bear the blow, and you can get through my comments without feeling personally offended,...
Bio
When it comes to reviewing/critiquing, I'm incredibly critical. Not trying to be malicious; it's just my nature. But I'm always honest, and always constructive.
If your ego can bear the blow, and you can get through my comments without feeling personally offended, you'll find solid advice to make your work better. I script critique a LOT, and I've been doing it for years now.
FYI, here's the personal rubric I use for grading Triggerstreet screenplays:
CONCEPT
5 - Easily explained, original, strong and simple enough to appeal to audiences/producers of all kinds.
4- Derivative or not-so-easily explained, but strong enough that when explained it has appeal to a large group of audiences/producers.
3- Unoriginal and/or not particularly easy to explain, nor strong enough to garner interest on its own, but could be made attractive through creative advertising/pitching.
2- Overly complicated and/or weak premise, but potential to appeal to a niche market.
1- Overly complicated/weak premise, with practically no potential market.
STORY
5- Events in script follow a logical progression, free of cliché and contrivance, with effective reversals and developments.
4- Events in script are generally logical, but may utilize a very few contrivances, or feature moments not really relevant to the narrative.
3- Events follow a generally logical progression, but may often utilize contrivances. story veers into irrelevant tangents occasionally. Script may be stagnant, lacking moments that demonstrably change the situation.
2- Events occur in script often without reason or basis. Contrivances are commonplace. Story veers into irrelevance with frequency.
1- Script is a collection of disjointed scenes, with no logical connection between them. Contrivances are commonplace. no scene feels relevant to narrative, because there is no clear narrative.
CHARACTER
5- Clear protagonist(s) who actively pursues a goal and has a well-rendered arc. Distinct supporting roles, all with clear desires of their own. All major characters memorable enough that I remember them days after reading.
4- Clear protagonist(s) who actively pursues a goal, and has an arc. A very few supporting roles may seem to lack true desires, only exist to support protagonist or more story forward.
3- Clear protagonist(s) who actively pursues a goal. Some supporting roles may seem useless or redundant, and lack true desires or purpose in screenplay.
2- Clear protagonist(s). May be numerous unnecessary supporting characters, with no desires other than supporting protagonist and/or moving story forward.
1- Unclear who protagonist is. Numerous unnecessary characters who exist solely to move story forward.
STRUCTURE
5- Central conflict is almost immediately apparent, and is reflected in most (if not all) scenes. Script properly follows 3-act structure with effective act breaks, or else effectively employs an alternate structure which successfully places story-relevant plot points at appropriate places in the narrative . Scenes effectively build in tension as story proceeds, compelling reader's interest.
4- Central conflict apparent, reflected in most scenes. Script generally follows 3-act structure or effectively uses alternative structure, though act breaks and turning points not completely effective/apparent. Scenes build in tension as story proceeds, though a very few scenes may be lacking or derail a reader’s interest.
3- Central conflict mostly apparent, reflected in most scenes. Script may or may not follow 3-act structure; breaks are unclear or not apparent, but narrative is at least easily followed. Some scenes may derail narrative or disrupt tension. May utilize advanced story-telling techniques (e.g. flashbacks) improperly, temporarily obscuring read.
2- Central conflict may not be apparent. Script does not follow 3-act structure, and any attempt to employ another structure is largely ineffective. Script frequently disrupts narrative with awkward scene placement or abundant flashbacks. Conflict/tension rarely apparent in any scenes.
1- Screenplay largely devoid of conflict. Each scene jumps to another with nothing accomplished and no apparent direction.
DIALOGUE
5- Dialogue is distinctive for every character, revealing personality. Beyond flowing naturally, it is evocative of mood and appropriate to the screenplay's genre/setting: it's funny, or scary, or dramatic. Dialogue avoids overt exposition.
4- Dialogue flows naturally, and is appropriate to the genre/setting. Every voice may not be distinct. Dialogue generally avoids exposition, save for very few occasions.
3- Dialogue generally natural, though there are some 'hiccups'. Appropriate to setting. Overt exposition occurs infrequently.
2- Dialogue oftentimes awkward, with strange non-sequitors. Overt exposition occurs frequently. Dialogue may be inappropriate for genre/setting.
1- I seriously can't understand wtf anyone is saying. You'd basically have to be a native klingon-speaker in beginner's English to earn this from me.
OVERALL
This one is entirely subjective on my part. Basically just my overall impression of the script. I employ the grading of 'I loved it', 'I liked it', 'It was okay', 'I disliked it', 'I hated it'.
Submissions by olufemi
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a screenplay by olufemiA race car driver granted superpowers by a mysterious device must defeat Nazis to save the 1936 Olympics.
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a screenplay by olufemiA race car driver granted superpowers by a mysterious device must defeat Nazis to save the 1936 Olympics.
Reviews by olufemi 65
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A review of The Uglyby olufemi on 05/06/2013As a piece of written work, THE UGLY is a fascinating and engrossing story, featuring protagonists who are rarely portrayed in media, which makes them all the more interesting. If audiences were able to experience the lurid prose and captivating subtlety of the script, they would likely be completely enthralled. Unfortunately, the fact is that audiences do not read screenplays;... As a piece of written work, THE UGLY is a fascinating and engrossing story, featuring protagonists who are rarely portrayed in media, which makes them all the more interesting. If audiences were able to experience the lurid prose and captivating subtlety of the script, they would likely be completely enthralled.
Unfortunately, the fact is that audiences do not read screenplays; they watch movies. While they can be potentially captivated by visuals or mood or style, these aspects of film are provided by the director, the cinematographer, they production designer, etc., who do not want to be told by other aspects of production how to do their jobs.
Simply put, it is the job of the WRITER to provide a good STORY. A *good* story, not a “well-written” one.
Speaking as someone who reads a lot of scripts, Philip, I can tell you that there’s a different mindset in reading them than there is in reading standard fiction. There’s a sort of filter that comes on, cutting through the way in which a script is written (so long as the writing is unobtrusive), and instead honing on the building block of storytelling: CONFICT. Which is why it’s befuddling to me that you would intentionally downplay conflict in order to provide a “purely visual and poignant experience”. You don’t define the visuals, so how could you provide a visual experience?
It is obvious that you are a talented writer, who would no doubt create a hell of a novel. But as luridly written as “The Ugly” is, it is sorely lacking in what a screenplay needs to be. For that reason, it falls flat.
*The only possible caveat to the above, and really, to the rest of this review, is if you plan to direct the movie created from this script. If that’s the case, you should really mention it.
MECHANICS
Format is nearly without blemish. You’re missing a “FADE IN:” at the beginning of your script, and you should remove the scene numbers, but otherwise it’s fine.
As I’ve touched upon, the script is the work of a very literate writer, but this actually works against it. The narration:
-is overwritten and unnecessarily grandiloquent (page 2: “Jimmy willfully prises the food from Frank’s grasp”),
-breaks up action where there’s no need (page 45: “Frank presses into the curve of a dune to escape the wind./He pulls his jacket tight.”)
-describes visuals with unnecessary specificity which are irrelevant to the story (page 4: “rain lashes against Frank’s face, mats his hair and beard.” We already know it’s raining.)
-describes things that aren’t visual, and thus cannot be represented onscreen (page 5: “In a shock, a vicious wave of energy rises through her. It courses up through her legs and trembles at her chest.”)
All of this only disguises the fact that there simply isn’t much “meat” to the script. If one were to go through it removing every unnecessary description and detail, I suspect it would easily lose 15 pages.
It’s fine to have a specific voice or style, but your flowery prose is indulgent, and is tiring to a reader; I found my mind wandering frequently while trying to get through what should have been an easy read (again, because it was too difficult to find the CONFLICT).
Changing the subject, you may want to provide a SUPER early on to tell the audience the location and time period of your story. You say that it’s in Neely, but neglect to mention where this city is.
For what it’s worth, the formatting seems a *bit* out of whack on page 11: the top “Cybil” isn’t aligned properly. Also, it isn’t necessary any longer to use (CONT’D); it appears infrequently throughout the script.
Your “slow fade”s are formatted improperly.
CONCEPT
I really wish people would write actual loglines for Trigger Street scripts, rather than taglines. I’d like to have an idea what I’m about to read…
Here’s the thing: I get what you’re going for with this script (at least, I believe I do). You imagine a movie that is subdued in plot and evocative in mood, similar perhaps to Lars Von Trier’s “Melancholia” or Sofia Coppola’s “Lost in Translation”. That’s fine.
The problem is that movies like this are passion projects for directors, with scripts that are written by those directors, because they have a very specific vision for the movie. That director is not going to find a script that has a specific visual and then try to recreate it; that’s creatively stifling.
A script is going to succeed based on the strength of its concept and conflict, which you’ve intentionally subdued here. So I’m sorry to say it, but I think you’ve shot yourself in the foot. Frankly, I’d love to read this as a short story, or possibly even a novel, where we can get some true insight into the minds of your unique characters.
As far as the story concept itself, I can’t imagine audiences clamoring to see a film just based on knowing it’s about a mentally-challenged guy and a green-skinned woman wandering around being unwanted.
STORY
I’m probably going to harp on it a lot in this review, and I hope you’ll forgive me for it, but I simply cannot get over how you intentionally toned down the drama. You literally weakened the story on purpose, and it shows: every potential for interesting conflict (and there’s a *lot* of it) is minimized and wasted, and I just don’t get it.
There’s nothing at stake in the script. It has no momentum to it, no thrust, no immediacy, no trajectory. At no point does it feel like we’re heading towards an inevitable climax; instead we just sort of amble along, and on occasion, some random thing happens. Because of this, the story feels like a collection of disjoint scenes, rather than one uniform story.
Well-drawn characters simply aren’t enough. They need to *do* something, *struggle* with something. It’s clear that you intend for Frank to struggle *internally*, but herein lies another problem: because of his mental handicap, he lacks the mental capacity to fully appreciate and express those struggles. Because we can’t see inside his head, we can’t understand those issues.
Where the story does seem to gain some direction is around the midpoint, with the development of a (romantic?) relationship between Agnes and George. There is true conflict on display here, and it’s the most fascinating part of the script:
Here we have Frank, a character who is shunned and alone because of his mental impediment. People treat him like he is somehow less than a human being, and because he’s lost his dog, he has no companionship. When he finds Agnes, he gains companionship, but HE TREATS HER LIKE A PET, inadvertently being guilty of the same sin as all the people who shunned him.
Then what happens when the companion he treats like a pet begins to get smarter? Becomes even smarter than he is? Worse, she finds someone else she’d rather spend time with, someone who treats her as an equal, rather than trying to dominate her? Will Frank forsake their relationship and be alone forever? Will he go to further lengths to exert his will over her? Or will he finally learn to see himself and her as equals, and members of the same human race?
This is brilliant stuff, and it’s all stuff that is inherently in the screenplay! But you clutter your script with so much irrelevance that it’s lost:
Who is Celia, why does she attach to Agnes so quickly, and why should I care?
What does Frank murdering her contribute to the narrative?
What do colonists encroaching on George’s land have to do with anything (seriously, I was completely lost around this point; it felt so completely random)?
Why does Frank carry a stick around and think it’s a dog*?
Why is Agnes’s skin green?
Why does Agnes apparently have some sort of supernatural control over plants, which allows her to make roots and vines move?
Why does a random colonist woman throw herself at big, lumbering, retarded Frank?
Why does Frank’s voice change into that of a ten year old (SERIOUSLY, WHAT?!)?
The relationship between Frank and Agnes should be the story. It is the most interesting aspect of the screenplay, and bares the most potential for compelling conflict. I get that this story is part of something larger, but I don’t particularly care: you’ve presented the script to be evaluated, and the script’s story is what I care about. You have the skill and the script has the potential, so use it.
*Regarding this, it’s actually wonderful that Frank is so lonely that he treats an inanimate piece of wood like it’s his friend. But it would add so much more STAKES if Frank was completely alone, and both he and we were aware of it. If the script perhaps began with a scene of Frank burying his one and only friend, crying. Or, we could even see cruel townspeople causing the death of the dog somehow. If he’s completely alone, the moment where he finds Agnes feels like a crucial moment: the protagonist attaining what he wants (at least, what he *thinks* he wants), rather than it feeling as causal an event as the current draft makes it.
CHARACTER
The characters of the screenplay are vividly-drawn, distinct, and unique. This is the best aspect of the screenplay. You do wonderful work creating them; they all feel real.
You could stand to strengthen some of their motivations (do NOT downplay it!). Celia being possessive over Agnes is meaningless and confusing without context. If we see in her house that she has an empty room with an unused crib in it, suddenly that character makes sense.
Frank frees Agnes on page 6 (presumably to have a companion), but then on page 22 he turns her away. Why does he do this? What does he want?
I question the efficacy of Frank as a protagonist. Mentally-challenged characters in film seem to invariably have some accompanying lucid character (Lenny for George; Tom Cruise’s Charlie to Rain Man; Lieutenant Dan/Jenny/Mrs. Gump for Forrest Gump). Such a character is able to express to the audience what the “retarded” character cannot.
Your story is so dependent on Frank’s isolation and alienation though, that such a character wouldn’t really work, so this is a bit of a Catch-22, which I’m honestly not certain how to resolve.
Because of the lack of this lucid character, Frank tends to be a bit inconsistent: when he’s displaying the qualities of a strong protagonist, he doesn’t really seem disabled. When he seems realistically disabled, he doesn’t feel like a very good protagonist.
When stuff just “happens”, it feels like your characters are victims to fate, rather than instigators of change, which weakens them. Agnes gains enough prominence later in the script to be considered another protagonist, but she and Frank just don’t seem to be changing their world enough.
I think better displaying how desperately Frank wants to care for someone and be cared for will go a long way toward improving your script. It gives him a more concrete goal, strengthens him as a character, provides and overarching conflict to the story, and gives the script the sense of direction that it currently lacks.
STRUCTURE
Argh.
Story structure is predicated on CONFLICT.
You intentionally LESSENED THE CONFLICT.
This means that your story structure has similarly been lessened, so it’s weak.
Stuff that one would assume is major and game-changing plays out as if it doesn’t matter (Frank killing someone; Frank and Agnes passing her parents on the road), so that rather than the story experiencing highs and lows, everything feels like the same frustratingly unimportant flatline.
The numerous time jumps in the script are problematic. It’s unclear how much time is passing, for one, but more importantly, they lessen the importance of every scene, particularly when nothing particularly important seems to have been accomplished in them. If Frank kills a woman, then we jump forward several months to see how prison life has affected him, that’s a good transition. If Frank is living at a water station, then months pass and he’s living at a water station, it’s not.
Time skips should occur when major changes have happened in the story, and only sparingly. Giving the story a clearer sense of direction will also keep these from disrupting your narrative as much.
You state that the overall theme of the story is about the use and abuse of power. While I get this from the back end of the story, with the colonists and George, that theme isn’t really set up with the story’s beginning, which seems to be more about “belonging”.
Some of your scene transitions are a bit confusing. On page 25, Agnes is following Frank. Then we go to INT. CYBIL MORGANS HOUSE, and Agnes is inside, while Frank is out. Generally it should be easy to glean what has happened in the interstitial time between scenes, but I can’t figure out what happened here.
With the idea of increasing the stakes and giving the script a bigger sense of momentum, might you consider an early scene where Frank contemplates suicide? Nothing elaborate, of course; something as simple as him walking closer and closer to a ledge with a giant fall while peering over its edge would be enough. A near-suicide scene would show how dire the situation is for him, and how desperately he needs someone to whom he can relate. It would draw the audience into the story much more quickly, and strengthen their desire to see him resolve his problem (i.e. they’ll want to hang around to see the climax).
DIALOGUE
You do a good job of giving characters distinctive voices. Particularly impressive is how you display Agnes’s slowly increasing cogency.
Frank’s manner of speaking gets to be irritating, particularly when I had to reread sentences to figure out what he’s saying. This wouldn’t be a problem if the script were a novel, but it’s not: it’s a screenplay, meaning the specific manner in which Frank speaks will be determined by the actor playing him, NOT by the script. I would suggest going back and removing most of the apostrophes (’ad, jus’, y’, etc.) from the script, as they’re excessive and unnecessary, as well as the intentional word misspellings (bin, fer, etc.).
I suspect that this imitation of accent is why your script has only been rated a 3 in dialogue, but this isn’t fair. Your dialogue is distinctive, conveys character, and avoids exposition. It’s missing that spark of life and wit that you see in the best professional screenplays, but it’s still very strong work, and I’m giving it a 4.
While the townspeople all seem to have some sort of regional accent, it’s not clear *what* that region is. As I mentioned before, perhaps you should specifically state where and when “Neely” is.
OVERALL
Have you given thought to writing short stories and/or novels? I hope you don’t take it as an insult, but you seem to have the temperament for it. This script is well-written and literary, and if those were the qualities that made scripts worthy of production, THE UGLY would be well on its way to perfection.
They’re not, however. Good scripts do very little to draw attention to themselves, instead transporting the reader directly into your STORY. Flowery writing cannot compensate for weak plotting.
If you do give traditional narrative writing a try, I look forward to reading some of your work, as I think you’re suited for it, and will be able to create some really moving work. If you instead you decide to continue developing this story as a script, I hope that I’ve given you some things to chew on, and some good advice towards improving it.
Best luck to you. read -
A review of Love Hack's Revengeby olufemi on 04/22/2013There’s a lot of imagination on display in “Love Hacks”. Now I’m going to be honest with you: translated from rewiew-ese, “a lot of imagination” generally means “there’s too much going on and it's confusing”. Such is the case in this script. As a reviewer, I want to help you tell the story that you want to tell, but the truth is that poor mechanics and an overabundance of... There’s a lot of imagination on display in “Love Hacks”.
Now I’m going to be honest with you: translated from rewiew-ese, “a lot of imagination” generally means “there’s too much going on and it's confusing”. Such is the case in this script. As a reviewer, I want to help you tell the story that you want to tell, but the truth is that poor mechanics and an overabundance of characters and subplots make it impossible for me to even tell *what* story you’re trying to tell.
You appear to be a prolific writer, which is a major positive. But if you don’t slow down for a moment and correct some of your own screenwriting flaws (which I know are prevalent in your writing, because I’ve read reviews of your other work), you’ll never grow as a writer.
MECHANICS
Nothing make it more difficult to get into a story than poor spelling, grammar, punctuation, and formatting.
Your script mechanics are unacceptably poor, and I’m not going to bother pointing out the multitudinous errors throughout the script. It’s apparent you created this script in Word (or a similar word processing program), which has an automatic contextual spell-check, so there’s no excuse.
Download Celtix. It’s free, and it will correct several of the issues with this script’s format.
A few notes:
-Unless your characters are actually saying “Gee dash Dee”, do not sensor yourself in your writing (“Oh My G-D”). I understand that perhaps you have some moral convictions that prevent you from using the Lord’s name in vain, but this looks stupid. Write it out, or find another expression to use.
-Don’t provide specific details unless they are absolutely necessary. This goes for the color of a character’s hair (p. 70), the color of a character’s outfit (p. 83), or the precise number of registers there are in a store (p. 7).
-Transitions (“CUT TO:”) are almost always unnecessary in a spec script. They should be removed from yours.
-Avoid writing action in gerund form (“the man is [blank]ing”); use the more active present tense (“the man [blank]s”).
-Upon a character’s introduction, provide the character’s relative age, a brief description of their physicality (again, WITHOUT specifics, unless they are relevant to the story), and some hint of the character’s personality.
-I don’t believe it’s legal to put a real credit card number on screen as you have on page 27. That’s even if the number is expired.
CONCEPT
You wear your inspirations on your sleeve: your dialogue heavy scenes feel like something out of a Kevin Smith slacker comedy, while the heist elements of the script feel straight out of a Guy Ritchie flick.
The problem is that these two styles directly conflict with each other. The laid-back, everyday feel of the characters is at odds with the crime/adventure tone you seek to bring across; it’s like shoving Dante and Randal into “Ocean’s Eleven”.
A crime/heist film with slacker characters is a fun idea for a comedy (something akin to “Tower Heist”, perhaps), but as an action/adventure story (as you have listed as this script’s genre), it falls flat. Getting this concept to work will require either reworking the script to function as a comedy, or else replacing the wage-slave characters with characters more appropriate to (and believable for) the genre.
Your title and logline also both need a lot of work. The title sounds like it’s for a romantic comedy, and the logline is completely nondescript. One has no idea what to expect from the script having read them.
STORY
You do a good job making sure there are set-ups to your story’s ending. The numerous disparate characters and subplots come together to create the ending you want. The final stinger with Frankie knowing that Keegan is about to get everyone in trouble over a girl again is a really nice way to wrap things up.
The problem with your set-ups, though, is that they themselves aren’t well set-up; you can’t introduce a major plot element like a hacker competition, then have it disappear from the story entirely, only coming back when a character from that subplot randomly decides to show up again. Particularly when competitive hacking is such a weird, unrealistic element, and everyone in the story treats it as though it’s commonplace.
This happens frequently in your script; there are so many subplots and side characters that it’s impossible to tell what the *actual* plot is, and the reader gets lost (again I’ll point out that the poor spelling and format only compound this problem).
One thing missing from your story is STAKES; stakes are what Guy Ritchie movies easy to follow, even though there are so many characters and situations of which to keep track. Early in his films, we meet a character who NEEDS something, and if he doesn’t get that thing, he’s in serious trouble.
What does Keegan need? Apparently he “needs” to be with Sophie. This isn’t a very strong motivation for a 90-minute action movie. What happens if he doesn’t get Sophie? Does he die? Will he go to jail? No. Nothing happens.
I’d comment more on story, but I’m afraid I was just completely lost for the majority of the script. I can only advise you to streamline your story; find ONE central story, and build that up, rather than cluttering your script with subplots.
CHARACTER
Keegan is a fun character; he’s kind of an @$$hole, frequently sarcastic to the point of being acerbic, and he’s a little bit pathetic in his pursuit of Sophie. It’s also nice that you allow him to arc, finally realizing that pursuing Sophie simply isn’t worth it.
Keegan seems to be a bit inconsistent, though, as if at times you were trying to make him more likeable. On page 36, for instance, after losing his hacker competition he flips off the audience… then he tries to shake hands with his opponent? On the next page, he’s brash and overconfident, but then suddenly he’s nervous?
He’s also a little too perfect sometimes; Keegan seems to have a helluva lot of skills for a guy who works at a Verizon store. Why on earth does he know gemology, like on page 84? Why is he so comfortable around firearms?
Figure out who your main character is as a person, then stick with it. Also, it’s not necessary to make characters (not even main characters) “likeable”; they only need to be *compelling*. This is accomplished by giving them well-defined goals, and making them overcome what opposition stands between them and those goals.
There are far, FAR too many characters in this script, and it’s impossible to keep track of them all without keeping notes. It’s bad enough that even you, the writer, confuse a couple of them by story’s end (you start calling Albert Moss “Donald” Moss; you change Quincy Lawrence’s name to Quincy Sparks; you have a character named “Lenny” appear out of nowhere on page 64, then disappear just as quickly!). If you can’t keep up with the characters, how could you possible expect a reader to? Worse, the characters rarely do enough to distinguish themselves from others in terms of personality.
It isn’t necessary to name every character who appears in your script; if a character only shows up on one page, it’s fine to call that character BITCHY WAITRESS or EFFEMINATE DOORMAN. Every time you give a character a proper name, it says to the reader that the character is an important one. When EVERY character has a proper name, the reader can’t be sure who to pay attention to.
Your female characters all seem to be little more than objects of desire for the male characters. You introduce them, comment on how attractive they are (note: actors are attractive. Saying that the character played by an actor is attractive is pretty moot), and then they don’t really do much of anything.
No person, male or female, sees him/herself as a supporting character in someone else’s story. Give your characters (ALL of them) desires, and let everything they do reflect those desires.
STRUCTURE
Structure is difficult to decipher without the context of the overall story. As I trust I’ve made clear, it’s difficult to tell what the main thrust of the story is, with so many subplots.
Ideally, a well-structured screenplay should increase in tension as the story progresses. The opposition to the protagonist attaining his goals grows more and more powerful, and the protagonist is forced to fight harder and more desperately, or else lose his goal forever.
“Fight” doesn’t necessarily refer to a physical confrontation, though in an action screenplay, it probably should. There aren’t enough moments where Keegan’s life is in danger, or where the stakes are high. There are some times when there’s the hint of a threat (from Craig Vargas, for instance), but Keegan sidesteps any possible threat with such ease that it becomes rote and boring.
Learn to test your protagonist, even punish him. It will excite your audience, and endear them to the character.
Well-structured screenplays have a “trajectory”; every scene after the first begins with the audience and characters knowing what needs to be accomplished. Something occurs in the scene to disrupt accomplishing that goal, which sends the story in a new direction, leading to a new scene with a new objective. The audience has an idea of what needs to happen next, they just don’t know how it’s going to happen.
DIALOGUE
Dialogue is probably your strongest skill as a writer. The script is filled with several clever turns of phrase and exchanges, and it helps to bring your characters (particularly Keegan) to life.
This doesn’t mean that the screenplay should be filled with dialogue, though; certainly not when you’re trying to write an action/adventure. Dialogue taking up an entire page is something that should happen only infrequently even in a drama; in an action/adventure script, such pages should be practically non-existent. Like several other reviewers have already told you on other scripts, your script has way too much dialogue.
Dialogue for dialogue’s sake isn’t worthy of being in a screenplay. It must move the story forward, give insight to character personalities, and disguise exposition, making it sound natural.
Young Keegan’s dialogue on page 2 doesn’t sound like that of a precocious child; it sounds like it’s coming from an adult. Child actors sound *really* awkward reading adult dialogue; you should fix this.
The commentating on page 37 is esoteric and boring. The scene itself is already flat (you really expect the audience to get excited about watching two people type on keyboards?), and not being able to understand what the commentator is talking about doesn’t help.
On page 47: if you have your characters sitting around discussing the plan, it’s almost always not necessary (unless the plan eventually goes so horribly awry that we need to know what the plan was *supposed* to be). I’d remove this and cut straight to the plan being enacted.
OVERALL
Proper mechanics are SO important to your script. I freely acknowledge that there are story details that I may have missed, simply because I couldn’t decipher them for your typos and formatting errors. Fixing them will go a long way in making your script at least intelligible, because at the moment it’s a mess.
I wish you the best in your screenwriting. read -
A review of Party Hackers (Final-ish)by olufemi on 04/09/2013Amateur writers frequently overlook the importance of story concept, believing that all that is necessary to get one’s foot in the door is to have a good story well-told. This is a mistake. The honest truth is that enticing someone with a pithy logline and a clever concept are what will get your script read. It’s great, then, that Party Hackers has such a catchy and clever... Amateur writers frequently overlook the importance of story concept, believing that all that is necessary to get one’s foot in the door is to have a good story well-told. This is a mistake. The honest truth is that enticing someone with a pithy logline and a clever concept are what will get your script read.
It’s great, then, that Party Hackers has such a catchy and clever premise. Frankly, if the writer had the right connections, this script would probably be in a position for sale and production already; the movie wouldn’t be as good as it *could* be, but it would be made.
Lacking those connections, though, it’s necessary for the script to properly capitalize on the potential created by the premise. Hopefully this and other reviews can help the writer do that. I know you believe this script to be a “final-ish” draft, but I’m afraid it still needs work.
MECHANICS
Mechanically, there’s not much wrong with this script; misspellings and typos are few, format is on point.
There are a few times where the narrative describes moments that seem impossible, logistically: on 2, Will sits at his desk, with a computer behind him showing a screensaver. Then he suddenly opens an email. Is this on a different computer? Or did the screensaver disappear, *then* he opened his email? It’s unclear. On page 46, Sally somehow sees Brandon walk up behind her. These are major problems, but they’re present.
Your character introductions could do more to establish the personalities of your characters. It’s not necessary to give an in-depth analysis of who they are, but “good looks, pale” doesn’t give a reader a lot to work with (particularly the term “good looks”; most actors are attractive, so this is almost unnecessary).
It’s unclear if the conversation on page 27 is meant to be intercut. If “Gruff Male” is only a voice over the phone, use (V.O.). Otherwise, you need to mention that the conversation is cutting between two locations.
Typos:
-p. 1: Begin script with “FADE IN:”
-p. 1: “Oversized” is one word.
-p. 6: The audience can’t know that the character introduced here is Andrew’s DAD, unless he refers to him as such.
-p. 17: “go out on a lim[b]”, not “limp”.
-p. 47: “[He] stomps and stretches”
-p. 85: “a relationships”
CONCEPT
The best thing about the screenplay is the fantastic idea behind it. It’s more than a little derivative of WEDDING CRASHERS, but this similarity is a positive: “It’s like Wedding Crashers” is a selling point for both producers and potential audiences.
But, as I try to emphasize for people, “idea” is not the same thing as “concept”. Story issues make it unclear what the exact concept is. There’s a lot going on in the script, and it frequently seems difficult to find its “spine”: the primary CONFLICT that is witnessed through the story in its entirety. This stems from issues with both the STORY and the STRUCTURE which I’ll touch on later.
The logline (both the short and long versions) could use some work; the short one doesn’t mention the best part of the concept, and the long one is awkwardly phrased and overlong. This reflects the story issues. With both, try to streamline. Maybe something like: “An awkward programmer hacks his way into ritzy parties to up his social status and woo the girl of his dreams.” (21 words, 110 characters)
I don’t know what “the Gordon Gecko of man whores” means, and I don’t believe it’s as funny as you think it is.
STORY
For my money, many of the funniest situations in movies stem from a guy who is very clearly *not* cool trying his hardest to be exactly that. It’s hilarious to watch, but it simultaneously endears you to the character.
PARTY HACKERS’s premise allows for scenes just like this, which is great. The best moments in the story are where we get to see the façade crack, the characters forced to either dig in deeper to protect their lies, or else finally expose themselves (emotionally, that is) and come clean. The scene on page 45 with Will and Natalie is such a scene, and it’s PERFECT. What make scenes like this work are the forces of CONFLICT at play; the characters’ desires are directly at war with others’ perception of them, as well as their own self-doubts.
It’s odd, then, that with the built-in potential for conflict and humor in this script, a lot of it seems to be wasted. We barely get to see the two failing at trying to act “cool”; instead, they seem to have no problem at all adapting to this new environment. Andrew successfully has sex with a woman by page 11! Then again on page 16! I know in the latter case it turns out to be a stripper, but this still feels like your characters achieving the exterior goals far too prematurely. For as much as you set up the pair as having almost crippling social debilitations, they really flourish in the party setting.
I would question the need to have both Andrew and Will fired from their jobs simultaneously. For one thing, having one (or both) of them still working at Inviteweb increases the stakes and potential for conflict; it’s even more likely they’ll be caught, which makes things more interesting. Secondly, it strains credulity that the two are fired the exact same day for unrelated reasons. Lastly (and this is something I’ll touch on under CHARACTER), it’s often times pretty difficult to tell your two main characters apart. One of them still working at Inviteweb may help remedy that.
Much of the script feels unfocused because for much of it, Andrew and Will’s desires are so nebulous. There’s nothing driving them forward, and there are no stakes preventing them from moving backward. Why do Andrew and Will need to hack parties *now*? What happens if they don’t? Perhaps Andrew’s Dad is a sad and lonely widower, so in the scene between him and Andrew, we can see Andrew’s very real fear of dying alone?
Without strongly established goals and stakes, the story becomes formless around the time the numerous characters and subplots are introduced. Sally’s bad history with Natalie, Natalie’s dealings with her ex-boyfriend, Brandon Lomar’s deception… it all vies for center stage, and no one subplot seems strong enough to hold the story together.
I know “getting laid” or “finding love” don’t feel like particularly lofty stakes, but they can be made so through effective writing. The main characters in AMERICAN PIE make a pact to have sex before they graduate, and this is strong enough a goal to hold the film together, despite its seeming shallowness. The characters believe that their emotional well-being is tied into this event, and on top of that, there’s a deadline, which makes it all the more urgent.
Party Hackers lacks this. Something primal and urgent must drive the characters.
These problems stem from the fact that it’s a bit unclear what story you’re trying to tell, and it feels like you’ve maybe gotten (and followed) conflicting advice from people who assumed it was about one thing or the other.
What is the story really *about*? Is it about two programmers who become “party hackers”? Or is it about two “party hackers” who fall in love?
If it’s the former case, then we need more time to get to know these characters beforehand, and we need a stronger reason for them to start doing it (I would guess that at some point, someone told you that you should get to the “party hacking” as quickly as possible… if you want to tell a story about their difficulties party hacking, then this advice is wrong). The reason could possibly even be to *meet* Natalie, with whom Will can already be infatuated.
There should be more scenes showing how difficult a time they have with it.
If the latter is the case, the main characters should probably be “party hacking” before the script even starts. There’s no need for the first 9 or 10 pages of the script.
Other STORY notes:
-p. 1, I don’t understand the “Haven’t seen you on here in ages”. What’s the point of it? Is this a joke? If so, not very funny…
-p. 14, “YOUR FACE MELTED ON ME!” is laugh-out-loud funny. This joke needs better set-up, though, which is a persistent problem. Hopefully I’ll get to this in STRUCTURE.
-p. 29, Look, I’m not a feminist, but women solving issues by showing their boobs (as on page 29) is hackneyed and sitcom-ish, and it weakens Natalie as a character. I’ve seen this numerous times in amateur screenplays, for some reason.
-p. 51, The sudden revelations of the $100,000 savings account seems contrived. If you’re going to have a reveal like this, it needs to be set up earlier. Again, there’s a pretty big lack of set-up/pay-off in the script.
-p. 79, Don’t understand why Andrew drinks the beer
-p. 80, Why does Brandon’s stand-in look at Will’s penis?!
CHARACTER
It’s easy to picture Ben Stiller and Vince Vaughan (or similar actors) playing the roles of your two likeable lead characters. They’re lovable losers in over their heads, which makes them easy to root for.
As mentioned, the two often seem too similar, and it’s difficult to know which is which. The more different they are, the more easily two actors will be able to play the characters off of each other, and the more fun the interactions will be. Perhaps Will is a loud-mouth and a braggart, overcompensating for his lack of endowment. Perhaps Andrew is more nervous and jittery (and their DIALOGUE reflects this). At the moment, it’s a bit difficult to gauge what their unique personalities are… not just what they do, but what they’re like.
Andrew seems to vacillate between being nervous and being confident at times. It’s fine if this is a gradual arc that he experiences, but moments such as on page 57 where he stands up to a stranger make it feel like he’s arced prematurely.
Really beat up on your leads. Every success they have early in the script makes them a little more difficult to root for; like I mentioned, you establish your characters as loveable losers who are unlucky in love, but then Andrew gets laid barely 10 minutes into the movie.
Natalie is a fun character, who gets to show some depth beyond her air-head introduction. It’s a little hard to believe that this girl who didn’t know that the Titanic was a real ship gets a Game of Death reference, but otherwise, she’s a well-realized character.
Sally feels more like a goal than an actual person in the script. Any actress playing the role in a romantic comedy is going to want the opportunity to be funny. So what’s Sally’s source of funny?
STRUCTURE
I would guess that previous versions of this script were longer, and that with this submission you concentrated and bringing down the page count. While that’s commendable, it feels like you may have thrown out the baby with the bathwater a little bit.
There are, unfortunately, some structural issues with this script, which is probably surprising to hear, because it’s apparent that you’ve paid some attention to placeing your plot points where they should be. But proper structure does more than just this; besides the structure of the overall script, *every scene* has a structure.
A scene should begin with the characters (and the audience) having certain expectations of what is going to happen, based on what has transpired before the scene. Then in the scene, something counter to those expectations occurs, causing a new situation that the characters must deal with. This is called “turning” a scene. Scenes turn on conflict. In a comedy, you want them to turn comedically. Forgive me if I’m being pedantic here…
Your scenes rarely last longer than they need to, which is nice, but they rarely turn. Because of this, they feel like you’re only presenting information (a.k.a. exposition), rather than moving the story forward.
As an example:
On page 6, Andrew is suddenly at his Dad’s home. Andrew says “my plan is to post my resume on job sites.” Then Andrew tries to throw a ball and is bad at it, and the scene ends.
What was the point of this scene? It seems to be to tell the audience that Andrew is bad at throwing balls (exposition), then to tell us something that we could have figured out from the following scene (generally, any scene that only says “I’m going to do this” is unnecessary… just show the character doing it!).
How would it impact the rest of the story if you didn’t have this scene? It wouldn’t. Rather than him going home and talking to his father, the script could simply have cut from Andrew being fired to Andrew looking for work. The scene is useless because it doesn’t turn, and any editor worth his salt would remove it.
Imagine instead that Andrew entered this scene with the intention of moving in with his father (EXPECTATION). He’s playing catch with Dad, and he says “I’m not sure what I’ll do now. Or, you know, where I’m going to stay. Wow, this house sure is big for only one person to live in it, huh? Yup, sure is big…” Dad says “I’ll make you a bet: throw the ball to me from that tree, and you can stay here as long as you like” (CONFLICT). Andrew throws just as crappily as you’ve described in the current script. The two stare at each other a beat, then Andrew says “Yeah, so I think I’ll go post my resume on some job sites.” Dad: “Yeah, maybe you should do that.” (TURN)
Now the scene has *turned*. Andrew entered it expecting to be able to stay with his father, and left it knowing he couldn’t, but with a new plan for fixing his problem. He and the story have a new direction, which is what keeps the reader/audience interested. Plus, you’ve still conveyed the information you wanted to, and it’s (in my opinion) funnier!
On page 9, Andrew and Will walk up to the party, expecting to get in. They meet with the doorman, he runs their IDs… and they get in. Meaning you could have cut straight to inside the party. With ALL scenes: either dramatize by adding conflict, or remove.
Similarly to the problems turning scenes, you don’t always properly set scenes up, making it feel somewhat random when they occur. On page 13, Will* walks up with a weird orange spray-on tan (*by the way, is this supposed to be Andrew? You describe Andrew as “pale”, not Will… it’s kind of a problem if even you are mixing up your characters! I’m going to assume this is meant to be Andrew).
Yeah, it’s kind of funny, but it would have been so much funnier if it had been properly set up! Ever seen “There Something About Mary?” In one scene, Mary meets a friend who has put two giant tongue depressors in his mouth, like buck teeth. Mary jokes that she just loves a man with big giant teeth. She doesn’t realize that Healy, who is trying to impress her, is listening in to the conversation, and he doesn’t know that she’s joking.
Several minutes later, Mary goes to meet Healy, and he’s had these ridiculous, oversized veneers put in. He looks absurd, which is funny enough. But that the audience knows *why* he had them put in makes it all the more satisfying and funny.
In the early scene with Andrew at The Brig, what if one of Cute Brunette’s friends says to her “Hey, I think Casper the Friendly Ghost over here is trying to talk to you” (replace “Casper” with “Edward Cullen” or “this albino” or whatever you please)? Or whatever; something that makes us know that Andrew is self-conscious about his paleness, so we understand when he gets the spray tan.
The scene on page 45 between Will and Natalie is an amazing one. Will enters the scene with a clear goal (get laid) and expectations, clear opposition to that goal (Natalie’s need to be wooed, his own self-doubt), it has high emotional stakes, awesome reversals (Natalie doesn’t care about Will’s small penis; she isn’t angry about his party hacking, she’s impressed), plus it’s funny, sexy, has great dialogue, AND it perfectly sets up the next scene!
Please, please, apply the kind of care and talent you display in this scene to the rest of your screenplay, and you’ll have a surefire hit. Let’s have less of scenes like the Andrew and Sally date scenes on pages 56-58, which are pretty much all exposition and set up.
DIALOGUE
There are several times in the script where the dialogue really shines; generally in the moments where the main characters have a back-and-forth (again, these exchanges would be even better with more disparity between the two).
For instance, the conversation between Andrew and Will on page 20. There’s an element of conflict, even though the two aren’t outright arguing with each other, which is great.
Conversations like on 59-62 drone on and on, though; it’s essentially two people agreeing with each other, which is boring.
The majority of the stuff coming out of Sally’s mouth is exposition; she’s either giving facts about herself and her history, or else she’s telling us things we already know. Serious attention should be paid to her.
The gag on page 15 with the Porn Star correcting Andrew would actually be funnier without her dialogue. Look for opportunities like this where you can convey the same meaning without words.
“No dancing” on page 10 feels really shoe-horned in, like it was awkwardly added in a later draft. The entire brother subplot feels forced at the moment, honestly, and needs to be either more organically introduced, or else removed.
OVERALL
Probably not the review you wanted to receive when you believed your script was really close to completion. Know that I’m probably one of the harsher reviewers here at Trigger Street, so this review isn’t really as negative as it may read; the script is, in fact, more professional than the average script on the site.
That doesn’t mean I think you should ignore my advice, however (I *did* just spend a lot of time and effort writing this review, after all…). I genuinely hope I’ve given you some things to consider, and that it helps you with your next draft.
Best of luck. read
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Submissions by olufemi
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a screenplay by olufemi
After creating a civilization of intelligent apes, Rex fights to keep two worlds from destroying each other.
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a screenplay by olufemi
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a screenplay by olufemi
A race car driver granted superpowers by a mysterious device must defeat Nazis to save the 1936 Olympics.
Reviews by olufemi 65
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A review of The Uglyby olufemi on 05/06/2013As a piece of written work, THE UGLY is a fascinating and engrossing story, featuring protagonists who are rarely portrayed in media, which makes them all the more interesting. If audiences were able to experience the lurid prose and captivating subtlety of the script, they would likely be completely enthralled. Unfortunately, the fact is that audiences do not read screenplays;... As a piece of written work, THE UGLY is a fascinating and engrossing story, featuring protagonists who are rarely portrayed in media, which makes them all the more interesting. If audiences were able to experience the lurid prose and captivating subtlety of the script, they would likely be completely enthralled.
Unfortunately, the fact is that audiences do not read screenplays; they watch movies. While they can be potentially captivated by visuals or mood or style, these aspects of film are provided by the director, the cinematographer, they production designer, etc., who do not want to be told by other aspects of production how to do their jobs.
Simply put, it is the job of the WRITER to provide a good STORY. A *good* story, not a “well-written” one.
Speaking as someone who reads a lot of scripts, Philip, I can tell you that there’s a different mindset in reading them than there is in reading standard fiction. There’s a sort of filter that comes on, cutting through the way in which a script is written (so long as the writing is unobtrusive), and instead honing on the building block of storytelling: CONFICT. Which is why it’s befuddling to me that you would intentionally downplay conflict in order to provide a “purely visual and poignant experience”. You don’t define the visuals, so how could you provide a visual experience?
It is obvious that you are a talented writer, who would no doubt create a hell of a novel. But as luridly written as “The Ugly” is, it is sorely lacking in what a screenplay needs to be. For that reason, it falls flat.
*The only possible caveat to the above, and really, to the rest of this review, is if you plan to direct the movie created from this script. If that’s the case, you should really mention it.
MECHANICS
Format is nearly without blemish. You’re missing a “FADE IN:” at the beginning of your script, and you should remove the scene numbers, but otherwise it’s fine.
As I’ve touched upon, the script is the work of a very literate writer, but this actually works against it. The narration:
-is overwritten and unnecessarily grandiloquent (page 2: “Jimmy willfully prises the food from Frank’s grasp”),
-breaks up action where there’s no need (page 45: “Frank presses into the curve of a dune to escape the wind./He pulls his jacket tight.”)
-describes visuals with unnecessary specificity which are irrelevant to the story (page 4: “rain lashes against Frank’s face, mats his hair and beard.” We already know it’s raining.)
-describes things that aren’t visual, and thus cannot be represented onscreen (page 5: “In a shock, a vicious wave of energy rises through her. It courses up through her legs and trembles at her chest.”)
All of this only disguises the fact that there simply isn’t much “meat” to the script. If one were to go through it removing every unnecessary description and detail, I suspect it would easily lose 15 pages.
It’s fine to have a specific voice or style, but your flowery prose is indulgent, and is tiring to a reader; I found my mind wandering frequently while trying to get through what should have been an easy read (again, because it was too difficult to find the CONFLICT).
Changing the subject, you may want to provide a SUPER early on to tell the audience the location and time period of your story. You say that it’s in Neely, but neglect to mention where this city is.
For what it’s worth, the formatting seems a *bit* out of whack on page 11: the top “Cybil” isn’t aligned properly. Also, it isn’t necessary any longer to use (CONT’D); it appears infrequently throughout the script.
Your “slow fade”s are formatted improperly.
CONCEPT
I really wish people would write actual loglines for Trigger Street scripts, rather than taglines. I’d like to have an idea what I’m about to read…
Here’s the thing: I get what you’re going for with this script (at least, I believe I do). You imagine a movie that is subdued in plot and evocative in mood, similar perhaps to Lars Von Trier’s “Melancholia” or Sofia Coppola’s “Lost in Translation”. That’s fine.
The problem is that movies like this are passion projects for directors, with scripts that are written by those directors, because they have a very specific vision for the movie. That director is not going to find a script that has a specific visual and then try to recreate it; that’s creatively stifling.
A script is going to succeed based on the strength of its concept and conflict, which you’ve intentionally subdued here. So I’m sorry to say it, but I think you’ve shot yourself in the foot. Frankly, I’d love to read this as a short story, or possibly even a novel, where we can get some true insight into the minds of your unique characters.
As far as the story concept itself, I can’t imagine audiences clamoring to see a film just based on knowing it’s about a mentally-challenged guy and a green-skinned woman wandering around being unwanted.
STORY
I’m probably going to harp on it a lot in this review, and I hope you’ll forgive me for it, but I simply cannot get over how you intentionally toned down the drama. You literally weakened the story on purpose, and it shows: every potential for interesting conflict (and there’s a *lot* of it) is minimized and wasted, and I just don’t get it.
There’s nothing at stake in the script. It has no momentum to it, no thrust, no immediacy, no trajectory. At no point does it feel like we’re heading towards an inevitable climax; instead we just sort of amble along, and on occasion, some random thing happens. Because of this, the story feels like a collection of disjoint scenes, rather than one uniform story.
Well-drawn characters simply aren’t enough. They need to *do* something, *struggle* with something. It’s clear that you intend for Frank to struggle *internally*, but herein lies another problem: because of his mental handicap, he lacks the mental capacity to fully appreciate and express those struggles. Because we can’t see inside his head, we can’t understand those issues.
Where the story does seem to gain some direction is around the midpoint, with the development of a (romantic?) relationship between Agnes and George. There is true conflict on display here, and it’s the most fascinating part of the script:
Here we have Frank, a character who is shunned and alone because of his mental impediment. People treat him like he is somehow less than a human being, and because he’s lost his dog, he has no companionship. When he finds Agnes, he gains companionship, but HE TREATS HER LIKE A PET, inadvertently being guilty of the same sin as all the people who shunned him.
Then what happens when the companion he treats like a pet begins to get smarter? Becomes even smarter than he is? Worse, she finds someone else she’d rather spend time with, someone who treats her as an equal, rather than trying to dominate her? Will Frank forsake their relationship and be alone forever? Will he go to further lengths to exert his will over her? Or will he finally learn to see himself and her as equals, and members of the same human race?
This is brilliant stuff, and it’s all stuff that is inherently in the screenplay! But you clutter your script with so much irrelevance that it’s lost:
Who is Celia, why does she attach to Agnes so quickly, and why should I care?
What does Frank murdering her contribute to the narrative?
What do colonists encroaching on George’s land have to do with anything (seriously, I was completely lost around this point; it felt so completely random)?
Why does Frank carry a stick around and think it’s a dog*?
Why is Agnes’s skin green?
Why does Agnes apparently have some sort of supernatural control over plants, which allows her to make roots and vines move?
Why does a random colonist woman throw herself at big, lumbering, retarded Frank?
Why does Frank’s voice change into that of a ten year old (SERIOUSLY, WHAT?!)?
The relationship between Frank and Agnes should be the story. It is the most interesting aspect of the screenplay, and bares the most potential for compelling conflict. I get that this story is part of something larger, but I don’t particularly care: you’ve presented the script to be evaluated, and the script’s story is what I care about. You have the skill and the script has the potential, so use it.
*Regarding this, it’s actually wonderful that Frank is so lonely that he treats an inanimate piece of wood like it’s his friend. But it would add so much more STAKES if Frank was completely alone, and both he and we were aware of it. If the script perhaps began with a scene of Frank burying his one and only friend, crying. Or, we could even see cruel townspeople causing the death of the dog somehow. If he’s completely alone, the moment where he finds Agnes feels like a crucial moment: the protagonist attaining what he wants (at least, what he *thinks* he wants), rather than it feeling as causal an event as the current draft makes it.
CHARACTER
The characters of the screenplay are vividly-drawn, distinct, and unique. This is the best aspect of the screenplay. You do wonderful work creating them; they all feel real.
You could stand to strengthen some of their motivations (do NOT downplay it!). Celia being possessive over Agnes is meaningless and confusing without context. If we see in her house that she has an empty room with an unused crib in it, suddenly that character makes sense.
Frank frees Agnes on page 6 (presumably to have a companion), but then on page 22 he turns her away. Why does he do this? What does he want?
I question the efficacy of Frank as a protagonist. Mentally-challenged characters in film seem to invariably have some accompanying lucid character (Lenny for George; Tom Cruise’s Charlie to Rain Man; Lieutenant Dan/Jenny/Mrs. Gump for Forrest Gump). Such a character is able to express to the audience what the “retarded” character cannot.
Your story is so dependent on Frank’s isolation and alienation though, that such a character wouldn’t really work, so this is a bit of a Catch-22, which I’m honestly not certain how to resolve.
Because of the lack of this lucid character, Frank tends to be a bit inconsistent: when he’s displaying the qualities of a strong protagonist, he doesn’t really seem disabled. When he seems realistically disabled, he doesn’t feel like a very good protagonist.
When stuff just “happens”, it feels like your characters are victims to fate, rather than instigators of change, which weakens them. Agnes gains enough prominence later in the script to be considered another protagonist, but she and Frank just don’t seem to be changing their world enough.
I think better displaying how desperately Frank wants to care for someone and be cared for will go a long way toward improving your script. It gives him a more concrete goal, strengthens him as a character, provides and overarching conflict to the story, and gives the script the sense of direction that it currently lacks.
STRUCTURE
Argh.
Story structure is predicated on CONFLICT.
You intentionally LESSENED THE CONFLICT.
This means that your story structure has similarly been lessened, so it’s weak.
Stuff that one would assume is major and game-changing plays out as if it doesn’t matter (Frank killing someone; Frank and Agnes passing her parents on the road), so that rather than the story experiencing highs and lows, everything feels like the same frustratingly unimportant flatline.
The numerous time jumps in the script are problematic. It’s unclear how much time is passing, for one, but more importantly, they lessen the importance of every scene, particularly when nothing particularly important seems to have been accomplished in them. If Frank kills a woman, then we jump forward several months to see how prison life has affected him, that’s a good transition. If Frank is living at a water station, then months pass and he’s living at a water station, it’s not.
Time skips should occur when major changes have happened in the story, and only sparingly. Giving the story a clearer sense of direction will also keep these from disrupting your narrative as much.
You state that the overall theme of the story is about the use and abuse of power. While I get this from the back end of the story, with the colonists and George, that theme isn’t really set up with the story’s beginning, which seems to be more about “belonging”.
Some of your scene transitions are a bit confusing. On page 25, Agnes is following Frank. Then we go to INT. CYBIL MORGANS HOUSE, and Agnes is inside, while Frank is out. Generally it should be easy to glean what has happened in the interstitial time between scenes, but I can’t figure out what happened here.
With the idea of increasing the stakes and giving the script a bigger sense of momentum, might you consider an early scene where Frank contemplates suicide? Nothing elaborate, of course; something as simple as him walking closer and closer to a ledge with a giant fall while peering over its edge would be enough. A near-suicide scene would show how dire the situation is for him, and how desperately he needs someone to whom he can relate. It would draw the audience into the story much more quickly, and strengthen their desire to see him resolve his problem (i.e. they’ll want to hang around to see the climax).
DIALOGUE
You do a good job of giving characters distinctive voices. Particularly impressive is how you display Agnes’s slowly increasing cogency.
Frank’s manner of speaking gets to be irritating, particularly when I had to reread sentences to figure out what he’s saying. This wouldn’t be a problem if the script were a novel, but it’s not: it’s a screenplay, meaning the specific manner in which Frank speaks will be determined by the actor playing him, NOT by the script. I would suggest going back and removing most of the apostrophes (’ad, jus’, y’, etc.) from the script, as they’re excessive and unnecessary, as well as the intentional word misspellings (bin, fer, etc.).
I suspect that this imitation of accent is why your script has only been rated a 3 in dialogue, but this isn’t fair. Your dialogue is distinctive, conveys character, and avoids exposition. It’s missing that spark of life and wit that you see in the best professional screenplays, but it’s still very strong work, and I’m giving it a 4.
While the townspeople all seem to have some sort of regional accent, it’s not clear *what* that region is. As I mentioned before, perhaps you should specifically state where and when “Neely” is.
OVERALL
Have you given thought to writing short stories and/or novels? I hope you don’t take it as an insult, but you seem to have the temperament for it. This script is well-written and literary, and if those were the qualities that made scripts worthy of production, THE UGLY would be well on its way to perfection.
They’re not, however. Good scripts do very little to draw attention to themselves, instead transporting the reader directly into your STORY. Flowery writing cannot compensate for weak plotting.
If you do give traditional narrative writing a try, I look forward to reading some of your work, as I think you’re suited for it, and will be able to create some really moving work. If you instead you decide to continue developing this story as a script, I hope that I’ve given you some things to chew on, and some good advice towards improving it.
Best luck to you. read -
A review of Love Hack's Revengeby olufemi on 04/22/2013There’s a lot of imagination on display in “Love Hacks”. Now I’m going to be honest with you: translated from rewiew-ese, “a lot of imagination” generally means “there’s too much going on and it's confusing”. Such is the case in this script. As a reviewer, I want to help you tell the story that you want to tell, but the truth is that poor mechanics and an overabundance of... There’s a lot of imagination on display in “Love Hacks”.
Now I’m going to be honest with you: translated from rewiew-ese, “a lot of imagination” generally means “there’s too much going on and it's confusing”. Such is the case in this script. As a reviewer, I want to help you tell the story that you want to tell, but the truth is that poor mechanics and an overabundance of characters and subplots make it impossible for me to even tell *what* story you’re trying to tell.
You appear to be a prolific writer, which is a major positive. But if you don’t slow down for a moment and correct some of your own screenwriting flaws (which I know are prevalent in your writing, because I’ve read reviews of your other work), you’ll never grow as a writer.
MECHANICS
Nothing make it more difficult to get into a story than poor spelling, grammar, punctuation, and formatting.
Your script mechanics are unacceptably poor, and I’m not going to bother pointing out the multitudinous errors throughout the script. It’s apparent you created this script in Word (or a similar word processing program), which has an automatic contextual spell-check, so there’s no excuse.
Download Celtix. It’s free, and it will correct several of the issues with this script’s format.
A few notes:
-Unless your characters are actually saying “Gee dash Dee”, do not sensor yourself in your writing (“Oh My G-D”). I understand that perhaps you have some moral convictions that prevent you from using the Lord’s name in vain, but this looks stupid. Write it out, or find another expression to use.
-Don’t provide specific details unless they are absolutely necessary. This goes for the color of a character’s hair (p. 70), the color of a character’s outfit (p. 83), or the precise number of registers there are in a store (p. 7).
-Transitions (“CUT TO:”) are almost always unnecessary in a spec script. They should be removed from yours.
-Avoid writing action in gerund form (“the man is [blank]ing”); use the more active present tense (“the man [blank]s”).
-Upon a character’s introduction, provide the character’s relative age, a brief description of their physicality (again, WITHOUT specifics, unless they are relevant to the story), and some hint of the character’s personality.
-I don’t believe it’s legal to put a real credit card number on screen as you have on page 27. That’s even if the number is expired.
CONCEPT
You wear your inspirations on your sleeve: your dialogue heavy scenes feel like something out of a Kevin Smith slacker comedy, while the heist elements of the script feel straight out of a Guy Ritchie flick.
The problem is that these two styles directly conflict with each other. The laid-back, everyday feel of the characters is at odds with the crime/adventure tone you seek to bring across; it’s like shoving Dante and Randal into “Ocean’s Eleven”.
A crime/heist film with slacker characters is a fun idea for a comedy (something akin to “Tower Heist”, perhaps), but as an action/adventure story (as you have listed as this script’s genre), it falls flat. Getting this concept to work will require either reworking the script to function as a comedy, or else replacing the wage-slave characters with characters more appropriate to (and believable for) the genre.
Your title and logline also both need a lot of work. The title sounds like it’s for a romantic comedy, and the logline is completely nondescript. One has no idea what to expect from the script having read them.
STORY
You do a good job making sure there are set-ups to your story’s ending. The numerous disparate characters and subplots come together to create the ending you want. The final stinger with Frankie knowing that Keegan is about to get everyone in trouble over a girl again is a really nice way to wrap things up.
The problem with your set-ups, though, is that they themselves aren’t well set-up; you can’t introduce a major plot element like a hacker competition, then have it disappear from the story entirely, only coming back when a character from that subplot randomly decides to show up again. Particularly when competitive hacking is such a weird, unrealistic element, and everyone in the story treats it as though it’s commonplace.
This happens frequently in your script; there are so many subplots and side characters that it’s impossible to tell what the *actual* plot is, and the reader gets lost (again I’ll point out that the poor spelling and format only compound this problem).
One thing missing from your story is STAKES; stakes are what Guy Ritchie movies easy to follow, even though there are so many characters and situations of which to keep track. Early in his films, we meet a character who NEEDS something, and if he doesn’t get that thing, he’s in serious trouble.
What does Keegan need? Apparently he “needs” to be with Sophie. This isn’t a very strong motivation for a 90-minute action movie. What happens if he doesn’t get Sophie? Does he die? Will he go to jail? No. Nothing happens.
I’d comment more on story, but I’m afraid I was just completely lost for the majority of the script. I can only advise you to streamline your story; find ONE central story, and build that up, rather than cluttering your script with subplots.
CHARACTER
Keegan is a fun character; he’s kind of an @$$hole, frequently sarcastic to the point of being acerbic, and he’s a little bit pathetic in his pursuit of Sophie. It’s also nice that you allow him to arc, finally realizing that pursuing Sophie simply isn’t worth it.
Keegan seems to be a bit inconsistent, though, as if at times you were trying to make him more likeable. On page 36, for instance, after losing his hacker competition he flips off the audience… then he tries to shake hands with his opponent? On the next page, he’s brash and overconfident, but then suddenly he’s nervous?
He’s also a little too perfect sometimes; Keegan seems to have a helluva lot of skills for a guy who works at a Verizon store. Why on earth does he know gemology, like on page 84? Why is he so comfortable around firearms?
Figure out who your main character is as a person, then stick with it. Also, it’s not necessary to make characters (not even main characters) “likeable”; they only need to be *compelling*. This is accomplished by giving them well-defined goals, and making them overcome what opposition stands between them and those goals.
There are far, FAR too many characters in this script, and it’s impossible to keep track of them all without keeping notes. It’s bad enough that even you, the writer, confuse a couple of them by story’s end (you start calling Albert Moss “Donald” Moss; you change Quincy Lawrence’s name to Quincy Sparks; you have a character named “Lenny” appear out of nowhere on page 64, then disappear just as quickly!). If you can’t keep up with the characters, how could you possible expect a reader to? Worse, the characters rarely do enough to distinguish themselves from others in terms of personality.
It isn’t necessary to name every character who appears in your script; if a character only shows up on one page, it’s fine to call that character BITCHY WAITRESS or EFFEMINATE DOORMAN. Every time you give a character a proper name, it says to the reader that the character is an important one. When EVERY character has a proper name, the reader can’t be sure who to pay attention to.
Your female characters all seem to be little more than objects of desire for the male characters. You introduce them, comment on how attractive they are (note: actors are attractive. Saying that the character played by an actor is attractive is pretty moot), and then they don’t really do much of anything.
No person, male or female, sees him/herself as a supporting character in someone else’s story. Give your characters (ALL of them) desires, and let everything they do reflect those desires.
STRUCTURE
Structure is difficult to decipher without the context of the overall story. As I trust I’ve made clear, it’s difficult to tell what the main thrust of the story is, with so many subplots.
Ideally, a well-structured screenplay should increase in tension as the story progresses. The opposition to the protagonist attaining his goals grows more and more powerful, and the protagonist is forced to fight harder and more desperately, or else lose his goal forever.
“Fight” doesn’t necessarily refer to a physical confrontation, though in an action screenplay, it probably should. There aren’t enough moments where Keegan’s life is in danger, or where the stakes are high. There are some times when there’s the hint of a threat (from Craig Vargas, for instance), but Keegan sidesteps any possible threat with such ease that it becomes rote and boring.
Learn to test your protagonist, even punish him. It will excite your audience, and endear them to the character.
Well-structured screenplays have a “trajectory”; every scene after the first begins with the audience and characters knowing what needs to be accomplished. Something occurs in the scene to disrupt accomplishing that goal, which sends the story in a new direction, leading to a new scene with a new objective. The audience has an idea of what needs to happen next, they just don’t know how it’s going to happen.
DIALOGUE
Dialogue is probably your strongest skill as a writer. The script is filled with several clever turns of phrase and exchanges, and it helps to bring your characters (particularly Keegan) to life.
This doesn’t mean that the screenplay should be filled with dialogue, though; certainly not when you’re trying to write an action/adventure. Dialogue taking up an entire page is something that should happen only infrequently even in a drama; in an action/adventure script, such pages should be practically non-existent. Like several other reviewers have already told you on other scripts, your script has way too much dialogue.
Dialogue for dialogue’s sake isn’t worthy of being in a screenplay. It must move the story forward, give insight to character personalities, and disguise exposition, making it sound natural.
Young Keegan’s dialogue on page 2 doesn’t sound like that of a precocious child; it sounds like it’s coming from an adult. Child actors sound *really* awkward reading adult dialogue; you should fix this.
The commentating on page 37 is esoteric and boring. The scene itself is already flat (you really expect the audience to get excited about watching two people type on keyboards?), and not being able to understand what the commentator is talking about doesn’t help.
On page 47: if you have your characters sitting around discussing the plan, it’s almost always not necessary (unless the plan eventually goes so horribly awry that we need to know what the plan was *supposed* to be). I’d remove this and cut straight to the plan being enacted.
OVERALL
Proper mechanics are SO important to your script. I freely acknowledge that there are story details that I may have missed, simply because I couldn’t decipher them for your typos and formatting errors. Fixing them will go a long way in making your script at least intelligible, because at the moment it’s a mess.
I wish you the best in your screenwriting. read -
A review of Party Hackers (Final-ish)by olufemi on 04/09/2013Amateur writers frequently overlook the importance of story concept, believing that all that is necessary to get one’s foot in the door is to have a good story well-told. This is a mistake. The honest truth is that enticing someone with a pithy logline and a clever concept are what will get your script read. It’s great, then, that Party Hackers has such a catchy and clever... Amateur writers frequently overlook the importance of story concept, believing that all that is necessary to get one’s foot in the door is to have a good story well-told. This is a mistake. The honest truth is that enticing someone with a pithy logline and a clever concept are what will get your script read.
It’s great, then, that Party Hackers has such a catchy and clever premise. Frankly, if the writer had the right connections, this script would probably be in a position for sale and production already; the movie wouldn’t be as good as it *could* be, but it would be made.
Lacking those connections, though, it’s necessary for the script to properly capitalize on the potential created by the premise. Hopefully this and other reviews can help the writer do that. I know you believe this script to be a “final-ish” draft, but I’m afraid it still needs work.
MECHANICS
Mechanically, there’s not much wrong with this script; misspellings and typos are few, format is on point.
There are a few times where the narrative describes moments that seem impossible, logistically: on 2, Will sits at his desk, with a computer behind him showing a screensaver. Then he suddenly opens an email. Is this on a different computer? Or did the screensaver disappear, *then* he opened his email? It’s unclear. On page 46, Sally somehow sees Brandon walk up behind her. These are major problems, but they’re present.
Your character introductions could do more to establish the personalities of your characters. It’s not necessary to give an in-depth analysis of who they are, but “good looks, pale” doesn’t give a reader a lot to work with (particularly the term “good looks”; most actors are attractive, so this is almost unnecessary).
It’s unclear if the conversation on page 27 is meant to be intercut. If “Gruff Male” is only a voice over the phone, use (V.O.). Otherwise, you need to mention that the conversation is cutting between two locations.
Typos:
-p. 1: Begin script with “FADE IN:”
-p. 1: “Oversized” is one word.
-p. 6: The audience can’t know that the character introduced here is Andrew’s DAD, unless he refers to him as such.
-p. 17: “go out on a lim[b]”, not “limp”.
-p. 47: “[He] stomps and stretches”
-p. 85: “a relationships”
CONCEPT
The best thing about the screenplay is the fantastic idea behind it. It’s more than a little derivative of WEDDING CRASHERS, but this similarity is a positive: “It’s like Wedding Crashers” is a selling point for both producers and potential audiences.
But, as I try to emphasize for people, “idea” is not the same thing as “concept”. Story issues make it unclear what the exact concept is. There’s a lot going on in the script, and it frequently seems difficult to find its “spine”: the primary CONFLICT that is witnessed through the story in its entirety. This stems from issues with both the STORY and the STRUCTURE which I’ll touch on later.
The logline (both the short and long versions) could use some work; the short one doesn’t mention the best part of the concept, and the long one is awkwardly phrased and overlong. This reflects the story issues. With both, try to streamline. Maybe something like: “An awkward programmer hacks his way into ritzy parties to up his social status and woo the girl of his dreams.” (21 words, 110 characters)
I don’t know what “the Gordon Gecko of man whores” means, and I don’t believe it’s as funny as you think it is.
STORY
For my money, many of the funniest situations in movies stem from a guy who is very clearly *not* cool trying his hardest to be exactly that. It’s hilarious to watch, but it simultaneously endears you to the character.
PARTY HACKERS’s premise allows for scenes just like this, which is great. The best moments in the story are where we get to see the façade crack, the characters forced to either dig in deeper to protect their lies, or else finally expose themselves (emotionally, that is) and come clean. The scene on page 45 with Will and Natalie is such a scene, and it’s PERFECT. What make scenes like this work are the forces of CONFLICT at play; the characters’ desires are directly at war with others’ perception of them, as well as their own self-doubts.
It’s odd, then, that with the built-in potential for conflict and humor in this script, a lot of it seems to be wasted. We barely get to see the two failing at trying to act “cool”; instead, they seem to have no problem at all adapting to this new environment. Andrew successfully has sex with a woman by page 11! Then again on page 16! I know in the latter case it turns out to be a stripper, but this still feels like your characters achieving the exterior goals far too prematurely. For as much as you set up the pair as having almost crippling social debilitations, they really flourish in the party setting.
I would question the need to have both Andrew and Will fired from their jobs simultaneously. For one thing, having one (or both) of them still working at Inviteweb increases the stakes and potential for conflict; it’s even more likely they’ll be caught, which makes things more interesting. Secondly, it strains credulity that the two are fired the exact same day for unrelated reasons. Lastly (and this is something I’ll touch on under CHARACTER), it’s often times pretty difficult to tell your two main characters apart. One of them still working at Inviteweb may help remedy that.
Much of the script feels unfocused because for much of it, Andrew and Will’s desires are so nebulous. There’s nothing driving them forward, and there are no stakes preventing them from moving backward. Why do Andrew and Will need to hack parties *now*? What happens if they don’t? Perhaps Andrew’s Dad is a sad and lonely widower, so in the scene between him and Andrew, we can see Andrew’s very real fear of dying alone?
Without strongly established goals and stakes, the story becomes formless around the time the numerous characters and subplots are introduced. Sally’s bad history with Natalie, Natalie’s dealings with her ex-boyfriend, Brandon Lomar’s deception… it all vies for center stage, and no one subplot seems strong enough to hold the story together.
I know “getting laid” or “finding love” don’t feel like particularly lofty stakes, but they can be made so through effective writing. The main characters in AMERICAN PIE make a pact to have sex before they graduate, and this is strong enough a goal to hold the film together, despite its seeming shallowness. The characters believe that their emotional well-being is tied into this event, and on top of that, there’s a deadline, which makes it all the more urgent.
Party Hackers lacks this. Something primal and urgent must drive the characters.
These problems stem from the fact that it’s a bit unclear what story you’re trying to tell, and it feels like you’ve maybe gotten (and followed) conflicting advice from people who assumed it was about one thing or the other.
What is the story really *about*? Is it about two programmers who become “party hackers”? Or is it about two “party hackers” who fall in love?
If it’s the former case, then we need more time to get to know these characters beforehand, and we need a stronger reason for them to start doing it (I would guess that at some point, someone told you that you should get to the “party hacking” as quickly as possible… if you want to tell a story about their difficulties party hacking, then this advice is wrong). The reason could possibly even be to *meet* Natalie, with whom Will can already be infatuated.
There should be more scenes showing how difficult a time they have with it.
If the latter is the case, the main characters should probably be “party hacking” before the script even starts. There’s no need for the first 9 or 10 pages of the script.
Other STORY notes:
-p. 1, I don’t understand the “Haven’t seen you on here in ages”. What’s the point of it? Is this a joke? If so, not very funny…
-p. 14, “YOUR FACE MELTED ON ME!” is laugh-out-loud funny. This joke needs better set-up, though, which is a persistent problem. Hopefully I’ll get to this in STRUCTURE.
-p. 29, Look, I’m not a feminist, but women solving issues by showing their boobs (as on page 29) is hackneyed and sitcom-ish, and it weakens Natalie as a character. I’ve seen this numerous times in amateur screenplays, for some reason.
-p. 51, The sudden revelations of the $100,000 savings account seems contrived. If you’re going to have a reveal like this, it needs to be set up earlier. Again, there’s a pretty big lack of set-up/pay-off in the script.
-p. 79, Don’t understand why Andrew drinks the beer
-p. 80, Why does Brandon’s stand-in look at Will’s penis?!
CHARACTER
It’s easy to picture Ben Stiller and Vince Vaughan (or similar actors) playing the roles of your two likeable lead characters. They’re lovable losers in over their heads, which makes them easy to root for.
As mentioned, the two often seem too similar, and it’s difficult to know which is which. The more different they are, the more easily two actors will be able to play the characters off of each other, and the more fun the interactions will be. Perhaps Will is a loud-mouth and a braggart, overcompensating for his lack of endowment. Perhaps Andrew is more nervous and jittery (and their DIALOGUE reflects this). At the moment, it’s a bit difficult to gauge what their unique personalities are… not just what they do, but what they’re like.
Andrew seems to vacillate between being nervous and being confident at times. It’s fine if this is a gradual arc that he experiences, but moments such as on page 57 where he stands up to a stranger make it feel like he’s arced prematurely.
Really beat up on your leads. Every success they have early in the script makes them a little more difficult to root for; like I mentioned, you establish your characters as loveable losers who are unlucky in love, but then Andrew gets laid barely 10 minutes into the movie.
Natalie is a fun character, who gets to show some depth beyond her air-head introduction. It’s a little hard to believe that this girl who didn’t know that the Titanic was a real ship gets a Game of Death reference, but otherwise, she’s a well-realized character.
Sally feels more like a goal than an actual person in the script. Any actress playing the role in a romantic comedy is going to want the opportunity to be funny. So what’s Sally’s source of funny?
STRUCTURE
I would guess that previous versions of this script were longer, and that with this submission you concentrated and bringing down the page count. While that’s commendable, it feels like you may have thrown out the baby with the bathwater a little bit.
There are, unfortunately, some structural issues with this script, which is probably surprising to hear, because it’s apparent that you’ve paid some attention to placeing your plot points where they should be. But proper structure does more than just this; besides the structure of the overall script, *every scene* has a structure.
A scene should begin with the characters (and the audience) having certain expectations of what is going to happen, based on what has transpired before the scene. Then in the scene, something counter to those expectations occurs, causing a new situation that the characters must deal with. This is called “turning” a scene. Scenes turn on conflict. In a comedy, you want them to turn comedically. Forgive me if I’m being pedantic here…
Your scenes rarely last longer than they need to, which is nice, but they rarely turn. Because of this, they feel like you’re only presenting information (a.k.a. exposition), rather than moving the story forward.
As an example:
On page 6, Andrew is suddenly at his Dad’s home. Andrew says “my plan is to post my resume on job sites.” Then Andrew tries to throw a ball and is bad at it, and the scene ends.
What was the point of this scene? It seems to be to tell the audience that Andrew is bad at throwing balls (exposition), then to tell us something that we could have figured out from the following scene (generally, any scene that only says “I’m going to do this” is unnecessary… just show the character doing it!).
How would it impact the rest of the story if you didn’t have this scene? It wouldn’t. Rather than him going home and talking to his father, the script could simply have cut from Andrew being fired to Andrew looking for work. The scene is useless because it doesn’t turn, and any editor worth his salt would remove it.
Imagine instead that Andrew entered this scene with the intention of moving in with his father (EXPECTATION). He’s playing catch with Dad, and he says “I’m not sure what I’ll do now. Or, you know, where I’m going to stay. Wow, this house sure is big for only one person to live in it, huh? Yup, sure is big…” Dad says “I’ll make you a bet: throw the ball to me from that tree, and you can stay here as long as you like” (CONFLICT). Andrew throws just as crappily as you’ve described in the current script. The two stare at each other a beat, then Andrew says “Yeah, so I think I’ll go post my resume on some job sites.” Dad: “Yeah, maybe you should do that.” (TURN)
Now the scene has *turned*. Andrew entered it expecting to be able to stay with his father, and left it knowing he couldn’t, but with a new plan for fixing his problem. He and the story have a new direction, which is what keeps the reader/audience interested. Plus, you’ve still conveyed the information you wanted to, and it’s (in my opinion) funnier!
On page 9, Andrew and Will walk up to the party, expecting to get in. They meet with the doorman, he runs their IDs… and they get in. Meaning you could have cut straight to inside the party. With ALL scenes: either dramatize by adding conflict, or remove.
Similarly to the problems turning scenes, you don’t always properly set scenes up, making it feel somewhat random when they occur. On page 13, Will* walks up with a weird orange spray-on tan (*by the way, is this supposed to be Andrew? You describe Andrew as “pale”, not Will… it’s kind of a problem if even you are mixing up your characters! I’m going to assume this is meant to be Andrew).
Yeah, it’s kind of funny, but it would have been so much funnier if it had been properly set up! Ever seen “There Something About Mary?” In one scene, Mary meets a friend who has put two giant tongue depressors in his mouth, like buck teeth. Mary jokes that she just loves a man with big giant teeth. She doesn’t realize that Healy, who is trying to impress her, is listening in to the conversation, and he doesn’t know that she’s joking.
Several minutes later, Mary goes to meet Healy, and he’s had these ridiculous, oversized veneers put in. He looks absurd, which is funny enough. But that the audience knows *why* he had them put in makes it all the more satisfying and funny.
In the early scene with Andrew at The Brig, what if one of Cute Brunette’s friends says to her “Hey, I think Casper the Friendly Ghost over here is trying to talk to you” (replace “Casper” with “Edward Cullen” or “this albino” or whatever you please)? Or whatever; something that makes us know that Andrew is self-conscious about his paleness, so we understand when he gets the spray tan.
The scene on page 45 between Will and Natalie is an amazing one. Will enters the scene with a clear goal (get laid) and expectations, clear opposition to that goal (Natalie’s need to be wooed, his own self-doubt), it has high emotional stakes, awesome reversals (Natalie doesn’t care about Will’s small penis; she isn’t angry about his party hacking, she’s impressed), plus it’s funny, sexy, has great dialogue, AND it perfectly sets up the next scene!
Please, please, apply the kind of care and talent you display in this scene to the rest of your screenplay, and you’ll have a surefire hit. Let’s have less of scenes like the Andrew and Sally date scenes on pages 56-58, which are pretty much all exposition and set up.
DIALOGUE
There are several times in the script where the dialogue really shines; generally in the moments where the main characters have a back-and-forth (again, these exchanges would be even better with more disparity between the two).
For instance, the conversation between Andrew and Will on page 20. There’s an element of conflict, even though the two aren’t outright arguing with each other, which is great.
Conversations like on 59-62 drone on and on, though; it’s essentially two people agreeing with each other, which is boring.
The majority of the stuff coming out of Sally’s mouth is exposition; she’s either giving facts about herself and her history, or else she’s telling us things we already know. Serious attention should be paid to her.
The gag on page 15 with the Porn Star correcting Andrew would actually be funnier without her dialogue. Look for opportunities like this where you can convey the same meaning without words.
“No dancing” on page 10 feels really shoe-horned in, like it was awkwardly added in a later draft. The entire brother subplot feels forced at the moment, honestly, and needs to be either more organically introduced, or else removed.
OVERALL
Probably not the review you wanted to receive when you believed your script was really close to completion. Know that I’m probably one of the harsher reviewers here at Trigger Street, so this review isn’t really as negative as it may read; the script is, in fact, more professional than the average script on the site.
That doesn’t mean I think you should ignore my advice, however (I *did* just spend a lot of time and effort writing this review, after all…). I genuinely hope I’ve given you some things to consider, and that it helps you with your next draft.
Best of luck. read -
A review of Reflections (v2)by olufemi on 03/27/2013It’s weird; I’m currently working on a screenplay similar in theme to this one. So perhaps it’s a little self-indulgent to applaud the concept here. All the same, I believe it’s a very strong one. People will always have a fascination with the “road not taken”, and the magical conceit of “Reflections” provides a wish-fulfillment fantasy to see just that. The biggest issue... It’s weird; I’m currently working on a screenplay similar in theme to this one.
So perhaps it’s a little self-indulgent to applaud the concept here. All the same, I believe it’s a very strong one. People will always have a fascination with the “road not taken”, and the magical conceit of “Reflections” provides a wish-fulfillment fantasy to see just that.
The biggest issue with the script at the moment is one that appears consistently in films with heady themes: you’ve got your theme, and you’ve got your story, but at present there is not a proper marriage of the two. Every now and then, your story stops so you can explore your theme, then the theme disappears so you can tell a story. Ideally, the theme should be conveyed *through* the story.
This is an issue I found to be apparent in the other work of yours I’ve read, “The Gospel of Eibhlin”. The good news is that this points to the script having a sturdy foundation, which will be reinforced through future drafts, rather than there being a need for a drastic overhaul.
MECHANICS
Mechanics are spot-on; concise and descriptive. My notes here are few and specific:
p. 1: “She slows as she passes a narrow, cobbled street. She slows, hesitates…” the word “slows” is repeated. I’d remove the second occurrence; go straight to “she hesitates”.
p. 10: “She comes back a moment later with a tall glass with water in it”. Or, perhaps, just “a glass of water”. Just an example of times you could be a bit more concise.
p. 28: You use REFLECTION in the mini-slugline, which suggests that all on screen is IN the reflection “universe”, but then under the slugline you state that Caroline (presumably in the ordinary universe) watches the reflection. A bit confusing.
p. 47: You neglect to ever give Samuel’s age, or Evanglina’s.
p. 62: “In [h]is ambulance jacket.”
p. 72, et al: There seems to be a formatting issue (perhaps with your word processing software?) which is causing the word “cliché” to print improperly.
p. 86, you say her name is “Evangeline”, but for the rest of the script, you say “Evangelina”.
p. 110, FYI, Shakespeare did not say “Tis better to have loved and lost…” That was Lord Tennyson.
CONCEPT (4 - Good)
The wish-fulfillment afforded by the premise is the script’s biggest selling point. You also do a good job to not get hung up on the sci-fi/fantastical implications or origins of this conceit: it simply exists, and attempting to delve into the particulars of how and why it works would do a disservice to your story. It’s a fantastic concept.
For a ROMANTIC COMEDY.
You have this listed as drama/mystery/suspense/romance. I’m sorry if it offends you to hear it, but this story is pretty plainly a rom-com. The meet-cute, the professional woman forced to balance her romantic and professional lives, the funny mom, the sassy/dumpy best friend, and the numerous comic misunderstandings (e.g. the brazenly-comedic humping mix-up with Caroline’s mother on page 38) are all clear tropes of the genre.
While things take a dramatic turn with the revelation that Samuel Connor is a violent rapist (!), this happens WAY too late (nearly page 90) for it to function as setting the tone. Instead, it causes an awkward tonal shift, like if the romantic interest in NEVER BEEN KISSED kidnapped and tortured Drew Barrymore in the last 10 minutes of the film. The plot turns involved with this detour honestly are more difficult to swallow than a magic mirror. I’ll speak more on this under STORY.
It feels like towards the end of the story, you try to force things into becoming these other genres, but it just doesn’t work. I think you need to accept what the script is, rather than trying to twist it into something it’s not.
If you DO intend for this story to function as one or both of these genres, there will need to be some substantial changes from the ground up, mostly concerning the STAKES and the protagonist’s internal or external GOAL:
-In a drama, more than the protagonist’s romantic life must be at stake: it must be her emotional well-being, possibly even her soul. Much more emphasis must be placed on if the character will overcome her debilitating inner demons and flaws, and much less on if she ends up with the right guy at the end. We need to see that her way of living is somehow empty, in such a way that she MUST change. Caroline is flawed, sure, but she’s completely functional. There’s no pressing need for her to change. Plus, your happy ending is that she gets the guy, NOT that she becomes a better person.
-In a mystery/suspense, there (obviously) needs to be a mystery. Not only this, but uncovering the truth must be the crux of the story, which the protagonist actively pursues.
Suspense is all about what you keep hidden from the audience/reader. The only mystery in the script is where the mirror came from, and the protagonist is never concerned with uncovering this. Additionally, there’s nothing that the reader/audience needs to know that you don’t spell out.
Look at “Frequency”, another movie featuring two realities or a sort: Jim Caviezel’s character, a sullen, embittered detective, communicates with his father 30 years in the past. At some point between these two timelines, Jim’s mother was killed, and the murderer was never caught. Uncovering the mystery is the goal both he and his father push towards.
Frequency also serves as a heartwarming drama about father/son relationships, but the mystery concerning the murder, and the very real danger in apprehending the murderer, make it a mystery/suspense script.
Not sure how movie ratings work across the pond, but here in the States you can use the word “fuck” ONCE before earning a Restricted rating (anyone under 17 not admitted without an adult), and that instance can’t be in reference to the sexual act. This drastically reduces your potential audience. It’s certainly not the kind of language one expects to hear in a romantic comedy.
It’s also kind of high on the list of curse words over here, and definitely does not jibe with the fun, comedic tone of the majority of the script.
The inclusion of Shakespeare is inspired; just know that you risk losing some people with the Bard’s flowery speech. He’s a bit esoteric. Watch out for those scenes with extended Shakespearean dialogue.
STORY (4 - Good)
The story here is good for the most part, but it’s way too minimal. It’s not surprising that this is based on a short story, because much of the script feels stretched out unnaturally. The magic mirror is introduced almost immediately on page 2, yet it’s not until page 33 or so that it actually has some effect on the story: Caroline finally sees that her life could have been (a little bit) nicer, causing her to (kind of) doubt her decision.
For those first 30 pages, the mirror may as well not even exist. This is a problem, because all that occupies those pages is Caroline dating and going to work (and expositing your script’s themes), which is ordinary. Why would you introduce the element that makes your story unique, and then practically ignore it? You’ve got the potential for some great CONFLICT in the concept, and you need to bring it to light.
Even after you bring the mirror into play, it doesn’t do enough to create actual conflict. Caroline goes on a date, comes home, then says “I wonder what other me is doing right now”, watches the mirror with halfhearted curiosity, then goes about her business. It doesn’t affect any of the decisions she makes, impact her mood, or anything.
You need more conflict; more reversals. Right now, both the real world and the mirror world pretty much proceed for long periods exactly as you’d expect, and don’t have any impact on the other. Both worlds should have effective reversals.
For example, consider: what if Caroline decides to stay in London (as you’ve written), but she’s kind of depressed about it (rather than having “never felt so happy”). She fears she may have made the wrong decision, and her preoccupation with that thought affects her relationship with Ryan (CONFLICT).
But one day, she looks in the mirror and she sees: her mirror-self, clothes ripped, face muddy, purse empty, the obvious victim of a mugging. Further looks in the mirror reveal just how difficult things are going for Mirror-Caroline: the landlord is a jerk, her neighbors’ loud love-making keeps her up at night, the one guy she actually tried to bring back to her place has a tattoo of an evil clown face on his chest… things are so bad, it looks like she may lose the job anyway (CONFLICT!).
This all gives our Caroline a sense of elation! “A ha! Clearly I made the right choice in staying here!” thinks Caroline. Suddenly she dives into her relationship with Ryan headfirst, no longer doubting herself, fully committed to making it work (a REVERSAL from her previous attitude).
But then, a casual look in the mirror reveals that a dramatic turn occurs… Mirror-Caroline’s boss (Samuel) comes over to discuss her poor performance at work, and when she tells him about it, he has a frank talk with the Landlord to fix that leaky faucet. He brings over a trumpet, and when the wall starts shaking from another love-making session, he blares it loudly, embarrassing the lovers. Mirror-Caroline sees a kindness in Samuel, he has an attraction for her, and at some point they share a kiss (REVERSAL).
Imagine if, more than this, we see that other people’s lives are wonderful in the mirror-reality as well. Mirror-Caroline gets a letter in the mail, which is an invitation to Gillian’s wedding- maybe even a wedding to RYAN- and they both look absurdly happy.
On top of this, our Caroline has been hitting a rocky time with Ryan. He’s constantly breaking dates because of his job’s erratic schedule. He can’t afford to take her to the places she *knows* she could go if she had taken the job.
This is important. You really need to show that Caroline and Ryan are struggling, because it’s something that occurs in ALL relationships, and it’s both unbelievable and one-note that all we see of them is LOVE LOVE LOVE (there’s no CONFLICT in the relationship). The one time you show some friction existing between them is in a random, silent fight during a montage, which feels like a cheat. Let them argue over something real, something that stems from *character*, and let the audience/reader experience it. Hell, even after Caroline dumps Ryan, he’s willing to take her back (though he gives the weak admonition “be sure you really want to be with me if you call”).
This is more of a logistical thing, but you may want to consider writing something into the script to differentiate the look of the two Carolines. This is an easy fix: something as simple as a conversation between Caroline and Gillian, where Caroline promises that if she goes the America, the first thing she’ll do is cut/dye her hair.
Bringing Samuel into our Caroline’s world is a great move, and a very interesting development. While I don’t agree with his characterization, and I think the late-story revelations about the character are a bit contrived, his showing up is a great moment.
Considering that the script deals so much with the importance of choices, you make decisions too easy for Caroline. When Caroline is in a wonderful relationship with Ryan, it’s *obvious* that the “right” decision is to stay with him and be faithful. When her boss brazenly comes on to her like a sex-fiend, it’s *obvious* she should rebuff his advances. Seek to create more dilemmas for Caroline, where the right answer isn’t obvious; more like the first decision that kicks off the story: should she stay with Ryan, gaining love but losing a once-in-your-life business offer? Or should she take the opportunity and lose Ryan forever? If Samuel is just charming (rather than an overbearing dick) and Caroline feels a genuine connection with him, does she pursue it? Or stay loyal to Ryan?
This will make both your story and your character more interesting. For instance: the mirror showing on page 68 that Caroline’s life would be happy if she’d stayed with Ryan makes things too easy. What would really be tragic (and stem from CHARACTER) is if the mirror revealed that as wonderful as Mirror-Caroline’s life was, Mirror-Caroline still constantly wonders about what her life *could* have been.
Imagine a reveal where Carline goes to the mirror and sees… Mirror-Caroline, staring right back at her. Both have been looking in their own “what if?” mirrors, both ruining what they have for want of what they *could* have, and both are unhappy. It shows that the problem isn’t Caroline’s circumstances, it’s Caroline. The only way her life will improve is if she changes.
The story takes a real problematic turn around page 85. Besides the fact that it’s just not the right tone, Caroline investigating and confirming that Samuel Connor is a womanizer and rapist has *nothing* to do with what the story has been about to this point. Outwitting him and sending him to jail is not emotionally satisfying, because it is not the culmination of the story. It’s an unnecessary detour.
Plus, it strains credulity. Caroline just walks on up to a major celebrity’s front door (at a MANSION, no less) with ease? Caroline then walks in and proceeds to question this woman who she has never met, a woman who is trained to avoid revealing personal information, a woman who is constantly scrutinized in the public eye? This woman spills her guts to this random Brit, admitting that her ex-boyfriend, who is also wealthy and powerful, beat and raped her?!?! There’s no way. Even non-celebrities wouldn’t be this forthcoming.
The ending to this story needs to be seriously re-thought. Samuel Connor is not the antagonist here, and transforming him into a rapist won’t make him one. The true sources of antagonism should be coming from Ryan, and from Caroline’s own flaws. It’s these obstacles which must be overcome. As it stands, Caroline does nothing to earn Ryan back, especially after how shittily she’s treated him, so the happy ending doesn’t feel genuine.
The reveal of Ryan’s “other woman” being his sister is another example of making things too easy. It’s also rather cliché. Make Caroline face the repercussions of her actions; force her to atone for her own sins. Ryan is a human being with his own desires; why would he not move on?
CHARACTER (3 - Average)
One excellent thing about your characters is how few of them there are. You get a lot of mileage out of the few that you have, meaning that (almost) each of them feels distinct, and serves a very specific purpose to the script.
Caroline and Ryan’s chemistry is well-written and believable; actors worth their salt will have no problem bring their attraction to life.
The only issue with Caroline is really more an issue of structure (because, as McKee states, character IS structure). You don’t give the reader much chance to get to know Caroline and the ordinary world she inhabits before she picks up her magic mirror. For this moment to really work, we need to know who she is, what she wants, and how the mirror offers her something she wants/needs.
The most obvious solution would be for Caroline to be somewhat indecisive and/or non-committal. Her later decisions seem to reflect this idea, but because of how stretched-out so much of the first act is (in particular), it’s a bit tough to tell if this is your intention.
There’s also this apparent thread about her only “reflecting” on things, never regretting them… she keeps claiming that she never, ever regrets things (which is plainly untrue, as you write her as showing remorse after decisions). Then she arcs and admits that she regrets how she treated Ryan. I don’t really get what kind of statement this arc is meant to express. “Regret is good”?
If she instead begins wishy-washy, constantly obsessed with how things *could* be, then learns that she needs to live in the life she’s got, not concerning herself with “what if?”s, it expresses the message “live your life without regret”, which is much stronger. She can still regret hurting Ryan, but she owns up to her own decisions, both her successes and her mistakes, and she lives her life based on those actions, without wasting time wondering how things could have gone.
Achieving this message requires some reworking of the story, though; particularly, she needs to directly confront her own wishy-washy nature (not confront a rapist).
Gillian could use a bit more personality. As I stated, she’s basically a trope of scripts like this, but what about the character is going to make an actress want to play her? She feels like a supporting character in someone else’s story. Even though that’s exactly what she is, she can’t *feel* like she is, and she certainly doesn’t believe that of herself. What does Gillian want? Does she have any desires of her own? She seems to mostly be a sounding board.
Touching on structure again, but Gillian is an excellent opportunity for you to develop your B-story. Imagine if she was stuck in the past, constantly lamenting about this one particular guy, her “one who got away”. Or maybe when she was really young, she got pregnant, and she gave the child up for adoption, and constantly brings it up. Or maybe she had a lucrative modeling career which was just about to take off, and she gave it up to do whatever the hell she and Caroline do (you need to make this clear, by the way… how unspecific her job is feels phony. Though it’s possible you stated it and I just missed it). The b-story would provide an oblique means for you to explore your themes.
This b-story is sort-of the function held by Caroline’s mother, with her traveling magician story. This comes too late to serve as a proper b-story though.
Gillian also reads as older than 28. Because she doesn’t appear to have a life of her own (because she only appears to support Caroline), she comes off like Caroline’s unattractive/kinda dim-witted friend who has no luck with men or work, so she gets vicarious enjoyment from Caroline.
Going back to that “(almost)” up at the beginning of the CHARACTER section, Pauline and Gillian aren’t different enough in function. Pauline has a very fun personality, and Gillian is affable enough, but essentially, both characters are only there to listen to Caroline and offer advice when she needs it. Consider putting one or the other of them (NOT both) in a more antagonizing position. Perhaps Pauline is critical of Caroline’s perceived lack of success in love and career. Perhaps Gillian is incredibly successful, and Caroline secretly envies her; they’re more “frenemies” than enemies.
Ryan is a nice character, and frequently exhibits the kind of qualities that will make a female audience swoon. Unfortunately, he frequently reads as though he was written by a woman, for some strange reason…
This is mostly stuff in DIALOGUE, but in your next draft, keep in mind: men, even ones as sensitive and poetic as Ryan, are rarely open and expressive about their feelings. When hurt, they don’t admit it, *especially* to the one that hurt them; they’re more likely to become cold and dismissive than explain how they feel. When there’s a chance they’re about to get some action, there are few things that will distract them, particularly that the girl’s mascara is running (page 36)! And I sincerely doubt any male lead actor in a rom-com will want to be seen by female audiences “holding back tears”. A romantic drama, perhaps. But not in this script.
Samuel is way too over the top. He drools all over Caroline like a gross American Pepe Le Pew, and it’s not charming, it’s creepy and cartoonish. He sucks on her fingers and calls her delicious, for Pete’s sake! Strongly consider letting him and Caroline share a genuine, natural chemistry; this makes the drama and the dilemma for Caroline stronger.
It should go without saying that the woman-beating rapist aspect of the character should be dropped.
One last note: it’s great that you allow Caroline to make some bad decisions. Her choosing Samuel over Ryan is one such bad decision, which can make for good drama. But the fact that her life with Ryan is so perfect, yet she still leaves him for this molester-ish creeper just makes her come off as naïve, stupid, and heartless. Add hardship to her relationship with Ryan, and real chemistry to her relationship with Samuel.
STRUCTURE (3 - Average)
Adding conflict will punch up the structure of your script. Structure isn’t simply about hitting plot points on certain pages; it’s about turning scenes and increasing tension.
Scenes constantly feel like they are placed in the script just to deliver some bit of information to the audience, or to set up a later event. They set out to accomplish something, then they accomplish that thing, and that’s it. This can’t be. Every scene must turn, sending the story in a new and unexpected direction from how we entered it.
As an example, the scene on page 46 begins with Caroline upset, then ends with her explaining why she’s upset (she had plans with Ryan, which she has to cancel to have dinner with Samuel).
Instead, DRAMATIZE. Begin the scene with Ryan (or Caroline) already having bought the tickets. Caroline walks into the room, in a good mood, talking on the phone with the man she loves. Then Gillian asks “Thankless said to tell you to check your email as soon as you got in.” She checks, and her face falls. She has to cancel her plans with Ryan, right there. We get to hear his disappointment and frustration.
The scene began heading one way (a romantic night with Ryan, which is positive), then switched direction (a boring work dinner, which is negative).
Next scene, Caroline is in a foul mood (negative), until Surprise! Her dinner is with charming-and-not-a-rapist Samuel Connor III (positive)!
Any scene that doesn’t turn like this either needs to be dramatized, or else removed. A “scene” such as on page 55 where Caroline just tells Gillian what the audience already knows is unnecessary.
You have good knowledge of story beats and Archplot structure, so there’s not much to say about the overall story structure. But the structure of individual scenes needs some work.
DIALOGUE (3 - Average)
People speak because they want something. They may want to be understood, or to understand; they may want to reveal their knowledge to impress someone, or reveal their ignorance to show their humility.
People don’t ever speak in order to convey the themes of the story they’re in, because people don’t KNOW that they’re in a story. If you want to hear what it sounds like when characters sit around openly discussing the movie’s themes, go watch the crappy Matrix sequels.
You’ve got scenes where just this happens (23, 31, 73, etc.), and they need to be reworked.
Speak to any actor worth her salt, and she’ll tell you that before performing a scene, she asks herself “what does my character *want* in this scene? What does she do to get it?” The answer to this needs to be strong, and primal; it can’t be “she wants to answer the questions asked her”. It should be “she wants to show everyone in the room that she’s smarter than they are.”
You write good dialogue. It flows well and feels natural. *Until* someone in your script starts talking about the story’s themes. Then they start to feel like your own voice being shoved into the script, hijacking the characters for your own reasons.
Look at the conversation between Caroline and Ryan during their date on page 23.
Caroline: “Do you think that it’s possible for someone to manipulate their own destiny? Or will what’s already meant to happen, happen anyway?”
Why does she ask this question? Because she’s a bit drunk, and she’s concerned that she’s made a bad choice accepting the L.A. job. She asks because she *wants* the affirmation of hearing “yes, you have the power and ability to change your fate.” This is great. A little on-the-nose, but it’s okay, cuz she’s drunk.
Then Ryan responds “I believe in free choice over fate. Nothing is written in the stars. We constantly make choices, every day, and each choice has bearing on the next.”
Why does he answer this way? Because that’s the theme you want to convey. That’s exactly how the scene reads, so there’s no conflict or drama or subtext, which is a problem.
Ryan is a man on a date. He’s trying to have romance this woman, and she’s brooding and acting distracted, apparently not having a good time, since she’s going on about fate and free choice and junk.
What does he want? He wants to seduce Caroline. No, not “make her have a good time” not “let her fall in love with me”, SEDUCE (*strong* choices). What would he say to do that?
Maybe:
Ryan takes Caroline’s hand. “Fate didn’t bring you here tonight. Choice did. I chose to ask you out. You chose to accept. This moment, we choose to be here with each other.”
Caroline smiles.
Ryan: “And now, I’m choosing to buy you another drink.”
Caroline (laughing): “Oh no!”
This still conveys the theme you mean to. But it’s also apparent that Ryan says what he says to get Caroline’s mind off those heady topics, and get her invested in the date (and hopefully get some action afterwards). Because these two want different things (Caroline wants existential understanding… Ryan wants to get laid), it creates CONFLICT, which makes the scene a helluva lot more interesting.
Make sense?
On the topic of Ryan, his lines frequently sound inappropriate to the character. He can be sensitive, but don’t make him sound like a p*#$y. On page 36, he sees something in the mirror and exclaims “Oh my God!”, revealing he has a grey hair. I get the joke, but it could be just as easily done with him staring into the mirror and frowning like he sees something, then plucking the hair. And he doesn’t come off as effeminate.
His revelation that he loves Caroline on page 44 feels trite. It’s a *huge* deal for a man to say “I love you”, ESPECIALLY when he’s the first to say it. Dramatize this. Keep the poem, and Caroline’s teasing, but try letting him actually get frustrated (conflict!). Something like:
Ryan: “Thou art more lovely and more temperate—“
Caroline: “You’ve no idea how bloody temperate I am!”
Ryan: “Rough winds do shake the darling buds of May/And summer’s lease—“
Caroline: “You know he wrote that for a man?”
Ryan: “We don’t know that. Besides, it doesn’t matter; what matters is that the writer speaks of love. ‘And summer’s lease doth have too short—‘”
Caroline: “Would it bother you it was meant for a fella?”
Ryan: “Could you just be quiet for two seconds and let me say this?”
She looks surprised.
Ryan: “I love you. There, I’ve said it. Jeez.”
Caroline: “I love you, too, Ryan.”
A fun, comic turn (again, scenes need to turn on conflict), and Ryan doesn’t seem like such a putz.
On page 54, after basically being dumped, he says to the woman who just dumped him “I’ve wanted to spend all my time with you.” She’s already got all the power; why is he giving her even more by allowing himself to sound pathetic? And then, at the end of the conversation, he does even worse! “I’m still available if you change your mind, but don’t toy with my emotions.” Forgive me, but this guy sounds like a little bitch.
This scene would play a lot more effectively with Ryan saying very little, allowing the actor to convey his hurt nonverbally.
I mentioned it before, but seriously: a man about to make out with a woman does NOT care that her mascara is running. I can’t think of a time I’ve ever heard any (straight) man utter the phrase “your mascara is running.”
Mrs. Thankless seems to do nothing but spout exposition.
Cut way back on the “fuck”s.
OVERALL (3 - Average)
I haven’t written a full review in a while, and I’m obviously over-compensating; I’m pretty sure this is my longest Triggerstreet review ever.
I hope you get some good use out of it, and look forward to the next draft. The script has plenty going for it already, and tucking away your theme and allowing the characters and events to be true to themselves will go a good way towards improving it. read -
A review of Pride Of Lyons (2012)by olufemi on 03/06/2013Comedy/dramas are always a bit difficult to gauge in screenplay form (at least, they are for me). It’s tough to decipher just how funny versus how dramatic the writer intends the script to be; all comedies have elements of drama, just as all dramas have elements of comedy, and when the two are intentionally blended, the effectiveness will largely be dependent on the execution/delivery... Comedy/dramas are always a bit difficult to gauge in screenplay form (at least, they are for me). It’s tough to decipher just how funny versus how dramatic the writer intends the script to be; all comedies have elements of drama, just as all dramas have elements of comedy, and when the two are intentionally blended, the effectiveness will largely be dependent on the execution/delivery.
Which is just my bit of a disclaimer to state that I could be missing your intentions with this screenplay. It’s well-written, to be sure. While I think there are things that could be done to elevate it, it could be that my suggestions conflict with the style and tone you’re shooting for.
Even so, there are some aspects of storytelling that are pretty much universal, and I think these elements could still stand to receive some extra attention in PRIDE OF LYONS (heh heh… “Lyons”), so not all my advice will be for naught.
MECHANICS
Spot on (seriously, thank you). I’ll not waste your time going through this, save for a few very minor issues:
-Page 7: “…hands on his shoulders like he was FIXING him in cement”. I can’t picture what you’re trying to describe here, particularly because of the verb in caps. On first read, I though you meant he was running his hands on his shoulders, as if he were encasing the man in cement (?!). On further reflection, perhaps you mean he’s pushing down on his shoulders, as if he was trying to set the man’s feet in cement?
Either way, this could be clearer.
-Page 16: “Groucho”, not “Grouch”.
-Page 21: “hers”, not “her’s”.
CONCEPT
It’s entirely obvious that you either have experience in the worlds of acting and law, or else have done extensive research in them (I’m almost certain you actually do have an acting background; not as certain with the law). The parallels you’ve drawn between the two worlds and the way you have brought them together seamlessly is ingenious.
This is a dynamite concept; the sort that is far smarter than most people will give it credit for, and the sort that gets a potential audience to hear it and say “yeah, I would watch something like that”.
The concept could be strengthened through some bolder story decisions, but still, it’s solid. Top marks.
STORY
Okay, here’s where we step into more critical territory (hopefully constructive, though).
There’s a scene around page 19 that represents all that is great and all that is wrong with the screenplay; it’s almost a microcosm for the story as a whole. Danny is on the stand, acting as witness in a mock trial. When the mock prosecutor (Norman) begins to founder, showing performance jitters, Danny gives him a private pep-talk, and Norman astounds the audience with sudden, newfound confidence.
This is a wonderful scene. The comic turn is exceptionally executed. Yet in this scene, while DANNY is the character who instigates the turn, it’s NORMAN whose actions ACTUALLY TURN THE SCENE. It’s NORMAN who has something at stake in the scene: his competence is in question by his employers, and an antagonist (KRISTIN) stands in the way of his goals. What is at stake for Danny? Not enough. There’s little to no conflict in this scene specifically for him.
This is, as I see it, the biggest problem in the script. There simply is not ever enough at stake for Danny, making it more difficult to care about him; and since Danny is the glue that holds the entire story together, it becomes more difficult to care about the story as well. Considering he’s the protagonist (I assume?), it’s critical that the greatest challenges, and overarching conflict, is tied directly to him.
Look at this scene again. Consider if you established that Danny *needs* this audition to go well. It’s as simple as a scene with Danny asking Bryce “So, what now? Rehearsal?” and Bryce responding “Danny, these aren’t casting directors; they’re lawyers. They’re not really familiar with the idea of calling ‘cut’ during a case.” “So… no rehearsal?” “Just… just get it right the first time.”
Not trying to write your script for you; trying to convey my meaning. It’s established now that Danny’s got one chance to make his mark; otherwise he’s lost the job. So now, when Norman starts stuttering and tripping over himself, the reader/audience isn’t thinking “this poor guy is a mess”. We see Danny’s frustration and desperation at this dufus who is mucking everything up, and we’re thinking “This clumsy dork is ruining everything! Danny has got to do something to fix this!” That’s what the story is about, after all: the protagonist experiencing obstacles that prevent him from attaining his goals, and the protagonist developing new ways to overcome those obstacles.
Make sense?
Extending this thinking to the entirety of the script: what happens to Danny if he can’t teach these schlubs to be more effective lawyers? Nothing particularly bad. He pretty much goes on the way he’s living.
But what if you established in those first 10-15 pages that Danny is on his last legs? You do a fine job of showing how pathetic he is (which is incredibly well done, by the way… very strong characterization), but there’s never a sense that he *must* change, OR ELSE. A landlord who demands this and the last two months’ rent, otherwise Danny’s out on the street. Or, even better, a sympathetic ally who has been allowing Danny to stay with him/her, but can’t do it any longer for whatever reason (you could combine this idea with the Monica character… he could be staying with her, but it turns out she’s pregnant, and wants to try raising a family with her husband, so he has to go. Or something).
You need SOMETHING to make it clear that Danny MUST take action, and that if he can’t keep this new job, he’ll be broke, homeless or worse. Worse how? Maybe he’s got a friend who can offer him a cushy nine-to-five job as a telemarketer or some such thing… something that might seem like not a big deal to most people, but that we would understand would be to Danny (an artist and an actor, through-and-through) effectively selling his soul. This would seem to fit pretty perfectly with your story’s themes (if I understand them correctly).
If not made physical, the emotional stakes for Danny need to be much clearer. We need the sense that Danny is such a despicable person, on such a self-destructive path, that he MUST change. I hope you won’t take offense to comparisons between your script and THE MIGHTY DUCKS (cheesy, I know, but it’s a fine script; there’s a reason it connected with audiences and spawned sequels), but in the moment when Gordon Bombay is arrested for drunken driving and forced to coach Peewee hockey, it is established just how desperately he need to change, as well as effectively setting up the story’s core concept.
I may bring up that movie again at some point, as (you have to admit) it does share a few similarities with PRIDE OF LYONS. They even both have animal names!
This is largely subjective, but the humor seemed to be tonally erratic at times. Danny’s extramarital dalliances seem rather edgy and adult, but then Van’s over-the-top histrionics feel very broad and family-friendly.
Additional Notes:
-Pps 17, 54, etc. Broad racial/cultural humor like this seems a bit dated on the page. May be dependent on performance.
-P. 65, the overheard restroom conversation is pretty cliché. You can come up with a better means of achieving that this scene does.
-P. 99, hearing Bryce barking was enough for Kristin to know he’s being unfaithful? I don’t understand.
CHARACTER
The script is filled with a wonderful assortment of colorful characters, ready-made for an ensemble cast. Though there are a lot to take in at first, and they don’t do much to distinguish themselves immediately… pretty much all of your characters have rather “whitebread” names, which makes them sort of blend together. Makes sense, since it’s an uptight law firm, I guess, but there are still ways around this. Consider referring to one by a nickname, or by surname, or giving a character an unconventional name… just something to change things up.
This is minor, though. The characters are great. At the head of it all is DANNY (for what it’s worth, I pictured him being played by David Duchovny…), who you do a remarkable job of making him equal parts likeable and deplorable. At least, for the first 30 pages or so.
The biggest issue with the characters is that the supporting characters are so full of life and personality that they steal the spotlight from Danny, who is shunted to the periphery. He seems absent for much of the story, even when he’s onscreen, simply because he doesn’t really seem to be wrestling with anything. Again, this lets the work as a whole sort of lose focus.
Don’t dare tone down your other characters to make Danny stand out; strengthen Danny. Challenge him, and allow that challenge to play out throughout the entire script. In the current draft, once Danny has his class, he seems to be pretty much okay as a person. He has difficulty teaching these uptight lawyers how to act, but that’s all EXTERNAL conflict. What about his INTERNAL conflict?
Gordon Bombay doesn’t really want to coach the Ducks. He *needs* to, for his own personal growth, but he doesn’t know that, and he certainly doesn’t act in a way to consciously facilitate that growth. There’s conflict between him and the kids, yes, but he’s also conflicted internally. He’s reluctant, moody, and frankly a bit pissy, and he does as little as possible to serve his sentence… until he starts to care for the kids. Until he starts dating one kid’s mother. Until he’s forced to confront his old coach, and all the feelings of failure he brings out. We see a gradual arc in him, change brought about through conflict.
Danny, on the other hand, seems fully committed once he starts teaching. He seems to already care about the lawyers’ well-being and performance; not for selfish reasons, but for selfless ones. It feels like he prematurely arcs by page 35.
I think you could strengthen Danny by giving him the opportunity to make more decisions. At times, it feels a bit like he’s just along for the rider, rather than the one driving the story. For example, consider letting it be Danny’s idea to give the lawyers acting lessons, rather than someone else’s suggestion that he resists, then eventually agrees to. This is a bolder decision, and would further solidify Danny as protagonist (especially if you more effectively establish the STAKES driving Danny to this choice).
Van seems problematic. He’s a fun character, but if it’s your intention for this script to be comedy SLASH drama, he makes it pretty difficult to take seriously, as he’s just so damn off-the-wall.
STRUCTURE
The script moves forward at a great pace. Scenes begin only as early as they need to, and end only as late as they need to, making each one incredibly lean. The time-jump on page 3 is a perfect example of efficient storytelling that gives the reader/audience just as much information as they need before moving to the next scene, in a manner that holds our interest.
It’s apparent you’ve paid some good attention to classic Archplot structure; I think the biggest issues with the structure are actually story problems (without the stakes for your protagonist clearly defined, it’s difficult to tell what moment is the “point of no return” for him, or where he experiences his “major setback/dark knight of the soul”, for example).
I would guess that it’s your intention for the event on page 13 to serve as the inciting incident: Bryce tells Danny about his litigation training weekend. I’d argue that the moment that serves as a truer inciting incident is on page 24, where Danny is offered a job. Hear me out: after the first 10-15 pages of setup showing the everyday life of our protagonist, the inciting incident represents the moment that answers the question “what makes today different from every other day?” It’s the event which sets the story in motion.
Danny having the opportunity to have a job for a weekend isn’t what sets this story in motion. It’s easy to imagine that this is part of Danny’s everyday life: finding odd jobs that he does for a short time, but nothing that sticks. The opportunity presented on page 24 is one for a potential *career*, something that could honestly turn his life around.
Point being, it feels like it takes a while for the script to kick into gear and reveal the central conflict. The scenes before this moment on page 24 are well-written, but they begin to feel like excessive set-up. This advice will most likely fall on deaf ears, but I recommend trying to fast-forward things a bit to get the actual job offer on page 15.
Each scene needs to accomplish something. Simply being funny is likely enough for a scene to survive the editing room floor, but a truly great script can make us life while also moving the story forward. The scene between Danny, Monica, and John is wonderful. But does it really change the situation for Danny? Does it tell us anything about the character which we need to know that we don’t already? Does it move us forward to the next scene? Most important, would the story make sense without it? Seek to add relevance to every scene; if you can’t, the scene likely doesn’t need to be in the script.
A few extra notes:
-By page 91, it still doesn’t really feel like there’s a push to the story climax… this push should first appear around the midpoint. Also, Danny’s knowledge that he’s been set up by Bryce doesn’t seem to affect anything. So what’s the point of it?
-The intercuts between the courtroom and attempted love-making on page 96 is great, but the chronology of it is confusing. The prosecution rests in the time it takes for Bryce and Kristin to make out a little bit and decide to do it on the desk?
DIALOGUE
Dialogue is for the most part just as it should be. It does a great deal to reveal character, while constantly maintaining the comical tone of the script. You’ve got several great zingers in here… “you could be full of myself” on page 16 is a standout. Great line. You do an awesome job with subtext too, as on page 80 with Brent and Melissa (though I was a little confused as to why they seemed to be working against each other… I thought they were working on the same side?).
If I were to be pernickety, I’d say that comical moments are better conveyed through the dialogue than are the dramatic ones… it makes you seem to be a comedy writer who is trying his hand at some drama.
This isn’t necessarily a bad thing, and again, much of this would come down to performance.
As an example, Bryce and Maggie’s conversation on page 34: “But together they don’t add up to one of you.” “I’d be lost without you.” This reads as kinda schmaltzy; so much so, it sounds ironic and self-aware, rather than actual dialogue between two people, if that makes sense.
The biggest issue with the dialogue (and this is something I used to struggle with) is that characters tend to say each other’s names A LOT. The audience will likely forgive a character awkwardly stating a character’s name the first time, as you’re clearly providing it for the audience’s sake (though this is still exposition, and you should be clever enough as a writer to find better ways to convey it). But after it happens multiple times, it just sounds weird.
Page 10 is a particularly egregious example of “name-dropping”:
“His mind is made up, Kristin.” “Hey, Kris.” “Give it up, Brent.” “Hi Brent.” (these two references to Brent are actually one line after the other) “Yeah, hi, Melissa”.
This is minor, and an easy fix when you’re keeping an eye out for it.
OVERALL
David, you know this script is good. Give it another layer or two of polish, and I have no doubt this script will be ready for sale.
Best of luck making that happen, and thanks for the opportunity to read this. Hope my review help towards perfecting it. read -
A review of Braceby olufemi on 02/14/2013Welcome to Triggerstreet, Matthew, and as you seem a pretty new writer (based on your profile), welcome to screenwriting. Let me start off by saying that your sense of imagination is prodigious, which is great. While you can hone skill through practice, raw creative ability is something you must be born with. Which means there’s plenty of potential for you to go far in screenwriting... Welcome to Triggerstreet, Matthew, and as you seem a pretty new writer (based on your profile), welcome to screenwriting.
Let me start off by saying that your sense of imagination is prodigious, which is great. While you can hone skill through practice, raw creative ability is something you must be born with. Which means there’s plenty of potential for you to go far in screenwriting.
BRACE reads precisely like the work of a talented amateur who hasn’t yet learned to focus his imagination into something palatable for an audience. Some issues with tone and characterization, and most unforgivably mechanics (seriously, there’s no excuse) impair what would otherwise be a fun read.
MECHANICS
By “mechanics”, I’m referring to the spelling, grammar, and format of your script.
I’m becoming more and more of a hardass on this. In the age of contextual spell-checks, and free software that automatically puts your script into the proper format, there is absolutely no excuse for mechanics as poor as yours are here.
A script should begin with “FADE IN:”. This is what signifies the picture coming up.
Learn to pay attention to object order when writing. This is difficult to teach; it’s something you should develop naturally from reading and writing. As an example, look at your opening image:
“The arizona desert. The sun beats down on 5 cowboys, 4 on horseback and one on his hands and knees, head against the railway track [sic]”.
There are many things wrong with this sentence (and note, this is the very first sentence in the script, meaning it’s making a pretty bad first impression): You don’t need to tell us we’re in the Arizona desert again, when it’s already in the slugline. “arizona” should be capitalized. The numbers 5 and 4 should be spelled out as words. There should be a period at the end of the sentence.
But the bugbear that gets me is object order, which occurs throughout the script. You say that a man is on his hands and knees, and only *then* reveal that there’s a railway track in the scene. This is backwards… I certainly didn’t picture railway tracks when you described the scene, but now you’re disrupting my initial mental image, which makes the script a tougher read. You also describe it as THE railway track, rather than A railway track, as if it’s already been established.
Generally, when describing a scene, go from large/general, to small/specific. You wouldn’t open a scene with “He runs for dear life, exhausted. He pushes through the numerous stalks in the cornfield.” When you read the sentence, did you imagine a cornfield after the first sentence? Of course not.
Describe the location, describe who’s there, describe what they’re doing.
Your punctuation needs some serious attention. I shouldn’t have to tell you this, but here it is: periods come at the end of a sentence; for some reason you’ve omitted just about all of them. Commas come when there is a pause, or before addressing a person, such as “I’ve just about had enough of you, Geoffrey.”, or “This is a stick-up, ladies and gentlemen.” (also note there should be a hyphen between “stick” and “up”).
Apostrophes (‘) are NEVER used to pluralize (p.1 “…scarves over face’s…”), and NEVER used to change tense (p. 1 “Mama’s head snap’s around…”).
You need to establish time period and geographical location immediately, probably using a SUPER. Yes, I get it’s in the “Old West”, but 1849 San Francisco is a very different “Old West” from 1866 Atlanta. Being more specific will make your story feel more genuine as well.
Capitalize a character’s name upon introduction, and above their dialogue. That’s it. There’s no need to capitalize their name every time it’s used, especially in dialogue.
I’m not a proofreading service. You’ve got many, many issues with mechanics, and I’m not going to list every occurrence. A few are listed below, but seriously: there’s no excuse.
-“Are you telling me lies…” should be Mama’s line.
-“Dives up” is contradictory. “Jumps up”, “springs up”, “darts up”, or replace “up” in any of those with “to her feet”. Or “launches to her feet.” It can be said many ways. But not “dives up”.
-The word is “taut”, not “taught”. And it’s the wrong word choice anyway. You could say he becomes visibly “tense”, but it’d be better to just say “he tenses”.
-Know the difference between “you’re” and “your”. Also “they’re” and “there”. And it’s “should have”, not “should of”.
-You must introduce characters properly.
-Don’t write what the audience can’t see, such as that “the dead man is his brother”. Unless someone says it, the audience couldn’t possibly know.
CONCEPT
“Two gunslingers get more than they bargained for when they rescue a mysterious girl”
This is a fun idea, and fine foundation for a story. It’s a well-trodden trail, but that doesn’t mean it’s not worth treading again.
Unfortunately, this logline seems to be trying a bit hard to be mysterious, and it comes off as clichéd and nondescript. What’s special about these gunslingers? What’s special about this girl? What are the gunslingers going up against for two hours? Why should your potential audience care?
The biggest problem with your concept is the same problem the script has: everything feels so general. There doesn’t seem to be any sort of established mythology to the world you’ve created; it’s in the Old West (don’t know the year), and there’s some kind of magic that does some kind of something… maybe raise the dead? Give spontaneous intelligence to people? And even these are only revealed in the final ten pages. Yes, we get that it’s not good for the “bad guys” to have power, but what, exactly, is at stake?
Get specific. I didn’t say *detailed* (don’t bog the script down with unnecessary description or exposition), I said “specific”.
A major problem with your story is one of tone. You list this as an action/adventure, but honestly, this story is fantasy; not just because of the magic/mysticism, but because of how far removed your world feels from reality.
The tone of your story *is* action/adventure… the humor is broad, like that of a family comedy. But the violence and language are R-rated.
What is your target audience with this script? Children might accept an “Old West” that is as unspecific and, frankly, inauthentic as the one you create, but they can’t watch a movie with a dozen f-bombs, an attempted rape, and innocent people being cut down bloodily. Adults can appreciate violence and adult language, but they won’t accept it in a story that reads like a bland fairy-tale.
Perhaps it’s simply gone over my head, but I really don’t understand why the story is called “Brace”.
STORY
What engages our emotional involvement in a story is CONFLICT. Despite what many assume, conflict is not the same thing as violence. Conflict occurs when a character pursues a specific goal, and something or someone else stands in the way of his attaining that goal.
A character sets out to attain his goal, something prevents it, so he must find another way of pursuing his goal. These changes in tactics are what lead to the creations of scenes, sequences, acts, and finally, a complete story.
You’ve done a great job in the script of taking the characters (and the audience) on a wild ride, to numerous locations and events. This is absolutely needed in an adventure script.
The problem is that to make these events satisfying, they must be brought about through CONFLICT. Too often it feels that the characters are going to a location, not because they have story-relevant reasons for going there, but because the author wants them to go there. Casey and Frank feel like they’re being pushed by the story, rather than being the ones *driving* the story, making things happen.
A big reason for this is that the characters don’t have a strong goal. What do they want? To protect Azia? This isn’t a strong goal. It’s not *pro*active; it’s *re*active (they can only act to protect her when someone else is putting her in harm… meaning it’s the other person instigating action, not them). It doesn’t have a clear finish line, and there’s not enough at stake if they fail (at least, nothing that is well established).
In the current draft, it feels like Gabe captures/chases Casey and Frank, so they escape and run away, repeatedly. In the next draft, try to make it that Casey and Frank are running to get Azia home, so Gabe chases them to try to stop them. It seems like not a big deal, but it’s actually major. Casey and Frank should be aware of where they’re trying to get to, and there should be immediate stakes if they fail. Imagine a scene where Azia points on a map to where she needs to go, trying to convey it to Casey and Frank. When they ask what happens if she doesn’t get there, she tells them she’ll die. Or that “Dark One rises.” Or “All dies.” Or something, whatever! It just needs to be laid out plainly.
For this to work, you need to have better motivation for your two characters. I get that Frank is a good guy, and that he has feelings for Azia, but this isn’t enough. If he just wants to be with her, he could find a secluded spot to take her and hide there forever (again: this wouldn’t be PROACTIVE). There needs to be a reason that he thinks he MUST help her get where she needs to go. I’ll expound on that under STORY.
Once you’ve established your characters and their goals, and what stands in their way of attaining it, you must let your characters overcome the obstacles before them. In BRACE, you do a good job of apparently stacking the odds against your main characters, which is positive. They’ve got to deal with the law, plus Surly’s gang, plus Gabe and his men.
Unfortunately, far too often, you remove obstacles for Frank and Casey, rather than letting them work their way out of them. Sometimes it’s through story contrivances (p. 25, Gabe’s men take them hostage, but don’t even bother to tie them up. P. 39, Indians capture them and threaten them with weapons… and then reveal that all they want to do is talk, and end up befriending them and letting them go). Other times, other characters save them (Wei on page 26. Mr. Sandbach on 64. The tribesmen on page 89).
Either way, it weakens your characters and weakens your story.
You could stand to do a bit more research into your chosen era. Not EVERY person in the Old West was a cowboy; it’s a little silly in your opening scene that there’s a train-full of gun-toting gunslingers. Trains were still a relatively new and expensive technology at the time (it’s also silly that with a train full of armed men, they allow TWO armed men to hold them all up). It’d probably more make sense for the train to be filled with wealthy gentlemen and ladies.
There being a prophecy about Frank and Casey saving everyone is kinda cheesy, and pretty cliché. It’s been done to death.
You really shouldn’t introduce zombies in the last 5 minutes of your movie.
CHARACTER
There is some strong characterization on display in BRACE. Frank and Casey are very different characters, which makes for some fun interaction. Gabe is appropriately slimy and evil.
It’s also nice how many different racial/cultural backgrounds are represented throughout the script, which I’m sure was intentional.
The difference between characterization and character is that character is only revealed through CONFLICT. Frank is a thief: this is characterization. When Frank sees a woman about to be raped (CONFLICT), he intercedes and protects her: this is character.
Seek to provide more moments like this one. Past this initial decision, Frank and Casey rarely make tough choices in threatened situations. Also, you don’t do enough to provide reasonable motivation for their actions. Why is Casey along for the ride at all, for instance? In the current script, there doesn’t appear to be a reason.
Imagine if Casey was only helping because he believed there was priceless treasure to be found where Azia comes from. How loyal is he to this characterization? Is it who he truly is? We would find out if Gabe offered Casey money to betray his friend… CONFLICT. What if he agrees to betray Frank. What does that say about him as a character? Does he do it because he only cares about money? Or is it because he wants to give Frank a means of getting out of this crazy adventure by splitting the money with him?
Or let’s say he chooses to stick by his friend, not betray him… why? Is it because at heart, his loyalty outweighs his greed? Or is it because he is so dependent upon Frank, he wouldn’t know what to do with himself without him?
These are the character depths you can plumb when you do more work establishing motivations, and offer the opportunity to make CHOICES in the face of CONLFICT.
You also should consider allowing your main characters to arc; they seem to end the story as the same people (internally) that they were at the beginning, which is stagnant. An arc is often accomplished through some internal flaw that the characters must overcome. What if Frank failed to save the love of his life some years ago, and he’s never forgiven himself for it? This would provide motivation for helping Azia, as well as providing a compelling flaw.
No person is all good, or all evil. Gabe comes off as just the evil just for the sake of being evil. *Why* is he so vicious? Does he loath what he perceives as weakness? Does he crave power, and think that being violent demonstrates his dominance? Remember in THE MATRIX where Agent Smith takes out his earbud and has that awesome monologue with the drugged-up Morpheus? “I hate this place. This zoo. This prison. This reality, whatever you want to call it, I can’t stand it any longer. It's the smell, if there is such a thing. I feel saturated by it. I can taste your stink and every time I do, I fear that I've somehow been infected by it.” What a great bad-guy speech, and it makes us understand what motivates Smith; why he wants so desperately to destroy Neo and the other redpills.
Seriously, Frank and Casey run away a lot. Make them more proactive, and don’t make every person they meet so willing to assist them.
STRUCTURE
You’re pretty new to screenwriting, so I’m going to assume you’re unfamiliar with STRUCTURE, which is one of the most oft-misunderstood concepts for amateur writers.
Structure is NOT the mechanics of the script, like spelling, grammar, format. We’ve already gone over that stuff.
Structure IS the construction of your story. Back under STORY, I mentioned a character experiencing opposition to attaining his goals, and needing to change tactics. This opposition, the way things go differently from what the character expected, is called “turning” a scene (which is based on: you guessed it, conflict).
Stories are about change. Effective structure features scenes which effectively “turn”, using them to construct sequences that change the story direction in larger ways, which construct ACTS that change story direction in major ways. Three acts (in the classical format) form your entire story, which represents an enormous, irreversible change.
You’ve actually got a pretty good, natural grasp on structure. The flaws in your structure are the flaws in your story: a neglect to firmly establish the goal and stakes. You need to test your protagonists, and allow them to overcome the obstacles in their path. I’d also recommend adding a time-crunch; at no point in the script does it feel like the protagonists must succeed *right now*. Rather than there being a sense of urgency or immediacy, things feel rather lackadaisical, as if if the heroes don’t succeed now, they can always just wait and try again some other time.
Below is some info on structure.
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The FIRST ACT of a story establishes the characters and the world which they inhabit, and sets up the conflict that the protagonist will be dealing with throughout the story. The act generally comprises somewhere between 25-33% of the overall story.
At 10%, something occurs which throws the character’s life out-of-whack. It disrupts his status-quo in a way that, at the end of the act, he MUST do something to right it. This event is called the INCITING INCIDENT. I’m going to use “Inception” because it’s so well structured: Cobb fails at his attempt at extraction, earning the ire of his unseen employers (who will probably kill him for failure).
At the FIRST ACT BREAK, the protagonist takes an action to right the imbalance caused by the inciting incident, which puts him in direct opposition with antagonistic forces (this doesn’t mean “bad guys” or “evil ninjas”; it’s forces and/or people that, wittingly or unwittingly, prevent him from attaining what he wants, be they “the guy dating the woman he’s in love with” or “his addictions and fears”).
The character’s action at this break brings us into the SECOND ACT. In the second act, the antagonistic forces increase in power, causing the protagonist to take stronger and stronger action to overcome them. This comes to a head at the MIDPOINT (obviously, around the 50% mark), where the character experiences a major loss, and/or an increase in the STAKES, and/or a “POINT OF NO RETURN.” In Inception, Cobb realizes that if they die in the dream, they die in real life. They need to succeed in their task, and there’s no turning back.
From here, things get significantly worse for our protagonist. This continues until the SECOND ACT BREAK (~67-75%), where it appears that all is lost for the protagonist. The antagonistic forces have won. The protag has given in to addiction or his own flaws or to despair, and it looks like he’ll never attain the goal he had so fervently been seeking (Cobb fails to shoot Mal before she kills Fischer, dooming their quest to plant the idea in his subconscious).
But then, from the ashes, the protagonist looks back on the events preceding this moment, and draws strength from his experiences and the characters he has met, in order to push through. He forms a new plan to attain his goal, and at the CLIMAX (~90%) he has a final showdown with the forces that resist him.
DIALOGUE
There are some fun turns of dialogue in this script. They exchange between Casey and the woman on the train (“Just one, ma’am”) is pretty clever. You also do a good job of giving individual characters strong, unique voices.
There are times when you go a bit overboard. This being a period-piece, it’s necessary for dialogue to sound era-appropriate. “I’ve had enough of that these last few weeks. No offense” doesn’t sound like the language of an Indian in the 1800s.
Gabe often sounds like a parody of a Brit rather than an actual Brit. “They ran into a spot of bother” on page 23, for instance.
The two biggest things to work on in the next draft are avoiding clichéd dialogue (“What more could a man ask for?” “Well would you look at that”), and removing on-the-nose/expository dialogue (pretty much all of page 30, for instance, or page 86). Exposition is a necessary part of any script, but you need to learn to disguise it.
FYI, a movie can say “fuck” once before being rated R, and that use can’t be in reference to the sexual act.
The line on p. 76 (“if I wanted my comeback I’d of wiped it off’ve your momma’s chin!”) is incredibly problematic. Yes, it’s a clever line, but
1. You didn’t write it. You “borrowed” it. It doesn’t sound like dialogue you’d write (because you didn’t), making it stand out.
2. It’s wildly anachronistic, making it sound inappropriate to the era, and making it stand out.
3. It’s contrived and shoe-horned into the scene. So it stands out.
I’m sure you heard the line somewhere and thought “that’s hilarious, I have to put that in a script”, but seriously, it doesn’t belong.
OVERALL
Some really crummy mechanics hinder what could be a fun script. Spend some time making your characters and world feel like they could actually exist, and smooth out those mechanical issues, and you’ll be one step closer to making something a bit more polished. read -
A review of The Carrier (rev.)by olufemi on 10/18/2012My second Villanueva review in as many weeks. Thanks again for the quick read. At the time of writing this, The Carrier already has 68 reviews, making this one number 69 (tee hee!). I suspect that anything I have to say about the script has already been said; that the script’s flaws have been pointed out and corroborated numerous times already. So, just add this one to... My second Villanueva review in as many weeks. Thanks again for the quick read.
At the time of writing this, The Carrier already has 68 reviews, making this one number 69 (tee hee!). I suspect that anything I have to say about the script has already been said; that the script’s flaws have been pointed out and corroborated numerous times already. So, just add this one to the pile, I guess…
“The Carrier” reads as the work of a writer just as talented as the one who wrote “The Angeleno”, but not as mature.
MECHANICS
Good grammar/spelling/format. The few mistakes I noticed are below.
-Page 1: LIES on a table, not LAYS. I know it’s picky, but I only bring it up because it’s an error on the first page.
-Page 6: “HEINZ, 40s, large and rough, blows him away.” Blows him away with what?
-Page 28: It’s unclear from the syntax if Richter is placing bullets in a revolver or Brennan.
-Page 45, 46, 47, 49, 50: The verb “rifle” doesn’t mean what you apparently think it means; it means to “search through” or “rummage”, as you use it on page 94. The word you’re perhaps looking for is “barrel”.
CONCEPT
I just began re-reading Robert McKee’s “Story: Style, Structure, Substance, and the Principles of Screenwriting”. Early in the book, he describes the two kinds of failed screenplays he sees most often. One is what he calls the “personal story bad script”, and the other is the “guaranteed commercial success bad script”.
He describes the latter as one where a hapless protagonist somehow comes into possession of a device that is sought after by numerous characters, many of whom are trying to kill him, with shoot-outs and hair-raising escapes and explosions. And when there isn’t action, there are scenes heavy with dialogue where the character tries to figure out whom he can trust.
“The Carrier” fits this description to a tee.
It’s not that it’s a bad idea. It’s that it’s been done a million times already. The cancer cure aspect throws a unique wrinkle into things, at least, but still: “The Carrier” is doubtful to garner interest on concept alone. Rather, it will take a strong cast and solid advertising.
It’s a little problematic from a marketing standpoint that so many of the characters in the script are so old. Young audiences (the ones most likely to see a movie like this) like young characters.
STORY
The script moves along at a really quick pace, which is great. Part of this is that it reads well, and part of it is that scenes rarely last too long. The script feature numerous well-constructed, high-octane action scenes meant to get the audience’s blood pumping.
But there’s something missing from these action scenes, and the story as a whole: emotional relevance. A fight scene between two characters (such as on page 24, between Keller and Quinn) could feature the most amazing choreography ever committed to film, but the fight will fall flat if we don’t know
-Who the characters are
-Why they’re fighting
-What the fight accomplishes.
The problems with story mostly stem from problems with CHARACTER (which I’ll get into later). Who are we meant to “root for” in this story? What is that person trying to accomplish? What is our emotional anchor? Yes, there’s plenty of action, but what does it MEAN?
Things happen without proper motivation or any sense of logic, leading to it feeling like every character action is just a set-up for action, rather than an organic decision.
Why does a brilliant cellular biologist who has created the cure for cancer destroyed all the data save one copy, especially when he knows there are people who will kill him for it? Why not leak it to EVERYONE?
Why does this doctor go through the remarkably convoluted task of surgically implanting it into some random dude?
Besides which, the idea of performing such a complicated and unnecessary procedure in someone’s apartment without proper equipment- it’s just silly.
For much of the script, the characters’ ultimate GOALS are unclear, meaning the script has no direction. “Survival” is not a strong goal, because it has no definitive finish line.
The story is actually pretty thin. As with “The Angeleno”, the script starts far too early, featuring events that, while kind of interesting, are ultimately unimportant to the narrative. Who cares that Brennen’s girlfriend has been killed? Who cares that Glenda Callini is the speaker at the National Health Association Forum? The movie is about a guy with the cure for cancer surgically implanted in his ass (as silly as that is). Why does it take so long to get to that?
Because it starts so late, there’s not enough time to devote to the meat of the story.
This story needs to be streamlined. Determine WHOSE story it is, first and foremost. Then refrain from deviating from that person’s story. Provide reasonable motivations for every character in the script.
Taker’s gun running out of ammo at one point, then jamming at another, feels pretty darn coincidental.
CHARACTER
There are far too many named characters in this script. By page 10, you’ve introduced TWELVE. Worse, very few of them do anything to reveal any personality. This isn’t a pot-boiler drama, it’s an action script. A reader should have a sense of who your characters are as soon as they meet them.
I had to keep character notes reading this script (which is generally a bad sign, meaning it’s difficult to keep them straight). Here are my character descriptions, written upon meeting each character:
Galen Richter, 30s: Thin, unhealthy victim. Is this the protagonist?
Lee Cushing, 60s: Guy who is somehow enfeebled?
Keller, 60s: Tired. Has a gun.
Taylor Brennen, 40s: Cellular biologist with a problem
Glenda Callini, early 60s: Former Senator, CEO of Providential Pharmaceuticals
Heinz, 40s: Hitman
Clinton Osgood, late 50s: Cielo Pharma CEO
Moreno, 40s: Bit guy. Hitman.
Roth, 30s: Hitman
Baldmon, 40s: Well-dressed.
John Taker, 40s: Linebacker in a suit.
Chung, 50s: Chinese (?)
Note how none of these notes say anything whatsoever about personality, because it’s indecipherable. The only character with one is Riley, and his sarcasm becomes grating pretty quickly.
There’s no way I’m the first to mention this: this screenplay has no protagonist. This is unforgiveable, and I’ll tell you now, based on my personal rubrick, it earns a script the lowest possible score from me.
The problem isn’t that there’s not a singular protagonist; several stories have multiple protagonists united in a common goal (X-Men, Thelma and Louise), or even several protagonists chasing their own individual goals (Pulp Fiction, The Breakfast Club). The problem in “The Carrier” is that no character’s motivations are well-defined, and it’s impossible to empathize with any of them, to care if one succeeds or fails. Also, this genre of film simply does not lend itself to the multi-protagonist structure.
It’s clear that there are a few attempts at characterization: Richter apparently has a troubled past which has brought him to religion. Keller and Quinn have some sort of pre-existing animosity. But when so little time is devoted to each character, these minor details aren’t given the attention they need to serve as true character development.
While Richter is in an interesting situation, he’s at present a poor character, especially if he’s going to be the protagonist. He doesn’t ever take action to get out of his situation; instead he whines and asks questions while Keller drags him around. And he’s really, REALLY annoying.
There’s really not much advice I can provide here, beyond the very, very basic. I know you’re capable of creating memorable characters, because you did it with “The Angeleno”.
Cut the unnecessary characters (Quinn, Sally Lynne, Glenda Callini), or at the very least, give the less important characters pseudo-names, so we don’t assume we need to keep track of them (Chung appears in only one scene, then disappears forever).
Refrain from giving characters names with similarities (RichtER, KellER, TakER), as it makes it even toughER to keep them straight.
STRUCTURE
When CHARACTER motivations and goals aren’t well-defined, it’s impossible to tell how close or far they are from attaining their goals. “Being hunted” is not an action, and “survival” is not a strong goal, meaning that for all the action and gunfights, there’s remarkably little CONFLICT in the script.
If it isn’t yet clear, let me make it so now: all aspects of story stem from CHARACTER. This script has MAJOR problems with character, and it impacts EVERY ASPECT OF THE SCRIPT.
It’s hard to comment on the structure with the character problems being as egregious as they are, so here are my running notes.
-(p. 7) Okay, we get it. Many people are being killed. You should make this a MONTAGE.
-(p. 8) Starting in media res is a great way to get the audience's attention; they're eager to catch up and figure out what's going on. But you're pushing it. We need an anchor now. Who's the protag? What kind of a situation is he in? You risk losing the audience.
-(p. 22) With no anchor, no idea what's really happening, it doesn't feel like anything is accomplished in any scene.
-(p. 32) Honestly, this would be a lot more compelling if the story began with Richter waking up with the cylinder in his back. That would make this HIS story. We don't care about what happened beforehand to get to this point. Having read another work from this writer, it seems he has a bad habit of starting the script way too early.
-(p. 33) Excessive cutaways lessen the immediacy of the situation. Showing both sides so frequently dissipates any possible tension and suspense. We're not given a chance to empathize with either side, either.
DIALOGUE
Dialogue issues stem from character issues. The characters don’t have well-defined personalities, so they don’t have distinct voices. So instead of them speaking in order to obtain their goals (which is the only reason characters should speak), they speak to convey information to the audience, which is exposition.
Beware any character whose dialogue consists mostly of questions (*cough* Richter *cough*), because it’s a sure sign of a weak character. Characters should be driving action with bold STATEMENTS, not just continually asking for clarification.
Again, it’s apparent that there are attempts for characterization through dialogue, but it comes off as on the nose.
“Isn’t that pathetic? I’m willing to sacrifice my life over money.”
“I’d like to start my life over again.”
“Your Jesus gave his life for you didn’t he?”
Try not to be so obvious with your setups. While some of the lines in the script are quite clever (“My foot if you don’t shut up!”), a lot of times the lines preceding these comebacks are awkward, and obviously only said to set up the punch line.
OVERALL
I’m really hoping that this screenplay is an earlier work, because I know you’re better than this.
You’ve got 69 reviews now. If you’re just trying to get the ratings to go up, by all means, keep adding credits to it, and remove the effects from negative reviews (such as this one). But if you’re serious about wanting to improve this script, it’s time to take the advice everyone’s given you, and earnestly apply it to a new draft. read -
A review of The Holstein Epiphanyby olufemi on 09/07/2012Apologies for the lateness of my review; hopefully you got a bunch of extra assigned reviewers because of it, and hopefully this review will offer enough solid advice that the wait will have been worth it. Immersive, engrossing, captivating; The Holstein Epiphany manages to be all these things, without resorting to novelistic descriptions, or hackneyed, contrived plot-twists... Apologies for the lateness of my review; hopefully you got a bunch of extra assigned reviewers because of it, and hopefully this review will offer enough solid advice that the wait will have been worth it.
Immersive, engrossing, captivating; The Holstein Epiphany manages to be all these things, without resorting to novelistic descriptions, or hackneyed, contrived plot-twists. Instead it does this through careful establishment of characters, situations, and truly, a full world.
So where does it go wrong?
To put it simply, at the halfway-point. But this is an oversimplification. Digging to the root of the problem requires critical analysis, insight, and unfortunately, a bit of guessing on my part, as I don’t for certain know the writers’ intentions. However, from what I can glean, there appears to be a gap between the reader’s expectations are as set up by the first half, and what the writers apparently want to deliver in the second half, which creates a dissonance that is ultimately unsatisfying for the reader.
Improving the work will require either manipulating the reader’s expectations, or else delivering what the reader wants (in a way they don’t expect, of course). Because while both halves are quite strong, the combined halves in this draft form something less than the sum of their parts.
MECHANICS
Peerless. Wonderfully descriptive, but without abusing novelistic or overly-descriptive writing. Errors are few and far-between; enough so that there’s no way it should impede the script’s chances at success as a spec. I’ll leave it to other TSers to point them out.
More than being descriptive using a scarceness of words, the script features numerous strong images (you’ve learned to let the image you paint be your poetry, rather than the flowery syntax used to describe the image), that stay with the reader, and are sure to leave their mark on an observing audience. Randy’s dog eating up candy bars next to the brain-splattered remains of his master comes to mind.
The only hiccup in the mechanics is in the numerous time-jumps (which likewise provide story problems… but I’ll get to that later). Frequently it is unclear in what year the story was taking place… more than once during the read, the slugline would indicate we were moving to a new year, when I already assumed we were in that year.
Considering how often it happens, I’d strongly recommend listing the year after every slugline. That, or stop jumping around so much.
CONCEPT
I’m afraid I have to rate this lower than most reviewers apparently have. This isn’t a reflection on the quality of the script; it doesn’t really consider the script at all. I score concept based on what I guess your average producer and/or filmgoer would think, hearing ONLY the premise.
“A divine visitation compels a down-and-out factory worker to rid his white trash world of human vermin” doesn’t exactly make a person say “whoa, cool!” or “what a great idea!”…it’s not clever or ironic or particularly interesting. It’s also not apparent what the conflict is; hopefully I’ll get to this later in the review. It could certainly be made to look interesting through creative advertising: a slick poster, a good-looking trailer.
Bottom line: it’s a fine idea for a script, but it’s doubtful to be the one that gets people’s attention and be your big break into the business. But no one ever knows what will be a big hit, so take that for what it’s worth.
STORY
More than any other amateur screenplay I’ve read, The Holstein Epiphany goes a long way in creating a sense of verisimilitude. The writers are wise to avoid the blandness of most scripts by infusing their story with specificity and realness. The particular location (Rayville, Arkansas), the protagonist’s occupation that somehow manages to feel simultaneously unique and everyday, the rapport between Baylor and his coworkers… it’s all the stuff of a modern-day classic.
But enough praise; I suspect you both already know what works in the script. Let’s get to what’s holding it back. Here’s where I have to make some assumptions.
ASSUMPTION 1: One writer wrote the first half of the screenplay (or at least the *story*) up to the TWO YEARS LATER time jump made on page 57, then the other took over.
This assumption could be incorrect. But the very fact that it *feels* as though the two halves are written by different writers is a problem, which needs to be addressed.
The first half of the script establishes our protagonist and the world he lives in. Around page 20, after a series of misfortunes, Baylor murders his first victim (without premeditation), and experiences his first vision. It’s an extreme action, but we buy it, because the script has done such a good job of bringing us along for the ride that it makes sense.
Perhaps it wasn’t the author’s intention, but this scene makes a promise to the reader/audience; it creates what is called the OBLIGATORY SCENE. We’ve met Baylor, we understand him, and we empathize with him. The moment he sees his vision, it says to us that his madness is the ANTAGONISTIC FORCE he must fight against for the remainder of the story. The story will consist of this character’s gradual descent into further madness, and come the climax, he’ll be forced to confront it directly, either succumbing to it (which would make it a TRAGIC story), or else overcoming it (which would make it more of a REDEMPTION story).
But this doesn’t seem to be the authors’ intention, because we never see Baylor struggle with his madness. Instead, it’s treated as if (ASSUMPTION 2) we’re meant to find his actions justifiable, as though we’re supposed to see the “method in his madness”, understand his decision to clean the world of “human vermin”, and just go along with it.
I don’t think you’ll be able to convince the audience that Baylor is vindicated in his quest to murder the “guilty”. Not with his goals being so nebulous (i.e. he’s not trying to kill one specific person, or specific group of people), with his victims being so innocent (they’re trash, yes, but certainly not deserving of being murdered), and with nothing at STAKE if Baylor simply gives up his quest.
This is where the major emotional dissonance occurs in the script. The first half spends its time introducing Baylor, trying to justify that he’s becoming a murderer; it’s actually handled quite well. Then after the 2-year time jump, he’s suddenly a full-fledged mass murderer, chainsawing people to death in his spiritual revolution, and taking on acolytes like some sort of homicidal Christ figure (ASSUMPTION 3… I assume the parallels to him being a sort of messiah are intentional).
Either of these directions could make a complete movie. But right now, the two halves are from two different movies; the first half is something akin to FALLING DOWN (or, strangely enough, Cronenberg’s THE FLY), and the second half is something more like LAW-ABIDING CITIZEN. For this story to really come into its own, the writers need to decide which of these two choices they want to pursue.
Considering how strong the nuanced world-building and characterization is in the first half, I would vote for the FALLING DOWN/THE FLY option. Baylor killing people is boring. But Baylor’s descent into becoming a killer is fascinating.
What is the audience meant to feel at the story’s climax? The writers seem to be setting up the situation such that Baylor is sacrificing himself in order to take down Breckinridge. But this is based on a logical fallacy; it presumes that the audience agrees that Baylor must punish the wicked, and I don’t think you’ll get that agreement.
Some specific story notes:
-How did Baylor know Harvey was referring to him when he mentioned the “Valentine Killer” on page 26? And why did you not mention that the first murder occurred on Valentine’s?
-While we don’t see it, the scene where Baylor proposes to Kim strongly suggests that she turns him down. Yet later we discover she died. Are we meant to understand that she turned him down because she knew she was dying? If she was dying, what good does it do to hide this information from the audience? Or are we meant to understand that he killed her?
-The time jumping is confusing, and doesn’t add any better insight or understanding to the story. It’s not clear from when the story is being “told”; 2012? 2024, with Baylor on death row? When is the “now”?
-After his initial misfortunes, things get too easy for Baylor. Too many people are willing to help him, without good reason (not one given to the audience, anyway). We see the police trying to track him down, but he never seems to have any difficulty evading them. Challenge him.
CHARACTER
For the first half of the script, Baylor is an incredible, empathetic, living and breathing character. In fact, for the first half, I’d say he’s pretty perfect.
The problem comes once he starts murdering people. It’s not just that we lose empathy for him (which we do, and IS a big problem), it’s that he never appears to struggle with it. On page 54, after spending some time getting to know Randy, Baylor discovers that he’s cheating on his wife. So he shoots him in cold blood.
Imagine if Baylor wrestled with the decision; if we saw him actually experiencing turmoil over whether he can spare this man who could be his friend, or if he must follow his new calling and murder him. Even if he does it, he can show remorse. This would go a long way to making Baylor a more complex character. Forcing him to overcome dilemmas, where either option is irredeemably bad.
Looking at the climax again; while I get that Baylor basically sacrifices himself to get retribution for Carrie Weeks, this just doesn’t feel like what the story’s been building to.
What if, instead, Baylor discovered that Carrie Weeks went missing because she went looking for her father… and her father was one of the “human vermin” that Baylor had killed. I know the chronology doesn’t quite work out, but the point is that it creates a *dilemma* for Baylor. It forces him to confront his own actions and hypocrisy.
Pretty much all of the characters are well-drawn, particularly Harvey.
Tom Quackenbush seems completely useless in the story. He comes out of nowhere (as far as the script is concerned), and appears to be the voice of *reason* as Baylor’s partner? What reasonable person would join up with a mass murderer? Then before he’s even around long enough to justify his existence, he’s dead.
Generally speaking, you should avoid introducing major characters after the midpoint.
While Tanner Gates serves as a possible threat to Baylor, he seems an empty one. Consider strengthening the character, giving him opportunities to actually come close to stopping Baylor.
One thing you’ll notice if you’ve seen FALLING DOWN and THE FLY is that they both something of a FALSE PROTAGONIST (some may argue with me on this); the main character that we’re falling actually ends up being more of a sympathetic ANTAGONIST, while another character serves as the TRUE PROTAGONIST (Robert Duvall’s cop trying to stop the insane Michael Douglas in Falling Down; Geena Davis’s girlfriend character to Jeff Goldblum’s insane Brundlefly character). This is actually a pretty brilliant means of sidestepping the whole issue of losing empathy for the protagonist, without losing *sympathy* for him.
This direction is something to consider. Try watching these movies and see if you can get any insight from them.
STRUCTURE
Traditional three-act structure is not the only structure in existence, much as many a know-it-all may try to convince you it is. With many stories, particularly those that are far removed from reality (i.e. sci-fi and fantasy stories), it becomes more important to use the more familiar structure.
The Holstein Epiphany is not one of these stories, however. It’s wise to stretch out the first act a bit, because it’s important in slice-of-life stories like this for the audience to really have a chance to get to know the main character, especially when he ends up taking some morally objectionable actions (look at ROCKY or WORLD’S GREATEST DAD). The inciting incident comes on page 20, when Baylor kills Charlie (no, it’s not Baylor getting fired or his proposal being turned down). The FIRST ACT BREAK is on page 32, with Baylor actively choosing to put his new philosophy to practice.
The only issue with the first few plot points coming late (relative to traditional structure) is that it makes the sudden time jump on page 57 incredibly jarring. We’ve been moving along at a languorous pace, experiencing everything that Baylor experiences, when we’re suddenly slingshot forward in time, without our protagonist to serve as an anchor.
Time jumps are dangerous, for a couple of reasons. For one, they can destroy empathy. Separating the audience from the characters they’ve become emotionally connected to makes them feel disconnected and left out; it’s like the protagonist just took a journey without us.
Secondly, they kill tension. There’s a reason you rarely see big time jumps within the second act of a story; they make the story lose its sense of immediacy, and make whatever stakes there are seem much less important. Usually, time jumps occur no later than the first act break (a time jump can even function as the act break, as in the recent STAR TREK movie), or they’ll happen after a story’s climax just to serve as a denouement.
In case it isn’t obvious yet, I really hated the time jump on page 57…
Speaking of time jumps: flashbacks and flash-forwards aren’t inherently flawed, so blanket statements that they shouldn’t ever be used or should simply be removed are erroneous. However, like pretty much any tool a writer uses, the point should be to introduce an element of *conflict*. Flash-forward from a prosperous and well-loved character to show him penniless, dirty, and pointing a gun to his own head, and it incites our interest to find out how he got there. Flashback from a woman discovering she’s pregnant, to show that she miscarried her first baby, and it gives context to the conflicting emotions she’ll feel over the news.
To be frank, the constant time jumps in The Holstein Epiphany did not accomplish this sort of conflict; generally I just found them to be confusing, and I don’t feel they contributed anything to the story. Page 21 is an example of well-used time jumps; as Baylor soaks in a bath, we cut back to the moments after him murdering Charlie. The scenes of violence conflict with the scene of peace, which is compelling. EXCEPT for the fact that, for no reason I can determine, the events from the highway are presented in reverse chronological order. Again, it doesn’t provide better insight or strong conflict; it’s just confusing.
Remember to create a sense of escalating tension in the second act. Make it clear what the overarching goal is for Baylor, the primary conflict he faces in attaining that goal, then be certain to make the obstacles he faces in its pursuit larger and more dangerous.
DIALOGUE
The writers have an ear for natural dialogue, and each character has a strong and distinctive voice. This further strengthens how real everything feels. Harvey’s voice is particularly strong; one can hear his accent with simply reading the lines.
The coworkers singing “High Hopes” in the shower and using impromptu lyrics are dynamite. Really great stuff. Though I’d recommend dropping “My eyes!” from the line on page 7. “My eyes!” sounds like someone making a joke about being in pain, or something out of an outright comedy (“My eyes! Ze goggles do nothing!”). The motion of the guy grabbing his eyes and falling to the shower floor, paired with “Oh, sweet fuck!” is enough for us to get it, and it’s funnier.
The writers could pay more attention to conveying characters’ emotional states through dialogue. Sometimes this will be handled by actors, but the seeds can be planted in the script beforehand. For instance: on page 34, a Baylor breaks into a woman’s house, pistol-whips the man she was having sex with, then attacks her, strangling her and causing her to hit her head on the tub.
He then criticizes her lifestyle choices, all the while implicitly threatening her. When he points out that she wastes all her money on booze and weed, the woman says
“The welfare checks never go as far as you think.”
This is a remarkably calm and cogent response. The woman was just strangled and had her head bashed, she’s probably drunk and/or high, and she’s terrified. Would a person in such a situation be able to form so cogent a thought? Would she even *want* to? She doesn’t need this man to understand her life choices, she needs him to not kill her and get the hell out of her house.
Another example, on page 39. Baylor pulls a gun on Scribner, a pastor. The pastor’s response: “Brother Dannon!”
People faced with their mortality tend to drop pretense. It’s an opportunity for you to expose who they really are. You’ve already established Scribner as pretty scheisty, so why not something that mirrors that? “Oh, shit.” Or he could be stunned silent, again in contrast to the silver-tongued smooth-talker he portrays himself to be (watching him recover and readopt the persona would also be interesting).
This neglect to show characters’ emotional states spills over to the voice over. It’s never very clear what Baylor is feeling as he relates this story. Is he at peace with his actions? Remorseful? Proud?
Look at the V.O. on page 3: after a sweet scene with Kimberly, the V.O. says
“It’s been six years since Kimberly left me.”
This is merely stating rote fact. What’s worse, we already KNOW that Kimberly isn’t with him anymore, so all this line does is tell us it’s been six years, which isn’t particularly important. How does he *feel* about it?
Imagine instead if, after Kimberly says “You’ll be late for work” and the two kiss, the voiceover said “Backstabbing bitch.” There’s contrast between the loving relationship we see, and Baylor’s current emotional state. It makes us wonder what could have gone so wrong that is love for her could become hate (I know that wouldn’t fit with your characterization of Kimberly; just trying to make a point).
Or, the voiceover could say “God, I miss her.” This line reveals his emotional state, suggests that she’s dead, and makes us wonder how it could have happened, inciting our interest and emotional involvement.
Voiceover, like flashback, is one of those tools that can be an invaluable tool in a writer’s arsenal, but is only used correctly if it’s done to create CONFLICT. Too often in the script, the voice over just tells us what we’re seeing.
Also in this script, like the flashbacks, the voiceover makes it very difficult to follow the chronology. At times it seems as if the voiceover we’re hearing is from Baylor sitting on death row, waiting to be executed, narrating the events that led to his incarceration (page 16, “Sometimes I wonder… If I’d never took that turn, would I still be sittin’ here on death row?”, which is a fantastic V.O., creating expectation in the audience), but other times, it seems like the V.O. is the thoughts of the Baylor we’re watching on screen (page 22, “I wonder if they’ll electrocute my ass.” Baylor sitting on death row would surely know already his method of execution, as it’s stated at conviction… so this sounds like it’s the musings of “past Baylor”).
Make certain you’ve decided what the voiceover is meant to represent. If it’s Baylor narrating his story, he must have a compelling reason to be narrating that story. And either make the voiceover provide insight that would be missing from the script without it, or else remove it.
A couple more dialogue notes:
-“I can damn sure feel it, too” is an awesome line because of the subtext. He’s basically telling Randy “Shut up and let me sleep” without saying it, which is great.
-Page 81, what preacher thinks cows and grass have souls? Or believes in destiny, for that matter?
OVERALL
The first half of this script features some superlative work. It feels like I’m experiencing a real person going through real events. But every flashback, every voiceover, every time jump, pulls me out of that very real-feeling fiction, and reminds me “nope, this is a movie”. I would think you’d want to avoid that.
It’s not my script, so certainly don’t follow my advice if it conflicts with your intentions. But I think making the second half follow through with the direction of the first would make a far more compelling and emotionally satisfying story than the script is currently.
Either way, I do hope I’ve conveyed how skillful the writers are here. This isn’t a case where the writers must be instructed on the basics of storytelling; this is a strong work that has a great deal of potential, and if the writers can gain a little insight from other opinions, they should have an amazing script completed after a rewrite or two.
Wish you the best in making that happen. read -
A review of Let There Be Light (2)by olufemi on 08/16/2012I really admire and envy those who can write well-meaning, slice-of-life dramas, completely free of cynicism; it’s a skill I simply don’t have, and kudos to you that you can. I think there’s a great deal I can learn from scripts like this. However, I’m hoping that there’s likewise something that writers of scripts like this can learn from me. Too often, in an effort to make... I really admire and envy those who can write well-meaning, slice-of-life dramas, completely free of cynicism; it’s a skill I simply don’t have, and kudos to you that you can. I think there’s a great deal I can learn from scripts like this.
However, I’m hoping that there’s likewise something that writers of scripts like this can learn from me. Too often, in an effort to make a script “nice”, writers simply remove any element of conflict. More knowledgeable/skilled writers may include elements that they *think* are conflict, but really aren’t: a disagreeable/bad-guy character, a sad scene, a melodramatic moment. These elements touch on conflict, but ring hollow.
TRUE CONFLICT occurs when the PROTAGONIST, in pursuit of a GOAL, is challenged by FORCES OF ANTAGONIST that keep him from that goal. This is as true for dramas as it is for sci-fi action thrillers. And for a story to connect emotionally, it simply must feature true conflict.
As it stands, this is a weak story that is well-told. Only conflict will elevate it to an actual good story.
MECHANICS
While the script is pretty much free of grammatical/formatting errors, it doesn’t make a great first impression.
I know we all learn that a script should begin with “FADE IN:” (note that the colon is omitted in the script), but that’s only when the beginning of the movie actually fades in. This script begins with text on a (presumably) black screen. Begin with “OVER BLACK”, and place the FADE IN: only where the picture begins.
Immediately after the quote is a giant chunk of text in ALL CAPS. There’s no reason for so much to be in all caps, and it makes me want to stop reading immediately. Capitalizing sounds is proper format, but it’s not necessary (and it’s distracting) to capitalize every single word of it (“A door CREAKS open”, not “A DOOR CREAKS OPEN”). Also, sounds shouldn’t get their own entire line as if they’re a slugline.
Besides this, the sounds described in this opening paragraph are overly descriptive, which is a problem that continues. “Sounds of CHAOS – an intense WWII battle” was enough to set up for the reader an idea of what he’s hearing. Yet it goes on to describe *precisely* what things we’re hearing. It simply isn’t necessary, and it impairs the read.
It goes on: “The ground, the forest, the continent – indeed – the whole creation, quakes from things falling. Snow plummets from a swarthy granite sky.” This sentence is both overwritten and confusing. It sounds like it’s trying to be poetic, when it’s completely unnecessary. Snow doesn’t “plummet”; I don’t care how hard it’s falling. A single object “plummets”. Snow “falls”. “Swarthy” means dark OF COMPLEXION, as in describing SKIN, not the sky.
Let the image you paint be your poetry, not the flowery syntax used to describe it: “Snow falls from a grey sky. The earth below TREMBLES.” A strong image, and conveyed in two sentences, rather than four lines.
The same goes for all the descriptions of the various animals in pain (yes, I get the thematic imagery… it’s still overwritten and annoying). The script notes how all the animals and people are dying (again, in several lines) without even bothering to mention if we’re seeing one army or two. If they’re climbing a hill, or being bombarded with artillery in a bunker.
The first page is a bit of a chore to read through, which is a shame, because as the script progresses, it becomes more and more obvious how skilled the writer is with words. Seek clarity of image before poetry of prose.
Try to avoid using the gerund forms of nouns (“is _______ing”) or describing actions as “starting” or “beginning” (“he begins to _______”), as they make the actions sound weaker.
When a character speaks, you must write the dialogue. You can’t do things like “he recites the 10 commandments”.
CONCEPT
Good title.
Okay, let’s get this out of the way: in no way is this a children’s/family movie. The themes of the story are simply too mature and too dark. The script opens with a quote about death, for Pete’s sake! Then the opening scene is a World War II battle!
From there, we get characters discussing matters of existential angst, the word “shit”, the word “nigger” for no good reason in a scene that has nothing to do with anything, dead animals, animals giving birth, animals giving birth to dead animals, etc.
Sure, there’s a family in the script, and there are some children, but I don’t think you could keep children captivated with such heady drama.
The concept of an emotionally-scarred vet coming home isn’t particularly new or novel, regardless of how well the story is told. It’s doubtful that potential film-goers would be excited to see the film (nor that production studios would want to buy the script) based on this concept alone. What does set this script apart is its time-period and setting; just recognize that those things will bring a rather hefty price tag, requiring a budget easily exceeding $100 million for all the exterior, city shots.
I’m no industry insider, but period pieces are pretty much the hardest sells there are in spec scripts. Making one marketable requires it to be either an adaptation of an existing property, or a really inventive concept. Let There Be Light is neither.
I’m not trying to dump on your script, here. It’s a fine idea for a story. But it feels more like something to be read in a novel (which perhaps could LATER be adapted into a film?) rather than something for the big screen.
STORY
This is a little difficult to comment on. Frankly, there isn’t much of a story in this script. Things happen, and they’re even frequently interesting. But a story is more than a collection of events and tenuously-connected subplots.
A story requires a strong protagonist, pursuing a specific goal (yes, even dramas), and stuff preventing from obtaining it. This goal needn’t be lofty or physical, any more than the forces keeping the protagonist from it need be. The ultimate goal doesn’t even need to be one the protagonist is aware of. The story takes a direction based on the protagonist pursuing the goal in a specific way, then new setbacks appear that require him to change tactics, sending the story in a new direction.
It all comes down to conflict. The strongest scenes in the script are those that carry a strong degree of STORY-RELEVANT conflict. The birthing scene at the climax of the film is a great one, because there is so much at STAKE: besides just the life of the calf, we sense that Jason’s emotional and spiritual well-being is tied in to that calf’s safety. The booming thunder and crashing rain mirror Jason’s efforts to save a life in the opening scene, taking him back to that traumatic day, and forcing him to confront his fears directly.
On the other hand, Jason fighting three racists to protect an African-American cabbie has plenty of conflict and action on display, but the scene reads as flat and boring, because it has nothing to do with Jason’s emotional journey; it’s an unnecessary (and unwelcome) detour.
*On a more personal note, it’s sad that the more and more often I read amateur scripts, the more a loathe seeing a character introduced specifically as BLACK or AFRICAN-AMERICAN, because it just means he’s going to be a borderline-offensive stereotype, and/or he’s going to die. Regardless of if it’s accurate to the time-period or not, it’s frustrating, and it’s lazy writing.
Consider the scene on page 60, where Jason meets the parents of the soldier whose life he saved, though he doesn’t remember him. There is potential for this to be an amazing scene, but it’s squandered when it’s revealed that the parents *know* Jason doesn’t remember their son, and they’re fine with it (!!!). How boring!
What if they don’t realize Jason doesn’t remember Christopher? What if Jason is actively trying to hide the fact from them, to spare their feelings? Now, imagine that the reason Jason can’t remember Christopher is that he’s trying (subconsciously) to suppress his memories from the war; every time someone asks him questions about the war, he avoids answering by saying he’d “rather not talk about it” or that he just “doesn’t remember”. Picture the moment that the memories begin to resurface, and Jason abruptly stands and storms out, leaving the parents confused. Suddenly, this conflict isn’t only relevant to this specific scene, but to Jason’s emotional journey as a whole.
Look backwards from the climax of your script. If there is any scene whose removal doesn’t undo the climax, then that scene needs to be cut. Make certain that the scenes that remain test Jason in some way, keeping him from his ultimate goal.
The frequent scenes showing the boys hunting animals have nothing to do directly with Jason. Again, there’s this motif of animals being harmed, but you should seek to maintain this element *while* furthering your main character’s story.
Give some serious thought to how much the 1940s setting contributes to the story as a whole; in my honest opinion, it’s not enough to justify the exorbitant production cost. I know this seems like a major change, but if this story *can* be told in the present day, and can still get across the message you intend, you’re unnecessarily impairing your chances at production.
CHARACTER
You do a fine job of establishing characters and their personalities in this script. None of them seems out of place; they all feel like they belong in your story.
There are a few too many of them at the beginning, however. It’s difficult to tell what their function/relevance will be in the story, because so many of them are named, yet only pop up long enough to say a quick line, and disappear for an hour (Rachel, for instance, who it seems could be easily cut). I just finished reading “Game of Thrones”, and had no difficulty telling the dozens of characters apart, even when we’d not see them for hundreds of pages. With “Let There Be Light”, I had to write myself a character cheat-sheet.
While I understand that Jason is traumatized because you told me he is in the logline, he doesn’t really seem it in the script. The scenes with him experiencing flashbacks (going for a grenade) are really nice, but other than those, he seems to just be a man who has lost is faith, and is at peace with that.
For Jason to be a more compelling character, his lack of faith must be at odds with his desires. He must either pursue something that his lack of faith prevents him from attaining (e.g. he loves and wants to be with Diana, but she refuses to be with someone faithless), or else he needs to WANT to restore his faith, but have difficulty doing it because of his experiences in the war (this has the potential for stronger drama, I think).
Consider establishing that Jason is either unaware of how badly his faith has been shaken (he doesn’t realize how much he’s been hurt), or else make him aware of it, but desperate to hide his lack of faith from others. Something to provide some CONFLICT.
Diana is a great character, who stands out above the others. Seek to have her *challenge* Jason, rather than just facilitate his growth. This doesn’t mean she needs to be quarrelsome with him, but when she makes things too easy for him, it’s a waste of her potential.
Another thing to consider with Diana is that she’s rather forward, and a bit anachronistic as a character. This is fine; it makes her interesting. What’s odd is that no one ever acknowledges it. She’s in her mid-twenties and unmarried (already cause for tongues to wag in the 1940s), she drives a car, she takes Jason’s arm and leads HIM into the grass for a walk. I’m not saying there’s anything wrong with these actions; I’m saying that other characters should probably think there is.
For all the hoopla surrounding Stacey’s first appearance, he seems to pretty much disappear from the script (other than the one scene at the bar).
STRUCTURE
I’m not going to bother getting into the whole “catalyst, first act break, yada yada” here, because it’s not really necessary. Dramas are the genre of story least beholden to conventional Archplot structure.
At its most basic, though, structure refers to a gradually elevating sense of tension. Think of it as the law of diminishing returns; every scene needs to be more dramatic than the previous, otherwise the audience won’t continue to invest their interest.
Tension, and therefore structure, is predicated on CONFLICT. And there’s really not enough of that in this script, so there’s not enough to keep an audience “coming back for more.”
In the next draft, pay attention to what each scene is meant to accomplish, not only in terms of moving the story forward, but what the audience (and the reader) is meant to be feeling. When should they laugh? When should they be worried? When should they cry?
When you find scenes that don’t provoke an emotional response from the reader/audience, they need to be dramatized by adding CONFLICT. Starting on page 6, the script spends 7 pages in and around the church. Most of this is spent honestly listening to a sermon. Who wants to go to a movie to watch people go to church? I understand that important set-up is being done, but you can set up while also making the proceedings interesting.
DIALOGUE
The dialogue featured in the script is natural and conversational, which is great. It flows smoothly, and generally without hiccups.
There are times that characters’ voices seem a bit off. Benjamin, in his introductory dialogue, honestly sounds like a woman (p. 12 “Little Freddy and I were at the drug store on Friday.” “I think it’s sweet”). Grensky sounds like he’s a robot (p. 21 “Nothing is wrong ma’am. We are from the Veterans Administration in Iowa City. It is very important…”). Stewart and the other children frequently just don’t sound like 11-year-old farm boys living in the 1940s (p. 31 “I have to check my gopher traps. Who wants to come?”, rather than maybe “I gotta go check my gopher traps. Y’all wanna come?”).
From time to time, some awkward syntax choices change the effect of what is being said. On page 24, Diana says “we had to shoot the dog.” This makes her come off as incredibly cold and uncaring, whereas “we had to shoot Sparky” conveys genuine sadness.
It might just be necessary to do more research into how people spoke back in the 1940s. People in the script tend to speak ironically, or in sort of “hip” inflections, that don’t sound era-appropriate; lines like “That is so like Christopher” (sounds like something Chandler Bing would say), “Kind of on their case about Jason, aren’t you?”, or even Jason saying “I’m a farm boy”, which is way too self-ironic.
The only other big problem with the dialogue is any scene where characters are having existential theistic discussions. They’re way too on-the-nose; characters just discuss exactly what they’re thinking, and it’s obviously just the themes that the writer wants to convey. Bury your themes in dialogue and action such that after the movie, the audience is having this conversation; don’t just write your characters having the conversation.
“WE ARE TALKING ABOUT MY SON!” on page 69 was a really strange and random outburst, and “Go! Go! Go!” made me laugh out loud.
OVERALL
You’ve set up so much potential for conflict, but you squander it beating the reader over the head with your message. Trust your audience and yourself more to understand subtlety, and don’t be afraid to challenge your protagonist, to the point we’re concerned he won’t overcome; it will make his eventual success all the sweeter. read -
A review of Zymaen's Ambitionby olufemi on 07/31/2012Aren’t rainbows pretty? (That's me trying to start out positive... =P ) You’ve only been screenwriting for a few MONTHS and you’ve already cranked out TWO plays? That’s really impressive. Sincerest congratulations to you. As I trust you’re aware, being new to the craft means you probably don’t have a handle on the skills required to produce quality material yet. That... Aren’t rainbows pretty?
(That's me trying to start out positive... =P )
You’ve only been screenwriting for a few MONTHS and you’ve already cranked out TWO plays? That’s really impressive. Sincerest congratulations to you.
As I trust you’re aware, being new to the craft means you probably don’t have a handle on the skills required to produce quality material yet. That doesn’t mean that what you’ve produced is worthless, and don’t dare give up after reading critical reviews (as this one is sure to be).
Let’s get to it: ZYMAEN’S AMBITION reads like the pulp, dime-store, sword & sorcery novels of old, complete with the requisite, testosterone-laden, bloody action. It really seems like the work of an author with a love for the genre, who learned the basics of screenwriting format, then set out on the grand and ambitious adventure of completing a feature-length screenplay, much like the titular protagonist.
Like the protagonist, though, not much forethought goes into taking on so lofty a goal. Unlike the protagonist, the results aren’t so successful.
MECHANICS
You need to pay some SERIOUS attention to the format, spelling, and grammar in this script. Nothing screams AMATEUR and makes a reader lose interest faster than multiple, egregious errors on the VERY FIRST PAGE:
“FADE IN:” should be aligned LEFT on the first page. The first page should not have a page number. Your margins look wrong. The slugline should read “EXT. DESERT – NIGHT” (a period, not a dash). Commas should be followed by a single space. Periods should be followed by two spaces. “V.O.” should be on the same line as the character name. The sentence “Using it,he makes a campfire [sic]” is poorly structured, such that it isn’t clear to what the pronoun refers. A character speaks (STORY TELLER) before being introduced. Storyteller is one word. It’s unclear what “The storyteller’s words weave the image of temples shining in the sun and of a great hall” means.
Again, this is all on the first page. Beyond this:
You LOSE a bet. You pull a LOOSE tooth.
You WAVE to someone you know. You WAIVE the right to a court-appointed attorney.
You push a shopping CART. You review statistics on a CHART.
These words are frequently mistaken for each other in the script, and there are several other problems with spelling and grammar besides these. Proofread this script, or get someone you trust to do it.
You constantly leave no spaces after commas,like this.You do the same with periods and exclamation points.
This is wrong.
There should always be TWO SPACES after a period and a SINGLE SPACE after a comma in writing. This isn’t a screenwriting thing; it’s a writing thing.
An ellipsis should have THREE dots (…), not two, not four. Actually, it should actually be four dots at the end of a sentence…. Few people do this, though, so you can just always stick with three.
The “-CONTINUOUS” suffix in a slugline doesn’t mean what you seem to think it means. What it signifies is that the scene in the next location occurs immediately after the previous, chronologically. For example, you might write:
EXT. WAR-TORN CITY – DAY
Zymaen passes the corpses of the fallen strewn about the roads, and walks to a hut. He opens the door-
INT. HUT – CONTINUOUS
-and walks inside.
Note how this is all one CONTINUOUS motion, hence the suffix.
The biggest issue with the mechanics of the script is that it’s written as though the script were a novel. You use flowery, overly descriptive language when something simpler would suffice (“Everyone has to fight against the scorching blaze of the desert, the windless sands which seem to stretch to infinite [sic]”…how about “they fight as the sun blazes overhead” or even “they fight in the sun”?)
This is a SCREENPLAY. No one in the audience will see how poetic your prose is, and the production crew really doesn’t care who prettily you can describe every scene. They need to know who’s in the scene and what’s happening in the scene; that’s it.
You can’t have giant time-jumps in your prose. On page 20, you simply say “Two years pass.Two years marked by small clashes for land,while continuing to advance towards their goal.” What does this look like? What, precisely, would the audience be seeing right now? How are they to know that two years have passed? How can they know that during those two years, there were small clashes for land?
You probably need to use a MONTAGE for something like this.
Write only what is necessary, and what can be seen or heard. Descriptions like this have no place in a screenplay: “And nobody, from the first warrior ever has ever fought that well. And the battle was so great, that from the very first sunrise, such movements have never been seen. And such a war never took place before.”
In case it isn’t obvious, the mechanics need a lot of work.
CONCEPT
Good CONCEPTS are steeped in irony and conflict. Tell a great concept to someone, and they’ll immediately start imagining where the story will go. They can see the potential for drama, or comedy.
The concept of ZYMAEN’S AMBITION isn’t really a concept, so much as it is an excuse for a bunch of fight scenes. Some guy decides he should rule, and sets out to do it. So? What are the STAKES if he doesn’t succeed? There aren’t any.
Try this experiment: present your concept (and ONLY the concept) to people that you don’t know. Not your friends, not your family members: complete strangers. When you get to the point that the main character is just about to begin his adventure (this would be the moment we call the BREAK INTO ACT 2), stop. The person’s reaction will tell you how strong your concept is.
In the case of ZYMAEN’S AMBITION, you’d say “My story is about a guy who is descended from a great ruler who gave up his kingdom. He believes he deserves to live a life of luxury. So he forms an army and sets out to conquer the world.”
If he says “Okay…?” or “Mm-hmm?”, it means your concept lacks a strong foundation. He’s still waiting for you to get to the point, which you thought you’d already arrived at.
If the person says “Oh, that’s interesting”, your concept is lame. He’s heard enough to know that he doesn’t care about your story, and he wants you out of his face.
If, on the other hand, he says “So what happens next?”, then he’s hooked, and you’ve got a good concept.
I would wager that most responses will be of the “okay…?” variety. Sorry to say it, but there’s not really a way to overcome a weak concept, beyond starting from scratch and rewriting.
STORY
What makes a strong story is CONFLICT. Don’t confuse CONFLICT with ACTION; Zack Snyder’s SUCKER PUNCH is stuffed to the gills with action, but it’s an interminable bore (which barely recouped its budget at the box office).
Conflict isn’t just about opposing forces; it’s about characters’ expectations. It’s not about how much fighting there is; it’s about how much every obstacle challenges the main character, whether that challenge is physical, mental, or emotional. We need these challenges to increase in difficulty in order to maintain our interest.
Your story ironically lacks strong conflict. There aren’t enough moments that change the situation for Zymaen, forcing him to adjust his plans, dig deeper within himself, and find a new means of overcoming the obstacles in his way to attain his goal. In fact, he’s barely ever challenged! You set him up as a god-like, nigh-invincible force of nature.
You do, on occasion, try to show his failures, which is commendable. I’m afraid they’re simply not big enough, though. Nekkhy’s betrayal, for instance, would mean something if you established that he and Zymaen are friends. Instead, killing the man who’s meant to be his best friend is a hollow moment.
Similarly, on page 38, Zymaen discovers that “Lyker”, a character we’ve never met or even seen, has died. You can’t expect the audience to care about the death of a character they know nothing about, especially when it happens off screen.
Things are just too easy for Zymaen. It makes the script repetitive (“and then he fights THESE guys, and he wins. Then he fights THESE guys, and he wins again. Then, he fights THESE guys…”). On top of this, it strains credulity. This boy challenges several armed men and defeats them, so they become his loyal army? He really has this easy a time in his quest to take over the world?
A story can’t just repeat the same beats, even if those beats are intended to be badass fight scenes. The fight scenes must have specific relevance, with something in particular at stake with each one. Go watch the original STAR WARS trilogy. Have you noticed how seldom there are actual lightsaber duels in those movies? And each time it happens, the ensuing battle is of the utmost importance. A fallen Jedi knight fighting against his ex-best friend and master, whom he betrayed. Our young hero fighting the Prince of Darkness, and learning the horrifying truth about his past.
You must seek to bring the same kind of importance to the fight scenes in this script.
Find ways to challenge Zymaen, with events that send the story in new, exciting, unexpected directions. Ever seen INCEPTION? In the opening scene, Cobb tries to pull off a heist, which he expects to succeed… and he fails. This creates a new situation he has to do something about, because his bosses are going to kill him for his failure. We also find out that he’s estranged from his children (he’s challenged EMOTIONALLY). He decides that he’ll just flee from Kobol Engineering… but then he’s betrayed by one of his partners, and found by Saito. He thinks Saito is going to kill him… but instead Saito offers him a deal to perform inception.
See how the story keeps changing from what the character expects? By the way, all of that stuff I just described happens in only the first 25 PAGES of Inception.
CHARACTER
Zymaen is a protagonist who has a clear goal, and is active in its pursuit. This is very positive; it’s the protagonist’s pursuit of his goal which forms the story. He also undergoes an arc and a maturation, from the brash, overconfident character of the first pages, to a wise and giving servant of the people in the end.
As mentioned in STORY, Zymaen is rarely challenged. True character is exposed under extreme duress; how the character reacts to being challenged is what shows the audience the kind of person he is.
We also don’t have much chance to learn what kind of person Zymaen is before he sets out on his adventure. You should spend the first 10 or so pages introducing the reader/audience to the character of Zymaen, and the world he inhabits (we never even learn where he lives, or in what time period!). This will make the character more empathetic, as right now, he often reads like a sociopathic, spoiled brat. It isn’t necessary to make us *like* the character (though in the fantasy genre it sure would be helpful), but it *is* necessary to make us understand him.
The other characters suffer the same problem, but to far greater a degree. The numerous characters in the script pop up wantonly, without giving the reader enough time to get to know them, or to care about them. They don’t feel like real people; instead, they feel like automatons placed in the script to perform the functions necessary of them for the story to move forward.
STRUCTURE
Structure is one of the most often misunderstood concepts in screenwriting. Remember how I said in “story” that you need to include more moments that send the story in a new direction? Where in the script those moments happen is the STRUCTURE. It’s the way you tell your story, and how you engage your audience to evoke emotional attachments.
There are many resources on approximately where every kind of “plot point” should occur (including several of my own reviews). I won’t bore you with the specifics here. I will say, though, that it its most basic, proper structure for a story maintains a continually escalating sense of tension. The closer the protagonist gets to accomplishing his goal, the greater and more numerous the ANTAGONISTIC FORCES in his way become.
The structure for the majority of the script is flat. It isn’t until around page 70 where Zymaen is (finally) defeated by the “Son of the Spiders” that we witness any kind of tension.
It all comes back to conflict.
DIALOGUE
I’m sorry to say it, but this may be the weakest aspect of the script, and the element you should spend the most time to correcting.
Human beings simply don’t speak the way the characters do in ZYMAEN’S AMBITION. Every character speaks precisely what is on his or her mind, without subtext or conflict. They declare their intentions for no reason other than to convey the information to the audience.
Look at Zymaen’s FIRST LINE: “Week after week,month after month,season after season,I've
trained myself hard.For this moment,I prepared myself.If you wish to stop me,then your efforts are in vain!”
Then he and Lyker talk for a page or so about things they both already know.
Who would speak like this? Why would Zymaen need to tell Lyker that he’s trained “week after week, month after month”? Why would he need to say things to Lyker, when Lyker already knows them?
You obviously wrote this to convey to the audience how long Zymaen has been training. Information conveyed to the audience is known as EXPOSITION. A good writer must learn to disguise/hide exposition, otherwise it sounds like terrible dialogue from a commercial.
Bad expository dialogue: “Hello, James, my brother! How is Mary, your wife?”
Good expository dialogue: “James! Mom told me you’d be here. Where’s the ball-and-chain?”
See how the two sentences convey the same information, but the second sentence feels much more natural? You can’t just have characters announce “this is who I am! This is what I have been doing! This is what I want!” You must reveal it subtly, through actions, through the *way* they speak; not just have them blurt it out.
Before you try to defend the dialogue by saying it’s supposed to be mimicking an older dialect, note how often you use contractions and anachronistic speech (“You’re with me!” on page 22, for instance).
It’s also rare for people to speak in giant blocks of text, as above. Far more frequently, people speak in choppy sentences, and other people interject.
Your characters all sound the same; they have the exact same voice. Seek to reveal characters’ personalities through the way they speak. Perhaps a nervous character constantly stammers:
“I- well, that is to say, we- believe that the best, or, rather, the most sensible course of action, would be to…”
A tough, not particularly bright character might speak in quick, terse spurts: “You. Me. Outside. NOW.”
Get it?
OVERALL
It’s a first draft of a first (or second?) script. There’s a reason they call them “rough” drafts. But seriously, every writer has some crummy scripts under his belt.
You’ve proven to yourself that you have the dedication to write an entire screenplay, which is no mean feat. Now you need to show the dedication to learn the craft, and apply the lessons you learn towards making a better script. Ambition alone will only get you so far; it's going to require patience, humility, and skill to take you the rest of the way.
Best of luck in your journey. read
Comments About olufemi 74
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philip halmarack on 05/07/2013
thanks for such a detailed and well considered review of The Ugly.
It's much appreciated.
Philip -
shedenbo on 04/16/2013
Thanks! That's very kind of you to say.
How is the 'black man' project going? -
mbannonb on 04/13/2013
Thanks for the feedback! -
FredCDobbs1 on 04/04/2013
Thank You Very Much for your input you don’t know what it means to me just having someone listen to me I always wanted to tell a story, I love a good adventure. Saying that and please forgive my writing and grammar to you reading this must be like scratching finger nails on a chalk board. I will attempt to answer some of your points you thoughtfully brought up, Again Thank You.
When I worked at the Colorado prisons and I do mean most all the prisons in the state. I observed the brick layers setting the concrete hollow blocks, there is a cavity that needed to be filled with an insulating sand mix. There could be placed anywhere in these walls a container with no inspectors watching. Also in between each and every floor there was a thin layer of corrugated sheets that each craft laid there material such as electrical conduit, or plumbers put their piping and sheet metal workers put down through this hanger strap for the duct work below. Then this was poured with a four inch layer of concrete once again no inspectors where at hand. Also all the iron work was sprayed with a cellulous insulation in complete isolation for it was very messy at the time; they were also surrounded by a plastic tent at this time. I could go on and on about the places where wooden boxes, or the like in case a metal detector was used later on.
As one prison was being finished another was being started so there was hardly a time in between. Also I think the appeal of the logistics of how these men were going to pull this stunt off is quite interesting. I think the conflict will happen when the money starts coming in and unforeseen expenses arise, and interlopers wanting in on the action, kind of like in my favorite movie Treasure of Sierra Madre.
If this story is told in a style like Pulp Fiction where action is not always true time but in the moment going back and forth and in-between, I think it would hold the interest week to week.
I would pick one man’s story at a time making us want to root for him or see him fail, but not bring down the others. Following the families and their motivations for this risk.
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FredCDobbs1 on 04/03/2013
I would be interested in what you think of my idea -
f-ceska on 03/28/2013
Hi Olufemi,
Wow! One certainly gets their money's worth with your reviews, and that's without even having spent any money! Thank you. I can't tell you how useful this is. This is the kind of review that can actually help me, almost every word of it. I've read all your points very carefully. I'm going to have to read them again, and I'll study each point before I do a rewrite, but basically, you are totally right in that it comes across as almost two different genres trying - and failing - to merge. The truth is that the short story worked better because Caroline just stayed in the UK. The reflections were what showed her she was better off with Ryan and never needed to leave. As a screenplay, I needed to add a 3rd (or 5th if you count Shakespeare) act, and as you so rightly pointed out, trying to make a villain out of Samuel doesn't really work. It does work better as a rom-com; i'm glad you pointed that out. Maybe I should try to work on that and forget the original short story.
One more thing - that final quote. I am sooooooooo embarrassed. I grew up in Stratford-on-Avon and had the Bard rammed down my throat from an early age. I double checked all the other quotes I used, but this one... I should have known. Dreadful.
Thanks for all your help. I'll let you know if there are any rewrites at some point in the future. Let me know if you upload anything else too.
Francesca -
TheReccher on 03/23/2013
Forgive the lateness of my reply. I've been ridiculously busy. I'll send my e-mail to your Facebook private message (as Eric Recchia). -
TheReccher on 03/07/2013
Yeah, that's okay. You can e-mail me and ask any question you'd like. Good luck on polishing your script. -
David Muhlfelder on 03/06/2013
Thanks for your review of Pride of Lyons. You put a lot of thought into it, and I appreciate it.
David -
matthew owen on 02/15/2013
Thanks for your review of brace. Your feedback is much appreciated and I will be taking it into consideration. You guessed right about my being new to writing (less than a year), and this was my first piece. I've reacently joined a writing class so that is helping a lot. Many of the things you've mentioned I'm aware of and are being worked on in the second draft.
Cheers, matt
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Comments About olufemi 74
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thanks for such a detailed and well considered review of The Ugly.
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Thanks! That's very kind of you to say.
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Thanks for the feedback!
+ more commentsphilip halmarack on 05/07/2013
It's much appreciated.
Philip
shedenbo on 04/16/2013
How is the 'black man' project going?
mbannonb on 04/13/2013