Reviews of We'll Always Have Basra (v2) 20

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  Decent
  A review of We'll Always Have Basra (v2)
  by brouge on 01/26/2010
  This play is a decent one. I would suggest that you check on the format and make sure it is to industry standards. There are a few spelling errors in this screenplay that will need fixed. I think that the dialogue of Ophelia, being she is from Russia, should be a little bit more in broken english. It reads like she has been born and raised in America. Also i have heard that... This play is a decent one. I would suggest that you check on the format and make sure it is to industry standards. There are a few spelling errors in this screenplay that will need fixed.
  I think that the dialogue of Ophelia, being she is from Russia, should be a little bit more in broken english. It reads like she has been born and raised in America.
  
  Also i have heard that you should not direct the camera angle as it is the directors call, but I do understand you see what you see and want the reader to see it too. I got a little lost on the bar scenes and the significance of it relating to the script in a whole.
  
  It seems like with some more work it could turn out to be something worth while. And always remember to use FADE OUT. You used Fade In but not the later. That is a very important part of the formatting. The one Flash back you put in was only one sentence that didn't make any sense to me to be in the play at all. I did think there should have been a flash back on Ophelia's life when she was talking about where she came from as a kid and all. Also maybe a little more depth within the characters dialogue. ( Not sure what that means, but I just felt the characters didn't have much emotion or personality)
  
  Good luck with it. read
• 
  We'll Always Have Basra (review)
  A review of We'll Always Have Basra (v2)
  by matt.deschamps on 01/20/2010
  (Although you had stated that you were looking for criticism regarding the Dave/ Ophelia aspect of the story, I feel I should address some other things as well). First of all, I feel as if this story has some real potential to be something different than just another war movie. There were some very original aspects of the story, however, some seemed recycled from other action... (Although you had stated that you were looking for criticism regarding the Dave/ Ophelia aspect of the story, I feel I should address some other things as well). First of all, I feel as if this story has some real potential to be something different than just another war movie. There were some very original aspects of the story, however, some seemed recycled from other action movies, for example, the 'boxing match' confrontation between Rex and Dave; this was done in 'Lethal Weapon' and I believe the fight between them should have been more epic. I liked the characters a lot, mainly the way each seemed to have a core quality that defined them. Rex was clearly insane, Ophelia was sarcastic, etc. Altogether, I think the strongest character in the entire script was Rex; he never veered off of character once, and for a villain, that is essential. When it came to Dave/ Ophelia, I felt that the film was about them and their relationship, and this is what I meant when I referred to the original elements of the script. I think that by burying some of the military and political portions of the script you could really delve into their relationship. They should have met sooner then they did, however, in my opinion. This is where the story lies, between these two characters, and I think the best way for you to make this a very, very strong script is to explore them much more than you have. Altogether, a pretty good attempt, but I would suggest going through the script again, to clean up the typos. Also, something that detered me greatly was at the bottom of page 40, where you refer to adding something about Katho and Bishop... it took away from the flow of the story greatly.Anyways, I wish you the best of luck with this and hope I wasn't too pushy about some of the things I said. I feel like you have a good start, man, and wish you the best. read
• 
  REVIEW
  A review of We'll Always Have Basra (v2)
  by damiz7o7 on 01/19/2010
  This was pretty entertaining read. I love 80s action flicks, and I can concur that this fits the mold. Too much special effects heavy stuff nowadays. I must say that I liked Ophelia and Rex a little more than Dave. They had a lot more spunk than him. I especially like Ophelia's attitude in the interrogation room and Rex's lesson in the mess hall with his troops. Really saw... This was pretty entertaining read. I love 80s action flicks, and I can concur that this fits the mold.
  
  Too much special effects heavy stuff nowadays. I must say that I liked Ophelia and Rex a little more than Dave. They had a lot more spunk than him.
  
  I especially like Ophelia's attitude in the interrogation room and Rex's lesson in the mess hall with his troops. Really saw him as a cold bastard.
  
  I had some minor issues, but I'll point them out in my notes below.
  
  Overall, good story. Reminded of a Shane Black screenplay with the dark humor. Oh, and as for Ophelia and Dave, I thought they were good together. Her giving him shit and him not giving in to her. I just think that any good actress in the role would completely outshine Dave.
  
  Write numbers out in dialogue
  
  Several typos throughout-I suggest scriptproof.com
  
  phone convos should have (into phone)
  
  29-30---This scene with Ophelia and Goldie should be trimmed.
  
  40--possibly add something... What is this?
  
  55--Stay with the flow. Ophelia says "coolies" earlier, now she says "cool"..Or just get rid of the Diablo Cody word "coolies"
  
  94--Okay, the whole mask thing was a little too Mission Impossible.
  
  101--Damn, Dave is lucky everybody only aims for his shoulders. That's two shots in the shoulder now.
  read
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  Left my Heart in Kirkuk
  A review of We'll Always Have Basra (v2)
  by Michael Keller on 01/18/2010
  I tend to like this type of story, set in a failed state, where various military, intelligence, mercenary and rouge operatives squabble over power and resources, and it's not always clear who is on what side. There were quite a few pages of talky exposition in the beginning, but once it got moving, the script became more interesting. There were so many characters that it... I tend to like this type of story, set in a failed state, where various military, intelligence, mercenary and rouge operatives squabble over power and resources, and it's not always clear who is on what side.
  
  There were quite a few pages of talky exposition in the beginning, but once it got moving, the script became more interesting.
  
  There were so many characters that it was sometimes hard to remember who is whom, and follow what is going on, but I'm sure when you see a face onscreen for every name, that won't be as big a deal.
  
  -Awesome atmosphere in the beginning.
  
  -Dialog was occasionally clunky in the beginning. I'd simplify.
  
  -Why are Goldie, Ophelia and Rex talking about the weather for half a page? Were you trying to do that Tarantino thing where you lull the viewer with mundane banter, then shock them with abrupt violence?
  
  -Why did Mushtaq's detonator delay?
  
  -Funny repeating of side-on joke
  
  -I like Ophelia's blazé attitude.
  
  -REX: "I’ll deal with you later." Only bond villains make that mistake.
  
  Overall, good draft and keep up the good work. read
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  Mosul on my mind
  A review of We'll Always Have Basra (v2)
  by OldFFF on 01/18/2010
  Comments on We’ll Always Have Basra There are a great many scenes that you wrote well. Enough to convince me you can do that. I did have some trouble with scene selection. There were times when the characters sat and talked. There were others where Dave just phoned in to O’Connell. Those would command more attention if the action was staged to force the characters to give... Comments on We’ll Always Have Basra
  
  There are a great many scenes that you wrote well. Enough to convince me you can do that. I did have some trouble with scene selection. There were times when the characters sat and talked. There were others where Dave just phoned in to O’Connell. Those would command more attention if the action was staged to force the characters to give out the info or we just picked it up through the action. The CIA stuff is too complex for me but it could still be handled by the fly on the wall camera as those characters do their thing in their plans. We don’t have to know they are CIA all the way through. It would add to the tension to know there are plans and not know who all the good guys are. How many threats do they face? You did that fine when you chose to have Steadman and Doggerman on the airplane together.
  
  More detailed comments follow.
  
  You start the script with a bang. Then you spend the next eight pages with people in a tent talking to each other. Can O’Connell deal with Rex in the field? That would give urgency to the dialogue about them having to leave. It also gives you the chance to show the relationship. Does O’Connell stop Rex from a nasty action that would be illegal? Does Rex have to save O’Connell because he was about to lead his men into a trap? Whatever action you choose, it defines who is who. Are they ready to shoot each other? Would they die for each other? Are competence and authority in the same person? And the dialogue would have to be brief and functional. Avoid expository talk.
  
  What is the incident that triggers Dave to do this? In the present version it is not on the page. It happened somewhere in a bar in Baghdad? Is it an internal moment? Can you make it, instead, the result of events he is a part of? Does something happen to remind him that he has purpose in life and his life will be meaningless if he does not do it?
  
  Good image mingling his blood with the beggar boy’s on the sidewalk. Having him fall down drunk to accomplish it is not a very positive note.
  
  As a plot device does it make sense to have O’Connell have such easy access to Bishop? We just saw Bishop run from O’Connell.
  
  As it plays Dave is passively accepting information from O’Connell. Shouldn’t he be asking the questions? Will he be satisfied with the answers? Something has to be wrong, and we have to know that even without knowing exactly what it is, to be in tension about whether he will survive. And then spin us later by having a surprise about what the problem was with his set up or how much was wrong with it. Anticipation comes from knowing there are opposed intentions between Dave and someone (Rex) or more than one. Tension comes from us knowing something Dave does not know. Surprise comes from us learning that what we knew was wrong or insufficient. Set us up and feed us like this in a highly active setting.
  
  Don’t let people sit down and talk in a scene. Always have them doing something. Sleeping is only allowed when we know they are at risk if they don’t wake up now.
  
  If Mike’s face is hidden, how will we get the irony of his slitting a throat while O’Connell says he doesn’t know what Mile is up to? He could have a distinctive scar or tattoo that we saw before. But what is the point of wearing a mask if everyone knows who you are regardless?
  
  Dave calls in and hears that O’Connell is away talking with Steadman? This is unforced information. It has no tension and no conflict. Is it a scene that needs to be there? Should we see that meeting instead?
  
  Bye the bye, why do we have Basra if we’re in Mosul? I know we always have Paris, but what is the connection?
  
  Having Mushtaq demand they take O’Connell was a good bit. Dave doesn’t get much out of it. There is no build up and tension about the operation. Boom it’s all gone. If you invest more meaning in O’Connell and Dave there would be more emotion in the scene when you eventually pay it off. Make it harder for Dave so it means more for us.
  
  Bishop and Dave sitting and talking. Can you activate them?
  
  Seems like Rex has crossed a line. Beatings and abuse. OK. But sexual mutilation of your men? He’s a fool if he expects loyalty after this. Everyone around him is armed and he has treated a key man with worse than death. And still expects Mike to work for him? Or Goldie? How will you pay this off?
  
  Voice over can be effective. I don’t see what it contributes in the scene with Rex and the woman.
  
  Dave our hero is passive in getting the info from Stupid Larry.
  
  Decimate. At last somebody who knows what it means. Lenin sent Dzherzhinski into the middle class neighborhoods to shoot every tenth person. It was marvelous as a means of terrorizing the populace. But they never executed their own men randomly in front the others. This villain is begging to be shot by his own men is self defense. It lowers him as a threat to the hero because he does not pretend there is merit in his selection of who to kill. Lenin and Stalin and Mao always made sure they presented executions of their key followers as a response to a threat. It was orchestrated so the underlings knew they were at risk for any slight appearance of disloyalty. If they are at risk for no good reason why will armed men not shoot him? This does not demonstrate his control over them. It demonstrates his lack of control over himself. The race is not whether Dave can stop him in time. It is whether Dave can stop Rex before he destroys himself.
  
  They just walk in on Bishop in a beheading mood and then they drive to a cell where Diapod is kept. It’s a lot of information and looks free. There is minimal tension. The excitement is not developed in these scenes. And Dave seems to just trust Ophelia.
  
  The betrayals were there in the end. I am not clear why they were handled as conversation between characters. They could be effectively done by letting the audience in on critical moments and saving the exposition which slows the story down. And it can be handled so it raises the concerns for the hero’s safety instead of lowering them. We should know as we approach the final fights who is fighting whom. If there is to be a surprise and a betrayal it should be clear without talking, once it occurs, how it comes about.
  
  I am not sure why the mano a mano fight between Rex and Dave. That seems to be a requirement in some films. It takes me out of the moment of characters who are fighting for their lives and into the Hollywood world of staging improbable events.
  
  I can see you’ve put a lot of effort into this story. I think it can be worked into a stronger story if you redo the exposition.
  
  Good luck and happy writing.
  OldFFF
  read
• 
  Iraq and a Hard Place
  A review of We'll Always Have Basra (v2)
  by TheKeenGuy on 12/08/2009
  LOGLINE After mercenaries fired by the US government begin a violent rampage, an alcoholic ex-war hero must infiltrate the group in order to stop their planned assault on Mosul. PAGE NOTES Pg. 1 “and passes by the boy into a bar.” This isn’t really needed. Pg. 1 “to him, scowls and” Should be divided into two sentences or rewritten as one. Pg. 1 “He surveys… nonetheless.”... LOGLINE
  
  After mercenaries fired by the US government begin a violent rampage, an alcoholic ex-war hero must infiltrate the group in order to stop their planned assault on Mosul.
  
  PAGE NOTES
  
  Pg. 1 “and passes by the boy into a bar.” This isn’t really needed.
  
  Pg. 1 “to him, scowls and” Should be divided into two sentences or rewritten as one.
  
  Pg. 1 “He surveys… nonetheless.” Quite a run-on sentence, and with so much happening in the sentence, the “nonetheless” was a speed-bump, because I had to take a moment to realize it referred to the scowls and mutters from the previous action line.
  
  Pg. 1 “imperialist dogs” Missing period.
  
  The first page makes a big impression, so be especially careful about making it a clean, easy read. Of course, really, this standard should be held to the whole script.
  
  Pg. 1 “I dunno what…” The whole line isn’t needed. The action of laying down the money and the Barman’s change says it all. Also, I would recommend against the translations of the Arabic, because you want the audience in the same boat as Dave.
  
  Pg. 2 “It used to be…” This line is too exposition-heavy.
  
  Pg. 2 “DAVE’S ALCOHOLISM” I wouldn’t recommend naming a montage like this, especially because this montage as communicated visually merely tells us that he got drunk, not that he’s an alcoholic.
  
  Pg. 3 “He flanked” Typo. If the script is this typo-heavy throughout, then I’d recommend you proofread it again. If you have Final Draft, the speech mechanism is an excellent way to catch these mistakes. (You can also find a similar program online for free.)
  
  Pg. 3 Not sure the layman knows what a “jar head” is, even after the movie JARHEAD. Also, the character intros should be capped, even if they have no dialogue.
  
  Pg. 5 “stops it’s Iraqi” its
  
  Pg. 7 “O’Connell himself” No need for “himself.”
  
  Pg. 8 “O’Connell thinks back.” Cut this. Even the flashback is only debatably necessary, but how do you visually communicate this part? By having him look up and to the left and the screen goes wavy?
  
  Pg. 9 “became deservedly disillusioned with the command of one Steven Steadman” This is worded very awkwardly for dialogue. Work on delivering exposition in a more natural way.
  
  The thing is, you never want a character speaking directly to the audience, saying either what both characters know or what a person wouldn’t naturally admit unprovoked. Avoid, the way Mamet puts it, “Would you like a cup of coffee because I’m Irish?”
  
  Pg. 18 “You’ll be like Die Hard With a Vengeance.” Too self-conscious a movie reference.
  
  This dialogue-heavy scene between Dave and O’Connell, and well as Dave’s last two dialogue heavy scenes (with Bishop and O’Connell again) read too young and unprofessional, and suffer what I talked about before where you’re focused too much on connecting the expository dots to build the story, and the dialogue suffers.
  
  Pg. 34 “” wanna come back to the fighting, any fighting.” This is weak as his fake motivation to join with anti-American terrorists, at least as communicated here. If you don’t have him demonstrate his loyalty to the cost in some physical way, then he better make a darn convincing speech. One that almost makes the audience say “you know, he’s got a point.”
  
  Pg. 35 How does the viewing audience know that’s Steadman?
  
  Pg. 37 Does Dave shoot Mushtaq so that Mushtaq doesn’t follow him out of the van? I can see no other reason (in which case it should happen differently, meaning during Dave’s struggle to get out of the van as fast as possible), but it still feels unnecessary.
  
  Pg. 40 “possibly add something…” It really does yourself a disservice to put a working draft out there for review. My page notes have slowed down because there’s really too many little fixes you probably already know that you need to make. It makes me feel that it’s really only going to be helpful to focus on the big picture stuff.
  
  Pg. 51 “You didn’t lock the door.” This feels so very false. She should be prepared to break in anyway.
  
  Pg. 53 “No. You’re one of those side-on girls.” Funny.
  
  Pg. 58 “loosing” losing… Forty is misspelled also.
  
  Pg. 61 “rye smile” wry
  
  Pg. 81 “Dave throws his phone out the jeep.” Umm, why? Is he just being recklessly petulant?
  
  Pg. 82 “I wanted back in. I just wanted to see my friend.” I’m definitely going to focus on this once I’m done with page notes.
  
  Pg. 87 “Pretty poor guard work. Especially since you know I was coming.” I’ll say. Having characters point out giant gaps in logic does not excuse them.
  
  Okay, finished reading, onto…
  
  THE BIG PICTURE
  
  I was surprised as I got into this to find this that this isn’t your average Iraqi war film. This is a genre pic, part of the post-Tarantino movement of colorful characters, vast amounts of black humor, and a LOT of violence. Guy Ritchie came right to mind for me, so I’m not surprised to see your reverence of him indicated in your bio.
  
  I also think it’s very likely that you had a neo-western conceit in mind. If not, you were at least channeling a lot of western motifs subconsciously.
  
  You do a good job of creating memorable characters with interesting quirks, although sometimes it’s overkill when it does nothing to serve the plot (Dave and Ophelia’s “c*nt” discussion comes to mind.). You also have too many beats of Rex killing his own men, and I’m surprised there wasn’t a pay-off where he realizes that he killed someone he actually needs.
  
  Dave is actually your most poorly defined character, and that’s where you focus needs to start with your rewrite. To start with, as I pointed out, you seem to give him two goals, neither of which resonates. He wants to get back in the armed forces, for whatever reason, and he wants to find Mike… for whatever reason.
  
  You put a lot into that idea that he wants to find Mike, but there’s no motivation behind it. When he does find Mike, he has a rather meaningless chat, and then abandons Mike because his focus has turned to the mission at hand. This isn’t presented with any dramatic irony or pathos. It’s just bizarre that Dave dismisses what was his initial goal. Mike is hardly more than a MacGuffin. That part of the plot is useless in this draft.
  
  The same goes for Dave’s alcoholism. The first scene is focused on Dave’s alcoholism, and would’ve had more resonance had his alcoholism actually impaired him in some way where he probably could have saved the beggar boy otherwise. But the alcoholism doesn’t really affect the plot in any way. It’s a patch to create some semblance of a character arc. He gets drunk in the first act and pours out the drink in the third act. It’s cliché, and it should be scrapped unless you are actually going to make it relevant.
  
  A clever take would see Dave truly struggling with sobriety throughout the mission and, when it’s finally accomplished, he returns to his binge drinking ways. A tragic character who sobered up just long enough to redeem himself.
  
  So you need to go back to the first act and fix this. I think the strongest way possibly would be to focus on that incident which the characters all talk about, but you don’t show, where the Green Beret mission with Dave, Mike, Bishop, etc. went to hell.
  
  I would recommend that be your opening scene, because the impact that incident has on these men needs to be the brush you use to paint all of this. It has to be a severe enough betrayal by the US government (the strings invisibly pulled by Steadman, of course, who gained stature as a result) that the audience can understand how it turned these American heroes into severely damaged men, some now even fighting against the US.
  
  Imagine Dave, now a former soldier racked with guilt because he left another soldier to die (Mike) in the chaos of that mission gone bad. Now he’s a cripple and an alcoholic.
  
  Then, O’Connell comes to him and reveals that Mike isn’t dead, but has fallen in with the wrong crowd. That way, Dave’s interest in the mission, in finding Mike, is clear. He can redeem himself by saving Mike, and no longer blame himself for Mike’s death. It’s his second chance.
  
  Of course, the tragedy can end the same way (made stronger by this backstory, in fact), when Dave has to kill Mike to complete the mission and save many more lives. He’s a hero, but he’s right back to where he was before at the end of the film, self-loathing and binge-drinking.
  
  You could certainly form a stronger character arc for your protagonist out of something like that, and that’s what’ll really give this film an emotional core. As it, it feels a little too hollow and cynical.
  
  Also, I’ll repeat from the page notes because it’s important, you need to up the maturity of your characters, both in what they do and what they say. Often, the dialogue read too young, and their actions were not particularly logical. This goes far beyond the few examples I pointed out.
  
  Don’t lose the sense of fun and eccentricity that you bring to this, but try to make the characters appropriate to their age/position and more credible overall.
  
  Good luck! read
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  Interesting enough
  A review of We'll Always Have Basra (v2)
  by JakeinCT on 11/22/2009
  It was hard to picture the scenes as they were supposed to unfold. Although I did like some of the characters, it was difficult to get to really know them. I guess I like more of a book layout of the story. Something more involving that makes you look forward to the dialogue unfolding in front of your eyes. I like to get a better picture of back story I guess. Maybe its just... It was hard to picture the scenes as they were supposed to unfold. Although I did like some of the characters, it was difficult to get to really know them. I guess I like more of a book layout of the story. Something more involving that makes you look forward to the dialogue unfolding in front of your eyes. I like to get a better picture of back story I guess. Maybe its just my preference I guess. I don't claim to know everything as I am a complete novice, just my preference, once again.
  My interest wasn't really peaked and so I found the reading difficult at times. read
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  INTERESTING READ
  A review of We'll Always Have Basra (v2)
  by CJ Knight on 11/19/2009
  I loved the title! CONCEPT A group of mercenaries posing as terrorists cause trouble for the Americans in post-war Iraq. PLOT A bit tricky to pin this one down. The initial set up seems to indicate we are going to be analyzing the reasons for the gulf war, as this is what the dialogue focuses on. However, this turns out only to be backstory and unnecessary exposition. The... I loved the title!
  
  CONCEPT
  A group of mercenaries posing as terrorists cause trouble for the Americans in post-war Iraq.
  
  PLOT
  A bit tricky to pin this one down. The initial set up seems to indicate we are going to be analyzing the reasons for the gulf war, as this is what the dialogue focuses on. However, this turns out only to be backstory and unnecessary exposition.
  
  The Arabs are never given any credible characters, so we know this is not a serious look at the troubles in Iraq. There also seems to be a lack of understanding of Muslim countries, as there are references to bars selling alcohol, threesomes and whore houses. I can imagine many Muslims/Iraqis being VERY upset about the way their country is portrayed and this should be given some more thought and/or research.
  
  As the plot develops, it takes on a JAMES BOND feel when the villainous/fun/cartoonish REX is introduced. For some reason, REX has turned mercenary and has acquired a “big gun”, which he intends to use on the town of Mosul.
  
  The ending then turns into MISSION IMPOSSIBLE/GI JOE, as characters pull off fake masks and reveal their true identity, etc. The reader is kind of left wondering what type of movie the reader was intending to write.
  
  CHARACTERS
  I did like Rex, although his narrative of the final fight scene went a bit too far into the absurd. Dave was not a bad “troubled” hero. I would say that his battle with alcohol was clumsy and this could have been handled better (or could have been dropped for another flaw -- it is overused in movies).
  
  I can see what you were trying to achieve with introducing OPHELIA. I would imagine you wanted to write a character similar to YELENA in XXX and/or CAMILLE MONTES in QUANTUM OF SOLACE. Unfortunately, the character you actually invented was ridiculous. Everything she said or did was stupid and unrealistic… and she was too bad to be redeemed and turned into a sympathetic character. By all means, keep her but please CHANGE everything she does and says.
  
  DIALOGUE
  The script is littered with swearing. Even the characters refer to this themselves. I became numb to this eventually, but the problem is that it makes all the characters sound the same. Even Rex (who should have had distinctive dialogue) swears too much.
  
  The issue with the dialogue is that it provides too much exposition (show us, do not tell us)… everyone speaks with the same voice… and a lot of the conversations/lines are totally unrealistic. Are you writing a serious movie, or are you trying to write the next AUSTIN POWERS?
  • “But, am I the only one who sees the overriding irony of that statement?”
  • “Driver, it is too soon for you to know of such situations. Suffice to say it is a very rich man”.
  • “Y’know, I wanted to be a Cosmonaut. But you so infrequently get the chance to open doors like this when you’re in space.”
  
  The references to John Holmes should be removed and/or updated. This is not the 70s.
  
  FORMATTING/STYLE
  It doesn’t look too bad on the page, but on closer inspection there are the usual and excessive use of adverbs and unnecessary parenthesis: slowly, appropriately, nervously, friendly, slightly, aimlessly, erratically, barely, grudgingly, (without turning) (vaguely) (smiling) (lighting a smoke) (furious) (flatly) (in agony, rolling) (grimly) (pissed off) (starts pacing) (painfully) (quietly) (wiping the flecks of sick from his lips) (panting) (super quiet) (getting down) (shocked) (answering) (unfolding note) (examining it) (sets it down) (grinning) (tearing up, slightly) (getting up) (sees Dave isn’t getting back up) (placing a single bullet in the revolver) (in great pain due to his jaw, still manages a Rex impression).
  
  The narrative was also littered with unnecessary lines (and some lines did not make sense at all). Do we really need to be kept informed of EVERY move each character makes? I don’t think so:
  • Dave chews his lip.
  • Dave lets out a pained chortle.
  • O’Connell’s eyes fall to the floor.
  • Bishop leans forward, his hands on his knees.
  • Dave looks up, frowning sadly.
  • O’Connell looks around the room aimlessly, hands on hips.
  • O’Connell taps his foot, thinking.
  • Mike spots Dave immediately.
  • Mushtaq speaks in a cold monotone.
  • Sidearm. Mercs. Building. Rex crouches down
  • [possibly add something about johnson kathro and bishop]
  
  “scowls and mutters are set off like dominoes”. I liked this line.
  
  The SCENE HEADINGS are basic and need fleshing out to tell us more of when/where we are. For example, the first SH tells us we are on a street. The narrative then goes on to tell us we are in Iraq! In another example, the SH puts us in a tent… yet the narrative goes on to tell us we are in a US army command center.
  
  When introducing characters, I would start with their name first and then give us the description (not the other way around). Other functional characters should still be put in CAPS if we are seeing them for the first time. I would not be so specific with your ages (apart from the kids)
  
  Don’t give your characters a name (e.g. LEADER) and then change it for something else (e.g. GEORGE BISHOP). Stick with one name to avoid confusion.
  
  Is MOMENTS LATER on page 2 necessary?
  
  Is the one line FLASHBACK on P8 necessary?
  
  Put sound effects in CAPS.
  
  SUMMARY
  This is not a serious movie because it has nothing to say about Post-war Iraq. However, there is the makings of action movie in here (think GI JOE meets JAMES BOND)… so long as the characters and dialogue is adjusted to suit.
  
  CJ Knight. read
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  Great Read!
  A review of We'll Always Have Basra (v2)
  by **DELETED ACCOUNT** on 11/18/2009
  Solid, solid read. You have something good on your hands here. I thought your dialogue was among some of the best I’ve seen for an unproduced script – easily the strength of this project. Dave was a great protag – a clear, distinct voice. My only knock on him is that I wasn’t sure if he really had an arc besides kicking the bottle. I know what Dave has to do to save the day... Solid, solid read. You have something good on your hands here.
  
  I thought your dialogue was among some of the best I’ve seen for an unproduced script – easily the strength of this project. Dave was a great protag – a clear, distinct voice. My only knock on him is that I wasn’t sure if he really had an arc besides kicking the bottle. I know what Dave has to do to save the day physically, but how about emotionally? If there was an arc present in any of the other chars, I missed those as well. Then again, it’s a fierce debate about whether or not one needs an arc. Some people swear by it, others say it’s trivial.
  
  Your bad guys are pretty evil dudes. Rex manages to surpass most evil-boss types with some fairly sophisticated char insights – I just wish that the battle at the end with him and Dave could’ve been a bit longer.
  
  Your side chars also have distinct identities – regarding Ophelia and Dave’s relationship, it didn’t seem forced to me. Ophelia is clearly a creature motivated by her own selfless pursuits which allows me to believe her switching sides, but going back to the arc issue, if anyone had one, I think it would’ve been her.
  
  The funny thing is that I read this like I’d read a drama – and that’s no easy feat, given your intended genre. Strong characters, fresh, distinct and sharp dialogue – those are the things that will help your script to really stand out in the long run, and this script has plenty of it.
  
  And yeah, get a damn proofreader! :) read
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  Basra Review
  A review of We'll Always Have Basra (v2)
  by KenArthur on 11/14/2009
  Typos galore. Also on p. 40 was this: [possibly add something about johnson kathro and bishop]. Dialogue: for a war movie, there was a lot of talking and a lot of it was rather unecessary (to me!). Ophelia had a lot of lines that didn't necessarily advance the story. The long interrogation of her with Doggerman was, well, too long. The long story Rex tells on p. 42. When... Typos galore. Also on p. 40 was this: [possibly add something about johnson kathro and bishop].
  
  Dialogue: for a war movie, there was a lot of talking and a lot of it was rather unecessary (to me!). Ophelia had a lot of lines that didn't necessarily advance the story. The long interrogation of her with Doggerman was, well, too long. The long story Rex tells on p. 42.
  
  When you edit this one, aside from the typos, take a look at each and other line of dialogue and ruthlessly cut out any and every line that doesn't directly contribute to the advancement of the story or to characterization. Especially relating to Ophelia.
  
  As far as structure goes, I was not able to clearly discern the three acts---they all kind of blended together. The ending with Steadman's involvement could have been foreshadowed; instead it kind of appeared from whole cloth right near the end.
  
  There are a lot of Iraq movies out there already, and lots of scripts. I would imagine the studios would be looking for something very unique, very different and something "high concept."
  
  
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