What happens when you switch a whole lot of shit around in a great script? Today’s script-to-screen breakdown tells you!
Genre: Contained Thriller/Sci-fi
Premise: (IMDB) After getting in a car accident, a woman is held in a shelter with two men, who claim the outside world is affected by a widespread chemical attack.
About: This movie has had a weird journey. It started as a spec script unrelated to the Cloverfield franchise. You can check out my review of that script here. Then Bad Robot bought it and decided to turn it into a Cloverfield thing. The film came out this past weekend and did really well for a contained thriller, pulling in 25 million dollars off of a 15 million dollar budget. For comparison’s sake, the new Sascha Baron Cohen film pulled in 3 million dollars on a 60 million dollar budget (I’m sensing a Borat sequel very soon). The film’s success also hinted at a new avenue for screenwriters – writing specs that you can sneak into existing franchises.
Details: 103 minutes
Writers: Josh Campbell & Matthew Stuecken and Damien Chapelle
Cloverfield Lane has to be one of the strangest script-to-screens I’ve done so far. That’s because the writers changed a whole shitload of little things despite the fact that they didn’t have to. Nothing was wrong with the previous script. And yet despite all these changes, the movie still worked. In fact, BOTH versions of the screenplay worked great.
This goes to show that when you have a good premise or a good setup, it’s hard to screw things up. Sort of like how if you have good bone structure, it doesn’t matter if you grow a beard or have a strange haircut. What’s underneath is so structurally sound that you’re still going to look good regardless. This doesn’t even get into the final 20 minutes of the film, which I’ll be spoiling later in the review (You’ve had your warning!). So let’s get into it.
For those who didn’t read my previous review or see the movie, here’s a quick breakdown of the plot. A young woman, Michelle, wakes up in a room, chained to the wall, with no idea of how she got there. Eventually, Howard, an older large man and the owner of this place, comes in and tells Michelle that he saved her life.
He proceeds to tell her that they’re in an underground bunker and that the United States has been attacked by some sort of chemical weapon, which means they’re stuck here for two years. Also living in the bunker is the young man who helped Howard build it, Emmett. Michelle has her doubts that any of what Howard has told her is true and begins plotting her escape. But as the old saying goes, “Be careful what you wish for.”
Right away you noticed differences between the script and the movie. First off, instead of starting with Michelle waking up in the room, they start with her in the real world – first at home, then driving her car, then getting hit by another car and crashing.
I was shocked to see this. One of the most intriguing things about the original script was that we didn’t know if anything Howard was telling Michelle was real. He’d say he found her in a car, but both she and we were wondering, “Did he?” Here, we know he’s telling the truth since we saw it with our own eyes. This stole a lot of the mystery away from the script, and I’m still not sure why they did it.
I know that sometimes when a production is given more money (as is the case when you go from a contained no-budget thriller to a Cloverfield film), they feel like they have to use it somewhere, and therefore stick in some high-production-value shots at the opening of the film to show you, “This is a big movie.”
They made the exact same mistake with Source Code. It was critical in that film that we wake up with the main character in a train with no idea where we were or how we got there. Instead, they had some costly opening crane/drone shots of a train shooting down the tracks. Sometimes, less money can be better, as it means less temptation.
Anyway, once we’re in the room, waking up with Michelle, I noticed we were drawing this scene out way longer than in the original script. In the original script, Michelle wakes up, and a minute later this guy comes in, she attacks him, fails, and he tells her, “I’m here to help you!” Here, we stay with Michelle for awhile as she tries to figure out how to get out of the room.
I can understand this choice better. You’re in a contained location. It’s easy for things to become boring. You want to draw out any potential suspenseful situation you can. A girl waking up in a room without any idea of how she got there is inherently suspenseful, so I liked that we stayed with her for awhile as she tried to solve the problem.
Next up is Howard. In the original script, Howard has a meekness about him. In the new version, he’s much more dangerous. He has more of a “you need to walk around on eggshells around him” quality. It was an interesting choice because it definitely made the character more powerful. But one of the strengths of the previous version of the character was that even though he was meek, you had the sense that he could become dangerous at any moment. And we were always waiting for that dangerous moment to arrive.
Here, we know Howard is capable of being horrible from the get-go and it takes some of that mystery away. I’m still not sure how I feel about it. On the surface, he’s a more memorable character. But the other incarnation may have been better for the overall story.
Then there’s Emmett. Poor Emmett. Emmett was this cool dangerous unpredictable character in the last script. Here he’s a boring nice guy. If you’re like me, you’re probably wondering, “Why did they do that???” I’ll tell you exactly why. Once they changed Howard’s character into a more surface-level badass, he became too close in tone to Emmett. So they had to change Emmett’s character to complement him. Unfortunately, Emmett’s fate as an interesting character was sealed.
This felt to me like a “ran out of time” choice. Emmett is the third most important character in the script, and therefore the one that they’re not going to worry about until they have Howard and Michelle figured out. Once that happened, the obvious choice to complement Howard was to go “nice.” With more time, I’m sure they would’ve tweaked this, made Emmett nice-but-with-an-edge. But hey, it’s hard to be perfect in any screenplay.
A result of this choice was that there’s no longer an “Are they collaborating?” element to Howard and Emmett’s storyline. That was one of the strongest parts of the previous script so I’m surprised they removed that. However, someone pointed out in the comments of my previous review that there’s a famous play and/or short story that sets up this exact same premise, so I’m wondering if they dropped that simply to avoid a potential lawsuit. Man, writing screenplays is complicated!
Finally, there’s Michelle. They definitely improved this character, making her much more active. From the very first scene, she’s using tools to create an elaborate hook to drag her phone towards her while chained to the wall. Later she’s using liquor to create fires to force Howard to take her out of the room. She’s always thinking, always trying to escape. It wasn’t like she was passive in the last script. But she’s aggressively active here, and that has a huge effect on how we view her. It’s nearly impossible to dislike a character who’s in a bad situation yet won’t stop fighting. So that was another smart choice.
Finally, there’s the ending. This is spoiler territory and I’m not even sure it’s worth discussing, to be honest. Basically, the last 20 minutes of this movie became a completely different genre, which is totally bizarre. Now I knew this was coming, so it’s hard to gauge how successful the choice was. But I’m curious what people who had no idea what to expect thought when, all of a sudden, our main character is fighting aliens and spaceships. It’s a really weird way to end the movie.
But I have to admit, the nerdy side of me was desperately trying to figure out how this linked up with the original Cloverfield. In that movie, we had a giant monster. Here we have a fucking spaceship. What does that mean?? I want more Cloverfield movies to find out! I’m actually surprised that they still haven’t created a direct sequel to that surprise hit.
Anyway, like I said, this setup was so strong that the execution was malleable to the point where several hundred choices could’ve worked. So besides the lesson I’m about to teach you below, the takeaway here is: come up with a concept with strong bones.
[ ] what the hell did I just watch?
[ ] wasn’t for me
[ ] worth the price of admission
[x] impressive
[ ] genius
What I learned: Today we’re going to talk about the concept of EXPANDING. Expanding is something you’ll do between drafts. It’s the process by which you look for potentially dramatic situations within your scenes to create new “mini” or full scenes from. The final draft of Cloverfield Lane did a lot of expanding. For example, in the spec script, Michelle wakes up in that room, hears someone coming, and prepares to hit him. The writers of the script expanded this for the final cut. They decided that the first thing Michelle would try to do was call someone. But her phone was all the way across the room in her bag and she was chained to the wall. So Michelle has to use the objects around her to construct a pole which she then uses to reach across and pull the bag towards her, all with the threat of that man potentially coming in at any moment. There are expandable scenes everywhere. You just have to look for them.
Wow, all these people came out of the woodwork to submit for Pilot Week. It’s as if there’s this whole sub-section of secret Scriptshadow readers who were waiting for this moment. I might have to do a second week of this since there were so many submissions and I couldn’t get all the good ones in today. But first we’ll have to see how this week goes. For those who don’t know the rules, download and read the pilots and vote on your favorite in the comment section. Winners gets a review next week. Also, if you have time, give feedback to the writers, letting them know where you had problems (or on what page you stopped reading their script) and how they can improve. Good luck to all!
Title: Unraveled
Genre: Viewer-Interactive Mystery
Logline: Tasked with finding a wealthy family’s newlywed daughter, we quickly realize we’re not working a straightforward case.
Why You Should Read: Greetings from the future! 2020 to be exact. In the back of my driver-less car I just finished binge-watching Netflix’s first foray into “viewer-interactive/virtual reality” content. Frankly, it wasn’t very good. We storytellers at Scriptshadow can do better. So I jumped in my family’s time traveling Honda Odyssey(new feature for 2018) and jetted back to 2016 to ask, humbly, for your feedback. “Unraveled” bridges the gap between serial format TV and gaming, on the forefront of Virtual Reality storytelling. As the viewer adopts the protagonists role, he/she can(and should) choose the order in which they watch episodes as they try to solve the mystery. As a result, not only do the characters have GSU, but the viewer as well. Is this ambitious? Yes. Is it impossible? You’ll have to open the script to find out.
Title: Bananas & Cocaine
Genre: TV Pilot – Drama
Premise: What if Miss Chiquita walter-whited her way to the top of a Colombian cartel?
Why You Should Read: I think I subconsciously came up with the concept for this pilot while shopping at Ralph’s back in the day. You see, there happened to be a grocery list left inside the shopping basket I snagged on my way into the store. (Which is way better than the usual red onion skin remnants and/or unidentifiable sticky liquid by the way.) As I took a gander at this list, I noticed that the only two items not crossed off were “Bananas” and “Coke.” Voila!
Title: Infamous
Genre: 1hr Dramedy
Logline: A struggling author goes undercover at an infamous gossip magazine to write a tell-all book and discovers that her morals aren’t the only thing threatened in the bizarre world of celebrity news.
Why You Should Read: Well, most people know me as a dedicated Writer/Producer/Director, but only a few know my dirty little secret: I used to be a gossip reporter for a top gossip magazine, and Infamous gives you an inside look at the absurdity of it all.
As a gossip reporter, my life was part Carrie Bradshaw, part James Bond and completely over the top. If I wasn’t dining by candlelight with Angelina’s bodyguard, I was undercover in Belize tracking Tom Cruise, or trying to find out if Britney Spears ate bacon for breakfast. I have so many stories to tell, and this pilot is just the beginning.
Title: The Remains
Genre: Thriller/Athology (aimed at Netflix/Amazon/HBO, etc)
Logline: When the main suspect commits suicide on the twentieth anniversary of her mother’s disappearance, a woman soon finds out that everything she held true about what happened all those years ago is shattered and she must partner with an unstable Texas Ranger to save her own life and uncover the truth.
Why You Should Read: I grew up in a small Texas town (pop. 2000). After a local woman simply vanished in the ’90’s, I would listen to my dad come in late at night and tell my mother about the case, which he was investigating. The stories were replete with local scoundrels, psychics, and drugs.
Even as I entered adulthood and went on in the world, the case never left my psyche. It’s exacerbated each time I see her daughter, who was a few years younger than me, posting on Facebook each year on the anniversary.
Although the real-life story and my version are vastly different, I still owe the seed being planted, so many years ago, to those late night stories about the case. A case that I feel is hard for me to let go of emotionally, although I have no deep personal connection to any of the parties that were involved.
Title: Calling All Destroyers
Genre: TV Pilot – Adventure
Logline: A wide-eyed teenager follows in the footsteps of his heroic older brother and enlists in The Monster Defense Force, an organization responsible for protecting what’s left of America from attacks by giant monsters.
Why You Should Read: There were a million reasons not to write this.
It’s insanely expensive. It doesn’t check any of the traditional boxes an hourlong pilot should. There isn’t an obvious structure or episode guideline to follow (it’s more of a weird hybrid mini-series than anything). It feels more like a movie than TV. The narrative is heavily influenced by books as opposed to any of the visual material that shares the same subject matter. It’s a waste of time because no one will ever make it. So no one will ever buy it. Which means no one in the industry wants to read it. Etc. Etc. Etc into infinity.
But here’s the thing people forget about writing, sometimes the story picks you. And it chases you everywhere you go until it finally catches you and invades your brain.
So while there definitely was a million boring and responsible reasons not to write this, it just wouldn’t leave me alone. So I HAD to do it anyway.
Calling All Destroyers is an adventure story about a group of underdogs figuring out who they really are in the midst of fighting giant monsters. It’s the best thing I’ve ever written. And I’m incredibly proud of it.
Congrats to Paul Schellens! Who yesterday won the “Introductory Character Scene” Contest. Really good scene – did everything I asked for. Was even clever enough to use a scene I’d previously suggested, which always gets you points. :) Nice job, Paul!
Genre: Horror, Thriller
Premise: After accepting a gig to craft a demon mask, a makeup effects artist must protect her and her daughter from her abusive husband and the sinister forces that stalk them.
Why You Should Read: I’m not a mother but I want to be (eventually). I also want to be a paid screenwriter, proficient Japanese speaker, dog owner and in another life, Cirque du Soleil performer. What most people know (especially in this industry), is it’s really hard to find balance and sometimes you must sacrifice something to get your heart’s desire.
Besides that idea, I wanted to pair movie horror with the real horror of domestic violence. I researched, googled and trolled forums to craft my story. It wasn’t until after a reading when a woman approached me that I realized I was telling her story. It hurt to hear her share her accounts of abuse that she’d mostly kept to herself. I hope if anything this story inspires people to take control of their own lives.
Details: 103 pages (updated draft from last week)
Guys, I’ve been doing this for awhile now. So please stop. Stop trying to game the system. It’s not just a bad idea here at Scriptshadow. It’s a bad idea for your pursuit of success in this business. If your script didn’t get the requisite number of votes to win a review, read the comments and figure out what the problems were. This is one of the only places on the internet where you can do that. So take advantage of it.
I love self-promotion. It’s a huge under-talked-about element of this business. But self-promotion cannot prop up subpar writing. You have to get the writing part down before you blitz the world with your work. But how do you know when you’re ready, you ask. That’s a bit harder to determine. But Scriptshadow is a great place to start. If legitimate people aren’t voting for your script and if those same people are agreeing on common issues, accept that you have some work to do and then go get the work done. There are no shortcuts here. So stop trying to create them.
Okay, I don’t want to take away the spotlight from the true winner the week, Devil’s Workshop, so let’s get to it! Note that I’m reading a newer draft than the one you guys read, I’m guessing because Katherine incorporated a few of your suggestions.
Serena Berkin is in an abusive relationship in every sense of the word. At the center of the abuse is her husband’s, Isaac, desire to have a child, something Serena has been secretly preventing by taking birth control pills.
But when Isaac discovers her secret, he eliminates that problem and the two end up having a daughter. Flash forward nine years where the bulk of our story takes place. Serena is now a struggling make-up artist secretly using the money she makes from jobs to save up so she and her daughter, Charlotte, can get out of this dungeon of a marriage.
So Serena takes a job on a low-budget film that needs a demon character quickly. As she starts creating this demon, strange things start happening around the house, such as Charlotte talking to people when no one is around and waking up with strange bruises on her body.
At first Serena assumes that the culprit is Isaac. But when Isaac is sent to jail, Serena notices that Charlotte’s strange behavior and mysterious injuries continue. In comes Isaac’s mother, a rich old hag who would stick up for her son if she found out he was one of the 9/11 terrorists. She’s convinced that it’s Serena abusing the child, and begins proceedings to gain custody of Charlotte.
In the meantime, as Serena continues to create this monster, stranger and stranger things begin happening, such as the actor cast to play the demon taking on the persona of the monster when he wears the suit. Is he just method acting? Or could this be something more?
Serena holds off on the assumption that this suit could actually be demonic until the evidence is too strong to ignore. But by that time, there are so many people closing in on her, trying to steal the daughter she, ironically, never wanted in the first place, that this demon may be the least of her worries.
Wow, this was a good script!
I really only have one major complaint, and it’s the opening scene. The scene shows our main character, Serena, secretly taking birth control pills, her husband discovering her, and then him pinning her against the wall. We then see: “9 YEARS LATER.”
I bring this up because I see it a lot. The starting-off-with-a-flashback scene that isn’t big enough to necessitate a major time jump afterwards. Look, it’s a good scene. Our main character is discovered pulling off some shady shit by her abusive husband.
But that’s not a “CUT TO 9 YEARS LATER” opening scene. If you’re going to cut to 9 years later, you have to hit us with something huge in that opener. Somebody needs to die. Something utterly unforgettable needs to happen.
A couple of weeks ago we had “American Witch,” which started with a group of people carrying a witch into the caves and burying her alive as she stuck an acorn up her vagina which we then watched grow over the next 100 years. THAT’S a scene worthy of jumping forward in time after. This is just a normal well-written scene.
But after that, the script gets good. Katherine does a really nice job of building an emotional core into her story. Sure, this is about a demon suit that may or may not be associated with the devil. But it’s also about a woman who’s trying to protect her child from an abusive husband.
And what’s cool about The Devil’s Workshop is that it isn’t straightforward. It’s not black and white. I loved that this is a daughter Serena never wanted. And now, ironically, she’ll do anything to protect said daughter against the man who DID want her.
Another thing I want to touch on is originality. Look, we’re all trying to come up with that premise that nobody’s heard of before. That’s what turns heads in Hollywood. But it’s hard to find anything original when you’re competing against 100 years of film.
Lucky for writers, there’s a “next best thing.” Which is a world or a job that not many people know about. In this case, that’s a make-up artist. The reason this still works is because a lot of what you’re going to be writing about are things that the average person doesn’t know about. Which means your script is going to feel “new” and “fresh.” And that’s exactly how I felt here. Sure, we’ve seen plenty of horror films like this. But not from a make-up artist’s point of view. So that was fun.
Katherine wraps all this up by writing about something she cares about, that she’s emotionally invested in – abuse and the power of standing up to it, of getting out of it. Never underestimate the power of something you care deeply about. It comes out in the writing and it turns your script from just another horror flick or just another thriller flick, into something that hits people on a gut level. And that’s how you write a screenplay that stays with someone. You hit’em in the gut.
I really liked this. The only other change I’d suggest is possibly making Isaac more three-dimensional. You want to be careful not to make your villains too villain-y. Isaac coming home and calling his wife’s make-up work garbage is a bit on-the nose. What if that’s what he loved about her? Her artistry? That would make him even more fucked up that he’d be able to go from that to beating her.
Just a thought. But in the end, these problems were minor compared to the script’s strengths.
Script link (new draft): The Devil’s Workshop
[ ] what the hell did I just read?
[ ] wasn’t for me
[xx] worth the read
[ ] impressive
[ ] genius
What I learned: Everybody says, “Write what you know,” but then you have writers who all they do is play video games all day, so they write about a character who plays video games all day. “Write what you know!” they defend their script with. Uhh, no not really.
So today, I’m going to make two addendums to this famous piece of advice.
1) Write about the most interesting thing you know.
2) Package your “write what you know” idea inside a marketable premise or genre.
Let’s say you’re a housewife. You could write a story about being a houswife because you know it well. But is there enough to work with there? Is it that interesting? Probably not. But being a make-up artist? That’s a pretty unique job with some potentially interesting avenues to explore. I’d pick that over a housewife in a second.
Next, create a marketable component around your “write what you know” subject matter. For example, Katherine could’ve written a drama about a make-up artist who’s in a custody battle with her child. But that’s not going to sell tickets. Instead, she placed her subject matter in one of the most marketable genres in the movie business – horror. And the result is something that could actually be a movie. Well done!
One of the most important scenes in a script is your protagonist’s introductory scene. I can’t stress this enough. One of the biggest mistakes new screenwriters make is not conveying who their protagonist is in that opening scene and not showing us why they’re a character we should be interested in.
You can have a great story and be excellent at plotting and dialogue and lots of other things. But if your main character is uninteresting, vague, unappealing, or just plain boring, it doesn’t matter.
This isn’t just true in movies. It’s true in real life. Have you ever gone to a party and started talking to someone only to find out they’re the most boring person in the universe? You don’t want to keep talking to that person, do you? You want to find someone who’s more interesting!
Obviously then, getting that introductory scene right starts long before you write it. After constructing your premise, you should make sure you have an interesting/unique protagonist to drive that premise.
Once you have that, you will use your first scene to highlight that uniqueness. If your main character is mysterious, have them be mysterious. If your main character is a chatterbox, open with them chattering. If your main character is weird, open with them doing something weird.
Note this isn’t just about creating quirky characters that would serve as Charlie Kaufman masturbation material. “Interesting” could mean someone who’s passionate, energetic, charming, or a number of other things.
Let’s take a look at recent Academy Award winner, Leonardo DiCaprio, in his most famous film, Titanic. We meet him betting everything on a poker game. That tells us everything we need to know about this guy. He lives life by the seat of his pants and goes wherever it takes him.
Next, you want to convey what a character’s ISSUE is. By issue I mean what’s plaguing their life at the moment, making things sucky? In Star Wars, Luke’s issue is that he doesn’t want to be on this planet farming any more. He wants to be a pilot, fighting for the Rebellion. Or Neo in The Matrix. We meet Neo alone in his apartment, fallen asleep in front of his computer. This man’s issue is that he lives a boring, lonely, introverted existence (note how in the first example, the main character is aware of his issue, in the second he is not – either approach is fine).
Now here’s where things get juicy. If you want to REALLY do your job, you want to convey in that first scene what your main character’s FLAW is. This will indicate to the audience what your character needs to “fix” to become whole by the end of the movie.
Remember when we were discussing dramatic questions a few weeks ago? And how if you pose a dramatic question, the reader will stick around for the answer? Identifying your main character’s flaw in that first scene works in a similar fashion. Once we see what’s wrong with them, we’ll subconsciously want to stick around to see if they can overcome it. “Close the loop” so to speak.
Now here’s the thing. The “flaw” opener is most prominent in comedy scripts. Like Liar Liar. Jim Carrey DEPENDS on lying. We see that in his opening scene in the courtroom. This tends to be the case because audiences are okay with comedies being over-the-top in conveying important story points.
It’s a lot harder to pull this off in other genres, like drama or science-fiction, because you can’t be too overt about it. For that reason, most writers tend to avoid it and deal with the flaw later on, if at all. I would caution against this. If you can make your main character interesting, identify their issue, AND announce their flaw all in their first scene, you are not only a masterful writer, but you’ll have bought yourself that reader’s eyes for 30 more pages AT LEAST. Readers will want to stick around to see what’s up with that character.
Remember, you’re not always going to be able to pull all three off. Each screenplay has its own unique set of problems. For example, in the Bourne series, Jason Bourne has amnesia and therefore doesn’t remember who he is. How can you establish someone’s flaw if they don’t know who they are? Or in Braveheart, we meet William Wallace before he’s an adult. So you can’t really give him a flaw since his flaw will be born through his experiences growing up. The point being – don’t try to force everything in there if it doesn’t work for your particular story.
But today is different. Today we ARE going to try and pull off all three. So your challenge is to write a scene introducing us to a main character who we a) want to see more of (conveyed through making them interesting/unique in some way), and b) know who he is by the end of the scene (conveyed through issue and flaw).
Upvote the character you MOST want to read more about in the comments section and we’ll give a shout out to the winner tomorrow. Good luck!
First Edit: Okay, not sure if this has sold yet. I thought it sold to Warner Brothers but someone said not true? Can anyone confirm?
Second edit: Wow, just 5 hours after the review was posted, Netflix came in and bought Bright. This is easily going to be their biggest original film yet.
HUUUUUGE spec sale reviewed today folks. And from the most controversial screenwriter working today. Days like this are what Scriptshadow was made for.
Genre: Cop Drama/Fantasy
Premise: In a world where fantasy creatures live alongside humans, a cop and his orc partner stumble upon a magical item so rare, everyone in the city comes after them to get it.
About: This is that super big spec sale that just occurred a few days ago. And yup, you’re correct, it was written by Max Landis. Although this time, Landis has teamed up with David Ayer (who wrote one of my favorite cop movies of all time – Training Day), and his revised draft is the draft I’ll be reading today. Ayer is also planning on directing the film. Lots of folks wanted this one. Let’s see if it lives up to the hype.
Writers: Max Landis – Current Revisions by David Ayer
Details: 96 pages – 2/29/16 draft
Here’s a brief through-the-years synopsis of how to sell a spec script:
1990 – Come up with any idea that resembles a movie that could conceivably make money, don’t have to write the actual script, get a million dollars for it.
1996 – Come up with a cool hip indy script with tons of dialogue (note: dialogue does not have to be story-relevant).
1998 – Come up with a “high concept” summer blockbuster idea that likely involves the end of the world.
2003 – Write high-concept horror. Bonus points if there’s a big twist at the end.
2008 – Come up with a cool contained thriller. Anybody trapped in a small location will earn you a sale.
2009 – Anything found-footage. ANYTHING!
2014 – Low-budget horror gets you in like Flynn.
2015 – Biopic Party. Write a script about anybody from any time period who was reasonably famous. Bonus points if World War 2 is mentioned in even a cursory manner.
2016 – Be Max Landis.
Today’s script is going to be interesting because on the one hand, you have Max Landis, the social media rabbel-rouser who’s six months away from having an Amanda Bynes-like public meltdown. On the other you have David Ayer, a screenwriting superstar who’s a writing badass on every level. I don’t know what I’m expecting, but I do know it’s going to be worth talking about.
Scott Ward is a good cop who used to be well-liked until he teamed up with the first orc-cop in the department, Nick Jakoby. There’s tons of tension between humans and orcs in the real world as well as this precinct, and this politically correct hire has pissed a lot of cops off.
Scott and Nick receive a dispatch to check out some gunshots fired in South Central, only to walk into a home and see people dead in ways they’re not supposed to be dead. That’s when Scott sees it. A magic wand! Just lying there. Now magic wands are a big deal in this world. As another cop points out: “You wanna be rich? Tall? Have a bigger dick? Live forever? A magic wand can give you anything.” And it’s just lying there.
The second group of cops on the scene realize just how rare this opportunity is and inform Scott that they’re keeping this motherfucker, and he’s going to stay quiet about it. Not only that, but since his orc partner can’t be trusted, he has to kill him right now.
Scott freaks, and when the moment of truth comes, he spins around and kills the other cops instead. Him and Nick then take the wand and book it into the bowels of South Central, where word quickly spreads that they have a magic wand. And everybody wants that wand.
Latino gangs, Orc gangs, LAPD, the Feds, even private companies are coming after that wand. And let’s not forget that the owner of the wand, the witch, probably has a “find my wand” app on her phone. As Scott and Nick realize that nobody’s playing by the rules anymore, they’ll have to escape South Central and come up with a plan to get the wand into safe hands. That’s assuming there are any safe hands left.
There’s a lot to learn from this script, guys. For starters, what are the scripts that are most likely to sell? We’ve discussed this before so you better know the answer. What? You’ve forgotten??? A fresh take on an established idea. That’s the first thing Landis does with Bright. What’s cool is that this plays out like a typical grimy LA cop drama. But the introduction of orcs and magic and witches and elves – it gives it all an exciting fresh feel.
Next, we have a SIMPLE STORY. How many times have I babbled about this one? If you’re writing a spec, you don’t want to get too complicated. And actually you don’t want to get too cpmlicated with any screenplay you write. You only have 2 hours so keep things basic. Here we have cops who have found a wand and must escape South Central LA without getting killed. Easy-peasy bag of cheesy.
Next, we have the tried-and-true McGuffin setup. One item that all the characters are after. The McGuffin setup is particularly effective when you’re following multiple groups of people in a script. That’s because if you have to create unique goals for 5-6 groups of people in your story, you’re going to spend 10-15 pages of your screenplay dishing out exposition (“We have to go here now so that we can get that thing that will helps us solve that other thing.”).
What a McGuffin does is it takes out all that exposition. Because everyone’s chasing the same thing – the wand! We know that. So when we jump to the Feds or the orc gang or the bad cops, we know exactly what they’re up to and don’t need to be constantly updated.
Something else is going on here that I’d like to weigh in on. I’ve heard this a lot lately: “Don’t write a big-budget spec.” Everybody says that. Guess what? It’s bullshit. What these people are really saying is, “Don’t write a big-budget spec with a lame-to-average idea.”
They’re probably not even aware that that’s what they’re saying. To them, they’ve seen all these big-budget specs passed over by their bosses with the feedback: “Too expensive.” So they disperse that information into the ranks. But what the boss is really reacting to is the fact that this movie is going to cost all this money and the idea isn’t even very good.
“Bright” is a good idea. So it doesn’t matter if it’s going to cost a bunch of money. And that’s what you have to remember when writing a big-budget spec. The more your movie will cost, the better the idea and the more marketable the concept will have to be.
Whenever I read big-budget specs, 95% of them fall victim to the same mistake. They’re a carbon copy of another big movie from the past. Lord of the Rings, The Hunger Games, The Matrix, Blade Runner, Independence Day, Armageddon. You can’t change the character names and the time periods and expect to win the “fresh take on an old idea” argument. It’s more like a “fresh coat of paint on an old ass house” argument.
If you really want to write something fresh, you have to perform a tear-down. “Bright” really does nail that “same but different” feel, and that’s why it’s gotten all this heat.
But what’s great about this script is that it also executes. I have no idea how much of this is Landis and how much is Ayer (Ayer is the cop-movie expert so I’m sure a lot of the specific cop-related stuff was his), but this is solid storytelling here. The scene where we find the wand and the other cops tell Scott that he has to kill his partner – and we build up that suspense of “what is he going to do?” – that was a great scene and the moment I got hooked.
If I had to nitpick, I’d say I wish they’d spent more time on the other creatures and not just the orcs. More variety. But the story was so strong that it didn’t suffer much from the issue. It’ll be interesting to see how this comes together. Isn’t Ayer signed on to Suicide Squad 2? When is he going to have time to make this movie? Anyone know?
[ ] what the hell did I just read?
[ ] wasn’t for me
[ ] worth the read
[x] impressive
[ ] genius
What I learned: Whenever you write a script that requires a lot of world-building (fantasy and science-fiction), it’s essential that you convey exposition in as few lines as possible. You don’t want to weigh down your script with Monologue Mike never shutting up about how the Orc Castle of Targenhale once birthed a young orc cub, who would later become the king of Smokerbasin until he lost his right eye. That may fly in Game of Thrones. But movies are short and need to move quickly. Here Landis and Ayer did a great job of explaining the magic wand. This wand is driving the entire story, so a lesser writer might’ve thought a flashback and three page monologue were in order to build it up. Here’s what we get instead:
HICKS
: Ever seen a wand in person?
WARD
: What? Sure … yeah. That broken one in the Smithsonian.
This conveys two things quickly. One, that seeing a wand is very rare. And two, that they’re such a big deal, they’re displayed in museums. That’s all we need to know going forward to understand that this wand is going to change their lives.
