Reminder that CONTAINED THRILLER SHOWDOWN – a script competition for contained thrillers (action, sci-fi, horror, dramatic, all okay) – is set for January 17th. Submissions are due Thursday, January 16th, by 8pm Pacific Time. Send a PDF of the script to carsonreeves3@gmail.com. Include your title, genre, logline, and why you think the script should get a shot. The best five entries will be posted for the showdown!
It’s a crazy day. The Black List is out. Or, at least, it’s being dripped out on Twitter. Maybe someone can post the list when they’re finished because I have to run around town today. Any concepts that catch your interest? Share them below. We’ve also got the big Rise of Skywalker premiere. That means we’re going to know REALLY SOON whether this movie is good or not. If we get a lot of those tweets that *sound* excited but the content of the tweet doesn’t say the actual movie is good (“This is the most real Star Wars movie of the last few years!” “JJ brought some amazing direction to this last film!” And my personal fave: “You’re going to love Rey. She kicks all types of a$$ in this movie!!!”) then our hopes for a good Star Wars film are over. Oh yeah, this post isn’t about Star Wars. Thoughts on the Black List. Leave them below!
EDIT! (LIST PRINTED BELOW)
People have been curious about the low vote count for the top 10 scripts. I think that’s because there’s no runaway great script this year. My first impression is that this feels like a return to form for the Black List. Lots more original ideas than in years past. Less of the most unoriginal genre out there – the biopic – helps a lot. The Traveler did, indeed, make the top 5, like I predicted. The Menu up there as well! Two great scripts.
“Move On” winning the top slot is bittersweet. I gave notes to a writer 8 years ago who had this exact same concept. I kept telling him, “This is a slam dunk! Keep working on it!” I think he just wasn’t into it enough to give it those extra 3-4 drafts that it needed. This is something all screenwriters deal with. How much of yourself do you have to give to a script? Because great scripts tend to require everything we’ve got. You have to be ready to do that hard work on those final three drafts where you hate your script more than anything because you’ve been living in it for so long. But that extra work ends up paying off in the end.
Just to remind everyone, these are AGENT AND MANAGER LOGLINES. Agents and managers aren’t writers. Some of them understand logline writing better than others. But don’t judge these loglines on their construction because, besides a few exceptions, these aren’t writers writing them.
29 votes
Title: Move On
Writer: Ken Kobayashi
Logline: Teddy thinks he’s the only living person left in a world where humanity is frozen in time… until his ex-girlfriend, Leyna, shows up at his doorstep. Together, they must go on a journey to find the cause behind the freeze and in the process, confront the issues that plagued their relationship before it’s too late.
20 votes
Title: Field of View
Writers; Reiss Clauson-Wolf, Julian Silver
Logline: A soldier, forced to relive her worst day in combat, begins to question her sanity when the VR simulation she’s experiencing doesn’t match her memory of the mission gone wrong.
19 votes
Title: Don’t Worry Darling (read my review!)
Writers: Cary Van Dyke, Shane Van Dyke
Logline: A psychological thriller about a 1950s housewife whose reality begins to crack, revealing a disturbing truth underneath.
16 votes
Title: Cicada by Lillian Yu
Writer: Lillian Yu
Logline: When a talented hacker is recruited by the mysterious Cicada 3301, she gets wrapped up in a plot that threatens to destroy the entire world. Based on the real organization.
Title: The Traveler (read my review!)
Writer: Austin Everett
Logline: A man jumps forward in time at the same time every morning. As the length of time increases for every jump, he struggles to keep his family together and find a cure, all as his secret spreads throughout the world. Based on the novel by Joseph Eckert.
Title: The Unbearable Weight of Massive Talent
Writers: Kevin Etten, Tom Gormican
Logline: Actor Nicolas Cage, spiraling and trapped in debt, makes an appearance at the birthday party of a Mexican billionaire. While there, he learns that the billionaire runs a drug cartel, and the CIA recruits Cage for intelligence.
15 Votes
Title: Rumours
Writers: Tyler Austin, Patrick Eme
Logline: In 1970s LA, Stevie Nicks and Lindsey Buckingham, two struggling musicians and lovers, join a band called Fleetwood Mac and are thrown into a whirlwind of worldwide fame, infamous drug addiction, and one of the best-selling albums of all time — which also happens to be about the disintegration of their relationship.
14 Votes
Title: A Magical Place Called Glendale
Writer: Sara Monge
Logline: To revamp her self image, an arrogant but well-meaning high school socialite decides to help a former friend land the guy of her dreams… but in the process, realizes she wants her for herself.
Title: Shut In
Writer: Melanie Toast
Logline: A single mother is held captive by her violent ex, and her two young children are left at risk. She must do everything to protect them and survive.
13 Votes
Title: The Broker
Writer: Justin Piasecki
Logline: A fixer who brokers off-the-books exchanges for powerful corporate clients finds himself being hunted after he’s hired to protect a whistleblower and the evidence she’s uncovered.
Title: Pod
Writer: Nabil Chowdary
Logline: After a mission to destroy a black hole that endangers mankind goes wrong, an astronaut awakens in her escape pod to find that decades have passed seemingly in a moment. Now, with an old body and fragile mind, she battles against the elements of space & time to complete her mission.
Title: Wayward
Writer: Andrew Zilch
Logline: The wife of a megachurch pastor seeks atonement after she and her lover kill an attacker in self-defense, but don’t report it out of fear of exposing their affair.
12 Votes
Title: Grandma Wants to Die by Patrick Cadigan
Logline: When Ben is left footing the bill for his own wedding just weeks before the big day, he’s forced to make a deal with his estranged grandmother Minnie. She’ll give him the money if he signs the papers for her assisted suicide. Ben gladly agrees, only to unearth Minnie’s final agenda before she departs… destroy the wedding from the inside and seemingly ruin Ben’s life.
Title: I Heart Murder
Writer: Tom O’Donnell
Logline: A true-crime podcaster tries to solve a gruesome cold case, putting her in the killer’s crosshairs.
11 Votes
Title: 8 Bit Christmas by Kevin Jakubowski
Logline: Ten-year-old Jake Doyles goes on a herculean quest to get the Christmas gift of his generation – a Nintendo Entertainment System – in suburban Chicago in the late 1980s.
10 Votes
Title: Black Mitzvah
Writer: Lauren Tyler
Logline: After embarrassing herself at the most popular girl’s party, a black and Jewish middle school misfit embarks on a journey to glow up and throw the best Bat Mitzvah of all time.
Title: The House Is Not For Sale
Writer: Roy Parker
Logline: With one last chance at a promotion, a down-on-her-luck real estate agent returns to her rural hometown to sell the impossible – a haunted house where countless couples have been murdered. As the bodies of new residents continue to pile up, our real estate agent will stop at nothing to rid the house of evil – no matter what the cost.
Title: Klein
Writer: Derek Elliott
Logline: Life as a single dad hasn’t been a challenge for Las Vegas blackjack dealer Mike Klein, until his ex resurfaces after walking out on the family six years ago.
Title: The Menu (read my review!)
Writer: Seth Reiss, Will Tracy
Logline: A young couple visits an exclusive destination restaurant on a remote island where the acclaimed chef has prepared a lavish tasting menu, along with some shocking surprises.
Title: The Process
Writer: Levin Menekse
Logline: Trapped at a three day personal development retreat, a woman fights to save her husband and herself from being brainwashed by a charismatic self-help guru.
Title: Refuge
Writer: Debra Moore Munoz
Logline: A brother and sister navigate the perils of both man and nature through Central America in their quest to find safety in the United States.
Title: Ripple
Writer: Ezra Herz
Logline: After strange deaths and suicides skyrocket in a dying Appalachian coal town, Maggie – a first responder – wages a personal war against the local coal mine, unearthing a disturbing past that the company has kept secret within the waters of the local lake.
Title: They Cloned Tyrone
Writer: Tony Rettenmaier, Juel Taylor
Logline: An unlikely group is thrown together by mysterious events that leads them to uncover a government conspiracy.
9 Votes
Title: Breathe
Writer: Doug Simon
Logline: In the near future when air-supply is scarce, a mother and daughter fight for survival when two strangers arrive desperate for an oxygenized safe haven.
Title: Dollhouse
Writer: Michael Paisley
Logline: When a struggling fashion model in New York City gets chosen by a mysterious Parisian designer to be the face of his first campaign since his disappearance five years prior, she begins to realize she was chosen for a reason and must decide how much she’s willing to sacrifice for beauty and recognition.
Title: Helldiver
Writer: Ben Imperato
Logline: After finding themselves stranded on the wreckage of a Helldiver bomber in the middle of the ocean, an American aviator and a Japanese Kamikaze pilot must work together to survive their greatest threat yet — a 22-foot great white shark.
Title: High on Christmas
Writers: Hannah Mescon, Dreux Moreland
Logline: A stoner comedy about one family trying to save Christmas from itself after Santa eats the wrong batch of cookies.
Title: The Laborer
Writers: Jared Anderson
Logline: A pair of out-of-work immigrant brothers catch a break when they are hired as day laborers to work at a house in the Hollywood Hills, until they witness something they will wish they had never seen.
Title: Say Something Nice
Writer: Erin Rodman
Logline: After she catches her boyfriend cheating, Liv goes on a social media tirade that lands her in court for slander, and the judge forces her to make amends by composing one positive comment for every negative comment she posted, while under the supervision of a reclusive mediator also on the rebound from a failed relationship. Inspired by true events.
8 Votes
Title: Affairs of State
Writer: Pat Cunnane
Logline: A romantic comedy about an outgoing President, an incoming Prime Minister, and their second shot at love.
Title: An Aftermath
Writer: Lauren Caris Cohan
Logline: After a whirlwind lost-distance online romance, a once-cynical writer inherits a remote smart-house from her newly deceased new husband and discovers he might not be entirely gone after all.
Title: Apex
Writers: Aja Gabel, MJ Wesner
Logline: When old college friends on a trip to Mexico get trapped in an underwater cave system with a bull shark, old tensions and power struggles resurface as they fight to survive.
Title: Barron: A Tale of Love, Loss, & Legacy
Writer: Nicolas Curcio
Logline: Fearing the devastating impact that his father’s presidency would have on his personal life, his country, and the world at large, ten-year-old Barron Trump sets out to sabotage his father’s 2016 campaign.
Title: The Cabin at the End of the World
Writers: Steve Desmond and Michael Sherman
Logline: A gay couple and their adopted daughter have their cabin invaded by four strangers who take the family captive and tell them that, to prevent the upcoming apocalypse, one of them must be killed by the others.
Title: The Diamond as Big as the Ritz
Writer: Cody Behan
Logline: When the underprivileged John Unger is invited to spend the summer at the mansion of his peculiar classmate, his thirst for grandeur leads him down a dangerous exploration of greed, morality, and the secret horrors of the ruling class. Based on the F. Scott Fitzgerald short story.
Title: First Harvest (read my review!)
Writer: Kevin McMullin
Logline: George runs a struggling farm where he cares for his terminally ill wife, Alice. Everything changes when he decides to bring home an orphaned baby he found out in the field. The child’s presence begins to unearth buried secrets while engulfing the family in a series of supernatural events.
Title: My Boyfriend’s Wedding
Writer: Carrie Solomon
Logline: After Georgia accidentally receives an out of the blue invitation to her on-again, off-again boyfriend’s wedding, she and her best friend Keely make the ill-informed decision to attend.
Title: Resurrection
Writer: Andrew Semans
Logline: Margaret is a single mother living in New York with her teenage daughter. When David, a mysterious older man from Margaret’s past, begins appearing randomly in her environment, she becomes convinced that he intends to bring tremendous violence into their lives. So Margaret embarks on a vigilante mission to protect her daughter, and to disembowel David.
Title: The Searchers
Writer: MacMillan Hedges
Logline: An inside look at the unique relationship between John Wayne and John Ford on the set of THE SEARCHERS.
Title: Sister
Writer: Azia Squire
Logline: Following her mother’s sudden passing, a queer black woman returns to her southern town to assist her estranged sister plan the funeral. Her trip takes a turn when sleep deprivation manifests visions of her deceased mother.
Title: Super Dad
Writer: Sean Tidwell
Logline: A subversive superhero story about the world’s only superhero living a bachelor lifestyle, learning he has two very different teenage twins he never knew existed, and now has to figure out how to be a father.
Title: The Swells
Writer: Rachel James
Logline: A young woman, propelled by an unstoppable rage, begins inviting her victims to a summer lake house as revenge for past wrongs. But when one of her guests has been wronged as well, she passes on The Swells- bringing its wrath to the streets of New York.
7 Votes
Title: Betty Ford
Writers: Kas Graham, Rebecca Polack
Logline: An intimate portrait of the sensational First Lady and ERA champion, Betty Ford, as she challenges, scandalizes, dances and drinks her way through the White House to gain a higher popularity rating than any President in American history, all whilst maintaining a 26 pill-a-day drug habit.
Title: Doll Wars
Writer: Matt Ritter
Logline: When the upstart Bratz dolls challenged Barbie’s antiquated gender norms and threatened their monopoly, Barbie struck back with a billion-dollar copyright lawsuit. In jeopardy of shutting down, Bratz turned to a small, scrappy, all-female law firm to take on Mattel in a historic, David vs. Goliath intellectual property battle that changed the toy industry and American popular culture forever. Based on a true story.
Title: Don’t Go in the Water (read my review!)
Writer: Peter Gaffney
Logline: A recovering alcoholic sets off for seclusion but gets more than he bargained for when he encounters a mysterious creature nearby.
Title: First Ascent
Writer: Colin Bannon
Logline: Two years after a free solo accident nearly kills Hillary Hall, she enlists the help of her old climbing partners to document her comeback — the first ascent of 4,000 foot rock wall in rural China. During the harrowing climb, Hillary struggles with her inner demons and supernatural forces, as it slowly becomes clear that this mountain does not want to be conquered.
Title: The Man in the Woods
Writers: Darren Grodsky, Danny Jacobs
Logline: After moving to Maine and befriending an enigmatic hermit, twelve-year-old Henrietta Thorne begins to wonder if he holds the key to solving a mystery that has eluded our planet for more than a decade.
Title: The Perdition in Liege
Writer: Henry Dunham
Logline: A prisoner of war in a Belgian POW camp undergoing abandonment survives an execution firing squad by chance and escapes by hiding among the dead. After removing his fallen compatriot’s dog tags to get home and give their families solace, he attempts the fifty-mile journey south toward the allied stronghold, through the deadly war-torn landscape, and before a hell-bent SS officer on his tail catches up to him.
Title: The Repossession
Writer: Megan Amram
Logline: Twenty years after a failed exorcism, a meek young woman becomes unlikely friends with the foul-mouthed demon that possessed her as a child.
Title: 10-31 (read my review!)
Writers: Peter Gamble, Ian Shorr
Logline: A young woman takes her niece and nephew trick-or-treating and discovers a note inside a candy wrapper that says there’s a killer loose on her block.
6 Votes
Title: Apex (read my review!)
Writer: Stephen Vitale
Logline: A mysterious loner heads to Muscle Beach in 1985 to pursue a career as a competitive bodybuilder. Struggling to transform his physique, he unleashes a darker side of himself as he descends into madness.
Title: Assisted Living
Writer: Kay Oyegun
Logline: A thief finds sanctuary in a retirement home after going on the run.
Title: Atlanta Onfire
Writer: Adam Morrison
Logline: The true story of Leo Frank, a young, Jewish businessman who, due to widespread anti-Semitism/the KKK in the post Civil War South, was wrongfully accused, tried, and convicted of murdering a 13-year-old factory worker, Mary Phagan.
Title: Blue Slide Park
Writers: Kyle Anderson, Michael Vlamis
Logline: After his first album topped the Billboard Charts, life was never the same for Malcolm McCormick aka Mac Miller. This is his story of music, love, success, family, and addiction. Based on the forthcoming manuscript UNT. MAC MILLER BIOGRAPHY written by Paul Cantor for Abrams Press.
Title: Can You Tell Me How?
Writer: Gregory Bonsignore
Logline: Alarmed by the disproportionate dropout rates amongst children of the working class, a young female TV producer finds a way to teach them their ABCs and 123s. With the help of genius puppeteer Jim Henson and a diverse team of dedicated researchers and educators, they brought us the groundbreaking show, Sesame Street.
Title: Girlfriend on Mars
Writer: Kaitlin Fontana
Logline: Amber and Kevin, weed dealer burnouts committed to going nowhere together, have been dating for twelve years. When Amber enters a reality show that will take the winner to Mars with no chance of return, Kevin has to face what it really means when the ones we love leave us and leave the planet. Based on the story by Deborah Willis.
Title: Meet Cute
Writers: Chris Powers, Dan Powers
Logline: ‘Meet Cute’ the hottest dating app on the market, brings couples together by giving them their Rom Com moment. When the app’s biggest skeptic, Haley, matches with one of its developers, Russ, their instant connection starts to change her mind.
Title: The Mother
Writer: Michael Notarile
Logline: The incredible true story of Fredericka Marm Mandelbaum, who was the countrys first female mob boss. During the Gilded Age, Marm opened a school for criminals, and built her empire by treating her gang of runaways and orphans as family — eventually partnering with George Leslie to pull off what is still to date the largest bank heist in American history (adjusting for inflation).
Title: No Good Deed
Writer: Christina Pamies
Logline: A woman with a troubled past invites her teen niece to live with her in the family’s farm house, but the two become tormented by a creature that can take away their pain for a price.
Title: Nomads
Writer: Esteban Orozco
Logline: A reverse SEARCHERS from the perspective of the Natives going East into the unknown, the metropolis, the belly of the beast, late 1800s New York City.
Title: The Showrunner
Writer: Cosmo Carlson
Logline: The unbelievable true story of the creation of the worlds first, longest running, and most notorious reality show “COPS.” Based on “How ‘Cops’ Got Made — And What It Says About America” by Tim Stelloh.
Title: Stampede
Writer: Sontenish Myers
Logline: A young slave girl named Lena has telekinetic powers she cannot yet control on a plantation in the 1800s.
Title: T
Writer: Eric Gross
Logline: The true story of how Lawrence Tureaud, a poor kid in Chicago with 12 brothers and sisters, fought and charmed his way into becoming the single lettered icon of saintly compassion and macho energy.
Title: This Is Going to Hurt
Writer: Cameron Fay
Logline: An absent mother attempts to reconnect with her daughter by relaying to her how she helped her own parent through battles with cancer and addiction.
Title: Til Death
Writer: Jessica Knoll
Logline: Swept up in the excitement of her wedding day, Dr. Julie Wheeler is oblivious to the killer on her guest list, who is methodically stalking her nearest and dearest, until its too late.
Title: Voicemails for Isabelle
Writer: Leah McKendrick
Logline: A low-level TV writer struggles to cope with the death of her little sister by continuing to leave her voicemails chronicling the shitshow that is dating in LA. When the phone number is unknowingly transferred, a cocky New York real estate agent begins receiving the hilarious and confessional voicemails, and feels pulled to California to find this stranger he feels intimately close to.
