Search Results for: the wall
Genre: Horror
Premise: A young husband feels that his marriage is slipping away. But he has no idea how bad it’s about to get.
About: Today’s script comes from one of my favorite screenwriters, Brian Duffield. I’ve reviewed all of Duffield’s scripts except for two, today’s script being one of those final two. My favorite script of his is Monster Problems, which is in my Top 25. And the script of his that is the closest to production is The Babysitter (about a babysitter from hell), which some have argued is Duffield’s weakest script. Vivien is one of the scripts that first put Duffield on Hollywood’s radar.
Writer: Brian Duffield
Details: 102 pages
Been saving this one for when I needed a pick-me-up.
Yesterday’s script left me with such a bored taste in my mouth, I needed a script I knew I was going to like – something weird and unexpected. That was my issue with Mr. Toy. It was just so… rote. You knew everything that was going to happen 30 pages before it happened, because the script never set a precedent for surprising you.
What do we say here? The enemy of entertainment is predictability. As soon as your story becomes predictable, you’ve lost your audience.
I went into this one completely cold. All I knew about it was the title. So let’s find out what it’s about together!
Tom and Vivien have been married for awhile, though like a lot of the details in this story, we’re not given exact numbers. What we do know is that Vivien is drifting away from Tom. He knows this. Somewhere, deep inside, he knows she’s fucking their neighbor, Charlie.
And so he’s gotten used to the fact that Vivien has stopped laughing at his jokes, that she now sleeps facing away from him, that in the tiny moments when he tries to make her jealous so she’ll notice him, she’ll notice but won’t care. That she’s, for all intents and purposes, checked out of this marriage.
“Vivien Hasn’t Been Herself Lately” then asks the question: What if that were the best case scenario?
When Vivien starts walking on walls, Tom knows that his life has taken a turn for the worse. When she starts biting off her own fingers, he knows shit is getting bad. And when she starts beating Tom up mercilessly, he knows that his life has changed forever.
Vivien, Tom quickly learns, is possessed.
But, you see, Tom refuses to leave her. He tells the million plus demons who have now taken residence inside her body this. That he loves Vivien so much, he will stay until he finds a way to get them out of her.
And boy is he tested on that. Vivien does everything in her power to get Tom to kill her, kill himself, or leave forever. One day, she chokes Tom out until he comes to again, then repeats the process. Over and over and over again. For 24 straight hours. And still Tom won’t leave. He keeps probing, keeps trying to figure out how to save his wife.
Unfortunately, as we move through the story, and we experience just how dark things get in this home, we realize that this isn’t your average exorcism script. And that it’s very unlikely that there’s going to be a happy ending.
Wow.
I haven’t said that in a long time after reading a script.
This script was… wow.
I mean, holy shit. That had to be one of the most intense reads I’ve ever experienced. I’m still processing it. It’s basically about the person you love more than anything actively hating you every day for months on end.
It’s relentless. To the point where I had to stand up a couple of times and walk around just to assure myself that there was still good in the world.
But to this script’s credit, I couldn’t stay away for long. I had to sit down and find out what happened next.
I’m trying to get myself into the headspace where I can help you guys learn some screenwriting tips from this screenplay since it was so affecting. But I’m just not there. And that’s probably the biggest compliment I can give a script. It pulled me in so much, I wasn’t even thinking about screenwriting.
Or maybe I was abstractly. I know I’d catch myself thinking, “Holy shit is this brave. Holy shit is this unique. Holy shit nothing in this script is happening when it’s supposed to.” I mean, this is a possession movie and the exorcist shows up on page 17. Page 17! Most writers would’ve drawn the story out before bringing the exorcist in, padding the script until page 50 or 60. Our exorcists (plural) run away on page 20 here. I’m looking at this script going, “What the hell is he going to do now for 82 pages???”
And what he does is he turns this into a character piece. This is about – at least in my opinion – how difficult marriage is. It’s that things don’t go swimmingly all the time. And there are going to be periods where shit gets really bad. And you’re going to want to run away. And so despite the relentless negativity that is hurled at the reader throughout this story, it’s ultimately about a man who’s so in love with his wife, that he will stay with her at her worst.
But if that’s all the script offered, I don’t know if it would have been enough for me. It was the choices that Duffield took that really wowed me. Remember – writing is about making bold unexpected choices. Not all the time. Some of your choices have to be familiar. But every once in awhile, you have to be bold. Yesterday’s script didn’t have a single bold choice. Not one. Thats why it was so boring.
Here, for example, one of the surprising sequences was that Tom and these demons actually developed a relationship of their own – separate from Vivien. It’s a fucked up relationship where one second they’ll be laughing together and the next “Vivien” will hurl Tom against the wall, breaking his arm. But it’s so unexpected and weird that it adds to, easily, the strangest character piece I’ve ever read.
And on top of that is Duffield’s voice (‘Voice and Choice’ should be the new mantra I endorse here). He’s one of the best screenwriters, hands down, at painting a picture with as few words as possible. On the very first page, we get this line: “Their socked feet touch.” Not “their feet touch,” which is what 99 out of 100 screenwriters would’ve written. But their “socked” feet. That one word turns a cliche into a verifiable image that you can imagine. And once you’re imagining, you’re no longer outside. You’re inside the story.
On top of that, this is the kind of stuff writers should be writing to start their careers. You want to write stories with 2-3 characters that are cheap but that have a hook to them. And because 99% of writers who take this route go the “cliche contained thriller” path, trapping a few characters in a room with danger outside (Cloverfield Lane, for example), if you’re the 1% that can do this without using that trope, you have a great opportunity to stand out. And if you have any directing aspirations whatsoever, try to direct that script yourself. Because you’ll get your career moving a million times faster by directing your own script than you will waiting for someone else to direct it.
I have nothing but praise for this screenplay. It’s not easy to read. In fact, it might be one of the hardest reads you’ll have all year. But it’s hard for the right reasons. It’s hard because you want these two to end up together so badly but you have to go through so much pain to find out if they’re going to.
This was really good. And a new TOP 25!!!
[ ] What the hell did I just read?
[ ] wasn’t for me
[ ] worth the read
[x] impressive (NEW TOP 25!!!)
[ ] genius
What I learned: If you want to write about a relationship, don’t literally write about a relationship. Find a metaphor for the relationship, something with a hook, and write about that. To use Vivien as an example, if the original intent was to write about a troubled marriage, writing about a literal trouble marriage will put people to sleep. By using this possession as a metaphor, you’ve all of a sudden got a clever hook, and your movie can now be marketed.
What I learned 2: Be brave and write about the things you’re scared to admit to anyone in real life. Your scripts and your novels are the places where you have to let that stuff out. And the more honest you are, the more the reader is going to connect with your story.
Memorial Day Weekend Consultation Deal!!! – Got a script that needs help? Tired of getting notes from friends like, “What does ‘EXT.’ mean?” Let me do what I do best: Break down your script, figure out what’s wrong with it, and tell you how to fix it. If you purchase notes from me this weekend, I’m offering $150 off feature consultations and $100 off pilot consultations. Just e-mail me at Carsonreeves1@gmail.com with the subject line, “MEMORIAL DAY.” You don’t need to send your script to me right away. You only need to purchase the notes by weekend’s end. That would be MONDAY 11:59pm Pacific Time!
Now, it’s time for everyone’s favorite screenwriting battle royale. The Hunger Games ain’t got nothing on Amateur Offerings. Kids may die in that sport. But here, screenwriting dreams die, which everyone knows is way worse. The good news is, one script will rise from the ashes, win the weekend, and get a Scriptshadow review next Friday. If the script is reviewed well, industry people usually notice. And if a script is awesome, I can guarantee something will come of it. So, let’s look at this week’s contenders!
If you’re new to Amateur Offerings, read as much of each script as possible then VOTE for your favorite in the comments section. This is also a wonderful opportunity to give writers feedback so they can get better. So feel free to let writers know, constructively, where you had troubles with their scripts and why.
Voting is open UNTIL MONDAY NIGHT on this one, all the way through the holiday weekend. I’ll be back with a script review on Tuesday. GOOD LUCK!
Title: No Other Way
Genre: Action/Thriller
Logline: When his girlfriend and daughter are mistakenly slaughtered by a gang of Neo-Nazis, an ordinary, stay home dad with no particular set of skills, goes on a mission of revenge.
Why You Should Read: In an attempt to improve my skills as a writer, I put the high concept ideas on hold for a while and decided it was best to write a script with a simple concept while trying to make it as readable and exciting as possible. This meant a fast paced story with short, high intensity scenes, good characters and an appropriate amount of risk taking where the average writer wouldn’t. In this vein, I think what I have managed to produce is a tight action/thriller with a enough uniqueness to keep you reading until the end… enjoy :)
Title: Know Thy Neighbor
Genre: Thriller
Logline: While on vacation, a recently divorced psychologist sees his attractive new neighbor on a missing poster, but instead of turning her in, he conducts his own investigation into her mysterious past and endangers both their lives.
Why You Should Read: They say always be open to concepts from anywhere in your daily life. The idea for this Hitchcockian thriller hit me while waiting in a very long line at the post office. There was a row of missing posters on the wall. Out of the corner of my eye, I thought I recognized one of the victims, but I was wrong. For days, I wondered what it would be like to see a new friend on a missing poster. What would I do? Would I turn them in? Confront them myself? Or watch them from afar and try to unravel their secret? The idea stayed with me for months until I created an outline and wrote the script. Long live AOW!
Title: Bend
Genre: Gritty Action/Superhero/Revenge
Logline: An aspiring reporter manipulates a seemingly indestructible vigilante into becoming a superheroine in order to stop the Russian mafia from selling a Cold War nerve agent to a megalomaniac.
Why You Should Read: Hello, with all the regurgitation of superhero movies these days, I took a stab at some different angles with the intent to create a new, adult, superhero IP. Please consider giving my project a shot at a review. Thank you Carson and of course, the SS community, for all of your valuable feedback over the years.
Title: PYRO
Genre: Thriller
Logline: In the midst of a deadly bushfire season, a petty criminal with a fascination for fire becomes entangled in a game of cat and mouse with a desperate arson squad detective while attempting to save his one, true friend.
Why You Should Read: The Black Saturday bushfires occurred in my home state of Victoria, Australia in 2009 and killed 173 people. It was Australia’s deadliest natural disaster and I still distinctly remember the atmosphere on that day – you could actually feel the death in the air. I’ve often been drawn to thinking about the people involved that day – both those fighting and investigating the blazes and the pyromaniacs who helped exacerbate them. While this story is set a little while later, the memories of that day remain an inspiration.
Title: OASIS
Genre: Horror
Logline: A scientist desperate to kill the elusive desert monster that maimed him, needs it to eat an unwitting team of soldiers, scientists and college students he embedded with tracking devices before it disappears for another seven years.
Why You Should Read: I love this script. It reminds me of the fun I had watching Creature Feature Saturdays. After winning the TableReadMyScreenplay Horror competition it’s just been parked on my laptop. What else do I need to do to get a production company to Green Light it? The Scriptshadow following may have the answers. Thank you in advance. I look forward to your notes and insight.
The hottest TV spec of the season. Is it any good??
Genre: TV Pilot – Drama
Premise: When the world’s biggest magician’s biggest trick is exposed, he gives up magic. That is until the FBI offers him a job.
About: Deception was THE hot pilot spec of the season. Which is probably why super-producer Greg Berlanti (Arrow, The Flash, Supergirl, Riverdale) jumped on board. The show comes from the mind of Chris Fedak, co-creator of “Chuck.” ABC is going all-in on this one, making it their number one new show priority going into next season. So expect to see a lot of Deception promos on your local buses.
Writer: Chris Fedak
Details: 62 pages
The nice thing about teleplays is that they’re only half as long as screenplays. And when a reader knows they only have to invest 45 minutes into a read, it allows the writer to do some things he wouldn’t be able to get away with in a feature. He can be… how do I say this? More “surface-level.” Especially if you’re writing a pilot for one of the major networks. And that is how we come across Deception, a pilot so light and fluffy, you might mistake it for a toaster strudel. And yet, I haven’t met too many people who can eat a toaster strudel and not want another one.
Cameron Black is the coolest most cutting edge magician in the world. Even worse? He knows it. And in case you think we’re going to get a lot of cleverly edited magic trick bullshit here, the writer assures us that everything we see on-screen is a REAL magic trick. Which is why the show is co-produced by real-life magician, David Kwong.
We meet Black during one of his shows, a slick multi-coastal endeavor where he starts his show in Vegas but teleports to New York, actually walking out of a TV screen in Times Square. How is that even possible????? I’ll tell you how. MAGIC!
Oh, and also, Cameron has a twin. Spoiler alert! But we’re not there yet. Later that night, Cameron picks up a hot babe, drives her around town, then gets into a huge crash and she dies. This is when it’s revealed that the man in the car is actually Jonathan Black, Cameron’s twin brother, and that they’ve been pretending to be the same person for 30 years.
Jonathan goes to prison for manslaughtering the woman, but Jonathan swears to Cameron he’s been set up. That the dead body was a plant. Someone’s been using magic on them! Whaaaat!!!??? Cameron now makes it his life goal to expose this trickery and free his brother from prison.
Meanwhile, FBI Agent, Kay Alvarez, is escorting cartel leader Felix Ruiz (I swear it’s like these names are coming out of a screenwriting character name generator) in a plane where, once they land, he’ll be put away forever. Except when they pull into the hanger and everybody’s getting off the plane, it blows up!!!
Ruiz is killed. But luckily, Kay and the rest of the FBI survive. It sucks at first until they realize, hey, we just got rid of one of the biggest drug czars on the planet. Hooray! That is until Cameron Black shows up and says, “You guys have been fooled!” He walks over to the wall of the airplane hanger, busts it open, to show that the plane explosion was a ruse!
The plane was swapped out with an exploded one to trick the FBI. And that means… Ruiz is still out there. Kay is pissed. Not so much that her drug lord got away. But that a freaking magician made her look like a fool. So she tells Cameron to get lost. “Not so fast,” Cameron says. “What are you talking about?” “I’m going to help you find Ruiz.” And hence, Deception is born!!!
I don’t know how to react to this pilot.
It’s like it came out of some pilot version of a cotton candy machine. I think I enjoyed myself? But holy banana cream sundae, can I get a little depth please? Somewhere?
The cliches. The number of cliches.
And the leaps of logic one must make to buy into this show. A plane was swapped out for a damaged one during a fake explosion and nobody noticed? In the age of the internet, twins have been able to keep their duality a secret for 30 years. Doesn’t this take one bored TMZ journalist a quick internet search to find that Cameron was born with a twin?
I’ve got a bigger beef with Deception though. Everything in this damn plot was too easy!!! For drama to be good, the journey must be difficult. The characters must run into real obstacles. If the audience isn’t in constant doubt that the characters are gong to solve the crime, the story isn’t working.
For example, there’s a scene in the middle of the script, after the plane explosion, where Cameron and Kay go to a diner near the airport where they’re convinced someone must have seen the swapped plane driven away.
Cameron does some silly magic trick to captivate the diners while Kay watches everyone’s reaction. When a single busboy isn’t captivated by the trick, Kay determines he must know something. What???? Anyway, she approaches him. He runs. She tackles him 2 seconds later and asks, “You saw something didn’t you?” He immediately blurts out: “A truck, with a plane on it.”
That’s every plot point in this pilot. They’re handed over to our heroes like breadsticks at The Olive Garden. They don’t have to work for anything.
So a lot of you are probably asking then… “Why is this getting made while my pilot is collecting dust?”
Well, I’ll say this about Deception. It utilizes the setup that television likes the most. Cocky charming rogueish main character who doesn’t follow the rules teamed up with a straight-arrow female co-lead who doesn’t like him. That formula right there is gangbusters. And all you need to make it work is a new take on the charming rogue character. It just so happened that the writer struck gold with the magic thing because there’s nothing else like it on television.
And sometimes that’s all success is. It’s not writing the best piece of material. It’s finding that fresh “pot of gold” twist on a trusted formula. And the irony of it? Oftentimes, that pot of gold is sitting right there where everybody can see it.
Fifty Shades of Grey. Sex. How much more front and center can a subject be? And yet E.L. James turned it into a money-making machine.
Even so, I wish Fedak would’ve slowed down and let his scenes breathe every once in awhile. This pilot reads like it was written on coke. One of the pilot’s most important sequences, where “Cameron” meets a mysterious girl, goes on a drive with her, and crashes the car, killing her, takes place over half a page. HALF A PAGE!
Keep in mind that this woman is the driving force behind the enteire show. She’s our “secret magician” who’s trying to screw Cameron and his brother over (by the way, I’m 99.99999% sure she’ll be the sister they never knew they had, since that’s the most obvious choice and this pilot is built on obvious choices). Cameron will be going after her for multiple seasons. And she’s introduced and killed all within half a page.
I don’t get it. I feel that a script that’s getting this much heat requires a little more attention to detail. I understand the sale but not the laziness. It’s frustrating and sends the wrong message to aspiring writers that this screenwriting thing is easy. Humph.
[ ] What the hell did I just read?
[x] wasn’t for me
[ ] worth the read
[ ] impressive
[ ] genius
What I learned: I hate writing this. But it’s the truth. If you want to sell a Big 4 network show, it’s a good idea to make your lead character 35 years old, roguish, charming, cocky, and full of one-liners.
What I learned 2: If you’re not good at writing that kind of character? Don’t try. As a screenwriter, one of your jobs is to understand what you’re good at and what you’re bad at and avoid what you’re bad at. I’ll read a lot of writers trying to write shows like Deception who aren’t funny. Who don’t know how to write funny one-liners or quippy back-and-forth dialogue. If you don’t know how to do that, move over to something else that plays to your strengths.
It’s here. It’s now. The ten worst films I saw and the ten best. It should be noted that I haven’t seen La La Land, Manchester by the Sea, Collateral Beauty, Passengers, Fences, or Billy Lynn. I’m pretty sure Billy Lynn and Collateral Beauty (going off of what everyone’s saying) would’ve made my “Worst” list. But alas, I don’t have the endurance anymore to go to movies I know I’m going to hate. So, here’s what’s left…
WORST FILMS
10) Ghostbusters – The cinematic embodiment of the social justice warrior crusade, telling us that we have to like what they, the world, has decided is best for us. The result was a movie that everyone watched and went, “Wait, why do Ghostbusters have to be women now? Why can’t they just be men and women?” Because men in 2016 are bad, that’s why.
9) Batman vs. Superman – So pretentious in its writing and directing that it gave you aches in places you didn’t now you could ache. After the 17th flashback to either Batman or Superman’s past, I wondered if the movie even cared about the present. How a movie with the two most popular superhero characters of all time could be so boring is a question aliens will debate one day when they take over our planet in 2512.
8) The Accountant – I didn’t see a more nonsensical movie all year. He’s OCD. He’s a contract killer. No, wait, he’s an accountant. No, he’s a consultant for companies. No, his dad taught him kung-fu. What’s the plot again? The government needs to find him RIGHT AWAY because he’s living somewhere and not bothering anybody? And he launders money.
7) High-Rise – A beautifully shot film without even 10 minutes spent on a screenplay, this film felt like Ben Wheatley stumbled onto the set and started making up things as he went along. Get a screenwriter, Ben. You’re a stud filmmaker but you can’t do it on your own.
6) Money Monster – An idea plucked out of the early 2000s given the treatment of 1990s film, attempting to rip off the chaos of the 1970s. After it was all said and done, it became a 2016 disaster, a bunch of old people who’ve lost touch with what audiences want. I’m all for adult fare, but you need to know what adults actually want.
5) The Witch – Holy Moses this was the most overrated piece of garbage of the year. I thought I was about to watch something amazing. Instead I witnessed a pretentious period piece with a bunch of well-costumed actors stumbling around a photograph-friendly farm. Another director who’s never learned how to tell a story. Wonderful.
4) Midnight Special – One thing that drives me batty is when reviewers give a bad film a good grade cause doing otherwise would fuck with the narrative. Jeff Nichols is supposed to be this up-and-coming filmmaker and this was supposed to be his break into the mainstream, his “early Steven Spielberg” film. Instead, it was a wandering mess that never committed to anything concrete, choosing instead to imply a whole lot of nothing, leaving us wondering what the point of the movie was when it was over. It’s okay to write screenplays that make sense. And it’s okay to say a movie sucked even when it doesn’t fit the narrative.
3) A Hologram For a King – This movie was the most bizarre thing I saw all year. It felt like something directed by Siri. Yes, I’m talking about the Artificially Intelligent concierge on your phone. Tom Hanks technically gave a performance, though I have a strong suspicion that he Skyped in his scenes standing in front of a green screen, which were then digital inserted into the film. If that doesn’t sell you, maybe the plot where nothing happens for 120 minutes will win you over.
2) Eddie the Eagle – Easily the worst performance of the year. I want you to go to the nearest mirror and make the goofiest smile-face you can think of. That was the actor’s, in this movie, entire performance. The writer also forgot to leave the 80s, as this screenplay seems to have been written immediately after a binge-watch of every 80s comedy ever made.
1) Sully – Was this the worst movie of the year? Probably not. Was it the most pointless movie of the year? Definitely. Sully and Billy Lynn (of which I read the book) are an example of what happens when you try to make a movie without a single dramatic beat. Drama is the essence of entertainment, something the makers of this film either don’t know or, worse, ignored.
BEST FILMS
10) Central Intelligence – Before you castrate me for liking this film, a film I’m sure you haven’t seen, let me add some perspective to the conversation. I don’t like Kevin Hart at all. I detest nearly every film he’s in. That Ride Along flick is garbage. Central Intelligence, however, not only gives us the best chemistry between two actors in any movie this year, but it’s a surprisingly good screenplay. Nothing flashy. Stays close to all the beats you’re supposed to hit. Yet it manages to stay ahead of the reader/viewer. Biggest surprise all year as I expected this to suck.
9) Tony Robbins: I Am Not Your Guru – I promise you there isn’t a film you’ll see this year that will make you squirm more than this one. It’s on Netflix and all I ask is that you watch the opening scene. I promise you won’t be able to look away. You’ll ask, out loud, “Does this really happen?” It does. Welcome to the cult of Tony Robbins.
8) Kubo and the Two Strings – This movie isn’t perfect. Before seeing it, I heard people marveling at how a “simple story could be so good.” But Kubo isn’t simple at all. Actually, it has some of the more complex and hard-to-follow world building I’ve encountered this year. Despite that, it’s a beautiful film to watch and listen to, and comes together in such a satisfying way in the end.
7) Zootopia – There wasn’t a movie in 2016 that made you feel happier to be alive than this one. That damn rabbit is so freaking cute.
6) Deadpool – The superhero genre needed to be disrupted. Deadpool charged towards the wall Hollywood tried to put up in front of it, broke through, and gave us the biggest box office surprise of 2016. It also reinforced the notion that nothing ever gets made by accident in this town. There has to be at least one person who will stop at nothing to get their movie made. Deadpool had four of those people and we’re the beneficiaries of their drive.
5) Weiner – I know, I know. Another documentary, Carson? Really? Just watch this film. You’ve never met anyone who can’t get out of their own way the way Anthony Weiner can’t get out of his own way. What a freaking weirdo. What’s so strange is that when he’s out in public speaking about issues and policies, he’s captivating. Then he gets home and all bets are off. The x-factor about this movie is the weird way in which it will later influence the 2016 presidential election.
4) Hunt for the Wilderpeople – This movie makes me want to move to New Zealand. I loved the main character. I loved the relationship between the main character and the stepfather. I loved how you had no idea what was going to happen next. This movie makes you feel good about life in a different way than say, Zootopia, but does the job nonetheless.
3) Eye in the Sky – I never thought I’d like a movie about drones so much. But let me put this not so delicately. This is the movie The Hurt Locker could’ve been if it had a screenplay. They actually thought this thing through, and, as a result, we get the most tension-filled movie of the year.
2) Swiss Army Man – The best movie score of the year accompanies the trippiest movie of the year. This movie is not for everyone, but it’s the only movie that I saw all year that took REAL ARTISTIC CHANCES and those chances actually paid off. It’s weird, it’s unsettling, it’s funny, it’s awkward, but most of all, it’s unlike anything you’ve ever seen.
1) Don’t Think Twice – This is the only movie I saw all year that genuinely affected me on an emotional level. Sure, part of that is because it’s about the “artist’s journey” which is so relatable to me. But the character development is better than any other screenplay this year by miles. And like any good movie, it keeps getting better as it goes on. If you’re an artist, you will want to see this movie. It’s perfect.
NEWSLETTER COMING LATE TONIGHT: And it’s a doozy. Not only do I review an IMPRESSIVE script, but I also give you the SEEDINGS for the Scriptshadow Screenplay Tournament. There will also be some must-grab deals on script consultations. I’ll announce on Twitter and add a post here as soon as it goes out. Sign up by e-mailing “NEWSLETTER” to Carsonreeves1@gmail.com and be sure to check your spam and promotions folders!
Genre: Thriller
Premise: (from Blood List) When a couple living in a Brooklyn high-rise think that a man in the building across the street is looking through their window, their paranoia grows until they begin to suspect he might actually be a killer at large who the news refers to as The Headhunter.
About: This script finished number four on The Blood List, the annual list of the best horror, thriller, and sci-fi scripts. I reviewed the number one script on Monday and the number two script earlier in the year (my favorite so far).
Writer: Zack Ford
Details: 90 pages
I’m a nervous wreck. Two days ago, I’d accepted the Cubs’ fate. They were down 3 games to 1 in the World Series, no hope of coming back. It’d been a fun season. But mentally, I’d resigned myself and moved on. They weren’t going to win.
And then they had to go and win 2 games in a row. And now it’s tied. And the 7th game of the World Series is today. And I don’t know what to do with myself. I can’t concentrate on anything. I keep thinking: What if this is actually the year?
Do you know how big of a joke the Cubs losing has become in Chicago? We have this saying, “Wait until next year.” We usually start using it around mid-season, as that’s when it becomes clear that the Cubs are, once again, not going to make the playoffs.
Well, it got so bad that we started using that saying on the opening day of the season. “Wait until next year.” It was an ongoing joke. WE were an ongoing joke. We knew the Cubs weren’t going anywhere. And we were okay with that.
Yet now, after 108 years, they actually have a chance to win the World Series. You don’t realize how bizarre this is for somebody who’s lived his entire life accepting that this would never happen. It doesn’t seem real. So, to be honest, I don’t know what to do with it. I don’t know how to mentally compartmentalize it so I can do other things.
I’ve just been staring at the wall most of the day with this weird “Huh?” look on my face.
Amongst these endless huhs, I will attempt to write a script review. Hope it’s more of a Kris Bryant Home Run than a Steve Bartman Interference.
Julia and Francis have just moved into a new apartment in Brooklyn, where Francis has secured a prime-time advertising job. But immediately – and when I say immediately, I mean within seconds – things start going wrong.
Julia’s convinced that there’s a man in the high-rise across the street who’s staring at her. When she tells Francis about him, he’s not so sure. But since there’s a killer on the loose, a man who slices people’s heads off, he can’t be too careful.
So the two monitor the man, first in his window, and eventually around the neighborhood. This dude is a big fucker, and he’s always wearing this raincoat and rain boots. But, of course, they can’t be 100% that he’s the headhunting serial killer who’s been turning people into real-life Halloween costumes.
Things get interesting, however, when Julia goes to the local supermarket and Raincoat Dude follows her there. Francis’s checking of the subsequent security footage proves that this man’s definitely following his wife around.
But that begs the question: What do they do about it? It’s not like you can go to the police and say, “This man stares at us from across the street so he’s probably the serial killer you’re looking for.” But Francis has got to do something. Julia wants out of this apartment pronto. And she’s counting on Francis to take care of it.
However, just when Francis secures a solution to the problem, he finds himself stalked by our rain loving face-collector. Is it too late for Francis? I’d tell you, but I don’t want you to get a-HEAD of yourselves. Heh heh heh.
Here’s what I liked about this script. It was a super fast read, and it had a lot of fun with its set pieces. I thought moving away from the traditional horror locations (attics, basements, old houses) really benefited the screenplay, with my two favorite scenes being the supermarket stalking and the late-night subway car confrontation.
The problem with The Watcher, unfortunately, is that it’s too thin.
Early on in our screenwriting education, we’re told to strip everything away and only focus on the areas of the story that push it forward. This is good advice unless you take it too literally. If you give us only the barest of bones, there’s no meat to grab onto.
It’s like if someone told you not to eat too much cause you want to stay skinny, and you took that to mean you should only eat exactly how many calories you needed to stay alive. You’d be a skeleton.
And that’s what this script felt like, a skeleton.
I mean we knew these characters for literally three seconds before Julia sees the man in the window across the street. It was like, whoa man, slow your roll. Let’s get to at least know you first!
The counter-argument to this is, “Well don’t you tell us to jump right into the story, Carson? Isn’t that what good screenplays do? Start quickly?”
Yes. But there’s a difference between jumping right into your story and jumping right into your concept. You want to build up to your concept (a man living across the street who watches you). Whereas with your story, you can jump into that in numerous ways without breaching your concept yet.
For example, in Rosemary’s Baby, the opening scene is our characters being shown an apartment. We’re pulled in by their excitement, as well as a mid-scene mystery — a secret closet our character spots that’s been hidden for some reason.
That’s important to remember. You don’t have to tear our eyes out with some balls-to-the-wall super-opening for your first scene to be a success. It only has to feel like something’s happening and we’re moving towards something that matters (in this case, towards the purchase of an apartment). If you can spike the scene to add curiosity (with a hidden closet), all the better.
But yeah, we’re not starting Rosemary’s Baby with Rosemary having her baby.
I was also hoping for more unexpected things to happen in The Watcher. Outside of a couple of scenes, when we were told something was going to happen, it usually happened. Scripts need to utilize the opposite approach. You tell the audience it’s going to happen one way, and then it happens a completely different way.
For example, after we see Julia stalked by the killer at the supermarket early in the story, Francis goes back to the supermarket and asks an employee if he can look at the security tape. When he watches the tape… everything happens exactly like we saw it happen with Julia. “He’s really stalking her,” Francis says.
How much more interesting would this have been if the tape showed that he didn’t stalk Julia at all? This would’ve made things so much more complicated. Now Francis is wondering if his wife is losing it. Yet she’s in such a fucked-up state, he can’t tell her that’s what he’s thinking. And everything, from how he talks to his wife to how he approaches the situation, becomes a lot more complicated.
That’s the world you want your characters dealing with in the second act. There shouldn’t be any easy choices. If the problem is: Killer is over here and the solution is: therefore we must go over there — that’s not very interesting.
But if the problem is: I’m not sure if that’s the killer. My wife might be crazy. But my wife is telling me she’s leaving me unless we get out of this apartment. But I emptied out my savings to get this place and we’re not getting our money back if we leave and I don’t have enough money to get us a new place… now you’ve got a movie.
I wanted more of that complexity here but unfortunately I didn’t get it. Then again, screenwriting is all about rewriting. And I’m sure there are some already well-versed managers and agents telling Zack this stuff.
So with that I say: Go Cubbies.
[ ] What the hell did I just read?
[x] wasn’t for me
[ ] worth the read
[ ] impressive
[ ] genius
What I learned: Things should rarely go according to plan in storytelling. Your characters should have a good idea of how things are going to go… AND THEN YOU MAKE SURE THEY DON’T GO THAT WAY. Try it out and watch your scenes improve. If your character is going to pick up his daughter after school, have the teacher tell him she needs to talk to him about something bad his daughter did that day. If your character plans to break up with his girlfriend, have her tell him she’s pregnant right before he breaks the news. If your character has been meticulously planning a bank robbery for six months, have him show up only to see that there’s a Police Appreciation Parade running down Main Street that day and the entire police force is out in tow. Things should never go according to plan!