Christoph Waltz to play Jakob in “Jakob’s Wife” maybe??

Many of you have been asking me, “Yo, Crackpot Carson, when the fly-handle are you going to be dunzoes with your freakin’ contest, homie! If I woulda known I’d be on welfare before I got my contest results, I wouldn’t have paid the ridiculous entry fee!” Well, maybe not in those words. More like normal-world words. I’m not sure anyone’s used the word “dunzoes” since 2003, and I’m pretty sure the last one to use it was me. But you get the point.

The good news is, I’m almost dunzoes picking the top 25. And I’m reading every free second I get. If I’m in the line at In and Out, I’m reading. If I’m driving on a relatively empty highway, I’m reading. If I’m on the treadmill because I ate too much In and Out, I’m reading. If I’m in the hospital because I got in a car accident, I’m having the nurse read to me (note to all: Do not ask nurses if a script has enough GSU. Apparently that means something very different in hospital-speak – p.s. I’m talking about ass-stuff). So while I can’t offer you a delicious helping of my special 25 sauce, I can give you 10 scripts that almost made the cut.

The reasons for why these scripts didn’t make the cut are varied. But the general assessment is that there have been no perfect scripts in the contest. So the scripts that have gotten through are ones that have had a lot more good than bad. These “almost” scripts are ones that maybe had 60-70% good, as opposed to the 80-90% required to make the finals.

What’s great about the below scripts, though, is that either they or the writer have potential. With guidance, who knows? Maybe we’ll even review some for Amateur Friday to get the writers some feedback.

As for the scripts that didn’t make today’s cut, the number 1 reason was lack of originality. It’s been one script after another with me going, “Already seen it.” I don’t get the sense that the writers are trying or that they understand the value of being unique in a medium that’s deluged with sameness. So, here are 10 Scriptshadow 250 “Almosts.” I’ll leave it up to the writers in the comments section on whether they want to post links to their scripts. Enjoy!

Title: Legendaria
Writer: Ben Baker
Genre: Fantasy, Family, Adventure
Logline: After being magically transported into the world of a fantasy role-playing game, a nerdy middle schooler and his friends must finish the game’s quest and defeat an evil sorcerer to get back home.
Notes: This was pretty good. Sweet, innocent, marketable, a Zathura-type premise. Kinda funny in a mainstream way. The only question is: Is it too simple? Does this writer have Harry Potter type imagination? Either way, it’s a super easy reading style and the kind of story that makes you feel good.

Title: The Value of Perception
Writer: Skye Lynch
Genre: Mystery/Heist
Logline: The sudden and mysterious death of her grandfather leads a young art historian to uncover the largest art heist in history. But in order to bring the thieves to justice, she must trust a man she barely knows and steal a painting from one of the most prestigious museums in the world.
Notes: The writing here is strong and this one started out with a head of steam, building a lot of mystery. However, once she actually gets into the investigation, things start getting a little repetitive and/or predictable. Stopped feeling fresh. That tends to happen a lot when you move into these investigative-type stories. You need to stray from the formula at some point since the blueprint is so familiar to the audience.

Title: Jakob’s Wife
Writer: Mark Steensland
Genre: Horror/Drama
Logline: In order to make his wife human again, an aging Episcopalian minister must hunt down and kill the vampire who bit her.
Notes: There is certainly something here, a sort of more-serious “Hobo with a Shotgun” vibe, mixed with a taste of Let the Right One In. My worry is that, “Is it too minimalist?” That could be. But the writer definitely writes with assuredness and seems to know what he’s doing. I just wish there was more going on.

Title: My Two Cents
Writer: Magnus Ronningen
Logline: When a grumpy, computer-illiterate, 85 year old widower accidentally becomes America’s most famous blogger, he must quickly learn to navigate the terrifying jungle of modern communication, or risk realizing his worst nightmare: being remembered as a joke.
Notes: This script has the second funniest scene I read in the contest. Without going into too much detail, an old man gets into an online fight with someone named “Cock,” then calls the guy out and says he wants to deal with this in person, like people used to. “Cock” agrees to meet at a San Francisco Park, where the Old Man charges around demanding “Cock” as loud as possible (“Sir, are you okay?” “I’m here for cock!”). It’s so juvenile and yet I couldn’t stop laughing. There are more of those laughs here. The problem with My Two Cents is it has ZERO STORY to speak of. As in I couldn’t locate a single plot thread. It was just this old man being confused with computers. Still, it was funny stuff.

Title: Ladybug
Writer: Alex Cope
Genre: High School / Monster Movie
Logline: An insecure teenager bitten by a strange bug finds that she is transforming into a giant insect and struggles to hide it from her friends and family.
Notes: This script’s heart is in the right place. And it achieves the necessary “weirdness” factor required to pull a Black List placement. I’m just not sure it’s firing on all cylinders. This is an ambitious premise and those require spot-on (no pun intended) execution. The whole time I was thinking, “This just isn’t reaching the execution level that the premise promises.” Still, it was good enough for me to remember in a sea of scripts. That shouldn’t be discounted.

Title: Intelligent Design
Writer: Brian Kazmarck
Genre: Gothic Horror/Sci-fi
Logline: A grisly vampire-like murder sends an NYC Detective in way over his head when he suspects that the culprit he’s after might actually be a real vampire.
Notes: This one has… something. Like most scripts here, though, it feels a little messy. Some writers seem to get lost in the details of their world. You’ve created a cool world. That’s great. But you need to tell the story. You need to move things along. This is a movie, not a novel. Writers always forget that. You don’t want readers giving up on your script cause they’re having to move through a molasses-level heap of description. With that said, this is a cool premise and I could totally see it being a movie with a leaner more “get-to-the-point” approach.

Title: A Wretch Like Me
Writer: Justin DiSandro
Logline: A horribly despicable selfish drug runner finds himself in a situation where he must help someone else. Will he?
Notes: The writer attempts to do something unique. Create the most unlikable character possible, place him in a situation where he must help someone, then attempt to change our perception of the man so that we’re rooting for him. This kind of thing has been done a few times before, but it’s really hard to get right. I admire that Justin committed to making this guy a total bastard. And I loved the simplicity of the story. But in the end it’s hard for me to change my mind about someone. And I disliked this character so much, I simply couldn’t come around in the end. With that said, Justin’s a writer to watch out for.

Title: The Operator
Writer: Huey Q. Pham
Genre: Action
Logline: After joining an elite counter terrorism unit in the CIA, a female Army combat veteran struggles to step out of the shadow of her deceased Navy Seal father while hunting a terrorist mastermind bent on avenging the death of his family.
Notes: One of the strongest female roles in the entire contest, and with female parts so big these days, that’s a smart choice by the writer. The problem is the same problem that plagues practically EVERY script I read with the acronym “CIA,” “DEA,” “FBI,” “NSA” or any other military acronym. They always devolve into generic story tropes. It’s so disappointing because the female character here was so good. My advice to writers going forward. If you’re going to write one of these movies, TRY TO BE ORIGINAL. We’ve seen every type of “man/woman with a gun” premise there is. What fresh element are you bringing to the table??

Title: Itchy Feet
Writer: Ian Bradley
Genre: Comedy
Logline: After a South African holiday goes hilariously wrong, two friends decide to make their way home to England – by driving up through the African continent.
Notes: This writer is really green. Script is 134 pages. Scenes go on for 3-4 beats longer than they should. But he’s got comedy dialogue down. It sucks that you can’t reward this because in addition to his knack for comedy, he’s given us a movie we’ve never seen before. How often does that happen? But this writer needs to learn how to focus his story (outline, only write the scenes you need, get into every scene late and out of every scene early) as well as get a few scripts under his belt. Potential is great but you need to learn the nuances of the craft before they’ll let you in the door.

Title: Hobgoblin
Writer: Bernard Kenney
Genre: Fantasy Action-Adventure
Logline: A dark retelling of the pagan, gnostic warlock Robin Goodfellow and his band of heathen Merry Men who fight against the onslaught of Christendom, in the form of the strong-arm of the Vatican’s Grand Inquisitor who aligns himself with the Sheriff of Nottingham.
Notes: This script lives on the edge between “same but different” and “too weird,” and honestly, I keep going back and forth between where it belongs. It’s got a really cool religious-nut villain. It’s got some fun set-piece scenes. And let’s not forget how much Hollywood loves these reimaginings. But the script feels too dense at times, too riddled with exposition. I kept feeling like the script needed to breathe and the writer was constricting it. Sometimes you have to move those eyes down the page faster. This is inventive and has potential, but wasn’t all the way there for me.

And there you have it. Congrats to all these writers. And I hope the notes I included help the writers in the next draft! ☺

I just wanted to say THANK YOU to everyone who entered the contest. Don’t get down on yourself if you didn’t make it. There were a good 50 scripts right on the cusp of getting in that missed for a variety of reasons. The biggest reason was that their idea didn’t feel big enough for a feature film treatment.

Even if you aimed for the indie market, you still have to have that idea that stands out. And I think a lot of writers sent in ideas that didn’t have enough irony, didn’t have enough conflict, or didn’t have that unique element. With that said, a few writers who had really stellar pitches were able to overcome this limitation. But overall, if your idea didn’t stand out in some way, there were enough entries that you fell by the wayside.

But don’t let that get you down. The people who succeed in this business are the ones who persevere. If one script doesn’t work, they go on to the next one, and then the next one. Sooner or later, everything comes together and you write something great. I see that breakout moment happen for a writer every few weeks in this town.

As for what happens next, I’ll be reading these scripts over the next couple of months. So at some point in December, I’ll be announcing the Top 25. Those scripts will then get read by Grey Matter, who are chomping at the bit to see what you guys have come up with.

For those who didn’t make it, feel free to share your logline and/or your e-mail pitch in the comments below. While you won’t know for sure why *I* passed you over, the always awesome Scriptshadow community may be able to give you an idea on what was missing from your pitch/logine.

Again, thank you to everyone who entered!

EDIT: Okay, everyone who made it is asking if they can send in a new draft. Since we’re trying to find the best script, and I’m tired of all of you trying to trick me (“Oh, Carson. I think I sent you the wrong draft. Here’s the correct one.” Come on guys, how dumb do you think I am??), you can send in a new draft if you do so by Tuesday 11:59 pm Pacific Time. It must be sent as a REPLY E-MAIL to the acceptance e-mail I sent out. Back to work!

As we near Saturday, when I’ll contact all 250 writers who made it to the next round of my contest, I find myself emotionally exhausted. I’ve read so many stories from writers who have given up everything for this craft. Some have moved from other countries. Some have health problems so severe, they can’t leave their beds. Some are weeks from being kicked out of their apartments. A few are even homeless.

I wish I could make every one of those writers’ dreams come true. But the reality is, I’m not letting screenplays into this contest out of pity. If you didn’t bring your S-game (Script Game), your script didn’t get chosen. And as harsh as that sounds, it’s the way the industry works. If you can’t tell a good story – even in e-mail form – you’re not ready yet.

So today is about highlighting the mistakes I saw in your queries in the hopes that you never make those mistakes again. If there’s a theme to my observations, it’s this: Be professional. If there’s even a hint of sloppiness or laziness in your query, no one’s going to take you seriously. Keeping that in mind, let’s look at the ten biggest mistakes queryers made.

1) Generalities kill loglines – There were a lot of loglines where the writer didn’t give me any actual information. They wrote in vague generalities that didn’t convey what the script was about. Something like, “A mother who questions her life must combat a powerful force that threatens her very existence.” Honestly, it seemed like some of you were actively trying to say nothing. The whole point of a logline is to show what’s UNIQUE about your idea. To achieve that, you must be specific. “When a mother’s developmentally challenged son conjures up a haunting monster known as “The Babadook” from one of his books, she must battle her own sanity in order to defeat it.” That’s what I mean by specific.

2) Word-vomiting kills queries – Beware the writer who takes twenty words to say what they could’ve said in five. These writers add qualifiers and adverbs and adjectives and empty phrases to every sentence they write, making the simplest points exhausting to slog through. For example, instead of writing: “My movie is about a boxer who gets a shot at the heavyweight championship of the world,” they write: “I have a story about a boxer, the kind of man who’s kind, yet forceful when the moment requires it, embracing the challenge of a world that seems to be, but never overtly tries to be, his worst nightmare, and the way that man, my main character, struggles to achieve and eventually is able to secure, a chance to fight for the heavyweight championship of the world, in Philadelphia, the city of brotherly love.” STRIP. YOUR. QUERIES. OF. UNCESSARY. WORDS. PLEASE. GOD.

3) Lack of conflict in a logline is a deal-breaker – You need to convey what the main conflict in your story is. Conflict is story! It’s the problem your main character must overcome to get to the finish line. I read a lot of loglines like this: “A young man experiences a spiritual awakening when he switches from being a Christian to a Muslim.” AND???? What is the conflict that tries to impede upon this switch? Lack of conflict in a logline means the writer doesn’t know what conflict is. If that’s the case, their screenplay is guaranteed to be boring. I mean 100% of the time guaranteed. Guys, if you don’t know what conflict is, go spend the weekend googling it.

4) The words/acronyms “CIA,” “agent,” and “FBI” combined with “terrorist threat” do not, on their own, make a movie – I must’ve read 50 loglines that were some variation of, “A CIA agent goes undercover to tackle a terrorist threat in London.” Secret agents and terrorist threats are some of the most potent plot elements in the movie universe. But they’re worthless on their own. They need a unique element to team up with.

5) Trending subject matter will always have an advantage in the query department – The trend of the moment is biopics. They’re the only thing that’s selling. So I admit that when I came across a biopic, as long as the query was competently written, it got in. Remember that everybody involved in the movie-making chain is trying to sell the project to the next guy up the ladder. I know Grey Matter will have to sell the winning script to the studio at some point. And the studio is more likely to buy a genre that’s doing well at the moment.

6) Focused loglines were always the best entires – One of the easiest ways to identify strong contenders was a focused logline. Unfortunately, the far more common logline was one that started in one place and ended someplace completely different. So I’d get something like this: “A down-on-his-luck mobster trying to open his own casino joins a cooking class and falls in love with his teacher.” Whaaaattttt??? How did we go from casinos to cooking class??? I saw this a LOT and the scary thing is, the writers who made this mistake are probably reading this right now and have no idea they’re guilty of it. That’s because everything connects logically in your own head. It’s only through objectivity that we see disjointedness. Take a step back and make sure you have a FOCUSED movie idea whose beginning, middle, and end, all tie together.

7) The overly mechanical query is digital Ambien – I read a lot of queries where writers were logical and succinct and measured in their pitch… and that fucking bored me to pieces. What these writers were saying was fine. It was HOW they were saying it that was the problem. There was no life to their words, no fun, no spontaneity. I’d read stuff like: “My goal was to eliminate the passive protagonist that’s been an Achilles heel to this sub-genre and replace him with a character that embodies the ideals of the thematic construct of revenge. In doing so, I’ve achieved an energy that was missing in my earlier drafts, but which I could never pinpoint. The resulting script is one that utilizes four out of five of the story engines that drive the classic “man vs. nature” tale…” AHHHHH! KILL ME NOW!!! Writing is supposed to be FUN TO READ. Even when you’re making a serious point, there should be a relaxed easy-to-digest demeanor to your writing. This style of query 100% OF THE TIME means the script will have no voice. So these queries were the easiest to reject.

8) Beware the logline that is at war with itself – I read a lot of loglines that felt like civil wars, with words jockeying for position as opposed to working together harmoniously. These writers had the “stuff it in there” mentality that should be reserved for the condiment section at a hot dog stand, not an e-mail query. Here’s an example: “A cowardly gunfighter is at odds with his idealism and the secrets he’s kept when a rival gunsmith rides into town, looking to settle a score that will help forge the frontier line between New Mexico and California.” A logline isn’t a contest to see how many words you can include. It’s a vessel to get your idea across as simply as possible. It should flow. If it doesn’t flow, rewrite it.

9) Don’t use weird adjectives to describe your main character – Every tenth logline I’d read, I’d get something like this: “A pestered train conductor plans a heist…” “Pestered???” The character adjective should give us both the defining quality of your hero, as well as CONNECT your hero to the plot of the movie. So let’s say your script is about a train conductor who decides to rob his own train. The adjective might be: “An exemplary conductor is forced by his wife to rob his own train after losing his family’s life savings.” I don’t love this logline but at least the adjective connects with the plot. This is a conductor who’s built his career on trust. He’s the last one you’d think would rob his own train.

10) Avoid the cliché opening-page overly-poetic description – Whenever I was on the fence about a query, I’d pop open the script and read the first few lines. If the overly poetic description opener made an appearance, it was bye-bye scripty. What is the “overly poetic description opener?” It’s when a writer who’s clearly uncomfortable with poetic descriptions starts their script with an overly clunky poetic description: “The sun-dappered late-afternoon light plays tic-tac-toe with the suburban rooftops.” No. Just no. Look, if describing an image in a poetic manner isn’t your forte, start with something else – an action, a mystery, your main character speaking. But if you dapper any suburban rooftops, goddammit I’m shutting you down, son.

If I could give writers one piece of advice when it comes to querying, it’d be the same advice I’d give them in regards to screenwriting: FOCUS. Get to the point. Convey your idea clearly. And being entertaining doesn’t hurt. It’s important to remember that you’re trying to convince a person to read something of yours BY READING SOMETHING OF YOURS. So if the short version of your writing isn’t enjoyable, there’s no way they’re going for the long version. Make your query focused and enjoyable to read, and there’s a good chance that reader will give you a shot.

I’m out of the office today but a quick reminder that I’ll be informing everyone who made the Scriptshadow 250 on October 3! That’s a Saturday. Hopefully this will prevent all of you from pulling any more hair out. In the meantime, today is a good old-fashioned “test your logline” post. Feel free to ask for Scriptshadow Nation’s feedback on a concept, a few pages of your script, or anything else you want help with. And dammit, don’t forget to enjoy your weekend!

The absolutely FREE Scriptshadow 250 Screenplay Contest deadline is just 56 days away! Make sure you’re preparing your entries!

A lot of what we talk about here at Scriptshadow comes from a reactionary place. We assess someone’s work and then discuss how it either a) worked or b) didn’t. And if it didn’t, we discuss how it could’ve been fixed, or how it could’ve been done better. This is all well and good, and we certainly learn a lot from it. But it doesn’t address one of the hardest things about screenwriting: the blank page.

Staring at a blank page is a whole different ball of wax than trying to come up with a solution to a bad scene.

There are two types of “blank page” problems. There’s the “On the fly” blank page problem and there’s the “Outlined script” blank page problem.

The “On the fly” problem refers to writers who are writing their script on the fly. They didn’t start off with an outline. They had their idea and figured they’d jump straight into the script. This method is notorious for leading to a lot of blank page problems. Since you didn’t outline, you have no idea where your script is headed, and when you don’t know your destination, it’s hard to map out a route to get there.

For this reason, the writer eventually runs out of scenes (curiously, they almost always peter out around page 45), and subsequently start “grasping at straws.” They write to shock, they throw a twist or two at the reader, all to energize what they perceive to be a dying story, not realizing that it’s the lack of direction in the first place that’s the problem.

To these writers I say, “This is why you outline.” You outline to destroy the blank page. If you’ve already figured out your ending, and you’ve come up with a general idea for the majority of the scenes in your script, you’ll at least come into each scene with a plan. And plans mean less blank pages.

If outlining scares you, here’s another option. Make sure that every character in your screenplay HAS A GOAL. If you give every character a goal, then every time you cut to one of those characters, you’ll know what scene to write to push them closer to that goal.

If you know, for instance, that your 5th most important character, Tracy, is desperately trying to make enough money to pay for college tuition next year, then you know to put her in a few job interviews. And if she doesn’t get hired, and subsequently gets more desperate, you know she might start doing some unsavory things to get that money.

On the contrary, if all you know about Tracy is that she’s your main character’s sister, then when she comes around, you won’t know what to do with her, and the story will drift or come to a stop when she arrives.

To use a recent example, look at Mad Max: Fury Road. The goals were clear from the start. Furiosa wanted to get back to her hometown. And Max wanted freedom. The bad guy, of course, wanted to get his five wives back. Every scene was dictated by the desires of those three characters, which is a big reason why not a single scene in that movie felt wasted.

Now if you’re a seasoned screenwriter, outlining is a huge part of your process. And for the truly hardcore, you’ve likely outlined every scene in your script (scene 1 to scene 60!). To these writers, having no idea what to write next isn’t really the problem. The problem is HOW to write what you write next.

Let me give you a real world example. A couple of weeks ago, a writer came to me needing to write a scene that took care of two things – introducing his main character’s wife, and conveying the fact that the two were struggling financially.

Notice that we know what to write, but we don’t know how to write it. I mean sure, we could take the obvious route. Our main character comes home from work, and there his wife is, at the dining room table, bills spread about everywhere, looking dire. Does the job, right? Sure.

But is it a good SCENE?

No.

Any time you give us the same scene/solution that the average Joe on the street could’ve come up with, you’ve given us a boring scene. Even the best version of that scene gives us information (exposition) and nothing more. Which puts us right back at the blank page. So what the hell do we write?

I’m going to let you in on a big secret here – the key to writing a scene that destroys the blank page. Are you ready?

CONFLICT

You want to approach your scene with the goal of injecting some conflict into it. And by conflict, I mean an imbalance that needs to be resolved. Maybe one character is mad at the other and starts yelling at them. Maybe one character is mad at the other and is passive aggressive towards them. Maybe one character is hiding a secret from another character. Maybe the two characters are avoiding talking about something. Maybe the characters desperately want to be together but can’t for some reason. Maybe the characters are fighting off a common enemy.

Conflict comes in many forms. But the important thing is that once you include conflict in a scene, you move away from merely conveying information, and you instead add an element of entertainment. Telling us that these characters are in financial straights is boring. Having one of the characters fed up that they’re in financial straights and taking it out on their partner in a passive-aggressive manner, now you have a scene.

I can already see it. The wife doesn’t NEED to have these bills out for when her husband comes home. But she wants to make a point. She’s reminding him that he can’t keep ignoring their reality. They’re in financial straights and he’s got to do something about it. He shakes his head, storms by her, and all of a sudden we have tension in the air. We have conflict. We have a scene, even if it’s a mere quarter of a page long.

But let’s say that one of the things you ALSO want to convey in this scene is that our husband and wife characters love each other very much. Having them pissed off at each other may make for a juicier scene, but it conveys the exact opposite about their relationship than what you want. Okay, that’s fine. Just shift the conflict so that it’s external.

Maybe our husband gets home, and the neighbors are, once again, playing their music loudly. As our couple work out which bills they need to pay first to stay above water, the music only seems to get louder, until the husband can’t take it anymore. He storms over to the neighbors and tells them off.

Remember, the most boring scenes in any script are the scenes where nothing’s happening. And “nothing’s happening” is universal code for “No conflict.” So always look for an angle into the scene where some kind of conflict is taking place, even if it’s subtle. Assuming that you know what needs to happen next in your script, the right level of conflict could be the key to busting past that blank page.