Poor Sherlock Holmes! By even the most conservative estimates, the movie was a solid success, and yet no one I know has even mentioned it to me. Why? Because it was swallowed up by the Na’vi! Those giant blue creatures stole Guy Ritchie’s thunder, and probably millions of dollars from the film’s coffers. This movie could have been a sensation, blanketing movie blogs with stories about “the return of the most popular movie character of all time.” By that internet real estate was given to James Cameron’s behemoth. Poor Robert Downey Jr. Who knows if his career will ever recover. Anyway, friend of the site and sometimes reviewer Michael Stark is here to give us his take on another Sherlock Holmes project that was bandied about but never made. Let’s give him our full undivided attention, assuming we’re not strapping on our 3-D glasses and watching Avatar for the fifth time.

Genre: Mash-up of gothic horror and action/adventure.
Premise: Holmes vs. Drac. Nuff said, Pilgrim.
About: Christopher Columbus would have directed this unproduced fanboy fave if it wasn’t for that damned Harry Potter. Jude Law was ironically considered as Holmes. Script sold for 700k against 1.1 million. Marc Gordon is the producer on the project. Sony is currently still sitting on the project.
Writer: Michael B Valle
Details: 126 pages (I imagine an early if not first draft)

We are the Sherlock Holmes English Speaking Vernacular Help save Fu Manchu, Moriarty and Dracula
“The Village Green Preservation Society” – The Kinks

Professor Stark once again will take the Wayback Machine down to the lowermost levels of development hell, armed only with a crucifix, a feather duster and his trusted fireplace bellows to brush off an old spec script that deservedly– and with due market diligence — should rise again.

It’s elementary, my dear execs. After the rollicking success of the DowneyRitchie Sherlock Holmes and the non-stop obsession of all things bloodsucking, Sherlock Holmes and The Vengeance of Dracula seems a no-brainer to un-stake and re-slate.

Holmes vs. Drac (my shorthand retitling) is an action adventure based on existing material (in the public-freaking-domain) that has had proven worldwide appeal for over one hundred years. So, why not, in the entrepreneurial spirit of Alien vs. Predator, Freddy vs. Jason and Godzilla vs. Mothra put these two Victorian superstars together in one, big, expensive, creature feature?!! Hell, Columbia, you already own the script.

Holmes vs. Drac was a spec written by novice scribe, Michael Valle, bought by Columbia in 1999 for $700,000 against a cool million with Christopher Columbus eager to direct. Aging fanboys will recall that ChrisCo wrote the Spielberg produced, Young Sherlock Holmes way back in 1985. Cause all spec scripts must be heavily rewritten, Rand Ravich was later hired to change things up a bit. Valle unfortunately passed away in 2001 and the project seemed to slip from ChrisCo’s consciousness as he embarked onto Harry Potterdom. The script is such an industry and fan favorite that Uberfanboy Harry Knowles openly pleaded with ChristCo to turn the beat around on his “favorite unproduced script”. Now, I too join Harry’s battle cry, adding only:

Just don’t turn the damn thing into Van Helsing!

I did indeed dig Holmes vs. Drac. But, heck, it’s my kinda Weird Tale. I’m a genre-mash-up-period-piece fanatic who loves penny dreadfuls, gothic ghost stories, Victorian bodice rippers, rickety steam powered contraptions, the foggiest of moors, extremely haunted castles, clockwork turks, consulting detectives and the whole lot of Universal Movie Monsters as long as they are terrorizing the Village Green or Queen Vic’s London.

Hell, my writing partner and I just finished scribbling one of these period piece mash-ups ourselves. (Will the usually lazy copyeditor, Carson, let that little self-promotional plug remain? Only the Shadow knows.)

Now, intrepid reader, if you don’t like pulp novels, old movies and comic books, this definitely won’t be your cup of tea. You may want to skip ahead to the next romcom or contained thriller soon to be reviewed here. But, for those few intrepid souls still standing – err, seated — let’s enter the inner sanctum and deconstruct this mother.

Now, these two dudes have crossed swords previously on paper in Fred Saberhagen’s “Seance for a Vampire” and Loren D. Estleman’s “Sherlock Holmes vs. Dracula”, proving once again there is very little new under the sun, especially when you’re hijacking famous characters for your plots.

So, how does Valle bring our two literary icons together? Knowledge of the Stoker and Conan Doyle universes is handy but not altogether mandatory to enjoy this ripping yarn. Count Dracula returns to England to exact revenge on Van Helsing, Dr. John Seward and Lord Godalming, who kind-of-almost-sort-of defeated the evil Romanian in the original canon. The stake through the heart wasn’t quite enough to kill the Nosferatu. I hate to say I told you so, but you needed to cut his bloody head off too.

Vengeful Vlad goes after Godalming first, setting up his murder as a convincing suicide. Unbeknownst to the Count, the guy had a perky & pretty Nancy Drew of a cousin, Constance Bracknell, who is suspicious enough to hire the world’s most famous consulting detective to take a closer look. Usually I can’t stand the contrivance of the spirited young lady playing junior detective, but somehow Valle charmingly pulls it off. Maybe cause I really have a crush on this fictional character. Is that wrong? She’s awfully hot.

Meanwhile, Holme’s arch enemy, Professor Moriarty, the Napoleon of Crime, is intrigued by the rusty ship the vampire sailed in on. Thinking he is robbing some priceless artifacts, his men unwittingly disturb the Count’s coffin. The surviving thug’s story of the bat-attack piques the Prof’s interests even more than the silver and gold he thought he was stealing.

So, now it’s a race against time between Holmes and Moriarty to see who finds Dracula first. Holmes vows to stop the monster before he kills again. Moriarty wants to become a vamp himself, making him the ultimate, unstoppable, immortal mastermind criminal.

Now, that’s an awesome premise right there. But, it gets even better. The Professor gets to Dracula first and when the vamp eventually betrays his new best friend, Moriarty must suck it up and team up with Holmes to stop the Count from taking over London (and then the world) with his fiendish Fu Manchu worthy plot.

Moving forward, the ante amazingly keeps getting pushed further up with Holmes becoming a fugitive from the law, Watson getting bit and Constance literally torn between two lovers.

Whew! That’s all the plot I’m gonna spoil, cause you’re gonna read it. Right?

The script definitely lives up to its thrill ride status. Even at a bloated 126 pages, it kept me turning and guessing till the end. The only thing noticeably absent was the mandatory action flick humor. Given, neither Sherlock Holmes nor Dracula were exactly known for cracking wise, but previous screen incarnations would use Watson or Drac’s human lackeys for a little comic relief. Downey’s re-invention gives the detective a healthy dose of sarcasm and narcissism for our amusement. We’ll compare the choices between these two scripts later.

For your mandatory character arc, Valle’s Sherlock must open his mind to the unscientific possibilities of the supernatural (faith vs reason, Jack) and his hermetically sealed heart to Constance, who Dracula, of course, has sized up as a tasty potential lifemate.

Holmes vs. Drac is both a throwback to the atmospheric Universal and Hammer horror flicks and the Spielbergian reinvention of serialized amazing adventure stories. There are some fantastic action sequences (some tailored made for a theme park ride), colorful secondary characters (I especially liked Mollie, the hot, trampy vamp) and enough violence and gore to keep the young kids from texting throughout the whole deal.

There’s even a scene out of The Lost Boys where our two unlikely allies drum up some monster-killing weapons with their limited Victorian-tech. How I love Steampunk, clockwork Victorian tech. Ach, it’s my geeky weakness. Oh, Lord, how I want a mechanical woman with her gear shafts showing.

Eek, have I turned into Roger Balfour???

Okay, it’s quite up my creepy alley, but the script is not without its flaws. I know that I probably read the first draft and that I’ll incur the wrath of Knowles for saying it, but the thing may be a ton of fun, but it still needs some tinkering.

That brings us to our first point of discussion. Does a script have to be perfect to sell? Or to even be brought to market? Can it skate by with just a nifty high concept alone? In today’s incredibly shrinking spec script market, can one still sell by premise alone? Was the bought-for-mega bucks Medieval anywhere near faultless? Faithful Script Shadow readers please make voice in the comment section.

Columbus was supposed to direct. But alas, now he never will…

The biggest bit of trouble with Holmes vs Drac is that there’s a hell of a lot of dialogue. Vast pages and pages and pages of it. Although the speech is authentic to the pulps and penny novels of the time, it clunks on cement by today’s standards. I’m sure the first thing the execs ordered was a STAT dialogue polish. Which brings us to our second topic of discussion for the boards. How do you write a period piece that will both appeal to purists, fanboys, tweens and civilians alike?

We may find the answer by comparing this Holmes to the recent blockbuster. While Valle voices every detail of the detective’s great deductive process ala the early Rathbone films, Ritchie’s writers show it instead of just telling it. Guy’s characters aren’t Thoroughly Modern Millies, but they sidestep some of the more cliched conversational conventions of the genre. Valle’s draft unfortunately is awash with loving lemons like “You foiled my daring plot.” And “Your primitive brain has no conception how precious this treasure is.”

Even for an old movie buff like myself those exchanges made the read a little plodding at times.

So, how do you hold onto the nostalgia and romanticism without getting too quaint and corny? How do you avoid turning this awesome homage into another League of Extraordinary Gentlemen? Somehow those producers wove genius source material into dull straw, managing to destroy our collective memories of Alan Quatermain, Captain Nemo, Mr. Hyde and the Invisible Man in one fell swoop.

On the other side of the slug, how do you avoid making a Van Helsing? Obviously that team had a great love and respect for the pantheon of Universal Monster Movies, but the film didn’t just run off the rails, it didn’t have any rails to begin with. It was a little too much fun!

What’s the proper mix? When does a retro feel suddenly slide into parody? Do you think The Rocketeer pulled it off? The Mummy? Or Sky Captain and The World of Tomorrow? The first Indiana Jones is still the gold standard for this kind of flick, a formula that even Spielberg himself hasn’t always been able to duplicate.

Valle’s script affectionately keeps Conan Doyle’s and Stoker’s characters extremely true to textbook form. But does that form still fly today? These are reboot times where even Spiderman, a film only nine years young, is going through a total retooling. Can the likes of Dracula and Sherlock Holmes dare remain the way they always were? Or must they be transformed into emo teens and bare-knuckled, shirtless brawlers for today’s tastes?

Truth be told, Sherlock Holmes and The Vengeance of Dracula probably could have used a minor face-lift. I’d like to have seen his Holmes a lot less Jeremy Brent and a bit more Robert Downey Jr. And, Dracula needed to be channeling his inner Gary Oldman rather than his legendary, long-winded Lugosi.

If a writer dares to bring an iconic literary figure into their work, I still believe they can bend the rules a bit and make them totally (kinda-sorta) their own creation.

I give this script an impressive. Cause even with the few warts exposed, I think the writer was just a draft or two away from totally nailing it. It being a huge tentpole franchise that would’ve rained money down from heaven. You write the next Pirates of the Caribbean and I’ll be pretty impressed by you too.

[ ] What the hell did I just read?
[ ] wasn’t for me
[ ] worth the read
[X ] impressive
[ ] genius

What I learned: It isn’t always easy borrowing famous characters for your narrative. If you re-imagine them too much, you can have more protestors than The Last Temptation of Christ. Plus, being both in the public domain and the collective consciousness, a few hundred other writers are probably putting Alice in Hoboken and Robin Hood on Mars just like you are.

Also, Holmes vs. Drac confirmed Professor Stark’s Fourth Rule of Screenwriting – always end your movie with a 50-foot tall monster. Hell, nothing less will do.

As many of you know, I love Source Code. I just love it. I think it’s one of best (if not the best) executed Sci-Fi scripts I’ve ever read. I often toy with the idea of placing it number 1 on my Favorites List, and why wouldn’t I? It finished number 1 on the readers faves, getting nearly double the votes of the next highest script. People love this script.

Late last year, Ben Ripley got the news that every writer dreams of, that his spec script, a story he and he alone came up with, was getting a green light, with Jake Gyllenhaal attached to star and Duncan Jones to direct. After finally seeing Moon a couple of weeks ago, I can honestly say this is a dream match-up. If you can suffer through one of my early reviews on the site, I talked about this script roughly a year ago today. It’s more a reaction than a review, but it gives you a sense of why I was so impressed with it. Well, a year later and I finally got to chat with the writer himself. Ben Ripley is repped by Bayard Maybank at Hohman Maybank Lieb, and managed by Michael Lasker at Mosaic.

Gyllenhaal will be starring in Source Code.

SS: Can you tell us how you got into writing, and bring us up to speed on your career before you sold Source Code?

BR: Like a lot of people, I had, from an early age, a love for movies and a curiosity to know how they were made. As I went through school, I noticed writing came somewhat easily to me, so a screenwriting career eventually made sense as a way to pursuing filmmaking while building on that strength. I was an English major in college and then received my formal training in the graduate screening program at USC film school. While film school is not a prerequisite for working in Hollywood, it does break down all the major components of the process and allow hands on practice of each discipline – editing, production, acting and writing. You also learn how to roll coaxial cable into perfect coils.

Even with an advanced degree, there is still no set path for getting into the industry. You have to fend for yourself and search for any way in you can find. I worked as an assistant at a production company and at a post production house, in addition to a few years outside of the industry as a grant writer for a non-profit foundation. There were plenty of opportunities to give up on screenwriting, to try something else, but I kept writing scripts, and those scripts eventually found their way into hands of a literary agency who offered to represent me. It still took four more years, and perhaps five or six additional scripts, before the first one sold to Fox. It was a horror film, it never got made, but it got me in and got me assignment work for the next several years. During that time I had three direct-to-DVD movies made. That kind of work is completely off the cultural radar, but it did teach me a lot about how to write for production.

SS: How did the sale for Source Code come about? How did the script becoming a go picture come about?

BR: Mark Gordon, the producer, became involved with the project while I was writing it on spec. At the time we went out with it, Topher Grace was attached to play the lead role, and I think an actor attachment always helps create buzz. Topher and Mark personally spoke with all the studios to lay the groundwork, and a few days after it went out we had more than one offer and interest just kept building. As a writer, it was one of those fairy tale moments – but also nerve wracking. In the end, Mark felt most comfortable with the script going to Universal. Incidentally, the Universal VP who brought the project into the studio was Scott Bernstein, with whom I had actually discussed the idea for Source Code a year before. So Scott was already familiar with the story and enthusiastic about it.

Source Code always had momentum. The studio went immediately to directors. There was zero development hell. What that taught me, at least in terms of spec scripts, is that the stronger you make it when it sells, the less creative interference will come afterwards. The script started to become a go movie after Billy Ray did a few weeks of targeted work bringing out a few more aspects of my script. Off that we got the attachments of Duncan Jones to direct and Jake Gyllenhaal to star. The final piece was Mark Gordon moving the project over to a new financing company called Vendome, which was passionate about making Source Code its first movie, with Summit distributing.

3) Why did you write Source Code? Did you write it because it was a great idea you had? Did you write it because you thought its specific elements gave it the best chance to sell? How did this script come to be?

BR: I wrote Source Code because I was discouraged with the work I was then getting. In the four years between the sale of my first spec and that of Source Code, I was mostly doing rewrites on other people’s horror scripts. I’d put a lot of effort into them, I’d get paid, and then the scripts would just sit there. I felt I had more to say creatively, and the great thing about being a writer in Hollywood, the source of our power, is the ability to generate new material.

Source Code was an immensely difficult script for me to write. All I had at the beginning was the impulse to tell a non-linear story with a structure like Groundhog Day, where you experienced the same event repeatedly. I asked myself if there was a science fiction conceit that would be the occasion for the narrative, and before long I had the setting on the train and the idea that source code would be used as a tool in a terrorism procedural.

From that point to the finished script was still many, many drafts and a lot of trial and error. Three people were instrumental in helping me shape it: Michael Lasker, my manager, and two guys at the Mark Gordon Company, Lawrence Inglee and Jordan Wynn. All of them believed in the potential of the film and were excited enough to roll up their sleeves and work with me to figure it out. They pushed me pretty hard to elevate the material, to think of it more as a character mystery than a conventional thriller, to subtract out much of the science and leave the mysteries intact. Without that kind of dynamic back and forth with collaborators who saw what it could be and kept at me until it was on the page, Source Code could not have been written. And by the way, as a writer, you want to partner with people who are as excited as you are – people who like movies, enjoy the creative process and see possibilities more than they see problems.

SS: What was the most important element (or elements) you focused on getting right in the script (character, theme, plot, etc.)? And how did you go about achieving it (them)?

BR: Everything was important. The narrative had to flow. The main character’s dilemma – moving from confusion to a slow awakening to just how awful his situation really was – had to be the reader’s experience as well. The technology had to feel mysterious. It had to end correctly. But the most important thing, I think, was ultimately the structure. I was in the third or fourth draft when I realized that this story only needed to have two settings – the train and the isolation chamber. And if you started the guy on the train, in some degree of confusion, and you slammed him back and forth between the two worlds, that was the movie. That binary structure was key: it simplified the noise, kept the narrative moving, gave the reader the identical experience as the main character’s and differentiated the script from the other stuff out there. Its very simplicity became its high concept. None of that was planned from the beginning – none of it was outlined. It all had to come during the process of discovery in the writing.

SS: Did you know Source Code was going to click with people? Were you sitting there going, “This one feels good,” as you were writing it? Or was it a total surprise?

BR: Six months before we went out with it, the Mark Gordon people knew it was going to sell. I was way too skittish to go around saying or believing that myself, but we all had a feeling the script could be something special. I should also point out that we didn’t stop with a draft that would sell. No one aspires anymore to just a development deal. We kept pushing to until I had a draft that would be made. There’s a difference, and with a spec script, you have the luxury of incubating it until it’s as strong as you think you can make it. Although I’ve written several scripts since Source Code that, to me, felt pretty strong, Source Code remains the most popular with people.

SS: Can you tell us a little bit about your writing process? Do you outline? Do you write fast? How many drafts do you write? Etc.

BR: Being a parent, my hours are more regimented than they used to be. I don’t write during the evenings or on weekends – I’m busy living my life then. I’ve always found that time away from material is just as valuable as time spent on material – it helps you maintain freshness and perspective. With the ease of communication and the ubiquity of laptops and email, there’s often an assumption that we’re always working, always available. But this kind of over exposure can lead to belabored and insular decision-making. Writing is part of my life, but only part.

Once I have an idea that I think works, my first step is to take pages and pages of notes, whatever comes into my head. Research is important. You need to steep yourself in whatever subculture you’re writing about, enough so that you develop a confidence to invent within it. Next I try to come up with some compelling central characters. This is always the hardest part for me to get right, but it’s a critical one. If your characters aren’t distinct, comprehensible and somewhat relatable, you’ll never hear the end of it from your readers. And it’s really about the hard work of understanding who these characters are and what makes them interesting. I’m not much attracted to Everyman characters. I’m more intrigued with mysterious, unusual or even extraordinary characters. If you look at Stanley Kubrick’s films, most of his characters are compelling for who they are. They’re not ordinary people who depend on a movie situation to come alive in. The outline comes next, but I don’t get overly detailed with it. I like to leave some open spaces for discovery. Only when you get in there writing scenes, writing description and dialogue, will the best things about your script occur to you. That said, I absolutely know what my three acts and midpoint are, even if they sometimes shift around during the writing. The more I write, the fewer pages per day I turn out. I wish I wrote faster, but I tend to consider pretty carefully each moment. I take my time with the language until it feels right. I never gloss over stuff. After that, I always go back and find material to remove. You can always say things with greater efficiency, always trim and tighten action. You look at any good film and you realize just how economical and propulsive the scenes are, especially in the first act as they work to set up the world. You can never get too good at that skill.

SS: It sounds like the midpoint is important to you. Could you explain what it is?

BR: A midpoint is a plot turn that happens in the middle of a movie. The midpoint in Jaws is when Roy Scheider, Robert Shaw and Richard Dreyfuss pile into the fishing boat and head out to the open ocean to hunt the shark. The midpoint of the original Star Wars is when the Millenium Falcon reaches the Death Star in order to rescue the princess. It’s the point to which the action of the first half of the story is ending and, as a result, sends the second half of the story in a new – or at least more focused – direction. A good midpoint turn will differentiate the action between the first and second half of the movie and keep things from seeming monotonous. The post-midpoint portion of the second act (pages 60-90) is often where you get much closer to the story’s real themes and you’re not as much focused on straightforward action.

SS: A lot of people write sci-fi, but I find it’s one of the easiest genres to screw up. Can you tell us what you think the key is to writing a good sci-fi script?

BR: Put character first. Don’t let the technology take over the story. Center your narrative on an emotional experience and let the science part of it be the ambience. None of the characters in your script should be aware that they’re in a science fiction film. It should be all utterly real to them.

SS: What is the biggest adjustment for a writer once they sell a script? What advice would you give a writer who just sold his first screenplay?

BR: The lifestyle of a full time writer is obviously different from a writer needing a day job to support him or herself. Once you make that first sale, a lot of producers and executives will want to meet you. You’re no longer creating in isolation – you’re part of the Hollywood community. You’re the flavor of the month. People will want to sit down with you and hear your ideas on new projects. Potential work will start coming your way. You need to be comfortable considering and developing multiple story ideas, with multiple partners, and try to push forward on them in order to book that next job. That means getting comfortable pitching in conference rooms, being proactive, coming up with new material and realizing that most of what you work on will not succeed. But that’s just the churn that everyone works in.

SS: What are some surprising things you’ve learned from your manager or agent about screenwriting that you would’ve never been privy to otherwise?

BR: I’ve learned tons from my representatives – way too much to relate here. At least once a year I make a point of sitting down with my agent over lunch. I ask questions and we assess my progress. The key is finding an agent who wants to invest their time in you, who believes in you and who’s interested in cultivating you for a 30 year career.

SS: It’s a question I ask a lot, but I think it’s a pertinent one. If you could go back in time and give the young wet-behind-the-ears Ben Ripley advice on the fastest way to finding success as a screenwriter, what would you tell him?

BR: I would tell him to keep faith, that it’s all going to be okay. I would tell him that the reason I’m a screenwriter today is that I believed in my talent and made the sustained sacrifices to become one. I eschewed other career paths. I worked day jobs to support myself. I wrote on weekends when maybe I would have had more fun at the beach. I started and finished scripts and then started new ones that were better. I kept at it. There are no shortcuts. The dues-paying process can be bewildering and lonely, but its job is to separate out the professionals from the merely curious, and when it’s over, you’re oddly thankful for having asked a lot of yourself.

SS: Whenever I ask professional writers, “How do you get an agent?” they always say, “Write a great script.” But let’s suppose, for the sake of argument, that you only have a decent script, and your (Ben Ripley’s) life depended on getting an agent within the next month. What would you do? What would you do?

BR: I remember how that felt. I remember being so impatient for my difficult, outsiders life to stop and for my “real” life as a working writer to start. It’s easy for professional writers to be benignly nostalgic about their early days coming up, forgetting that those days often felt tedious, frustrating and unsustainable. But your life shouldn’t depend on getting an agent within the next month. If it does, there’s something wrong. You should never let your life get to the point where you look at screenwriting as a lottery ticket that’s going to save you. What saves you is your belief in yourself and your commitment to getting better at your craft, regardless of when that craft is rewarded. And a decent script probably won’t get you an agent. If you’re still at the point where you’re writing “decent” scripts – as opposed to great scripts – you’re not ready for an agent. But the magic of Hollywood is that the appetite for great scripts far exceeds the supply of great scripts. So when and if you finally write that great script, word will get out. People will ask you to read it, not the other way around. Stay optimistic. Stay focused. Write well and the agents – and the success – will come.

SS: Although getting writers to answer this question specifically is almost impossible, can you tell us what you’re working on next? And if you can’t tell us, can you tell us your dream sci-fi adaptation (whether it be book, video game, comic, whatever)?

BR: I haven’t settled on the next thing yet. I don’t have a dream sci-fi adaptation. I’d love to write a submarine movie. I love historical stuff. I’d love to find a dormant Hollywood genre and reinvent it, as Gladiator did with the sword and sandals genre.

Here’s Roger with his review of Ender’s Game. Don’t forget to tune in tomorrow for an interview with a writer that reignited my love of Sci-Fi and reminded me that the simplest of Sci-Fi concepts can be the best. :)

Genre: Science Fiction, Action, Coming of Age
Premise: Aliens have attacked Earth and have almost destroyed the human species. To make sure humans win the next encounter, the world government has started breeding military geniuses and trains them in the arts of war. The early training takes the form of games, and Ender Wiggin is a genius among geniuses who wins all the games. But is he smart enough to save the planet?
About: Ender’s Game started out as a novelette by Orson Scott Card in the August 1977 issue of Analog Science Fiction and Fact. When it was expanded into a novel, it won both the Hugo and Nebula Awards for Best Novel. In May 2003, Card released his latest version of the screenplay to Warner Brothers. D.B. Weiss (and later, David Benioff), working closely with director Wolfgang Petersen, wrote a new script. Petersen eventually departed and Card announced in February 2009 that he had completed a new script for Odd Lot Entertainment.
Writers: D.B. Weiss (author of the videogame-themed novel, Lucky Wander Boy and one of the scribes for the screen adaptation of Bungie’s Halo and George R.R. Martin’s A Song of Ice and Fire Series for HBO) based upon the novels Ender’s Game and Ender’s Shadow by Orson Scott Card. Also based upon the screenplays by Orson Scott Card, and Michael Dougherty & Dan Harris (X2, Superman Returns).
Details: Draft is dated 7/7/05

Before there was Harry Potter and Quidditch, there was Ender’s Game and Battle School. Sure, when it comes to narrative voice, Miss Rowling is heavily influenced by Roald Dahl, but when it comes to plot elements, it’s hard not to draw comparison between Hogwarts and its various houses (Gryffindor, Ravenclaw, et al.) and Battle School and its various armies (Salamander, Dragon, etc.).

I’ve never read Ender’s Game, Rog. What the hell is Battle School?

Genre: Sci-fi
Premise: A group of strangers must band together in Moscow after a mysterious alien force invades the city
About: This project has been in development for awhile and, as far as I can tell, is waiting for someone or something to breathe new life into it. The original draft was written by M.T. Ahern & Leslie Bohem four years ago, and now Spaihts has given his take on the material. Spaihts, for those who don’t know, wrote the Avatar-sounding space thriller, “Shadow 19” back in 2006, which won the admiration of Keanu Reeves. Reeves (no relation) then hired Spaihts to pen “Passengers,” his weird idea about a guy who wakes up early on a 100 year space journey. The script wowed Hollywood and finished Top 3 on the 2007 Black List. Suddenly Spaihts was a big name and interviewing for all the big sci-fi assignments. That’s when he landed this job, rewriting “The Darkest Hour” for controversial director Timur Bekmambetov (Wanted). That in turn landed him a writing assignment for Disney’s “Children of Mars,” and of course, the biggest deal of his career so far, the Alien reimagining for Ridley Scott.
Writer: Jon Spaihts
Details: 118 pages (November 30th, 2008 draft)

When you look at the writers out there today, there really isn’t anyone who’s churning out consistently good sci-fi, which is probably why Spaihts (a name I couldn’t pronounce with a blaster to my head) surprised everyone by landing the Alien reboot. But is it that surprising? Roger definitely loved Shadow 19. And Passengers is one of those scripts it seems like everyone loves (except for one person, notably). So I decided to momentarily forego all this touchy-feely Sundance fare and finish up the Spaihts trifecta. Let’s get our hands dirty with a little sci-fi, shall we?

Rex Halley is an American entrepreneur trying to take advantage of Moscow’s new influx of wealth. Or, at least, Moscow’s new influx of wealth two years ago, when this script was written and people had wealth. Equal parts eager and naïve, the 27 year old Trump aspiree cracks the deal of a lifetime, making him a millionaire within seconds, only to have it sucked away when his company’s board of trustees, all Russian, unanimously vote to fire him. A few minutes later and he’s just as unemployed as the guy who stands in front of your local Jack In The Box.

In the meantime we meet Natalie, an American abroad looking for some fun, Vika, a waifish 16 year old Russian girl, Sean, a dorky American video game developer, Skyler, a dickhead lead singer for an American metal band, and Matvei, a “don’t fuck with me” Russian policeman as big as the horse he rides on. Each is experiencing Moscow in their own way, working in it, enjoying it, enduring it. None of them know each other yet, but they will.

Cause on that very night, small golden meteor type rocks start falling from the sky, crashing all over the city. Emerging from these meteors are alien beings called “Spooks.” Seemingly driven by light and energy, these evil E.T.s are nearly invisible except for the dense glow they give off when moving around. As everyone spills outside to see what this strange phenomena is all about, the phenomena starts ripping them to pieces. These “things” are made up of a bunch of small furiously rotating metallic shards. These shards are to a human being what a juicer is to an apple. And let’s just say that after that night, Moscow could supply enough apple juice to make sure Mott’s would never have to plant another apple tree again.

We slam forward a few weeks to see our heroes, who have found each other and are nestled up inside a makeshift bunker, jumpier than a trampoline full of kangaroos. The entire city is dead, 28 Days Later style. No electricity. No society. Not another soul in site. Their days have been relegated to scavenging for water. But most of the stores have been ransacked, and leaving the bunker is always risky. There are spooks around every corner. These guys are somewhere around Plan W. They’re running out of alphabet.

Luckily a beacon of light appears halfway across the city – a highrise with an entire floor lit up. The revelation confuses and excites them. Someone else is alive! But why are they broadcasting their location to the Spooks? Could it be a trap? They decide to take a chance and go to the building because…well, because what else are they going to do? The owner of the highrise is Sergei, a Russian Einstein who’s a whiz with electronics. He’s figured out that the Spooks don’t see like we do, so as long as you protect your place with lead lining, you can run as much electricity as you want and they won’t spot you. Sergei is the first sign of hope for this desperate group. Someone who sounds like they actually know what they’re doing.

But the party is short-lived. A greedy Skylar uses the opportunity to steal all of Sergei’s food. As he sneaks out the door, the knucklehead leaves it open. This alerts the Spooks to their location, and pretty soon the Spooks are upon them producing more Spook Meat. Hmm, I don’t know why but that sounded dirty in a weird way.

Anyway, only a few of members of the group survive, and now they’re worse off than they were to start. They’re stuck in the middle of the city with nowhere to hide. Will they live? Will they die? You’ll have to read to find out.

It’s funny. You can see Timur Bekmambetov’s influence on the material right away. I’m guessing this was originally set in an American city. But Timur moved it to Moscow, most likely because of familiarity. Even though that choice came from a selfish place, it actually ends up really helping the screenplay. We’ve seen the American-City-gets-invaded thing a billion times before. By throwing these Americans into Russia, making *them* the aliens to this country, it adds a whole new dynamic when the invasion hits. Anyone who’s been away from home when something bad happens knows how alienated you feel, how unfamiliar everything becomes, how desperately you pine for home. Watching Rex and Natalie and Sean and Skyler creep through this foreign land, it’s not just about coming out alive, it’s about getting back to where they belong.

I also really liked the aliens. While they weren’t perfect, they were at least original. They’re not bug like or reptile-like, the kind of aliens I see in 99% of the scripts I read. They’re a mix of light and energy and metal. And that weird combination inspires all sorts of questions. Why are they built that way? What are their needs? What are their intentions? It was a cool choice and one I thought worked well.

Unfortunately the final act takes a bit of a nose-dive. It makes that mistake of trying to do too much in too little time. How can you take down an alien race in 30 minutes when in the opening 90 pages you haven’t killed a single one? This results in a lot of rushing, a lot of warped logic (i.e. “Well if we do *this*, then they’ll go over there and then we can bomb all of them together!”), an entirely new location we have to learn about, new characters we have to file. In fact, the final act has so much going on that you could conceivably build an entirely new screenplay out of it.

But there’s easily enough stuff here to make it worth the read. It’s a fun script that tackles an age-old story from a slightly different angle

[ ] What the hell did I just read?
[ ] wasn’t for me
[x] worth the read
[ ] impressive
[ ] genius

What I learned: Spaiths does a perfect job describing his characters. Like any good writer, he has a hierarchy for his descriptions, cluing us in on which characters are here for the moment, which are here for a few scenes, and which will be key characters in the story. If I have a pet peeve, it’s writers who don’t have any system for describing their characters. For example, they’ll describe their main character with a single word: “cool.” Then describe a waitress in scene 48 who has one line as, “dripping with sex, the waitress wears a uniform that’s several inches too high. Her lips are naturally ruby red, and her eyes are caked in mascara. An exotic beauty.” I’m expecting that woman to be on every page of the screenplay! So be smart in how you describe your characters. If it’s a main character, give them 2 or 3 lines of description. A secondary character, 1 line of description. A minor character, a couple of descriptive adjectives is fine. And if it’s someone only making an appearance in that scene, simply give us their profession or describe them in their name (ie. “Waitress” or “Asshole Lawyer”). Let me give you an example of why this is important. Matvei, the horse policeman, appears early on in the script, but only for a moment. He won’t appear again for another 40 pages. However, since Spaihts took two full lines to describe him, I knew he was going to be a key character later on, so I paid attention. You don’t necessarily have to have *this* description hierarchy system, but you should have some system.

Genre: Drama/Love Story
Premise: A couple struggles to keep it together on the last leg of their marriage.
About: I know I said l was finished with Sundance script reviews but people kept pushing me to review more, so I’m pumping out a couple extra this week. Derek Cianfrance and his writing partners have been trying to make this movie for 12 years. Their hard work was rewarded when Ryan Gosling chose “Blue Valentine” over Peter Jackson’s “The Lovely Bones” (and left poor Jackson with the 3rd rate Mark Wahlberg in the process), new “serious actress fave” Michelle Williams joined him, and the Weinsteins bought the film at Sundance. While this may be a 2004 draft, from every review I’ve read of the film, it sounds almost identical to the shooting script.
Writers: Derek Cianfrance, Joey Curtis & Cami Delavigne
Details: 121 pages (2004 draft)

I know everyone loves Ryan Gosling, and I think he’s a fine actor, but I can’t say I’m a huge fan of the material he chooses. The double-dip combination of Half-Nelson and Lars And The Real Girl is about as enjoyable as sneaking into your local pizzeria and crawling into one of their ovens for the afternoon. I have a real issue with indie films that hit you over the head with their relentless depression for all 100 minutes of their running time, and I have a particular issue with actors who choose to only appear in these types of films. It’s as if they’re so desperate to be taken seriously, that they’re willing to sacrifice any semblance of a good story in the process. I mean, okay, you’ve moped, you’ve screamed, you’ve argued, you’ve cried…wonderful. Here’s your Oscar. But what about us? What about the people who actually want to sit down and ENJOY a film?? To me, Gosling is the poster child for that type of actor, and it’s why I don’t get excited for his projects anymore.

Blue Valentine is the third in his “slit your wrists” trilogy. Whether you love it or hate it, this is not the kind of script you enjoy. It is simply something you endure – a no holds barred look at a miserable couple trying to make it through their miserable existence. No film coming out of Sundance divided audiences more than this one. This Movieline review implies it’s one of the worst films ever made. Yet this Firstshowing review seems to say it’s one of the most authentic experiences the reviewer has ever had at a theater. Where do I come out on all this?

Well, I can’t comment on the finished film. But I can say that this draft was one of the most unpleasant reading experiences I’ve ever had in my life. I could get into the fact that there’s no real discernible story. I could talk about how the flashback device seems designed to distract us from that fact. I could get into how terribly unlikable the characters are. I could talk about how absolutely nothing happens for long stretches at a time. I could talk about how the same emotional note is hit over and over and over and over again. I could talk about the lack of character development, the stilted dialogue, how all the flashbacks could’ve been wrapped up in a single one minute scene. I could basically talk about how I had no idea what this script was about until one of the characters spelled it out for me on page 90.

BUT

The movie DID sell. The movie DID work for some people. So why?

One word. Emotion. If you’ve had a recent traumatic break-up where someone fell out of love with you, this script will hit you hard. I think the empty helpless crushing pain of being left is so powerful that it renders all of my above problems moot. It sounds like in Derek’s review on Firstshowing, that that’s exactly what happened. It was a very personal experience for him. And I get that. It’s the one thing I always say. The X-factor in your script is your subject matter. You never know who’s going to be into it, and who isn’t. But man, I mean, as a screenplay, I don’t think this works at all.

So what happens in Blue Valentine? Not a lot. But I’ll try and give you the Cliff’s Notes. David Periera is “35 years old and 35 pounds overweight.” His wife, Cindy, is beautiful. The two have a 5 year old daughter named Frankie. There seems to be an unhappiness in their relationship but we’re not told what that unhappiness stems from. The first 30 pages are basically different variations of giving us this same information.

It was this plodding approach to the story that first turned me off. I’m okay when things move slow if *something* is building. But from what I could gather, this wasn’t going to be that kind of experience. In fact, the focus appeared to be put on the most random things, characters or moments that added nothing to the screenplay. For instance we learn that Cindy had a bit of a strange family. But their introduction didn’t seem to have any point. We’d read a scene where one of the family members flipped out and then…that was it. That moment or the effects of that moment or the result of that moment never ever played into the screenplay at all. Which leaves you wondering…well then why show it in the first place?

Then there was the daughter, who also fell into this category. Why was she here? Whatever was wrong with these two had nothing to do with her (even when we reveal a “secret” about her later on, one that’s supposed to be shocking – it has no effect on the dynamic of their relationship). After a lot of passive-aggressive bickering and weird conversations between the two, David gets the idea that they should go on a weekend trip together. It’s clear Cindy doesn’t want to go but she does anyway.

Gosling at a Q&A, talking about the film, smiling more in one answer than he did the entire movie.

During their trip, we occasionally jump back six years to the period when they first met. David was the son of a logger who dreamed of bigger things. Cindy was hoping to be a doctor and was also engaged to a guy named Bobby. Somehow their paths collided, they fell in love, and they got married.

The flashback structure is supposed to be there to contrast their past with their present, not unlike a more depressing version of 500 Days Of Summer. Although as I mentioned before, nothing happens in the flashbacks that warrants them. For example, during one present-day sequence, Cindy runs into Bobby, her old fiancé, while she’s at the grocery store. They speak for a few minutes, and it’s clear Cindy and Bobby had a past together and that Bobby doesn’t like David. Cindy gets back to the car and tells David about the meeting. We can see he’s not a fan of Bobby’s. Right then we know all we need to know about Bobby and David. There was a past – the two probably fought over her – and David won out. Yet nearly 20 minutes worth of flashbacks are given to showing us this scenario, even though it’s exactly as we assumed it had been. I’m a big believer in that you don’t use flashbacks unless they add some critical piece of information or move the story forward in a way that you couldn’t in the present. And I just didn’t see that here.

Anyway….

From an objective point of view, this device of jumping from the beginning to the end of a relationship SEEMS like it could be interesting. But since the past holds so few surprises, it feels more like an obligation. You’re predicting every word five minutes before it comes out of the characters’ mouths. She’s going to yell at him here, you say. Sure enough, it’s a scene of her yelling at him. It’s as if we’re watching those fake animals at Chuck-E-Cheese’s exchange pre-recorded lines with each other. I guess that was my biggest problem with the script, is it was so predictable. I wanted more than two people who were unhappy with each other in 50 successive scenes.

And the characters. Oh the characters. You had David, who was nagging clingy jealous and annoying. And you had Cindy, who was cruel heartless bitchy whiny and a sociopath. Not to be flippant but who wants to spend their evening with two people like that?

There’s not much more I can say about this script. I’m trying to find some positives here but it’s like trying to find positives in a plane crash. I guess one thing it’s got going for it is I won’t forget it. They say the worst scripts/movies are ones you forget 2 minutes after you finish them. If it stays with you then it at least had an impact. Well, I can say with certainty that I will never forget Blue Valentine.

[x] What the hell did I just read?
[ ] wasn’t for me
[ ] worth the read
[ ] impressive
[ ] genius

What I learned: A couple of things here. A gimmick is not a substitution for a story. Jumping back and forth in time isn’t going to distract your reader from the fact that your characters aren’t growing, that the script only hits one note, that the goals are vague, that the focus is put on meaningless scenarios/scenes/characters. If you’re going to use a unique way of telling your story (like Blue Valentine, like Eternal Sunshine, like 500 Days of Summer, like Pulp Fiction), make sure you put just as much effort into your story as you would if you were telling the thing straight up. In addition to that, in my interview with Stacey Menear, he made a great point about how good movies hit multiple emotional notes. You’re scared, you’re happy, you’re sad, you’re angry. Blue Valentine hit the same note over and over and over again – sadness – just suffocating us with depression. Make sure your script hits multiple emotional notes, WHATEVER the genre is!