Genre: TV Pilot – Cop Procedural
Premise: (from IMDB) The lives of two detectives, Rust Cohle and Martin Hart, become entangled during a 17-year hunt for a serial killer in Louisiana.
About: This was a huge spec pilot that went out that a lot of networks were bidding for, with HBO finally winning. It stars Matthew McConaughey and Woody Harrelson and will premier this Sunday. Creator Nic Pizzolatto is an award-winning novelist and short-story writer. He’s an author of the novel ‘Galveston.’ Originally from Louisiana, he taught literature at several universities, including the University of Chicago, before going into screenwriting in 2010. His only other credits are writing a couple of episodes for, what sounds like, the exact same show, in Fox’s “The Killing.”
Writer: Nic Pizzolatto
Details: 52 pages

I remember when this show first sold. There was a TON of talk about it, the kind of talk usually reserved for some super high-concept spec sale or a new Christopher Nolan movie. I read through the description of the show several times, trying to figure out what the big deal was, but as far as I could tell, it was just another procedural.

I guess it did have Matthew McConaughey and Woody Harrelson involved, two established film stars, and since you don’t usually see that in a TV show, it was worth noting. But I was still trying to figure out why the trade sites were going batshit over this thing. I felt like I was missing something. Uhhhh, so it’s a procedural about detectives trying to catch a killer? Haven’t we, um, seen that before? Well, with the script in hand, it was time to find out what all the fuss was about!

True Detective begins oddly. Former Detective Martin Hart, 56, is being interviewed about a couple of things, his relationship with his old partner, Rustin Cohle, and an old case he was involved in 20 years ago, where a young woman was killed and posed as an angel.

Most of that discussion, strangely enough, centers on Cohle, who appears to be a weirdo to the tenth degree. There are some people on this planet who don’t believe in God. Cohle is the thousand times multiple of that person. He buys and reads dozens of books to help define his belief, how we’re all a bunch of meaningless nobodies floating inside a meaningless construct of time and space. Your typical upbeat stuff!

Anyway, we’re soon interviewing Cohle as well, getting his thoughts on that old case with the dead woman posed as an angel, but more so Hart and Hart’s thoughts about him. An inordinate amount of time in True Detective is spent on Hart’s thoughts on Cohle, and Cohle’s thoughts on Hart’s thoughts on Cohle. Sounds exciting right? Well it isn’t!

While we do eventually begin talking about the most interesting part of the story, the dead girl posed like an angel, the description of her and what they think happened to her is actually quite brief. Instead, the writer decides to make the centerpiece of True Detective a visit Cohle made to Hart’s house for a family dinner. Cohle doesn’t like being around people, so he gets wasted beforehand. We assume this is probably some insight into a huge drinking problem Cohle has or the beginning of some major event that caused a fracture in their friendship, but it’s neither. He just comes over. He’s drunk. And he talks to Hart’s wife and kids. Wow, way to build up something that goes absolutely nowhere!

In actuality, this entire pilot, where nothing happens, is a setup for one line, the final line, the only line in the script that actually gets you excited. Unfortunately, BECAUSE it’s the last line, it gets you excited for an episode to come, not the episode you just watched, where you feel beyond gypped that you just spent an hour of your life watching/reading. (Spoiler) That line is when Rustin Cohle says to the guys interviewing him: “It’s started again, hasn’t it? The killing. Him. And how can that be possible, when we got the bastard in 2000?”

So how is it that a script/show like this can get so much heat, and land on such a quality network like HBO, when its pilot is so subpar? GREAT QUESTION! I’m trying to figure that out myself. But I’d like to venture a guess. Cohle is an interesting character. I mean, I wasn’t interested by him. His bleak depressing persona actually kinda put me off. But his whole extreme philosophy about how life is meaningless along with the crazy attention to detail he has for investigating murders – I can see an actor wanting to play that role. And in writing, that’s really what we’re trying to do. We’re trying to create characters so compelling that actors can’t NOT want to play them. That’s exactly what happened, with suddenly hot Matthew McConaughey coming on. He legitimized the project, which gets a known actor wanting to play opposite him (Harrelson), and all of a sudden everyone’s saying this pilot is genius, when in reality, it’s simply a well-known actor wanting to play a challenging role. If I were the head of HBO and someone came to me with a shitty pilot that Matthew McConaghey was attached to, I’d probably buy it too.

And I hate to use that word – shitty – but come on. The majority of True Detective is people talking about each other! That’s never ever interesting. I think the biggest faux pas the script commits is that it masquerades as something deep, when in reality there’s zero depth. The writing is dense, with thorough descriptions of characters and events (such as the way the dead angel body is posed), giving the illusion that we’re dealing with something profound here. But it’s all a magic act. Description is boring. Remembering old times or people when they were younger is boring. If your story is devoid of conflict or drama, then you don’t have a story. And there is ZERO conflict/drama in True Detective.

The only real thing the script has going for it is the unanswered question of “why the fuck are we interviewing these guys?” I admit, that was the only thing I was looking forward to – the answer to that question. But not because the story did a good job making me want to know. Because I was dying to find some kind of point to what I was reading!

If this had showed up in my Inbox for an Amateur Friday slot, I would’ve been positive it was from a beginner. It takes good writers ONE SCENE to set up who their characters are. Not 20 pages! And the whole dead angel girl isn’t even original. It feels like every other setup for a serial killer. So I guess I’m not surprised that Pizzolatto is fairly new to screenwriting. I mean maybe he goes into actually telling stories in future episodes. But this episode was one big boring setup where nothing happens.

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

What I learned: As David Mamet has often said, one of the most boring things you can write is a character talking about another character. There is nothing inherently interesting about it. Since this entire pilot is based around people talking about other people, it’s pretty easy to see why it doesn’t work.

Genre: Found-footage Horror
Premise: A young man finds himself “marked” by a witch who lives below him.
About: Feeling that their franchise was getting stale, Paranormal Activity decided to take its newest entry in a different direction. The Latino audience for PA has always been huge, so they decided to create a PA movie specifically for them. Writer/director Christopher Landon scripted PA 2, 3 AND 4 (if you want to talk about “series fatigue,” I actually thought the fourth one was the third one until I wrote this review). Landon’s break-out writing credit was 2007’s Disturbia. It’s just coming to light now that Shia LaBeouf plagiarized his entire performance from the film. Landon is the son of famous TV star, Michael Landon, who headlined one of the biggest TV shows ever, Little House On The Prairie.
Writer: Christopher Landon
Details: 87 minutes long

The last Paranormal Activity was really bad. It’s hard to remember anything about it because it was so terrible, but what I do remember is that ¾ of the movie went by before anything happened. No story, no scares, no nothing. The creators of Paranormal Activity finally realized that their format was broken and they needed to look in another direction. I mean come on, how many times can you show a clip of someone sleeping with a counter in the bottom corner?

Here’s the thing though – the found footage genre is not dead. Oh no, my friends, it’s not even close. Any time a found footage film makes 19 million its opening weekend, its genre isn’t dead. That’s because of found footage’s unique advantage over other genres. It can be made with no name actors (who cost nothing!), and is super-cheap to produce. In fact, writer/director Christopher Landon defends the format best (in an interview he did on Crave Online) – “You know, it’s funny. I don’t think found footage is in danger of running out. I think it’s in that process now where I think we’re going to obviously start to see more and more movies that are tackling different genres through that lens. I think you’re going to see more comedies. I think we’re going to see a lot of sci-fi movies. I don’t think it’s going away entirely.

“Sometimes it reminds me of when reality TV first really hit and was growing. There was a lot of pushback and people saying, “Oh, it’s going to go away, it’s going to go away.” But it didn’t go away. It just changed a lot. That’s kind of where I see it going because there’s a thing that’s happened in our culture, a thing called YouTube which has completely changed the way that we experience movies because people are out there making stuff all the time and capturing moments, so there’s a certain language that I think we’ve adopted. So I think that the found footage format connects to that. I think it’s very relatable to people, even if you’re not necessarily making a “found footage” movie. I think the style of it connects with the audience in a way that traditional movies don’t.”

So what was The Marked Ones about? Well, the good news is we’re not stuck in a freaking house the entire running time. Best friends Jesse (the straight guy) and Hector (the funny one) have just graduated high school. They live in a lower-middle class apartment complex on the East side of Los Angeles that for all intents and purposes seems to be a group of chirpy, happy people.

That is except for Anna, their mysterious first floor neighbor. There have been rumors going around forever that Anna is a witch, but we never get her side of the story because she’s KILLED by one of Jesse and Hector’s friends from school. Being the high school trouble-makers that they are, the two investigate Anna’s now-abandoned apartment, and find a lot of spooky witch shit laying around.

Soon after, Jesse begins experiencing mood swings, as well as super strength and exceptional skate board ability (no seriously!). Hector, being his eternally cheery self, has to get it all on video, and even uploads the feats to Youtube (in one of the funnier lines of the movie, the youtube crowd belittles the tricks as mere “cheap effects.” Disappointed, Hector says, “Man, the people who comment here are so negative,” in a way that only fellow internet posters can truly understand).

After awhile, it’s clear that with these new found abilities, Jesse is also losing control of himself. When he’s finally kidnapped by a witch coven that plans to take advantage of his powers, Hector and some hard core gang members head to the coven’s home to get him back. As you might imagine, it doesn’t go well.

The biggest lesson of this movie is that people get tired of the same old crap. So after awhile, you can’t keep dishing it to them (Paranormal Activity 4). By adding a Chronicle aspect to the franchise (gaining powers) combined with a different culture (than the boring middle class white family) as well as getting out of the damn house, made The Marked Ones “fresh” enough to be enjoyable.

See there was a time when the claustrophobia of staying inside the house the whole movie worked. But not after four damn movies. That’s one of your jobs as a writer – to recognize what the general audience is getting bored of and adding a fresh angle to it. But this review isn’t so much about breaking down the movie as it is helping you write your own found footage film. I’ve read a good 50-60 found footage scripts and seen probably 20 found footage films. This is what I’ve discovered.

It’s becoming more and more accepted in these found footage movies that someone is holding a camera the whole time, even if it doesn’t make complete sense. Why hold a camera towards a monster that’s chasing you? Wouldn’t it be shaking by your side as you pump your arms running? But we still see it. Despite this practice becoming more common, it’s highly advisable that you motivate the reason why your characters are holding a camera. The thing with found footage is that it’s supposed to feel like REAL LIFE. So anything your characters are doing that doesn’t follow logic, alerts the reader/audience that it’s not real life. And their suspension of disbelief collapses.

You gotta bring the funny in FF. If you watch any family or friend’s video, someone (the cameraman, the person in front of the camera) is trying to be funny. It’s that age-old belief that once the camera comes on, you’re supposed to entertain. Paranormal Activity works best when it has that joker character (the husband from the first one, Hector from this one) making fun of shit. If someone isn’t joking around at least periodically, something about the “found footage” is going to feel off.

There should be no traditional character arcs in a found footage film. This isn’t Titanic where Rose finally learns how to enjoy life and follow her dreams. This is supposed to be REAL LIFE. People don’t typically change in real life. So if you try these big sweeping character arcs, they feel false, and expose the ruse of your “found footage.” Instead, let your characters change through the circumstances surrounding them. For example, Jesse changes because he’s marked, and starts losing control of himself. Hector changes because his best friend is acting weird and he’s scared for him.

Keep the script short. When it comes to found footage, the audience treats it almost like watching clips on Youtube. Their attention span for watching “real life” is shorter. So you can’t have these big long found footage movies. And really, the thing that creates screenplay bulk is complex storylines and lots of character development, something a found footage film should traditionally have none of. The Marked Ones was only 87 minutes.

This may seem like a small tip, but it’s an important one. Have at least ONE SCENE in your found footage script where the camera is used in an inventive/clever way. Or maybe a better way to put it is, make your camera become part of the story. One of the best scenes in The Marked Ones happens early on when they’re hearing strange noises coming from Anna’s place below them. So they tie the camera to a rope and lower it down the heating vent, looking at the video feed through Anna’s vent to see what’s going on. It’s an exciting scene because the camera’s now an actual part of the story. This is FOUND FOOTAGE, so you have to use that hand-held camera in interesting ways.

I think the hardest thing about writing Found Footage is that in real life, nothing happens. In movies, things constantly happen. So you’re trying to make a format entertaining that shouldn’t be entertaining. I mean who’s ever been stuck watching your Aunt Carol’s videos of her daughter’s figure skating lessons?

The great thing about Found Footage, though, is that it doesn’t have to be so perfectly linear and connected. You can use the power of the “Cut to black” (which The Marked Ones does constantly) and jump forward a week in time without the audience being jarred. You just can’t do that in a traditional film. A jump in time must be nuanced. In many ways, and I especially noticed this with The Marked Ones, Found Footage is just a bunch of selected vignettes tied together with “Cut to blacks.” Find the interesting scene that best tells the story. Then jump forward in time to the next interesting scene that tells the story.

I think whereas it was once okay to take the Paranormal Activity approach and have “nothing” happen for the first 60 minutes, audiences are getting more impatient with this format and so want the fun quicker. I don’t remember exactly where it happens in The Marked Ones, but Jesse and Hector’s friend from school kills Anna at around the 20 minute mark, a much earlier “inciting incident” than happens in any of the previous Paranormal Activity films.

Finally, I think it’s worth noting that this genre is still relatively young and therefore open to new ideas. If you’re not willing to play with the format in some way upon writing a FF film, don’t expect your FF script to stand out from the pack. And that’s exactly what producers interested in this format are looking for. Found footage films that are a little different in some way.

What about you guys? What have you found are the necessary components for a good found footage script?

[ ] what the hell did I just watch?
[ ] wasn’t for me
[x] worth the price of admission
[ ] impressive
[ ] genius

What I learned: Emotional anchors. Every film, whether it be traditional or found footage, should have an “emotional anchor,” an emotional centerpiece the story can keep coming back to. As Landon points out in his interview I linked above, he wanted the emotional anchor of The Marked Ones to be this friendship between Jesse and Hector.

This is your chance to discuss the week’s amateur scripts, offered originally in the Scriptshadow newsletter. The primary goal for this discussion is to find out which script(s) is the best candidate for a future Amateur Friday review. The secondary goal is to keep things positive in the comments with constructive criticism.

Below are the scripts up for review, along with the download links. Want to receive the scripts early? Head over to the Contact page, e-mail us, and “Opt In” to the newsletter.

Happy reading!

TITLE: Hunter’s Moon
GENRE: Action/Adventure
PREMISE: “Loosely based on a feature article I penned for Maxim (“The Death Dealer”) some years ago about an ex-merc who takes wealthy hunters on human safaris – mostly in Africa where they hunt poachers.”
WHY YOU SHOULD READ: “The merc this story is based on – a very twisted individual by the name of Keith Idema – died last year in Mexico. He made the cover of the Wall Street Journal for detaining Afghan civilians – and torturing them! – back when bin Laden was still alive, trying to get intel on where he was hiding. Idema – who owned a gun store near where I grew up – taught me to shoot. On the weekends, he used to go to El Salvador to fight alongside the Contras against the Sandinistas.My first year of college (U of Maryland) – I came back from a long weekend and he was in my apartment, hiding behind the couch which he had flipped over to guard against grenade attacks.

Yes, you read that right. Here’s his Wikipedia page:

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Jonathan_Idema

The script, which I’d pitch as Billionaire Boys Club meets Most Dangerous Game meets Deliverance is pretty fuckin’ cool and based on events that actually took place.

TITLE: Penalty
GENRE: Black comedy
LOGLINE: An ambitious soccer referee works his way up the lower leagues when he’s suddenly bribed to start throwing games.
WHY YOU SHOULD READ: “One thing I notice about your amateur submissions are that they seem to be mostly written by under 30s with comparatively little life experience. Technically they might be structured well and are always written in a confident style but generally lack a certain nuance that only age can give you. So come on Carson, how about us oldies. I propose an over 40s week to see if you can encourage a more measured kind of voice that can harness the important ground rules to something truly life-affirming.”

TITLE: Safeguard
GENRE: Action Thriller
LOGLINE: A hitman is offered the chance to avenge his wife’s murder by joining forces with a team of highly skilled ex-cons to prevent an assassination attempt in Paris. It’s Ronin meets the Dirty Dozen…
WHY YOU SHOULD READ: “SAFEGUARD was a 2013 Nicholl SF. The script was a (four week) first draft so as you can imagine, I was utterly stunned to see it advance as far as it did in the contest. My first script was an honorable mention in Trackingb and also a PAGE Award winner and has since been taken on by the guys behind the Batman Trilogy and Man Of Steel.”

TITLE: Rigged
GENRE: Biopic
LOGLINE: The true story of Bobby Riggs, The Battle of the Sexes, and how the mafia may have influenced the most famous tennis match in history.
WHY YOU SHOULD READ: “Rigged combines something you love (tennis) with something you hate (biopics). Like chocolate covered raisins. It’s also tailor-made for an A-list actor (Paul Giamatti?), has clear GSU and features some of the most intense tennis scenes this side of Bridesmaids. Is this the first amateur biopic to get a “Worth the Read” by Carson?”

Get Your Script Reviewed On Scriptshadow!: To submit your script for an Amateur Review, send in a PDF of your script, along with the title, genre, logline, and finally, something interesting about yourself and/or your script that you’d like us to post along with the script if reviewed. Use my submission address please: Carsonreeves3@gmail.com. Remember that your script will be posted. If you’re nervous about the effects of a bad review, feel free to use an alias name and/or title. It’s a good idea to resubmit every couple of weeks so your submission stays near the top.

Genre: Contained Horror Thriller
Premise (from writer): A woman fights to escape an isolated home controlled by an Incubus, a demonic force that feeds on sexual energy. A task made more difficult by her co-hostages, who are content to remain under the creatures spell.
Why You Should Read (from writer): Something interesting about me: Watch the pilot episode of “The Wire” and you will see my elementary school in the background behind the young Barksdale dealers. I went from playing marbles to shooting craps on the same corners where many of the show’s stories were ripped. I’ve loved movies and writing since childhood. They provided a 90 minute respite from an oft times less than ideal environment. I’ve had many people tell me that a career as a writer was a dream beyond my reach. Admittedly, I believed them. But even without the hope of making a dime let alone a living, I kept writing, reading scripts, and consuming all I could to learn about the craft from sites like Scriptshadow. I can’t stop writing. I’ve tried. It is a part of me. A part I want to make better. A goal I work on daily. “In the Flesh” is a sample of that effort. I believe a good one. One that people will one day read and enjoy. If I’m wrong, I’ll write something better tomorrow.
Writer: Ken Alston
Details: 91 pages

note: I read this without knowing the logline (Miss SS picked the loglines for Amateur Week) which I think really helped my enjoyment of it.  

Whoa, the last Amateur Offering Post was a dead heat. 172 comments long and at the end, I still didn’t know which script had come out on top. A little backstory might help explain why I went with In the Flesh. If you received the last newsletter (the new one JUST WENT OUT – if you didn’t get it, check your SPAM now!), you know I touted a big surprise in those offerings. Well, that surprise was that none other than Grendl had written one of the scripts (Tall, Dark and Handsome). I figured it might be interesting to put one of his screenplays in there under an alias. As we all know, the cave-dwelling commenter can be a bit antagonistic, and that makes it hard to read his stuff objectively.  Without anything cluttering our judgment, I anticipated a fair contest.  It seemed to work for awhile until a couple of long-time readers sniffed out the surprise, recognizing his style from previous posts.

The thing was, Tall, Dark and Handsome did well, going neck and neck with In The Flesh, but when it was all said and done, I decided to give the review to the writer who hadn’t had a review on the site before. And I mean, how can you not love Ken after that “Why You Should Read” section? His comments convey hard work, overcoming adversity, a love of screenwriting, humility, and a great attitude. A little more heartwarming than, “Because I wrote it.” That’s not to say I’ll never review Grendl’s script. I probably will at some point. Just not this week.

Weak heroines not apply in “In The Flesh.” Alison, 28, is the kind of girl who goes after what she wants. And tonight, after a couple of drinks, she wants Cole, the one guy in the bar sexy enough to make her forget about morals.

The two spend a wild night in the throes of drunken passion, and upon waking up, Alison isn’t ashamed. This isn’t the kind of guy you wince at come morning wondering how you’re going to spin it to your friends (“Well, he was wearing nice… shoes?”).   Cole’s the real deal.

The thing is, the real deal isn’t around (they never seem to be once the morning comes).  But he was forward-thinking enough to leave her some brand new undergarments. Which begs a few questions Alison doesn’t want to ask. Weird clue #2 is when she goes downstairs and tries to leave, there’s no doorknob on the front door.

It’s here where she runs into Breeze, an airhead-ish hippy who’s as sweet as a bowl of cookie batter. Alison assumes Breeze will have answers, but she seems just as clueless as Alison is. In fact, Breeze assumed that Alison lives here. Hmmm, now things are getting really strange.

Alison quickly realizes that if they don’t get out fast, they’re going to be decorating the wormy underground of the backyard. So she tries to break out the window. Unfortunately, she’s met with electrified bars! Eventually, Alison meets a third tenant, Doyle, a proper British gentleman who seems to have been here for awhile. Doyle informs Alison that she should stop trying to get out because… no one gets out.

That night, Alison’s introduced to another piece of the puzzle in the form of a beast-like growl coming from the basement. Are they all food? A constant influx of main courses accompanied here for late-night consumption? We certainly think so. But the great thing about In The Flesh is that it never quite goes where you think it will. Things keep changing, and with every change, we become more unsure of our heroines’ fate.

One of the marks of a good script is if you don’t typically like the genre that you’re reading, yet you’re still into it. Actually, the setup for In The Flesh was right up my alley. A woman waking up in a strange house with a bunch of locked doors, each with their own mysterious tenant? I was in.

But then later (spoilers) we learn that there’s a monster in the basement. And usually that’s where I go “Ehhhhh, no thanks.” But the characters were all so well-drawn and expectation-defying, and the script kept tripping me up as far as where it was going, that I wanted to find out what would happen.

So when we do find out what’s in the basement (a person) and see how it acts towards our protagonists (tries to bite them), we assume it’s a vampire. But again, the great thing about In The Flesh is that it’s constantly going against convention. It’s not a vampire at all, but a Succubus (or Incubus?). Now I’ve never seen a Succubus used as a monster in a script before, so I thought that was a nice twist.

The monster fit the tone and theme of the script well. This was about flesh, about sex, about want. A Succubus (or at least this succubus) survives by sucking all the life out of you through sex. We see this nicely handled not only with Alison and Breeze, but with the mysterious frail girl living in one of the rooms who’s only a shell of her former self (she’s been sucked dry) as well as the overtly subordinate Doyle.

Which makes Alison stand out all the more, because she’s the only one here who wants to get out and will do anything to do so. In other words, she’s ACTIVE, which is exactly what we want our main character to be. I mean this is easily one of the strongest female leads I’ve read in awhile.

Also, this horror script succeeded where so many others fail in the emotional component. We need a relationship to latch onto, something to play with, something that changes over time. That’s what gets us through the second act. Here it’s Alison’s relationship with Breeze. At first she’s disgusted by Breeze, calling her a moron, a retard. She even offers her up to the Succubus in a deal for a better room! But after awhile, she becomes attached to Breeze, and she wants to save her just as much as she wants to save herself.

I did have a few problems with the script. It was a little too bloody for me. I prefer the “cutaway” approach, cutting away before the blood starts gushing. And to Ken’s credit, he does that sometimes (the scene where the Succubus attacks Breeze in her room for example). But at the end, there’s so much blood, it almost becomes comical, and I think it undermines how clever the script has been up to that point.

I also thought some of the rules in this universe were unclear. I never fully understood why the Succubus slept during the day. I thought it lived by similar rules to the vampire in that it had to avoid sunlight. But this seemed to be true sometimes and not true others? I don’t now. It was confusing. A minor problem to clear up though.

Oh, and let me say this. This may be the first sex scene I’ve ever read in a script that I’d consider “hot.” Usually sex scenes are boringly or awkwardly written, but when Breeze makes a move on Alison, I am not going to lie, I forgot I was reading a screenplay. Yeah yeah, I know everyone will be saying, “Girl on girl. What guy isn’t going to like that??” I’m telling you, I don’t care what the sex scene is – I’m always aware I’m reading it.  This was the first time in forever that I got lost in one.  Kudos to Ken for pulling that off.

So the verdict is, this was a darn good script. It’s great to find and celebrate another talent here on Scriptshadow. ☺

Script link: In The Flesh (note: this is a newer draft of the script that Ken wrote after the comments he got on Scriptshadow.  So it’s probably even better than the draft I read)

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

What I learned: Try to store something in the freezer for your readers. One of the issues I see with amateur writers is they lay everything out right away. If a character shows up, they explain him. If something weird occurs, we’ll get three minutes of dialogue telling us why. Good writers give you a glimpse of something, then store it in the freezer for later consumption. I love how Ken introduced the Frail Girl, but before we could figure out anything about her, she was tucked back in her room, not to be seen for another 20 pages. We want to know what’s up with that girl, but we only get to find out when the writer takes her out of the freezer.

Genre: Drama/Black Comedy/Thriller
Premise: A Midwestern wife/schoolteacher begins to suspect that her husband’s cheating on her, so enlists the help of a fellow teacher she has the hots for to catch him in the act.
About: This was the #1 script on the 2013 Black List. Some of you will probably be depressed to hear that the writer, Andrew Sodroski, attended Harvard, implying that in order to be a top screenwriter, one must be Ivy League educated. But fear not, Sodroski’s road was not an easy one. He’s been writing since at least 2007 (when he wrote his only other known credit, a video short titled, “The Handmaid”), and therefore had to put in plenty of blood sweat and tears to get to this point. Wait, I don’t know if that makes us feel better or worse. If someone from Harvard is having a tough time breaking into Hollywood, what does that say about the rest of us?? Anyway, the script is being directed by heavy-hitting documentarian Errol Morris (this will be his first feature) and have Naomi Watts in the lead role.
Writer: Andrew Sodroski
Details: 117 pages

I suppose I should be excited that I’m one of the few people reading today’s script who’s actually BEEN to Holland, Michigan. I’m thinking that makes me better than everyone else somehow. Not sure how that would be, exactly, but I’m working on it.

What I don’t seem to have perspective on is why the number 1 Black List script had so few votes this year (45 I think?). I remember a couple of years ago when The Imitation Game, the number 1 script on the list, had like 120 votes. What does this mean? That not as many people are voting on the Black List? Or does it mean there are actually a lot more good scripts in town and the votes are more evenly dispersed (or possibly the opposite – there’s nothing good so they’re more evenly dispersed)? I’m not sure. But the low vote count is tickling (tee-hee) my concerned bone. Let’s untickle it with a little review, shall we?

“Holland, Michigan” is a strange little script. The first half is basically a combination of past Black List entries “The Details,” “The Oranges,” and “Jeff Who Lives At Home.” It’s a quirky little story about a Midwestern teacher named Nancy Vandergroot (nailed the Midwestern name) who’s feeling a little stuck in life. Much of this is via her own doing, though she doesn’t realize it. This is that woman in town who lives by God’s word, and who’s never performed an evil deed in her life.

Nancy has a wonderful little boy, Harry, and an optometrist husband, Fred, who spends the majority of his free time on his elaborate train set in the basement. To say that Nancy is a little jealous of that train set is a Midwestern understatement.

Well one day, Nancy is going through her jewelry box, only to realize that one of her earrings is missing. At first she suspects the babysitter, but after conferring with another teacher at her school, reformed bad-boy Dave, he convinces her to look deeper before she convicts anyone. She does, and is surprised when she stumbles across a group of Polaroid pictures in her husband’s basement.

Strangely, most of the pictures are of the model houses he’s built into his train set, but one is of a woman, and this is when she begins to suspect what was previously unfathomable. That her husband is cheating on her. After doing some more investigating, she gets a reluctant Dave (who she’s beginning to see romantically) to follow her husband on his next business trip in hopes of catching him in the act.

Dave does, and here is where we move past the mid-point, and EVERYTHING changes. I will say this. I was wondering what the big deal was about Holland, Michigan through those first 60 pages. I mean don’t get me wrong. It was good. A fun look at Midwestern America. I just didn’t understand what about it was “No. 1 Worthy.” However, when we find out what Fred is REALLY doing on these business trips and what’s really going on with his elaborate train set, let’s just say you immediately understand why the script snagged the top spot.

Okay, since you can’t discuss this script without spoilers, I’ll warn you when they’re coming. But I wanted to start by saying even before the twist came around, there was some pretty good writing to admire.

What stuck out to me was that all the characters had something they were doing. In a character piece, that’s essential. I see too many amateur writers giving only their hero and romantic lead “things” to do. Good writers give everyone something to do. So here, Fred, the husband, is all about his train set. Harry, the son, is all about getting ready for a dance he’s doing at the upcoming fair. Nancy is first obsessed with her missing earring, and then later with her husband’s potential infidelity. And Dave is trying to help a struggling student in one of his classes. These pursuits are what individualize and deepen your characters. Without them, they’re more “words on a page” than “people in a world.”

And as I always say, even when you’re writing these smaller character-driven pieces, you still want to use a goal to drive the story. That’s because goals KEEP YOUR MAIN CHARACTERS ACTIVE, which is exactly how Nancy is drawn. At first, she’s looking into who stole her earring, and that leads to her following clues to determine if her husband is cheating on her. This is the action that drives the story along. It’s why we keep turning the pages. If Nancy’s simply hanging out with friends, bitching about her husband, we get bored quickly. She NEEDS THAT GOAL. The story NEEDS TO PUSH TOWARDS SOMETHING.

(spoilers) Okay, now we’ll get into why this script kicks ass. Holland, Michigan has a great little twist. We realize that Fred is not, in fact, having affairs. He’s killing these women. And all the beautifully crafted perfectly detailed houses on his model train set? Those are his trophies. Those are the houses of all the women he’s killed. Oh no!

I LOVED this twist. Twists are always a balancing act. You can’t oversell them beforehand or we’re going to know they’re coming. You can’t undersell them either, or when they happen, we’re going to be like, “Where the hell did that come from?” Holland, Michigan got that balance about as right as I’ve ever seen it. Because when it happened, I was shocked. But at the same time, I said, “Of course!” And remembered all the clues that had been set up. An expertly crafted major twist is the kind of writing that gets Black List voters drooling.

My problem with the script is more about what comes afterwards. I’m not going to get into details, but I think the script tried too hard to live up to its huge twist, and have that third act feel just as big and crazy as the twist itself. As a result, we get a series of questionable choices (Dave deciding to clean up the crime scene he caught Fred in?) and a finale that felt more like an ode to Fatal Attraction than the unique genre-bending script we’d been reading.

Then again, that’s the gamble you take with a script like this. We essentially have a quirky indie black comedy in the script’s first half, then a straight up thriller in the second. Whether you like it or not, there’s going to be some screenwriting collateral damage from that choice.

But man, that twist was so damn good and unexpected, it made me remember why I love reading scripts so much – it’s to find stuff like Holland, Michigan. It’s by no means a perfect script, but definitely worth the read.

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

What I learned: Characters who are stuck in life (like Nancy, or Lester from American Beauty) who are then “set free,” are always interesting because they’re essentially fish-out-of-water characters, and fish-out-of-water characters are fun to watch. Here are these people who have been “good” all their lives, now getting to be “bad.” – I mean how can you screw that up?  Indeed, Nancy is fun to watch for this very reason.

What I learned 2: A friendly reminder to always look for ways to spice up your dialogue. Never go with the expected response. In a great little scene where Fred (who’s an eye doctor) gives Dave an eye exam, they finish up and Fred tells Dave that his eyes are good. Now I want you to think of how you’d write that line of Fred’s. Go ahead, write down what you might have him say. A lazy writer might throw in something like, “Everything looks good.” Sure, it gets the point across, but it’s boring, right? Instead, Sodroski has Fred say, “Well sir, we like to say that only God has perfect vision, but you come pretty darned close.” It’s a sentence that has so much more life to it. What line did you come up with? Share it in the comments. ☺