Okay, I’m going to talk today about a movie many of you probably don’t even know about. Which is okay because that’s the point. I’ve become strangely fascinated by this movie because I read (and reviewed) the script last year and it was a really good script! The kind of thing I may have even put in my Top 25 when I first started the site. The script and movie is called Promised Land. And while it attempted to position itself for the Oscar race (coming out at the tail end of 2012) it failed miserably. It made 8 million dollars at the box office and was promptly never heard from again. My question is, how come a film with one of the biggest movie stars in the world (Matt Damon), one in which everyone involved was confident it could compete for the Oscars, simply disappear? And what does that mean for those of you trying to write similar scripts?

As I said, Promised Land was a really good script. It was about this guy, Steve Butler (played by Damon), who worked for a major energy company, who was responsible for going into small towns and cutting deals with the residents to allow the company to frack on their land. Fracking is a controversial procedure that involves drilling deep underground for natural gas. Typically, converting residents is easy because you’re giving them more money than they’ve ever seen in their life. But things get complicated when certain members of the town start challenging the safety of fracking. And when a young, arrogant environmentalist, Dustin Noble (played by John Krasinski, who co-wrote the film with Damon), starts exposing the big bad energy company for the con artists they are, not only is converting this town in doubt, Steve Butler’s entire career is in jeopardy.

The script is really well-structured and well-written. We have a clear goal for Steve – convert the town. The stakes are huge – if he fails, he’s going to lose his job and his career in energy will be over forever. And we have urgency in the form of a ticking time bomb – he’s got 2 weeks before the town votes on whether to allow their town to be fracked or not. We have a fun little villain in Dustin Noble. Obstacles are constantly thrown at Steve, making his success more and more unlikely (in screenwriting, you always want to make things harder and harder for your hero as your story moves on). It even has a great little twist ending. There really wasn’t a whole lot this script or movie did wrong. So why the hell didn’t anybody see it?

That’s the question that’s been dogging me ever since the film came out. And it’s an important one. Part of your job, as a screenwriter, is to track every single movie in the business and how it does, and then be able to explain, to a reasonable degree, why it succeeded or failed. Why? Because you’re writing movies for the same market. If you don’t understand why something works or doesn’t work, you won’t be able to accurately position your own scripts for the market.

In fact, you should try and keep track of projects from the inception stage, when they were first purchased or announced. You should then make predictions on how well you think the project will do. If you’re right, it means you have a reasonably good grasp of the market, which means you understand what kind of screenplays do well. Prisoners was a great example. I knew when that script sold it was probably going to make between 20-25 million dollars opening weekend. It was something that could easily be marketed, but didn’t have splashy enough elements to take it beyond that. It opened at 22 million dollars.

Which leads us back to Promised Land. Why wasn’t it able to keep its promise? Whenever something fails at the box office, the first thing you have to look at is the concept. Promised Land is about fracking, which isn’t a very well-known practice in the public’s eye. It also sounds like a political issue, and one of the least lucrative subject matters at the box office is politics. Yesterday I pointed out that there are movies that you feel like you “should” see and movies that you “want to” see. No doubt Promised Land feels like the former. And the problem with movies you feel like you should see is that you usually never get around to seeing them. Which was clearly the case here.

And that brings us to the sad reality of where we are with this kind of film – Promised Land is the kind of movie that audiences don’t care about anymore. They used to. It used to be that audiences enjoyed going to the theater and watching a character-driven drama. Even as close back as Good Will Hunting, another Matt Damon writing-starring project (even directed by the same director, Gus Van Sant). But the reality is that these days, there’s too much competition. Not only has the amount of product quadrupled since then (there are like 10 new movies hitting straight-to-video every week), but you have video games (Grand Theft Auto just made 800 million dollars in its first week of release) and the internet. Not to mention we’re in the midst of the Golden Age of TV. Seriously, how fun is it to just lay back, bust open a bag of chips, and watch your favorite show while surfing the net? THAT’S what these movies are competing with. Which is why they’re suffering so badly. They don’t provide that big “oomph” factor that a film like Fast and Furious does to actually motivate you to get off your couch and go to the theater.

Oh, and don’t get confused with what makes YOU get out of your seat and go see a movie. You’re an anomaly. You want to be part of this business. So you see everything. And you get excited by quirky little independent films that the average moviegoer has no idea about. That doesn’t count. I’m talking about the guy in Middle America with a job that tires him the frack out every week with three kids. That’s the guy you gotta convince to get off the couch.

There’s only one exception to all this. If the movie is fucking amazing. If the movie is amazing, like American Beauty amazing, then a film like this can break out. But how often does that happen anymore? And this is why producers are so wary about this kind of script. Because they know that even if they do everything right – even if they cast one of the biggest movie stars in the world! – that the film could still bomb. If you’re a producer with two kids at private school and a $7500 mortgage every month, are you really going to take a chance on that kind of film? Of course not. It’s too freaking risky. Which is why I tell you guys to avoid these scripts – as spec scripts – like the plague. The sad reality is, if Promised Land would’ve come to me as an amateur spec, I would have said, “Holy shit! This is really good. But sorry guys, it’s too risky to gamble on.”

Another thing I believe doomed Promised Land was the lack of a memorable character. It’s my belief that the more “plain” your concept is, the more important it is to have a big memorable character, like a psycho therapist who will choke you if you fuck with him (Robin Williams in Good Will Hunting). I think they tried to do that here with Dustin Noble, but he wasn’t memorable enough. And that left us with a plain idea with plain characters. What’s there to get excited about? Matt Damon should’ve done more with his character. I mean, if he hadn’t written this himself, would he have wanted to play the straight-forward Steve Butler? My guess is probably not. You HAVE to have memorable characters in your script, especially with a drama, because the eccentricity of those characters is probably going to be the only thing you can market in your trailers. No effects. No exciting plot. But at least you’ll have a character we’ll want to see.

I have a new term I’ve been using lately – SOFT. The more I look at the movie industry, the more I see that the movies and scripts that fail to stand out are “soft.” There’s no edginess to the plot or characters or anything. They don’t really take chances. Instead of throwing you around, they massage you. And to me, those are the easiest movies to forget. Promised Land was really soft. And people don’t go to see soft. The concept was too “blah.” The characters were too “blah.” And that softness guaranteed people weren’t going to show up. But I’m interested in what you have to say. Did you know about Promised Land? Did you not go see it? Why not?

Genre: Drama
Premise: (from IMDB) The true story of Captain Richard Phillips and the 2009 hijacking by Somali pirates of the US-flagged MV Maersk Alabama, the first American cargo ship to be hijacked in two hundred years.
About: The original script title for Captain Phillips was “Maersk Alabama,” a title I’m not surprised they changed. As you read above, it’s based on a true story. Tom Hanks is starring in what surely the studio hopes will be an Oscar-nominated role. The script was written by Hollywood A-list screenwriter Billy Ray, who’s one of the ten guys in town who basically rewrites everything before it’s put in front of the lens. He makes ridiculous amounts of money for this. He’s probably best known for The Hunger Games. And he’s taking charge of the hopefully Brendan-Frasier-less Mummy Reboot. Paul Greengrass (most of the Bourne movies) is directing. The movie hits theaters October 11th.
Writer: Billy Ray (based on the book by Richard Philips)
Details: 120 pages – December 9, 2010 draft (first draft revised)

I’m going to put this politely. There’s something about Captain Phillips that feels kind of… boring. I remember when the whole Somali pirate thing swept the world and this particular story came out and I thought to myself, “They’re going to make a movie about this.” And then I thought, “But why?” I mean, there’s definitely a dramatic element to a crew being held hostage, but the concept is missing that “Gotta go out and see this in the theater now” element that a feature needs to make money.

The weird thing is that this is the reality in Hollywood. Studios are so desperate for product that if ANY major story hits the news, they HAVE to snatch it up and make a movie about it. Who cares if they can’t find a way to actually make it good. The fact that people have heard about it means much of the advertising for their film has already been done.

Take the Chilean miner ordeal. They’re making a movie about that. But why??? A group of 30 Chilean miners are trapped together in a small room. How do you make that interesting for 100 minutes? Especially when the miners are told right away that they’ll be fine! That they’re all going to be rescued! Where’s the suspense in that?? The only way that movie’s going to work is if they find a compelling storyline outside of the mine. And if they do that, what’s the point of having the mine anyway?

But back to Captain Phillips. I so want to be proven wrong here. But this movie looks like a slog. Miss SS said to me, “That looks like a movie you go to if you want to be depressed for the rest of your life,” and I’m not sure I’d disagree with her. But let me remind all you writers why readers desperately want your script to be good. Because it’s sooooooo much easier to read a good script than a bad one. Which is why I’m so hoping I’m wrong and this is good. Let’s check it out…

50 year old Richard Phillips is your typical family man…. who goes off for weeks at a time to sail across the Atlantic. The guy is a lot stubborn, and outside of his wife, people don’t like him for it. In fact, his crew for the Maersk Alabama, a cargo ship delivering food to Africa, thinks he’s annoying as hell.

Which is strange because the main reason he’s being so annoying is to prepare his ship for a possible pirate takeover. If they don’t have a procedure for this, they’re fucked. And with boats getting boarded every day (50 last week!), it’s probably a good idea to be prepared.

Anyway, as they approach their destination, what do you know, they get boarded by a group of pirates. There’s the youngest, Bilal, then Elmi, then Najee, and then the leader, Musi, a smart determined pirate who speaks English (you have to learn to speak English as a pirate because, “No ship speaks Somali”).

Musi wants one thing: money. And while the other boats have it, this boat is American. So he expects A LOT of money. Problem is, Phillips has locked most of his crew in a secret location somewhere on the ship. Musi wants the whole crew so a game of “Where’s the crew” begins, with Phillips slyly misleading Musi at every turn.

Eventually, Phillips convinces the pirates that if they leave his crew alone, they can have his lifeboat. They agree to this but want Phillips as well. They’re not leaving without their big payday. So the pirates and Phillips get into this little boat, and within hours, are greeted by a giant U.S. Navy ship. For some reason, this makes the pirates happy. They think their money is coming.

But they really have zero idea who they’re dealing with. The Navy tells them, there’s no way you’re getting back home, and proceed to trip Musi up with a multitude of negotiating tactics. The confusion ramps up their anger towards Phillips, who somehow stays calm throughout all this. Eventually, Musi surrenders, coming aboard the Navy ship, and his crew is sniped by some badass Navy snipers. Game over. Insert new coin.

So, did the script save this ship?

No.

You know what though? This started off good. I admire Billy Ray for finding some bit of life in this sinking vessel. The anticipation and suspense drawn out by the first 30 pages of these pirates coming (they even call the ship radio at one point and say, “We’re coming to get you,”) had me a lot more invested in this than I thought I’d be.

The combination of that and the anger you have towards these billion dollar companies run by men in posh suits sitting in the safety of their giant Manhattan offices for giving these boat employees ZERO defenses against these pirates (no guns, no weapons at all) gets you all charged up.

But then the pirates get on the ship and things start getting boring quickly. The problem is that Musi becomes obsessed with finding the crew and that becomes a 25 page chunk of the story. Here’s the problem with that though. Whenever you have a character going after something in a script, whether it be your hero or your villain, there must be stakes attached to it or the audience won’t care.

What are the stakes of Musi not finding the crew? What are the consequences? As far as I can tell, nothing. He already has the Captain. Doesn’t he have the big bargaining chip then? Yet page after page is dedicated to finding these other guys and I just couldn’t figure out why that was so important. That’s not to say there wasn’t a reason. It’s to say that we were never informed what it was! So we didn’t know why this was so important.

Another problem was that Captain Phillips appeared to be this grating guy that nobody liked. His son hates him. No one on his crew likes him. They actually constantly make fun of him behind his back. And because everyone thought he was a loser, I began to think he was a loser. I still wanted him to be saved. But the impression I got was that he was one of those annoying people in life that everyone just deals with. Not exactly Bruce Willis in Die Hard.

Then there’s the villain, Musi. Ray makes the choice to show his home life (he’s got a family too) just like Captain Phillips’s. We hear his sob story, that he used to be a fisherman before other countries overfished the Somali waters, leaving him with no way to make a living. He does this pirate thing to survive, for himself and his family.

In other words, the villain is gray. I go back and forth on this all the time. Should we get to know the circumstances behind why the villain’s life is so terrible? On the one hand, it fleshes out the character and makes him more real. On the other, we’re less interested in seeing him go down. I mean, do we cut back to Buffalo Bill’s childhood where his father used to beat him in Silence of the Lambs? No, because that would provide sympathy for the character and the writer doesn’t want you to like his villain. He’s the villain. He’s meant to be hated in that scenario. I guess I just had too much of a reason to sympathize with Musi and therefore wasn’t as in to him getting beaten. This made me even more blasé about the story.

Here’s the thing with Captain Phillips. It’s a well-executed script. I was telling Miss SS that the difference is so clear when I pick up a professional script, like this one, compared to the amateur scripts I read. Ray knows how to build suspenseful moments, how to keep the story moving, how to create memorable characters, and how to write in a concise and readable fashion.

But you can only do so much for an idea that was probably meant to stay in the headlines and never become a movie. This is straightforward “take us seriously” Hollywood entertainment here. You have a hero. You have bad guys. You have an international crisis with a lot of blurred lines. Ray somehow makes us want to get to the finish line, but once we catch our breath, we’re ready to forget this race and move on to the next one.

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

What I learned: I was in the bookstore the other day and picked up a book. On the back of it, a critic was quoted as saying, “This is the kind of book you want to read instead of the kind of book you feel like you should read.” That stuck with me. Because I look at a movie like Captain Phillips and I think, “That’s the kind of movie I feel like I should see.” It isn’t the kind of movie I want to see. Because the movie business is about entertainment, I believe that when you set out to write something, it should be the kind of movie that people will want to see. If you’re writing something that people “should see,” you’re probably writing something boring.

Genre: TV show/Sci-fi
Premise: (from IMDB) In a not-so-distant future, human cops and androids partner up to protect and serve.
About: This is one of the hot new shows coming out of JJ Abrams’ company, Bad Robot. It will be premiering on Fox in, I believe, November. The writer, J.H. Wyman, is a producer, writer, director, and actor, although he’s most recently been the showrunner on the cult hit, Fringe. It seems logical, then, that he’d come back to Fox with his next project.
Writer: J. H. Wyman
Details: 65 pages

Another Bad Robot (JJ Abrams) project? I’m in! I have made no secret of the fact that I am in love with this man and his career to an unhealthy degree. I love that he’s thinking outside the box on everything he does, going so far as to publish a book that isn’t even about the book, but the back and forth notes two friends leave each other in the margins while swapping the book. He’s found a way to break the fourth wall in books! Is there anything this guy can’t do?! (maybe get that book to work in e-book form?)

But, if we’re being honest, the one JJ show I didn’t get was Fringe. You know that moment that happens when you’re watching a show where you realize you’re done with it? It happens and you’re like, “Okay, never going to watch this again.” With Fringe, it was the first episode. The whole thing with the plane with all the dead people in some decaying weird liquidy state? I didn’t get it. And they didn’t do a good job explaining why it happened either. If you’re going to have a show about weird things and the explanation of those weird things, haven’t you failed if you don’t successfully explain the weird thing that happened on the very first show?

And you know, JJ hasn’t lit the TV world on fire since Lost. Undercovers and Alcatraz weren’t very good. I guess Person of Interest and Revolution have their audiences, but I haven’t connected with either. I mean, sure, I’m like anyone. I want the next Lost, despite Losts not coming around very often. But I’ll settle for a show that I genuinely want to tune into every week. Let’s see if Almost Human is that show…

30-something John Kennex is a Los Angeles cop in the year 2043. From the little description of the city we get, it’s basically a lot like Blade Runner’s LA. Speaking of Blade Runner, the cop world has been turned on its head as now we have robots in the police force. These robots may look like normal people, but they’re all nuts and bolts inside. Not surprisingly, John HATES robot cops and refuses to work with them. They’re, like, replacing all his friends in the force!

John’s big obsession at the moment is something called the Insyndicate, a crime organization that’s selling lots of drugs in the city. His investigation into them is going great until his pregnant wife is kidnapped and killed! The Insyndicate specifically offed her to send a message to John. Stop coming after us. But here’s the kicker. After the murder, the Insyndicate disappears. Like, wiped off the face of the earth. Huh?

Cut to a few years later and, despite the whole wife-murder thing, John is still coming to work every day to protect and serve. After doing a routine stop, John finds some guy tripping out on a new drug that alters people’s DNA. You literally start changing into other people. The trippy drug looks like a big problem so the LAPD starts looking into it.

In the meantime, John can no longer operate without a partner, so he teams up with one of the bots. But here’s the catch. He wants one of the earliest models since he believes they might have recorded police info on his wife’s murder. The problem is these early models have glitches, big mood stabilizing issues. They’re unpredictable and aren’t even supposed to be on the street anymore. But John says that’s the only bot he’s working with.

Enter Dorian, a sad-looking male robot (why he has a girl’s name, I don’t know). Dorian was about to be sent to LAX for manual labor the rest of his life. He’s thankful that John gave him another shot. The thing with Dorian is, he seems quite life-like. Whereas the newest generation of robots are very… robotic, Dorian was created during a time where the robots were meant to be more like people. For this reason, John starts to like him. But it all comes down to, will he be able to do the job? And, more importantly, will he be able to help John find the people who killed his wife?

Writing a TV show that gets on the air is not that different from selling a spec screenplay. You have to find an idea that’s already been done and add a little twist to it. But in television, it’s a little simpler because television is dominated by cop, hospital, and lawyer shows. So you merely find something from one of these “genres” that hasn’t been done before. You find a new spin. Almost Human finds that spin. A cop show (which TV eats up) with robot cops in the mix. Easy to see why this was picked up.

Where you take it from there is tricky though. The landscape of TV is changing rapidly. Edgier and edgier shows are finding their way onto the small screen due to all these cable channels looking for original material. However, the Big 4 networks are still playing everything safe. So you have to make a decision when you write: Do you want to write something for the networks or for cable? Because what will benefit you on one will alienate you to another.

What I mean is, Almost Human is very generic beyond the original premise. Much like The Blacklist, it’s laced with strands of “safe” everywhere you turn. I mean here you have two shows where, if they were in the real world, things would get really gnarly. But in the hands of NBC and FOX, you know everything’s going to be okay in the end. And since there’s never really a sense of danger, a sense of chances being taken, the show never grabs you.

I mean look at Breaking Bad. You have a high school teacher with a normal family making meth and eventually becoming a drug lord. That’s a world where, when I sit down every week, I have no idea what’s going to happen, because that choice isn’t something you see on TV often. My point being, when you sit down to write your pilot, you have to decide if it’s going to be a safe network kind of a show or a show that pushes the boundaries.

Having said that, I think Almost Human could’ve still pushed the envelope more. There’s something goofy about the name “The Insyndicate,” but more importantly, I wasn’t really scared of them. The DNA drug stuff they were selling was kind of cool, but they were just your garden variety TV bad guys. I mean did you meet Tuco on Breaking Bad? That guy was the scariest dude I’ve ever seen on TV. They took a chance by creating that psycho. The Insyndicate guys feel like the gun-wielding extras you see getting shredded in the background of your favorite crime flick.

BUT, the show still does a lot right. We have a highly motivated main character, John. One of the EASIEST ways to create sympathy for a hero is to kill off one of their loved ones. So we immediately like this guy and understand why he’s so driven to take down the bad guys.

I also LOVED that John picks out a first generation robot that was discontinued. Whenever you read anything, you want to feel like the writer’s created a deep world. The fact that we’re already three-generations deep into these robot cops and that the first ones were discontinued because of mood problems – that tells me J. H. has really thought through this world. It also makes Dorian a lot more interesting because we’re sitting there going, “Okay, when is this guy going to lose it?” Had J. H. gone with a straight-forward robot who talked in a monotone voice and did everything exactly by the book, that would’ve been predictable and boring.

Whether Almost Human becomes a one-time watch or an essential part of my TV viewing schedule will be determined by the chances it takes (or doesn’t take). The first episode is played too safe. I mean who didn’t see it coming (spoiler) that the wife was still alive? The reason I watched Lost was because something big would happen on every episode that I didn’t expect. I don’t know if Almost Human is set up that way. But it’s going to need to be if it’s got a shot at surviving. Even Flyover Country can spot a generic show that doesn’t push the envelope or try anything new.

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

What I learned: The mythology of a TV show must be MUCH DEEPER than that of a film because you’re creating a 100-hour story as opposed to a 2 hour one. So I’d recommend sitting down and writing at least 30 (single-spaced) pages about your world and how it came to be, even if it’s not sci-fi or fantasy. Because we’ll be able to tell if you haven’t done any work on your world. Everything will feel thin and “made-up-on-the-spot” to the reader. The three generations of robot cops, the problems with the first generation, all that stuff in Almost Human told me that J. H. had done his homework and really understood this world. I suggest you do the same.

Genre: Thriller/Drama
Premise: (from IMDB) When Keller Dover’s daughter and her friend go missing, he takes matters into his own hands as the police pursue multiple leads and the pressure mounts. But just how far will this desperate father go to protect his family?
About: This script sold for roughly a million dollars 4-5 years back. It was one of those dream scenarios as it was the writer’s (Aaron Guzikowski) first sale (a later script of his, Contraband, ended up getting made sooner). Who gets paid a million bucks their first time out?? Not only did he get the big money, but guys like DiCaprio and Bale wanted to star in his movie. Eventually, the musical chairs casting ended up with Hugh Jackman and Jake Gylenhaal in the lead roles. The film finally came out this weekend, finishing number 1 at the box office with 22 million dollars. There are some who say this is the first real Oscar contender to be released. Let’s find out if that’s the case!
Writer: Aaron Guzikowski
Details: 153 minutes!! Yowzers!

Okay, so here’s the deal. Five years ago, everybody was talking about this script. While it didn’t end up number 1 on the Black List or anything, a lot of folks tabbed it as their favorite script of the year. I read it and thought it was good. I even gave it an impressive rating (I was a little less discerning back in those days). What I remember is that the script had a strong sense of tone. It led us to a dark place and we believed in that dark place. That’s not easy to do.

I also remember that the ending completely fell apart and if they were going to make a good movie, they’d need to completely rewrite it. There was a common amateur mistake at play. Guzikowski set up a lot of fun little mysteries, but didn’t pay them off. In fact, the climax felt like a completely different film (the maze stuff came out of nowhere). I was interested to see how they would fix that in the rewrites.

Keller Dover (Hugh Jackman) and his family head to Franklin Birch’s house for some Thanksgiving activities. The neighborhood they live in is a nice, respectable middle-class suburb. You’d feel safe raising your kids there which is probably why neither the Dover’s or Birch’s think twice about letting their 10 year-old daughters play outside.

But as the day turns to night, the families notice the girls haven’t returned and begin a frantic search for them. When they realize they’re gone, Keller’s son remembers a strange RV camped out down the block. Lonely Detective Loki, no relation to Thor, is called in to find the van. When he does he’s shocked to learn it was being driven by Alex Jones, a local man with the IQ of a third grader. Jones doesn’t seem to know anything about the girls so they let him go.

This infuriates Keller, who’s convinced that Alex is their guy. So he takes matters into his own hands and kidnaps Alex, locking him up in an abandoned apartment building he owns. With the reluctant help of Franklin, the two begin to torture him in hopes of learning where their daughters are. The question is, does Alex really know? Is he their guy? Or does Keller want him to be the guy so badly that he’s unable to see the truth?

In the meantime, Detective Loki suspects that some other weirdo is the kidnapper and eventually finds out where he lives. When he gets there, the walls are covered with mazes. Coupled with the man’s propensity for buying children’s clothes despite not having kids, Loki’s pretty sure he’s got the guy. When Keller hears this, he freaks out. Is he torturing the right man? Before anyone can get a definitive answer though, Second Suspect OFFS himself! This leaves everyone rolling in a heap of hearsay. It isn’t clear who’s telling the truth, who’s lying, and who has the girls. But they’re going to have to find out soon, because the clock is ticking, and without someone to provide food or water, the girls don’t have long.

Here’s what I liked about Prisoners. The setup was unique. And because the setup was unique it allowed for a lot of unique situations that we don’t usually see in these kinds of movies. A straightforward kidnapping story goes like this: A girl gets taken, they search for her, there are twists and turns and false leads along the way until they finally save her. This is the boring traditional blueprint for this kind of film.

But Prisoners institutes what I call the “Silence of the Lambs” approach. It adds a secondary element that throws all your expectations for the genre off. In Lambs, obviously it was Hannibal. Here, it’s Keller’s imprisonment of Alex. This isn’t something we typically see, so it confuses us, intrigues us, unsettles us. It’s not just about finding this girl. It’s about “IS KELLER TORTURING THE RIGHT GUY??”  Is what he’s doing “right”?  Is Keller going to kill the wrong guy? Is Keller going to get caught? What happens if he does get caught? These are all questions we don’t typically deal with when we’re watching a mystery procedural.

I think that and the dogged determination of both Keller and Detective Loki to do their respective jobs is what made this film so watchable. I always tell you guys – the more determined your characters are to achieve their goal, the more we’re going to care. I mean Keller is ready to move mountains to find this girl. And Loki is going to stay up all night 7 nights a week until he’s got his man.

Which leads me to another thing Prisoners did well. It explored that gray interaction between the detective and the victim’s family we don’t typically get to see. Many times the victim’s parents are so mad, so angry, that they endanger the investigation, themselves, even innocent people. They believe vigilante investigation and justice is the only way to go. And since they place emotions before logic, they’re often wrong. This leaves the detective in a position of not only trying to find the victim, but trying to keep the family from hurting themselves. Prisoners did a really good job looking at that.

Here’s my big problem with Prisoners though. They never figured out the ending. It’s better than it was. But there are too many unanswered questions after the movie’s over (spoilers follow). Okay, so this Second Suspect had the girls’ clothes. How? As far as I could tell, he wasn’t affiliated with the real killer so why in the world would he have the girls’ clothes? And how did one of the girls escape? That was NEVER explained. And why wasn’t she able to tell them who she ran away from? Oh, and who was this mystery child killer the priest murdered? Or did he even murder him? That was never stated. Was he Alex’s mother’s ex-husband? If so, why wasn’t this clearly explained?

Sadly, the reason the first ¾ of this movie worked so well (its zig-zaggy plot) was because they never had to make the dots connect. Of course it’s a great twist when Second Suspect has the girls’ clothes if you NEVER HAVE TO EXPLAIN HOW HE GOT THEM. Certain choices seemed to confirm the director’s lack of confidence in the script. As we got closer to the end, we’d get more and more “artful” fades to black. These seemed to be used to cover up or divert our attention away from these emerging plot holes.

I’m not going to lie, there were things in that third act that upset me. But for the majority of its running time, Prisoners kept me on the edge of my seat. I think it wants you to believe it’s bigger and more complicated than it is, which is where the frustration sets in (because you want it to be big!) but the reality is that it’s a solid non-traditional thriller and that’s it. But hey, I’ll still take that over Transformers 8 any day!

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

What I learned: Breaking the fifth wall! Oh yeah, you guys have heard of breaking the fourth wall. That’s when one of the characters talks directly to the audience. But do you know what the fifth wall is? It hit me while watching Prisoners. At a certain point, I began to wonder what I would do if I were in a Keller’s position. My daughter is kidnapped. I think, but am not 100% certain, I have the guy who did it. Would I go to the same extreme Keller does? See, the fifth wall is the wall that invites the audience TO PARTICIPATE in the story. When they start asking, “Hmm, what would I do if I were in this situation?” you’ve officially sucked them in. This isn’t for every screenplay. But it’s a very powerful tool in the right script.

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: Abaddon
GENRE: Horror, sci-fi
LOGLINE: A team of marines and scientists board a spaceship, only to discover its crew have transformed into raging cannibals.
WHY YOU SHOULD READ (from writer): “After countless attempts to write a epic fiction (trying to run before learning to walk), I’ve learned about my strengths (plot-mapping, dialogue) and weaknesses (flowery language, vivid descriptions). So began my love of script writing. My first (polished) script, ‘Abaddon’ blends originality with familiarity. It contains the conventions of good horror, complete with twists, turns, and interesting/flawed characters trying to survive aboard a spaceship swarming with zombie-like savages. I appreciate any constructive criticism the SS community of passionate readers and writers can provide. Thank you.”

TITLE: DEADMEN
GENRE: Black Comedy Western/Thriller
LOGLINE: A beautiful woman persuades a washed up gunslinger in the West to commit suicide, and he does just that.
WHY YOU SHOULD READ (from writer): “I placed 2nd in this years Script Pipeline competition. This script has been developed since 2010, when the 1st draft was a semifinalist in the Austin Film Screenplay Competition.

What if Louie CK and Tarantino got together to do a Western…? That’s what Deadmen is.”

TITLE: SWAP
GENRE: Sci-Fi/Thriller.
LOGLINE: When a homicide detective learns that the murderer of a Senator was the victim of a high-tech setup, he then uncovers a conspiracy that makes him question everything he believes in, even himself.
WHY YOU SHOULD READ (from writer): “In 2003 I had a “concept” for a Sci-Fi movie but had never written a screenplay. My wife saw a news piece for a screenplay community on the Internet, where you could upload your work and get constructive reviews and help. I read the first ten pages of the “Terminator” to get an idea of formatting. Using Word templates and a few reference books, I knocked out the first draft of in a week. The formatting was terrible and the story was littered with mistakes. But I pushed on and learned/developed the craft though constructive feedback and hard work.

My ideas were always a little high concept (and budget) so I began to get interested in short scripts and independent film, to both learn and give me a chance at getting produced. 10 years later I’ve just started a draft of my 19th feature script and finished short script 120. So I guess it’s fair to say I’ve been bitten by the bug of screenwriting. I’ve had short films screened in Cannes, won and placed in contests (thrilled that Kenneth Branagh read and selected one of my scripts). But am I any closer to breaking into the business? Hell no! But I’m enjoying the journey and learning as I go.”

TITLE: STORM DRAGONS
GENRE: Epic Fantasy-Action/Adventure (in the vein of Game of Thrones, 300 and Gladiator)
LOGLINE: “In a mystical land where champions fight to the death to keep the peace, the revenge of a chosen warrior against the killer of his family risks starting the all out war he lives to prevent”
WHY YOU SHOULD READ (from writer): “With the growing general audience interest in the fantasy genre, specifically in adult epic stories like Game of Thrones (including yourself, right?), and after making the finals in 10 different screenplay contests, I believe that my script is ready to face your wisdom and get the answer to its main quest: Could it become the Game of Thrones of the Big Screen?”

TITLE: Blood Mountain
GENRE: Horror/Dark Comedy
LOGLINE: A group of friends filming a homemade comic book movie seek revenge on the bloodthirsty band of European vampires who murdered one of their actors.
WHY YOU SHOULD READ (from writer): “My script has GSU, an inciting incident, and something that ups the stakes as the story moves along, just like the SS articles emphasize. But just because I have that checklist, it doesn’t mean a thing until it is scrutinized by the best amateur writing community on the web. I’ve read quite a few Amateur offerings screenplays the last few months, and I haven’t rushed this along before it’s ready, like some others I’ve read. This is no first draft. The only question is, and it’s the one question I can’t answer but hopefully Scriptshadow can, is it ready for the big time?”