Is it possible for a script about the high school experience to feel original anymore? The Spectacular Now says, hell yeah.
Note, this review was first posted awhile back, but I re-read the script and added some new thoughts to the review in anticipation of its release.
Genre: Dark High School Dramedy
Premise: A popular alcoholic high school student starts dating a nerdy girl, possibly out of pity.
About: The names of today’s writers, Scott Neustadter and Michael H Weber, may sound familiar. That’s because they broke onto the scene with the structure-defying spec, 500 Days Of Summer. One of their first jobs after the success of that film was adapting The Spectacular Now, a book by Tim Tharp. The film recently debuted at Sundance and won awards for both of its leads, one of whom is Shailene Woodley (Clooney’s daughter in The Descendents), who’s gotten a lot of press lately for being completely cut out of the new Spider Man movie. The Spectacular Now will debut in limited cities this August.
Writers: Scott Neustadter and Michael H. Weber (based on the novel by Tim Tharp)
Details: 119 pages – July 23, 2009 – first draft
It’s been awhile since I was in high school. I was there before Twitter and Vine. I was there before you knew you were in a relationship (We didn’t have “Facebook status” to confirm that stuff. We had, “Uhh, are we going out n stuff?” “Uhhh, I guess so.” Bam. Sorta-relationship). And the more I think about it, should high school kids even get relationship titles? I mean come on. High school relationships have the same lifespan as a fruit fly. Who cares who’s going out with who? It’ll be over tomorrow.
Oh yeah, NOW I’m remembering. Back then, every single moment was the most important moment EV-ER. If you accidentally walked into Homeroom with a smidge of jam on your face from breakfast that morning, your life was destroyed for the next two weeks. You’d meticulously break down who in the school saw the .1 millimeter of jam. Did Julie see it? Did Claire? Did Kenny? He would surely tell everyone about the glob of raspberry jam pouring down your cranium like blood from a bullet wound. That image would be stuck in your head. The giggles that were going on behind your back you didn’t see. Ahhhh!!!
You have to remember this when reading a high school script. You have to transport yourself back to that frame-of-mind, even though in hindsight, all those things you obsessed over were so ridiculous (although I do wonder sometimes if the reason Becka Madel never went out with me was because she saw the jam on my face that day). Now the bar for high school movies this decade is low. I mean what do we got? Perks of Being A Wallflower? (How exactly was it a perk seeing that again?) So “Spectacular” doesn’t really have a lot of competition. I hope it takes advantage.
Sutter Keely is a complicated individual. He’s somehow managed to become “the popular guy” without carrying the dubious title of being “the popular guy.” Watching him walk into a room is like following Obama into the White House. Everybody knows him. Everyone wants to be around him. So it shouldn’t be surprising that Sutter is dating the hottest girl in school, Cassidy.
But Sutter has some other sides to him as well. First off, he’s a drunk. He keeps a flask and a buzz with him wherever he goes for the explicit purpose of being able to see the world through rose colored glasses. Sutter doesn’t keep any “real” friends either. He’s the guy who knows everyone but nobody knows him. And Sutter doesn’t plan ahead. His life’s goal is to cruise around and bring smiles to people’s faces. Sutter lives his life in the “spectacular now.”
But Sutter’s 18 years old and on the verge of the biggest decision of his life: What does he do next? Does he go to college? Does he get a job? These are things Sutter wishes he never had to deal with. Yet here they are, closing in on him like a coffin, forcing him to do what he hates to do most: commit.
This is probably why Cassidy dumps him. She’s sick of the fact that their relationship holds no meaning to him, and as if to prove her right, Sutter barely blinks afterwards. The way he operates is to never get too close. That way he never feels anything when they leave. Little does he know that that’s the very reason they do leave.
The post-breakup phase doesn’t last long. Sutter randomly runs into a girl from his school, oddball Aimee Finicky. Aimee’s the nerdy girl who sits in the corner of the room, hoping nobody notices her. There’s some cuteness there but Aimee’s complete lack of personal style destroys any chance of it coming through. Out of a combination of pity and curiosity, Sutter starts hanging out with her.
This seriously unbalanced relationship goes the way most of these relationships do. Aimee falls madly in love with Sutter, while Sutter goes along with it only because he’s got nothing better to do. At a certain point, he realizes he either has to stay in or get out, and he decides to stay in. Aimee’s love eventually seeps through the walls he’s put up, helping him get to the root of his issue, which is that his father left him at a young age.
Aimee encourages him to go see his father, and while initially reluctant, he realizes that if he’s ever going to grow up, this is what needs to happen.
The biggest trap you can fall into with these teenage high school scripts is cliché. Since most real-life high school kids mimic pop-culture, they actually live a life of clichés, making cliche movie versions of themselves “technically” authentic (everybody’s using the same catch phrase, kids identify themselves via film stereotypes). Regardless, you want to avoid any kind of cliche you can when writing these scripts. Cliche equals flat and flat equals boring.
What you have to do then, is move away from the high school and see what defines these characters as people, as individuals. You need to find out what parts of their lives make them unique, what specific challenges are theirs and theirs only. Once characters start to feel like individuals (real people!), it doesn’t matter where you place them, high school, a Fortune 500 Company, or a job at the local 7-11, the story will be interesting because we’re interested in THEM.
Take Cassidy for example, Sutter’s ex-girlfriend. The easy way to write this character would be to make her the “hot popular bitch.” And to a degree, she is. But when she and Sutter break up, she doesn’t fuck the first dude she sees to piss him off. She’s still concerned about him, about his drinking, about his choices. She still has feelings for him, but has met someone else as well, and isn’t really sure what to do. Or take her new boyfriend, the popular jock, Malcom. When Malcom finds out that Cassidy’s still talking to Sutter, we think he’s going to kick his ass. And at first, that’s the plan. But he ends up breaking down to Sutter and admitting that he wishes he could be more like him, more relaxed, more fun. He’s afraid that if he doesn’t do so, he’s going to lose Cassidy. In other words, the characters aren’t acting like stereotypes. They’re breaking those stereotypes and acting like people.
The Spectacular Now also does a great job with dialogue. Whenever Sutter and Aimee were having conversations, I believed what they were saying. And that might not seem like much but most of the time when I’m reading words on a page, that’s exactly what I’m feeling: words on a page. It takes a lot to break that spell.
So I spent a few minutes trying to figure out why these particular words (which weren’t mind-blowing by any means), felt so real. This is what I realized: The more real you make your characters (their goals, their flaws, their backstories, etc.) the less convincing the dialogue has to be. The most important thing about dialogue is that we believe it. So if the audience accepts the characters, it doesn’t matter what they’re saying. They could be bumbling morons. But since you already believe in their existence, the words themselves are an extension of that existence. I’m not saying dialogue doesn’t matter, of course. I’m saying develop your characters and your dialogue will emerge naturally.
And the last thing that really surprised me was how well the father stuff worked. The “father who deserted his family” thing can be quite the cliché in movies. But I liked how Neudstater and Weber gently weaved that storyline in here. Usually these things hit us with the subtlety of a church bell, but Sutter’s father isn’t even mentioned until the second half of the script. It had a real-life feel to it. Nobody blurts out their family problems to you on the first day. It takes time to open up. And I like how these guys mirrored that approach here.
Don’t have a lot of bad stuff to say here. I guess Sutter is such a complex character that I never understood exactly what his problem was. He drank too much? He lived in the present too much? He was too nice to people? He never allowed himself to get close to people? These flaws overlapped each other at times and made him a little confusing. Luckily, we like the guy enough to overlook it.
I thought the plot could’ve been a little stronger (it’s really threadbare), his relationship with Cassidy wasn’t all that clear to me, and the final father meeting was maybe a little too on-the-nose. But hey, it’s a first draft. You can’t ask for the moon. This was really well done. If you like your screenplays character-driven, check this out.
[ ] What the hell did I just read?
[ ] wasn’t for me
[xx] worth the read
[ ] impressive
[ ] genius
What I learned: Whenever your main character is gearing up for a big moment (a speech, a confrontation, a race, whatever), throw something unexpected at them. If it’s a speech in front of a hundred people, have them get there to find out it’s now in front of 10,000 people. If they’re confronting their girlfriend about cheating, have them bang down the door only to find her parents with her. If it’s a bike race, have them get there only to find out their bike is broken and they’ll have to ride a shitty second rate bike. – You want to make things difficult for your characters. It’s always more interesting. (spoiler) After Sutter sets up the big meeting with his dad, he gets there to find out his dad’s forgotten about it. Now the dad wants to meet a friend and drag Sutter along. You see how much more interesting the dynamic becomes as opposed to if they’d sat down and had a predictable boring heart-to-heart? Think about real life. Everything that goes according to plan is uninteresting. It’s only a story when the unexpected happens. You need to think that way in your screenplays.
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: Offline
GENRE: Contained supernatural thriller
LOGLINE: When a bed-ridden teen discovers his online crush is a ghost, he enlists the help of a psychic to investigate her death, leading him on a hunt to stop her killer before he strikes again.
WHY YOU SHOULD READ (from writer): This script is highly recommended by a few longtime Scriptshadow readers. At the very least, give it a shot!
TITLE: Enter the Holy War
GENRE: R-Rated Comedy/Satire
LOGLINE: A washed-up producer struggles with the leader of a religious cult over the rights to an epic script that will surely get him the Oscar he finally deserves.
WHY YOU SHOULD READ (from writer): The script had a five star rating on one website, script of the month on another. I haven’t had a negative review from man, woman or cult member. One reviewer labeled it ‘a once in a generation script that could change everything.’
TITLE: Where the Butterflies Die
GENRE: Action/Adventure
LOGLINE: A missionary’s boat stumbles across an island where stranded American and Japanese forces are still fighting six months after World War II has ended. (inspired by a true story)
WHY YOU SHOULD READ (from writer): A period World War 2 piece taking place on a mysterious island? Hand to hand combat with primitive bamboo weapons? Action, intrigue, romance and revenge? What’s not to like?
TITLE: Z-MAS.pdf)
GENRE: Comedy-Horror/Christmas
LOGLINE: An estranged black family gets a zombie invasion for Christmas.
WHY YOU SHOULD READ (from writer): Because I’m tired of movies with a black cast being called “urban films.” Because I want to prove it’s possible to write a black movie that people will watch that doesn’t involve us being slaves or drug dealers. Because Spike Lee doesn’t own the rights to black cinema. And because I freaking hate Tyler Perry.
TITLE: White Label
GENRE: Dark rom-com
LOGLINE: When a young vinyl music store owner loses everything — love, friendship and vinyl records — he struggles to rebuild his life, hindered by pimp-like friends, a beautiful agent provocateur and an ex-girlfriend who refuses to let their relationship die until she finds a suitable successor. In the vein of HIGH FIDELITY and 500 DAYS OF SUMMER.
WHY YOU SHOULD READ MY SCRIPT (from writer): WHITE LABEL landed me a Blacklist manager for three days when I sent it out last year. We had a weekend love-in, swapped lots of emails, planned a campaign to attach a director and talent — then she emailed back the following Monday and said she was simply too busy to take on another client. The script (under a different name) got a professional rating on SPEC SCOUT, and was ranked on the TOP 10 list of the best scripts of 2012 by a Scriptshadow reader (someone I have never met, honestly!).
Are you confused? Would you like to be? You are not prepared… for Paralleled!
Amateur Friday Submission Process: To submit your script for an Amateur Review, send in a PDF of your script, your title, genre, logline, and finally, why I should read your script. Use my submission address please: Carsonreeves3@gmail.com. Your script and “first ten” 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: Sci-fi/Thriller
Premise: (from writer) An emotionally unstable neurosurgeon undergoes an experiment with parallel realities and fights different versions of himself to find a dimension where the wife he put in a coma is still healthy.
About: This script won the Amateur Offerings Weekend a couple of weeks ago. Submit your script (details up top) to get on the list. Best of the 5 picked that week will get a review. So make sure to submit a snazzy well-crafted logline and a great query letter!
Writer: Denis Nielsen
Details: 103 pages
Downey Jr. for Angus??
I’m going to give Denis this. He put a LOT of effort into this. This wasn’t something he scraped together over the weekend. This is a mind-bending plot-twisting psychological thriller if there ever was one. But after finishing Paralleled, I think Denis might be his own worst enemy (that’s an inside joke between me and whoever read this script). There are so many moving parts to this plot, it’s impossible to grab onto them all, leaving us scrambling just to keep up. Then again, I would’ve said the same thing about Donnie Darko. So I’m still not sure if I’d call this a big mess or pure genius. And I have a feeling Denis prefers it that way.
(I’d like to ask the writer, Denis, to please excuse any mistakes in the plot summary. It was hard keeping up!)
Dr. Angus Williams, 48 years young, is working on a very special scientific project. In it, he’s attempting to bring doppelgangers from parallel universes over to our current universe. It’s kind of like cloning, except your clone isn’t created on the spot. He’s been living this entire life, just like you, in another reality, but making different choices from you, and therefore is a different person.
So one day he puts his wife and co-worker, Madeleine, into the machine, only to have her emerge in full freak-out mode. Her body starts breaking down and the lab team has to put her in a medically induced coma. Once this happens, Angus starts constructing a plan to find ANOTHER Madeleine in one of these other alternate realities so he can be with her (why he’s leaving this poor Current Reality Madeleine to lie in a coma, I’m not sure).
So he starts ushering in versions of himself, hoping that they’ll have a Madeleine in their lives he can go and be with. (This confused me as well. What was his plan if they did have a Madeleine? Was he just going to ask them politely if he could steal their wife?) Eventually he finds one in Number 4 (Angus Number 4), who says Madeleine 4 is doing well and fine in his reality.
So Angus jumps to that reality, only to find out that he (or Number 4) is being kept in a nearby barn by his wife. For some reason Number 4 has jumped with him (it’s not clear to me why Angus couldn’t simply jump himself) and because he wants this Madeleine for himself, he kills Number 4 and buries him. When Madeleine comes along to retrieve him from the barn, he learns that he’s on an extended time-out from the family because his Number 4 version nearly beat their boss to death.
Why would he do such a thing? Because he found out that Madeleine had slept with him. But this turns out to be the least of his worries. It turns out Number 2 (back in the Angus’ original world) is conspiring to do something terrible to him. What would that be? To be honest, that’s where I lost track of the story. It just became too complicated, which is where our analysis begins.
You know, I admire Denis’s ambition. He clearly wasn’t interested in writing some run-of-the-mill spec. He set out to challenge the audience. The problem is, it just got too complicated. And I tried. I mean I was re-reading scenes constantly (which I never do) to make sure I kept up. But at a certain point, I couldn’t do it anymore. We have four versions of our main character, we have two versions of our boss character, we have two versions of the wife character, and we have two versions of our assistant character (who I didn’t mention in the synopsis). We have separate mysteries in two timelines, some that intersect, some that don’t. And we have multiple double-crosses in the final act.
Now Denis was challenging us from the very first page (he had voice overs, off-screen talking from characters we didn’t know yet, AND overlaps – I’m not sure I’ve ever seen that happen all on the same page before) but I survived that. However, I can tell you exactly where I gave up on trying to figure out what was going on. It was at this line, around page 70-something.
“This is another REPLAY of Madeleine’s trauma surgery, administered by Number 2 – But we don’t know that yet, because at this point he looks exactly like our main Angus.”
Now Denis might be arguing that that’s exactly what he set out to do. He’s trying to twist your mind. And maybe he’s right. But I think he went one Angus too many, one mystery too many, one double-cross too many. Just because you’re trying to bend people’s minds doesn’t mean you can throw the kitchen sink at them. Part of making an audience think is knowing when to show restraint. And I never saw that here. Problems were solved with exorbitant twists rather than clever writing. It’s not that all of these twists and turns couldn’t have worked. But the more false realities you place in your script, the more skill it requires to inject those in a way the audience can follow them. And even though Denis was up to the task of trying (I could FEEL the effort on the page), I just think he wrote himself into a place he couldn’t write himself out of.
The thing you gotta remember is that if the audience can’t follow your plot, it doesn’t matter what you write. They’ve already mentally checked out. And what you ALSO have to remember is that the more confusing your plot is, the more mental focus the reader has to give to straightening all that out. Because we’re focusing on all the confusing stuff, we miss the other more obvious plot points. I’ve had this happen every once in awhile, where I’ll miss a plot point and the writer will be like, “What are you talking about! It was right there on page 64!” And I’ll try to explain to them, “Well yeah, but at that time I was trying to figure out why the 7th doppelganger of the Grandfather’s ghost’s son had his daughter travel to Klongor to find the Mogshire Suit.” So there’s this compound effect. It’s not just the complex plot the reader isn’t getting, it becomes the simple stuff too.
Take Madeleine going into a coma, for instance. Why did she go into a coma? I’m still confused about that. And why is our main character searching other realities for a new Madeleine when he has another one? Sure, she’s in a coma. But you’re a doctor. It seems like it’d be easier to try to get her out of a coma than go kill someone in another reality that’s completely foreign to you and take their place. It also makes your hero look bad. He’s ditching Vegetable Wife to go find a hotter more mobile version. These questions may be answered in the script somewhere, but there was so much going on, they apparently flew right past me.
Really intricate mind-fuck scripts require a lot of practice to write. It’s not just about logistically mapping everything out. It’s about writing a lot of scripts and learning when readers understand the stuff you want them to understand and when they miss it. It takes a writer a couple of tries, for example, to learn that when a main character SAYS he has a phobia of spiders, that a reader doesn’t always remember that. It’s only when the writer SHOWS the main character being attacked by spiders and freaking out, that we understand he doesn’t like spiders. There are a lot of little things like that that you only learn through trial, error, and feedback.
In Denis’s defense, movies like this have been made before. Primer. Donnie Darko. The Jacket. There is an audience out there for them. And an actor would LOVE to play the part of Angus, obviously (actors love to play multiple characters to display their range). But I just think there’s too much going on here. I’d recommend to Denis that he seriously dial the script back. Simplify this plot. You already have so much going on with the multiple Angus’s. The rest of the plot shouldn’t be so complicated. Good luck!
Script link: Paralleled
[ ] what the hell did I just read?
[x] wasn’t for me
[ ] worth the read
[ ] impressive
[ ] genius
What I learned: “Too-far-in-your-own-head” script. Sometimes we writers get a little too far into our own heads when we write. We write multiple plotlines, multiple twists, multiple mysteries, and we just keep piling it on because, why not, we’re in our own little world. But when the reader gets the script, he hasn’t been through the 15 drafts you wrote. He wasn’t there when you created the first clone of your character, the second, the third. He just doesn’t have all that information in his mind that you do, so he loses track quickly. As a writer, it’s your job to step out of your writer’s hat occasionally and into the reader’s. You have to ask, “Does this make sense to someone who’s reading this for the first time?” If you don’t do that, you’ll be stuck too far in your own head, and your script will remain a mystery to the world forever.
Tis the day when the Americans and the Brits split up. A proud day for America, maybe not so much for our brothers to the East. Whatever the case, it’s a reason to celebrate. And I need a day of celebration. The downside of being an American is that the ideology of the country is built to make you feel terrible if you’re not working 16 hours a day. I often fall victim to this practice. But today, I’m going to grill a dead animal, light some cheap firecrackers, and feel good about doing nothing. I WILL repost my newsletter screenplay review of White House Down though, for those interested in discussing it. And with that, I’m out. See you Friday!
Note: This review was originally posted in my Newsletter a few months ago. When I originally read this script a long time back, I thought it was pretty darn good. Then I found out the casting and my excitement died immediately, which is reflected in this more recent review. Jaime Foxx as the president?? The ubiquitous Channing Tatum in the title role? That eliminated any chances that I’d go to the theater to see this. Anyway, I decided to re-post it today since it’s the Fourth of July and I’m not putting a new post up. Interested how the big spec sale translated to the scene so if you saw it, chime in. To get early reviews of screenplays, sign up for the Scriptshadow Newsletter, which is sent every Thursday.
Genre: Action
Premise: (from IMDB) A Secret Service agent is tasked with saving the life of the U.S. President after the White House is overtaken by a paramilitary group (which I assume means terrorists).
About: Pitched as “Die Hard in the White House,” James Vanderbilt sold his spec to Sony for the biggest sale of 2012, at 3 million bucks! You know when you can make even Dan Fogelman jealous, you’re doing a good job. A few things to note here. Vanderbilt has written some huge screenplays, including Spider-Man 3. Also, he writes for Sony (Spider-Man is a Sony film) which means he has a pre-established relationship with the studio, and likely had been informed of exactly the kind of movie(s) they were looking for. All of this plays into the paycheck. But even that combination doesn’t guarantee a 3 million dollar payday. There are plenty of other top-notch writers trying to pull off a sale like this and failing. So what was the secret to this one? It must be a pretty good script, right?
Writer: James Vanderbilt
Details: 142 pages – March 1, 2012 (This is an early draft of the script. The situations, characters, and plot may change significantly by the time the film is released. This is not a definitive statement about the project, but rather an analysis of this unique draft as it pertains to the craft of screenwriting).
You might have recently seen the Olympus Has Fallen trailers. “Olympus” is a competing project to “White House” that sold at around the same time for 600k. They then raced that sucker into production as it’s on its way into theaters in a few weeks. While the early bird catches the worm, it doesn’t always catch the quality film. “Olympus” looks like a frat house bathroom at the end of a clean-cycle. There isn’t a single original shot in that trailer. The helicopter shots and explosions alone look like they were pulled from a stock video website.
Well, turns out White House Down caught the “rushed into production” bug as well, as it’s debuting this summer, landing Channing Tatum and Jaime Foxx in the lead roles. Not sure a few extra months will make a difference in quality control. But I can tell you this: “White House Down” is the better script.
Low-level security agent slash divorcee John Cale’s life isn’t going so well. He’s divorced. Doesn’t see his daughter very much. Doesn’t have a job. Yup, not good times. Luckily, he’s landed a rare day with his daughter, 10 year old Emily, whose claim to fame is being a CNN buff (it’s her favorite Ipad App). He’s decided to finally give her the gift of her dreams – a tour of the White House.
Cale’s also being a little sneaky, as he’s doubling up this tour with a job interview at the house. Hey, why not kill two birds with one stone? Although this two-for-one special pretty much encapsulates why Cale’s flying solo. Dude needs to start paying more attention to his family. Well, he’ll get his chance soon enough.
That’s because while taking a stroll through the White House, a series of explosions start rocking the wings. In another section, fun-loving president James Sawyer is rushed to the White House equivalent of a panic room. But before he can get inside, his head of security turns a gun on him. It turns out HE’S orchestrating this! Just as he’s about to put a bullet in the president, Cale comes screeching out of nowhere, providing just enough of a distraction to grab the prez and Harlem Shuffle it to another area.
In addition to protecting the president, Cale’s got to find his daughter, who was in the bathroom at the time of the attack. But the options are limited. With the head of security knowing just about everything there is to know about the White House, he’s able to bring backup mercenaries in, leaving all the major rooms occupied by gun-wielding trouble-makers!
Outside, everyone’s trying to figure out what the hell is going on. When they hear that the president is alive, being guarded by some secret service reject, their confidence is shaken. But they come up with a plan whereby the president and Cale will head to a little known escape hatch that leads to a series of secret tunnels Roosevelt built hundreds of years ago or something.
Naturally, things don’t go as planned, and in a spectacular firefight in the White House backyard (spoiler) the president is killed! Or at least, that’s how it LOOKS. It turns out the president actually escaped and is able to get back inside with Cale. Except now they don’t have any communication with the outside. And since the outside believes the president to be dead, they order a missile strike on the White House to take out the terrorists in 45 minutes. YIKES! Talk about a tight ticking time bomb. So will Cale get the president out alive? Will he save his daughter as well? Locate this 3 million dollar spec and find out for yourselves or get ready to line up in June.
White House Down was a cool spec. It’s got problems. Like that it’s way too long. And you don’t always know what’s going on. And the ending is a little confusing (“Ehhh, wait, what was the bad guy’s plan again??”). But it got the “fun” part right. And when you compare it to all the other Die Hard clones that have come out since the original film debuted 25 years ago, White House Down ranks up there with the best of them script-wise. I mean, it’s a thousand times better than “A Good Day To Die Hard,” that’s for sure.
There’s just some really good writing for a “blockbuster spec.” I noticed this early on in the scene that takes Cale into the White House for a job interview while ALSO setting up a tour with his daughter. Amateur writers probably would’ve separated these scenes, having Cale go somewhere else for a security detail interview, then after that, bring his daughter to the White House for the tour. The problem is, separating those scenes takes up more space. Which is why you want to combine scenes whenever possible – to keep your story moving swiftly. But what’s really cool about this scene is that Vanderbilt uses it to set up the distance between Cale and his daughter.
Most amateur writers, when writing huge action specs, avoid the emotional component. But these relationships are what anchor the story, what make it relatable and real, which is why you want to incorporate them. I particularly found the sentence from Cale’s ex, “She doesn’t even like you,” (in reference to their daughter) to be affecting. It sets up how far apart these two are, and it makes us want to stick around until they’ve made up.
I also liked some less-obvious touches, like the physical tour itself. The scene is designed as a way to establish the father-daughter relationship. Her bursting enthusiasm for the experience convinces us that maybe there’s hope for these two. But what the tour’s really doing is laying out the White House blueprints for the audience to set up what will happen down the line. There are certain details about the house we’ll need to know so we’re oriented when the shit hits the presidential fan.
There were some cool story choices as well. I liked how it was unclear if the president was dead half the time, leaving it unclear who had the authority to do what and how much authority they had. The Vice-President assumes the role of Commander-In-Chief if the prez bites it. But what happens when you’re not sure if the prez bit it or not? It’s the kind of uncertainty that I could see really happening in that situation, and I loved that attention to detail.
On the downside, there are way too many freaking characters here. Do we really need to see what happens to the Speaker Of The House? I mean we’re bouncing all over the place to a character list bigger than the entire Chinese population. Snippy snip snip all those characters away and you won’t have a 140 page spec (more important for you guys, of course, than guys like James Vanderbilt). There were one too many set-piece scenes as well, which could’ve lowered the page count. I was constantly confused about the geography of that backyard battle in particular, and didn’t see it as an ideal setting for the primary action scene. I would’ve K.O.’d it.
Still, this is really good stuff as far as blockbuster spec writing. I wouldn’t mark it as an “impressive,” but I’d tell you to read it if it showed up at your door.
[ ] Wait for the rewrite
[ ] wasn’t for me
[x] worth the read
[ ] impressive
[ ] genius
What I learned: You ever notice that main character’s lives aren’t going so well when we meet them? That’s because if their lives WERE going well, there’d be nothing to fix. Who wants to watch a character who already has everything figured out? Start your movie with a protagonist whose life is in the shitter then use your story to fix them.
