Today’s script is going to piss some people off because of its controversial writing style. But I liked it!

Amateur Friday Submission Process: To submit your script for an Amateur Review, send in a PDF of your script, a PDF of the first ten pages 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: Comedy
Premise: (from writer) Three different graduating classes return to their small New Jersey town for a night of awkward reunions and drunken debauchery on the biggest bar night of the year – Thanksgiving Eve.
About: Black Wednesday barely beat out “Ship of the Dead” in last week’s Amateur Offerings showdown. There appeared to be a strong divide in the reactions. Lots of people were up in arms about the “voice,” particularly all the asides. And when there’s controversy, there’s Scriptshadow getting on his Controversy Scooter to solve it.
Writer: Thomas Grant
Details: 111 pages

Okay, Dazed and Confused is one of my favorite movies ever. But it’s also a really tricky movie from a screenplay perspective because there’s no real story. It’s just a bunch of people living their life on the last day of school. For that reason, writing a “Dazed and Confused”-like script is typically a losing endeavor. And believe me, I’ve watched a lot of people try over the years.

You see, when you don’t have a traditional story, you have to be awesome at other things in order to distract the audience from the fact that there’s no story. One of those things is dialogue. The dialogue has to be really good. Now most of the people who write these types of scripts THINK they’re good at dialogue, but they aren’t. You have to remember that the best dialogue comes from dramatic situations. And dramatic situations come from a well-told story, since good stories are built to create dramatic situations. Since you don’t have that in a movie like this, the dialogue is sort of off on its own, asked to be flashy and fun without any underlying help. That’s a skill not a lot of writers have.

This was just one of the things I was worried about going into Black Wednesday. Let’s see if the writer was able to overcome it.

Black Wednesday is about that night before Thanksgiving – the one where everyone comes back to their small home town from all over the country and reconnects with all their friends at the bars before being asked “What the hell are you doing with your life” by their parents the next day. It’s potentially a really depressing time in that you’re forced to face where you are in life.

“Wednesday” follows a hell of a lot of people in that situation. There’s 32 year old Brandon, who’s reluctantly become an assistant football coach at his former high school. There’s Randy “Tag” Taglianetti, who’s now selling alcohol to minors at a local liquor shop. There’s 32 year old Nikki, who’s hot and bitchy and who still hasn’t found a husband. There’s 26 year old Sophia, who doesn’t realize how pretty she is. There’s 26 year old Dan, who’s trying to make it as a comedian in LA but failing miserably. There’s even 17 year old quarterback Vince, who’s hellbent on enjoying the night before the big game tomorrow, despite his coach’s warning not to do so.

There are a LOT more characters than this, most of whom are trying to survive the night in some way. Brandon’s trying to figure out how so many of his former classmates became successful while he’s still stuck in Nowheresville coaching football. Dan’s out of money and debating if he should give up on his comedy dream and move back home. Nikki is trying to use this night to find a suitable man, maybe not to marry, but at least to have as a boyfriend. Sophia’s trying to break out of her quiet shell. And that’s pretty much what we got here. There’s no real overarching story to get into. It’s just a lot of jumping back and forth between these characters.

One of the reasons these scripts are so hard to write is because of the character count. There are always a ton of characters to keep track of and how the writer presents these characters in order to make them memorable can either make or break the script. I mean, I’m finished with the script and I’m STILL kind of mixing Dan and Brandon up. I’m still getting Nikki and Paige mixed up. You have to be a master in character creation if you write a script like this. You have to be very particular about how you name everyone, so their name instantly invokes a unique face. You have to give them memorable opening scenes. You have to know when to eliminate characters that aren’t necessary, since they crowd the name pool. Even something as simple as the LENGTH of a name can make a difference in how (or if) that character is remembered. Thomas did a pretty good job of that here, but he walked into a minefield. It’s tough for us to keep track of everyone, and I definitely struggled at times throughout the first half of the script (when everyone was introduced) as a result.

Also, because there’s no story in a script like this, everything rests on the characters. You have to be an amazing character-creator, and the trick to that is, every character must be going through something that this night is going to challenge. If you look at Dazed and Confused, every memorable character there is going through something. The football player must decide if he’s going to sign the drug form, the main character, 13 year old Mitch, is trying to rise above his sister’s shadow, Adam Goldberg’s famous character must learn to stand up for himself, his buddy has to break out of his shell and talk to a girl for once. If there isn’t something for your characters to overcome, then we’ll quickly get bored with them because there’s no story to look forward to to take our mind off that lack of character development.

Black Wednesday has mixed results in this area. Characters like Brandon, Dan, and Nikki were all memorable because they were going through something. But Kevin Africa and Colleen just seemed to want to have a good time. For that reason, while their storylines were occasionally amusing (ending up at a high school party when Colleen was a high school teacher) they didn’t resonate. Even if it’s the smallest thing, it’s still important to have your character going through SOMETHING that the situation in the movie challenges.

Another thing with these movies is that they must be driven by a theme. You need something to reign the randomness in. There were flashes of themes here and there in Black Wednesday, but I’m not sure if we ever really settled on one. There was this moment on page 50, actually, where one of the older (sort of degenerate) characters was talking about how he watched MILF porn earlier in the day, and realized that those MILFS were now their peers. Yeah it wasn’t exactly Socrates, but it was the first moment I felt a potential theme shining through. You grow up fast so you have to enjoy your life. Remember, the best themes are usually the simplest, and I felt like that theme was perfect for this kind of movie. It just needs to be explored in more of the storylines.

Now I’m guessing one of the big problems some people had with the script was the voice. Thomas, here, LOVES to write asides. Like more than actually write the script sometimes. And this always divides readers. I mean, we get things like “This isn’t the Hollywood your friends and family are thinking of,” and “one of those shitty apartments off Hollywood boulevard you live your first year in LA in because you don’t know any better” and “The American Dream this is not.”

Okay, so, note to writers. THIS TYPE OF WRITING MAKES CERTAIN READERS ANGRY. Not all readers. Probably only half of them. But half is enough to be careful about this writing style. If you’re automatically alienating half your readers right away, you’re severely limiting your opportunities in a business that’s already short on opportunities.

Now there are some caveats here. First, if the writer is really good, then these asides aren’t as annoying, cause they’ll be funny and entertaining. Also, if you don’t go overboard and you pick and choose WHEN you use asides, readers are generally more tolerant of them. Thomas DROWNS his script in asides, which you just can’t do. It starts to feel like you’re trying too hard, and once that happens, the reader doesn’t like you anymore, and they don’t like your script either. So it’s a dangerous game to play.

I think Thomas is a good writer so while there were definitely times where I was like, “C’mon already! Enough asides!” it never got so bad that I gave up on him. Which brings me back to the dialogue statement I mentioned at the beginning of the script. Conversational (as opposed to story-relevant) dialogue, is super-dependent on writing ability. I’m not sure Thomas is as good as he thinks he is, but a lot of these conversations felt natural, like the way people coming back together on Thanksgiving Eve for a night of craziness would actually sound. So to that end, I commend him.

Which leads us to the end of OUR night of craziness – aka, this review. One thing Black Wednesday reminded me of is that these types of scripts are so “gotta make it” scripts. The writer has to go make the film himself (Richard Linklater with Dazed and Confused, George Lucas with American Graffitti, Paul Haggis with Crash) because the stories are so specific to the writer’s voice. I just don’t see these do very well in the spec world because, again, the spec world celebrates stories with high concepts and clear narratives. That’s not this kind of film.

So if I were Thomas, I’d go out and make this. Once you make the theme more prevalent and make sure all the characters have something going on, this is pretty much ready to go. It wouldn’t be an expensive film to shoot by any means. And the only other real major problem I had – not being able to remember who’s who – would be solved, since once we see actors on a screen, we don’t forget them.

Black Friday was tough to get into with all the asides and the memory game we had to play with the characters, but once it got going, it was a fun ride.

Script Link: Black Wednesday

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

What I learned: Aside or not to aside – that is the question. Only use asides in a comedy script (or a script with comedic elements). It’s the only real time they work. And even then, use them sparingly. Too many asides and readers will throw you over the side…of their boat…into the Sea of Forgotten Scripts. Can’t risk that!

I’m happy with the way the summer box office has played out so far. We’ve had a few nice surprises – like a non-sequel, non pre-existing franchise, non YA novel doing great amongst a sea of more traditional summer blockbuster flicks (The Great Gatsby). We have a spec script that’s not about super heroes or car races or blowing shit up outperforming a heavy favorite with the world’s biggest movie star in it (Now You See Me beating After Earth). We have ANOTHER spec script, The Purge, occupying a prime-time slot on the summer slate this weekend. Whether it does well or not, getting a spec script turned into a movie that’s released during the most competitive time of the year – that’s a huge accomplishment. This is all good news for screenwriters. It gives producers and executives and studios the confidence that they CAN take chances on spec material.

However, it’s important to remember that there’s a step that needs to happen BEFORE your spec competes for one of those coveted summer slots. You have to sell the damn thing. And in order to sell it, you have to get your script out there for people to read. And typically (unless you bypass the system and get a kick-ass reception on a site like Scriptshadow), that means getting an agent to go out wide with your script. And that’s what led me to today’s article.

You see, I don’t think there are enough amateur writers out there who track the spec market. Sure, many are aware of what sells. But are they actually tracking WHAT GOES OUT WIDE? Are they tracking the scripts agents and mangers are sending out to all the producers in hopes of getting a sale?  Agents are typically looking for two things when they’re repping a script from a new writer.  a) it’s well-written.  And b) it’s a marketable enough concept that studios will actually be interested in buying it.  “a” is, of course, important. But it doesn’t matter without “b.”   This information is invaluable because if you know what agents like to push, you’ll have a much better shot at landing one.

So today I’m going to give you the last 15 scripts that went out wide, along with their genres and loglines. I want you to see with your own eyes what reps are sending out there. I didn’t cherry pick these loglines. I went to the Tracking Board (which you can get a 25% discount on if you sign up through Scriptshadow btw) and simply filtered by specs that have gone wide. If something didn’t have a logline, I didn’t include it. These are the scripts that were listed.

There is a caveat here. Agents have relationships and often know what places are best for a project, and therefore will send certain projects out to a much smaller list of folks. So these are by no means the ONLY scripts being sent around town. But they are the ones agents are sending out wide in hopes of the script either selling, or everyone liking the script enough to want to work with their client. Let’s take a look.

Lewis & Clark: Trial By Fire
Genre: Action/Adventure/Supernatural
Logline: Pitched as “Pirates of the Caribbean” meets “Butch Cassidy and the Sundance Kid”. Story is a re-imagining of the historic expedition. After the United States acquires the Louisiana Territory, President Thomas Jefferson sends Lewis & Clark on a journey to the American West that is believed to be inhabited by fearsome beasts that threaten the entire country.

Bullet Run
Genre: Action
Logline: Kept under wraps but pitched as “Speed” meets “Thief”.

Autograph
Genre: Drama
Logline: Based on a novel, a boy secretly watches his actor/father run a con so the family can survive WWII Shanghai, but the father’s arrested, so the boy applies what he’s learned to survive.

Criminal
Genre: Action/Thriller
Logline: The right man in the wrong body. A dead CIA operative’s memories, secrets and skills are implanted into an unpredictable and dangerous prison inmate in hopes that he will complete the operative’s mission.

Visions
Genre: Horror/Thriller
Logline: A woman begins experiencing terrifying visions when she moves to her husband’s vineyard.

The Uncontacted
Genre: Horror
Logline: Pitched as “Attack The Block” meets “The Descent”. A group of grad students find themselves stranded on an island in the South Pacific. When they attempt to make a contact with an ancient cannibalistic civilization rumored to live there, they accidentally uncover something deadlier, lurking underground.

Pirate Hunter
Genre: Action/Adventure
Logline: In the year 1700 a Naval Lieutenant embarked on a search for the most bloodthirsty ship on the seas, as he sought his revenge. It found him.

Hottest Ass Contest
Genre: Comedy
Logline: With the coastal Florida city they work for on the verge of bankruptcy and their jobs on the line, the hard-partying great-grandson of the city’s founder, along with his coworkers, take matters into their own hands. Setting out to attract thousands of revenue-generating revelers, they transform their city into an epic spring break destination by staging a Hottest Ass Contest that will feature only the finest female derrieres from all over the world.

Beauty and The Beasts
Genre: Fantasy/Adventure
Logline: Two years after the events of the classic tale, Belle’s Prince Edgar mysteriously goes missing after she discovers the truth about his past, that he is actually a prince from a land of beasts. Belle is now thrown into an adventure where she travels to a magical land of fantastic creatures, and must restore order to the ancient kingdom if she is ever to see her love again.

The Asterisk
Genre: Action
Logline: Logline: Kept under wraps but pitched in the vein of “Beverly Hills Cop” and “Lethal Weapon”.

Keeping Time (yay!)
Genre: Sci-fi/Romance/Comedy
Logline: Logline: A for-hire time traveler, who specializes in “preventing” bad relationships, meets a mysterious woman who also claims to be a traveler and is determined to stop him from completing his mission.

Sinbad and the 7 Curses
Genre: Action Adventure
Logline: Sinbad’s crew must battle seven curses hurled at them by an old adversary when a princess gets in the way.

The Do Over
Genre: Comedy/Sci-fi
Logline: Pitched as “Back To The Future” meets “Peggy Sue Got Married”. When a divorced couple is inadvertently transported back in time, they set out to break up their younger selves and change the course of their unhappy lives…only to discover that they are still meant for each other.

Freefall
Genre: Action
Logline: Pitched in the vein of “Fast & The Furious” in the air. An undercover agent, posing as the infamous parachuting hustler D.B. Cooper, infiltrates a group of thieves who are staging elaborate robberies of casino “money planes”; mid-air, mid-flight, jumping from plane-to-plane at 10,000 feet! Next stop, China’s Macau Venetian Casino.

The Remplacement
Genre: Comedy
Logline: When his long-lost identical twin brother shows up, an unhappily married father of two seizes the occasion to swap himself out of his own life.

It’s pretty self-explanatory. Every one of these ideas, save the drama, is marketable. I’m not saying they’re all good ideas (Hottest Ass Contest??). But the writers have made an attempt at creating something for the marketplace. We got four comedies, seven action scripts, a few adventure, a couple of horror, and a couple of thrillers. It’s not a coincidence that these are the genres being pushed by the agents. These are what studios want because these are the genres that have proven to create the best box-office return in the spec market.

This doesn’t mean you can’t write your semi-autobiographical tale about how you learned how to swim in Mexico. What it DOES mean is that you make your chances for selling a script exponentially harder by doing so. When I talk to agents and managers about scripts, I already know what they’re going to say when I tell them I found a feel good piece about a leper colony in the 1930s. They’re gong to ask, “Is it based on a book?” And when I tell them no, they’re going to say, “What else do you have?” Because action and comedy and horror and adventure and thrillers are the only thing they’re confident going out with unless you have the next American Beauty. And unless you’ve been writing for 20 years like Alan Ball had, you probably don’t have the next American Beauty.

I wrote this article as sort of a wake up call to writers because I have been reading a lot of material privately lately where the writers aren’t considering this part of the equation. They’re not asking, “Is this something that an agent is actually going to want to send out?”

Look, I’m not telling you you need to sell your soul. I believe that you should write what moves you. But you have to be smart about it. You can’t write some really low-concept drama with no commercial appeal and say, “Ohh, because it’s coming from that deep unique special place that only I can offer the world,” that everyone will want it. At some point, you have to look at the thing from an investment perspective, from the person’s POV who’s ultimately going to put their reputation and their money on the line. Are they going to buy something that’s going to keep their company in business? Or are they going to gamble on a slow introspective drama? Don’t walk around with your heads in the sand, guys. Be aware not only what’s selling, but what kind of material people are passing around.

And hey, I’m not saying those loglines above are amazing. The loglines themselves are not the point. It’s the TYPES OF SCRIPTS that agents are sending out there: thrillers, horror, adventure, action, comedy. You guys are smart. You can play in this space and come up with much better loglines than those above. Hollywood’s still a place where if you come up with an amazing concept and you’re a competent writer, you can go directly to the front of the line.

Also remember that just because you’re writing a marketable concept, doesn’t mean you can’t explore characters and themes on a deeper level. It doesn’t mean you can’t make your reader think. The concept and genre are meant to get you through the door. Once inside, that’s when you show off your skills. So write something with deep characters who are battling their flaws and fears, but do it inside of a horror movie, or an adventure movie.

And if this article sickens you? If you can’t believe this is what you need to do to get in the game? Don’t complain about it. Grab your camera and make your movie independently. There’s absolutely nothing wrong with that and it’s actually one of the fastest ways to make a career, since you’re bypassing the “wait for someone else to like it” spec stage. In the meantime, if you want to play in the spec world, this is how the game is played. If you want an agent to take you on, give them something they can sell, dammit. Good luck!

Genre: Drama
Premise: A socially deprived teen, unable to feel pain, lives vicariously through a dominatrix named Agony on the night of his 18th birthday.
About: Today’s script is an amateur script that was highly recommended to me by a trusted source. Hoping to find that great unknown script, I cleared my Wednesday slot and made it today’s script review.
Writer: Michael Kospiah
Details: 93 pages

Freddie Highmore for Early?

It’s rare that I get an e-mail from someone saying “You have to read this right away,” when that person is not…

a) the writer
b) the writer’s mother

…so when it does happen, I always take it seriously. I sent the script out in my newsletter this week and I’ve already been getting a lot of responses from it. Some have been good, some have been bad. But the most important thing is that all of them have been passionate. That tells me the writer is striking a chord with readers. So I knew there was something here. However, I don’t think I was properly prepared for what I was about to read.

4 year old Early has not had an easy life. In fact, in one of the most intense opening scenes I’ve ever read, the boy is tossed into the lake to drown by his father, who raises a gun to his own head and blows his brains out. Uhhhhh… I think you now have my full attention, Morphine script.

We later find out that his father did this because Early’s mother died during childbirth. So he blames Early for that. This means Early has no parents, which leads to him getting adopted. As Early grows up, he encounters another curve ball to his unique life: he can’t feel pain. So he’ll often just bang his head as hard as he can on doors and tables just to try and feel something. Understandably, people around him are a little freaked out.

Eventually, after Early grows up, he meets Agony, a dominatrix whose full-time job is distributing pain. While at first he wants to hire her, he instead becomes friends with her and follows her to a few of her jobs. He’s quickly fascinated by both Agony and her unique career.

Meanwhile, we meet a guy named Winston, who saved Early the day his father tried to drown him. Winston has since hit on some hard times, and he seems to think it’s all because he saved Early that day – that he tempted fate. So he’s got himself a gun and is now out there searching for Early, supposedly to kill him and even fate’s score.

Someone else might beat him to it, though. Agony’s exponentially fucked-up brother comes out of nowhere and starts attacking her, forcing Agony and Early on the run. It appears that Agony has had a childhood that makes Early’s look like he grew up with the Cleavers. To put it simply, she has a kid, and the father of her kid is either her own father or brother.

They eventually get caught, ending up in a motel with Agony’s dad furiously demanding to know where his daughter (and granddaughter) is. If she doesn’t bleed out, Early will need to find a way to get her out of this mess, a path that’s looking less and less likely as the night goes on.

Morphine.

Man, this script was a mixed bag for me. I think the writing is really strong at times, but really raw at others. It feels to me like a young writer with a big voice who hasn’t quite mastered the craft yet. The first clue is that there are a lot of emotional moments that are way over-the-top, bordering on cliché. I mean we even have Early stumbling into the night, looking up to the sky, and screaming as loud as he possibly can. That particular situation and shot have been done so many times in movies that they parody it more than they shoot it these days.

And then there was just a lot of crying, a lot of screaming, a lot of overly intense moments. At a certain point, we were parked squarely in the middle of Melodrama Lane, and we hadn’t even hit the 30 page mark yet. So I was worried.

However, the script sort of reinvents itself when Early meets Agony. It latches onto some kind of direction, and it really saved the story in my opinion. A few people who e-mailed me about their Morphine read noted that their big problem with it was that no story emerged, forcing them to give up before the halfway point. I agree with that, thus I wouldn’t mind if we got to the love story a lot sooner.

Another issue Morphine runs into is that it depends a little too heavily on shock-value. The father shooting himself while his son is drowning, a little boy banging his head repeatedly against the table until it bleeds, a dominatrix screaming at her client to “shit on the newspaper!”, a father who fucks his daughter, tazers to people’s genitals. I learned a few years into my own writing that shock value works like a drug. The audience gets really high off of it, but also comes down really fast. To satisfy them then, you then need to give them another hit. But they come down off that next hit even faster, so they need another one. And on and on, with each hit offering diminishing returns. At a certain point, you don’t have any shocks left to offer.

Now, Morphine wasn’t purely shock-driven. We do find out WHY, for instance, Early’s father tries to drown him then blows his brains out (Early was born premature – that’s why he’s named “Early” – and his mother died during childbirth. Early’s father blames Early for that). So there’s some depth and reasoning behind some of these shocks. But I still got the feeling that Michael was more concerned with shocking me than telling me a story.

On the character front, I’m not sure I ever felt that the Winston character was necessary. This idea that he interrupted fate and now he’s gotta reverse it (by killing Early) didn’t quite work for me. I was way more interested in Early’s relationship with Agony. I think that’s the selling point of this script and if Winston isn’t involved, we could’ve spent more time with that (and got to that storyline sooner – which is what a lot of people complained about).

Now I don’t want to make a blanket statement here, but I’ve found that, on the whole, over-emphasis on fate as a theme tends to indicate a younger less-experienced writer. It’s an easy theme to play with and allows for a lot of wiggle-room. You just have a lot of characters pontificating “Is fate real? Is it not real?” and it gives the illusion that the script is really deep, when in fact it’s only pretending to be.

I say this not from a place of judgment but from experience. I remember being obsessed with that theme myself when I first started writing. But looking back on those scripts, they all feel thin and “wanna-be-taken-seriously.” And it’s not that fate can’t be explored on a more serious level, but I don’t know if that should be the focus here. You have an interesting ironic setup between a man who can’t feel pain and a woman who administers it. You then have her fucked-up family coming after her. I think there’s enough meat there for a story. I don’t think you need to worry about if fate intervened on that day Early was drowning. Maybe he simply dog-paddled to the pier and was able to survive. But I was never able to connect that moment with his “inability to feel” problem.  Maybe if his inability to feel was the result of that moment?  Like the lack of oxygen from drowning is what destroyed the part of his brain that registers pain?  Then the connection is there.  Otherwise, it feels like two different subject matters.

Now despite it seeming like I’m not a fan of Morphine, I’m glad I read the script. I think what we have here is a script that we’re going to look back on and say, “Hey, that’s the first script Michael Kospiah wrote. You can see the potential dripping off the page.” But the potential isn’t fully realized yet. I think a little more emphasis needs to be put on story as opposed to shock-value. I think the story itself needs to start sooner. I think certain subplots could be sacrificed in order to spend more time with our main characters. And I would’ve liked to have seen more scenes where Early used his unique “power” to get out of situations. If your main character can’t feel pain, you need to exploit that to its fullest, and I don’t think Michael’s done that yet. But I do think big things are ahead for Michael. He has a unique voice and that’s one of the most important skills a writer can possess. This is probably the highest “wasn’t for me” I can give, but the story itself didn’t quite get there for me.

Script link: Morphine

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

What I learned: Be careful about depending too much on shock scenarios! Ultimately, they’re fool’s gold unless you can naturally embed them into the story.

It doesn’t get much better than Goodfellas, a script based on the non-fiction book “Wiseguy” by Nicholas Pileggi (who shares writing credit with Martin Scorsese on the film). The film came out in 1990 and got nominated for six Academy Awards. Joe Pesci, in a role he’s still getting mileage out of, won for best supporting actor. While the story structure was put in place by the writers, much of the great dialogue was discovered through rehearsals, where Scorsese let his actors roam free, then wrote into the script many of the lines they came up with. While Pileggi wanted to follow a traditional narrative, Scorcese didn’t think it was necessary, believing the film was more a combination of episodes, and those episodes could be told out of order. It’s this and a few other non-traditional choices that make Goodfellas so interesting to study as a screenplay. As the story goes, after reading the book, which Scorsese thought was the best book on the mob ever written, he called Pileggi and said, “I’ve been waiting to direct this book my whole life,” to which Pileggi responded, “I’ve been waiting for this phone call my whole life.”

1) The tragedy script – The tragedy script does not follow the traditional three-act structure (setup, conflict, resolution). It works more in two halves. You build up the hero’s success in the first half, then have them fall apart in the second. That second half fall should be dictated by the hero’s flaw, which can be anything, but is most often greed.

2) The cool thing about tragedies is that you can have your main character do some pretty horrible things – The audience understands this isn’t a romantic comedy. They don’t need their main character to be a saint. They get that bad things are going to happen and that our protagonist is going to be unsavory. Embrace that. I mean, despite all of us falling in love with Henry’s (Ray Liotta) first love, Karen, he starts having an affair with another woman on the side. You can’t do that in a traditional film without the audience turning on the protag. The one caveat to all of this, is that we must START OUT loving our main character. We’ll only go down the dark path with him if we liked him before he got there. So it’s no coincidence that Scorsese and Pileggi used one of the most common tools available to make us fall in love with Henry – they made him an underdog – the little nobody kid from the streets who worked his way up the system.

3) Give ’em something to talk about – What I learned about voice over during Goodfellas (which is used practically non-stop) is that if you have a fascinating subject matter and you’ve researched the hell out of it, the device is a great way to give us all of that information. What sets movies like Goodfellas and, say, Casino apart is those “behind the curtain” details we learn about the subject matter. You walk away knowing exactly what it was like to be a wiseguy (or what it was like working in a Casino) after watching these films. But extensive voice over like this ONLY WORKS if the subject matter is fascinating, if you’ve researched the shit out of it, and if you’re telling us stuff we don’t already know. Break one of those three rules, and the voice over will probably get tiresome.

4) We’re more likely to go along with a character’s suspect choices if we’re inside his head (listening to his voice over) – There’s something about hearing a character’s play-by-play of his life that makes us more tolerant of the terrible things he does. If Henry is robbing people and cheating on people and killing people without him ever telling us why, there’s a good chance we’ll turn on the character. But because he’s explaining it to us as he goes along via voice over, we understand his choices. It’s kind of like hearing that some random person you don’t know is cheating on their spouse. You immediately conclude that they’re a terrible person. But when your best friend cheats on their spouse, and they explain to you why they’re doing it and what went into the choice, you’re more okay with it. Voice-over can be very powerful that way.

5) Research research research – I’ve read a LOT of amateur scripts about the mob over the years and none of them ever come close to Scorsese’s films. Why? Research. Nothing feels original or unique. These writers fail to understand that Scorcese is using material that has been meticulously researched. I mean, authors like Pileggi have spent hundreds of hours talking to the REAL PEOPLE involved in these crime magnets. He’s getting the stories that REALLY happened. Whereas with amateurs, they’re making up stories based on their favorite movies. Therefore they read like badly made copies. So if you’re going to jump into this space, you better have at least a hundred hours of research to base your story on. Or else forget about it.

6) Start your script with a bang – Goodfellas starts with a bang and never lets go. And that got me thinking. In the comments section of the Amateur Offerings post this weekend, a commenter said he stopped reading one of the entries after page one because it was boring. A debate then began on whether the first page of a script should always be exciting. Some believed it should, and others said the writer should be afforded more time. The actual answer to this question is complicated. In the spec world, yes, the first page should immediately grab the reader. However, your first scene should also be dictated by the genre and story. If you’re telling a slow-burn story, for example, then a slower opening makes sense. But the definitive answer probably lies within what happens BEFORE you write the first page. You should choose the type of story that would have an exciting opening page in the first place, since it IS so important to grab that reader from page one. Once you’re established and people will read your scripts no matter what, THEN you can afford to take your time getting into your story.

7) Always look to complicate your scenes – Driving a dead guy into the woods to bury him isn’t a very interesting scene. Driving a “dead guy” who all of a sudden starts banging on the inside of the trunk (Oh no, he’s still alive), is. And it leads to one of the most memorable moments in Goodfellas, when Tommy starts bashing the still-moving bloody mattress cover over and over again. Try not to allow your scenes to move along too smoothly. Always complicate them somehow. It usually results in something more interesting.

8) Beware the mob/gangster screenplay naming conundrum – One of the biggest assumptions young writers make is that readers will remember however many characters they introduce, be it 5 or 500. I can’t stress enough that too many characters leads to character mix-up which leads to story confusion. Mob movies are particularly susceptible to this problem for two reasons. One, they naturally have a lot of characters. And two, most of the character names sound the same, ending in “-y” or “-ie” (Jonny, Billy, Tommy, Frankie) making it particularly easy to mix characters up. For this reason, whenever you write one of these scripts, it is essential that you make everybody memorable and distinctive. Here are a few tips to achieve this (note that these will work for any script with a lot of characters):
a. Only create characters if they’re absolutely essential to the story (less characters equals less of a chance the reader will forget who’s who).
b. Differentiate names as much as possible (don’t use “-y” and “-ie” names if you can avoid it). If you have to do this, consider using a nickname or their last name to identify them by.
c. Describe each character succinctly. No bare-bones “fat and awkward” descriptions.
d. Give each character their own unique quirks. Anything to make them stand out from the other characters.
e. Open up with a memorable character-specific scene for each of your big characters. So if you have a character who has a temper, open up with a unique compelling introductory scene that shows him losing his temper (like how we introduce Tommy in Goodfellas, who gets so mad at Billy for insulting him that he kills him).

9) Bounce around a large location easily by using mini-slugs – A mini-slug is basically a quick identifier of where we are inside a larger location. Since a full slug line indicates a more severe location change, it can ruin the flow of a scene if used often. For example, say two characters are bouncing around multiple rooms in a house. You don’t have to write, “INT. KITCHEN – SECOND FLOOR – DAY” every time you come back to the kitchen. Just say, in capital letters, and on their own line: “THE KITCHEN” or “THE BASEMENT” or “THE LIVING ROOM” or wherever the sub-location might be. These are mini-slugs.

10) The “powder keg” character – To me, these characters always work. If you write a slightly crazy character who could blow up at any second, then any scene you put them is instantly tension-filled. It’s like the character brings with him a floor full of pins and needles wherever he goes. It’s why Tommy DeVito (Joe Pesci) is such a classic character. We’re terrified of what he’s capable of. We’re worried that anyone at any moment could say the wrong thing and BOOM! – our powder keg blows up. If you can find a way to weave a powder keg character into your script (and it fits the story), do it. These characters always bring the goods.

These are 10 tips from the movie “Goodfellas.” To get 500 more of the most helpful screenwriting tips you’ll ever find, mined from movies as varied as “Aliens,” “Pulp Fiction,” and “The Hangover,” check out my book, Scriptshadow Secrets, on Amazon!

Will Smith experiences some less-than-stellar box office returns. Was it the script’s fault, the director’s fault, or a certain casting choice?

Genre: Sci-fi
Premise: (from IMDB) A crash landing leaves Kitai Raige and his father Cypher stranded on Earth, 1,000 years after events forced humanity’s escape. With Cypher injured, Kitai must embark on a perilous journey to signal for help.
About: After Earth has a story created by Will Smith in order to work with his son, Jaden. The script was penned by Gary Whitta, who five years ago broke in with his hot spec, “Book Of Eli.” Smith hired M. Night to direct the film, who did enough script work to garner a co-credit on the writing. The film underperformed at the box office this weekend, and critics gave it some of the worst reviews of any Smith film (it is currently at 12% on Rotten Tomatoes). This isn’t the first time Smith has worked with his son, who he teamed up with five years ago for The Pursuit of Happyness.
Writer: Gary Whitta and M. Night (story by Will Smith)
Details: 100 minutes

After Earth has had an interesting journey leading up to its release. It started out with a surprisingly cool trailer that everyone was abuzz over, but then, over the subsequent weeks, those same people began to rebel against it.  I’m guessing this has something to do with the nepotism involved here.  I understand why Smith wants to work with his son in his movies. If I were a giant movie star, I would want to work with my son too! But I’m not sure he considered how the pairing might be perceived. In America, we like and respect people who earn their way. In fact, that’s why we supported Smith’s ascent into the biggest movie star in the world. He embodied the American dream, coming from nothing, working his butt off, and becoming something.

So for him to just hand out film roles to his son, it looks bad. And I know Karate Kid did well and they did Pursuit of Happyness together, but Jayden Smith is not yet seen as someone who can do it on his own. He didn’t have to fight his way up the ladder like every other actor in Hollywood. It was handed to him. And there is something about him now being anointed as an action star just because his dad decided he could be one that’s annoying – and it probably had something to do with the movie underperforming this weekend.

When you then throw M. Night into the mix, it takes the bizarreness to a new level. What a strange choice, to pick a director who’s so vigorously alienated his audience. Personally, I think Night is a good director (just a bad writer). But to bring him in on a project like this, where you’re already gambling, feels like – I don’t know – almost like you want to prove you can do anything. You can make your son an action star and save a flailing director’s career all in one swoop.

All of this factors into the finished product in a fascinating way. If you strip away all these variables and just judge the script by itself, it’s actually pretty good. It has a clear goal, urgency, high stakes, character development. But it becomes very hard to see all of this when you’re so focused on the fact that Will Smith and his son are on the screen (as opposed to Cypher and Kitai, the characters the father-son duo are playing).

It’s 1000 years in the future. Humans have moved off the dying Earth to a much fresher planet. But on this planet are a lot of large, nasty alien creatures who are always giving them shit. These creatures can physically smell fear, which is how they take down their human prey. Cypher (Will Smith) is one of the few soldiers who have no fear (known as “ghosting” in this universe) and can therefore fight these creatures without them even knowing he’s there.

Teenager Kitai, Cypher’s son, is the opposite of his father. He’s racked with fear. He can’t fear enough. So (and this is where the story got a little confusing so bear with me) I think Cypher decides to take a ship and his son to another planet, along with one of these super-creatures, to train him on how to ghost. Why they don’t just do this on the planet they’re on is anyone’s guess. Along the way, the ship encounters a meteor shower and they crash-land on the planet humanity left 1000 years ago, Earth.

Everyone dies in the crash except for Cypher and Kitai, but Cypher is hurt badly, with a broken leg. If they don’t send a beacon back home for help, Cypher will most certainly die. So Kitai has to send the beacon. Here’s the rub. The beacon is in the tail section, which has crashed a hundred kilometers away. Kitai will have to travel there to get it. The problem, as Cypher points out, is that everything on Earth since they left has evolved into killing machines. So it looks like poor Kitai is going to have to have a crash-course in facing his fears.

The story consists, then, of Kitai traversing through the jungle to get to the tail section, all while Cypher guides him via a video and audio link. Throwing a huge wrench into this plan, finally, is the fact that that damn creature has survived the crash too, and humans are its favorite meal. So if Kitai is going to get past it and save his father, he’s going to have to learn how to ghost, a talent that will require him to overcome his flaw.

Okay, so like I said, the screenplay here was pretty well-plotted. We have a clear goal: Get to the tail section. We also have tons of urgency: Cypher is getting worse by the minute, and needs help immediately. And Whitta cleverly adds oxygen packets to the mix – little packets Kitai must take to be able to breathe on earth, where the atmosphere has worsened since we left. When two of these packets break, Kitai doesn’t have enough to get to the tail, adding even more urgency to his journey. And of course, the stakes are their lives. Dad’s dead if he doesn’t do this, and Kitai’s probably dead too. So the structure to this story is in place.

We also have some character development in the mix. Kitai’s flaw is clearly his fear, something he must overcome by the end of this journey if he’s to succeed. And we also have a somewhat broken relationship with his father that needs fixing. Along with Cypher’s lack of fear comes lack of emotion. He treats his son like a fellow soldier as opposed to a son, something that clearly affects Kitai, and something that will also need to be resolved before the journey is over. I don’t think Whitta and Night nailed either of these, but they did a pretty decent job with them.

In my opinion, the script has two major problems and a few minor ones. The opening was confusing. I didn’t understand why they were transporting this monster or where they were going exactly (I just kinda guessed). Part of that confusion stemmed from a choppy flash-forward flash-back opening that made following the story more difficult than it needed to be. You can’t have confusing openings because openings are what set up everything that comes after them. If there are confused questions there, those questions will linger in the back of the audience’s mind for the rest of the film.

I also thought it was strange that Cypher kept saying “Everything on Earth has evolved to kill humans” when the only thing that was truly dangerous was the thing that they brought there. But neither of those were script killers. The major issues boiled down to flashbacks and too simple of a story. It’s why I remind you guys whenever possible not to mess with flashbacks. They’re so hard to get right and even when they’re used correctly, the chances of them hurting your script are far greater than them helping it. Here we get endless repetitive flashback scenes where we see Kitai, as a young kid, watching his sister being mauled by the creature. I understood its intent (it established Kitai’s flaw – his fear – it built more of a rift between him and his father, who’s resentful that Kitai didn’t do more to stop the creature, and it made his final battle with the creature more personal), but it took a story that couldn’t afford to slow down and stopped it cold every ten minutes.

The reason the story couldn’t afford to slow down was because the story itself was too simple. It wasn’t complex enough with enough threads going on to earn the right to slow down.  I liked the goal, the urgency, and the stakes, but GSU or no GSU, the story has to keep you guessing or else you get bored. And we were way ahead of the story here the entire time. There were no surprises, no twists, and I think that’s ultimately (story-wise) what critics and audiences are responding so negatively to: there just wasn’t enough happening in After Earth.

When you combine that with Smith anointing his son an action hero and us not feeling like he’s earned it, you get Smith’s poorest reception ever. Personally, I don’t think this movie is nearly as bad as people are saying it is. I think a couple of script mistakes and one casting choice hurt it. But it’s certainly better than some of the other, more heralded, summer movies I saw this year.

Script Review

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

Movie Review

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

What I learned: Flashbacks are tough. There are certain things they can add – like giving us key backstory on a character, but what you lose through using them is often more than what you gain. The biggest downside to their use is that they slow your story to a crawl. The reason this is an issue is that the vast majority of scripts out there move too slow. To STOP the story so you can GO BACKWARDS is basically like saying to your audience, “You can go to sleep now.” I’m not saying you should never use flashbacks. What I’m saying is that because they usually do more bad than good, you should seriously weigh your options before including them and make sure you believe that there’s no other way to tell your story.