What is “movie logic?” Why should it never enter your script?

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: Action-Thriller
Premise: (from writers) A college professor takes a yacht trip with her investment broker husband, but their plan for a relaxing weekend getaway turns into a deadly struggle when the skipper targets them in retaliation for the husband’s financial crimes.
About: A couple of producers inquired about this script when it was originally posted two weeks ago. I know they got in touch with the writers but I haven’t followed up with them to see what happened. Maybe the writers can share the status of the script in the comments section.
Writers: Joey Gray & Tim Wollaston
Details: 112 pages

Offshore is a strange little script, so much so that I’m still not sure what to make of it. It starts off as a serious thriller, then devolves into such craziness that it borders on comedy. The writing style and tone is so different in the two halves that when I saw it was written by two writers, I wondered if one wrote the first half and the other the second.

What the script has going for it is that it’s a movie. What I mean by that is I can SEE this as a film. I can see it being marketed. I can see the trailer. I can see the poster. And that’s important. If a script can be easily marketed, the quality of the script itself doesn’t have to be as high. With that said, I just don’t know here. The last act feels like it was written too quickly, almost as if it were a school assignment and the student had to write the last thirty pages in one night. There’s something here, but unless there’s a producer who really REALLY wants to make this kind of movie right now, the script’s going to have to be rewritten a few times before it’s ready to be purchased.

Dr. Rebecca Graham is a well-known psychology professor who has a book out about post-partum depression. She has a young son who was born deaf, Mason, and the book helped her get through that post-pregnancy part of her life to the point where she’s finally pregnant again. Unfortunately, Rebecca ends up having a miscarriage.

In the meantime, her husband, Paul, an investment broker, is dealing with all sorts of shit at work. The SEC is coming in to do a full-on investigation of the company and Paul’s boss is freaking out. For reasons that aren’t completely clear to me, the boss tells Paul he should take the company yacht and just go out into the open waters and have fun (I suppose possibly to recover from his wife’s miscarriage? Although it seems strange to me that Paul would just leave in the middle of an SEC investigation).

Anyway, Paul and Rebecca head over to this gorgeous boat where they meet Jack, the captain, a slimy sort who lingers on Rebecca’s cleavage a little too long. Rebecca feels uncomfortable about the guy but Paul assures her he’s okay and off they go. Turns out Rebecca’s intuition was right. Once they’re out on the sea, Jack kills Paul, then explains to Rebecca that Paul screwed over his parents’ retirement fund, which financially destroyed their family, which resulted in his mom shooting up the family (in a scene that opens the script).

Now here’s where things become a little unclear. The implication is that Paul’s company didn’t actually lose that money, but rather illegally stole it, and has since invested it in an offshore account in the Caymen Islands. Whether this was Paul’s boss or Paul himself who did this, I still don’t know. Regardless, there is now an account with 20 million dollars in it, and that’s where they’re headed. Jack needs Rebecca to sign off on the account so he can get the money. Of course, Rebecca wants no part in this, and spends the majority of their time on the boat trying to escape, a plan complicated by the fact that some men back on shore may or may not have her son Mason, whom Jack’s threatening to kill if she doesn’t help him.

Here was my big problem with Offshore. I never really believed anything that was happening. People were constantly saying and doing things that I’m not sure they would say or do in the real world. For example, the SEC is coming in to do a full-on investigation of the company. Paul is a key person in the company. So he just…leaves? If Paul was running away from something, I could see this, but it’s not his idea to leave. It’s his boss’s. So wouldn’t Paul say, “Uhh, Todd, shouldn’t I stay here if the SEC is doing an investigation? They’re probably going to want to talk to me. If I go on a trip, they’re going to think I’m hiding something.” That conversation never happened. So right from the start, something felt off.

Then there were little things. Like once they get on the boat and encounter Jack, the boat’s super-sketchy captain, he leers at Rebecca like a piece of meat. However, less than an hour after this extremely uncomfortable moment, she agrees to let Jack rub sunscreen on her back. Uhhh, WHAT??? Or later, when Paul and Rebecca start making out on the bed, Rebecca looks at the door to see Jack standing there, watching them. When she freaks out, Jack darts upstairs, so by the time Paul turns around, Jack’s no longer there. Rebecca proceeds to tell her husband that Jack was standing there but Paul doesn’t believe her. WHAT?? Why in the world wouldn’t you believe your wife if she said that the creepy guy who’s operating the boat was just standing there watching them make out? It makes no sense. There’s also a moment where when they first come on the boat and Mason’s with them. Mason does something wrong and Jack violently grabs him and yells at him.

Now Jack will be revealed to be bad soon. But at this moment, before the boat’s left the dock, he has to pretend to be the good guy. These two are the key to him getting 20 million dollars. Why in the world would you potentially screw that up by violently snagging the couple’s child and yelling at him?? Which was another problem I had. There was no subtlety here. Everything was on the nose. Jack makes clear he’s the villain from the second he enters the script. Why not have him be overly nice instead? Why not have him seem like the perfect helpful captain? That way, once they’re out on the water and he turns evil, it’s a great twist.

On top of this, the explanation of the plot (particularly the plot twists) was confusing. At a certain point we learn that Paul (I think) was actually bad, that he had stolen that money from Jack’s family, and was now taking this boat to the Caymen Islands to retrieve it. That might have made sense if the boat trip was Paul’s idea, but it wasn’t. It was his boss’s. So once his boss told him to take the company boat to spend time with his wife, Paul thought, “Well, why not collect that money on the Caymen Islands while I’m at it?” That just didn’t make sense to me.

Also, when we finally get to the bank, Rebecca reads a letter that basically implies Paul was going to run away from her with their son and nanny. So I guess he was secretly in love with the nanny? This is on top of the nanny secretly being Jack’s sister, who was supposed to have died in that opening shooting scene but who actually survived and infiltrated Paul’s family in order to facilitate this eventual boat trip that would get Jack and his sis their money back. Oh yeah, and the nanny/sister also caused the miscarriage (by throwing the morning-after pill into Rebecca’s coffee every morning). So the nanny is secretly a sister AND Paul’s secret lover?

This seems so outrageous that I’m inclined to think I misread it, but that was the problem with the second half (specifically the third act). It felt rushed and therefore confusing, like the writers didn’t meticulously plot through everything to make sure it all made sense. Instead, it was laid out there in a wild frenzy, giving the climax an “all-nighter” feel, one of those situations where you’re happy to have just gotten it finished, regardless of what you wrote.

If I were Joey and Tim, the first thing I’d do is go through every character choice in Offshore and say, “Would the real-life equivalent of this character do this in real life?” If the answer is no, rewrite it until the answer is yes. Too many characters operate on movie-logic here and it constantly breaks the suspension of disbelief required for a reader to enjoy the story. On top of that, re-outline and re-write all the twists and turns and make sure they all make sense. There are one too many twists here, which break the spell of the story. I’d rather read a script that has fewer twists that all make sense, then one that has a lot of twists that confuse me.

Like I said, there’s something here. But in my opinion, this script needs a few more drafts before it’s ready for primetime.

Script link: Offshore

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

What I learned: I don’t know why so many writers make this mistake but unless you’re writing a comedy, you don’t want your characters constantly doing or saying things that people would never do or say in real life. This is known as “movie logic” and it always reads false. If Rebecca has seen Jack look her up and down like a piece of meat AND nearly beat her child, she’s not going to allow him to do something as intimate as put sunscreen on her back. She’s just not.

Now THAT’S a memorable character

Last week, I talked about outlining your plot. This week, I’m going to talk about outlining your characters. The more scripts I read, the more I realize that the thing that separates the men from the boys is character. Characters with flaws, characters with backstory, characters who arc, characters with internal conflict, characters with interesting unresolved relationships. You can feel depth when a well crafted character steps on the page. When I read “Where Angels Die” last Friday, I FELT Parker. I FELT those other characters. The writer didn’t just write those guys on a whim. He (as well as the author of the book) got to know everything about those people. If you want to be a serious writer, you have to do the same. Being able to develop compelling characters is one of the easiest ways to carve out a career in the screenwriting business.

Which leads to the question – How do you do that? Well, I’m not going to lie to you. It isn’t easy. Character-building takes a LOT OF TIME. But it’s time well-spent, as it’s the difference between a character who feels made-up and a character who feels real. The more you know about your character, the more of a real-life-quality he takes on. Because in a way, he’ll start to become real, since he’ll have lived an entire imaginary life in your head. Some screenwriters balk at the idea of working so hard before writing a script. But I’m telling you from experience – Every time I’ve encountered thin characters, I’ve asked the writer how much effort he put into them, and he’s conceded “not much.” And every time I’ve encountered deep rich characters, I’ve asked the writer the same question and they say, “a ton.” So it WILL make a difference. But it requires commitment.

Unfortunately, character outlining isn’t as linear as plot outlining. You’re going to be building multiple documents here, one for each of the primary (and secondary) characters. So with that said, these are the three main things you’re going to want to focus on when character outlining.

1) Character Handprint
2) Character Backstory/bio
3) Character Relationships

CHARACTER HANDPRINT
This is what I consider to be the heart of your character. These are the things that define him, that you can always come back to whenever you’ve lost sight of your character. They’re important because they’re actually going to be coming up in the story (as opposed to the stuff in a character bio, which is all backstory). So create a file for each of your major characters, and start by writing these three things down.

a) Your character’s story goal – What does your character want in your screenplay? You need to know this because every choice he makes will be in service to this objective. Maybe he wants an ancient Ark (Raiders). Maybe he wants a girl (Notting Hill). Maybe he wants to get sober. Maybe he wants to not get killed by aliens (War Of The Worlds). Maybe he wants a life of freedom again (American Beauty). Know what your character wants as it will provide him with focus and clarity (never to be underestimated – I read so many scripts with unfocused unclear characters and they’re all a mess). And don’t just do this for your hero (which is the easiest story goal to figure out). Do it for ALL your characters!  Find out what ALL of them want in the story.

b) Your character’s story motivation – What is the reason your character is pursuing the story goal? A character without a motivation will read false because we won’t understand why he’s doing anything. Also, a strong motivation is one of the easiest ways to create a strong character. Sometimes motivations are obvious (Tom Cruise’s character’s motivation in War of the Worlds is to survive). Other times they’re complex (Alonzo’s motivation in Training Day is to frame a rookie cop so he can score a big payday). You need to know why characters are doing things or else every decision they make comes off as false.

c) Your character’s flaw – Everybody’s got a flaw, something holding them back in life. Once you know a character’s flaw, you can create a journey that challenges it. Think of flaws as a one-sentence sound bite a person might use to describe someone else. My friend Jason’s flaw, for example, is that he never follows through with anything. My ex-girlfriend Kristin’s flaw is that she put everyone else above herself. An old co-worker, Doug, never put in the effort required to succeed at his dream. Think of anyone in your life. Chances are, you’re able to come up with a one-sentence sound bite that describes their weakness. This is actually a great way to find a flaw for your protagonist. Go through everyone you’ve known in life, find their defining flaw, and see if it fits your character. Once you have that, you can create a story that challenges the flaw. For example, with my ex-girlfriend, Kristin, I’d write a story where people are constantly taking advantage of her because of how selfless she is. She has to learn, by the end of the movie, how to say no and put herself first.

With these three things in hand, you have the core of your character at your fingertips. But that’s just the core. If you want to really know your character, you’re going to have to know everything about their life…

CHARACTER BACKSTORY/BIO
If you want to take the next step as a writer, you need to create character bios for your characters. This will suck. It will take a lot of time. It will feel like work instead of fun. But it’s the best way to add depth to your characters. So within the same document that you wrote your Character Handprint, you’ll now write up that character’s backstory, broken down from the day they were born to where they are now. The idea here is to write down all of their major life beats.  Although it’s up to you how you want to do it, most writers simply write a character bio like they would a story.  How long should these be?   Some are five pages long.  But I’ve seen them get up to twenty pages long.  It all depends on how much you want to put into it.  Cover anything you think is important, but here’s a cheat-sheet to help you along.

a) When your character was born.
b) Who his parents were (if they’re still alive/together).
c) Where they were born (this will inform their speech pattern and personality. Someone born on the streets of Philly will act and sound different from someone who grew up in the suburbs of Chicago).
d) What kind of person he was growing up (Popular? Outcast?).
e) What kind of school he went to.
f) Who his friends were.
g) Who his first girlfriend was (first kiss, first love, who he lost his virginity to).
h) Where he went to college.
i) His first, second, third jobs.
j) Anything else you’d consider a “major moment” in his life (i.e. loss of a friend, lost the big championship as a kid, a major car accident, jail time, period of being a drug addict).

The more specific you can get, the better. Knowing where your character went to college is one thing. Knowing if he got a full ride or paid with school loans could inform his current financial situation. If he’s still paying off those loans, he might be drowning in debt, which affects his mood, his disposition, his personality. He could be bitter that his expensive education didn’t amount to a more lucrative career. Do you see how the more you know, the more specific and REAL your character gets? Only a tiny fraction of this stuff gets into the script because it’s backstory. But it’s still important because it will inform the decisions your character makes, which is what will make him feel more real. And if you really really really want to know your characters well, use this questionnaire sheet. It’s not mine. It’s been on the web for awhile. But it’s SUPER SPECIFIC and forces you to get to know your character better than you know some of your best friends.  Your character is going to be REALLY FUCKING DEEP if you fill this out.

CHARACTER RELATIONSHIPS
You definitely want to map out all the key relationships in your screenplay. And for a relationship to resonate, it should have a central conflict within it, something that’s unresolved. If there isn’t something that needs to be resolved, the relationship probably won’t be memorable. Think of relationships as the story that’s going on behind the story. Your hero battles orcs while searching for the gold. That’s the plot. But he may need his son as a guide, a son who’s never respected him after he deserted the family when our hero was a child. If you do it right, the audience will be more interested in the relationships getting resolved than the actual plot. Story relationships typically boil down to five types. They are…

a) family relationships
b) friendships
c) romantic relationships
d) work relationships
e) your hero’s relationship with the villain.

The typical screenplay will almost always contain the first three. One family relationship gone bad. One friendship that’s suffering. And finally, a romantic relationship that never seems to be on stable ground. Depending on the genre you’re writing, though (say you’re writing an action comedy like the upcoming, The Heat), the focus might very well be on the work relationship (Sandra Bullock needing to work with Melissa McCarthy). Whatever the relationship, your job in the outline is to identify what the unresolved issue is between the characters that needs to be fixed. It might be two cops who don’t respect the others’ work approach (The Heat). It might be a past love who’s run away with someone else and the hero wants her back (Great Gatsby). It might be a father desperately trying to get his daughter’s respect back (Taken).

You can map relationships out in two ways. You can create a document JUST for relationships, or, within each individual character document, include a section for that character’s key relationships. I prefer the latter because a relationship is different depending on whose perspective you’re telling it from. So say you’ve got Rocky and Paulie. On Rocky’s page, you’d describe the relationship as Rocky feeling loyalty towards Paulie and trying to help him. On Paulie’s page, however, you’d describe the friendship as more desperate. He needs Rocky because he doesn’t really have anyone else. Whatever the case, when writing a character bio, write out every character that character comes in contact with, and what the central conflict (or unresolved issue) is between them. Occasionally, there will be little or even no issues between two characters (there’s no conflict between Brad Pitt’s character and his wife in World War Z, for example). But usually, you’ll have something that needs to be fixed.

IN CONCLUSION
There are a lot of people who will tell you this stuff is overkill. And there are some instances where I’d agree with them. If you’re writing your first or second script, for example, getting into all this detail can be counterproductive. You haven’t even learned how to write a scene yet. Getting into who your character was 20 years ago will just be distracting. Once you get past those beginning stages though, you need to OBSESS over character. Because characters are the most memorable part of a movie. When we think of our favorite films, we think of the characters we loved in those films first and then the story. And I can practically guarantee that any timeless character you love wasn’t thought up on the fly. A lot of time and effort was put into making that character feel like a real person. That’s all you’re doing here when you outline. You’re getting to know the people in your story as well as you know yourself so you can write them as if they really exist. Most readers’ biggest complaint is thin characters. I’ve just given you a way to make sure that never happens. Take advantage of it!

So last week I took some kryptonite-laced shots at the man of steel for being a “reluctant” protagonist, an issue I contend can destroy a screenplay. What’s a reluctant protagonist? It’s a hero who doesn’t want to take on the problem. I contend that we don’t like our heroes wimpy. We don’t like them sitting back and doing nothing. It’s the exact opposite of what the word “hero” means. However, there’s no such thing as a screenwriting rule that works across the board. There are times where the reluctant protagonist works, The Godfather being one of those examples. This gave me an idea to kill two birds with one stone. I’m not the foremost authority on The Godfather, and therefore wanted a reason to read it. And I knew that Michael Corleone, the main character, is a reluctant protagonist, which would allow me to see why the character works here when in so many other scripts, it doesn’t. I’ve also always been drawn to how slow stories work. Only the best writers know how to keep you turning the pages during a slow burn. So those are the main things I went into this script looking for. Let’s see if I found my answers, or any good tips for that matter. (you can have 500 MORE TIPS just like these by buying my e-book here)

1) Counter your hero’s reluctance with positive qualities – I think the biggest issue with reluctant heroes is when you couple them with a downbeat or depressed disposition. The combination of those two things always makes characters droll and boring. Look no further than Superman in Man of Steel for that. Instead, look for traits that CONTRAST that negative quality. One of the best traits you can use to offset this is charisma. Michael Corleone has it. William Wallace (a reluctant hero from Braveheart) had it. A double dose of negativity can quickly make your hero moody, depressed, and a downer. Steer clear of that with a positive trait (if not charisma then something else!).

2) If you have a reluctant protagonist, the earlier you can break out of being reluctant, the better – In actuality, most screenplays have reluctant protagonists at the start of the story. This is the period where they’d rather stay in the safety of their everyday lives than take on the pressures of this new adventure that’s presented itself. So we almost always see reluctant protagonists become willing and active participants at the beginning of the second act. For stories where this doesn’t happen, note that the longer you keep your hero reluctant, the more frustrated with him we’re going to get. Because we came to your movie to see your hero DO SHIT, not RESIST DOING SHIT. Michael Corleone starts being active pretty early, when he must protect his father after the assassination attempt.

3) There’s a difference between an reluctant active protagonist and an reluctant inactive protagonist – I think the problem I had with Man of Steel was that Clark was not only reluctant to do anything, he DIDN’T do anything. A reluctant character works much better if, even though he doesn’t want to get involved, HE DOES. Michael Corleone doesn’t want to be doing the things he’s doing, but he does them anyway. Another famous reluctant character, Mad Max, didn’t want to be there helping any of those people, but he did because it furthered his own agenda. Ditto with William Wallace. He didn’t want war, but he realized it needed to happen to free his country. So write a reluctant protagonist, just make sure he’s out there still being active.

4) If you have a character you need us to like who does bad things, introduce them doing good things – Vito Corleone (The Godfather) does a lot of bad shit. He’s hurt a lot of people.  He’s killed a lot of people. But the power of writing is that you can make the audience like ANYONE. Don’t believe me? Have you seen Silence Of The Lambs? Yes, writers have made cannibalistic serial killers likable.  One of the simplest ways to do this is to introduce your “bad” character doing something good. Vito Corleone is introduced helping a man whose daughter was beaten and nearly raped by two men who got away with it. He orders those men to be taken care of. How can you dislike a guy who’s taking down rapists?

5) Outline big party scenes – Big party/event/wedding scenes (anything with a lot of people) are some of the hardest to write. Writers often bounce around from character to character without a plan, which results in a messy directionless sequence. When you’re writing a big scene, like the famous wedding scene that opens The Godfather, make sure to plot out beforehand every character and what that character is doing. Preferably, you’ll have characters that need something during the sequence (a goal!), as that tends to make things more focused and interesting. Here we’d map out all the people coming to the Godfather with their requests. We’d map out Miachel showing up with his new girlfriend – what they’re going to talk about and why. We’d map out a scene to show that Carlo, who’s marrying the Don’s daughter, is sketchy. We’d map out Michael’s brother Sonny, who cheats on his wife with one of the bridesmaids. Map all of this out ahead of time and make sure each set of characters is doing something IMPORTANT. That’ll keep you from lingering on irrelevant stuff, which is where these big sequences go to die. Have a plan and you’ll do just fine at your next wedding.

6) A reluctant protagonist in a drama has a much better chance of working than a reluctant protagonist in an action film – Know what genre you’re writing when considering the reluctant protagonist. In an action movie, when your audience wants a lot of action, it’s going to be pretty silly if your main character is avoiding it all. In a slower drama, however, where plot and action aren’t as important, you have more freedom to play with a reluctant lead. I’d still be wary of it, but you do have more freedom there.

7) The best setups and payoffs establish high stakes during the setup – Remember, a payoff doesn’t really resonate unless you establish high stakes when it’s set up. That’s what makes the famous “horse head in the bed” scene so powerful. The day before, Jack Woltz, our unlucky movie producer, shows Hagen (Don’s lawyer) his horse stable and gushes about how much he loves horses, especially one in particular, a 600,000 dollar horse which he’ll put out to stud, leading to endless riches. Guess which head ends up under his covers? This scene doesn’t work the same way if Woltz casually passes a race track and barely points out a horse that he likes. We build the stakes up high by having him LOVE this horse.

8) Always look for an indirect way to handle backstory/exposition – Remember, one of the most boring ways to convey backstory or exposition is to lay it out in a very straightforward manner via dialogue. Instead, try to find an angle that conveys the information in a nontraditional way. They did this quite cleverly in The Godfather. Michael tells Kay (his girlfriend who knows nothing about his family’s lifestyle) about Luca Brazi, the muscle for his father. His story is about how Luca was sent over to take care of these men who attacked his father. The backstory for this character he gets into is very graphic and violent. But Coppola added an angle. Michael is smiling while he’s telling the story, so Kay isn’t sure if he’s telling the truth. Gone is the on-the-nose boring rundown we’re USED TO in these situations, replaced by a, “is he or isn’t he telling the truth” angle that makes the same information kind of fun. It’s a slight change, but it’s these slight changes that separate you from the next guy, who’s doing it the obvious way.

9) Conflict, suspense and mystery are your friends when writing a slow story – When you don’t have urgency (as is the case with The Godfather), you need to use other tools to keep your audience interested, or else they get impatient. You do this with these three tools: suspense, conflict, and mystery (and tension – though it can be argued that tension is conflict). Consistent use of these should keep even the slowest stories interesting. We see conflict, for example, in all of the requests of Vito Corleone, who makes his guests work for it. We see tension in his relationship with Michael, who doesn’t want to be involved in the family business. We have suspense in what’s going to happen with Johnny, the movie star who desperately needs a part from a producer who won’t give it to him, in Michael needing to save his father at the hospital when he knows the bad guys are coming, and leading up to the dinner where Michael plans to kill the police chief and Sollozzo. There aren’t a lot of mysteries in The Godfather, but that’s an option for you to use as well. If you’re writing a slow screenplay and you’re not using these three tools frequently, your script is probably boring.

10) How committed are you? – The more I read, the more I find that the deepest most emotionally affecting stories are based on books and real life. Why? Because the writer has tons of backstory and character knowledge to draw from. When a screenplay is written from nothing, the writer often doesn’t fill in the details that happened before the story. As a result, the characters never project any depth (why would they? They never existed before they were placed on the page). I’ve constantly been looking for a solution to this. How does one manage the same depth of a book adaptation without writing a book? Is it possible? Or should a screenwriter actually write a book before his screenplay? It sounds nuts but I GUARANTEE you, if you did that, your screenplay would be a hundred times deeper than if you didn’t. And aren’t we all looking for an advantage over the next guy?  Reading the opening of The Godfather (based on the book by the same name), with this huge wedding, with Vito Corleone listening to requests for help, with Sonny cheating on his wife, with Vito’s daughter desperately trying to keep a man she barely has, with Michael introducing his new girlfriend to everyone, to Luca Brazi, to movie stars pleading for a break, a spec writer just wouldn’t know or care about 75% of these characters. They’d know their hero, they’d know the second most important guy in the scene, and then maybe one other character (the lead girl). Everybody else they’d know their first name, what they’re wearing, and that’d be it. And that’s exactly why all spec scripts feel so thin. To measure up to this expected level, try to write as much backstory as you possibly can on every character in order to give them as rich and as detailed of a history as you can. Then and only then, will they project the kind of depth and presence characters in adapted scripts like The Godfather project.

URGENCY solves all your screenplay’s ills!

Genre: Zombie/Horror/Thriller/Action
Premise: (from IMDB) United Nations employee Gerry Lane traverses the world in a race against time to stop the Zombie pandemic that is toppling armies and governments, and threatening to destroy humanity itself.
About: World War Z, the movie, has had its own apocalypse leading up to its release. Its well-publicized awful third act (which forced the studio to rewrite and reshoot the whole thing) steered buzz on the film towards Death Valley. Things didn’t exactly get better when geek screenwriting whipping boy Damon Lindelof came on to “save” the movie. But just like a zombie, the film came back from the dead and started building positive word-of-mouth with strategic early screenings and that cleaned up ending. Projected by much of Hollywood to bomb, the film made $66 million this weekend, 16 million more than the studio’s best case scenario. It looks like all aspects of World War Z got an improved ending.
Writers: Matthew Michael Carnahan and Drew Goddard & Damon Lindelof (story by Matthew Michael Carnahan and J. Michael Straczynski) (based on the novel by Max Brooks)
Details: 116 minutes

I’m not sure why everyone thought this was going to flop. The trailers looked awesome. It had Brad Pitt in it. What else do you need to get butts in seats?

I actually read an early draft of this script a long time ago and there were textbook problems with it that needed changing if this movie was going to have a shot. They made those changes (nailed them, in fact) and voila, we have a MUCH BETTER script and therefore a MUCH BETTER movie.

World War Z follows United Nations agent Gerry Lane as he and his family (wife and two daughters) are beginning their day. As they’re driving through the city, chaos erupts, with crazed possessed people attacking and killing everyone in sight. Those victims then turn into attackers as well, creating an exponential path of destruction.

In a harrowing opening 20 minutes, Gerry leads his family to safety and eventually to an extraction point where the government picks them up. They head to the only safe area on the planet, military boats in the middle of the sea, and everyone starts trying to find out what’s going on.

What’s going on is a particularly lethal strain of zombie. One that’s making quick work of the planet. If they don’t do something soon, these boats may be their final destination. Just like any plague, if you find out the source (Patient 0), you have a chance of coming up with a vaccine. Because Gerry’s job is to go into dangerous places and get answers, he’s a natural fit to go searching for this patient.

Problem is, every country is being overrun by zombies. So it’s sort of like sending a tree into a field of chainsaws. The chances of making it out with all your bark in tact isn’t very good. Gerry starts his investigation in South Korea, which experienced the worst of the attacks. Clues there eventually lead him to Israel, which somehow knew to build a zombie wall before the zombie outbreak even began. These guys were onto something and Gerry wants to know what.

While there, however, our clever (and quite energetic) zombies, figure out a way to scale the walls and overrun the city, forcing Gerry to make a harrowing escape on a passenger plane. That plane eventually leads him to a World Health Organization center where Gerry uses the clues he’s gathered to (spoiler) come up with a vaccine.

Okay, are you guys ready for today’s big screenwriting lesson?

URGENCY!!!

This script proves how important urgency is to a story. Why do I say that? Because I have the old script to compare it to.

In that version, the script tried to stay true to the novel. The novel was more about the AFTERMATH of the zombie outbreak. It took a “Post-Hurricane Katrina” approach to things, with Gerry trying to find who was to blame for the outbreak rather than Patient 0.

That’s fine for a book. But shit like that don’t fly in movies. In a movie, you need urgency. I’m surprised they didn’t figure this out right away – that they paid a writer to write a draft that had no hope of pleasing audiences. But someone finally got it right. They realized that telling everything in flashbacks and having Pitt strolling around countries leisurely without a single immediate threat didn’t lend itself to an exciting flick.

The brilliance of World War Z, the movie, is that it never slows down. Outside of the opening scenes establishing the family together, once the zombies hit, they never stop hitting. And for that reason, Gerry had to do his investigation WITH THE THREAT OF BEING KILLED AT ANY MOMENT as opposed to the threat of getting a paper cut at any moment. And everywhere he went, the zombie threat was right behind him. I know some people don’t like fast zombies, but they multiplied the urgency in this case a thousand fold and really made things exciting.

The best example of this was in Israel. We saw these zombies clamoring to get inside the country and we knew it was only a matter of time before they did. So when Pitt’s investigating, he doesn’t have time to hop around the country meeting numerous people and getting detailed rundowns. He talks to one dude before the zombies scale the wall and he’s running for his life.

World War Z is actually the prototypical GSU script. You have the Goal (find Patient Zero so you can create a vaccine), the stakes (Gerry being reunited with his family AS WELL AS the fate of the human race) and the urgency (zombies always on their tail).

Speaking of, that was another great change Damon Lindelof and Drew Goddard made. They actually suggested going back and adding the family scenes at the beginning of the movie, as well as another phone call between Gerry and his wife during the second act. They wanted more stuff between the family. They know that GSU doesn’t work unless the audience CARES ABOUT THE CHARACTERS and WANTS THEM TO REUNITE.

One of the best ways to create that caring is to create a family unit, a pair (or a group) of people who we want to see reunited. You do this by showing the family together, show how much they care for each other, then rip them apart. If Gerry is ONLY trying to save the world here, this movie doesn’t work. It’s that we want to see him back together with his family that keeps us so invested.

As for the ending, I don’t know what they changed the script from, but you can tell where the split happened. Clearly, that plane was going somewhere else in the old film. Now the plane crashes and Gerry comically walks over to the World Health Organization, which just happens to be a pleasant 5 minute walk form the crash site.

But once Gerry’s in the building, things pick up splendidly. Lindelof and Goddard create their own little mini-movie with new GSU. The goal is for Gerry to get a special bottle the scientists need in B-Wing, the stakes are, once again, survival of mankind, and the urgency isn’t as prominent, since the situation is so fraught with tension (the zombies potentially spotting them at any time). For coming up with this ending as quickly and under as much pressure as they did, they really did a great job.

You know, I got to thinking about this movie and wondering why it was so good, despite its mechanics being so simple. There are no real surprises in this script, no x-factor. It was all straightforward. I was reminded of a movie from earlier this summer that had a similar structure, yet wasn’t nearly as good: After Earth.

In that movie, we have the family unit (Dad and son) and a clear goal with high stakes and lots of urgency (son must get to the tail section to retrieve the S.O.S. beacon). So why did it fall so short of this one? A few things stuck out to me. The first was that the stakes were so much higher in World War Z. In After Earth, only the father and son’s lives were at stake. World War Z had the lives of the family at stake AS WELL AS the entire world.

A second problem was that the obstacles were so much greater in World War Z. I always talk about the value of creating big impossible obstacles for your characters and I never saw that in After Earth. Everything the son ran into was bad, but never “Oh shit ohmygod holy shit we’re fucked” bad. Contrast that to World War Z, which has tons of these moments. I mean at one point Gerry is watching the plane he’s on be overrun by zombies and must decide whether to blow a hole in the side of the plane with a grenade, effectively crashing it, or take on the zombies in close combat. Now THAT’S what I call an obstacle.

The other problem was that After Earth’s storyline was too simple. You were always way ahead of the story. World War Z squashed that issue by creating a central mystery to the storyline: What happened? Pitt needed to put together clues to figure out what happened in order to get to each successive clue. In After Earth, the kid didn’t really have to figure out anything. His father just told him where to go and he followed orders.

And that’s ANOTHER reason why this is such a great screenplay to study. On top of all this, we have a snapshot of the proper way to write a protagonist: HE’S ACTIVE! Pitt is making his own choices, figuring things out himself, and charging forward. Isn’t that a way more interesting protagonist than one who just follows orders from his dad the whole movie?

That’s not to say World War Z was without fault. What keeps this from being impressive are some of the glaring logic oversights. Israel is being heralded as this genius country for building a wall before anybody else to keep the zombies out. Yet they’re allowing random planes to land on their runway and random people from those planes to hop into their city without enduring – oh, I don’t know – a QUARANTINE.

Ditto for the random folks they’re letting through the wall. If someone can take as long as 10 minutes to turn, why are you allowing people into your city after a Q & A session that basically amounts to “Are you a zombie?” The plane that Gerry and crew stop and board is the worst example of this. Gerry’s helping along a pale sickly woman, who’s coming with him. She never turns into a zombie, but if you’re those pilots, aren’t you thinking she might?? And yet they never blinked. Yeah, sure, come on in.

I understand why they did this. They balanced the audience’s need for logic against the audience’s need for urgency. It’s a problem screenwriters are constantly faced with. You could have had Gerry and crew placed into quarantine for 12 hours after they landed in Israel to be more realistic, but it would’ve killed the momentum. I’m not sure there’s a universal solution for this. It needs to be addressed on a case by case basis. But my gut tells me they needed it here. Because everybody looked like morons for never once considering the fact that the new guy they’re letting in the room might be infected.

The thing was, everything else was so damn well done that I thoroughly enjoyed myself. I mean there isn’t a slow moment in the movie. So congrats to the writers who worked so hard on this. It paid off!

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

What I learned: I always talk about giving your protagonist a difficult choice at the end of the movie, something that challenges their fatal flaw. This reminded me that you don’t want to ONLY wait for that ending to do this. You should give your characters difficult choices WHENEVER YOU CAN in the script. I loved the scene in the plane where Gerry is watching the zombie mayhem get closer and closer, and must make an impossible decision. He’s got a grenade he can throw at them, which will crash the plane and probably kill him, or he can try and fight the zombies off, which will probably kill him. Those are the great moments in scripts, where you see the character battling that impossible choice.

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: Wonder Woman
GENRE: Action Adventure, Action Comedy, Superhero and Comic Book
LOGLINE: Amazon Warrior Princess Wonder Woman enters the world of men to stop Doctor Psycho and his evil plans for a never-ending world war, and maybe find a little love too.

TITLE: Paralleled
GENRE: Sci-Fi/Thriller/ Character Drama
LOGLINE: 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.

TITLE: Anyway But Dead
GENRE: Action/Adventure, Crime
LOGLINE: Two corrupt police officers are marked for death after stealing five million dollars belonging to a vicious crime lord.

TITLE: Abstract
GENRE: Drama/Dark Comedy
LOGLINE: A man on the brink of suicide stumbles upon a homeless art prodigy who will physically die if he stops creating art.
WHY YOU SHOULD READ (from writer): “I’m a 22 year old screenwriter who has been writing scripts since I was 13 — started with pen and paper. I’ve had three shorts produced, the latest just screened at the Cannes film festival in France,and I’ve had one feature optioned. So why am I here? I love your opinions, and this a script I’ve had offers on, but could never come to an agreement.”

TITLE: Evacuation London
GENRE: Sci-Fi
LOGLINE: As London is nuked in a last ditch attempt to fight off a sinister alien force, a young gang member and his reluctant travel companion must fight their way through the underground system to safety.