Genre: Crime/Noir
Premise: A private detective investigating an adultery case stumbles onto a larger conspiracy involving the Los Angeles water system.
About: Chinatown has been called one of the greatest films ever made. It was nominated for eleven Academy Awards in 1974, winning for Best Original Screenplay. In 1971, producer and all around kook Robert Evans originally offered Robert Towne $175,000 to write a screenplay for The Great Gatsby. But Towne came back with a different idea, asking for $25,000 to write his own story, Chinatown. It was the first part of Towne’s planned trilogy about the character J.J. Gittes. The second part, The Two Jakes, was about another grab for a natural resource — oil — in the 1940s. It was directed by Jack Nicholson and released in 1990, but the film’s commercial and critical failure scuttled plans to make the third film. Evans intended for the screenplay to have a happy ending with Cross dying and Evelyn Mulwray surviving. Evans and Polanski argued over it, with Polanski insisting on a tragic end. The two parted ways due to the dispute and Polanski wrote the final scene just a few days before it was shot. The original script was over 180 pages long. Polanski eliminated Gittes’ voiceover narration (hey, see what happens when you get rid of voice over! An Oscar!), which was written in the script, and structured the movie so the audience discovered the clues at the same time Gittes did. (Wikipedia)
Writer: Robert Towne
Details: 123 pages

If you polled every established screenwriter in the business and asked them what the best screenplay ever written was, Chinatown would probably come out on top. The Robert Towne screenplay is considered to be the gold standard of screenwriting. So one day while drinking a glass of Cavasia and watching the tail end of the women’s professional bowling championships, it hit me like a sack of bricks: How come I haven’t reviewed the greatest screenplay ever written? It seemed like an odd oversight.

Now I have a confession to make. I’ve never been a huge fan of Chinatown. It’s not that I don’t like the film. I think it’s okay. I just never understood the immense love for it. I mean, let’s be honest for a minute. It’s a murder mystery about water corruption. Try pitching that at your next meet-and-greet. For that reason, I’ve never sat down and read the screenplay from cover to cover. But all that was about to change so I could answer the eternal question that has been burning in screenwriting circles for centuries: Is Chinatown really the best screenplay ever written?

I’m not going to summarize the whole plot because the movie is too well-known. But for you youngsters who don’t know what the acronym “VHS” stands for, I’ll give you a quick synopsis. Chinatown is about private investigator Jake Gittes, who begins investigating the murder of Hollis Mulwray, the chief engineer for the Los Angeles Department of Water and Power back in the 1930s. It appears Mulwray was sniffing up the wrong tree in a larger conspiracy meant to protect the DWP’s interest in other parts of the water-starved city. Jake becomes chummy with Evelyn Mulwray, Hollis’ wife, who helps him piece together the mystery behind Hollis’ shocking death. But it soon becomes clear that Evelyn herself is hiding a dark secret, one that will help explain just how deep this conspiracy goes.

Okay so let’s get right to it then. Is Chinatown the best screenplay ever written? The answer to that question is no. Well, at least in my opinion the answer is no. I still think Back To The Future is the best screenplay ever written. But that’s a debate for another time. What surprised me, despite never holding this movie in high regard, was that once I stripped away all the images, once I forgot about the film and Jack Nicholson and just concentrated on the words, how good of a script it really was.

I’ll start with the first 15 pages. A big problem I have with most crime/murder mysteries is that they follow the same boring opening template:  “Dude gets murdered. Time to start looking for the killer.” A monkey could set up that scenario. Here, things are quite different. Mrs. Mulwray hires Gittes to see if her husband is cheating on her. He does a little investigating, finds out that he is. But after the investigation is over, a new woman walks through the door claiming *she* is Mrs. Mulwray. Which means the other woman was a fake.

Okay, when I say that professional writers make more original choices in their stories than amateurs, this is exactly what I mean. This is not a setup I’m used to seeing. Just like yesterday, in my review of Nautica, it passes my murder-mystery test of not just setting up the lazy question of “who killed the dead guy,” but poses a much more complicated series of questions, starting with, why the hell would a woman pretend to be someone else’s wife and hire a private investigator to follow her non-husband? It just doesn’t make sense. Interestingly enough, it isn’t until AFTER this scenario that the principal murder takes place, leaving us really confused about what the hell is going on. This multi-faceted setup is what hooks us. It’s different. It’s unique. We need to know what happened.

Another notable thing about the Chinatown script is its story density. One of the problems I had with Amateur Friday Randy Steinberg’s script (I love you Randy. Just using your script as an example!) was that there was no story density, no subplots, no character development, which led to a very “thin” feeling plot. Here, we have several intriguing threads going on at once. There’s the Hollis murder. There’s the city water conspiracy. There’s the mystery behind Evelyn. And then there’s the Ida Sessions stuff (the mysterious girl who first claimed to be Hollis’ wife). There were even a couple of smaller threads as well, making sure Chinatown always felt rich and complex. Of course, handled shoddily, these multiple threads could’ve led to the story feeling overplotted (read my Die Hard 2 review to see what I mean by “shoddy”), but everything’s been so well thought through here – each thread exists for such a specific purpose – that that’s never the case.

I also love how every key character in Chinatown has a real backstory, and that those backstories are multi-dimensional. Take Evelyn for example. She’s not simply the innocent wife. She’s been having affairs of her own, implying all sorts of things about her marriage. We never find out exactly what happened there, but we get enough of a whiff to imagine a rich full complicated history between the two.  If you can do that in your screenplay, you can make the audience believe that the characters they’re watching are real.  Because backstory implies a life before the movie existed, which tricks the brain into thinking the people they’re watching exist in real life.  Of course, if it’s some cliche generic backstory, we never get that sense, leading to the opposite effect – us not believing the characters are real.

I also thought the way Towne handled the backstories was great. When it came time to tell the story points that mattered, he went into great detail. But when it was time to get into backstory that didn’t necessarily affect the plot, Towne wisely showed restraint, something very few writers are able to do in the same circumstance. For instance, when it finally comes time for Gittes to dish about Chinatown, he doesn’t really tell us anything. He just implies how terrible it was. Such a nice change from the kind of thing I usually see (“Well, my partner and I were walking down an alley. And there was this 7 year old kid dealing drugs. I didn’t want to shoot him, but the gun went off accidently….”)

Chinatown is also a great example of how to construct conflict within the central relationship. With Gittes and Evelyn, there are actually two elements of conflict happening at all times. First, he doesn’t 100% trust her. So there’s always a restraint there, a cautious wall he puts up, which adds a nice subtext to their conversations. And also, there’s sexual tension between the two. Both characters are attracted to each other, which also plays into their dialogue, and nicely contrasts with the lack of trust. This is by no means a new device, but it works particularly well in this relationship for some reason.

As far as what’s not in this script, there’s no real ticking time bomb here, which I guess is not surprising since that was less of a concern back in the 70s. Everybody had all the time in the world so who cares if things get finished now or later? Now would it have helped Chinatown? I think yes, it would have. Not dramatically. But there were a few times in the script where we could’ve used some momentum. Also – and you’ll have to excuse me if this is a bigger deal in the movie because I’m just going off the script (it’s been ten years since I saw the film) – but there’s no true villain here. I mean, there are some smaller villains. And of course Cross is pretty bad. But here in the script he shows up late and the extent of his evil is only revealed in the final act. One of my big things is to try to get a great villain in your script. So it was interesting that Chinatown chose to cloak its villain for the majority of its story.

You know it’s funny. If this showed up on my desk for the first time today, I’d probably say, “Change the water conspiracy to something more interesting and get the opening act moving faster.” But otherwise, this script really is a master class in crafting a character-driven mystery. It’s not the greatest script ever written in my opinion, but I can’t fault others for believing it is.  It’s damn good writing.

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

What I learned: Restrained information. There are two instances where big parts of the characters’ pasts are set up, yet both times, very little or the barest amount of information is given. With Evelyn, it’s how she got pregnant. With Gittes, it’s Chinatown. Notice how Evelyn doesn’t go into extreme detail about the experience. “My mom died. He was angry. I was 15. I ran away.” It’s just quick flashes of information. And as I noted before, with Gittes, it’s not any specific thing that happened in Chinatown. It’s more the character’s reaction to the memory than the memory itself. These moments always tend to work better with restraint, and Chinatown is proof of that. Less is more people. Less is more.

Genre: Thriller/Mystery
Premise: An investigator tries to solve a murder case on a ship that involves a handyman, a young stock broker and the stock broker’s girlfriend.
About: Nautica was originally written and sold back in 2001 and was going to be directed by Tarsem Singh. As so often is the case in Hollywood though, things fell apart and the project was quickly forgotten. More recently, however, Summit picked up the pieces and is repackaging the Dead Calm like thriller with a new untainted title – Riptide. Brad Pitt and Shia Labeouf are rumored as possible co-stars. This is the original 2001 script.
Writer: Richard McBrien
Details: 117 pages – 2001 draft (This is an early draft of the script. The situations, characters, and plot may change significantly by the time the film is released. This is not a definitive statement about the project, but rather an analysis of this unique draft as it pertains to the craft of screenwriting).

How the hell this thing has been lingering in obscurity for ten years is beyond me. This is a really fucking good script. It’s not like G.J. Pruss’ Passengers, which hasn’t been made because the script’s appeal doesn’t translate to screen. Or Dogs of Babel, which is an amazing script but tough to market.

It basically has all the ingredients to be made into a movie. It’s got three great characters. It’s got thrills. It’s got mystery. It has gob-stopping suspense. And best of all, it’s told in a slightly unique way, giving it that “something different” factor. Jesus, all you’d have to do is sign Justin Bieber up for a cameo and this movie would print money.

The story goes a little something like this. Investigator Geoff Anderson shows up on a small island in the Pacific to arrest island hopper and all around drifter Max Shilton. Max has been found clinging to life in a yacht belonging to Frank Cotter, a successful stock broker.

500 miles away, Frank Cotter’s body has been found discarded in the ocean, and the barely identifiable sack of bloated pus shows signs of struggle consistent with murder. Anderson believes Max killed Frank for his boat and his money. But he’s about to find out there’s a lot more to this story.

A flashback begins, where Max explains he was a penniless handyman stuck on an island. Out of nowhere, Frank, an old acquaintance of his from high school, shows up on the island in a multi-million dollar yacht and a beautiful woman by his side, Kathy. The two get to talking, and when Frank learns there may be bad storms ahead, he hires Max as a navigator.

Within hours, Max and Kathy begin flirting. There’s clearly a strong sexual attraction here, and the two are stealing passionate kisses whenever the opportunity arises. When Frank starts to sense it, however, tension mounts. In a vulnerable moment, Frank pushes Max off the boat. Max is able to bring Frank down with him and a struggle ensues, climaxing in a life-struggling kick to Frank’s face which accidentally kills him. That, according to Max, is what really happened. It was all just an accident.

Anderson’s not buying it. Luckily, he also has Kathy in custody. So he goes to get her side of the story. Surprisingly, she defends Max. It’s true, she says, that he didn’t kill Frank. But Max also left out some key details. There’s much more to this story.

Kathy and Frank used to live in New York, with Frank being a successful foreign exchange trader. However, Frank was secretly skimming money off the top. When some investors found out, they stormed the offices and killed a couple of his co-workers. Frank was able to escape with 15 million bucks, but had nowhere to hide. So he and Kathy bought a boat and headed out to the middle of the Pacific, where they could never be found.

When Frank spotted Max, the old friend he grew up with, he feared that word would get out where he was hiding. Which is, of course, why he hired Max as a navigator, so he could kill him.

Naturally, this is just the beginning. Each time we go back, more and more details are revealed, molding and shaping our story into something increasingly elaborate. Suffice it to say, you’ll be guessing what happened all the way up to the end.

Nautica is a great little script for a lot of reasons, and it starts with the mystery at hand. Of all the things that drive an audience’s interest in a story, a good mystery is near the top of the list. Think about Monday’s script, Red Harvest. The mystery (who killed Willsson) started us off, and wasn’t bad, but it was solved quickly. So what’s left? Nothing. Kill the mystery, kill the interest.

Now there have been thousands of movies and TV shows that have started off with a murder. So what makes Nautica different? Simple. The mystery inspires multiple questions. First, our “killer” is clinging to life on this boat when we find him. Why? Second, the owner’s body was found 500 miles away. Why? Third, the wife of the murder victim is siding with the supposed killer instead of her husband. Why? Our brain is bouncing around like a room full of ping pong balls on mouse traps trying to link these events together. From the very first page, we’re actively engaged, which is what every writer in the world is trying to accomplish.

Here’s the thing about Nautica though. It’s a pretty messy narrative. We’re jumping back from past to present, present to past, different points of view, piecing together the story. I’d be hard pressed to identify a three act structure here. And as someone who believes strongly in the three act structure, I had to sit back and ask, “Okay, why is this still working then?”

And I remembered that if the central element that’s driving your story is strong enough, the structure isn’t as important. In this case, the mystery of what happened is so powerful that the usual story beats an audience craves aren’t necessary. It’s a distraction thing. We’re so distracted by the mystery that we’re not focusing on the nontraditional way the story’s being told.

Now I’m by no means advocating a free-for-all when it comes to structure. Only that it’s possible to have a messy structure if your script is focused in other ways (in this case, with the mystery). Here’s the thing though. The lack of structure does eventually come back to bite this script in the butt. There’s a portion of the story between pages 60 and 90 where the lack of focus results in a series of scenes that feel redundant and or unnecessary. This kind of thing happens when the structure isn’t in place because structure is what dictates the scenes you’re going to write next. Without it, you’re like a ship lost at sea. You think you’re going the right way – and maybe you are – but it’s taking you longer to get there than you’d like. It’s why this script is 117 pages – when a thriller with three characters probably shouldn’t run over 100.

My only other beef with Nautica is the ending, and I’m going to allude to but not give away a spoiler here, so turn away if you don’t want to know. A good twist ending should jolt you, make you think for a few seconds, then have the “Ohhhh” moment. The Sixth Sense is the perfect example. It confuses you for a brief second, but then you’re like, “Ohhhhh.” I think Nautica’s twist ending works, but you have to think about it and work things out in your head a little too extensively before the “Ohhhhhh” comes. And it’s not a very long “Ohhhhh.” It’s more like, “Oh yeah, that works,” which isn’t as satisfying.

Still, I loved this script. I know a script is working when I keep getting duped and immediately afterwards think, “How the hell did I just get duped by that?” Nautica has a lot of those moments. I thought long and hard about whether to give this a double worth-the-read or an impressive. I really am stuck in the middle. But in the end, the question is, “Did this script entertain me all the way through?” And the answer is yes. So impressive it is.

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

What I learned: A good murder mystery starts off with a murder that has the reader asking multiple questions, not a single question. A single question is good enough for a weekly cop show (“Who killed this guy?”). But a film should have your mind racing on several fronts. If you look at movies like Seven for instance, when they come across that first body, it isn’t as simple as, “Who killed this guy?” It’s “What the hell happened here?” There’s a bigger picture involved. And it’s our need to figure out that big picture that makes us want to keep reading.

NOTE: I notice people are discussing spoilers in the comments. This is one of those scripts where even the mention of similar movies hints at what the spoilers are, so please note all spoilers, and readers please traverse the comments at your own risk!

Genre: Dark Comedy
Premise: Three siblings deal with the fallout of their father’s successful children’s book series that based its lead character on their baby brother.
About: Bobby Blue Sky was purchased last year and will star Paul Rudd, Topher Grace and Kristin Wiig. The writer, Emily Kapnek, has been working in TV as both a writer and producer for five years now. She’s worked on the under-appreciated Parks and Recreation, and the hit HBO show, Hung.
Writer: Emily Kapnek
Details: 99 pages (This is an early draft of the script. The situations, characters, and plot may change significantly by the time the film is released. This is not a definitive statement about the project, but rather an analysis of this unique draft as it pertains to the craft of screenwriting).

Awhile back I was talking about “degree of difficulty” and how it relates to screenwriting. If it were as easy as coming up with a great idea and executing it, every screenwriter would be a millionaire. One of the reasons a lot of scripts fail is because the writer doesn’t understand that they’ve established a degree of difficulty higher than what they’re capable of pulling off.

Once again, the simplest stories to tell are the ones with a clear main character who has a clear main objective (or goal). Rocky. The King’s Speech. Raiders of The Lost Ark. Shrek. Main character wants something. Main character tries to get something. The more you deviate from that formula, the more elusive a successful execution of your story becomes.

The problem, of course, is that the best way to separate yourself from the pack is to write something different – something unique. And therein lies the rub. The more unique the idea, the higher the degree of difficulty. Ugh. No wonder this screenwriting thing is so hard.

Bobby Blue Sky is a script that has a high degree of difficulty – maybe higher than it realizes – and for that reason, spends a lot of its running time fighting against itself. It’s a strange beast, because its quirky sensibilities really shine in places. But there are just as many moments where the light goes out and you find yourself desperately feeling for a way out of the room.

I don’t usually like quotes at the beginning of scripts, but this one sets up the story perfectly. “It seemed to me, almost, that my father had got to where he was by climbing upon my infant shoulders, that he had filched from me my good name and had left me with nothing but the empty fame of being his son.” – Christopher Robin Milne (son of A.A. Milne, who wrote the “Winnie The Pooh” series).

That’s essentially what Bobby Blue Sky is about: A freakishly selfish author, Sid Bluestone, who uses his youngest of three kids to inspire a book series called “Bobby Blue Sky” that ends up becoming an empire. 25 years later, Bobby, the inspiration, and his older siblings, Todd and Lisa, are left to cope with the after effects of this strange form of fame (being a child celebrity, yet never having any personal celebrity experiences or making any money off the experience yourself).

Todd, the oldest, is the most bitter. Being ignored his whole life has led to him playing scratch off lottery tickets in order to pay off gambling debts. Lisa, the sister, ended up marrying a shrink and writing her own unpublished book series about, well, herself – a girl named Lisa who’s been ignored her whole life. And then there’s Bobby, who lives with the guilt of ruining his sibling’s lives, and therefore is racked with depression.

The story is cleverly narrated by Kiki, the East African nanny that used to take care of Bobby, in the same manner that a parent would read Winnie The Pooh to their children. Kiki is the lone beacon of hope in Bobby’s life, the only time he remembers being happy. And so to avoid spiraling down into an even deeper depression, Bobby decides that he must go on a trek and find Kiki.

In the meantime, Todd is desperately trying to come up with an idea to make money so he can pay off these thugs. What if, he thinks, Bobby wrote a new book continuing the adventures of Bobby Blue Sky? He could then manage Bobby and, voila, money problems solved. He’s shocked when Bobby (out of guilt) actually says yes, and thinks he’s in the clear. But things get complicated when Bobby starts writing some really depressing shit – the exact opposite of what Bobby Blue Sky represents – and Lisa gets in on the action, wanting her Angry Lisa book series included in the deal. Naturally, with so many unresolved weird issues from childhood, the dysfunctional family fight each other to achieve even the most mundane of tasks. The question is, will they be able to pull it together in time to solve their individual problems?

Okay so why is the degree of difficulty so high here? What is it that makes Bobby Blue Sky such a hard script to write? Well it starts with us having three protagonists instead of one (the three siblings). It’s hard enough to create a single compelling character that an audience wants to follow. So to now have to create three has just tripled the workload. Next is the voice over from the uninvolved party. I thought it was cute – the way Kiki narrates their story like a children’s book – but whenever you have the narration dictating the narrative, particularly from someone who’s not directly involved in the story, you lose some naturalism, because it’s the narrator that’s pulling the story along, not the characters.

Next, the subject matter’s a mix between depressing and angry. Most audiences like some form of hope, but this script is almost exclusively about selfishness and anger. That’s hard to pull off no matter how talented of a writer you are. And finally, there’s no clear goal set up for the characters (similar to what we dealt with in Red Harvest). It starts off about finding Kiki, but that problem is solved quickly. Next is writing the book, but that thread ends before the third act arrives. Without a plot we have no direction. Without a direction, we have no stakes. Without any stakes…I mean…you’re making it really hard on yourself to get the audience to care.

Having said that, I have to commend Bobby Blue Sky for giving me a reading experience I’ve never had before. The writing itself is good and to say the story is unpredictable is an understatement. I was constantly turning the pages wondering what the hell was going to happen next. That doesn’t happen very often when I read a screenplay.

The script’s weird subject matter leads to some really funny moments as well, like when Bobby has a fantasy where he teams up with an injured squirrel to write his book. Or when the president of the Bobby Blue Sky fan club takes matters into her own hands when she reads the atrocities Bobby has put the famous character through.

I guess I just wanted a little more…optimism. The characters were tough to root for because they were so mean-spirited, selfish, or hopeless. The one character who embodied hope, Kiki, was only in the story for an instant before being kicked aside. And the father – my God the father – was just a terrible human being. Who uses their child to make hundreds of millions of dollars and doesn’t give them a single penny? Or ignores them – is even embarrassed by them – when he sees them in public?

I always have trouble with villains like that, who are so one-dimensionally evil that they’re not realistic. I mean it’s one thing to not be interested in your children to the point where you never call them or don’t care about their lives. That happens every day. But to exploit your child to the tune of 200 million dollars and then act like they’re an annoyance whenever they call up or stop by…I mean, that’s just not realistic. At the very least the guy would *pretend* to be interested in his child’s life, particularly because he wouldn’t be where he was without him. Yeah, the father character was easily my biggest issue with Bobby Blue Sky.

However you see it, there’s no denying this movie is going to be different. I think the casting is exactly what it needs to be because the film is going to depend on its humor to offset all of the anger. And I love these three actors for the roles. But as a script, it just wasn’t for me. It was too nasty.

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

What I learned: Depression is a tough subject matter to tackle in a screenplay. Most of the people reading scripts and most of the people who go to movies don’t want to be depressed. Even the depressed people who can relate to the characters tend to go to movies to be cheered up, not reminded of how miserable their lives are. For that reason, I think films about depression need to be balanced with hope – and the best way to provide that hope is with a healthy dose of comedy. Little Miss Sunshine is the perfect example. Steve Carrel’s character is dealing with depression, but the film balances that out with a number of funny characters. Or the number 1 Black List script from 2008, The Beaver – another script about depression filled with laughs in the form of a British-accented Beaver puppet. It’s a dangerous subject matter to tackle, so just make sure you arm your funny bone before going in.

Genre: Period/Gangster
Premise: A cop rolls into the corrupt 1920s town of Personville, only to find that the man who hired him has been murdered. He must now navigate the town’s seedy underside to solve the murder and clean the town up.
About: Dashiell Hammett’s book Red Harvest was the material that inspired Sergio Leone’s For a Few Dollars More and Kurasawa’s Yojimbo. After “Last Tango In Paris,” Bernardo Bertolucci decided he wanted to adapt the book for himself. He ended up writing two screenplays, this one about socialist syndicalism in the late ’20s in America, and a second one that was more faithful to Hammett’s original story, where the setting was changed to 1934. Actors considered for the main character were Robert Redford, Clint Eastwood and Jack Nicholson. In Rome, Bertolucci and Warren Beatty talked in great detail about the film, and in 1982, Bertolucci left Europe for Los Angeles where he was to shoot Red Harvest, but never ended up making the film. Bertolucci has written and directed “1900,” the Oscar-winning “The Last Emperor,” the Liv Tyler starrer, “Stealing Beauty,” and his most recent film, 2003’s “The Dreamers.”
Writers: Bernardo Bertolucci and Marilyn Goldin
Details: 144 pages – First Draft, June 1982 (This is an early draft of the script. The situations, characters, and plot may change significantly by the time the film is released. This is not a definitive statement about the project, but rather an analysis of this unique draft as it pertains to the craft of screenwriting).

I don’t know if I hold Bertolucci in the same high regard as most people in the film business. I understand that The Dreamers was far from his Sistine Chapel, but the movie was so messy and disjointed and sent out such a confusing message, it was as if I was watching someone who had never tried to convey a story on celluloid before. Honestly, it just seemed like an excuse to get some gratuitous incestual sex on tape.

Likewise, I’ve tried to watch Last Tango In Paris several times, but have yet to make it past the 30 minute mark. It just wanders aimlessly, with a lot of drawn out meaningless dialogue and nary a story thread to latch onto. But Red Harvest was a passion project of Bertolucci’s conceived at the peak of his powers, and a few people have written me to tell me it’s a good script. I’m not sure if these people were drunk or on the wrong end of a lobotomy, but this script isn’t good. This script is a mess.

“The Op” (cool name even if I don’t know what it means) shows up in the 1920s city of Personville – what many of the locals call “Poisonville” – to take on a job he was hired for by the town’s mayor, Willsson. But see, Personville is one of the most corrupt, most dangerous cities in America. And before The Op can even meet his employer, he finds out that he’s been murdered.

So The Op figures, hey, he traveled all this way. He might as well find out who killed his boss.

So he starts snooping around, and all avenues point to a woman named Dinah Brand, the femme fatale of femme fatales. This stunning but dangerous black widow glides between high class cocktail parties and neck deep street gutters with the craftiness of, well, a politician. She leads The Op to the killer rather quickly, leaving us to wonder: Where does the story go from here?

Well there’s a big boxing match coming up and of course it’s fixed. So when The Op figures this out, he gets the boxers to reverse the verdict, leaving every nasty crook in town out of a lot of money. The reason The Op did this? Ehh, just to fuck with people – piss’em off. Sounds like a sound plan to me. Make all the killers, rapists, criminals, and mob bosses in a city hate you (I’m being sarcastic if you can’t tell).

Anyway, the boxer who was supposed to win is murdered for not doing his job, and now The Op has a second murder to solve, a murder that, once again, Dinah Brand seems to have all the answers to.

Eventually all this leads to The Op deciding he’s going to stick around and clean up this town. Why? Eh, cause he’s got nothing better to do. No outside motivation. No backstory that would dictate a need to help others. He just “feels like it.” Yeah, I know tons of people who do this sort of thing. Makes complete sense (more sarcasm btw).

When I talk about writing period pieces, this is exactly the kind of script I tell writers NOT TO WRITE. The period aspect of the story already requires a more concentrated and patient effort from the reader, since it’s a world they’re unfamiliar with. To add on an unfocused constantly changing narrative is like asking your reader to learn the Chinese alphabet…..with a blindfold on. There are just too many moving parts you’re requiring your audience to keep track of.

This is why I celebrate The King’s Speech as a period piece. It’s a simple story. Guy needs to get rid of his stutter before his big speech. We get it. We understand what he’s trying to do and what’s at stake if he doesn’t do it. Halfway through Red Harvest, you don’t know what the fuck is going on. The primary reason for this is the constantly changing narrative.

When you write a story, you have two main options. You can give your character a giant goal (like The King’s Speech) or you can give them a series of goals (like The Social Network). The second option is always harder to pull off because the audience gets restless when they don’t have that overarching purpose to look forward to. They instinctively want to know what the point of it all is.

One thing’s for sure.  If you do lead them along one tiny goal at a time, those goals better be damn interesting. And therein lies the problem. How do you come up with 8 or 9 extremely interesting goals in a row? You usually can’t. That combined with the audience’s impatience of not knowing what the point is results in the story running out of steam, and that’s exactly what happens here.

Red Harvest starts out with a compelling murder. Who killed Mr. Willsson? If that story had lasted the length of the screenplay (the “main goal”), Red Harvest probably would’ve been in good shape. Instead, it’s solved by page 30! Uh oh, the story needs a new goal now. What’s the new goal? An upcoming boxing match! Not even really a goal. It’s just an event. Technically, Op should’ve left by now. But okay, he’s going to a boxing match. We’ll roll with it.

At the end of the boxing match, there’s another murder. Okay, I guess that works. It’s a little weird that we had a way more compelling murder earlier that we chose to wrap up so we could replace it with this smaller less interesting one, but at least the main character has something to do again. Unfortunately, the story tells us who the killer is in *this* murder a little after the midway point. Which leaves us once again with…no goal.

Bertolucci decides the new goal is “to clean up the town.” That’s what The Op sets out to do. Clean up the town. Not only is this a vague goal but it’s boring and not properly motivated. Why the fuck does The Op care about cleaning up this town? He has nothing personally invested in this place. He just showed up a week ago. So it shouldn’t be a surprise that we quickly get bored. A weak goal combined with a weak motivation is screenplay suicide. You might as well change your font to comic sans and print your screenplay on green construction paper because your script is done.

And it’s too bad, because the seeds were here for something cool. The lone mysterious stranger who rides into a corrupt town, the genesis for many a great Western, is a solid one. We enjoy seeing the lone hero put all the bad guys in their place. And for the first 40-50 pages, when the script is focused and therefore maximizing this dynamic, Red Harvest is pretty damn good. Even the wishy-washy boxing thread works because the whole town’s excited for it (and we get excited by association)

But in the end, the fact that there’s no overarching goal kills this thing, and is the reason why it becomes a rambling incoherent mess by the time the third act arrives.

The solution to this is quite simple. You see, the best movies are movies that implement both types of goal-set narratives. There should be a giant goal and then a series of smaller goals that lead to that final goal. So why not make Willsson’s death a mystery that lasts the entire movie? Then you can kill off other people along the way, and each murder represents a goal he must achieve before he can get closer to understanding the big murder (Willsson’s). It’s such a simple fix, I feel like I cheated.

Red Harvest isn’t a total disaster. Just its second half is, and should serve as a warning for those of you with weak goals and weaker motivations in your screenplays. You want to make sure that that stuff is strong as a rock, ESPECIALLY in period pieces where it’s easier for the reader to get lost or lose track of things. And remember, if these kinds of mistakes can happen to an Oscar winner, they can happen to anyone, so stay on top of it kemo sabe.

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

What I learned: Don’t allow your writing to get lazier as the script goes on. I know we say “Make your first ten pages great!” And that’s definitely good advice. But one thing I notice is that a lot of writers will make their first 10-30 pages perfect – Paragraphs short, descriptions crisp, prose is beautiful – then get sloppy after that. That’s what you see here. The first 20 pages are really well written, then the paragraphs get chunkier. You can smell the lack of effort creeping onto the page. It gives off the impression that Bertolucci is slacking, that he’s not trying as hard. The second you’re not giving us your all, we smell it and are ready to move on.

Genre: Action
Premise: Eight hostages are held inside a city bank. Their only hope is a man who has called the wrong number and is told that if he hangs up the phone, the hostages will die.  Phone Booth meets Die Hard.
About: Every Friday, I review a script from the readers of the site. If you’re interested in submitting your script for an Amateur Review, send it in PDF form, along with your title, genre, logline, and why I should read your script to Carsonreeves3@gmail.com. Keep in mind your script will be posted.
Writer: Nick Everhart
Details: 98 pages (This is an early draft of the script. The situations, characters, and plot may change significantly by the time the film is released. This is not a definitive statement about the project, but rather an analysis of this unique draft as it pertains to the craft of screenwriting).

I thought as long as we’re on this Die Hard kick, why not tackle a screenplay that’s not only inspired by the action classic, but repeatedly references it as well. Wrong Number is the kind of spec idea that gives you the best chance of getting noticed as an unknown screenwriter. It’s contained, it’s intense, it’s short (98 pages) and it’s got a hook. Everhart definitely has the right idea here.

My question is, is the hook enough of a hook? Wrong Number’s premise dangles precariously close to parody, a fingernail away from falling into a Simpsons episode. If Funny or Die was around in 1988, might they use a premise like this to make fun of Die Hard? I don’t know but maybe. That was a big question going into this. Would it be able to make its premise compelling for a full 98 minutes?

We don’t know much about Carl when we meet him. He’s just a guy who spent last night in a Motel 6 and who doesn’t seem comfortable wearing his wedding ring.

So when his first call of the morning goes to the bank, we’re not sure why. But boy does his world turn upside-down when that call is made. A man – a very bad man – has answered the phone. This man is holding eight people hostage and for some odd reason, he wants Carl to stay on the phone with him. In fact, he tells Carl that if he hangs up, he’ll shoot one of those hostages.

Carl pleads with the man, who we’ll come to know as Jack, that he’s just a guy who dialed the wrong number and doesn’t want to be involved. But since Jack’s a high-functioning lunatic, he gives Carl a big fat “tough luck” and the game is on.

What the game is becomes the question of the day however. Jack doesn’t seem to have a plan here. He just spouts off his philosophies on human existence, concluding that sometimes you gotta shake shit up to remind yourself you’re alive. For most people this might mean quitting your job or running a marathon. For Jack, it’s holding a bunch of innocent people hostage.

Soon, we find out Carl’s secret, that this was not, indeed, a “wrong number,” but that he was calling his wife, Ashley, who’s actually one of the hostages. And somehow, between attempts to placate Jack’s insanity, he’s gotta find a discreet way to get her to safety.

Complicating the wife-saving is the huge police force that sets up shop in front of the bank, headed up by newly appointed Captain Holly, a woman trying to prove she’s “man” enough to handle the job.

(Spoilers) Little do she and Carl know, however, that Jack’s had a plan all along. This *is* a robbery, and every single moment has been carefully planned out, including this call with Carl. Carl will now have to ditch the confines of this phone call, race over to the bank, and save everyone before it’s too late.

Wrong Number is a tough script to analyze because while its structure is reasonably familiar, the limiations of the premise lead to some offbeat choices which I’m not sure do the story justice. For example, the script starts off with this phone call (and I have to give it to Everhart – less than 2 pages in and the call is made – we’re right in the thick of the story by page 5), but the villain has no goal. He just wants to talk.

And talk.

And talk.

And while Everhart does a pretty impressive job with most of the dialogue, that lack of a driving force starts to drag the script down. I’m not saying it ruined the script, because we know at some point a goal will emerge, but my biggest fear when seeing this premise was that there would be too much talking and not enough plot. Unfortunately, through the first half of the screenplay, that’s exactly what happens.

Now once the second half kicks in and the various threads shift into gear, the script picks up pace. Except it does so in the wrong places. The most developed character in the script is Captain Holly.  Don’t get me wrong. I enjoyed the depth here (her having doubts in herself – the force having doubts whether she can handle the job), but to me, Captain Holly is not the character we should be spending so much time on in Wrong Number. That character should be Ashley, Carl’s wife.

We barely learn anything about Ashley in Wrong Number and yet this is Carl’s whole motivation for staying on the phone. It’s for her. Think about Die Hard if we just got one 60 second scene with Holly, McClane’s wife, talking to Tagaki. That’s basically what we get here. We’ve been debating “unresolved conflict in a relationship” a lot lately. Well here, we don’t know what the hell the relationship is because outside of a couple of vague moments with Carl’s wedding ring in the opening scene, these two are a mystery to us.

This leads to my biggest problem with the script, which is that we don’t know any of the hostages. As someone pointed out in the Die Hard 2 comments, we didn’t really know the hostages in Die Hard either. But this is a different movie. It’s much more intimate, with only a single robber and a small group of hostages. We need to get to know these people, especially Ashley. The more we know her, the more we’re going to want Carl to save her. I’d actually recommend giving her all of Captain Holly’s screen time, or, if you wanted to try something different, making Captain Holly Carl’s wife.

Another problem is that Carl knows too much about what to do for a random Joe Schmoe who paints houses for a living. How does he know, for example, every intimate detail of calming a person down who’s having a panic attack? And he seems to be quite comfortable jumping into the middle of this chaotic urban battleground in the final act. This is why writers usually make characters in these situations cops (like McClane). So it’s somewhat believable when they start kicking ass. I mean, would you have believed everything McClane did in Die Hard had he been an electrician? Or a janitor?

So yeah, there’s a lot of stuff here that makes you go, “Hmmmmm.”

BUT! Wrong Number has a lot going for it as well. First of all, I thought the dialogue was good for an action movie. If you’re writing a movie where dialogue is going to be featured, such as a movie based on a phone call, you better be good at dialogue, and I thought Everhart was. The back and forth between Jack and Carl didn’t reach the heights of classics like Die Hard, but it was better than most action flicks I see.

I also thought the ending was pretty exciting, even if there were a lot of loose ends. For example, the series of events that led to Jack kidnapping Carl in an ambulance were…ehhhh…how do I put this nicely?…eccentric? Jack going through all this trouble to isolate Carl alone in an ambulance would imply that he had been planning this whole thing from the very first second. Which would of course mean he’d have known Carl was going to call, known that Carl was going to come to the bank, etc. It was silly and over-the-top and fun, but one thing it definitely was not, was believable.

So in the end, there were too many plot holes in Wrong Number, the key characters (mainly the wife and the other hostages) weren’t explored enough, and I’m not sure this premise was enough to sustain an entire movie. But I’m definitely a fan of Everhart’s potential as a writer. If I were covering this for an agency or a production co., I’d recommend Everhart for a further look.

A flawed but fun script.

Script link: Wrong Number

Script rating:

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

Writer rating:

[ ] Stay away from the Final Draft
[ ] Still needs work
[x] On his way up
[ ] Moneymaker
[ ] The next Frank Darabont

What I learned: Be careful you’re not too subtle when setting up your characters and their problems. While I respect not hitting the reader over the head with a piece of information, you still need to give us enough information so that we understand a character’s predicament. In Wrong Number, we see Carl discard a Motel 6 receipt and then take off his wedding ring before calling the bank. It was enough to tell us that there was something wrong with his marriage, but I don’t believe it was enough. I wanted to know what led to their problems, how long ago these problems occurred, and overall, just a more specific detailing of their situation. Because I wasn’t clear on what had happened in their relationship, I wasn’t that interested in seeing them get back together.