So a reader wrote in with an interesting suggestion, and an idea I’ve actually toyed with myself: A list of the top UNREPPED screenplays. What I told him, which is the big problem I run into whenever I entertain the idea, is that while the pool of scripts competing for the Black List is relatively small – around 400 – the pool for the Green List would be enormous, in the tens of thousands. And since 99% of those scripts aren’t any good, it’s like looking for a needle in a haystack.

What we would need is some kind of system whereby people could send in unrepresented scripts they thought were good, yet somehow weed out the people who are just promoting their own material. Now I realize that TriggerStreet already kinda does something like this with its rating system, and in that sense, should I even bother?

I’m coming to you guys to start a preliminary discussion on how to find these scripts to see if it’s possible. One thing I know I won’t be doing is adding complex rating submission systems like TriggerStreet because I simply don’t have the resources to do so. The more complicated it is, the less likely I am to do it. This will probably have to be fueled by the readers, as I don’t have time to weed through any more screenplays than I already do.

This is by no means a sure thing. It’s something I’m throwing out there to get your feedback on. If someone comes up with a solid reader-fueled easy to manage system for finding these screenplays though, I’m all ears.

Sorry, no link. :(

Genre: Drama/Thriller
Premise: When a man’s wife is accused of murder, he takes drastic measures to get her out of prison.
About: This is Paul Haggis’ next project which will star Russel Crowe, Elizabeth Banks, and Liam Neeson. It is an adaptation of the French film, “Pour Elle.”
Writer: Paul Haggis (adapted from the movie Pour Elle, written by Fred Cavaye & Guillaume Lemans).
Details: 126 pages (2nd Draft, June 2009)

Paul Haggis

Unapologetic supporter of Crash here. I’ve heard so many bashers of that movie claiming ridiculous nonsense like, “It tells us nothing new about racism!” I didn’t see the film as a commentary on racism as much as a bunch of characters who found themselves in fucked up situations. There are still a few scenes from that movie I feel are the most well-crafted scenes of the last decade. It’s Haggis’ follow-up film, “In The Valley Of Elah,” that I had issues with. That laborious piece of filmmaking about a father trying to solve the murder of his soldier son, had about as much drive as a public course golf cart. Talk about a movie that took its sweet time. Jeez! That cooled me on the former Scientologist but apparently not that much because I was eager to get my hands on The Next Three Days.

And which Haggis do we get here? Well, The Next Three Days’ heart is in the right place. I’m just not sure it’s big enough. Basically, the script asks the question: how would you really break someone out of jail? Not the movie version of how you’d do it. But if someone you loved was behind bars, how would you really go about trying to free them? And not just that. How would you get away with it? Could you manage all the meticulous painstaking details and planning required to stay invisible for the rest of your lives? That’s what The Next Three Days is about.

Crowe will play John.

John and Laura are a young happy couple. They have nice jobs, a nice house, and a beautiful son. On the outside, there isn’t anything wrong with these two. But that all changes when (inside the first ten pages) detectives burst into their house and arrest Laura for the murder of her boss. The previous night, someone beat the woman with a fire extinguisher in the parking lot. And unlucky for Laura, it happened minutes after she had a heated fight with the woman. Not to mention she’d been seen by the janitor holding the murder weapon. Whether she actually did it or not is something we don’t find out until the very last page (and something I won’t reveal here).

John then finds himself caught up in the nightmare that is the U.S. legal system, bouncing back and forth between appeals, court dates, and his own desperate investigation. But in the end, the evidence is too overwhelming. Even John’s snarky lawyer tells him to look at it as if he’s not the husband. Translation: Maybe she did murder this woman.

When that vine has been plucked clean, John starts to formulate another plan. What if he could break Laura out? What if they could run away to another country, never to be seen again? He somehow stumbles across an ex-con who’s escaped jail seven times. They meet and John listens as the man lays out the tricks of the trade: looking for breaks in prison routine, exploiting weaknesses when they least expect it, realizing not just how to get out, but where to run to. And the most important thing of all – being psychologically ready for the way this will change your life. Could you live the rest of your life knowing that at any moment, someone could bust through the door and take you away? Uhh, I get angry if a friend bothers me in the middle of a Modern Warfare game. So that would be a big no for me.

Banks play Laura.

This is where The Next Three Days spends most of its time and, as a result, suffers considerably in the momentum department. We get a lot of scenes of John visiting Laura in jail, casing the joint, meeting up with sketchy underground personalities to secure fake identification. Personally, I would’ve liked a big fat subplot here, because this portion of the script gets repetitive. There’s a cute single mom John keeps running into who I thought would be perfect to shake things up. Had they developed a friendship bordering on more between them, it could’ve been a nice deterrent, representing everything he’d be giving up by going through with this crazy plan.

Luckily the pacing is much faster here than In The Valley Of Elah, and this 126 page draft will no doubt be shortened to between 115 and 120 pages when they shoot it, which will at least partly take care of that middle act. In the end, I liked The Next Three Days because it comes at an old story from a new angle – realism. That as well as the lingering million dollar question – did she or didn’t she kill her boss – ensures you’ll be reading all the way to the final page.

The Next Three Days is worth the read and will likely be worth seeing as well.

[ ] What the hell did I just read?
[ ] barely kept my interest
[x] worth the read
[ ] impressive
[ ] genius

What I learned: Subplots! Make sure you have a few in the second act – If you’re writing a story with a slow burn, make sure to populate your script with a few subplots, because if the only thing we’re watching is your character trying to pursue his/her goal, that’s going to get old in a 60 page second act. Maybe you introduce a new relationship or friendship that shakes things up for your hero. Maybe one of your supporting characters is going through his own shit and that somehow affects your hero. But don’t use vast amounts of real estate to only explore your main character’s objective. Chances are, we’re going to need something extra to keep us interested.

Genre: Drama
Premise: A reclusive gardener’s life is turned upside-down when he’s given a unique plant thought to be extinct.
About: I originally thought this was the project Chris Weitz was doing next, but it turns out this is an older script that got some heat back in the day but never made it over the hump. Well, that needs to change, cause it’s a damn good script.
Writer: Jay Sherman
Details: 109 pages – Older draft (2005)

Contrary to popular belief, The Gardener is not a prequel to Garden State. So you won’t find Zach Braff staring melancholy-like into the camera while a hip indie band plays wistfully in the background. Instead, The Gardener is one of those movies with such a bland title, you figure it has to be amazing to have overcome such a handicap.

Turns out, that’s exactly the case. The Gardener is one of the best written most surprising screenplays I’ve read in awhile. Of course, it starts out with a story almost as mundane as its title. Lem Gardner, 30s (yes, his last name is Gardner), is an unassuming man out of touch with the world, who finds his only joy in gardening. Plants he understands. Humans? Not so much. Orphaned at 12 when his mother, also a gardener, died, Lem’s become the head gardener at the Botanical Gardens, meticulously taking care of plants the way most people would take care of their family.

Lem is forced to work with numerous slackers on the grounds, most of whom could care less about the difference between a fern and a carnation. One of the more eccentric characters is Gabriel, a wild-eyed hippy who’s made the Botanical Gardens parking lot his personal living quarters for the last three months. Lem has spent most of that time trying to convince him to leave, but see that’s Lem’s problem. He’s too passive. He’s unable to take charge. Even people as meek as Gabriel walk all over him. But when Gabriel finally decides that it’s time to move on, he leaves Lem with a parting gift: a weedish mess of a plant so obscure it’s assumed to have gone extinct. Lem, falling over himself at his fortune, begs Gabriel to tell him where he found it. But Gabriel is cryptic, telling him only to keep the plant in a dark place, and to never interfere with its growth.

The housing of the plant begins a chain reaction that turns Lem’s uneventful life upside-down, starting with an attractive couple who moves in next door. The kind and lovely Beatrice’s garden is is an absolute mess and when she finds out that Lem is a gardener, well naturally she enlists his green thumb to bring it back to life. Her sketchy overbearing boyfriend Wayne is skeptical of the plan but is about as threatened by Lem as one would be of Pee-Wee Herman, so he allows it.

So far, so average, right?

Well it turns out that The Gardener’s been buttering you up for the big twist – a what-the-fuck moment that will have you going back to read the page over again. During his evening routine, Lem hears a bump in the basement. He hurries down, looks around, and hears a “Hello?” He centers himself, attempting to locate the voice’s source, only to find that it’s coming from… the tank containing the plant! He walks over and notices a tiny naked man in the tank. This man, Terrarium Man, is freaking out, wondering what the hell he is and why the hell he’s in a tank. Lem is, of course, equally freaked out, but after the initial shock, the two realize that this tiny man has been birthed from the plant. Yeah, I know. What the fuck??

Despite the fact that there’s a tiny man now living in his basement, Lem does his best to go about his daily life, a life that’s spinning out of control due to a stray cat hell bent on destroying the prize statue in his backyard, the emotional fallout of Beatrice realizing that her boyfriend doesn’t love her, the spoiled son of the Botanical Gardens’ owner waiting for his father to die so he can turn Lem’s garden into a golf course, and the subsequent birth of both a Terrarium Woman (who for some reason can’t see Lem), and a Terrarium Boy.

To say that The Gardener is all kinds of bizarre is an understatement. But it’s bizarre in all the right ways, which is what matters. This is that rare combination of indie sensibility mixed with semi-high-concept goodness that you just don’t see in many scripts. It has that “I have no idea what the fuck’s going to happen on the next page” factor I so often complain about never seeing anymore. Not to mention the writer, Jay Sherman knows how to write. He juggles multiple plotlines here and each one escalates at the perfect pace, so we never come back to a storyline we’re not interested in seeing more of.

If there’s a complaint, I guess I would’ve liked to have seen more crossover between the Terrarium universe and the real universe. As they stand, they’re completely separate, making the only way they affect one another through Lem. This works, but I can’t help but think there were some more potentially interesting plotlines missed by isolating the two. I mean, even if it was as simple as Beatrice discovering the plant – that could’ve led to a hell of a conversation.

The Gardener won’t be for everyone, but if you liked The Ornate Anatomy Of Living Things or Dogs of Babel, or just have a jones for something offbeat, you’ll want to check this out.

[ ] What the hell did I just read?
[ ] barely kept my interest
[ ] worth the read
[x] impressive
[ ] genius

What I learned: Are you one of kabillions who like to write character-driven scripts with little in the way of plot? The “high-concept” indie flick is a great way to write something that gets you respect in the industry, with the added benefit of potentially getting made. I see so many “indie” character-driven scripts that bring nothing to the table outside of depressed characters trying to make it to the last page. If you want to write about characters like that and, oh I don’t know, have people actually care, consider adding an extra element to your premise that elevates it into something more than your average independent film. Eternal Sunshine Of The Spotless Mind, 500 Days Of Summer, The Ornate Anatomy Of Living Things. All of these films/scripts are able to explore their characters on a deeper level, but do so inside a concept that makes them more accessible to a mainstream audience. Some people think of these twists/quirks as gimmicks. But it’s a small price to pay if it sends your script to the top of the pile.

Genre: Period Drama
Premise: In the early 1900s, after their family is brutally murdered, two brothers choose different paths in life, one becoming an FBI agent, the other a criminal.
About: The 19th ranked script on last year’s Black List (right behind “Going The Distance” and above “Nowhere Boy”), The American Way was purchased by Anonymous Content and The Film Department. Described as a cross between Once Upon a Time in America and The Untouchables, the spec was Brian Kistler’s first sale right out of AFI Film school. It has since been retitled, “Murder Inc.” and will be directed by Ericson Core. Core was a D.P. on “Payback,” “The Fast and the Furious,” and “Daredevil.”
Writer: Brian Kistler
Details: First Draft, September 2008 (draft that landed him on the Black List)

So here we are, just two weeks away from the 2010 Black List. You can expect some mighty intense coverage here on Scriptshadow. As a prelude, I’ll be reviewing some Black List scripts from years’ past. The downside to this is, the only reason I haven’t already read them is because they didn’t sound interesting. Today’s script is a perfect example. It’s a mobster-centric movie set in the 1930s. I wouldn’t say I dislike period mobster films. If they’re done well, I’ll go see them. But they’re not must-see TV in the Reeves household. Still, I’m hoping with the Black List seal of approval, that this and a few others will turn out to be gems.

The American Way grabs your attention in the first half page. 12 year old Billy has just watched the horrific massacre of his parents and 4 year old sister. Only minutes after the killer’s left, with his mother’s body still twitching on the floor, Billy’s 10 year old brother, John, strolls in. It is a life-changing moment for both brothers not just because they lost their family, but because from this point on, John will always blame his brother for not doing more to stop the murder.

Cut to 20 years later. It’s 1938. Some guy named Hitler is crying for attention in Europe, and America is obsessed with making sure communist propaganda doesn’t ooze its way into society. So much so, that nobody’s really concerned about the local mob scene, allowing organized crime to flourish. Billy, all grown up now, is an FBI agent with a reasonably decent home life. When mutterings inside the mob indicate a possible assassination attempt on Senator Gordan Gance, Billy’s division must figure out a way to protect him, without the financial backing of a government with bigger fish to fry.

Things get personal though when Billy finds out that the man who plans to kill the senator, Charlie Cohen, is the same man who murdered his family. Billy comes up with an outside-the-box idea. Release his estranged brother John (now doing life in prison for an undisclosed crime), and task him to go undercover in Cohen’s gang, allowing them to get the skinny on any potential moves the bad guys make. A small caveat is that John will not be told that this man is the man that murdered his family.

These days, John is just as dirty and sketchy as Billy is moral and by-the-numbers. He still hates his brother for being a coward that day (didn’t really understand this – what did you expect a 12 year old to do?) and the only reason he takes the job is that after he’s done playing pretend, he inherits a get-out-of-jail-free card.

In a very “Gangs Of New York” scenario, John works his way up Charlie Cohen’s chain-of-command, developing a conflicting relationship with the man in charge, and begins to question whether Cohen’s murderous ideology is all that bad. Since his primary victims tend to be Nazi affiliates, Cohen complex character is tough to form an opinion on.

Kistler does a great job continually upping the stakes in The American Way. For example, John stupidly starts sneaking around with Cohen’s woman. And at a certain point, Cohen assigns John to kill his own brother. I have to say, the final act, which starts paying off all these setups, really makes up for the slow deliberate pace that takes us through the first two acts. It was easily the best part of the script.

But it’s those first and second acts that prevent The American Way from becoming that gem I so desperately wanted it to be. It takes forever for John to infiltrate Cohen’s gang, and the character of Bill has very little to do during that time. He basically hangs out with his wife, waiting for either good news or bad news from the front. John occasionally visits his bro, spicing up the script with a little conflict, but it wasn’t enough for my taste, particularly because their relationship is the most interesting part of the story.

One thing I couldn’t get past was this notion that – in real life – they would send John into Cohen’s gang without telling him that Cohen killed his family. I mean, I’m no FBI agent, but if there was ever a plan that sounded more like a disaster waiting to happen, I certainly haven’t heard of it.

But The American Way is well-written and deftly (if a little slowly) plotted. I would’ve picked this to be made over Public Enemies any day of the week. For you period mob-heads out there, cancel work tomorrow and give this a read. Even though it wasn’t my thing, I recognize that this is a solid effort from first-timer Kilster.

[ ] What the hell did I just read?
[ ] barely kept my interest
[x] worth the read
[ ] impressive
[ ] genius

What I learned: Pick up the pace people! No matter what genre you’re writing. — I’ve been preaching this to anyone who will listen lately. The pace of your average movie has picked up over the last 15 years. We’re getting into the story faster and faster. But I’m finding that people who write period pieces aren’t changing along with it. They’re still writing at the same pace period pieces were written 15 years ago. Particularly because readers see these stories as difficult to market (remember, their job is to find movies that can be *made*), they’re already going into your script with a bias. Don’t give them a reason to tune out. I felt it took us so long to get through the first and second acts that at times my patience almost gave out. Now luckily, the great third act paid off that patience, but I only kept reading because this was a Black List script. Had this came to me naked, I’m not sure I would’ve stayed around to enjoy the view.

What are you doing??? Only six hours left and some of you haven’t sent me your 10 pages yet. Hurry up!