note: no review today. :(

As you may remember, I made a plea a couple of weeks ago to send in your favorite scripts that didn’t make The Black List. For the last couple of years, The Black List has been hit by a wave of negativity, with many claiming it had “gone the way of Sundance,” and was now simply a marketing tool for the business, heavily if not solely influenced by the studios. I admit I jumped on that bandwagon for awhile but after stepping back and looking at it objectively, I realized the only reason I’d done so was because it *sounded* logical. “Of course,” I thought, “Naturally now that they’re bigger, they’re only going to choose screenplays that the bigtime players want them to choose.” But I didn’t have any proof. I didn’t have anything to go by but a hunch and rumors. Sure I’ve read comments like this one on Nikki Finke’s blog…

This list unfortunately has become meaningless now. It started out with great intentions, but now has become a PR contest between agencies and management companies to get their clients scripts on this list. I’ve read many of the scripts listed here and its [sic] so abundantly clear that pressure was applied to get some of these on the list. it’s a joke.

But the anonymous assumptions he was making were about as credible as his anonymous post. By no means am I Mr. Connections. But I realized I had enough of a reach whereby I could reasonably test this theory. So I made my plea to about 150 assistants, readers, creative execs, assistant producers, producers, and agents (that’s half the number of people polled for the Black List) and informally asked them to name me their favorite scripts that *didn’t* make the Black List this year. If it was true they were solely voting for scripts they were instructed to, then surely they had some personal favorites of their own, right? It was time to find out what the real Black List was. Not this fake Hollywood puppet government that was obviously feeding us garbage material that wouldn’t have made it past an illiterate intern at an agency in the Valley.

Welllll…..

I hate to disappoint the naysayers but prepare to be disappointed. Although conspiracy theorists will never ever give up on their theories no matter how much evidence you pile in front of them (my brother is still convinced that the entire NBA is rigged, to which I say – then how come Detroit and San Antonio, two of the smallest markets in the U.S., made it to the finals 7 times this decade?), this at least gave me some peace of mind on the issue.

You see, here’s the thing. The Black List is far too big for a really good script not to make it. There were 97 openings this year. Ninety-freaking-seven. Hollywood is OBSESSED with finding the next great script. If they do spot one, everybody hears about it. Then everybody reads it. And if they all like it, they’re not going to keep it a secret cause their boss told them to vote for “Paul Blart 2: Paul Blarter,” instead. Of course there will be isolated incidents here and there, but there are enough voters (300) and enough spots that truly deserving scripts *will* make it.

Look at who finished atop this year’s list. An unknown writer with no produced credits who sold his script to a relatively small company who hasn’t made a movie in years. If that isn’t an endorsement for supporting the little guy, I don’t know what is. And sure Sorkin finished second but that’s because he wrote a great script. We confirmed that three months ago. For those who think the list is a sell-out for doing so, let me remind you that Sorkin was also highly ranked on the very *first* Black List. Oh, and the highest selling script of the year? The Jonah Hill Hollywood friendly vehicle, “The Adventurer’s Handbook” (which I believe barely beat out the price of Prisoners), didn’t make it anywhere near the list. How do we explain that?

But hey, I can talk all night and I still won’t convince you. All I can do is tell you what I found. So again, I asked 150 assistants, creative execs, readers, managers, agents assistant producers, producers, etc., for their top 5 favorite scripts that didn’t make the Black List. Like the Black List, their suggestions would be completely anonymous. Since nobody really knew this was coming, and since the list has no cache, unlike the Black List, there would be little to no lobbying. If there really was this magical dearth of amazing (yet unconnected) scripts kicking around town, these are the people who would know about them. If the Black List really was a big scam, it’s time to expose it.

After informally polling all these people, this was the most common answer I received: “Umm, to be honest, all of my favorite scripts were on the list.” I’d then follow up with, “Well is there any script, any script at all you thought was great that didn’t make the list?” They’d usually answer, “There were a couple I thought were good, but nothing I would vote for.” Despite that, I was still able to get around 70 people to vote, some with a top 5, some with a top 3, some who could only think of 1. After all of that, no script received more than 7 votes. This led me to believe that people were either a) voting for something they had a personal connection with (a friend, a client, whatever). b) There were a few scripts out there that connected strongly with people on a personal level, but that weren’t mainstream. Or c) Enough people simply hadn’t read the script.

My big conclusion was that the Black List is way more accurate than people give it credit for. Am I saying that there aren’t scripts out there that should have made the list? Of course not. But the fact that those scripts aren’t on the list has more to do with the writer not getting their material out there, than the big Hollywood corporate types conspiring against the little guy.

Anyway, for better or worse, here are the Top 13 of those scripts (some of which I don’t even have the writers’ names for). If you have loglines or writers’ names for these, please send them to me ASAP so I can amend the post. Also, if you have any of these scripts, please send them in, as I’d love to take a week to review them. Also, if there’s a great script missing from the list, feel free to add it in the comments. I’d like for this list to be an evolving list. Let’s pool our resources and locate as many great reads as we can.

7 votes – Reversal by Rock Shaink
5 votes – Emergency Contact by Bear Aderhold & Thomas F.X. Sullivan -A straight laced guy finds his life thrown into turmoil after he agrees to become the “emergency contact” for a guy he barely knows.
5 votes – Fire Me by Dylan Morgan & Josh Siegal
4 votes – Priority Run by Terrance Mulloy
4 votes – Repeat After Me by Brad Bredeweg & Peter Paige
4 votes – Kristy by Anthony Jaswinski – In the vein of THE STRANGERS. A student trapped on a deserted college campus comes under attack by a malevolent group of intruders.
4 votes – Roger That by ??????
4 votes – Children of The Gun by ??????
3 votes – The Long Road Home’ by Mikko Alanne – 3
3 votes – One Night Stan by Joshua Friedlander – When Stan is given a one night “pass” from his fiance to have as much sex as he wants, all hell breaks loose.
3 votes – Love Drug by Josh Cohen – A loser longing to be rich and famous tries to make his dreams come true by inventing a pill that causes an instantaneous orgasm for the taker although the side-effects may be more than he bargained for.
3 votes – Five Star by W.J. Hortman
3 votes – Cocked and Loaded by Colin Trevorrow and Derek Connolly

With 2 votes:

The Last First Time by Jason Fuchs
The Lucky One by will fetters
Stainless Steel Providers by Kirsten Elms
The Begotten by Caleb Claxton
Hello I Must Be Going by Sarah Koskoff
A Day In March by Roberto Bentivegna – A nuclear physicist in the 1930s who, riddled by guilt over his early atomic contributions, fakes his own death- and inspires a journalist, 20 years later, to find out what happened to him.
Weekend Dad by Nicholas Schutt
Trust by Andy Bellin & David Schwimmer
Nancy and Danny by Brad Ingelsby
Detached by Stewart Hopewell & Tim Long
Timesheet by Riley Ray Chiorando
F by Howard Rodman
In This Land Of Gilead by Elana Frink – A young doctor shepherds a pair of kids through the American wastelands. Whey they finally find a stable colony, their nomadic life is questioned – do they build a life or keep moving?

Genre: Dark Comedy/Action
Premise: A directionless pizza delivery guy is forced into robbing a bank under an odd set of circumstances.
About: One of the bottom feeders on this year’s Black List, 30 Minutes or Less received only 5 votes. But the writing team of Sullivan and Diliberti have double dipped their laptops into the Black List, becoming the second writers to have two scripts on the list, (their other is titled “Comic Con.” I don’t think I have to tell you what that one’s about). Since Comic Con sounds a little more broad, I’m guessing that’s what got them the remake assignment on the old Richard Pryor-John Candy comedy, Brewster’s Millions (which was an adaptation of a book written all the way back in the 1900s).
Writers: Matthew Sullivan and Michael Diliberti
Details: 120 pages (July 7, 2009 draft)

Recalibrate your converters kiddies. This script is not what you think it is. I know this because I thought it was what you’re thinking it is now. And it’s not.

30 Minutes or Less is a character-driven comedy of darkness unlike any you’ve read before. The story is incredulous yet incredible. Like an action movie hot dog wrapped inside a dark comedy burrito. And here I thought this was going to be another high concept Paul Blart ripoff laming up the lame-line. Hello? Original idea? Busy signal.

It didn’t start off that way though. It actually started off so benignly that I thought, “If this had been in my contest (where I was only judging the first ten pages of each script) it wouldn’t have made the Top 25.” It’s not that the first 10 pages were bad. They were just plain. Will, a 25 year old pizza delivery guy and fuck up du jour, is tearing through the streets of his small town trying to make it to a customer’s house before the – um – 30 minutes are up. If poor Will doesn’t get the pizza there on time, the pizza is docked from HIS OWN paycheck. Whaaaat? He gets there a few minutes late and a couple of dweebosaurauses laugh in his face as they take their free pies. It was a scam. Their house is just far enough out of the restaurant’s radius so that there’s no way he can get there on time. Drat!

And lame! I don’t want a stupid comedy about delivering pizzas, motherfucker.

As if Sullivan and Dilberti could read my mind and were able to magically alter my PDF document in real-time, the pizza delivery stuff doesn’t come up for the rest of the script! Thank you thank you thank you. As Jim Carrey once said…”So you’re saying there’s a chance.”

Just after getting to know Will, we meet Dwayne, a beefy guy whose genetic globiness/assholeness makes him a born bully. Now that he’s older and doesn’t have enough people to push around, he’s looking for something to do with his life. His plan is to open the town’s first Tanning Salon, which will double as a whore house (because of course it will). Problem is Dwayne needs money to do that. Fortunately, his father won the lottery five years ago. Which would be great except his father hates him and has worse spending habits than Nicolas Cage. If Dwayne’s going to inherit any of his dad’s money, he’s going to have to kill him before he spends it all. And he really wants to open that Tanning Salon, like, now.

If your question’s whether to read this script, the character of Dwayne is your answer. He’s a one man show. You remember that documentary, “American Movie?” With that clueless director who formulates ridiculous plans that make no sense? Dwayne is like the fatter angrier version of him. Here, Dwayne discusses with his dimwitted partner, Jay, his fear of being a target once he gets rich.

DWAYNE
If I was willing to kill my own daddy
to get at that money, then how can I
ever trust anyone not to kill me for
the same fucking reason?

JAY
I’d never kill you. Ever.

DWAYNE
I know you wouldn’t. But what about
the rest of our crew?
(beat)
That’s why the first thing I’m gonna
do is hire a fleet of personal
bodyguards. And all of them are
gonna be retards.

JAY
Retards?

DWAYNE
Yes, Jay, retards. Water heads.
The type of people you rode the bus
to school with.

JAY
Why the hell would you do that?

DWAYNE
‘Cause they ain’t smart enough to
want my money. And they can fuck up
anyone who does come at me with their
super strength. You see, since their
minds don’t work, their bodies
compensate. I got attacked by one
in grammar school and he nearly split
my skull. I get like five or six
retards, pay ’em in quarters and
dimes…I’ll be untouchable.
(seriously)
But listen to me, Jay…don’t you
ever give one of the retards a
firearm, ’cause they’re liable to
shoot themselves. And then we gotta
find a new one.

Anyway, Dwayne realizes that he can’t kill his father himself. It’ll look too suspicious. So he has to hire someone. Problem is, the only assassin he has access to is asking for a hundred grand! Where the hell are they going to get a hundred grand? This is when Dwayne thinks up his genius plan. Since him and Jay are small-time explosive experts, they’ll find a random guy, strap a bomb to him, and tell him to go rob a bank! Problem solved. Right. Because that’s exactly what all of us would do if we were small-time criminals. And guess who they choose to kidnap?

That’s right. Will.

Once Will is captured and given the instructions (They’ll be following him. If he tries to go to the cops they’ll blow him up. If he doesn’t get the money within 8 hours, they’ll blow him up), he goes to his best friend, Chet, a middle school teacher and someone who refused to fall into the “fuck-up” ditch, and begs him for help. Chet is none too happy that Will’s arrived at his school with a bomb strapped to his chest (kids and bombs don’t mix), but after initially rebuffing the idea of riding around with a ticking time bomb a few feet from his face, he realizes he has a duty to help his friend (that’s a better friend than I would be – I’ll tell you that right now).

In something akin to what The Hangover would’ve been in a dark parallel universe, Will and Chet go bumbling around trying haplessly to accomplish something they’re so blatantly under-equipped to handle. In fact, they’re so ill-prepared, they draw on their knowledge of moves like Heat and Lethal Weapon to make key decisions. Just about everything that can go wrong goes wrong , and what I loved about 30 Minutes or Less is that even though every situation feels totally ridiculous, the characters themselves feel real, so you actually buy into it.

As most of you know, I’m not a dialogue freak. I don’t sit there and marvel at the ways characters speak to each other. But the dialogue here is fucking awesome. Even when the writers will occasionally stop the movie to have their characters spout off a whole bunch of nothing (something I tell writers never EVER to do), it’s so entertaining you just go with it. The big reason why it works is because these characters are so well drawn, so unique and so solidly motivated, that they don’t fall victim to what usually happens in this circumstance, which is that the writers use their characters to spout off their own problems and issues about the world. I never heard the writer’s voice in any of the dialogue. I heard the *character’s* voices. And that’s why it worked.

At first I didn’t like the idea of splitting up the storyline between two sets of characters. I tend to go for movies told from a single point of view, as it’s more like real life. But getting to know both Will and Dwayne before the actual kidnapping puts us in the unique position of seeing them as equals. Both of them are in dire need of better lives. And so in a strange way, we’re kinda rooting for both of them to succeed (well, until later that is, when Dwayne goes off the deep end). The main problem with doing this is that one storyline is always better than the other. So when you get stuck with the less interesting characters, you’re always checking your watch, impatiently waiting to get back the guys you like. That never happened here because you like everyone equally – something that rarely ever happens.

The big problem with Thirty Minutes or Less is that it’s the ultimate “unpitchable” script. I was excited to tell my dad about it when I finished, but then realized, “How do I describe this exactly?” “Well, um, it’s about this pizza delivery guy who gets a bomb strapped to his body and he has to go rob a bank or else the bad guys will blow him up. But it’s not like, cliché. It’s really funny. And it’s not a straight comedy. It’s more like a dark comedy thriller robber type thing.” Thirty Minutes Or Less isn’t a script you describe. It’s a script you read. And I’m positive that’s why it didn’t place higher on the list. After being told about the script, people likely had no interest in reading it. So I’m here to tell you – this is a script you want to read!

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

What I learned: This was a good reminder that even though I love the singular point of view, jumping over and seeing the other characters in their environment builds up the complexity of those characters in a way you can never achieve by looking at them only through your own character’s eyes. I still prefer following only one person, but I’ll be keeping an open mind from here on out to following multiple characters if it’s appropriate.

And…you know…Happy Holidays and stuff! If you’re offended by anything I’ve just said well, um…..sorry? Anyway, I’ve decided to include a clip of my favorite Christmas song and my favorite Christmas movie (the awkwardly structured “It’s A Wonderful Life”). Enjoy.

Roger’s back! And better late than never. Just when I was worried that Christmas would go by without a review from the man, he surprises me with a magical e-mail attachment. I guess this is his gift…to all of us. It’s a Christmas Eve miracle. This will also be the last review of the week as I’ll be taking Christmas off to hang out with the family. But I may throw up a surprise post if I have a few minutes. Won’t be a review though. Anyway, Roger’s got his eyes on another Black List script. Let’s take a look.

Genre: Period, Espionage
Premise: An FBI agent is ordered to babysit Ernest Hemingway as he goes about running a motley spy ring in WWII Cuba.
About: At Warner Brothers with Johnny Depp’s Infinitum Nihil producing, The Crook Factory made the 2009 Black List with 5 votes.
Writer: Adapted by Nicholas Meyer, based upon the novel by Dan Simmons

The spy fiction of John le Carré isn’t normally the type of story that makes my dick hard, but the fiction of Ernest Hemingway has the type of prose that does. And although “The Crook Factory” ain’t about the prose (it’s a screenplay, baby, it’s about the scenes), it is about Ernest Hemingway in pre-Communist Cuba with plenty of subterfuge and the customary spy fiction shenanigans.

Genre: Sci-fi
Premise: A man who possesses a time travel device uses it to go back in time to prevent an alien invasion.
About: Oh how quickly fortunes change. Chad St. John is a writer nobody had even heard of last year. Now he’s on fire. And I’m not talking about that wussy orange fire either. I’m talking the steel-melting blue type of fire. With two scripts on this year’s black list, one of them in the top 10, and a script sale just the other week which is supposed to do for Westerns what Pirates of the Carribean did for pirates (it’s called “The Further Adventures of Doc Holliday”), it’s definitely St. John’s Hollywood. The rest of us just live in it.
Status of this draft: 2nd Draft
Status of project: Development
Writer: Chad St. John
Details: 111 pages (undated)

There are times when scripts don’t get a fair shot with readers. Maybe the reader is tired. Maybe the reader got in a fight with her boyfriend. Or, worst case scenario, maybe the reader was forced to watch “Alvin And The Chipmunks: The Squeakel.” Whatever the reason, sometimes readers open a script with the attitude of, “You better fucking impress me.” Harsh? I’d reckon so. But sweetheart, when the world’s pushing your buttons, you need a place to push back. And unfortunately, sometimes that place is work. I just saw it happen the other day in fact. I was at the supermarket and one of the cashiers – a nice portly guy in his 50s who always had a big smile on his face – had to repair a register in a closed line. One of the other workers saw him and erroneously assumed he was opening up. So he got on the P.A. and said, “Lane 5 is now open. Lane 5.” Everyone from the overflowing lines rushed into Lane 5 and this cashier flipped the fuck out. He threw up his hands and screamed, “What are you doing! I never said I was opening! How dare you! I never said that! I never said that once! GOSH!!” He then charged off like a little boy who’d just had his candy stolen and disappeared into the back room. This left the entire store in shocked silence (except for me – I had a big smile on my face because I had stayed in line and not lost my place. Heh heh, yes, I’m a sick human being). The point is, I’d never seen that man exhibit anything even close to bad behavior before. It was clearly a bad string of events that came to a head. Believe me, readers have those days too.

The reason I’m telling you this is because I remember the circumstances under which I read The Days Before. And looking back on it, I didn’t give it a fair shot. I had a ridiculous amount of scripts to read that week. And by ridiculous, I mean 30. Also, for maybe the first time in my life, I decided to buy groceries in bulk, so I had purchased over $170 worth of groceries I planned to last me for three weeks. Ten minutes after I got home, the power on my block went out. FOR TWO DAYS! This ruined nearly 80% of the food I bought. And yes, even though it’s cliché, in addition to this I was having girlfriend problems! I came into that script with a chip on my shoulder the size of Ellen Page’s forehead. Instead of inviting the writer into my home, I stuck a gun to his head. “This better be good!” Ehhhh, needless to say I don’t think I was in the right state to read The Days Before. So because everyone’s been e-mailing me asking me to review it, I decided to wipe the slate clean and start all over again. I would give St. John another chance.

So let me be the first to say: Holy f’ing mother of balls was I wrong.

This script is all types of awesome. It starts with a grizzled mess of a man, Smith, and his wise-cracking tough-as-nails wife, Riley, barreling towards the White House in a Bonneville. These two are met with the typical response one would expect plowing your car forward at 86 miles an hour towards the White House post 9/11. With lots of SWAT and Secret Service bullets. They survive the onslaught but are captured and stuck in separate interrogation rooms. What each of them tell their captors, is that they’re, you know, from the future, and they’re, you know, trying to save the planet. Their warnings are ignored and mere minutes later, big bad dragon-like alien creatures appear and start killing everyone in sight. Including our president and even Riley. It’s not easy watching your wife die. But if there’s anyone conditioned for it, it’s Smith. He’s watched her die 109 times.

Luckily, Smith jumps back in time before these things can catch him. When? Exactly one day before. The alien Blackberry device he’s stolen from these creatures only allows him to jump back one day at a time – or at least, that’s the only type of time jump he’s been able to figure out. It’s not like the thing comes with an instruction manual. Oh, and he’s been doing it. For seven years. Each day coming back and trying to warn his president, his country, his planet, that there’s an alien race ready to invade the planet and kill everyone on it.

But this time when he jumps back, it’s different. He’s amassed enough video evidence, among other things (cutting off the president’s finger after he died) to finally step up to the table with a case. And it’s a compelling one, so much so that they listen to his pleas. The thing is, there’s nothing they can do about it. These aliens are thousands of years more advanced than them. And there’s millions of them. Maybe even billions. It’d be like us jumping back in time and starting a war with the cavemen. However, using classified technology developed by the creepy Dr. Oro, they realize they can send a message back in time 15 years to tell the planet what’s going to happen. As the aliens once again – like they always do – appear in this time and start obliterating the world, the humans are able to get the message out, and Smith and Riley barely escape to jump back in time one more day…

Into a completely different world. A broken down militarized world that for 15 years has been preparing for this day, the day the aliens arrive. Every single cent that every nation has earned has been used on creating a state of the art military. Anyone not with the program, has been forgotten. The streets are Sarajevo. It’s the Third Reich. And yet it has to be. The world has been preparing to save itself, to fight back, and militarizing itself was the only option. Ain’t no giant trees making out with animals here. This is hard core live or die.

The rest of the script then focuses on the hours leading up to the invasion. And it’s beyond captivating, as we’re wondering: Can they do it? Can they actually defeat this race that regularly wipes out the entire planet within minutes? This is fucking “Aliens” times a million!

The really cool thing about this script is that it makes you think. It makes you think about what our world would be like if we spent every single available dollar on our military. It makes you think about whether we would force children to fight. Hey, sure they’re children, but this is the end of the world we’re talking about here. Might as well increase our numbers. And unlike, say, Independence Day, you’re so invested in the characters that it makes you step back and wonder what you would do. Would you cower in fear? Or would you rise to the occasion?

Are there complaints? Well…yes. Some of the over-the-top banter between Dr. Oro and Riley, who say things like, “That is one saucy piñata,” followed by “Get me down, you big Wienie!” was too much to take. “Pervy nerds. Man eating growly things. Bombs falling from the sky. This is the worst Christmas ever!” sounds more like a sitcom than an end of the world film to me. I remember that this is what bothered me so much when I first read it. I immediately thought, “This is going to be another one of those lame action movies with the wanna-be Bruce-Willis’esque action hero spouting out clever line-age. I assigned the script that label way too early, which prevented me from seeing just how much more there was here. St. John has really thought everything through in this world. And while there are holes (It’s impossible to write a time-travel movie without them) they’re minimal enough so that they don’t hurt the story.

The Days Before is a freaking sweet script. It’s “Independence Day” with a brain (and, uh, a script!). Don’t know what Warners’ plans are with this, but I’d be putting it into production today. Or, err, I mean yesterday. :)

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

What I learned: So yeah, regarding the “You better impress me” stuff. You have to remember that readers read *FOR THEIR JOB*. They’re not clearing out their day so they can read your script next to a fire with cookies and warm milk. They’re trying to make it through. That’s their job. Make it through the script remembering just enough to write cohesive coverage. This is why I tell writers they can never half-ass it. That every scene and character and story element they include has to be fucking awesome because you never know what kind of mood or situation that reader is going to be in when they sit down with your script. Assume the worst. That your reader is a bitter old man who hates movies and hates his job. If you can win him over, you can win anyone over!