KASHMIR

Posted on June 7, 2010 | by admin

Yes! I am so glad Roger’s finally reviewing Kashmir. I’ve been hearing great things about it forever and have repeatedly meant to read it. Plus, as a bonus, he applies my 13 Keys to a great script and sees how Kashmir stacks up. I mean, I have to love this review, right? — This is what happens when you write an awesome spec. You get work. And Weiss has gotten worrrrrrrrrk and then some. Anyway, as promised, I’ll have at least one horror review for you this week – on Wednesday – and let’s just say I was pleasantly surprised. I have a sharp funny comedy review for tomorrow. Thursday and Friday are up for grabs. Enjoy Roger’s review!

Genre: Drama, War, Thriller
Premise: Three ex-mercenaries stumble upon information concerning the whereabouts of the world’s most wanted terrorist. They journey into Kashmir, the dangerous and disputed territory between two nuclear powers in order to claim the $50 million bounty on the terrorist’s head.
About: D.B. Weiss’ “Kashmir” was on the 2005 Black List with 2 votes. In 2008 it was acquired by Relativity Media with Jean-Jacques Annaud (Seven Years in Tibet) attached to direct. Weiss is a graduate of the Iowa Writer’s Workshop and is the author of the videogame-themed novel, Lucky Wander Boy. Back in February, I reviewed a draft of Orson Scott Card’s Ender’s Game adapted by Weiss. Weiss has also penned drafts of the I am Legend prequel for Warner Bros., Halo and an adaptation of George R.R. Martin’s A Game of Thrones for HBO with David Benioff.
Writer: D.B. Weiss

This is a tale of three men.

One is motivated by desperation.
One is motivated by greed.
One is motivated by guilt.
This is the story of what happens to these men when they venture into volatile territory occupied by Jihadis, separatists and murderous native tribes in order to capture the world’s most dangerous man and claim the fifty million dollar bounty on his head.
Who is the man motivated by desperation?
Frank Pierce is former Marine Recon now working a boring high-tech menial labor job where he spends his hours soldering connections on circuit boards at International Navigational Technologies. He’s lorded over by MBAs fifteen years his junior and his soul seems to be slowly dying because he’s living a life that doesn’t call for his unique set of talents and expertise.
See, Pierce is really good at tracking things, specifically, other human beings. He’s a hunter. It’s a pretty specialized talent (huh, kinda like screenwriting?), and when he was in Marine Recon, or even the independent merc contractor, Executive Armor, he was able to use this talent. His official title? Full Service Independent Operator.
As an operator that could do the one thing he was good at every day, he thrived. Pierce was truly alive then.
But then, he met a girl, and realized, “I’d rather spend my life with her than with a bunch of sweaty guys in a South American jungle.” And together, with his wife, Linda, they had a daughter named Emma.
When the story opens, little Emma is watching a news broadcast that shows the aftermath of a terrorist bombing at the American Airlines Center, home of the Dallas Mavericks, in Texas.
Over two thousand people have been killed and Emma asks, “Dad, where’s Dallas?”
And this simple question from his five year-old daughter plants a seed of unease in Pierce, something that he’ll hold onto and try to convince himself is his true motivation.
Who is the man motivated by greed?
Carl Serra is a mad dog living the ex-private military man’s existence in the Philippines. He seems to spend a lot of his time gambling, which is what he’s doing when we meet him. A typical wise-ass, he beats some Filipino men at a hand of poker and says, “I thank you, Texas thanks you. And Uri thanks you, for giving me money I will no doubt piss away right here at this bar.”
We’ll get to Uri in a minute, but Serra drunkenly ambles home to his low-rent guesthouse, but is immediately accosted by Smiley, the Filipino man he pissed off, and his thugs. “You take my money, Funny Man. We need my money. We need it for important things.”
“So why’d you gamble with it?”
A reasonable question, but one Smiley doesn’t bother to answer. As he takes his pesos back from Serra, his thugs debate in Tagalog whether they should use a gun or a knife. They opt to use a knife, to which Serra replies in their own language, “Wrong choice.”
Serra Jason Bourne’s the knife out of their hands and quickly kills everyone in the room with it, even gutting a man like a trout. He strangles Smiley to death and goes through his possessions.
He finds a handwritten list of phone numbers that piques his curiosity.
Who is the man motivated by guilt?
Uri Tzur is the Israeli proprietor of the bar Serra operates out of, a former Israel Defense Forces soldier who can speak fluent Arabic. Actually, he went AWOL from the IDF, and it’s not something we think about much until a breathless sequence at the mid-point of this tale reveals his tragic back-story.
Compared to the other two soldiers, Uri thinks he’s dead weight, but the fact that he can speak Arabic makes him the fail safe for their plan. And as such, he’s at the center of one of the most intense scenes in this script. I mean, can you imagine the terror of being Israeli and having to infiltrate a network of caves by pretending to be an Arab jihadi? It’s a tense trial and the pure drama drawing off the historical context of the bigger conflict is staggering.
So who is the most wanted man on the planet?
His name is Sayim al-Bakr and he’s the man who has assumed leadership of al-Qaeda. He’s also the man responsible for bombing the American Airlines Center in Dallas.
Yep, he’s pretty much a narrative analog for Osama bin Laden.
OK. So that list of numbers Serra finds. They have to do something with Sayim’s location, right?
Smiley was a terrorist bomber in league with Sayim. The numbers are a list of one day satellite telephone numbers that Sayim’s men are using to communicate with the rest of al-Qaeda.
Serra phones Pierce, and Pierce uses his resources at International Navigational Technologies to trace the numbers. Serra and Pierce worked together, a long time ago, on a security detail for an Iranian dissident when they worked for the Halliburton suits.
Pierce calls the CIA and tries to inform them that Sayim is in Kashmir, a territory US troops haven’t set foot in for quite some time. But America is looking in Afghanistan or Iran, a thousand miles in the opposite direction, and they have a hard time believing Pierce because they don’t know who he is. And the CIA is reluctant to check the coordinates, because they would have to go to their supervisors, who would have to put in a request to Naval Intelligence and it’s all too much red tape for them to deal with.
With each passing day, they lose a number, and when Pierce sees that there are only seven numbers left, he finally decides to team up with Serra and take matters into his own hands, “We’ve got seven days.”
“We’re talking about hunting the worst man on Earth –-“
“– three guys, setting out to do a job the whole free world is crapping out on.”
So they go to Kashmir. But are they going to bring in Sayim al-Bakr dead or alive?
So, armed with the numbers and days as their ticking clock, a GPS device, cover as journalists for Outdoor magazine, and weapons, they trek through fifty miles of hostile terrain into the mountains of Kashmir. Their plan is to nab Sayim, bypass the Indian Army Base on the border and take him to the CNN field office at Srinagar where they collect their fifty million bounty and their names go down in the history books as heroes.
But this is where it gets interesting. Because Serra and Pierce have different motivations, they disagree. Pierce convinces himself that he’s doing this to protect his daughter, his wife, the citizens of his country. Sayim has war plans in his head that can surely be extracted. Serra just wants the bounty, and to him, he’d rather bring in Sayim dead than alive. It’s less problematic that way. And Uri is caught in the middle of this struggle, a conflict that gets heated with every obstacle that gets thrown in the way of their mission.
What about the action?
The second act involves double crosses by native drivers, a grueling march through wilderness, infiltrating a cave system that’s heavily guarded by terrorists and a snatch and grab that tests the physical endurance and psychological well-being of our heroes. It’s a tense adventure, a pressure cooker that frays loyalties and plants paranoia.
The third act explodes into all sorts of fucked-up fun when the arrival of someone who may or may not be a rival bounty hunter, Saint Nick Howard, causes our heroes to finally team-up as a unit or all-out compete against each other. Will they put their warring ideologies aside to work together or will their mission end in tragic circumstances by their own hands?
There’s a firefight on a treacherous mountain pass, a pretty awesome bridge battle with rocket launchers and derring-do, and a race through a mine field that’s probably as suspenseful as anything in The Hurt Locker.
Just for fun, let’s see how “Kashmir” measures up to Carson’s 13 Qualities of a Great Script:
1)AN ORIGINAL AND EXCITING CONCEPT – I’m sure many of us have thought, man, why haven’t they caught Osama bin Laden? Well, here’s a concept that fantasizes about that question and runs with it, with pretty riveting results.
2)A MAIN CHARACTER WHO WANTS SOMETHING (AKA “A GOAL”) – They want to capture Sayim and collect the fifty million dollar bounty. And everyone has a different reason for doing it.
3)A MAIN CHARACTER WE WANT TO ROOT FOR – Pierce is a family man who not only wants to protect his family, he wants to live a life where he can use his talent and feel valuable. We can all relate to that in some way, I think. Serra is an asshole, but he’s a funny and likeable asshole who can dispatch the bad guys in impressive ways. Uri has a sad back story that makes us sympathize with this mysterious character.
4)GET TO YOUR STORY QUICKLY – Page 15. Our main story goal is capture Sayim. Every scene before that even hints at it in some way, letting us know what this is about. And on page 15 the characters start talking about it, even if they were thinking about it for 14 pages before that.
5)STAY UNDER 110 PAGES – Nope. This is 123. But this is epic storytelling, and I was never bored once by it. It was so suspenseful I didn’t mind spending extra time absorbed with it. It’s a page turner.
6)CONFLICT – Characters on a mission who disagree with each other. All the other characters in the script are either trying to kill them or steal their bounty. Yep. Loads.
7)OBSTACLES – I think this script explores everything that can go wrong when entering hostile territory to capture the world’s most wanted man.
8)SURPRISE – Uri and Saint Nick Howard are characters that hide surprising secrets. Every fifteen pages has something that spins the plot in an interesting direction. The resolution is a big What If?
9)TICKING TIME BOMB – 7 Satellite Phone Numbers. 7 Days to find Sayim.
10)STAKES – Everyone’s life is on the line. What starts out as about money becomes something else. Philosophies, ideologies and morality collide against each other. The personal stakes symbolize a bigger historical conflict.
11)HEART – Pierce wants something that’s more than money, and he goes through hell to reach for it.
12)A GREAT ENDING – Sad, satisfying, thought-provoking. Doesn’t feel false. It feels right, like this is the only way it could have ended. That’s a good sign.
13)THE X-FACTOR – Look man, D.B. Weiss comes from the Iowa Writer’s Workshop, a workshop that has produced 17 Pulitzer Prize winning writers and Kurt Vonnegut, Jr. Guy can writer. And it’s not in that anorexic, breezy style that everyone else is so fond of. His language and voice is something that cannot be replicated. And the feel of this thing reminds me of something by John Milius or Walon Green. A script written with weight, machismo and command of the language.

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

What I learned: The turn into the 3rd Act is something I think about a lot. Sure, this is usually a point where there’s another twist in the story, but it’s also a place where everything gets so bad for our heroes you wonder how the story can possibly resolve itself. Here, Serra and Pierce’s arguments and motivations collide and lines are drawn and you think they’re going to kill each other. And as they’re fighting amongst themselves, the enemy capitalizes on the situation and tries to kill them. And the twist, or plot point here, is that another character crashes the party, someone revealing himself to be someone else. And although this character may save their lives, he’s also compromising their goal because he wants to claim the bounty for himself. There are layers to the conflict. And worst of all, the terrorist they’ve captured escapes and then everyone gets separated. It’s like the writer thought about everything that could possibly happen to the characters that they DON’T WANT TO HAPPEN. So, at this moment where the shit hits the fan, think of your character’s worst fear involving their goal. Then hit them with that fear to see how they’re going to hit back.
Posted in Uncategorized | 2 Comments

Sunday Book Review – The Wheelman

Posted on June 6, 2010 | by admin

Watch Scriptshadow on Sundays for book reviews by contributors Michael Stark and Matt Bird. We won’t be able to get one up every Sunday, but hopefully most Sundays. Here’s Stark with his review of “The Wheelman.”

SUNDAY BOOK REVIEW (The Wheelman by Duane Swierczynski)


Welcome back to Scriptshadow’s Sunday Book Review where we get to play Delancy Street Matchmaker, setting up jet setting, multimillionaire producers with our favorite, dreamy, deep-thinking authors. Unlike eHarmony or JDate, we provide this service totally free of charge without even asking for anyone’s credit card digits first.

It’s a thankless job, thank you. Hell, it would be nice if someone would at least spring for a gift card or a Nectarine of the Month Basket for our troubles. A few of the books we’ve reviewed have been optioned and a couple that were dying on the development vine have been lovingly picked back up and revived. Coincidence? Perhaps. But, I do dig free nectarines.

In case you haven’t been keeping score, this is the third Duane Swierczynski novel we’ve thrown bouquets at. No, he’s not family. Nor is he dating my sister. Don’t even know the guy to ask for a kickback. We just really, really dig his stuff. The dude knows his noir. He’s Richard Stark, Elmore Leonard and Max Allan Collins all thrown together and mashed up in whatever damned mess hall apparatus you’d need to make U.S. Army strength corn beef hash.

Luckily, Hollywood has taken notice. Severance Package, the book Roger gushed all over a few months ago, has already been picked up by Lionsgate. No luscious nectarines or tangelos for ol’ Rog though. This deal happened over two years ago.

So, what’s the set-up, Stark?

Let me first ask if you’d like a triple espresso with you noir? A triple espresso served with a sidecar of crack, laced with meth, added to a shot of adrenaline and frightened-cortisol-saturated sheep gonads delivered straight through your puny breastbone into your tachycardial heart with a Jolt Cola and Pop Rocks enema thrown in for good measure.

The Wheelman is pretty high-octane fare. A fast and furious crime spree that would make a much better vehicle for Jason Statham than The Transporter, Crank or whatever piece of crap he just sold another piece of his ever diminishing soul to star in.

(Okay, I actually love the actor and him starring in the upcoming adaptation of Ken Bruen’s Blitz is the ultimate act of redemption in my eyes.)

Oh, yeah, this isn’t any ways related to the Wheelman video game or the Vinnie Diesel flick of the same name. It has to be a gazillion times better. Hollywood may know how to really amp action scenes up lately, but The Swierz (You try spelling his name a half dozen times) really out-ratchets anything I’ve ever seen before.

So, you were getting to the set-up, Asshole!!!

Patrick Selway Lennon is a wheelman. For those who don’t know the bank-robbing parlance, he’s the driver; the guy entrusted with the getaway. The guy you hire to get you the hell outta there before the whip comes down.

And, like most heists, things don’t go exactly as planned. Well, who wants to read about a perfectly executed bank job? How dull. This one gets pretty much cluster fucked from the very start.

Lennon already hears the damn alarms ringing by the second page. He sees his partners trapped in the vestibule of the bank they were robbing like “two gerbils in a Habitrail.” He could just leave them there, but instead smashes the getaway car through the glass window and rescues the poor schmucks. Bank windows may be bulletproof, but they ain’t quite carproof!

Lennon is a pretty great wheelman, but he doesn’t have a lot of nifty, cool dialogue. That’s cause the Irishman is mute. So, he has a lot of nifty, cool thoughts. Not cinematic, you say? How dare you?!! What is more film noir than a protag’s constant voice over?

Like a combination of The French Connection and Frogger, Lennon wrestles the wheel and gets them out of there before the cops come, managing to avoid smashing a baby carriage in the process. The young woman pushing the carriage, however, doesn’t get off so easy. And, from there, Lennon’s bad day just keeps getting worse.

They ditch the getaway car in a parking garage, hide the loot in a second car planted there and take a third to the airport. Seemingly, an ingenious plan. There, they’ll split up in different directions till the heat is off.

But, on the way to the airport, a reinforced van crashes into them, flipping their Acura over. Lennon wakes up, finding himself in a body bag. Two college twerps are trying to stuff him and the rest of the evidence down a construction site’s huge pipe. Seems the mob has been using the place for a dumping ground since the project first broke ground.

Even stuck in a bag, Lennon manages to put up a pretty good fight. But, he still ends up stuffed down the damned pipe.

Don’t count him out just yet. He, and quite a few of the other characters we’ll soon meet, are guys that stubbornly and comically refuse to die. There’s a gal, Katie, waiting for Lennon in Puerto Rico and it would be uncouth to have her worry if he doesn’t show up on time. He crawls out of the pipe, kills the college kids, steals some clothes and tries to figure out who the hell just double-crossed him.

Now, there’s really not much more I can divulge without spoiling all the fun. The double crosses quickly escalate into more twisted triple crosses that you’ll never see coming.

No one is exactly what they seem (Did Lennon just speak? What is Katie doing in Puerto Rico snogging another dude?) Soon, everyone is after them, including the Russian mob, The Italian Mafia, crooked cops, bent politicians and a few accomplices they should never have trusted in the first place.

Though most of our readers are student scribes, I’m assigning this book right away for teaching narrative drive. Drive, He Said! The Wheelman doesn’t just chug along at a nice clip. It freaking burns rocket fuel. Imagine Mr. Toad licking himself before going out on that wild, fucking, murderous joy ride.

What I learned: As more and more screenplays are turning into glorified video games, how do you give your characters some realistic heart even if their outlandish antics are a bit cartoonish? Elmore Leonard grounds both his heroes and villains with believable dialogue. Start reading his entire back bloody catalogue and watch the brilliant Justified. When you get your characters crackling as much as your action, then you know you’re on to something!

Points for discussions: Which heists flicks do you feel worked? Would you approach it Michael Mann or Michael Bay style? Are you planning to write one? If so, may I plug another Swierczynski book? His nonfiction, This Here’s a Stick-Up, might just start you out on your own life of crime writing.

More of Stark’s rantings and ramblings can be found here: http://www.michaelbstark.blogspot.com/

Posted in Uncategorized | Leave a comment

Sunday Book Review – The Wheelman

Posted on June 6, 2010 | by admin

Watch Scriptshadow on Sundays for book reviews by contributors Michael Stark and Matt Bird. We won’t be able to get one up every Sunday, but hopefully most Sundays. Here’s Stark with his review of “The Wheelman.”

SUNDAY BOOK REVIEW (The Wheelman by Duane Swierczynski)


Welcome back to Scriptshadow’s Sunday Book Review where we get to play Delancy Street Matchmaker, setting up jet setting, multimillionaire producers with our favorite, dreamy, deep-thinking authors. Unlike eHarmony or JDate, we provide this service totally free of charge without even asking for anyone’s credit card digits first.

It’s a thankless job, thank you. Hell, it would be nice if someone would at least spring for a gift card or a Nectarine of the Month Basket for our troubles. A few of the books we’ve reviewed have been optioned and a couple that were dying on the development vine have been lovingly picked back up and revived. Coincidence? Perhaps. But, I do dig free nectarines.

In case you haven’t been keeping score, this is the third Duane Swierczynski novel we’ve thrown bouquets at. No, he’s not family. Nor is he dating my sister. Don’t even know the guy to ask for a kickback. We just really, really dig his stuff. The dude knows his noir. He’s Richard Stark, Elmore Leonard and Max Allan Collins all thrown together and mashed up in whatever damned mess hall apparatus you’d need to make U.S. Army strength corn beef hash.

Luckily, Hollywood has taken notice. Severance Package, the book Roger gushed all over a few months ago, has already been picked up by Lionsgate. No luscious nectarines or tangelos for ol’ Rog though. This deal happened over two years ago.

So, what’s the set-up, Stark?

Let me first ask if you’d like a triple espresso with you noir? A triple espresso served with a sidecar of crack, laced with meth, added to a shot of adrenaline and frightened-cortisol-saturated sheep gonads delivered straight through your puny breastbone into your tachycardial heart with a Jolt Cola and Pop Rocks enema thrown in for good measure.

The Wheelman is pretty high-octane fare. A fast and furious crime spree that would make a much better vehicle for Jason Statham than The Transporter, Crank or whatever piece of crap he just sold another piece of his ever diminishing soul to star in.

(Okay, I actually love the actor and him starring in the upcoming adaptation of Ken Bruen’s Blitz is the ultimate act of redemption in my eyes.)

Oh, yeah, this isn’t any ways related to the Wheelman video game or the Vinnie Diesel flick of the same name. It has to be a gazillion times better. Hollywood may know how to really amp action scenes up lately, but The Swierz (You try spelling his name a half dozen times) really out-ratchets anything I’ve ever seen before.

So, you were getting to the set-up, Asshole!!!

Patrick Selway Lennon is a wheelman. For those who don’t know the bank-robbing parlance, he’s the driver; the guy entrusted with the getaway. The guy you hire to get you the hell outta there before the whip comes down.

And, like most heists, things don’t go exactly as planned. Well, who wants to read about a perfectly executed bank job? How dull. This one gets pretty much cluster fucked from the very start.

Lennon already hears the damn alarms ringing by the second page. He sees his partners trapped in the vestibule of the bank they were robbing like “two gerbils in a Habitrail.” He could just leave them there, but instead smashes the getaway car through the glass window and rescues the poor schmucks. Bank windows may be bulletproof, but they ain’t quite carproof!

Lennon is a pretty great wheelman, but he doesn’t have a lot of nifty, cool dialogue. That’s cause the Irishman is mute. So, he has a lot of nifty, cool thoughts. Not cinematic, you say? How dare you?!! What is more film noir than a protag’s constant voice over?

Like a combination of The French Connection and Frogger, Lennon wrestles the wheel and gets them out of there before the cops come, managing to avoid smashing a baby carriage in the process. The young woman pushing the carriage, however, doesn’t get off so easy. And, from there, Lennon’s bad day just keeps getting worse.

They ditch the getaway car in a parking garage, hide the loot in a second car planted there and take a third to the airport. Seemingly, an ingenious plan. There, they’ll split up in different directions till the heat is off.

But, on the way to the airport, a reinforced van crashes into them, flipping their Acura over. Lennon wakes up, finding himself in a body bag. Two college twerps are trying to stuff him and the rest of the evidence down a construction site’s huge pipe. Seems the mob has been using the place for a dumping ground since the project first broke ground.

Even stuck in a bag, Lennon manages to put up a pretty good fight. But, he still ends up stuffed down the damned pipe.

Don’t count him out just yet. He, and quite a few of the other characters we’ll soon meet, are guys that stubbornly and comically refuse to die. There’s a gal, Katie, waiting for Lennon in Puerto Rico and it would be uncouth to have her worry if he doesn’t show up on time. He crawls out of the pipe, kills the college kids, steals some clothes and tries to figure out who the hell just double-crossed him.

Now, there’s really not much more I can divulge without spoiling all the fun. The double crosses quickly escalate into more twisted triple crosses that you’ll never see coming.

No one is exactly what they seem (Did Lennon just speak? What is Katie doing in Puerto Rico snogging another dude?) Soon, everyone is after them, including the Russian mob, The Italian Mafia, crooked cops, bent politicians and a few accomplices they should never have trusted in the first place.

Though most of our readers are student scribes, I’m assigning this book right away for teaching narrative drive. Drive, He Said! The Wheelman doesn’t just chug along at a nice clip. It freaking burns rocket fuel. Imagine Mr. Toad licking himself before going out on that wild, fucking, murderous joy ride.

What I learned: As more and more screenplays are turning into glorified video games, how do you give your characters some realistic heart even if their outlandish antics are a bit cartoonish? Elmore Leonard grounds both his heroes and villains with believable dialogue. Start reading his entire back bloody catalogue and watch the brilliant Justified. When you get your characters crackling as much as your action, then you know you’re on to something!

Points for discussions: Which heists flicks do you feel worked? Would you approach it Michael Mann or Michael Bay style? Are you planning to write one? If so, may I plug another Swierczynski book? His nonfiction, This Here’s a Stick-Up, might just start you out on your own life of crime writing.

More of Stark’s rantings and ramblings can be found here: http://www.michaelbstark.blogspot.com/

Posted in Uncategorized | Leave a comment

The Numbers Station

Posted on June 4, 2010 | by admin

Genre: Dramatic Thriller
Premise: A black ops agent is assigned to protect a female operator who works out of a “numbers station” deep in the Arizona desert.
About: This sold a few weeks back once Ethan Hawke attached himself to the project. It is F. Scott Frazier’s first sale. He previously worked in the video game industry. Kasper Barfoed, a Danish filmmaker known for his film “The Candidate,” will direct. Production starts this September.
Writer: F. Scott Frazier
Details: 108 pages – not dated (This is an early draft of the script. The situations, characters, and plot may change significantly by the time of the film’s release. 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 remember in an interview Ethan Hawke gave a few years back, he said (paraphrasing) “You’ll never see me in a movie like some of these actors make, Beethoven 2 or Transformers, because I’ve never lived above my means. A lot of star actors take gigs because they have house payments. I’ve never made a decision to be in a film based on anything other than the material.” Now you may not like Ethan Hawke’s choices, but I love the fact that he stays true to his craft. You can count the number of actors on one hand who do that. And it’s for that reason that I always pay attention when Ethan Hawke signs onto a project. I know he’s basing his decision on the quality of the project, and in most cases, the quality of the screenplay.

The Numbers Station is a dark, somewhat twisted, story about an agent, Emerson Little, whose job it is to “retire” other agents when they’re no longer necessary. As far as what kind of agency Emerson belongs to, that’s anyone’s guess. I suppose it could be the CIA, but like a lot of things in The Numbers Station, “supposing” is about as close as you’re going to get. This story is shrouded in mystery, which is both its biggest strength and its biggest weakness.

Whomever it is that employs Emerson, they do so with an iron fist. Emerson and his fellow agents live in constant fear. One little slip-up and it might be them getting “retired.” So when Emerson does slip up on a routine job, he’s thinking it could be lights out. Instead, he’s given a reprieve. He’ll be sent to a “Numbers Station” way out the fuck in the middle of the Arizona desert. His job will be to protect the operator at the station. The job is meant as an insult – the easiest of all the jobs an agent can have.

So out into the desert Emerson goes and sure enough there’s a lone tiny building in the middle of nowhere. Inside the deceptively but heavily fortified building are a few rooms and a “broadcast station.” A woman named Katherine – pretty, simple –reads numbers into an encrypted frequency all day. She doesn’t know what the numbers mean. Nobody knows what the numbers mean. Except, we assume, the people who they’re being broadcast to.

As agents, everything is supposed to be kept professional. No smiles, no personal talk, no “real life.” She reads the numbers. He protects her. That’s all.

But when you’re out in the middle of nowhere with no one to talk to, with nothing to do, sooner or later something’s going to break. Katherine and Emerson develop a quiet friendship. It’s wrong – he knows that – and he knows one more slip-up is going to place him in the middle of the desert permanently. But what can he do? She’s so full of life. In fact, Katherine who erroneously believes that one day she’ll have a “normal” life, is eager to crack Emerson’s icy exterior. It’s a delicate line Emerson must walk, and it’s one he struggles with the more he gets to know here.

Then out of nowhere, one day between shifts, the station is compromised. And even though it seems to be empty now, they find out that whoever broke in is nearby, and they’re not leaving until they get one more thing. And that one more thing is still there, in the station, with them.

The Numbers Station is a bizarre script. It takes its time, and in the first 30 pages, could’ve gone several different ways. For that reason, it took me awhile to settle in and really feel comfortable.

Once we’re at the Numbers Station though, the story picks up, and that mainly has to do with our fascination over what these numbers are that are being broadcast. What do they mean? Where are they going? Who’s receiving them? What are they doing once they receive them? Does this kind of thing exist in real life? Whatever they are, it becomes clear that they’re important, and the obvious reason for why the station is compromised.

Now if you’re hoping for a clear-cut answer on these numbers, you’re not going to get one. The Numbers Station goes out of its way to give you pieces of the puzzle, but never what it looks like when it’s put together. Strangely, for someone who usually hates a lack of answers, I was captivated. Cause there is just enough information to make your imagination run wild. And like I stated above, I kept coming back to that question: Does something like this really exist? How horrifying would that be?

The crux of the story, however, is what goes down once the station is compromised, and I think the script, in its current draft, falls a little short here. As Emerson and Katherine (interesting character names btw) try and figure out what to do, the surprises aren’t surprising enough, the bad guys plan isn’t clear enough, and there’s something in the back of your head whispering, “We’ve seen it go down this way before.” There are a few nice revelations, and I’m a sucker for the “play back the audio/video and look closer” device (which plays a big part in the mystery), but if they could nail this aspect of the script, this could really be something special, because I was truly fascinated by this tiny but compelling world that F. Scott Frazier created.

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

What I learned: You want to make your main character’s defining characteristic clear. If we’re unsure what that characteristic is because you focus on too many sides of your hero, the character can quickly become confusing (and muddled). Han Solo’s defining characteristic is that he’s selfish. We’re never confused about that. Woody’s defining characteristic in Toy Story is that he’s jealous. We’re never confused about that. Once you know that characteristic, you can shape the storyline to repeatedly challenge it. So when the Millennium Falcon gets stuck on the Death Star, Han Solo isn’t concerned about saving a stupid princess. He’s concerned about how he’s going to get his money. Only when Luke presents the idea of a reward does Han become interested. Later, when Han can either fight for the Rebel Alliance (help others) or leave (save himself), he of course chooses to leave. So there’s a huge advantage gained by making your hero’s defining characteristic clear. Here, Emerson’s defining characteristic is his emotional distance. He refuses to allow anyone in. When you read the script, pay attention to how that plays out during the course of the story. Always make sure the hero’s defining characteristic is clear!

Posted in Uncategorized | Leave a comment

Premium Rush

Posted on June 3, 2010 | by admin

Genre: Thriller
Premise: A bike messenger has 90 minutes to get a mysterious package across town.
About: From spec-kings David Koepp and John Camps, this script recently sold to Columbia with Joseph Gordon-Levitt attached to play the lead. Koepp is also planning to direct. Gordon-Levitt is set to star in another thriller as well, this one for a sci-fi script written and directed by Rian Johnson (Brick) called “Looper.” Is Gordon-Levitt finally ready to become the next DiCaprio?
Writers: David Koepp and John Kamps
Details: 111 pages – September 18, 2009 Draft (This is an early draft of the script. The situations, characters, and plot may change significantly by the time of the film’s release. 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).


David Koepp and John Camps come to play. They wrote a little script a decade ago called The Superconducting Super Collider from Sparkle Creek Wisconsin and sold it for 2.5 million. They wrote Ghost Town a few years back and that sold for 2 million. Koepp, on his own, wrote Panic Room in 2000 and that sold for 2 million. That’s three specs sold for 2 million or more. Only a few writers have that kind of track record. So when Koepp and collaborator Kamps write a new script, the market is ready to listen. I was particularly interested in this script after posting yesterday’s article, “How To Write a Great Script.” I was curious to see how many points out of the 13 listed it hit on. Surprisingly, it hit them all. So what’s it about?

Wilee is a modern day Puck. You remember Puck, right? The San Francisco bike messenger who liked to taunt Pedro by putting his fingers in the peanut butter? Too obscure a reference? Understood. I’ll start over (but 10 bonus points for the first person to point out where the reference is from). Wilee is a 26 year old bike messenger in New York City. He zips around town tempting serious injury and/or death at every intersection, at every car door, at every bus he speeds by. This is not a job for the faint of heart, or, you know, people who value their life. But the rush is what Wilee lives for. If you need a package taken from midtown to downtown in 20 minutes, he’s your man.

So on this particular day, Wilee receives a seemingly innocent package from an Asian Woman to be delivered to Chinatown. It is very important, the woman stresses, that the package get to its destination, and that it gets there within the next 93 minutes. Yeah yeah, Wilee says. If it didn’t need to get there fast, they wouldn’t be calling him. Every package is a rush – piece of cake.

Except it’s not a piece of cake. Less than a block after leaving the pick-up, Wilee runs into a man named Barry Monday (I love how Koepp and Kamps introduce him: “His name, no matter what he says, is BARRY MONDAY”), who claims that the woman who gave him the package did so unlawfully, and he’s going to need it back. Wilee sizes him up, senses something suspicious, and rolls out. But this will not be the last time Wilee runs into Barry Monday.

That’s when Premium Rush starts making some interesting choices. I usually hate flashbacks, mainly because they put the story on hold until the flashback is over. If you have a ton of momentum, why would you want to pause your story? But as has been previously noted, this isn’t Koepp’s and Kamps’ first trip to the rodeo. They understand that if we’re going to flash back, there needs to be something revealed, something that, essentially, pushes the story forward instead of holding it in place.


So what we do, is cut back a few hours to the individual characters in the story and how they reached this point. We learn about why Barry Monday is chasing Wilee. We learn about why the Asian woman needed Wilee to deliver the package. And we learn about Wilee’s own issues via the romantic relationship he’s involved with.

As soon as these flashbacks are over, we zip back into the present-hour situation, which mostly entails harrowing chase scenes throughout New York City. I’ll be honest with you. I didn’t expect to like this. Mainly because I thought bike messengers were extinct once the internet hit. It just seemed like old hat to me. But it turns out it actually has the opposite effect. The zipping and zapping through New York City felt fresh and alive, different from anything I’d recently read or seen.

Let’s start with the best part of the script: bike-o-vision. Yeah, you heard that right. Koepp and Kamps have created their own Matrix-style stop-motion technique. When Wilee’s zipping through the streets and gets into a tough spot (door opening, cross-traffic ahead, baby stroller), everything slows down so he can assess his options. Then, out of nowhere, a small area will light up, and that’s the direction he zips into.

Also, this script should be a template for how to write action. The description here is so clean it practically shines. I can’t tell you how often I stumble through sentences because of bad description. Each line feels like downtown Chicago once spring hits – potholes everywhere. Here, I felt like I was on one of those sleek Japanese magnet trains – everything was smooth as silk. I haven’t been able to visualize action like that in forever.

But now for the fun stuff. Let’s see how the script stacks up to the 13 qualities of a great script I posted yesterday…

1) AN ORIGINAL AND EXCITING CONCEPT – Haven’t seen a movie about bike messengers before. Rushing through New York City on a bike almost getting killed at every corner? Definitely exciting.

2) A MAIN CHARACTER WHO WANTS SOMETHING (AKA “A GOAL”) – He wants to deliver the package. Check.

3) A MAIN CHARACTER WE WANT TO ROOT FOR – Wilee fends off the bully Barry Monday after receiving the package. We also slyly see him get screwed over by another biker early on. Instantly-built sympathy. We like this guy. We want to see him succeed.

4) GET TO YOUR STORY QUICKLY – We get to our main story goal (deliver the package) on page 13. And I give you guys til page 25! I’m thinking I was way too generous.

5) STAY UNDER 110 PAGES – Script is 111. I’ll give Koepp and Kamps a break on that extra page seeing as they’ve sold 7 million dollars worth of scripts.

6) CONFLICT – I don’t think there’s a single scene in this script that doesn’t have a healthy dose of conflict. The nature of the premise practically ensures it.

7) OBSTACLES – Rarely does 10 pages go by without some major obstacle getting in the way of Wilee delivering the package.

8) SURPRISE – Lots of surprises here. From the way the story is structured (flashbacks) to the revelations of who these people are and why they’re in this predicament. Monday is a whole basket of secrets.

9) TICKING TIME BOMB – He only has 93 minutes to deliver the package.

10) STAKES – The stakes are extremely high for everyone. Wilee’s life is on the line. Monday’s career is on the line. The Asian woman’s package contains the highest stakes of all (which I won’t spoil).

11) HEART – When we find out what the Asian Woman is transporting, that’s about as much heart as you can pack into a thriller.

12) A GREAT ENDING – The ending here is solid.

13) THE X-FACTOR – The script has a beautiful combination of kinetic energy, surprising revelations, and fresh plot points. Nothing here feels old or rehashed. It’s the old “same but different” every producer is looking for.

Now does this mean I think Premium Rush is perfect? No. This isn’t Casablanca or Chinatown. It’s a thriller. But it’s a thriller that’s executed pretty much perfectly. The only thing the script is missing is a slightly more emotionally engaging main character. I would’ve liked to connect with Wilee more, and that’s why this just missed an impressive rating. But this is really good stuff. Check it out.

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

What I learned: Whenever you write a script like this where your main character is being chased by dangerous people, you have to address the question of “Why doesn’t he just go to the cops?” When writers ignore this simple question, it indicates they don’t give a shit about reality, and the script loses credibility as a result. If real world rules don’t apply, then you’re writing a fantasy. Here in Premium Rush, a great reason is given for why Wilee doesn’t go to the cops (don’t want to spoil it), so we never consider the possibility again.

Posted in Uncategorized | Leave a comment