Genre: Action-Thriller
Premise: After an ex-Marine turned lawyer sees that he’s been reported dead in a local car accident, he gradually learns that he’s the target of someone involved in a top secret government program.
About: Million dollar sale back in 1993 to Arnold Kopelson, the producer of The Fugitive. Christine Roum, the writer, still writes today, 30 years later. She’s currently writing on the show, Big Sky.
Writer: Christine Roum
Details: 121 pages
Would he still do it? The Seagalaissance?
This one has a fun backstory.
It was sold for one million bucks back in 1993. Once The Fugitive debuted, the script got a hard push to become a female version of the hit movie (wait a minute, is this 1993 or 2023??), with the hope of it starring Jodie Foster or Geena Davis.
Ah, but then Hollywood enigma Steven Seagal somehow got a hold of the script and, all of a sudden, he wanted to make it. So the film was completely rewritten from a female to a male lead (check that – DEFINITELY not 2023).
Because Seagal duct-taped himself to Everglades trees and became impossible to contact, the project stalled and, unfortunately, never got made. But the script is supposed to be good and, since it’s a member of the ageless action-thriller genre, could probably be made today!
Let’s see if it’s any good.
Nick, who’s almost 40, is a lawyer in Washington D.C. We can tell Nick is different because while everyone else wears suits, Nick is just fine in cheap jeans and a ratty sports jacket. When we meet him, he’s helping an old reporter buddy of his, Jay, get off for some invasion of privacy charge. Jay rides right up next to the law whenever he investigates a story and so Nick constantly has to bail him out.
Afterwards, Nick reluctantly lets Jay borrow his car, as Jay’s got another story he’s chasing. But he says something chilling before he leaves. “If I die, it wasn’t an accident.” Nick notes the odd thought but doesn’t think much of it until later that evening, when he turns on the news and sees that Jay died in a car crash. Oh, and that so did Nick!
Nick, determined to correct this mistake, goes to the local police station where a buddy of his works and explains the situation. His buddy, though, looks very surprised to see him. Not just in a, “I thought you were dead in a car crash” way. But in a “You should not be alive right now” way. Nick senses this and makes a run for it. The cops start shooting at him and that’s when Nick knows for certain: Someone wants him dead.
Nick heads to an old lawyer girlfriend of his, Delia, who hooks Nick up with a lawyer she knows, Avery. The three decide it’s not safe to be in D.C. right now and head out of town. But on the toll road, Nick can’t help but keep looking in the rearview mirror at Avery and thinking something funny’s going on. At the toll booth, Nick leaps out of the car and both Avery and Delia start shooting at him.
Holy SH-T! Everyone wants Nick dead!
After being betrayed by several other friends, Nick goes back to an older girlfriend, an electrician named Casey, who has zero ties to D.C. Casey, still burned by their failed relationship, isn’t exactly thrilled to hang with her old beau, especially under these circumstances. But together they do some digging and find out that Jay was looking into some deep government program and the assumption is that Nick now knows about it too. So Nick will have to find out what this program is and expose it in order to save his life.
It was funny reading this script as I felt like I’d been taken back through a time warp. Right from the start, I could sense a different attitude towards script writing than I do today. The writer really REALLY wants you to turn the page. And it’s effective.
We’re at some remote lab and this seemingly innocuous woman walks up and just BAM shoots another woman in the face. We then cut to a security camera where we’re seeing some guy walking through another area of the lab and he JOLTS. A split-second later he falls. The same woman walks into frame, gun raised.
There was something about this all being done by a mild-mannered woman that surprised me and pulled me in. I now wanted to keep reading. And hence, how screenplays used to be written.
These days, there just isn’t that sense of urgency. The writer doesn’t seem nearly as worried about losing the reader. The reader needs to respect the time and attention *the writer* put into this script. The *reader*, in the 2023 writer’s eye, is the one who owes *them* their time. And it’s this attitude that leads to so many boring scripts.
Now you may be thinking I’m about to award 90s scripts, and this one in particular, the gold medal in screenwriting excellence. But the truth is, Dead Reckoning displays both strengths AND weaknesses of that era. The biggest weakness of those 90s big spec sale scripts is that they were all soooooo generic. There was very little innovation.
Blah blah blah some sort of political conspiracy. Blah blah blah a dozen generic chase scenes. Even when Dead Reckoning tries to differentiate itself, introducing a struggle inside a wacky machinists’s lab, it doesn’t feel right. It was almost as if, in an attempt to prove that they weren’t going to make this COMPLETELY cliche, they added this bizarre location. Except that it was so random, so disconnected from the rest of the script, that it didn’t work.
It’s one of those things rarely talked about in screenwriting. A random unique location isn’t proof that your script is different. Your locations, your scenes, still have to organically evolve from the story you’re telling to hold water.
This contrast makes Dead Reckoning very hard to judge, its familiarity constantly interjected with a dogged determination to keep the reader turning the pages. To that end, Dead Reckoning may have the most untrustworthy cast of characters ever. No one can be trusted, even former years-long girlfriends. There are so many people who try to kill Nick that the later scenes play out with tons of tension even when the writer isn’t trying to add any. We keep waiting for the shoe to drop. And it definitely infuses the script with a relentless energy.
Good, right?
Okay, but now quiz me on what the actual cover-up is in Dead Reckoning.
I DON’T KNOW.
Even though a good four scenes were dedicated to explaining it.
Again, 90s scripts seemed so uninterested in answers. They were more focused on the questions, on the mystery. And it sucks. Because one of the best moments in the script is when Nick turns on the TV and sees that he’s dead. And then, a few scenes later, when he goes to the cops, they look at him not as they’re happy he’s still alive. But that Nick isn’t supposed to be alive. And they’re going to finish the job.
That kind of extreme need to kill this man necessitates a kicka$$ explanation. If he needs to be eliminated to take care of a cover-up, then give me a great cover-up. Not Generic Black Contract Army Navy Secret Weapon Something-or-Other Cover-Up that’s in every script.
The Fugitive, which this script wants to be, didn’t have a mind-blowing explanation of why Richard needed to be framed for his wife’s murder. But it was very well plotted, constructed, and made sense. His wife’s work was threatening a very big release of a medical drug.
The truth is, most scripts written back in the 90s were front-loaded. They came in with big splashy first acts (you turn on the TV to see that you’ve been reported dead) and had no idea where to go from there. Which is why most of them devolved into the same type of third act that you see here. Some governmental program-weapon conspiracy.
And, honestly, I think this is why the spec boom died. Cause you had a whole bunch of great first acts but very few great second and third acts. So when all of these movies bombed, Hollywood said, “Enough is enough. We need a better model.” And they moved over to IP.
With that said, I don’t dislike these types of scripts. In fact, I love them. And the genre is always going to be in favor. What fits better into the movie format than thrills and action? But you have to write a good script. You have to write a COHESIVE script. You have to put just as much energy into acts 2 and 3 as you do that grabber of a 1st act. It’s not easy. But it can be done!
Script link: Dead Reckoning
[ ] What the hell did I just read?
[x] wasn’t for me
[ ] worth the read
[ ] impressive
[ ] genius
What I learned: A great way to set up a character is to have them dress completely differently from the standard uniform that everyone else wears. Nick wears grubby jeans in a field of people who wear 2000 dollar suits. You can do the opposite of this, too. If everyone wears normal clothes, have your character wear a suit. Anything that stands out from the norm helps us identify your character. Also, characters who stand out in some way pop off the page better.
