O.M.G. Do we have a new contender for the top spot on the 2015 Black List??
Genre: Drama
Premise: A small-town boy goes hunting for a mythical figure known to cheat death in order to save his cancer-stricken mother.
About: This script sold to Disney a few months ago. It’s said to have shades of “Stand by Me” and “E.T.” to it. The writer, Emily Needell, is a first-timer, however she did work in a small capacity as a writer’s assistant before the sale. She also went to NYU film school, no easy feat after growing up on a 750-acre cattle farm. Hey, who says you can’t find screenwriting success living in the middle of nowhere?
Writer: Emily Needell
Details: 99 pages – undated
Disney isn’t exactly known for their spec-script buying prowess. More than any studio, they plant their feet firmly in the IP sector. So when they do buy a spec, it’s a big deal and worth checking out who they made the exception for. It also gives you an idea of what kind of material Disney is looking for tone-wise.
Despite that, I wasn’t expecting much out of The Water Man. I thought the title was bland. In a world where writers have come up with names like Hannibal Lecter and Freddy Krueger, we’re supposed to get excited about someone called, “The Water Man??” The cancer angle also implied this was headed into Melodrama Nation, a destination I had no interest in visiting. Oh how very wrong I was.
10 year-old Gunner Boone lives in the tiny town of Willow Spur, Montana. To say that Gunner isn’t like other kids is the grand poobah of understatements. The boy writes graphic novels, and really good ones at that. His current novel follows a dead detective who’s trying to solve his own murder. Hell, I’d read that book.
But since creativity isn’t exactly celebrated in the 10 year old demographic, the only friends Gunner has are the local plump librarian and his mother, Mary. Even his father, Amos, seems confused by his son’s weird interests. He’d rather Gunner come out hunting with him, which is probably why he gave his son his name in the first place.
But everything changes when Gunner finds out his mother has cancer. Really bad cancer. Gunner being Gunner, though, thinks he can solve the problem by reading enough books, by doing enough research. But the only thing he comes across that gives him hope is the story of Edward Shaal, a local man who died in a flood back in the 1920s and somehow came back to life two days later.
Gunner believes that if he can find Edward, who the locals refer to as “The Water Man,” he can save his mother. So he grabs his father’s rifle and some supplies, and finds the one boy in town who claims to have come in contact with The Water Man, 12 year old Joseph Riley. Riley, not exactly the nicest kid, demands a hundred bucks to take Gunner into the woods where The Water Man lives. Gunner, who doesn’t have many options, agrees and off they go.
As the two head deeper and deeper into the forest, Gunner senses that something is off about Riley’s story. The details of his encounter with The Water Man are non-specific, and he doesn’t really seem to know where he’s going. As Gunner’s mother lies precariously close to death, his trip into the forest becomes more uncertain, and that’s when we come to a horrifying realization, that it may not be a son who’s about to lose a mother, but rather a mother who’s about to lose her son.
So the other day I was reading a script from a good amateur writer – a guy I feel is on the precipice of breaking into the industry. But while his latest script was chock-full of big ideas and spectacle, I finished the script feeling empty, like I watched a bunch of people I didn’t know do some cool stuff. To put it bluntly, the script was missing an EMOTIONAL COMPONENT.
The emotional component is what allows the audience to FEEL SOMETHING DURING A MOVIE. If you don’t include it, they don’t feel. That’s why you watch a movie like Transformers and you think, “Ooh, that was cool,” a few times, and yet the movie evaporates from your mind at a dizzying rate once you leave the theater. It’s because there was nothing to emotionally tie you to what was going on.
The Water Man is the opposite of both that script and that movie. Before it takes you anywhere, it establishes an emotional connection. “So Carson,” you ask, “Are you saying that all I need to do to establish an emotional connection is stick a cancer mom in my script?” Oh if it were only that easy. Sticking cancer people in your script is actually the worst thing you can do to create an emotional connection. Because it’s cliché and melodramatic.
However, if you can build a specific set of circumstances surrounding that cancer, one that feels inventive or different or complex, you’ll find the connection you’re looking for. You see, it isn’t Gunner’s dying mom that gets us reaching for the Kleenex box (although that’s part of it). It’s the fact that Gunner and Amos (Gunner’s dad) don’t have anything in common. Mary knows she’s going to die. Her worry is that she’s the only thing that has kept this family together. Without her, you’ll have a father and son who don’t connect on any level.
The Water Man, then, is about much more than a boy irrationally trying to save his mom. It’s about a son and a father needing to find a connection before it’s too late. I know it’s not easy to categorize what I’m explaining here. But basically, by building a more complex situation around our dying person’s life, the story doesn’t feel cliché. It doesn’t feel melodramatic.
But The Water Man doesn’t stop there. Once on the trip with Joseph Riley, we realize that Riley isn’t the tough kid he presented himself as. He’s got a shitty life back home, enough so that he’s run away. And so even when we move away from the emotion-centric Gunner-Mom storyline, we still have a relationship to explore. This one between two misfits. Watching Riley start off deceiving Gunner, only to eventually come to the conclusion that Gunner is his only friend, was one of the many heartwarming moments in the script.
I also liked how Needell played around with traditional structure. I tell you guys to inject a clear goal into your story. And we have that here. Gunner needs to find The Water Man. But she adds this soft twist to the goal, in that we’re not sure if Riley really knows where The Water Man is. So we’re heading off on this adventure that may be a total farce, which gives us all sorts of anxiety. I mean, how are we going to save mom if our guide is making his entire story up? I guess you could say it was a goal with a twist.
(spoiler) I even loved the way Needell treats the eventual meeting with The Water Man. It’s hard as hell to gear an entire script towards meeting someone and then have that character live up to the build-up. I see writers strike out on this about 90% of the time. But Needell treats this moment with just the right amount of restraint, just the right amount of mystery, and just the right amount of, “Wait a minute, did that really happen or didn’t it?” It was immensely satisfying.
I’m not surprised Disney broke their “no original material” rule for this one. It’s a real gem.
[ ] what the hell did I just read?
[ ] wasn’t for me
[ ] worth the read
[x] impressive
[ ] genius
What I learned: Use your unique circumstances as a strength, not an excuse. So many people are convinced that because they live in some faraway country or in the middle of nowhere that it’s impossible for them to make it as a screenwriter. You don’t realize how wrong you are. A lot of people in Hollywood come from very privileged middle to upper class upbringings. Unfortunately, that means their scope of real-life experience is limited. By living outside of that scope, you have the power to craft a story that feels unique. Just use your unique surroundings as inspiration. That’s clearly what Needell did here with this small-town story.
What I learned 2: To expand on this, your unique experiences growing up are part of what shapes that elusive “voice” everyone says you need in this craft. So if you’re not tapping into one of the key things in your life that makes you different, you’re not giving us everything you can in your screenplays.
