Genre: Comedy
Premise: A marginally talented tribute band finds itself magically/accidentally transported back to the year 1973 and seizes the opportunity to become actual rock stars by “stealing” the career of the group they’ve long made a living out of impersonating.
About: Okay you guys who want to submit to Amateur Friday, I expect your loglines to get a lot better after yesterday’s great discussion. Feel free to re-submit with something new and improved. —- Every Friday, I review a script from the readers of the site. If you’re interested in submitting your script for an Amateur Review, send it in PDF form, along with your title, genre, logline, and why I should read your script to Carsonreeves3@gmail.com. Keep in mind your script will be posted (feel free, however, to use an alias and a fake title).
Writers: Charles Wellington and Michael Bloat
Details: 118 pages (This is an early draft of the script. The situations, characters, and plot may change significantly by the time the film is released. 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).

Let me start this by reiterating a common theme that comes up during comedy reviews: this genre is subjective as hell. I bring this up because Tribute didn’t win me over in the end, but it clearly won a lot of other people over. I had a half-dozen people e-mail me during the week to tell me how much they liked this. So I want to strike a deal with you. Give this script a chance. Don’t go by my review alone. It’s rare that I get a chance to hype up an Amateur Friday screenplay and it seems like the one time everybody seems to like something, I’m the Debbie Downer. I’m the guy crapping on the parade. I’ll explain why I felt this way after the synopsis.

40-something Guy Kirshner is the lead singer of a group called “Swords of Britain,” a moderately successful tribute band celebrating the legendary hard rock group “Jabberwocky.” His group consists of guitarist and music aficionado Sean Goolsby, as well as his short and stubby drummer and bassist team, the Ramirez brothers. Guy’s one of those eternal optimists who thinks Swords of Britain’s big break is always around the next corner.

Which it kind of is. Richie Loud, the elusive and partly insane lead singer of Jabberwocky, has just been found dead, which has thrust Jabberwocky’s music back into the spotlight. Guy realizes that they’re not going to get many opportunities like this again, and convinces his band to crash Richie’s funeral to promote tonight’s gig.

However, as the band drives to the bar later, they get in a pretty gnarly accident. Guy, hellbent on still making their gig, gets the band to suck it up and rush to the bar, and it’s only once there that they realize they’ve been magically transported back to 1973! In fact, after they play their set, they realize they’ve accidentally been mistaken for the REAL Jabberwocky, who are (or WERE) about to play their first American gig, the one that started their success. This means that Knights of Britain have taken the real Jabberwocky’s place!

Of course everyone else is nervous about this, but Guy realizes this is his one and only real shot at becoming a rock star, and so convinces them to take advantage of the opportunity. The next thing you know, they’re recording Jabberwocky’s first album and living Jabberwocky’s success!

In the meantime, an angry Richie Loud, who’s convinced that these men stole his music, though he has no idea how, since he’s never played it before (At one point, he starts writing a song on Sunset Boulevard, only to hear it blasting out of a car radio seconds later), plots to expose Guy and his band of imposters to save Jabberwocky.

That job may take care of itself though since Jabberwocky only recorded one album. So when the media starts asking Guy and the others what’s next, Guy realizes there is no next. There are no more songs left to steal. Or are there? That’s when Guy formulates his ultimate plan, to steal every single great tune recorded after 1973 and make it a Swords of Britain song. Will he succeed? Or more importantly, will everyone else in Swords of Britain go along with it?

There’s no doubt this is a cool premise. And I’ll back this script all day for potential. But I had a lot of issues with it, and it will be interesting to see why others didn’t. As a reminder, I don’t check boxes when I read scripts. I first judge a script on how I feel while reading it. If I’m not feeling it, I go back and try to figure out why. In this case, the story felt like it was wandering. So I asked myself, “Why did it wander?” Did it wander because I lost interest in the story and therefore wasn’t fully paying attention? Did it wander because I never connected with the characters? Or did it wander because there was really something structurally wrong here? That’s not always an easy question to answer. The simple solution is to just slap a cliché screenplay analysis term on it (NO TICKING TIME BOMB!) and call it a day. But I always want to get to the heart of why something didn’t work, or else I don’t learn anything from it.

My first problem with Tribute? There was nothing FOR ME PERSONALLY that I hadn’t seen before. The tricky thing about any premise, particularly a high concept one, is that you have to give the audience what they’re expecting, but you have to do it in a better way than they’re expecting it. That’s what we writers do. We give you what you want but in a higher quality version of how you thought you’d get it. If the audience already knows exactly how everything goes down, why even show up? The problem with this is that each person brings a different depth of movie knowledge to the table. The more they know, the harder it is to give them something they weren’t expecting. I suspect that that’s part of the problem here. I’ve seen this all before.  However, someone who’s younger (and surely someone who’s read a few thousand less scripts) is going to be surprised more often, and therefore more likely to enjoy Tribute (and other films like it).

My second problem was – yes – the lack of a ticking time bomb. Everybody’s allowed their opinions on ticking clocks. There are some cases, particularly slow character driven indie-fare, where the artificial quality of a ticking time bomb does more harm to a story than good. But when it comes to high concept movies, especially high concept comedies, ticking time bombs are essential. You have to have one dominating your narrative, or else your story gets lost. The moment where this story lost me was after Swords of Britain recorded their first album and realized they didn’t have any music left. After that point I was like, “What now?” The finish line was nowhere to be seen. I had no idea what the goal was anymore (vaguely continue to try and be famous?). There was no indication of when the story would end. I felt lost.

I understand that the concept here is to see a band become successful, and that takes time, but when you’re talking about a movie, you have to find a way to bookend the journey. For example, maybe Jabberwocky’s history is that they first started to get popular in Los Angeles, but it wasn’t until they opened for the Stones at the Rose Bowl that they became national rock stars. Assuming this, you’d now have Swords Of Britain arrive in 1973 just like in the current script, accidentally steal Jabberwocky’s first gig, then begin to get famous in L.A. only (this way you can still have scenes of them experiencing success) and then place that Rose Bowl concert in three weeks. That then becomes your ticking time bomb. Your characters will have to make a choice by that night whether to play the concert (live a lie for the rest of their lives) or walk away (do what’s right).

Character-wise, Tribute was a mixed bag. Sam (the guitarist) was obviously the deepest character. I loved how he’d been trying to get Guy to listen to his demo. But after that, there’s less character depth than the Los Angeles Clippers’ bench. Our next deepest characters are Richie Loud, who’s relegated to solo scenes of being pissed off. And Tess the Weirdo Groupie, who’s actually a pretty sad and interesting character, but since she’s relegated to scenes with Richie, who’s number 3 on the depth chart, she never has a chance to shine.

And that was another problem I had – I was never sure who the main character was. Remember that whoever you introduce us to first in a screenplay, that’s who we assume is the main character. So for a long time, I thought Guy was the main character. But then Sam sort of emerged as the main character and Guy became this caricature of a man obsessed with fame. Then there are times when Richie could be interpreted as the main character. Yet just when you think that’s the case, he disappears for a few scenes. I don’t know. I couldn’t figure it out.

Now having said all these terrible things, I want to reiterate the strength of this concept and the strength of this story’s potential. You can see A-list comedy actors dying to play these roles (Jack Black alone is probably begging Charles and Michael for an audition). I’d just like to see a rewrite with a little more structure, some more character depth, and a few more surprises. I wish these guys luck. This could be a project to look out for.

Script Link: Tribute

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

What I learned: A 118 page comedy equals a big no-no. You want to keep your comedies under 110 pages, unless you’re a known movie star or you already have ins in the industry (and even then, it’s not advised). I’m not saying 118 pages is bad because it’s 118 pages. I’m saying 118 pages is bad because it almost guarantees that a comedy will be unfocused and/or bloated. If you have a clear character goal, if you have a ticking time bomb, you can make sure that every single scene you write is necessary to tell the story. If you don’t (and as you can see, these were my issues with the script), you end up writing too many unnecessary scenes, which in turn bloats your screenplay up to 120 pages.

Okay, first thing’s first. I am not a logline expert! There are probably people on these boards that know a lot more about loglines than I do (and therefore I welcome their criticisms). However, I am someone who’s received a few thousand loglines all designed to catch my attention and make me want to read your scripts. From that end, I can speak from experience, and my experience is that 90% of the loglines I read aren’t professional or well-constructed. Since your logline is your initial point of attack, the line that either gets you or doesn’t get you the all important read-request, it’s gotta be just as tight as your script. So, let’s take a look at what loglines are, and how you can improve them.

WHY A PROPERLY CONSTRUCTED LOGLINE IS SO IMPORTANT
People always used to say to me, “Make sure you write a proper logline!” stressing the word “proper” with an inordinate amount of vigor. I always dismissed them with a roll of the eyes and a, “I’ll write my logline however I want to, thank you very much.” Well, now that I’m on the other side, and I’ve read hundreds of loglines which I’ve then gone on to read the scripts for, I’ve realized that there’s a strong correlation between professional loglines and professional scripts. When a logline is really well constructed, the script is usually really well constructed. When a logline is confusing or unfocused, the script is usually confusing or unfocused. For that reason, when I see a logline that confuses me in even the slightest bit, I won’t read that script, as experience tells me that if they can’t make that one sentence comprehensible, there’s no way they’re making 110 pages comprehensible. Seasoned industry folks are looking for a clear concise summary of your story. For that reason, it’s essential that you get the logline right.

HOOK US
The single most important thing in a logline is the hook. There has to be some kind of intrigue, some kind of irony, some kind of high concept, some kind of unique subject matter, that grabs our interest. In other words, there has to be something in the logline that’s exciting. That word is, of course, subjective, but without a hook, you could construct the most technically perfect logline in the world and still no one will want to read it. It doesn’t matter if the scope’s big (Breaking into people’s minds to steal information) or small (A man is stuck in a coffin with no memory of how he got there), you gotta hook us. A teenager who has to save his mom and dad’s marriage is not a script I’d hurry to open. A teenager who gets stuck in the past and must figure out how to make his parents fall in love or else he’ll cease to exist? Now THAT’S a script I want to read.

WHAT IS A GOOD LOGLINE?
A good logline usually covers three bases. It gives us the main character, the main character’s goal, and the central conflict in the story (what’s preventing them from getting that goal). Let’s take a look at this in action. The logline for Black Swan might be: “A sheltered ballerina must train for the most important role of her career while fighting off fierce competition from her talented and dangerous understudy.” We have the main character (the ballerina), the goal (training for her role) and the central conflict (the other ballerina trying to steal the role from her). Bonus points if you can give or allude to the hero’s defining characteristic. This is usually done with an adjective. “A sheltered ballerina must train…” gives us a lot more information than “A ballerina must train.” And there it is. That’s your logline template.

KNOW THE DIFFERENCE BETWEEN AN IDEA AND A LOGLINE
This is the biggest mistake amateurs make when constructing a logline. They think an idea, or a “concept” is a logline. So they might write, “A hockey player takes up golf and becomes a superstar that changes the sport.” (Happy Gilmore). That’s not a logline. That’s an idea. A logline fleshes out the details to give us a better understanding of the main character and the specific journey he goes on. So instead, that logline might look like this: “A hockey player with severe anger issues is forced to join the golf tour, a sport he detests, in order to save his Grandmother’s home.” Now instead of imagining a vague series of scenarios, we understand who our characters is (a hockey player), what he’s trying to do (save his grandmother’s house), and what’s standing in his way (a sport he hates).

IRONY IS A LOGLINE’S BEST FRIEND
Okay, I’m not suggesting that every movie you write from this point on be based on an ironic premise, because there are plenty of great movies that aren’t, but I will tell you this. The loglines that read the best are the ones with some sort of irony in them, where the character and the situation are at odds with one another. A lawyer who can’t lie (Liar Liar). A king who can’t speak to his people (The King’s Speech). A Detroit cop investigating a case in Beverly Hills (Beverly Hills Cop). A time manager stuck on an island with all the time in the world (Cast Away). An alcoholic superhero (Hancock). These loglines will always catch a reader’s attention, so you’ll have a huge advantage if your concept contains irony.

EXAMPLES
Here are some good examples of well-written loglines I’ve found across the web. Notice in all of them how we have the main character, the goal, and the central source of conflict.

On the eve of World War 2, an adventurous archeology professor tries to find the mythical Ark Of The Covenant before the Germans, who plan on using the powerful relic to take over the world. (Raiders Of The Lost Ark)

In a future where criminals are arrested before the crime occurs, a drug addicted cop struggles on the lam to prove his innocence for a murder he has not yet committed. (Minority Report) 

After a thirteen year old outcast accidentally destroys a mixtape belonging to her deceased parents, she struggles through an impossible journey to re-find each rare track in hopes of finally connecting with the parents she never knew. (Mixtape) 

A precocious and selfish high school playwright whose life revolves around his unique private school, finds himself in a dangerous competition with its most famous and successful alumnus for the affection of a first grade teacher. (Rushmore)

A reclusive sociopath must fight his way across the wasteland of a dangerous postapocalyptic America to protect a sacred and mysterious book that holds the key to saving the future of humanity. (The Book Of Eli)

SOME EXAMPLES
Okay, now on to you guys. I’m going to finish this post up by listing 5 loglines I’ve recently received (for Amateur Friday) and explain why I haven’t picked them. The goal here is not to embarrass those who submitted, but rather put them inside the head of the person who’s using their loglines to determine whether to read their script. Hopefully they, as well as you guys, will learn something in the process. Enjoy.

THE WARRIOR POET – The Epic story of the early years of the Biblical figure David, who while fleeing from the paranoid and murderous King Saul becomes leader of a guerrilla unit of 600 soldiers and assassins in the harsh wilderness of Israel.

Jason’s a regular contributor on the site, and I know he’s been working on this script for awhile. Why then, did I not choose his logline? Good question. The subject matter itself sounds like it has potential, but there are some red flags that kept me away. The word “epic” itself is daunting. I think “epic” and I imagine 140/150 pages, which is an immediate “no way” since I read too many screenplays as it is and like to keep each read under the 1 hour and 45 minute mark if possible. The subject matter is weighty as well. It sounds like it’s going to be dense, with lots of long paragraphs, and will require copious amounts of concentration to stay involved. That sounds more like work than entertainment. And finally, the logline doesn’t indicate any character goal driving the story. Rather it implies a situation. After David flees, it sounds like he just hangs out in the Israeli forests with 600 soldiers for a few months. Where’s the point? Where’s the all-essential driving force? There isn’t one, which leaves me thinking that the story, as well, will not have a point or a driving force.

SMALL TOWN HITMAN – The world’s worst hitman is banished to Anytown, USA.

This logline is way too general. It doesn’t tell me enough about the story. I’ve seen a billion loglines about hitmen. What makes this one special? What makes me want to pick up THIS hitman screenplay over all the others? Again, scripts often reflect loglines. So if a logline is vague and generic, the script will likely be vague and generic. This logline needs some major fleshing out, more specificity, and more of a hook. “The world’s worst hitman is accidentally assigned to assassinate the number one criminal on the FBI’s most wanted list,” sounds like something with a lot more potential.

BLACKOUT – A band about to embark on their first world tour throws the party to end all parties, only to wake up with a corpse in their pool… Hilarity ensues.

There’s something too generic about this idea. Any dead body is a problem in a story, for sure. But there’s something too on the nose and obvious about a wild band having to deal with a dead body. A much more intriguing logline would consist of a CHRISTIAN ROCK BAND waking up and finding a dead body in their pool. Now you have irony. Now you have a movie. Also, I advise against using “Hilarity ensues” in any logline. I see it a lot, and since hilarity almost never ensues, it tends to send a subliminal message to the gatekeepers to “avoid this.”

THE PRIDE OF CLEVELAND – A WOMAN IN MID-LIFE CRISIS BECOMES AN ANARCHIST OUTLAW ON THE FBI’S “MOST WANTED” LIST WHEN SHE TRIES TO SAVE THE LIONS OF AFRICA FROM TOTAL EXTINCTION.

First of all, you definitely don’t want to present your logline in all caps. It’s too hard to read and comes off as unprofessional. My big problem here is that the story doesn’t make sense, at least as told through the logline. If someone heads off to Africa to save lions, why would the FBI care enough to put them on their most-wanted list? If she was going from continent to continent killing lions, trying to make lions extinct, I could see the FBI wanting to find her, but why would the FBI want to stop someone from saving lions? Isn’t that a good thing? And don’t they have more important criminals to take care of? Like child molesters and terrorists? It didn’t make sense to me. And if the logline doesn’t make sense, I’m not going to open the script.

THE DAY OF RECKONING – After a Zombie outbreak erupts, a devout Street Preacher must struggle to make it home and save his pregnant wife and young son while determined to keep to God’s commandments—especially, thou shalt not kill.

This is actually a well-constructed logline. Notice that we have our main character (our preacher). We’re told something about him (he’s “devout” and does his preaching on the “street”). We’re given his goal (make it home while protecting his wife and son), and we have a hook (he’s not allowed to kill any of the zombies along the way). This is something that I might pick up and read in the future. So why haven’t I yet? Simple. I have read a shitload of zombie scripts in the last 3 months. And while this sounds solid, it’s got nothing new or different enough in the well-tread zombie genre to make me want to pick it up right away.

And there you go. Hope this has helped. If you’d like, go ahead and post your own logline in the comments section and I (as well as the rest of the readers) will tell you if it needs work or not.

Genre: Drama
Premise: After a young man’s wife dies, he befriends a strange homeless girl who’s building a raft she hopes to sail away with.
About: The Devil and The Deep Blue Sea is based on the memoirs of Henry Hertzel Jr. and will star Zach Braff, Chloe Moretz, and Jessica Biel. Robbie Pickering, the writer, had his first produced credit with Natural Selection, a comedy about a woman who goes on a journey to find the mullet-headed son her husband secretly had via donating to a sperm bank. That film debuted at SXSW last year.
Writer: Robbie Pickering
Details: 107 pages (This is an early draft of the script. The situations, characters, and plot may change significantly by the time the film is released. 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’m fully aware that I’ve reached the quota on dead wives scripts on this site (Dogs of Babel, Honeymoon With Harry, After Hailey), but I swear to you I didn’t know what this was about when I picked it up. Actually, I was a little bummed, as this specific script has some similar elements to a script I myself am working on (for the record, there are no dead wives in my script). But in the end, the similarities were negligible, and I was able to get through “Deep Blue Sea” confidence intact. As for whether “Deep Blue Sea” made it through intact, that’s another question. This is one odd puppy. And I’m not really sure what to make of it.

33 year old architect Henry Hertzel slips into a dress shirt, ready to begin his day, a day that will end with his wife, Cindy, driving their jeep into a pole and not living to tell about it. Of course, that hasn’t happened yet. Right now, we’re listening to Cindy get ready on the other side of the bathroom door while Henry goes through his own morning ritual. Just listening to these two talk, you can tell they’re deeply in love.

So when Henry gets the news later that day, it’s no surprise that he’s beyond devastated. And before he’s able to wrap his head around it, Cindy’s family is already putting him in charge of dispensing of her ashes.

Luckily, Henry becomes distracted by a peculiar 15 year old homeless girl who’s known for junk scavenging in the neighborhood. He remembers his wife mentioning the girl, and begins to take an interest in her. He eventually finds out that she’s hauling all this junk back to an abandoned barn where she’s building a raft to sail away to the Azores Islands.

So Henry, along with his contractors, Pele and Retard (yes, his name is Retard) offer to help her. She’s reluctant at first, as she doesn’t trust anybody, but his building experience becomes too valuable to pass up, and she decides to give him a shot.

The building of the raft begins to consume so much of his time, that soon he’s skipping work on a daily basis. Although it seemed inevitable, Henry finally realizes that he wants to join the girl (Millie) on her trip to the Azores. He wants to sail away into the great unknown.

The problem is his mother-in-law, Julie, learns about Henry’s exploits with this girl and becomes very concerned. She begs him to seek some help, but he refuses, becoming more and more obsessed with completing the raft. In the end, he’ll have to fend her and others off to reach his goal, as well as overcome a shocking truth about Millie.

I feel like I’ve read three scripts this week all with tons of potential, none of which realized that potential. There are so many neat ideas packed into “Deep Blue Sea,” but I’m not sure they come together in a cohesive or satisfying way.

These sort of quasi-mystical concepts are harder to pull off than they look, because the tone is so tricky. You don’t want to play up the magical/quirky aspects too much, because the story won’t feel realistic, but you can’t skimp on them either, since they’re the hook that brought people in in the first place.

That’s why I liked Dogs of Babel so much. It walks that line with pinpoint accuracy. And it’s a great reminder of why that script is so awesome. It makes you believe in the impossible even if it isn’t possible. In fact, Dogs of Babel is a perfect comparison piece for “Deep Blue Sea.” When you read that script, you really feel like the writer had a plan, that they mapped out their story. In “Deep Blue Sea,” you feel more like the writer had an idea, and just scribbled it down stream-of-conscious style. As a result, the script comes off as a messier not-as-good version of “Babel.”

Indeed, I found myself frustrated by the sloppiness of the characters and the narrative in “Sea.” You have the funny guy named Retard. You have the raft made out of junk. You have the weird homeless girl with her strange way of talking. You have the imaginary flashbacks of pretend famous people sailing across oceans. There’s no structure here. Just ideas.

For example, I wasn’t sure why anyone was doing anything. Millie was building a raft to sail somewhere…but why? Because she wanted to sail somewhere? And while at first Henry’s motivation for hanging out with Millie made sense (his wife asked him to check on her before she died), it becomes increasingly unclear why he continues to hang around her other than the vague conceit that he’s having trouble moving on.

Or we’d get these moments of total randomness like a picture of Henry’s wife when she was 15 years old, who looks exactly like Millie does now, setting up a big revelation somewhere down the line. But then it’s never mentioned again. As a reader, when things are set up but never paid off, it makes me question just how much effort was put into the rewriting.

My biggest issue though, was the lack of any true character exploration. Don’t get me wrong. Characters are experiencing things here (the loss of a wife) and having deep conversations (discussing the dead wife), but much more emphasis is put on the external qualities of the characters as opposed to the internal. As a result, we get caricatures, characters who are defined by their quirky attributes (one named Retard, one who collects and wears trash). But what about the inside of these people? Why they are the way they are? Look at After Hailey, where we knew the main character’s flaw was his inability to settle down. This informed his entire character, as the central conflict was about him attempting to leave town (to avoid settling down) but constantly being pulled back (by his stepson, by his sister, by the house). In “Deep Blue Sea,” all I knew about the characters was their quirky exteriors, their weird mannerisms, and that made it hard to connect with them on a deep level.

The truth is, there may be some symbolism here that I’m just not getting (I’m notoriously bad at picking up on symbolism). The stuff with the sea, the dog named AHAB, the friend named RETARD. I’m half-expecting someone in the comments to say, “Don’t you get it Carson? This is about the slowly deteriorating state of the capitalist construct and our over-reliance on Middle Eastern oil.” Well, symbolism or no symbolism, I wanted to be entertained, and while there were some really neat ideas in “Deep Blue Sea,” they never came together for me.

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

What I learned: Now this doesn’t apply exactly to this script because we realize that Millie has only been homeless for a few days, but a word of warning to those of you writing homeless people into your scripts. Don’t do it. Unless you’ve been homeless and know what it’s like, do not write a major homeless character into your movie. Every single homeless character I’ve ever read in a script reads like an ignorant writer’s idea of what a homeless person would be like based on TV shows or movies they’ve seen. If you’re going to do research, go out and interview homeless people and figure out what their day-to-day life REALLY consists of? Then fine. But if you’re just going to guess? Don’t do it. Cause I promise you it will come off as a really shallow version of a homeless person. Go rent Pay It Forward and watch Jim Caveziel’s homeless character to see what I’m talking about (The “The first time you sleep in a dumpster” monologue may be the worst monologue ever written).

What I learned 2: When one character makes a quick off-the-cuff analysis of another character, try to come up with a more original response than, “Thanks Dr. Phil.” I’ve read that line somewhere in the neighborhood of 6 billion times.

Genre: Drama
Premise: An alcoholic pilot becomes a reluctant hero when he saves a crippled plane from certain catastrophe.
About: If this is based on anything (a novel?), I wasn’t able to find out what. Which means we have the rare exception to the rule that is a drama spec sale. The writer, Gatins, has jumped back and forth between small roles in films and being a feature writer. He wrote the Dakota Fanning film, Dreamer, as well as Coach Carter and Keanu Reeves’ Hardball. Robert Zemeckis is said to be interested in directing. And Denzel Washington is currently attached to star.
Writer: John Gatins
Details: 134 pages – undated (This is an early draft of the script. The situations, characters, and plot may change significantly by the time the film is released. 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).

Robert Zemeckis used to be my favorite director. What I loved about him was that he always put the story first. And the bigger he got, the more effects-driven his movies became, it was fascinating to watch him stick to that philosophy. I still remember going through the Forrest Gump DVD extras and realizing just how many special effects were invisible.

So when Zemeckis gave up live-action movies to become this 3-D motion capture pioneer, I was left not only confused, but baffled that he was no longer embracing the principals he’d built his career on. This motion capture stuff seemed to be ONLY about the special effects, with the story being an afterthought. It’s no coincidence that every one of those movies was absent of any soul. What’d happened to the Robert Zemeckis that I loved?

Well, I’ll say this. I have no idea what it’s like to direct a dozen movies in Hollywood. But I’d imagine that, as hard as this is for someone like you or I to believe, you probably get bored after awhile and look for new challenges. Pioneering a new technology then, would be alluring. Still, I’ve been impatiently waiting for Zemeckis to return to the live-action well, and finally it’s starting to look like that will happen, with Flight being one of his first steps back.

40-something Whip Whitaker is waking up from a long night of drinking and fucking. In order to kickstart the old ticker and put an end to his post-wasted sluggishness, he snorts up a few lines of cocaine. Nice! Breakfast of Champions baby.

It is to our horror, then, that we realize Whip is piloting a commercial airliner that morning. His co-pilot, a ball of nervous energy to begin with, is staring at Whip suspiciously. He wants to believe that he doesn’t smell booze. But man does he smell booze. Does he say something? Does he do something? If he’s wrong, his career could be over before it begins.

Despite Whip’s questionable shape, he seems amazingly calm during a rough take-off. And later in the flight, after a huge BANG and a collapse of the plane’s hydraulics which results in the plane flipping upside-down, it’s the co-pilot who freaks out and Whip who’s as calm as a cucumber. I won’t ruin what happens next, but let’s just say that, if executed well, it will be one of the more harrowing scenes ever put on film. In the end, Whip crash-lands the plane, saving all of the passengers except a few. It is seen as the single most amazing maneuver in commercial piloting history.

Whip’s injuries put him in the hospital where he misses the majority of the media coverage and it is there that he meets Nicole, a 30 year old drug addict who’s resorted to giving hand-jobs during massages to secure money for her next high. She overdoses on heroin which is what led her here. Her and Whip then form an unlikely friendship, that slowly turns into something more.

What Whip doesn’t know is that when he was unconscious, they took blood and skin samples from him, and know he was drunk and high during the flight. This becomes the central focus of the story – an inside look at the politics of a crash investigation, as each of the parties (the union, pilots, airlines, plane manufacturers) all fight against one another for who’s to blame so that THEY aren’t responsible for footing the bill. It’s the uniquest of unique situations. There’s no doubt that Whip saved all of these people. Yet he still might get tabbed as the cause of the crash.

There are so many ideas in Flight, and the structure of the story is so unpredictable, I’m not sure how to break it down. I guess that ultimately it didn’t work for me, and the reason is, that for all the interesting stuff going on with the crash and post-crash politics, this is really just a hard-core look at alcoholism (and addiction in general). It’s kind of like Leaving Las Vegas in that sense. A good movie, but not something you pop in after a long week for entertainment.

I’ll give Gatins credit though. He went against the grain a lot, and made choices you didn’t expect him to make. For example, the hero aspect of the story is never explored. Whip is a hero, yet is never seen by the media, never recognized by the public.

My question is, is that realistic? I think every person in America knew exactly who Captain Sulley was after he landed that plane in the Hudson (granted, he was kind of a funky looking dude). My issue with Whip never experiencing his celebrity firsthand, was that it made the event seem less significant. We’re told this was the greatest commercial airplane maneuver in history, yet if we’re going by what Whip experiences in the aftermath, it’s like it never happened.

It actually had me wondering why Gatlins didn’t go in the opposite direction. Why not have it so Whip becomes this huge celebrity with all these opportunities stemming from his heroics? He’s hugging babies, he’s the spokesperson for the airlines. For the first time, he’s got real control over his life. And THEN the union comes to him and tells him about his toxicology report.

The reason I think this works better is because now Whip actually has something to lose. He has this perfect life that hangs in the balance of these reports getting out. This would in turn make the backroom politicking more interesting. They have a national hero on their hands who’s changing the industry for the better. Do they really want to lose that? In other words, the stakes would be higher on both ends.

This led to the biggest bout of turbulence during Flight: Whip Whitaker doesn’t really give a shit about his goal – keeping his job. Protagonists not caring about their goals is a huge problem, because if they don’t care, we the audience don’t care. Look at some of Zemeckis’ other films. Marty McFly is desperately trying to get back to the future. Tom Hanks is desperately trying to get off that island. Jodie Foster is desperately trying to make contact with aliens. Whip Whitaker is barely interested in keeping his job as a pilot. And this lack of interest just kills any significant stakes in the story. I will say this all day long. If there’s nothing to lose for your hero, you don’t have a movie.

Despite all this, I didn’t dislike Flight. I thought it was an interesting script with some great moments (the crash landing sequence was truly awesome) and should be an awesome role for Denzel. But in the end, it’s a huge downer, and because of that, not the kind of reading experience I’d recommend.

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

What I learned: I think there are two kinds of passive characters. The worst kind is the one without a goal. Without a goal, your hero will be directionless, and the movie will be directionless as well. The second kind of passive character, which isn’t as bad but still not good, is the character who DOESN’T CARE ABOUT HIS GOAL. So Whip Whitaker has a goal here – to save his career. But he just doesn’t seem that interested in it. We get the sense the whole way through that if he fails, then he fails. He doesn’t really lose anything. This lowers the stakes and makes us less interested in his journey.

Genre: Comedy
Premise: When a controlling fiance-to-be loses her boyfriend and descends into bitterness, her friends send her to “Man Camp” to learn how to date again.
About: Every Friday, I review a script from the readers of the site. If you’re interested in submitting your script for an Amateur Review, send it in PDF form, along with your title, genre, logline, and why I should read your script to Carsonreeves3@gmail.com. Keep in mind your script will be posted (feel free, however, to use an alias and a fake title).
Writers: Amie Kelbing & Eva Taylor (story by Ami, Eva, and Danielle Morrow)
Details: 90 pages

It’s probably unfair to put Man Camp under the spotlight a day after reviewing the best movie about bridesmaids ever put to paper. However, it’s a great opportunity to compare a professionally sculpted screenplay shepherded by a dozen industry pros to one written by a couple of amateur scribes still figuring things out. Actually, I wouldn’t be surprised at all if Wiig and Mumolo’s first draft looked similar to this one, more of an unfocused collection of thoughts than a fully fleshed out story.

That’s the big problem with Man Camp. It’s majorly unfocused. The narrative feels like it’s been strapped to an overanxious rabbit set loose in the jungle. You think you’re going one way, but oh wait, let’s go over here, but oh no, how about checking this out, wait, let’s go back to where we started, no, changed my mind, let’s go this way again. Structure is so important for a screenplay. And there isn’t a lick of it here.

Man Camp has a surprisingly similar setup to Bridesmaids. Annie (same name!) is in a relationship with Ryan, the key difference being she expects to be marrying Ryan soon. The problem is, Annie can’t shut up. She makes all the decisions, she takes all of the control, she doesn’t let her boyfriend get a word in edgewise – about anything. As a result, Ryan dumps her, and there Annie is, back to square one.

Even worse, Annie’s friends all start finding husbands and having babies, leaving Annie further and further out of the loop. She begins to feel sorry for herself, gives up on dating, and becomes a hermit. Worried she’ll become a cat lady, her friends set up an intervention and send her to “The Center” – a place that teaches destitute women how to get back out there and start dating again.

Except The Center is run like an insane asylum, which is appropriate because Annie’s rambunctious roommate, Nina, is about as crazy as they get. While everyone else conforms to the “warden’s” strict rules, Nina’s running around wreaking havoc, trying to get the girls, and in particular, Annie, to live a little. Eventually Annie learns enough from the camp to land another man, Eric.

In a kind of unclear development, the very friends that cared so much about getting Annie help, have now completely forgotten about her, instead wrapped up in their own married pregnant lives. Eric is Annie’s ticket back into that selective group, and she carefully grooms him for reinsertion. But just before they get to the party, Annie can’t help but be too demanding, and loses Eric right before going in. In a lucky coincidence she convinces the bartender, a flamboyant weirdo named Javier who she met while at The Center, to pretend he’s Eric so that her friends won’t know she’s alone again.

And if that doesn’t test the boundaries of believability, Annie then convinces Javier to marry her, and the next thing you know the wedding is set! But at the last second, Annie’s old friend from The Center, Crazy Nina, shows up, drugs Javier, and dresses up like a man so she can scold Annie for marrying just to get married. The moment causes outrage from the wedding party, and Annie is forced to come clean about the whole ordeal.

Okay, first of all, Amie and Eva? I want you guys to know that I love you. But it does neither of us any good if I sugarcoat my notes here, so this is going to get a little bumpy. It’s important for readers of this script to remember, before you go crazy in the comments, that this is likely a first or second effort from the writers, and as anyone who writes knows, the first and second efforts are usually best left as learning experiences. So, let’s get into what’s wrong with Man Camp.

The problem here is a maddening lack of structure. First, we have a main character, Annie, who’s given up on dating. So her friends send her to a “Man Camp,” to learn how to date men again. The script then switches gears and becomes sort of a broad comedy version of Girl Interrupted. And even though we just met an entire cast of Annie’s friends, we’re asked to meet and remember a whole new cast of friends.

But what’s strange about Man Camp is that the actual Man Camp ends halfway through the script. We then cut to THREE MONTHS LATER with Annie now in a relationship with Eric. It’s a little jarring that we’ve now left a second set of characters in the dust, but we try and go with it. But in an ongoing trend of “this is the story, oh wait no it isn’t,” Nick disappears from the script three scenes later! Another seemingly key character left in the dust!

This leads to the impossible-to-believe development of Annie spotting a bartender she barely knows and paying him to pretend that he’s her boyfriend (and subsequently marry her). This is the fourth time now that the focus of the script has changed. First it was about a woman losing her boyfriend. Then it was about a Man Camp. Then it was about the relationship that stemmed from Man Camp being a success. Now it’s about a woman paying a man to pretend that he’s her boyfriend. In other words, you’ve officially said to your audience, “We have no idea what this movie is about anymore.”

So first and foremost, this script needs focus. If it’s about Man Camp, then Annie needs to be in Man Camp for 80% of the movie. If it’s about paying a man to pretend he’s your boyfriend so you can hang out with your married friends, then that needs to be explored for 80% of the movie. The fact that Man Camp keeps switching around on us is what makes it so damn frustrating.

Man Camp also cares little about making sense. I get that this is a comedy, but that doesn’t mean characters can just do things because the writers want them to. Actions need to be rooted in some sort of reality for the audience to go along with them. Annie’s friends love her enough to have an intervention for her. Yet we’re to believe they won’t hang out with her unless she has a boyfriend? Nina hates Man Camp. Why doesn’t she just leave? Random bartender Javier agrees to marry Annie on a lark for a few extra dollars? This is nonsensical even by broad comedy terms. Every character here acts like they’re in a cartoon, like there are no consequences to their actions, and because there are no consequences, we stop caring.

Also of note is how Annie’s character is constructed. In Bridesmaids, (the other) Annie is getting screwed over by an asshole, creating instant sympathy for her. In Man Camp, it’s Annie who’s doing the screwing over (of her boyfriend), leaving us sympathizing with the boyfriend as opposed to her. I’m not saying you can’t make your protagonist unlikable or be the one with the unflattering problem. But it’s important to note how this seemingly minor approach dramatically changed how we perceived these two protagonists.

Also, like I was talking about yesterday in the Bridesmaids breakdown, you gotta spend time on your secondary characters. I couldn’t remember any of the characters in this movie besides Annie, Javier, and Nina. There was nothing distinct about any of the original group of friends. There were no memorable characters inside The Center besides Nina. You need to sit down and create big full backstories for these people if you expect them to come alive. Then and only then will you discover the unique characteristic that will help them stick out.

But these problems are minor when compared to the structural issues of Man Camp. The lack of focus and a clear plan is what really hurts the script. Figure out what this movie is about, make sure the entire movie follows that plan (not just parts of it), and you should be okay. Remember, you’re making one movie, not 5-6 mini-movies. Good luck on the next draft! :)

Script link: Man Camp Project

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

What I learned: Unless you’ve set up a comedy that logically progresses over a long period of time (Knocked Up, Juno), you don’t want to throw a random huge time jump into the middle of your story. The 3 month jump in the middle of Man Camp is so awkward, so random, that it deflates everything that came before it. Good comedies usually have some kind of immediacy to them, a ticking time bomb, a feeling that things need to happen RIGHT NOW. Hangover. Liar Liar. Meet The Parents. Even Knocked Up, which takes place over 9 months, has that feeling of, “Oh boy, we’re running out of time!” If you can just randomly fast-forward your story to 3 months later? That tells me you were missing urgency in your story. I mean imagine in Bridesmaids if, in the middle of the movie, we just cut to 3 months later. How awkward would that have been? Condense your storyline into a more stable time frame and make everything happen inside that timeframe. Random large time jumps in the middle of your movie are momentum killers.