All screenplays on the simplyscripts.com and simplyscripts.net domain are copyrighted to their respective authors. All rights reserved. This screenplaymay not be used or reproduced for any purpose including educational purposes without the expressed written permission of the author.
Once I looked up what in the holy hell "A leaving do" meant things fell into place. Great dialogue here. Especially the beginning when they're basically talking about nothing but you still built in a nice rhythm. Main character had a fun personality quirk, fast paced story, really the whole thing was extremely solid...
Probably a recommend but for now I'm just putting CONSIDER.
What can I say? I was digging it. Despite some minimalist action and a bit much reliance on wrylies, I quite enjoyed this piece. The reveal about the zombie attack was icing on a fine cake; but even if you didn't have it, I really liked this take on the challenge.
Great work overall - gets a vote from me as one of my faves.
It's got a bit of that Hitchcock element with Gareth and his phobia. I like that Gareth is fighting his fear, thus making the other elements just a little less obvious. The clicks of door locks, the traffic lights, the car moving through a street past flash mob chaos, that's a beautiful setup. It was like the tumblers of a lock falling into place. I read this and I felt confined to the back seat of this cab. I felt the guy's angst, the sweating, the unease... and the rising zombie madness outside — an initial distraction. Then when the cabbie started bleeding, and the cab ultimately coasted into a sea of the dead — I'm like 'Wow.' Loved that ending, too.
If I have any suggestion, it would be to consider Gareth harboring a secret. Maybe he isn't 'a leaving do.' Maybe he's out on a more daring venture. Maybe he's got an attache case. I offer this because it would increase the stakes even more. Just a thought.
Overall, this is one helluva story. Great writing. Spare, but I like spare. What more can I say, but Click — and out.
Zombies. Okay. Not the most original idea (but what is?) but the added phobia made this different though it ended up the same. The writing is a step above. I wonder what else the writer has done? A few nits. The words supercilious and suppurating struck me as unnecessarily collegiate. "A leaving do" means what? (I'd like to know so I can rid myself of ignorance.) You sure this wasn't written by Keith Richards?
Thanks to all who took a read and fed back on the script.
To answer a few points/queries...
The red lights are common on all black cabs in the UK and as someone explained, they activate as soon as the car sets off, but even if you haven't experienced this I think I got across the meaning/mechanism in the script. The title is what it says on a little sign on the taxi door, also the title of an Arctic Monkey's song.
Two clicks at the end, one was the doors unlocking, the other was someone/thing pulling the handle up.
Leaving do, 'do' a Brit expression and given the script is unabashed British then seemed right, normally means party or get together.
Zombies, well they might be, but in my mind they were more infected like in the Crazies as they're not the undead type... how quickly an infection can spread, well it's fiction but things can travel through the body v quickly, hydrogen cyanide in a high dose can kill in under a minute as it spreads through the body. But I'm gonna claim poetic license
The things going on outside were left vague as things seen through the windows of moving vehicles are often just glimpsed, upped the tension too as they know something is going on but not what.
ChrisB, thanks for the thorough read and catching the errors etc, and glad to have expanded your vocab And delighted you liked it so much too.
I'll be going through all the feedback again and doing another polish on the script so thanks to all for taking a read.
Thanks to all who took a read and fed back on the script.
To answer a few points/queries...
The red lights are common on all black cabs in the UK and as someone explained, they activate as soon as the car sets off, but even if you haven't experienced this I think I got across the meaning/mechanism in the script. The title is what it says on a little sign on the taxi door, also the title of an Arctic Monkey's song.
Two clicks at the end, one was the doors unlocking, the other was someone/thing pulling the handle up.
Leaving do, 'do' a Brit expression and given the script is unabashed British then seemed right, normally means party or get together.
Zombies, well they might be, but in my mind they were more infected like in the Crazies as they're not the undead type... how quickly an infection can spread, well it's fiction but things can travel through the body v quickly, hydrogen cyanide in a high dose can kill in under a minute as it spreads through the body. But I'm gonna claim poetic license
The things going on outside were left vague as things seen through the windows of moving vehicles are often just glimpsed, upped the tension too as they know something is going on but not what.
ChrisB, thanks for the thorough read and catching the errors etc, and glad to have expanded your vocab And delighted you liked it so much too.
I'll be going through all the feedback again and doing another polish on the script so thanks to all for taking a read.
Anthony
Anthony, Great job. This was one of my 2 top fav stories. I really enjoyed it. For most of these OWC, I just ignore the typos and errors. I had a few biggies in mine too, and sometimes, you just don't have the time to figure it all out. One week goes so freaking fast.
Let me know if you write a second version. I'd love to read a version where you don't have any limitations. And I can easily see this as the beginning to a movie, or TV series...
I had wondered if they were zombies too. That seemed to be the common idea of what the infected were, but, I could see either way, even mysticism...
I'm interested in reading animation, horror, sci fy, suspense, fantasy, and anything that is good. I enjoy writing the same. Looking to team with anyone!
This is a great script and would work very well as a short but I would also recommend considering turning this into a feature. If you could set most (if not all) of the story in the cab this could be a unique and very low budget feature.
For more of my scripts, stories, produced movies and the ocassional blog, check out my new website. CLICK
Thanks Mark, again delighted you liked it too... yes feature version currently percolating... has to line-up behind a couple of other projects. Watch this space