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Hera by Ben Clifford - Drama, Mystery - A writer investigates a decades-old murder in a small Australian town, uncovering the town's horrific secrets and putting her personal life on the line . 83 pages - pdf, format
I disagree about the passive action. I mean I agree that it's passive, but I've never seen it as an issue. I don't even notice it when I read it in other scripts. I dunno. Obviously most disagree, and I'll go through and fix it, but I've never understood why.
I agree about the last ten pages. I'll fix that up.
Ben - I will try to get to more letter. But the first two pages are filled with typos. e.g.,
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EXT. BINDIRIN MAIN STREET – DAY
Since you don’t continue the use of Bindirin in the next slugs – no need to put it here. I would just add City of Bindirin to your SUPER. If you are going to leave it here – I think it needs to be BINDIRIN/MAIN STREET - DAY
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Lined by timber-built stores, and art deco pubs.
You don’t need a comma after stores.
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Two small boys, JOHN and MERRICK, both about 9 year old,
Think it needs to be years
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Once inside, John and Merrick approach the front counter,
You don’t need “once inside”. The scene is INT. We know they are inside.
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They dodge passerby.
Passerby should be plural
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The storefront of the main street run adjacent to the
Should be runs
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Merrick opens the jar, passing a candy to John. He takes on
On should be one
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The boy sit in silence, chewing on the candy.
Boy should be boys.
That was just on the first two pages. I am not going to comment on grammar for the rest of the story as I think you can see there are issues.
Hey, thanks ElDave. I do have a relatively good grasp of grammar (maybe not for a native speaker though, haha). Those are mis-types I clearly missed in my rewrite. Thanks for catching them
There are some grammar and typos issue throughout - do try Grammerly - I'm telling you it is a wizard at catching this stuff.
Later in the script - there are some weird spacing issues - need to be cleaned up.
This (used in a couple of spots)
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BLACK SCREEN
The sounds of a CAR CRASH -- violent, destructive. A child’s SCREAMING.
The car is UPSIDE DOWN, windscreen smashed, it’s contentswreckage.Madison, stuck in her seatbelt, is unconscious in the frontseat. Big gash on her head.
Does not work. You go from Black Screen to a scene (which appears to be a flashback) with no Scene Heading. Need a scene heading here (also else where)
A few of your flashbacks have no scene heading at all (I think). This around page 57 has no scene heading.
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Sunny, August and Donald are eating a stately dinner.Silence. A TV buzzes in the next room.
I recall a couple of other instances where scene heading were missing.
As indicated before - there is a lot of cleaning up to do.
In terms of the story. I think you have something here. I liked the dynamic between Madison and her Mom.
I would get rid of the flashback scenes with the Madison car crash. I would get us that info another way. You are already managing a ton of flashbacks with the August story line and more flashbacks just make it all the more complex. For example, Madison can relay some of that information (e.g., about her drunk driving accident) with the dude in the bar, or her Mom, or others.
The ending seemed rushed for me and there were some character arcs and story lines left unattended. For example. it would be interesting to know if she ever wrote the book. Did she get her son back? What is it about her journey searching for August that change her and the arc of her life?
Good start - but there is some meat to sill be put on the bone IMO and there are a lot of format issues that need tidying.