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It is fine. As far as "active voice", you do have several words that end in "ing", if that is what you are asking.
Not disallowed, but in several instances, you could punch those up.
"...rolling onto his back, clutching his side in pain."
"...rolls onto his back and clutches his side in pain."
You have already started a "Work in Progress" thread for this -- if you are going to post scenes for feedback, please use that exisiting thread. This board is for general questions. Thanks.
Certainly not the worst I’ve read. But a few points to think about:
Your action needs more oomph. It needs to be more cinematic.
You don’t need to put stuff like “in pain” into parenthetical direction.
Why knock Lucifer unconscious before blowing his head off? It’s better to have him see the end coming?
Why waste time having Max lower the shotgun, then raise it again to shoot Lucifer?
I did a very quick rewrite that brings it all up a couple of notches. Hope it helps.
FADE IN:
INT. DERELICT WAREHOUSE - DAY
Max, unconscious, face to pavement. Lucifer stands over him, shotgun in grasp, finger firm on the trigger.
LUCIFER: Wake up, Max. C’mon, up.
Max doesn’t budge. Lucifer delivers a swift kick to his gut – WHAP!
Max’s eyes spring open and he’s coughing, clutching his gut. Lucifer shoves the gun hard to Max’s head.
LUCIFER: It’s really too bad, Maxie. It really is.
MAX: Bullsh*t!
In one swift move, Max grabs the barrel of the shotgun, wrests it from Lucifer’s grip, sends it flying, skittering across the warehouse floor.
Then, in a flash, Max is up. He delivers a smashing blow to Lucifer’s face. Lucifer reels, topples back, cracks his head on the concrete. He’s stunned momentarily. Then he comes to -- and finds Max hovering over him, shotgun in hand. The barrel is now aimed between Lucifer’s eyes.
MAX: Bet you got one helluva headache.
Lucifer hocks up some saliva, spits a wet stream into Max’s face, snarling.
LUCIFER: F*ck you!
Max smirks as he calmly presses the shotgun barrel firm to Lucifer’s forehead. A long tense beat. Now there’s a bit of a smug smile on Lucifer’s face.
LUCIFER: You can’t do it, can you? You’re yellow. Yellow! That’s all you are, Maxie. That’s all you’ll ever be...just a yellow piece of sh—
BLAM! Max stands there, dark crimson and brain matter dripping from his face.
As WS asked, why wake someone up if you're going to shoot him? What's the point? And would kicking someone actually wake it up? He's unconscious, not sleeping.
Max is lying on the ground and he punches the shotgun, knocking it out of Lucoifer's hands? Either Max is extremely strong or Lucifer is missing most of his fingers.
And the shorgun firing, just missing Max's head seems a little cliche. Even if it just missed him, a shotgun blast can hurt. Aside from burns from the flash, the blast is pretty deafening. For Max, however, it was nothing,. the whole scene seemed like nothing.
I'd say that WS' version is much more pasive than the original. Tons of passive verbiage that definitely doesn't need to be there.
I agree with Phil that basically none of it rings true. It also doesn't seem to pack much of a punch.
If this is truly a big scene, it needs to be played way up and it needs some exciting stuff going on.
Also, with the shotgun blast, keep in mind that a shotgun sprays out pellets in quite a wide arc. If the blast is semi point blank, it's pretty tough to "miss" your target.
The real question you need to ask is whether you could fully picture every detail of this scene in your own head. Does it make sense when you view it? After all, you know the larger story more than we do. To me, I can see that the content of the scene from just a scene perspective is fine, if that's what happens. The only line that reads oddly is "The shotgun hovers over Lucifer's forehead." Shotguns don't usually hover; someone usually holds them. After all, the scene needs to be written well enough to understand what's going on for all the other people to take it apart and make it real.
As the writer, you *should* know everything else that goes on to the point that if you had to sit and tell us everything down to the characters' thoughts, emotions, and reasonings, you could. These things aren't in the screenplay, but they should come through it in the writing. Looking over this, you should be able to answer these questions:
Why is Max unconscious at the beginning? What event lead to Lucifer bringing Max to this place? Why is Lucifer using a shotgun instead of some other weapon? What is "too bad"? How long have these men known each other? Why would Lucifer aim the gun into Max's face instead of somewhere else? What is "bullshit"? How did Max hit the gun so he would know Lucifer would lose his grip? Why wasn't Lucifer prepared for that retaliation? What caused the gun to discharge upon hitting a flat, concrete surface? Where did Max hit it to that a discharge would "narrowly miss" him? How did Lucifer fall down in such a way that he hit his head on the ground? Given that Max was groggy, what kind of training had he been through that he could deliver such a crushing blow and immediately leap to his feet, grabbing a weapon on his way up (no easy task)? Why would Max kick Lucifer in the face, killing him? What kind of relationship would they have had that Max felt the need to give Lucifer a gentle farewell (as evidenced by the laying down of the weapon; a peaceful gesture)? What history or organization would have necessitated Max shooting Lucifer in the face?
Now, we don't need to know all this, but if you know all these answers, you'll be able to write a better scene because you'll have all this is your head as you sketch it out. I'm as guilty as anyone else of writing a scene because it rings cool, but in reality I have no idea why anything is happening in it. I just think it's cool, and as screenwriters, we can get away with this to an extent because we feel like "someone else will figure it out." I would imagine some of the better screenplays have this figured out during the writing process and while those scripts leave those freedoms to someone else in the end, the writers have an idea as to what they would do if they had to plan it out.
I think the scene is to long it tries to explain everything when all you need to explain is what characters do not what they feel just a few points I thought a shot gun had two shots one shot was used why didn't lucifer kill max with the other one if you are in pain on the floor I think its unrealistic to even attempt to take the shotgun if you are lay down on the floor on your back I think you would need very long arms to try even to reach the shotgun never mind disarming him If I was writing the scene I would try to make it leaner something like this I hope this helps you
INT. WAREHOUSE - DAY
Max lies face down on the warehouse floor lucifer stands above him kicks max in the ribs max eyes open looks at lucifer loading his shotgun
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Need feedback on an action scene
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