TRAPPINGS


Im only a few lines in to this but the way you write is so good it deserves a mention. You're descriptions are acurate and detailed but with a good sense of humour aswell.
The way you switch from the past to the present was really well done.

This really whizzed by very quickly and all in all, it was a great read.

I think you're characters were all good, Donnie had a couple of good lines particularly about the doctor.
I think you also outlined Chip's character really well. It seems he's been stuck with this persona ever since he was a kid and the finale means he is now free to get on with a life. Mira, too.

Dialouge is spot on and you're writing is ace. The only shame is that this is so short!

Great job, Bert.

Hey Bert,

I read this. Very good. Description was above average as usual. I really like your descriptive style. You have your own voice. I’m not quite able to recognize your writing without knowing the author, as I’ve learned from the writing challenges, but I still think your writing is very distinct. Though there didn’t seem to be as many Bertisms in this, which I’ll chalk up to having been on a deadline.

Format is fairly impeccable, as usual. And you have excellent word choice. I think you’re one of the best technicians I’ve read around here.

I printed this off because I didn’t feel like sitting at the computer for a while. My printer informed me that your bottom margin was .5. I don’t know if you realized that.

****SPOILERS****

The story was fine, in large part thanks to the writing. Only two things really stretched the boundaries of credibility as far as I thought:

1) I’m not sure that the police would have let Mira go home so soon after killing her husband. I would think they would arrest her for murder. The abuse from her husband would have been part of her defense. I wouldn’t think she would be out on bail before the body went to the morgue.

Of course, her being free is crucial to the plot. I was, however, willing to believe it. I just assumed the clear bruises were meant to sort of make her abuse obvious even to the police, who would surely want to make an arrest. Also, it’s obvious that Austin has a past of troubles which would surely include legal ones. So I bought it. But I had to think about it.

2) I was at odds as to whether Austin’s actions were horrid enough for Chip to be fixated on him his entire life. Being stuck in a locker all night is pretty gruesome, I think. But I wasn’t sure that one night at school would constitute so much agony for someone as to ruin his career by destroying a corpse.

I was willing to accept it but the hardest thing to accept was how Chip’s actions could have been perceived to cause so much trouble for Austin. I think maybe the Mira character could fill in the blanks a little and tell us a little more about the chain reaction the locker incident set off. He was sent to reform school, he never graduated, etc.

Just some thoughts. Overall, I thought it was pretty good.

Brea

Hey Brea!  What are you doing here?  I thought I told Ben to read this one.

Thanks for looking, though.  Not too many Bertisms here.  It's an early work, and one's style is continually evolving, you know?  Or it should be.  That's what I think.

And a technician, huh?  You make it sound like plumbing or something.

As to the plot points in question, I have no idea how realistic it is that Mira would be free at home.  You just gotta' buy into that one, I guess.

But you don't think you would remember that locker, huh?  How about if I made it over the entire weekend?  In fact, I like that.  It's already going in the "someday" rewrite.

And you are quite right about making it more clear what happened to Austin in the aftermath of this little event.  Chalk that one up to the short deadline.

Thanks again, Brea.  Looking forward to your new one -- even if it does sound like some old guy clearing his throat haha.

Quoted from bert Hey Brea!  What are you doing here?  I thought I told Ben to read this one.

Well, you got me instead.

Quoted from bert But you don't think you would remember that locker, huh?

****SPOILERS****

I would probably remember the locker incident for a long time. But I’m not sure if it would become such a focal point in my life. The lockers in my school weren’t so strong that someone couldn’t have mangled them by morning though. But, mainly, I just wasn’t sure if it was so bad as to throw your life away as an adult, which is essentially what Chip did. You steal a corpse (especially one involved in a murder investigation) and burn it, you’re going to lose your job and go to jail.

Chip said he only knew this guy one day. So the gum incident, the bathroom incident, and the locker incident were the only times they ever met. This wasn’t a bully who picked on him all through high school. It was a punk he had one (albeit horrible) experience with. I didn’t see why Austin would even remember Chip. He probably picked on so many kids.

Quoted from bert Looking forward to your new one -- even if it does sound like some old guy clearing his throat haha.

Wow. That’s exactly what it’s about. Some old guy clears his throat for a hundred pages.

You’re just upset because Starr Jones got fired from The View and you’re taking it out on me. -- hahaha!

Hey Bert,

This one was pretty cool, the opening V.O by Chip was dead on, I remember when I got sent away and had to go to another school in another country, that's totally how I felt, so good job there.

I thought the story flowed quite nice between the flashback and present day and I had no idea where this was going, which was good.

One thing that gets me, it always gets me when I hear of spousal abuse, if Mira hated Austin so much why did she stay with him, by the sounds of it it seemed she never really liked him, I never get stuff like that.

Loved the ending on the boat, that was a great surprise.

I think on the last page when Chip says "But that’s a lot of shit" he should say "but that's a load of shit"  sounds better I think.

anyways this was another good one.

PS: Are Chip and Mira gonna hook up now?

Hey, thanks for resurrecting this one, Jordan.  This was one of those "one-week" stories, and I've always been pretty fond of the way this one turned out, as it is so different from the type of stuff I usually put out there.

Martin's "Requiem" that you also read today was part of the same exercise -- a completely different take on the same theme -- and I agree with you that one is just a fantastic effort.

So you think it should be "load of shit", huh?  Well, I suppose if Jordan gives you advice on proper cursing techinique you ought to take it  

I'll make the change whenever I go back into this one for renovations.  Thanks for your thoughts on this one.

(And yeah -- they hook up.)

Bert,

Since I haven't had time to read anything real long lately, I've explored some of the Shorts. I like to finish with one writer's pieces, before moving to another's work. This way, it gives me more of a feel for their style and recurring themes.

Settling the bully is one of my pet themes, and you've done a good show of that here.

From your logline, I thought it referred to a body he'd recently killed. Thus, I was surprised how it really was. That didn't hurt the enjoyment of the story.

I love voice overs, and the thoughts in yours are penetrating. I do think it would have helped to put PAST and PRESENT in the time jumps, but it's not a major flaw in a shortie.

I liked the sardonic tone Donnie had. It worked for me. Austin is so totally mean, there might be some danger of one-sidedness here. Abusive people usually have interludes of some decency, to keep people under power to them.

The hurts of youth are a wellspring of material for stories. It seems you have a real strength in this area.

Being stuffed in a locker and almost suffocated is plenty of reason for lifelong trauma. I don't think he could survive over a weekend. Think hard about that.

Hi Monette.  You must have been in a real reading mood haha.

This is another one-week challenge story -- a drama in which a funeral home worker is confronted by the body of an old bully.

Since I just discussed "Requiem" with Jordan a few posts back, I'll give the link:

http://www.simplyscripts.net/cgi-bin/Blah/Blah.pl?b-short/m-1121874780/

Try that story for a completely different -- and powerful -- take on the same theme.

You make an excellent point with the "past" and "present" designations.  A few people got confused about that, it it could be made more clear.

I went back and read this one again this morning for the first time in a long time -- and was surprised nobody caught my little inside joke --

"Kroehner Funeral Home", where Chip works, is the competing funeral home on "Six Feet Under".  I had forgotten I put that in there haha.

Thanks again, Monette!

Quoted from bert I went back and read this one again this morning for the first time in a long time -- and was surprised nobody caught my little inside joke -- "Kroehner Funeral Home", where Chip works, is the competing funeral home on "Six Feet Under".  I had forgotten I put that in there haha.

What if "Six Feet Under" makes a stink that you used something of theirs? I'd use a made up name to be on the safe side. Why risk their wrath, eh?

Can't help but feel like popping in here and not reading anything makes me look like something of a lazy bastard. So I thought I'd take a look at this. Somehow your older scripts always disappear only to get bumped months later. Anyway...

I liked this one a good deal. I liked the transitions between the past and present. The past had action and the present had reflection. I thought the contrast was very good and made reading this much more satisfying. Chip is a likeable character as well. Everyone can feel for the kid who finds himself in trouble when he was only minding his own business.

I did however feel the first half of the story was a bit repetitive. A lot of the present scenes involved Chip's partner telling him he didn't look good. Once is enough. We get the idea. We also know that Austin died from a bullet to the head from the introduction of his dead self. No need to reiterate.

Other than that, pretty solid story. I was a bit afraid at the beginning that the V.O. would go overboard but that wasn't the case. The conclusion was also something I didn't expect and I liked that. Things don't always have a happy ending and I felt that was very appropriate here.

Anyway, good job, Bert. Always a pleasure.

Hey, James.  I also get worried when stories start off with a long V.O.  I intentionally kept that minimal here -- as a bookend kinda' thing -- and I was really just playing with it, as it is not a technique I use very often.

I am going to look for that repetitive stuff right now and see if I can find it.  Thanks for jumping into one of this story's cyclic re-emergences haha.  I appreciate your thoughts on it.

Quoted from MonetteBooks What if "Six Feet Under" makes a stink that you used something of theirs?

That would fall under "no PR is bad PR".  I would be so completely amazed they had even seen the story that I would gleefully accept whatever stink they wanted to raise.

Hey Bert, im just reading through some of your scripts as you seem to have good idea of what makes a good script and i decided to read this first.

I must say that i really liked this and how it went from the past to the present. It showed how things that affected us when we were younger can still affect us when were older. I liked that the two people that Austin had treated the worst in his life could banish their demons of him together.

Great story and look forward to reading more of your scripts.

Hey, there Fish.  Boy, you really dug up a relic here haha.

Looking back through this one, I really need to update this file into a PDF don't I?  Lord, what a mess it is.

I am glad you enjoyed it, though.  I really like this one, too, as it is quite different from most of my work.  I really had to step out of my comfort zone for this OWC -- and if memory serves, I think this might have been the very first OWC.

Quoted from TheBigFish It showed how things that affected us when we were younger can still affect us when were older.

Yes, that was the takeaway message.  Not an earth-shattering message, really, but I suspect all of us have been both Chip and Austin and different times in our lives.  This is perhaps one of the most personal pieces I've ever posted.

Welcome to the boards, Fish, and thanks for reminding me of this one.  It is due for a reformatting, if nothing else.

Hey Bert,

You've got any more great shorts hidden away here? Don't know how I managed to miss this one but I'm glad I found it. What a special story this was, very emotional. It hooked me from the start and kept my eyes peeled from start to finish. A real pageturner.

Nice work with the flashbacks - they worked really smooth. I skipped over the one instance of "DISSOLVE TO" you used, cos' your writing had already told me that the one scene dissolved into the next. Your descriptions worked really well. The way you laid out the visuals here made this script such an easy read. I was really impressed with how well you build the atmosphere in this piece.

Now, onto the nitpicks.

I didn't find it plausible that Mira would be at home since she was the one who blew Austin's brains out. Yes, I know that she could probably be out on bail, and I guess a case could be made that she shot him in self-defense, but it would help (at least me) if you would touch upon that.

Another thing, why burn the boat? I can understand why they both would want to burn Chip's body, but unless the boat symbolizes something for Mira (and that is not how I read it) then it doesn't make much sense to me to burn the boat. I mean she could sell it and rack in some much needed cash.

All in all a damn fine script, one that you should be very proud of.

Cheers
Rob

PS: What was the theme for this OWC? I'm guessing something about being trapped?

Hey, thanks you guys.  It is nice to have some new looks on this one after so much time, as I always felt it had been a bit overlooked.

It is a shame the file is in such bad shape, though.  I am in the process of cleaning it up now, and fiddling around with some of the rough patches of dialogue now that I can work on this at my leisure outside of the one-week deadline.

Quoted from Grandma Bear I loved your descriptions and the sense of liberty, lack of restraint you have in your writing here.

Thanks, "me".  I will be sure to keep that aspect intact on this one.

Quoted from Grandma Bear ... everything , except for the cheesy'ish ending.

Hmm...are you referring to the boat, or the closing V.O., or both?

Quoted from Sniper You've got any more great shorts hidden away here?

Yeah.  Got some crappy ones, too haha.

I will take your thoughts on board since I am cleaning this one up, Rob, but will probably keep the end, as most readers seemed to like it pretty well.  But I can probably give it a little more meaning, too, as it is meant to symbolize them putting some old demons to rest.

Quoted from Sniper What was the theme for this OWC? I'm guessing something about being trapped?

It was a drama about a funeral home worker confronting the corpse of an old bully.  "Rest in Peace" by MacDuff is another that has been floating around the first page of the shorts board lately, and Martin wrote a helluva script for it called "Requeum".  Seek that one out -- I recommend it highly.