Darren, as promised, I’m giving your short another view, since you have a new draft up. I have not taken notes, but I do have some mental ones and I’ve got your PDF still open, so I will use a few actual quotes.
I see you’ve made some changes here in the middle and end, based on feedback, and that’s good. However, it doesn’t look like you did much of anything with the opening, which is a problem, and there are still many, many mistakes everywhere. This is a better version, but, IMO, it’s still a mess.
Let’s check it out…
I don’t know if this is a new Logline or not, but I have to start here.
“Three people are trapped inside a chapel as a terrible creature hides somewhere out in the cemetery outside.” – Look at the “out in the cemetery outside” ending here. Reads just awful, repetitive, missing punctuation, just not good. The script has very little to do with the creature hiding anywhere. He’s killing people, attacking people, destroying things, digging up graves…very little hiding going on. It’s just a really bad Logline (and trust me, I’m not a good Logline writer, and many Logs aren’t good, but when they’re downright bad, it’s something you need to address immediately).
So, as I said after reading the first draft, the opening just doesn’t work. It’s way too long, slow, and dull. It’s good you got rid of most of the Goth stuff, but other than that, it comes off the same way. Unlikable, bland characters, dull, unbelievable dialogue, hard to follow visuals and action. Check out your opening lines…
“Industrial dark wave music plays over the speakers of a rusty car.
An Ouija board rests on a headstone, surrounded by roses and empty bottles of rum.”
Your first sentence ends in an orphan…and what does it tell us? What is “industrial dark wave music”? Are you showing the speakers in this rusty car? I know this may all sound very picky and maybe even pricky, but I’m serious. Is this really the way you want to open your script?
Next line – “An Ouija…” – This is incorrect and you do it again later. Technically, since “Ouija” starts with an “O”, “an” seems like the right choice over “a”, but when you say this out loud, you should immediately know it’s not correct. Should be “A Ouija…”
But it’s more than just the “an”. I personally dislike the entire line. First of all, I can’t picture a headstone that would hold a Ouija board, roses and empty rum bottles…I’m not saying it’s impossible, but I just don’t picture what this headstone looks like..or is shaped like, and right off the bat, I’m pausing to try and get a mental image. Finally, what’s with the empty rum bottles? We’ve got 4 kids and they’ve polished off multiple bottles of rum?
OK, 1 more quote from Page 1…(sorry I’m being a lot more detailed than I wanted to be).
“BRIAN, CATHERINE, VINCE and LILY, (all 17-18 years old) party around an area of the graveyard. Only Lily is into an emo-Goth look. Blue jeans, T-shirts and Salvation Army jackets are the norm for the others.”
And this is the 3rd passage and again, for me, major issues going on. You intro all 4 characters together, but don’t give us any physical descriptions to differentiate them. You say they’re all 17 or 18, but don’t tell us which ones are 17 and which ones are 18. You say they “party around an area of the graveyard”, but what does that mean? It’ so far from visual and again, I have to pause to try and figure out exactly what you’re trying to say. I mean, seriously, “an area of the graveyard”…what does that mean or show us? Nothing. Then, for some reason, you state that “only Lily” has on some emo-Goth look, which reads and sounds really odd, as if it’s surprising they all aren’t dressed like this. Then, you specifically dress your other 3 characters in “blue jeans, T shirts, and Salvation Army jackets”. If they have jackets on, how do we know they’re wearing T shirts underneath?
Again, you may be rolling your eyes and thinking, WTF? What’s wrong with this A-Hole? Why in the Hell is he bringing all this up? Well, IMO, you’ve got to hit the ground running, right out of the gate. For me, this is the opposite…it’s as if you tripped at the gun, and fell down. It’s a bad way to start.
OK, from there, we’ve got 3 pages of difficult to follow action prose and dull, go nowhere dialogue, that doesn’t even sound realistic. I mean it’s almost an entire page about what’s in the “empty rum bottles”, and even after all that, I’m completely clueless. It doesn’t go anywhere, it doesn’t give us any insights into any of these characters, and doesn’t even provide an answer to the question it poses.
I think this entire opening is a major problem here and needs to be fixed up.
Top of Page 4 – we’re introduced to our Antag now…and it happens very suddenly, and awkwardly, I’m afraid. Here’s the first passage…
“Shadow of outspread bat wings fall over Vince and Lily. Both look up. Lily screams as Vince tears away from her.”
I’ve brought this up many times before and will again now. I just don’t understand why writers omit the word “A” or “The” in action prose. It doesn’t read well at all the way it is. There’s a shadow, and then, in the same shot basically, Vince is picked up into the air. Doesn’t work for me as written at all.
Next passage…
“Vince windmills his arms as he flies backward in the air. Once on the ground, Vince slumps dead next to a tombstone. Blood pours from his mouth, which opens to reveal his fake vampire teeth.”
Passages should basically be a single thought…or shot, or description detail, or action sequence. This is far from it, and shouldn’t be linked together. Vince is windmilling his arms in the air, then, in the next sentence, he’s on the ground, dead. Yet, you didn’t show him killed or even fall, and that’s a HUGE problem. And although you completely exclude all detail of Vince being dropped to the ground and dying, for some reason, you give great detail after he’s lying on the ground, dead.
OK, let’s move on…I don’t want to keep on providing quotes, cause I think I could do it with the majority of the lines. The writing on display here is very awkward to me. The visuals and action not well presented and hard to follow and picture. The dialogue isn’t realistic, and it’s also shockingly repetitive, with characters routinely repeating themselves again and again. You’ve got missing words and some typos.
The part you rewrote is better than it was before and I’m very happy you got rid of the 13 cultists in the giant pit, but it still doesn’t work for me at all the way it is. The surviving characters in the chapel/mausoleum just don’t act or speak like they should. I don’t buy any of it. The scene also goes on way too long. Way too much talking that doesn’t come off as real or go anywhere (at least we now find out where this “Q” comes from though, which is nice). IMO, this shouldn’t be longer than 10-12 pages, and you’ve got it running onto Page 21!
The finale was better this time around, but still needs attention, IMO. Brian’s death is not well done. Miller shooting himself in the head is not well done. The creature’s demise is much better, but still not good, IMO. And you supplanted the pit for an open grave, but this open grave must be just cavernous for all the action taking place inside it. Just doesn’t work and I can’t visualize what you’re after.
Maybe the problem is that I can’t visualize the creature, itself, still. Based on what it does, it sounds like it must be huge, but you never really tell us or give us a visual of how big it is. It upends cars and heavy grave markers. It picks people up and flies around with them. It snaps off heads and breaks bodies in 2, yet it fits inside an open grave with several other people in it at the same time.
I’m sorry, Darren, but this doesn’t work for me at all, as written. I’ll say what I said originally, I love the premise and possibilities here, but the execution isn’t working for me at all. I bring up all this stuff to point it out to you, in hopes it will help going forward.
Take care and best of luck with this. |
Pages: 
Author
Something Is Out There
Logged
Locked Board