...Shall Be Infringed by 0 - Short, Drama, Thriller - The story behind the repeal of the second amendment.  18 pages - pdf, format

Writer interested in feedback on this work

Have read. Will comment later.

Pretty solid.  Interesting that both stories are about the same topic.

Dan

Pretty damn good.

AJR

Well, you’ve got a big story here crammed into eighteen pages.

My first read and reaction was: whooah, dense, too much narrator, (I’m generally a big fan of V.O.) get on with it.

Honestly, I was skimming to get to the good bits – such is the short attention span of the 21st century consumer.

I then read again, of course, twice more, cause I don't want to miss out on a good story. Eighteen pages just threw me for a minute. Good thing I focused, this time slowing down and paying attention to story and detail.

Your story is ambitious, high budget, covering different decades, different countries, a decade into the future, two decades going back. I think the task you were set obviously dictated this, and the task you set yourself was not easy.

I'm going to critique as I would an OWC with 'championship round’ in addition.

For a short I think it’s a bit too big and ambitious for the page count. That you got it all down in that page count is a credit to you. Feature length really,  this type of story, so kudos.

Your opening line has an error:

‘I’m am'

I'm sure you’re aware of this. Fwiw, I think you should start with the more emphatic: I am.

Do libraries have tiled floors? I suppose it's: write a good visual/audio – her shoes clacking against the hard surface, contrasting with the very quiet atmosphere of a typical library full of students. Soon however, that quiet is going to be ruptured by gunfire anyway so maybe consider complete quiet perhaps with some murmurings and whispers. Might be more effective.

There are small errors throughout – missed words etc.

Most of the students...
Allison squeezes Joshua’s hand as (she) stares at the protestors

Those who didn’t hide were the first to die. That's written on the second line of an action para. Unless it's a not so great aside, I assume that should be the Narrator's voice?

Jeremiah quickly turns into Jerimiah btw. (Spelling)

I like the visual of the book pages flying.

So many far flung locations, and a wedding, a funeral, an attempted assassination, a suicide. Whew!
Iraq, Chechnya, New York.

The repeal of the second Amendment. Okedoke.

Eliminate Allison Stone. First female President. Protection: An ex spouse.

A large cherry wood china dining table? Wood and China?

She watches the video every week? Hmm, bit obsessive.

The Agent rolls his eyes - couldn’t help it.

Stay in the present tense – ‘can't help it'. But really you don’t need to add that last bit.

You create some great visuals and the feel of time and place very well with your descriptions – the scene at the MOMA with the guests in all their finery, the music playing from the string quartet etc. Nicely done.

So, the Syrian mother is not so much a diversion as she is a martyr. Well both, I suppose.

In the debris, an AUTOMATIC PISTOL that was hidden within the Sculpture. Abraham grabs it, takes dead aim at Allison.
Abraham grabs an automatic pistol hidden within the debris of the sculpture.

Or just omit the 'that was'.

It took her a moment before she realized it was him.
You really could write it as 'it takes' ...
It takes only a split second before she recognises him.
But, how about, there’s recognition in her eyes straight away. That'd be more poignant. Jmh.

Is he wearing a bullet proof vest? Okay, I suppose he has to die for the story.

Final scene, dissolve to where? The Whitehouse, a news studio? Who is Joshua addressing at the end with the reveal? Us obviously. But where is Joshua in this scene, other than perched on a stool? Is he looking down the barrel of a camera, is he being interviewed by someone? You could/should elaborate on that slug.

Forgive me for being finickity.

It’s a big epic saga. You did really well with it and I enjoyed it.

Code OVER BLACK NARRATOR (V.O.) (adult male voice) I’m am the son of a President. A rifle SHOT - loud as thunder. NARRATOR (V.O.) And the son of an assassin. Another SHOT. NARRATOR (V.O.) This is their story.

Who ordered the extra cheese? I have the theme tune of the A team running through my mind right now - no bad thing.

Code A dozen high school STUDENTS weave in an out of rows of bookshelves in the center of the room.

Why? Are they doing a wedding-style Macarena?

Code ...surrounding the perimeter of the room

line the perimeter would be better. The perimeter already encapsulates and therefore surrounds the room... to surround the perimeter would be... well, awkward.

Code NARRATOR (V.O.) But of course, it wasn’t.

This is killing me.

Agh, I just noticed 18 pages. 5 pages of cheese, perhaps, but 18 is not for me.

First line of dialog "I'm am...". Rough way to start.

Whoa. That's a lot of V.O.

And why couldn't he go home? Man, I'd be on the first boat outta there.

Character dialog Hardwick/Agent Hardwick.

Some good stuff here that could fill a feature. It's obvious, after reading both entries, that the parameters made this a difficult challenge. Great work getting the first female President, 2nd Amendment, year 2028, husband hitman, MOMA, and shiny black limo. Not sure if I could come up with that combo.

Good job, writer.

For me, there are things here that make this entry stand out -

One, the Columbine connection. Very clever, and sets up the motivation for both characters.

Two, the love story - we get fleshed-out characters, and we feel something when we see Jeremiah see her with her new husband for the first time, and we feel something when they look at each other (this moment should have been held longer) and he dies saving her.

Three, a competent back story about why Jeremiah doesn't return after being declared MIA. Getting caught up in another country's revolution was believable, and though neither writer had a choice, this writer handled the inevitable husband returning to protect the wife really well because of all the setup done beforehand.

Very nice job here.

Hey writer, good work and congratulations.

For the most part, this script is well written. The dialogue IMO was weak in areas. For instance the gunman saying "come out, come out, wherever you are" was a little corny for me.

I feel like the narrator was dumping exposition a little too hard. I wish at times that between the characters and the narrator, there was more of a puzzle to piece together. One example is on page 12 when Jeremiah says "The British Embassy in Lebanon, two thousand and twelve. Eight dead." That's really all you need, but then the narrator continues with "He was referring to the assassination of the British Ambassador..."

I think your instincts were right by making the Syrian terrorists not really Syrian. Let's face it, Syrian immigrants have enough enemies in North America as it is. However, this poses a serious problem for this script as a film. Were they white rednecks dressed as Syrians? That would be pretty cheesy and hard to pull off. Are they other middle easterners that were paid by the NRA? I wouldn't buy that either. So yeah, it's an issue for me.

I will say that between the two scripts, I experienced an emotional response with yours. Something about a hero being forgotten only to come back and save the love of his life one more time...

Hard perimeters but good job. And good luck!

Writer,

What good work! Your writing style took me along through what seemed, at first, like a tough 18 pages. However, it breezed by. I never got bored, or skimmed. Your set-up was good, writing style, pace. everything worked for me. And it was a good story. The only issue I had was that it ended rather abruptly. If there was any point where you could have slowed this down a little it was within the last page. I feel that was worthy of not more explanation, just a bit more time spent to wrap it all up.

Top marks.

Steve

This is a well-written story, and it looks like you plucked out the most exciting 18 minutes of a feature and used a narrator to fill in the gaps.

There were a couple spots where a word was missing, but I read right over it because the whole story hangs together so well that the missing word was kinda obvious. Well, except in one spot.

CNN ANCHOR
Stunning results today from the
latest Gallup poll on the upcoming
presidential election. Senator
Allison Stone has increased her
lead over Chet Wilkins. It’s
currently an eleven percent gap.
(turns to Pundit One)
What do you make of this?

Just before the wrylie, the words "Even the famously cautious Nate Silver thinks this race is over" are missing

Personally, I don't like the V.O. throughout the story. I'm not sure he actually adds anything, though listening to him is a lot easier than listening to the Russian explain his now-ex-wife's situation.

SPOILERS

So we have an arms manufacturer hiring Chechnyan terrorists who disguise themselves as Syrian refugees. Unfortunately, it is entirely plausible that Syria could still be in civil war ten years from now, and conditional on an arms manufacturer being stupid enough to make this deal, the Chechnyans are acting perfectly rationally. I'd have given the assassin grenades rather than a pistol, but what's there works especially since the point is to get firearms banned rather than grenades.

I do have an issue with the part before that. I don't see the Secret Service approving that rooftop event for a major party candidate's Election Night reception. MoMA is surrounded by buildings taller than it with hundreds and hundreds of windows that have line-of-site from all sides. Ultimately the rooftop only mattered for the mother's distraction, so I'm sure there was some way to bring all of that indoors.

END SPOILERS

So although I think there was a bone-headed decision made off-screen, it's peripheral to the story and would be easy to fix on in a second draft.

Very entertaining read.

This is technically well written, a typo here and there doesn't spoil the read and the 18 pages went past pretty quickly.

But for me there's far too much Narrator and there are too many decisions that don't ring true, e.g. his decision not to go home when the Russians rescue him, his decision to turn executioner for the state etc.

I felt these things mounted up and derailed it for me, ultimately I didn't buy into it enough.

The VO at the beginning didn't work for me. The first three lines are OTN in my opinion. Then he says something we don't need to hear - "it was a normal Tuesdays morning" - and you show a normal morning anyway.
On p4 Jerimiah goes to war and Narrator says exactly what Jerimiah does.
On P9 the Narrator doesn't work for me again - you show Jerimiah arrive and that's what the Narrator tells us - I think there should be as little retelling as possible when the Narrator is involved.

I liked Jerimiah and Allison and their son very much. Especially Allison - and she talks a lot which is very good. The info about Jerimiah has been related to us via Narrator. I mean almost everything. And I wish Jerimiah talked a bit more and we got used to him.

In the end I fell in love with the story. Very nice and I loved to find out who the Narrator was. Excellent work in my opinion.

Hey you,

Title is okay, like the oddness.

Logline is okay too. Simple but full on subject, so why not…

The super on p1 is freakish frightening as a train you see not coming. Dramaturgically it's very impactful imo, since those are words that don't read easily.

Page 14 and still new characters step in the picture… well it's the big approach and probably the right choice to go big and epic (also re the narrator) due to the gun law subject, which deserves big – on the other side though things are really exposition-heavy so far, so I hope for some great payoffs and a quality ending…

The sculpture move surely does work. Cool images in this whole section.

Okay… this was biiiigg. Also, nice payoff about the boy being the storyteller, actually I forgot about the original narrator's intro.

I don't think this is realistically doable because it's really ultra high budget material. Whatever, you definitely convinced in case that you had about what, 20 characters ? :-) ? and still kept control over the plot. That's hard to do.  All in all I'll go with yours, it was pretty okay with lots of fine aspects.

It's okay.  Not a fan of the over use of the Narrator.  I think this was done once before in this very competition.

I did wonder, Allison at 23 is in college.  Isn't that a little old for someone of 23?  Maybe she's at university?

There's a few spelling errors in there, I'm sure someone else has mentioned them.

As I don't know the parameters, this one could be the winner.  Who knows...

Quoted from jayrex It's okay.  Not a fan of the over use of the Narrator.  I think this was done once before in this very competition. I did wonder, Allison at 23 is in college.  Isn't that a little old for someone of 23?  Maybe she's at university?

Most 23-year-olds are roughly 23 years old.

Pretty much all politicians in the US have law degrees, which a considerable number of years beyond one's bachelor's degree.

Quoted from jayrex There's a few spelling errors in there, I'm sure someone else has mentioned them. As I don't know the parameters, this one could be the winner.  Who knows...

The parameters were posted in the voting thread.

The intro over black is a good jarring start.

Oh no. Columbine? This is well written but by focusing on this good taste is gonna be an issue. Not really sure where this is going and the narrator is getting on my nerves a bit. It could work on screen, but seems almost too concerned with drama. Not sure what he (or she) adds right now. Most of this would work just as good without it.

Making a big deal of the 2nd amendment now? Are we getting political?

Now the dude is a Russian agent? This is kinda all over the place at this point.

Getting heavy handed

What?

The end kinda lost me. Too much time spent on setup I think that culminates in a rushed ending. This really reads like it wants to be a full length story and the first and second acts just got crammed into a short. That said, the heavy handed 2nd amendment references lost me. Are we trying to make a political statement here? Guns are bad because.........

Well written no doubt. But the story choices don't really work for me here.

I gave this one high marks for (1) the scope of what the writer attempted, and (2) the degree of success he achieved.

Great story, I had no problem with the V.O. For a short with a big story it works well.

The 'weaving in and out of bookshelves' was a strange visual for me.

I liked how in the end it was an American corporate that had organized the shooting. A good take on who the real terrorists are.

Because this is seems to be a tragic love story, showing the President at his grave grieving would tie things up nicely towards the end.

Would make a good feature...

Nice Job

An ambitious and epic tale for 18 pages. We covered generations and countries.

Would like to see a lot of the narration cut out, it gets a little much after a while.

I feel this writer left nothing in the tank with this script and I'm glad he takes home the title for his efforts.

Massive congrats to both of you!

Many thanks to all who read and commented on the script.  

I have corrected all the typos and missed words – chagrined that I didn’t see them. Appreciate that peeps took the time to point them out.

Re: the 18 pages. Yes – it’s very long for a short. Partly because I struggled with the parameters. e.g:
-     Why would anyone vote for a woman who’s estranged husband was a hitman?
-     Why would the Secret Service let a hitman anywhere near a presidential candidate?
-     How is it that the husband hitman would gain knowledge of the assassination plot?

Anyway, when I started prepping, a lot of it was backstory. By the time I got to writing it, I saw no rational way not to include the backstory in order to address the above and to void a ton of WTFs?  I felt that my choices were a lot of clumsy expositional dialogue in a shorter story or a lot of narration in a longer one. Obviously, there is an ideal way that one could have been accomplished this objective without either crutch – I just didn’t think of it.  

I also wanted to write something that could be developed into a feature at some future point. I had not done that with any of my shorts and I thought this one would be a good possibility - So, it kind of ended up being somewhat of an outline for a what ultimately will be a much longer story.

In terms of a potential feature. My thinking was:
- As a premise – the different paths and life arcs taken by two involved kids involved in the Columbine shooting.  One becomes a gun control advocate and one takes the opposite direction creating friction in their lives.
- Will add balance to the debate – both sides of the issue will have a say.
- I can lose the narrator as the exposition won’t need to be delivered in that fashion.  
- The Hitman aspect will be eliminated. The soldier/sniper aspect will remain.

Basically, it would just become the life-arc of two close people that survived Columbine.  
Again – I appreciate all of the suggestions I received – many were very valuable and the ones I disagreed with certainly gave me food for thought.

This read as a feature dying from being stuffed into a short.

The issue you'd have trying to avoid becoming too preachy or over handed on the gun control debate. You'll have to be very subtle and let the story ask the questions and raise the points naturally or else I don't think it'd work well. It could be difficult to pull off, but the setup you made is an interesting one that could work.

Quoted from CameronD This read as a feature dying from being stuffed into a short. The issue you'd have trying to avoid becoming too preachy or over handed on the gun control debate. You'll have to be very subtle and let the story ask the questions and raise the points naturally or else I don't think it'd work well. It could be difficult to pull off, but the setup you made is an interesting one that could work.

I agree. Subtlety and balance are going to be the keys