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SimplyScripts Screenwriting Discussion Board    Unproduced Screenplay Discussion    Horror Scripts  ›  Midnight Lake Moderators: bert
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  Author    Midnight Lake  (currently 7116 views)
Don
Posted: November 6th, 2008, 10:16pm Report to Moderator
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So, what are you writing?

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Midnight Lake by Abel Orfao (abelorfao) - Horror - Ten college friends gather together at a secluded lakeside residence for one last celebration before fall semester unaware a dangerous predator lurks in the nearby woods. Will anyone discover his presence before it is too late... and will anyone be able to stop him? 94 pages - pdf, format


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Revision History (3 edits; 1 reasons shown)
Don  -  September 9th, 2009, 5:52pm
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abelorfao
Posted: November 7th, 2008, 1:45pm Report to Moderator
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Thank you SimplyScripts for providing such a valuable resource for everyone interested in the art of screenwriting. For those interested, I am willing to exchange scripts (preferably, but not necessarily, a script in the action or horror genres). The script exchange link is:

http://www.simplyscripts.net/cgi-bin/Blah/Blah.pl?b-goose/m-1226083290/
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BlackChristmas
Posted: November 8th, 2008, 6:33pm Report to Moderator
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Hey, Abel...

I'm in the process of reading the script as I type this. I was intrigued by this because the "killer in the woods stalks unsuspecting horny young people" genre is probably my favorite of all the horror sub-genres. So, I decided to give it a read, and I have to say that I really am enjoying it.

First of all, I really like your work in the opening scene(s). The dialogue seems real, which was definitely a plus here, but I could also tell right away that I would dig your description style. It's clear, concise and to the point rather than having six-line paragraphs of it that flood the page (which is something I have a huge problem with), which makes it a much easier and more enjoyable experience reading your script.

Now, after this portion ends is where my main problem with the script starts: too many characters. Sometimes this works in a screenplay's favor, sometimes it doesn't. For this one, in my opinion at least, it doesn't. With this many characters in a horror/slasher screenplay, it gets hard to distinguish them from one another, especially once the killing begins. I do appreciate that you took the time to really establish their personalities (which is perhaps my favorite thing about this screenplay), but it still causes some confusion between who's who, who's doing what, who's dating who, etc. if you 'get' what I'm saying. Of course, some people have different preferences but this is just one of my pet peeves of the horror genre. Less characters with more development is better than more characters. Just my personal preference.

However, what you've got here is definitely something very good. The deaths are pretty standard fare, but again I think this works in the screenplay's favor. Going too overboard with the creative kills really is a detriment to the overall feel of the screenplay. The scariest horror is horror that is based in reality (see: the original Psycho, Black Christmas, Halloween, and to a lesser extent Friday the 13th), and I feel you've achieved that greatly here.

Well, I'm finishing it up now and I have to say that the last 10 or 15 pages are very suspenseful. I did find it a little goofy when (on page 81) Shauna exclaims "Not again!"...I had to giggle about that one. OH, before I forget; speaking of giggling, I thought it was a nice touch having Williamson giggle every so often. Very nice.

Overall I really enjoyed 'Midnight Lake'. I think it could take a bit of polishing to smooth out some rough spots...and I definitely think a few characters could've been excised completely (which would have increased my enjoyment personally). I hope what I've said is helpful.
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abelorfao
Posted: November 9th, 2008, 12:33am Report to Moderator
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Thank you for reading my script, BlackChristmas, and for providing some very constructive criticism.

I'm thrilled you enjoyed the opening sequence, as I found it the most difficult part to write. (My early drafts started with the OSP officers simply stumbling upon the already-overturned van.)

As for your criticism about having too many characters, I was trying to balance having enough potential victims to kill off to please horror fans without having so many I'd be resorted to basic stereotypes with no development.

Looking back, I suppose I should have left out Gordon and Kim as they are probably the least developed characters among the group. As for Shauna's frustrated exclamation, I could easily excise that line if it's too distracting.

Still, I'm glad you (mostly) enjoyed my screenplay. If you have a screenplay of your own you'd like read, BlackChristmas, I'll gladly return the favor.
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Dreamscale
Posted: November 9th, 2008, 5:31pm Report to Moderator
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Hey Abel, I'm more than willing to read this and give you a very detailed review/critique, if you're willing to do the same for me.

My script is titled "Fade to White" and is located in the horror section.  I've actually rewritten this recently due to alot of feedback I've received (both in the Horror section and the Script Club section, where it was featured a few months back).

I could easily E-mail the new draft to you, as I'm not quite ready to repost it here yet.

Let me know and we can get started.  I could have yours finished by tomorrow night (maybe even tonight, as it looks like a rather quick read.
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abelorfao
Posted: November 9th, 2008, 6:56pm Report to Moderator
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Hello, Dreamscale. I'll gladly read "Fade To White" for you. Just send the new draft to my hotmail account. Let me know if you want the feedback placed in the discussion board thread or if you want it sent to you by e-mail.
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Dreamscale
Posted: November 9th, 2008, 7:26pm Report to Moderator
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Right on.  I'll E-mail it over to you in a few minutes.  I've cut it down to 114 pages and added an additional scene.  Also made a few things much easier to understand in the ending.

Feel free to post your comments under the Horror section.  You may want to start off the review with something to the effect that it's a new draft.

I appreciate it.

I'll get on yours tonight if possible, tomorrow at the latest.

Take care.
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Dreamscale
Posted: November 10th, 2008, 4:36pm Report to Moderator
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Hey Able, I'm a little more than 1/2 way through this.  I've got lots of things to say, and lots of advice that I think is going to help yyou.

I scored tickets to the Cards/49ers game tonight, here in Phoenix, so I'm not going to rush my comments.  I'll finish up tomorrow and give you an extremely detailed review.  Keep in mind that everything I say is meant as help, and try not to get offended or upset.

I'll be back on tomorrow with everything.  take care.
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Dreamscale
Posted: November 11th, 2008, 6:44pm Report to Moderator
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OK Abel, here we go.  As promised, I’m going to give you a very in-depth review, complete with comments and suggestions that I hope will help.  I’m going to break this down into 2 separate posts (maybe 3 even if I’ve written too much). The first one, here, will go over story, plot, characters, action, and dialogue.  The 2nd will cover technical aspects of your script and writing.

As I always preface, please understand that this is all meant as constructive criticism, and is aimed at helping you as a writer, perfect your craft.  In no way do I mean to be harsh or cruel in what I say.  If you are at all familiar with my reviews, you’ll know that I don’t pull any punches and tells it as I sees it.  These are simply my opinions, and please take them as that.

First of all, though, I want to give you a few compliments.  You’ve written a 90 page script that is coherent, and tells a complete story with a large number of characters, that are well developed.  Everything makes sense and your thoughts and intentions are clear.  The script is very clean…I only found about 10 mistakes, and most were simply a letter omitted (Shauna’s name showed up as “Shaun” several times), or a missing word.  You obviously spent some time editing this, and it shows.  You know how to write and how to tell a story, and these are all great things!

OK, let’s get started…

SPOILERS     SPOILERS     SPOILERS

Story/plot

This is pretty standard Slasher fare.  Sorry to say, but I’ve seen and read this exact story many, many times.  A group of 20 somethings spend a weekend away at a remote location (a lake house), while an escaped psychopath killer lurks nearby.  One by one, he systematically kills our protags off, leading to a final showdown.

This is by the numbers and very predictable, with literally no twists or reveals.  The story is extremely slow and the onscreen violence is almost non existent.  What violence you do show, comes off as rather tame and nondescript.  Although there are a few possibilities of nudity, and several sex scenes, the lack of swearing and gore, leads me to believe that you’re gunning for a PG 13 rating, with implied sex and nudity, but nothing really being shown.

And this is a big issue, I think.  What people are looking for (and appreciate) in a Slasher flick is cool onscreen kills, gore aplenty, sex, nudity, and swearing.  You haven’t delivered on these.  If you actually do intend on having the nudity and sex (as noted, there are several possibilities here) shown, you’re looking at an R rating, so why not also include the gore that’s required and expected?  Your few onscreen kills (other than the demise of Williamson) are for the most part PG 13 rated at most.  As far as I can remember, the only killing instrument is a butcher knife (again, other than in the finale), and the way it’s used is quite bland.  You need to seriously up the violence and come up with some unique, and or brutal scenes.

Literally 2/3 of your story revolves around our protags arriving at the lake house and then what they do that first day (unpack, talk, have sex, talk, walk, talk, ride bikes, talk swim, talk, hang out, drink, etc.).  Things are portrayed in an almost “real time” basis, and the entire story spans less than 1 day, other than your intro, which seems to occur a day or so ahead of the main body of story.

Abel, I know you’re probably not happy hearing this so far, but there just isn’t anything going on here that is at all different, engaging, or entertaining.  Way too much time is spent on extremely mundane things, and once things start happening, again, nothing is done in a new, or fresh way, leaving me with a sour taste in my mouth, and a feeling of “been there, done that”.

Characters

Lots of characters here.  To be honest, it’s very difficult to keep them separate, even though it’s painfully obvious that you tried to give them a life of their own, with back-story, differentiating looks, mannerisms, etc.  The problem is that they’re all introduced pretty much at once and for the most part, they’re all together, in the same location again and again.  The fact that they’re all approximately the same age doesn’t help either.  Nothing wrong with a cast this size though, as I feel Slasher flicks need a potential large body count, and you’ve provided that.

The biggest problem with the characters, though, is that they’re all total clichés, and standard Slasher personalities.  We’ve got the shy guy, the good guy, the obnoxious guy, the cute girl, the bitchy girl, the tough girl, the nice girl, and then the mask wearing, orange prison suited Killer.  We’ve all seen these exact characters again and again, and you didn’t really do anything to make them unique or truly “likeable”.

Lets’ look at our Antagonist, as a great example of what’s lacking here.  You set him up to be a mass murderer who is large, powerful, and…well…that’s about it.  He somehow makes it very difficult for over 6 people to subdue him in the intro, but it’s all done off-screen, so we don’t really have much reason to fear him.  Same deal with his initial kills of the guards, as he escapes.  We don’t see any of it, so again, why should we be so scared of him?

When he finally starts terrorizing our Protags, he doesn’t seem to be very vicious or powerful at all, as he has trouble taking out girls with no means of defense, while he has the advantage in surprise, a butcher knife, and the fact that he’s a psycho mass murderer.  His fight with Xerina should be a simple kill for him, but he has trouble taking her down and repeatedly gets kicked down, etc.

Also, the fact that you dress him in a mask is so cliché!  And the orange prison jump suit?  Why wouldn’t he take that thing off?  It’s a dead give away!

In your intro, you introduce a pretty big number of characters, but you don’t name a single one of them.  Your descriptions for these characters don’t even give their sex, so visualizing them is literally impossible.  And then in your wrap up, you introduce a bunch of new characters and give them personality traits for no apparent reason, as the story is already over.

In terms of me routing for anyone, I really couldn’t, cause there was so little going on that it really didn’t matter.  It was obvious that they were all here for 2 reasons only…to either get killed, or to survive.  Sorry to say also, that I wasn’t at all surprised with who did survive, as they seemed (well, 2 of them at least) to be the main characters, and most likely to pull through.

Action

Again, sorry to say, but there wasn’t a lot of action or things going on.  Most of your action prose was painstakingly describing extremely mundane things.  When the action did heat up, it didn’t come across very well.  Your fight scenes seemed like they were all retreads of each other, with exact lines used again and again (kicking Williamson off, slamming people that were hanging on Williamson’s back into walls, running back and forth from the main house to the guest house, and back again, etc.).

Bottom line is that there wasn’t much action here although there was a large body count, which doesn’t seem to make sense.  I guess part of the reason is that most of your kills were off screen, implied, or simply not shown (just showing the dead body later).

Dialogue

The dialogue was hit and miss for me, but definitely not bad.  At times, various characters said some cute, funny things.  Some of the characters actually sounded like they knew each other, which is good.  But, for the most part, the dialogue didn’t sound very real to me…especially near the end, when the survivors were in very tense situations.

Most of the examples I’m thinking of are merely a word here and word there that shouldn’t be there.  Or characters speaking in very formal, and “correct” English.  College aged friends don’t usually sound this way (Hell, most people in general don’t sound this way!).  I think the dialogue could be improved pretty easily, and again, I don’t think it’s that bad at all.

This is an extremely heavy dialogue based script.  Most of what’s being said doesn’t really have much to do with anything, but I personally don’t have a problem with that.  I do feel that just about every single scene has too much dialogue that doesn’t go anywhere.

Nelson’s dialogue was downright ridiculous, but I think you purposely did it that way.  The way he spoke with Xerina (what he said, the way he said it, and how he came off) was obviously cartoonish, or maybe just total Slasher cliché obnoxious/horny guy-like.  I didn’t buy it at all, but there were some funny interactions between them…they just didn’t ring true.

Thomas and Deena’s interaction also didn’t come across as real.  You did a god job in showing Thomas’s shyness and trouble interacting, but Deena’s instant like to him didn’t seem real at all.

Adam and Shauna probably came off the best, but again, there were many instances of dialogue between them that didn’t sound real.  They did seem like they were a couple though.
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abelorfao
Posted: November 11th, 2008, 7:58pm Report to Moderator
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Thank you for reading my script, Dreamscale, especially since it seems to have disappointed you. Still, I'm glad to hear your reactions as well as your constructive criticism.

Although your disappointment in the lack of standard slasher film sex and violence is understandable, it was an intentional decision on my part. Basically, I was aiming for a Halloween-style film based on characterization and suspense as opposed to a Friday the 13th-like gorefest. (Michael Myers, lest we forget, only killed via knife or strangulation in the original film.)

In other words, I was aiming for a film where instead of responding with a "Cool! That chick just got her head cut off!" the audience would react to the murders with a "No! Why'd they kill her?! I liked her!" (A styistic attempt, obviously, which was unsuccessful.)

I was also attempting to take the standard Friday the 13th formula (several young people at an isolated lake being picked off one by one by a masked killer) and slyly subverting it.

For example, after clearly being set up as the Final Girl, Deena ends up being swiftly injured by Williamson and plays no factor in the final confrontation. Likewise, after being established as virgins who are deeply in love and on the road to marriage, Paige and Bryan end up being quickly dispatched by Williamson.

Furthermore, while initially appearing to be the invincible masked killer cliché, Williamson can be hurt (as witnessed by the cut to his leg which remains injured instead of magically healing) and eventually killed with no chance for a Jason Voorhees-like rebirth. (My attempts at subversion, apparently, were also unsuccessful.)

Once again, Dreamscale, thank you for your criticism and I look forward to your further comments.
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Dreamscale
Posted: November 11th, 2008, 9:19pm Report to Moderator
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Hey Abel, I'm glad you took what I said the way you did.  I was actually a bit worried that I was being too harsh.

As for your suggestion that you went for a "Halloween" story or vibe, that's fine, but keep in mind that Halloween came out 30 years ago, and alot has changed since then.  I think that's why Zombie's remake was recieved so poorly.  Although he added a bunch of back story, and violence, there just wasn't much there.  The original worked because it was fresh, new, something that few had seen before.  And Carpenter handled the tension and suspense masterfully.  It was truly a terrifying movie, and pretty much introduced the masked killer, whom we've all come to love.  The success wasn't relying on the violence, but more of the suspense, and based on the local, the plot had lots of places to go...nothing was so obvious and predisposed.

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Dreamscale
Posted: November 11th, 2008, 9:20pm Report to Moderator
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Part 2 – Technical aspects of the script and writing in general

Abel, you’re probably already cursing me, and I apologize if that’s indeed the case.  Here’s where I think I can provide some suggestions and help with your overall writing. I’m sure going to try, at least.

Format

Well done throughout.  Very few problems with overall format, and as I said earlier, this is a very clean, mistake-free script.  There was 1 scene in which I think you missed some “(OS)” cues when Xerina was in the upstairs bathroom talking with several characters that were outside.  I’d suggest relooking at that scene and making corrections.

Also, mostly in the intro scene, you missed capitalizing a bunch of characters when they were first introduced, but there were so many, and mostly throwaway characters, that’s understandable.  I’d give it another look though.

Again, in your intro, as I mentioned earlier, you didn’t name any of the characters, and it got to be tough to get through this.  If a character is going to have multiple speaking lines, they should have a name.  Also, when you’ve got several cops or nurses, or whatever, that have speaking lines, give them a name.  I personally hate reading things like “Cop 1”, Cop 2”, etc.  In this example, you had 2 cops who were transporting Williamson, and they each used each others names in dialogue, but you never actually gave them that name (Roland and Inverness?).  It was a rough read here with all the “first cop”, “second cop” stuff going on.

Another thing to keep in mind is not to use the scene heading in your first sentence following it.  Once you set the scene, we know where we are, so you don’t need to repeat it.  You did this frequently, and it simply adds space that is both unnecessary and frustrating for the reader.

Writing

OK Abel, you’re either gonna love me or hate me for this, but again, this is merely meant to help, and I think it definitely will.

Your writing style is what I’m going to call “odd”, or “strange”. It’s technically not wrong, but it makes the read difficult and also artificially lengthens the script.  90%, and probably closer to 99% of your action/description prose is 1 compound sentence with 2 or more things going on.  Most of these start with words like “As”, “While”, “Once”, “Before”, etc.  Other instances are “Emerging”, “Entering”, etc., whish are passive verbs, and frowned upon in screenwriting (it’s 1 thing to have a few passive sentences in your script, but when you literally start the sentence off this way, it’s a red flag for sure).  It’s literally shocking if you scan through here how often you’ll see these words starting your sentences.

The problems this causes are multiple.  First, every time you start a new “paragraph” (in this case, a new sentence), you have to use a blank line.  So by not creating any actual paragraphs, you’ve got tons and tons of blank lines, which make the script much longer in terms of pages than its actual run time, based on the old rule of thumb that 1 page of script equals 1 minute of film.  As far as I’m concerned, action paragraphs should never exceed 5 lines, and really should rarely exceed 4.  But I think you can see that by never stringing sentences together, you’re adding a ton of extra space that literally doesn’t say a single word.

Secondly, just about every sentence of yours is long and has at least 2 actions or thoughts going on, so it’s just not a quick easy read…you have to almost stop and re-read each sentence to make sure you’ve gotten what was just written.  You’ll hear people describing screenwriting as being clean, tight, and neat, etc.  It should be, as you want to make the read as easy as possible for your readers.

Using words as described above to start most of your sentences is also strange for me.  I have nothing against doing it every now and then, but it just gets weird.  The sentences all seem to sound alike and it gets really old quick.

What you’re writing in your action/description prose is your biggest problem here.  There is WAY TOO MUCH DETAIL given on a constant basis.  You have whole passages that take up ½ a page and more that shouldn’t be included, because they are such mundane things.  Examples are descriptions of the houses, what each character is wearing, characters walking through a house, room to room, taking out various foods, utensils, etc.  When you initially introduced all your characters, look how many times you used the words “driver side door”, “passenger side door”, etc.  These things are understood if they’re exiting a car, how else are they going to get out?  It’s all just wasted space and when you keep repeating yourself, it gets very irritating.    There are probably at least 25 pages, if not more of these sorts of things that could/should be chopped out that literally wouldn’t change a single thing about your script.

And this leads into another HUGE problem.  At 87 pages, you’re looking at an hour and 27 minute film. If I’m correct, taking out 25 pages brings this script down to an hour long movie.  And I’d say that it’s even pushing it.  There’s just not nearly enough going on here.  We’re about 2/3 into your script before anything really happens, and when things do start to happen, the payoff isn’t worth the long haul we’ve been through to get there.

Some other things to think about in your writing…don’t say things like “Shauna hears…”.  It cannot be filmed and shouldn’t be included.

When describing your characters, you can’t say things like “college senior”, because that doesn’t tell us anything at all about their age.  Also, you repeated this description for every single character!  Give them an actual age.  Don’t include so much detail about what each character is wearing unless it somehow is relevant to the story, or maybe funny, or something.

Don’t use words like “meanwhile”, or any other such phrases in between your compound sentences.  You did this over and over, and if you’re going to do it at all, cut down on the frequency.  Also, way too many instances of words like “then”, “however”, etc. inside sentences that don’t say anything and just take up additional space.

Don’t continually use “this” instead of “the” or the like in your descriptions.  It doesn’t sound right, and again, after awhile, it gets irritating.

Be careful of using the same words or phrases near each other.  There are numerous examples of this throughout your script, and they jump off the page in a negative way.  “Nodding in acknowledgement”,   “…startled by the sound of a breaking branch, emanating from the woods”, “mystery man” are all examples of repeated phrases verbatim.

And finally, there are WAY TOO MANY descriptive adjectives before a character’s name being used.  You’ve done this just over and over again, and it just shouldn’t be in here.  They take up space for no reason, because they’re not filmable things, and they get so annoying.  Drop them all.

Abel, I’d say that if I was going to do a “quick” rewrite, this script wouldn’t exceed 45 pages.  That would mean not changing or adding anything.  I honestly feel that’s how much extra “garbage” is in here.  Obviously, it appears that you intended on writing a full length feature, and if I’m even remotely correct, you’ve only got enough stuff here for ½ of a full feature.

So I’d suggest thinking up some new ideas for this to increase its (actual) length.  You need a lot more going on, and when I say that, I mean a lot more interesting, engaging, unique stuff.  I think you need at least 1 new setting.  I also feel you need another character that could save the day or die along with the rest of the people.  It’s just so obvious what’s going to happen, because you didn’t set up any other possibilities.

Hope this helps, and again, it’s all meant to move you forward in your writing.
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abelorfao
Posted: November 11th, 2008, 10:28pm Report to Moderator
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Hello again, Dreamscale, and thank you for providing some more criticism.

In terms of my writing style, I guess my mistake was attempting to write the action in a storytelling style as opposed to utilizing a straightforward, almost bullet-point fashion. I was hoping writing the action sequences with story-like prose would make the screenplay read easier, a decision which seems to have backfired.

I do have to take exception with your assumption tightening the prose would only leave a one-hour long film. While Midnight Lake uses roughly the same amount of action words as both the Halloween and Friday the 13th screenplays (both of which led to 90-95 minute long films), my script contains 2,000 to 2,500 more dialogue words than either of the others.

In addition, a quick glance at both those screenplays finds the only difference they utilize is restricting each point to its own brief sentence. If either script were written with the same type of prose I used, I doubt their lengths would be changed in any substantial way.

I apologize if I'm sounding argumentative, Dreamscale, because I really do value your opinions. Once again, I thank you for slogging through such an un-enjoyable script and providing valuable feedback.
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Dreamscale
Posted: November 11th, 2008, 11:53pm Report to Moderator
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You're not being argumentative at all.  You should always feel free to speak your mind and stick up for whatever you believe in.

A couple things I want to respond to...

It sounds like you're basing your script on Friday the 13th and Halloween.  I want to say again that you're talkng about movies that were released 30 years ago, and have been done to death ever since.  There are literally thousands of clones of these movies.  Also, and maybe even more important, is the fact that these were written 30 years ago.  Screenwriting has come along way in 30 years...a LONG way!  If you're going off original Spec scripts, you'll notice that they look alot different than current scripts do.

You say that based on your word counts, your script has roughly the same amount of action words, and over 2,000 more dialogue words.  Here's the deal...as I said, you've got first of all roughly an additional 40% or so extra action words that need to be edited out...things that have absolutely no business being in your script or any script.  Once they come out, your script is no longer roughly the same size as the others.   And having an extra 2,000 words of dialogue is also not a really good thing.  Your script is way too "talky".  The vast majority of your script is dialogue, and for a Slasher flick, that's not what you want.

Stick with it Abel.  It will be interesting to see what others will have to say. You'll have to read other scripts in here and post reviews adn that way, maybe others will give yours a read as well.

Best of luck to ya!
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abelorfao
Posted: November 12th, 2008, 1:33am Report to Moderator
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Hello again, Dreamscale, and thank you for your words of encouragement.

You'll be glad to know I'm not a one-trick pony in terms of the number or types of screenplays I've been working on. Over the past three-and-a-half years, I've worked on nine scripts in various genres (although not all of them are anywhere near ready for prime time).

Two of my other scripts posted here, War Machine and Chrysanthemum, are an action film and a murder mystery, respectively (although, considering your misgivings on my writing style, I'm hoping you ignore them for the moment ). Furthermore, I have what I feel are solid ideas for five more scripts, including a police procedural as well as a chase film.

I plan on sticking with it, Dreamscale, and thanks for wishing me luck. God knows I'll need it!
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