Black by Bryson G (13thchamber) - Short, Crime - An ex cop and a prostitute plan to rob her coke dealing pimp, and run away together.   10 pages - pdf, format

All I can say is..."ain't that a b****"  The ending of course.  Made me think of "King of New York".  All in all, a very well-told story.  I'd suggest changing "The Blond's" name.  Seems like you could come up with something better.  Other than that, no real gripes.  A quick and effective read. I enjoyed it.  Great job.

Thanks for the read. The crazy thing about the blond...he's based off a real person whose nick name was..."the blond" Once again thanks for taking the time out of your day to read this, really appreciate it.

I liked it. Good action - has a "True Romance" feel to it.

My only gripe is with the second person description: "The storage unit
you would live in." I think you can even strike this out and the reader will still get an idea of that room.

Overall, Good job!

Thanks for the read. Much appreciated.

I thought this was a good read. I liked your descriptions and dialogue. Nice.

There were a couple typos. There for they're and aside for side. You needed a couple commas, too but those can be cleaned away on a rewrite now that you have the story down.  

It read like it was the beginning to a larger piece, too. I think you'd do well to make this into a feature.  

All the best,

Cindy

I liked this, that blond sure's one tough m*****f*****.

Wll written and thought out imo. has alot of "delicious" details to it. Also think this would make into a great feature.

Thanks again for the reads. Really can't thank you guys enough. I'm trying to get on top of my typos and grammatical errors, as I know that can take someone out of the read. Thanks again.

Hey Bryson,

Firstly and I hope this doesn’t offend you but this is a lot better than the last short “Midnight Launch” I read by you. You don’t have too many characters with generic names like that piece so good on you for taking that advice on.

However, I’m afraid to say that this one didn’t do a lot for me either. It’s entertaining enough but Miles and Kendra fell flat with me for some reason. The Blonde was okay, think he could be a very good character but the name…reminds me of Mr. Blonde from Reservoir Dogs which isn’t a bad thing I guess.

The writing on display could do with a lot of work I’m sorry to say. Watch out for the typo’s, there were quite a few and I also felt the character intro’s could do with some work.

“A scruffy man with short hair, a thick beard, and sporting a
"SWAT" t-shirt exits the bathroom.

MILES (36) lean muscle with a wild look.”

Why not:

“MILES, 36, scruffy, short dark hair…” It reads better and saves space?
The slugs were also lacking detail throughout IMO and you used continuous incorrectly.

The action could do with tightening up in certain places.

“Miles, now in a grey Robocop hoodie, speeds through the city
with his passenger, Kendra.”

Does it matter that he’s wearing a “Robocop” hoodie? Also “his passenger” is superfluous.

“The storage unit you would live in.” Huh?

You are also using slang in the action, for me this is a no-no unless necessary to the story. Fine in dialogue but this:

“recently trimmed bleach blond do, and a pack of squares”

As soon as I read this I imagined a pack if squares literally and thought WTF! Then realised you’re using slang, try not to confuse the reader, try to make the action as clear as possible.

Unfortunately, all of the above and many other issues took me away from the story so I couldn’t enjoy it as much.

I do believe you’ve got something here, The Blonde could be a very good character, lots of potential but I think he needs a name.

It would have been nice to know more about Miles and Kendra before they hatch their plan of stealing the cash and running away. Some reason why Miles is so determined to run away with Kendra, what’s so different about her to any other woman.

Miles is the biggest problem for me, he likes this woman so much to go through this situation but when she gets shot, he doesn’t rush to the hospital or try to save her life, he runs off to the safe.

Give this a rewrite, work on some of the typos and phrasing and make Miles and Kendra more likeable which would make his stronger IMO.

Hope this helps.

Cheers.

Steve

Thanks for the feedback Steve. The Blond is based off a real person, so I didn't want to use his first name out respect I guess. But, I assumed someone would think of the resivior dogs character too, hopefully he's distinguishable from that character. As for "pack of squares" I thought squares was common slang for cigarettes? But, ill try and minimized the slang next time. Thanks for the read, especially for the advice you took the time to write, very much appreciated. I'll take this info into the next one.

I'm resurrecting this thread for the sake of showing SimplyScripts members that some of these short scripts here do end up getting produced.
Thanks for embedding the film/YouTube SimplyScripts!

Video up top.

EDIT: I made the film but Bryson is the writer.

Congrats man,

Looks good!.  Especially those bullet wounds.

Ghostie

Hey Bryson and Brandon.

Great job with this one all around.

Storywise, it was tense and climactic, and the dialogue, while playful and fun, was never cheesy.  (Well, there was one cheesy part in the script, with Kendra's Light and Dry... that read really weird, but I was glad to see it didn't make it into the film.)

Filmwise, the effects were GREAT especially for such a small production.  Loved the tiny trace of cigarette smoke coming out of the holes in his chest at the end.  That was a great little addition.

If I had anything negative to say, it would just be that, personally, I'm not a big fan of this kind of bright neon lighting, (a little Michael Mann-ly), but, I also have to admit that that kind of lighting did compliment the story.  It definitely put me in the mood for a 90's crime-drama.

Guess my only other question would be why 'Black' and not 'Blonde'?

Anyway, great job and congrats to both of you.  Has this been submitted anywhere yet?

- Mark

Oops.  Was just going through it again because I forgot to say that there were some great casting choices, and I heard the fresh and dry line in the film.    I didn't understand that's what she said the first time.

But the actors were very competent, though.

Great job, again.

Saw this one on the main website the other day. I must say I was impressed throughout the piece. It's quite a little thrill-ride you take the viewers on.

Congrats

Dan