Innerlock by C. Martin (Cloroxmartini) - Short, Drama - A Man defines love so he can be free. - pdf, format 8)

Hey Clorox, this is a strange one, indeed.

Can't say I like it or that it works.  IMO, it's way overwritten in almost every passage.  Considering it's only 2 pages, with 1 of those being a SUPER long speech, that's a problem.  To make matters worse, I "knew" the password almost immediately.

Visually, there's not much here at all.  And again, with that long speech by Charlie, with absolutely nothing going on while he's giving it, it's just not going to cut it visually at all.

You didn't even bother to give us an age for Charlie, which, again, just kills any kind of visual we could get here.

It's interesting, in a strange way, but I;m afraid that's about it.

Take care.

Clorox,

Good to see you put something up. You always comment on story. Never formatting. The only thing there I really have to point out is the WOMAN ON SPEAKER would be better WOMAN (ON SPEAKER). Let's us know that it is a V.O.

I'm guessing this room is someone's heart. Someone wounded, not ready to let themselves be emotionally attached again.

I don't know if that's right. Sounds like the woman is trying to coax her own heart to open again. If it's Charlie's, why is he in the room?

That long block of dialogue, though excruciatingly long, is quite good.

But, as Jeff pointed out, That doesn't make very good film.

I like the idea. Bit on the fence with this one. Glad to see you post something.

James

So ol' Clorox, more often than not lurking about with some snide yet telling comment, bravely posits something of his own for the wolves.

I have been curious what you might bring to the table, though I must say this piece feels quite tentative in its brevity.

The speech is a bit elongated, but clearly forms the backbone of this short piece.  It is a tad repetitive at points, however, and could use a small trim.  Livelihood is a single word, and you've got a your when you mean "you're".

It is clearly meant to be metaphorical. Perhaps this man is preparing to propose to a woman, but has his doubts?  Or is considering divorce?  Something like that is what I overlay on this scenario, anyway.

There are plenty of visual elements for me, and I like asides done for the reader's benefit, provided they are succinct, used well and sparingly, as you have done.

I am left to wonder why Charlie does not enter the code himself, to be revealed to us later, after he has left the room.  That is the way I would have done it.

But then maybe I do not understand all of it.  You will have to check in at some point with your own thoughts.  

Clorox,

I envisioned a dream much like someone in a coma.

Perhaps like God was talking through the speaker and the door was to heaven and as the wire fell, you could almost hear the solid beeeeeep of a heart monitor in the distance.

Please don't anyone use this to trigger some debate about faith. That is not my intention.

The rat though didnot mean anything to me. Was it supposed to?

Thought provoking though. Actually other than that one very long block of dialog which could be broken up I liked it.

Shawn.....><

Quoted from Dreamscale I "knew" the password almost immediately. You didn't even bother to give us an age for Charlie, which, again, just kills any kind of visual we could get here.

Love was in the logline, so that wasn't hard to miss.

The age thing. Could be almost any age except for a kid, so I left it at that.

______________________________

Thought about V.O. or parenthetical, but decided against it. Either way, the character becomes redundant.

Not the first thing I've posted but close.

Perceptive, Bert.

It is "your" but I could see you're as well.

It's not a God thing. Just one of those things that pops into your head once in a while. Could be better, but at the time fits exactly.

The code. He thinks he gets it, like most men think they do, and some of the time he's close, but never 100%, until now.

Hi Cloro (what's your real name anyway?),

For a 2-pager, this works for me. The setup and the atmosphere was very intriguing, and it didn't drag on when the payoff comes.

The long block of dialogue from Charlie is alright. I lost track of what he was talking about when I was 2/3 of the way down his speech. Maybe you can trim just a little bit.

Writing itself is pretty good. I didn't mind the first chatty aside: .....a dingy room, the kind where you see in movies. But you can cut that out the second and third time you use it.

What could really ramp this up is to add an actual story behind it. Why Charlie is here to define love. But I guess that's not your purpose.

Anyway, I liked the way it is delivered. Good.

Herman

Hey Clorox.

Had to give this one a read.

Actually I liked it. Brave, unconventional and thought provoking.

Is Charlie talking about a woman or how a woman should view him? Please let me know.

As stated by others there was some overwriting but I'm always guilty of that too.

All in all pretty good.

Best.

Martin.

Clorox

Interesting conceptual piece you have here. I agree with the above that the speech is long winded and at times repetitive but then again he is meant to be expatiating on the meaning of love so it should take a while.

I think the fact that Charlie's explanation is jumbled and lacking clarity in places works well and adds an authenticity to what he's attempting to convey. "On the nose" it certainly is not and that's the way it should be.

As for the set-up and thought process behind Charlie's definition...man, his wife seems like a needy bit?h! ;)

I liked the image of the wire from the speaker dropping to the floor from the ceiling and the closing shot of L O V E on the combination, nice visuals there.


Now for part two...define H A T E.

Hi Clorox,

Thought this was a very interesting, and dare I say, scary concept (at least for us men).  I enjoyed the vibe you were able to create with this piece (I thought the rat was a ncie touch), and all in all I rather enjoyed it.

As far as the long blcok of text.  Well, I don't get why people need constant visual stimulation when watching a movie.  Quite frankly, that kind of attitude, begets schlock like the subsequent "Saw" films, and "Transformers".  Sure that stuff has its place, but I see no reason why people can't spend 25 seconds actually listening to what a character has to say.

As far as what this character says, I think I would agree with Col. and some others that it could probably be tightened up in a few places as it does seem to repeat, but I would by no means stirke the whole thing.  It's the heart of the story.

Anyway, good luck.

Craig

Quoted from chelsea Is Charlie talking about a woman or how a woman should view him? Please let me know. As stated by others there was some overwriting but I'm always guilty of that too.

Thanks. He's talking to a particular woman.

On overwriting, yeah. If it was longer, I'd cut it out. There is a lot of hesitation in Charlie, and the scene.

Quoted from Colkurtz8 ...but then again he is meant to be expatiating on the meaning of love so it should take a while. I think the fact that Charlie's explanation is jumbled and lacking clarity in places works well and adds an authenticity to what he's attempting to convey, on the nose its certainly is on and that's the way it should be.

Your take on the explanin' part is pretty much how it's conveyed.

Couldn't really get into this one.  Story made more sense when I read the other posters' comments.

I don't get the reasoning behind this short.  As pointed out I probably should have read the logline beforehand, but as ever I always read the story first to see what it's all about.

Not sure how a locked room would give this man more motivation to define love in a more accurate assessment than say a coffee shop.

I agree a V.O. is best.

With this rat, are you hinting that Charlie is a rat?

All the best,


Javier

Hey CM,

Interesting. After reading this twice, I am convinced it is... interesting.

Charlie  is reluctant to say he is in love, really in love, and is a prisoner along with the other rats in a cell of his own vision. When he's confessing about how he knows what love is. he comes across as something he's been thinking about but his innerlock is preventing him from his realizing he does reluctantly know the definition of love. The woman is not asking if he loves her just that he has the capacity for love.

Interesting take on a man's indecision re: love. Good job.

Gary

Hi all,

Cloroxmartini, It was just okay to me. I'll explain.

'fill this dingy room, the kind you see in the movies, like this one."

This is the first line, did you cut something out? (formatting is never really a big issue to me, just look at my script...But this is two pages).

The woman in the speaker is a little...cheesy IMO. It would be best to cut her out and just leave Charlie in V.O.

The last dialogue would be more interesting if it is used over visuals of some kind.

And finally, "...you would be considered first in all my thoughts and actions about the above..."

(last dialogue again).

I get the impression you were referring to the text? Of course no one speaks in such a way.

Hope this helps.

Hey, Clorox.

Hmm.  I think this one is a little bit too ambiguous for me.  Maybe a lot too ambiguous.  I think a lot more things have to be cut and dried to make this story work.  It's very jumbled in the fact that you got a ton of information squeezed into the action blocks and what the character feels sardine-canned into one, long, somewhat rambling dialogue.

It's even jumbled in the fact that you only have one space after all your periods, instead of two spaces to break the sentences, kind of like this was for a contest and you weren't aloud to go past two pages.

I'm not saying that the story needs to be given up on, but as it is now, it needs elaborated upon.  In fact, the only word that comes to mind when I think back to this story is 'sardinecan', and not because of the fact that it's about a man in a room, but that there's just way too much information squeezed into two pages.

-  Mark

Hey Clorox,

I really couldn't get into this story. Is this metaphorical? Did this really happen? Ambiguous maybe? Also, I have to agree with Mark in that it feels condensed into a two page script. The speech by the main character did feel too long. I lost track of what was being said by Charlie after a while. If the story was longer, maybe the details could flow more naturally? I did like some of the imagery you provided regarding to the locked room, though.

tailbest