Knowing Your Opponent by Andrew (Sculder) - Short, Heist - Frances, plays to her strengths, when her bickering family has their annual poker game in 1963's Chicago. 10 pages - pdf, format 8)

Andrew,

You've got some typos on the first page.

Your dialogue is on the nose at times. It's also awkwardly written in places-- a couple sentences run a little long. Almost every time a character speaks, it's a big paragraph of dialogue. It needs to be short... look at some other scripts to see what I mean. Dialogue is usually around one or two sentences at a time.

I think you have a problem with the opening. You've got more than an entire page of dialogue, but the whole time, we're just watching Frances sitting on the couch. Especially for a short, this is a pretty big chunk of the film, and it's spent watching someone sitting there, doing nothing. If you want to hook readers/viewers, this is not the way to go.

This kinda goes on and on, and nothing really happens for the first three pages. There really aren't any goals or anything yet-- just people doing stuff.

Sorry, man, but a ten pager should be a breeze to get through, and this dragged. It's not focused enough yet... things that could happen in a single page... no, just a few lines... a dragged out over multiple pages.

Hope this helps.

Will

Andrew, this is a bit awkward in the writing style.  There are grammatical errors throughout. For example, the first bit of dialogue is as follows:

Come on baby It’s really not even that big of a deal.

You have no period between baby and It's.  A lot of places you're lacking commas.  Commas are not only necessary for grammar purposes, but they indicate places where the actors would normally pause in their speech.  Look at your dialogue throughout, and everywhere you think it would be natural for the actor to pause when they are talking, there should be a comma there.

Here's another example:

JOEL (O.S.)
Ok... This year. If I beat you. You
let me stay in the bed with you. So
I don’t have yet ANOTHER sleepless
night on that goddamn couch, Your
father be damned. BUT. If I lose...
I will spend the rest of our two
week stay here, HAPPILY on the
couch. Not another peep out of me.

This is just not properly written.  Here is how it should be written, using your exact wording:

JOEL (O.S.)
Ok...this year, if I beat you, you
let me stay in the bed with you so
I don’t have yet ANOTHER sleepless
night on that goddamn couch, your
father be damned. BUT if I lose,
I will spend the rest of our two
week stay here HAPPILY on the
couch. Not another peep out of me.

Notice how that makes a difference?  Attention to detail is important, especially in dialogue.

The story itself was okay, but as Will pointed out, it took too long to get to anything interesting.   I didn't necessarily buy it, but I could see where you were going with it.

I would go through the entire story again with a sharp eye to detail and edit it vigorously, then repost and we'll give it another look.  Best of luck,

Gary

Hi Andrew,

Read the script with the mindset that it was interesting to see how a poker game was written in a screenplay.

Going to start from the ending - it was ok, but could have been better written. There are other possibilities. Frances learning her skills from a book is believable, but perhaps too normal. The stakes could have been raised more, and I was left thinking - why did she want the money? Stating a motive could allow the reader to connect better with her character, and this could even be established from the start.

The story seems to lack structure and feels more like a scene in a screenplay that needs to be fleshed out more. There is some unnatural dialogue between REBECCA and JOEL (too long, as mentioned in previous reviews).

Some thoughts:

• The first set of dialogue between Rebecca and Joel was completely offscreen. That's too much offscreen time from the main action - perhaps the focus could be placed on them instead.
  
• Without knowing Rebecca and Joel's ages, my takeaway after the first set of dialogue was that they were teenagers and not mature adults.
  
• Frances and Rebecca laugh, as Joel walks toward the den.
  Having more than one character doing the same action could be unnatural.
  
• Do proofread for some typos.
  

All the best!

@Crookedowl - Thank you so much for taking the time to read! I see what you're saying about the unnaturally long dialogue and about needing to have a hook in the beginning. Definitely glad I posted so I could see what work or doesn't work.

@Hawkeye - Thank you as well for taking your time to read my short. You are absolutely right, and it seems to be the general consensus that I need to fix some grammatical errors, as they take away from the point I'm trying to get across. I will definitely take this into account and rewrite it from the ground up.

@Angela - Thank you also! As for Frances wanting the money... I was trying to make it clear that she wasn't necessarily interested in the money, but more about having the room to herself. But you are absolutely right, having her have some kind of motivation for the money as well would make for a much more interesting read, I'm sure.

Thanks a lot guys! This was very helpful and also my first post on the site! I really appreciate the feedback, and I look forward to writing/reading lots of stories.