The Corn Wall by Luke Walker - Horror - A stargazer takes his family to a Cornish cottage for the weekend, to witness the imminent return of a seventh century comet. Unknown to them, this cottage was once home to a murderous witch, who was burnt alive the very night the comet last passed by, and now she's back, searching for a body to inhabit and a child to sacrifice. - pdf, format 8)

I think you're writing too much in some places. At first I thought the scene in the jewelry store was too long, but really, you're just adding unnecessary lines. You don't need all the parentheticals of (to attendant/Jack/Ewan) because most of the time they're implied by the scene. Even things like (sleepily), cause Alice just woke up, of course she's sleepy.

The same goes for lines like "Jack looks to the attendant" or "the attendant acknowledges him." You don't need an action after ever line. Remember there's going to be actors who already know the feel of the scene, so you don't need to describe every nuanced action. The scene itself is fine, but it would read better if it was smoother.

The exposition is a little biting in the car scene. I can see you're trying to avoid it ("That has to be the two hundredth and seventy-third time you've mentioned it"), but I think you can do better! Maybe I'm being too critical here. I'm not exactly good at it either. I think the best way to go about it is to make it more subtle. Maybe even cut out all the dialogue in the car, and have Alice start complaining only when she sees the shitty cottage. Then have Jack explain it to her.

Ask yourself why the car conversation is there. It's there for two reasons: to tell the audience where they're going and why it's different from before. But oh! It seems on page 20 you actually already explain it to the audience why they're there (when explaining the comet to Moon). That makes part of the car conversation redundant and you can cut it. It'll do good because we're on page 20 and there hasn't been much of a hook/conflict yet.

Okay, 30 pages in. You got your characters set up. Jack seems to not believe love/marriage or whatever and will use the power of love to save the day. Alice is the opposite. Ewan is a kid so he's more sensitive to the spooky stuff. I guess I'm curious to see where it's going, but at the same time you really need to have hooked your audience by now. It's got a bunch of horror cliches (right down to the cabin, cat scares, and spooky kid), but doesn't really play with them enough. It's like a horror spoof without the spoof. I haven't read the rest yet, so I'm only commenting on what I can tell. I think the most beneficial thing you can do is shorten it up. I see it's 125 pages, which is already too long for a typical horror film. Luckily for you, the beginning can be shortened up easily. Since the audience is probably familiar with the idea, you don't need to overdo it. The first scene in the 1700s doesn't need to be as long as it is either.

Okay, I skimmed through the rest. I think the biggest problem is that even by page 100, your characters are still sleeping soundly. If your characters don't feel in danger, I don't feel it. And no one wants to sit around for 1+ hour of horror cliches. The script is sort of bobbing from spooky incidence to spooky incidence, but nothing really happens until the end. And in the end all that happens it hey have a little fight.
And then he kisses her to life? I mean, why does he have to kill her if she's going to come back to life anyway? Does he really learn anything by drowning her? I think it'd be stronger if his power of love is able to exorcise her. You take his one flaw that he seems to have (not wanting to get married), and as he overcomes that he overcomes both obstacles at once (not wanting to get married/the evil spirit). I mean, that's also cheesy (and I think that's how The Conjuring ended), but it's better than what you have here.

In my opinion, there's some salvageable ideas here. Primarily you need to work on Jack. He's got some likable dialogue in the beginning, but you need to give him a bigger flaw. Something that he can overcome and that we want him to overcome. At the same time, Alice could use some more color too. Next, everything needs to be shortened. This type of story should be done in 90 pages or less. Good job though. Besides some grammar/spelling issues, it's competently written. It's legible and flows nicely, and I can tell what is going on.

Thanks for taking the time to read the script and leave a reply.

I think you're right about some of the early dialogue and parentheticals, it could be cut down and condensed, which would help the story flow.

I had already wrote and entered an earlier draft of the script into a competition before The Conjuring even came out. I too saw the similarities which was annoying.

It is the first script I've ever written, after trying to teach myself the art of screenwriting. It reach the semi finals of Shriekfest 2014, which means it can't be too bad, so to call it a spoof without the spoof is a bit harsh.

I know its 124 pages long which breaks the 90 - 120 pages rule, but its better to have too much material than too little.

Luke,

Started reading the first line. Had to stop to google the meaning of the word deciduous and then got distracted. :)  

Tony.

Hey, Luke, congrats on finishing the feature. I'm in the process of reading this and just wanted to make sure you were still active on the site, and also give my initial reaction. So, my initial reaction, formatting, while you open with action you're able to break up the descriptive narrative into no more than 4 line sentences which is easy on the eyes. However, you insert, IMO, one too many technical directions early on, with "(OS)." Also, I was able to get the gist of what was taking place, some of your sentences weren't concise which slows the reader down. An example...'ALICE... is sat in the passenger...' The less intrusive you are the easier it is on the reader. Just keep that in mind during the re-write. Next, I'll focus more on the story and it's structure.

BLB

Hey BLB. I am still active on the site. Thanks for the feedback. I hope you enjoy the script.