Narcs N' Ludes by Emanuel Farhi - Series, Drama, Thriller - During the 1970s, a DEA agent must take down a psychiatrist who is forced to fuel a quaalude uprising in New York. - pdf, format 8)

Emmanuel,

Had a quick look. Wasn't bad. You could lose all the cut to and angle and we see stuff. There's not a huge amount of it but dropping it would help.

Might have a proper read if you're about.

R

I'm glad you thought it wasn't bad since this is one of my first scripts. I can easily get rid of the cut tos and we sees, ect.

Ah. So you are around, Emanuel. Glad to hear you'll lose the cut to etc.

As promised -

At the start I'd recommend describing the Sgt. and the Man a little more. They talk for a page and a half and there's no way to get a real idea of what they should look like.

Maybe you're imagining the focus would be on the sketch. Still, it wouldn't do any harm if they were given even the briefest of descriptions. Especially if either or both these characters reappear later.

I see you're a fan of the double dash. I'm not myself but there's nothing wrong with it - for each their own.

However, I really don't like the INT/EXT business. Seems to be a lot if it about and it doesn't help. I'd stick to one or the other and switch with a new header. It's a bit too 'have cake and eat it' for my liking.

As I said with the Man and the Sgt, the other man on p8 needs some bit more so we can get an idea what you had in mind.

I'm as guilty as anybody of having scenes of dailogues go on longer than they probably should, but I'd say some of these could have been shorter and still got to the same place.

I'm about halfway through. Lot of the writing and dialogue are pretty good. There's a few lines that could use improvement, a coupla typos but nothing major.
It feels like a screenplay, rather than a long short.

Pretty good so far. I'll finish up later.

R

Yeah, I have a tendency to not describe minor characters and write long strips of dialogue. Easy fix though

Emanuel,

Regarding minor characters, it's easy enough to skip over descriptions if it's a nurse or a cleaner who's just there for a minor and very brief function. But if the character speaks or is around for a while it'd be wiser to give the reader a rough idea what they look like, even if it too is brief.

I read through it all again. So -

Leave off the draft info on the title page. That's for you alone to know.

The voice on radio should be (V.O.) as they're not in the room.

You've some interesting characters. I'm sure there are people knocking around who are that clueless. However, he's seems a little too dumb to be plausible.

But 'Yeah, so you must have some, then.' did make me laugh out loud. Always a good thing.

Make Intercut As Needed just Intercut.

I don't know a lot about the DEA in the 70s. But some of this reads more like Vice Squad than DEA.

A lot of the dialogue is pretty good. Some bits could do with improving, though. A good edit would help, it would make the good stuff better.

I could buy David falling off the chair by leaning too far back - something everyone's done some time. But the chair breaking seemed more farcical than necessary and out of place.

'Oh ya, real good.' Sounds a bit too close to Fargo for comfort.

POSSIBLE SPOILERS...

I didn't buy the bit about Lisa going undercover. I'm not saying you can't do this. You can do what you like. But seeing as the rest of the script is played realistically this seems a stretch too far and extremely unlikely.

The point I'm making is I'm not sure you know what type of story this is. It has elements of police procedural, comedy, farce, drama. That's fine. But the tone veers too widely for it to be as enjoyable as it could be.  

R

Thanks for the feedback. That helped me out a lot

You're welcome. Bear in mind I'm not William Goldman. Or David Mamet. And even they aren't what they once were. Opinions are just thoughts. Some good stuff in there.

R

read your stuff. pretty good. i agree with rendevous on some points he made out. He hit it on the spot. its great to hear this is your first script and your doing so well.

good luck with the rewrite

Ugo