Course Listing Unavailable by James Barron (MarkItZero) - Short, Comedy - An ambitious student signs up for an internship program promising real world, hands-on experience but fails to read the fine print regarding "demonic possession". 17 pages - pdf, format 8)

That was great, loved Max. I laughed several times and thought Max's intro rule line was good. You took some familiar themes (Ghostbusters, Exorcist, etc) and wove them into your own take. I think you could play this into a feature with this as the intro and having Gortex, I mean Gortat, coming back to Max - next scene: Gortat detailing the car.

Got to say, I love this script!

The story is unique, the characters funny, Max is a funny badass type of guy and the dialogue between him and Gortat is hilarious. Gortat's awkwardness and naivety is also very very funny.

The formatting is clean and well done, good action lines and descriptions. Dialogue is crisp, fast-flowing and funny and I also liked the pacing of the story too, it all felt well paced and always funny.

Honestly I'd love to see a feature length of this, the short is packed with a perfect mix of comedy and horror and of course action.

Well written and very likeable characters, funny dialogue and story. Nice work mate, this should be one you're considering to be a feature!

Good show! I think the first few pages need a bit more comedy written into them as they read slow. But yeah, you've got your mind around the characters. I would like a moment of dialogue between Max and Gartot after he pukes in the car. Feel like you're missing an opportunity there.

James

Hey James, this was wildly entertaining! I absolutely loved it. Got nothing for you, sorry, thinking you should leave it as is.

Thanks to all for the reads, glad people seemed to enjoy it.


jwent6688 -- Yeah I was worried the very beginning might be a tad slow. Don't know if I can make if funnier, but I can definitely make it shorter. Might try and have the scene in the guidance office start with them in mid conversation with her already in the midst of looking for a class.

Quoted from MarkItZero Thanks to all for the reads, glad people seemed to enjoy it. jwent6688 -- Yeah I was worried the very beginning might be a tad slow. Don't know if I can make if funnier, but I can definitely make it shorter. Might try and have the scene in the guidance office start with them in mid conversation with her already in the midst of looking for a class.

I wouldn't change it. If anything show Gortat in the establishing scene flipping through a paper class listing (or scrolling through his phone app) and he looks up to see the campus then we hit the guidance counselor scene. Reason is it helps establish this kid and who he is and what he is looking for. He is innocent, has lofty, honest goals. It doesn't need to be funny, it needs to hook and create suspense, which it does. That suspense being we want to know what happens next. And what happens next is such a stark contrast. That's why it works so well.

That's why I think it could easily be a feature because Gortat would have a tremendous character arc.

For me this is overly long. The first few pages where his character is established are not necessary. With shorts especially it's best to jump straight into the action. I'd completely cut the first three pages and attempt to show his character in some other, perhaps more visual way. He explains the previous three pages in the car anyway.

try to keep your action lines as active as possible. This:

Code It flings open before the third try and a short, stocky Pakistani WOMAN, 60’s, is shouting at them frantically in URDU.

reads better like this:

It flings open before the third try and a short, stocky Pakistani WOMAN (60s), shouts at them frantically in URDU.


With an edit or two I can't see any reason you can't get this down to 10 pages. It's an entertaining read and story though, nice work.

Quoted from Dustin try to keep your action lines as active as possible.

Try as I might to break this habit completely I always miss a couple.

Quoted from Dustin For me this is overly long. I'd completely cut the first three pages and attempt to show his character in some other, perhaps more visual way.

I'm all for cutting the beginning substantially. I think maybe keep one scene at his apartment where he's picking classes, everythings full, till he stumbles upon "Demonology 101" (which might be a better title too). That way I can have some books around him, and maybe a framed news article about this dad... then next scene is him waiting outside with the address in hand.

Thanks for the read.  

James,

Some notes.

A very entertaining script and story.  I liked it all the way through.  Only caveat is the opening.  If you skip right to the computer search for courses, you don't lose anything.  Start with her saying something like, 'no that's not available either' and run with it.

Anyway, good job.

Best
Richard

Thanks for the read Richard. I actually have a new draft that's significantly shorter if anyone's willing to take another look. Assuming I didn't butcher the story and humor in the process of making cuts, I'll pass this on to Don so he can update the title and logline... but in the meantime the dropbox link already has the new version.  

James,

A lively read with some solid dialogue and engaging characters.  Wondered how you were going to bring such a big idea around but you bookended it nicely with the guidance counsellor.  

Intro did seem a tad long -- though I’m not the one to be preaching shorter set-ups…

Testing the waters for a feature perhaps?  Maybe one worth pursuing.  The idea of throwing these two characters together could work well.  Good stuff.

Steve

I enjoyed this short.

If I had to criticize it would be on format and grammar issues that I have learnt along the way. Please feel free to correct me.

I feel the use of parentheticals in this is way over done and that some would be better served as action lines or just get rid of them completely.

Lots of words ending in "ing". This can change the tense of the writing and obviously it needs to stay in the present tense. It also reads better without them.

Things like this are a pet peeve of mine:  "!!!!" and "!?". They are grammatical no no's.

I also don't know what extra affect the all CAPS dialogue is meant to have?

Only other thing is that I feel you occasionally use "..." and " -- " interchangeably?

Hope this doesn't come off too harsh. Like I said it is an enjoyable read. Some jokes didn't land for me while other hit the spot. I did have a laugh out loud moment with the ending.

I think with a bit of a clean up this would be great.

Warren

Not harsh at all, formatting and grammar are not my strong suit. For some reason that stuff feels like minutiae and it's hard to focus on, even though it's important. I blame my middle school English teacher for having students stand up in front of everyone and do sentence structure then mercilessly ridiculing every mistake. I think she got fired eventually and I hope she burns in Hell.

I will go back and work on getting rid of passive stuff. I am apparently making this mistake far more frequently than I thought.

And I will work on cutting down on parentheticals that interfere with the flow for the reader.

I'm not sure interchanging "..." and "--", or using the occasional "!?" is so dire... but I don't wanna do anything that takes the reader of the story... if this becomes a problem for more people I will stop.  

thanks for the read.

James,

Pretty good stuff. I agree with Dustin that your opening could be shorter. However, I like the foreshadowing as  Gortat met Max and the line about no puking in the car. That was a great set-up moment, and kinda clued us in to what to expect later.

I also agree with Steve's comment about this possibly being turned into a feature. He's right. You do have a nice dynamic between these two characters.

Other than that, I'd definitely try to whittle some of this down. There's a lot here that can be tightened up, in both you action and your dialogue. Overall, a fun read and a good job!

Steve


Steve