The Elevator Most Belonging To Alice by Bill Sarre (reef dreamer) writing as Christine Beauchamp - Short, Drama - With the help of a new friend, Alice discovers a way to manage her difficult situation. 11 pages - pdf, format

Umm,

Wow, this was disturbing.  I won't list any spoilers, but, wow, that was really hard to read.  Sad more then hard.

Don't get me wrong, it was an easy fast read, and you did a great job explaining what was going on.  You could have easily lost me.  But, you didn't.

I'm torn.  I loved the writing.  Hated the premise.  felt awful at the end.  And I am not sure this was the definition of following the rules.

This must be the story that went outside the box.  

Very imaginative.  

I just wish, well, I'm sure you know what I wish...

Scores 10/10 for imagination, 5/10 for the rules of the "contest", 9/10 for execution, overall, I'd have to give you a solid 8/10.  You made me feel.  I hated it, which is why you did a great job.

Imaginative, yes. Enough conflict? Well, not really. More a child's fantasy world being indulged by an imaginary playmate than a linear story. Conflict doesn't emerge until she must return to reality. Otherwise a flowery vignette.

Congrats on getting an entry in.  

Disturbing content yes.  Overwritten, yes in almost every page.  The writing was good, just too much of it.  Plus, this would be an expensive film for a short.

I understand where you were going with this.  I bothers me to think kids have to go through this kind of stuff, so on that you made me emotionally connected.  Pissed me off in fact.  Got a shotgun to take care of that situation.

Cut the writing down and the -ing -ly words out and it will read better.

Hmm...

The narrative is well written and convincing. I'm not really seeing the overwriting here either, it's just laced with adjective clauses that add tons of variety to this read. Verbs are strong and weak when the need to be. Emphasis where it needs to be. Passive when it needs to be. I'm sayin it's written with purpose without trying too hard.

These are the scripts that are memorable to me.

Pretty good and well written.  It wasn't outside the challenge parameters at all to me. The lift was there, no other location. I guess nothing in the requirements said it couldn't  be an imaginary lift

I have to question the wisdom of having a young girl named Alice in a story. It's going to detract rather than add, in me humble.

Ooh, a Dambusters reference on page three. It'll certainly raise a few eyebrows.

Finished. That went somewhere I wasn't quite expecting. The mood of the start carries on a bit too long, I found myself skimming. That said it's imaginitive. I think I'd have a lot more to say if she wasn't called Alice. It's like trying to read a book about a young magician called Harry that isn't written by JK Rowling.

Not that I would meself, I think I'd rather slam my fingers in the door.

R

I for one didn't notice the overwriting mentioned above, the writing pulled me in, as did the story. The elevator seems incredibly forced into the piece with no real reason to be there other than fill the OWC parameters. Not sure how much that matters, since I thought the script itself was very good and chock full of emotion. "Escaping to a happy place" excellently turned into a script. Hard-hitting stuff -- great job, writer. I'd recommend getting rid of the elevator after the OWC, though.

P10: The "open your bedroom door, now" line felt more like unnecessarily reinforcing the location again instead of what would actually be said.

I'm not sure whether I got the ending or not. Is she dead or just resisting? Based on the "Fly free" and the white knuckles, I deduced that she was dead, but I'm not 100% sure I'm interpreting it right. I suppose it works both ways -- the script just gets a different meaning to it. Be nice if the author specified this after the writers are revealed. Good luck!

This is my favorite so far, easily gets a recommend from me. An outstanding mashup of tone and imagery.

The child holds its breath, tries to keep quiet.

I'm not 100% on the author, and it's little details like this that are chilling to me. If I'm right about who wrote this, I'll say this - you're straight up lethal with a keyboard.

Great work writer, you writing inspires me.

Really strong writing in this one, disturbing by the end and all too plausible ;-(

The only things that didn't work for me, and this is based on my reading that Alice is creating her own escape room, is that she seems to be quite sophisticated in word and thought for a 10 year old... would still work though if you made her older.

And as someone has pointed out, I too think the lift is somewhat jammed in, but I'll let you off given the strength of the writing.

Anthony

Very solid effort. May be my favorite so far. Great premise, solid dialogue and, IMO a chilling ending. A couple of nits:

Quoted Text INT. ALICE’S ELEVATOR

Think you need DAY or NIGHT here

Quoted Text Allow me to explain one of life’s hidden truths. You do not have to move in order change where you are. In here you can do as you wish.

Typo - missing a "to" between order and change.

I found this difficult going at first but am now into it by page 4. I like how you're (in a sense) rebooting Alice in Wonderland for this. Very inventive for an OWC. Nice work.

9 out of 10.

Why doesn't this have more reads?

I found this pretty creepy which is essentially the idea so good work there but on paper I found it a bit tedious to read and I think on-screen I might find the same - I did start looking at how many pages were left. To that end I think you could make it a bit shorter and still not lose its essence.

A little girl concocts a world of her own to escape real life horrors - it is well done and there are some lovely turns of phrase including this one:

You do not have to
move in order change where you are.
(despite the missing word)

And the dialogue is good for each and every character - unique voices.

Am I the only one who didn't get the ending? Jerome's a figment of her imagination, a coping mechanism, right? and she can't really fly off somewhere unless that elevator has an imaginary lift shaft she's going to fall into... And, I don't see how she's dead with that last shot of her gripping Jerome's hand.

Well written. I'm just averse to the subject matter and I did find it a bit of a slog to get through, but you're a talented writer for sure.

FROM AN UNKNOWN PERSON’S POV...

You mean the camera’s POV? You don’t need to start like this, nor should you. Just write what we can see. You then tell us there’s a child there, show us don’t tell us.

I’m confused. Alice and Jerome are in an elevator, I get that and it’s very well described but what is this about a sheet? Why is Alice in a sheet?

Wait a minute, now she’s in a tent?

Page 3, the N word! Oooh, I always use the V word (Voldermort) instead of the N word.

Page 4 and I’m into this now. A shaky start but I like Jerome and this is very much in the style of Alice in Wonderland.

Got to the end and wow! I like this a lot I just think it’s a bit confusing at the beginning and heavy handed at the end. You can hit the same emotional tones without using a sledgehammer, that’s all I’m saying. Well written, great characters.  This is a very adult take on the Wonderland tale; Alice is using her imagination to escape the horrors of her father and Jerome is a representation of her will, her resolve. Powerful stuff.

I will say this though, the elevator cart seems like a mechanism added just so the story could fit the confines of this OWC. The same tale could be told using an empty train or a whole host of other symbolic journeys, after all this is all in Alice’s imagination. So I’m not sure it quite matches the confines of the challenge. Regardless,  this is very memorable and I imagine it will score highly.

-Mark