Going Down (another script with the same title) by 0 - Short, Drama - Multiple obstacles stop a man from going downstairs via elevator.  7 pages - pdf, format

Edit: I believe my original post was a little too harsh and not really that constructive either, sorry about that. I'll try and be a little more in depth about my thoughts on this. All completely subjective, as usual.

The short felt very fragmented to me and none of it really made sense, so maybe a few of the fragments are missing. One of the things I found confusing was the genre, it's listed as a drama, but the closest thing I'd associate it to is surreal comedy. It feels like a bunch of jokes thrown together into mush with no real story behind it. The protagonist's flirting with the smoking woman made some sense, but how the weirdness with the mom, the short skirted girls, the puking woman and well... the elevator fit in here... I'm simply at a loss. I'm going to throw up a question mark on whether this is a pisser. Sorry, not for me.

Yeah, I didn't like it that much either.  Sorry.

It didn't really do much for me.  I didn't get it I guess.  And it has a few mistakes in it.

4/10

It didn't make sense, was it supernatural, psychological why was the vomit gone?  Too many questions...

I read it twice to see what I missed - sorry, I just did't get it.

OK... for me, it was an average tale of a guy winning and ironically losing at the same time... with a lot of fluff in the middle, which is what good drama is about of course.

It would be easy to film, but what would be the point? Maybe I'm missing some deeper message or maybe there is a more profound way for you to show it.

At the moment, it's a 4 out of 10. It works as a story, there''s just not enough oomph.

I think the writer was going for that "surreal" feel, I didn't really get much from this either way.

It's a confused piece IMO, what's the significance of him racing the woman down to the bottom? What is the purpose, the point of the end... where she trots off without giving her number?

I didn't see any point in this.

It started off as like, maybe a type of comedy vibe? Every-time the elevator opens there's someone in the elevator being a pain... but why? There's nothing here, perhaps there is something hidden but I didn't find it.

A few typos here and there but no big deal.

Guess it's the story of an unlucky bloke, that's all I got.

First page was going well. The end of that page made me wonder if I'd continue, as it felt a bit too much too soon. But I persevered. As I'm a stubborn git.

It reminded me of that French thing with Kylie Minogue in it. If I was smarter I could pretend I know the title. But I'm not, so I'm going to look it up on the thing that passes for my memory these days.

Back now. It was Holy Motors. Not the type of title easily remembered. I've forgotten it again already.

That too had seemingly random encounters that critics saw as metaphorical. It being a French film helped this enormously. I watched it, and I'm for metaphor, well, sometimes. All I saw was a French bloke driving round in a car to locations that didn't seem to connect. I was very glad when it was over.

There's a similar problem here. Maybe there's some bigger thing going on I didn't pick up on. But if you have to work hard to pick it up when you read it, or be told what it means then it isn't quite doing its job.

It's not bad, but it was a bit too random for me.

R

There is a stacking issue late in the script, where the space between lines are crammed together. Other than that, no format problems jump out during the read. No spelling errors. No grammar errors. Everything looks ship-shape.

I didn't get it.
The punker girls, the sick vomit woman, "mom" and others just pop in and out randomly. Perhaps it is the main character's phobia at work. Maybe not - hey, who wants to stand in or around vomit and/or a sick lady? Perhaps these characters who are never seen or heard from again (let alone the vomit) were part of his bad experiences on elevators? The one good time was when he meets the Smoking Woman and she races him to the lobby. But she loses the bet, and renigs on her part. Thus there is no point to the story. Unless I really missed something.

So the writing was pretty clear but the intent behind the drama much less so!

Not really sure what to make of this one, going to mull it over.

I may come back.

Anthony

Ok, no need to repeat others comments.

To me this was meant to be a series of challenges that the man would face. If so that would lend it a surreal feel as unconnected people and event get in the way.

So, I suppose you need to define what he's after, perhaps a little more clarity on what the encounters mean and ideally a sense of what could be lost if he fails.

All the best

Nope.  This one didn't go anywhere and threw in a bunch of stuff that meant nothing to me. And he wasn't very interesting.  

Best
Rivhead

Inoffensive little tale.  Offbeat style of humour -- surreal in places, though the mother felt like one curveball too many.  Had a certain feel to it, no disrespect to the writer but it felt like it was written on the spot with little by way of clear goal or reason.  I enjoyed the back and forth between Don and the Smoking Woman, had a charm about it.  More I think about it, more I like the idea of this guy being afraid of elevators -- it just didn’t quite capitalise on the idea.

A couple typos to clean up, but an otherwise oddly engaging idea.  Just not taken far enough to be memorable.

Wow...really?

Sorry, but I'm out once again, this time before the end of Page 1.

Writing is poor with lots and lots of mistakes.  Writer seems to have some kind of odd attitude, which really comes across on the page, but not in a remotely positive way.

This one is not for me.  Sorry.

What's an alt chick? Alpha, maybe?

...Yuck. At the vomit part.

Page 2 and I'm starting to think these obstacles are in Don's head, which would make the little girls in short skirts rather disturbing...

It was sort of interesting, but mostly because I didn't understand all of it. Whenever I don't get something, my interest is peaked, just because I want to know.

I disagree with Dustin that this would be easy to film. Not that it's hard to film what's there. I'm thinking more along the lines of getting 6-10 year old girls in short skirts...

IMHO, this one could actually be turned into something good if these people in the elevator are thoughts in Don's head that he struggles with. Mother issues. Attracted to way too young girls, but obviously knowing that's wrong and so on.

Not bad, but needs depth for things to make sense.

Quoted from Grandma Bear What's an alt chick? Alpha, maybe?

No, well they may be. But it's short for alternative. A different type of chicken.

R

Read to me like this was Don Draper from Mad Men in a kind of a surreal Twin Peaks world.

I thought he was going to hell which is a bit cliché of course but I am surprised there were not more heaven/hell stories in this OWC. I myself am guilty of that

It just seems like he was just going down a crummy elevator, possible while on drugs or possibly he’s mental or possibly his mom happens to be in the same Motel as him? I dunno but there’s not enough story here for me, so I’ll say well done for entering this OWC and take my cue to leave.

-Mark

I'm going to take this script at face value. It's just what the logline says: "Multiple obstacles stop a man from going downstairs via elevator."

I didn't pick up any hint of higher meaning.

Don sees the little girls and Alt Girl with the "#YesAllMen" shirt on the elevator and decides not to get on. The writer doesn't show him looking at the girls inappropriately, despite Alt Girl's accusation, so I don't see that as an element, as others have suggested.

Then he sees the pale vomiting woman, his mother, and Smoking Woman. He asks for Smoking Woman's number, but she walks away.

End of story. That's it.

Congrats on your entry.

Well, that was a little different.  Some strange word choices and descriptions.  The one line sentences on page 5 need to be labeled as Series of Shots, then that would be fine to have them one sentence at a time.  There is probably some meaning behind the whole thing, but really didn't get the ending.  

At first, it looks as if he's done something wrong and is heading for Hell, because there is no Up.  Seeing others in "trouble" or doing "bad" things seemed like that's where it was heading.  But the ending kind of threw me off, unless him and Smoking Woman reached their "destination."

Sorry if that's not it, but with more time for rewrite maybe some of this could be cleared up.  Good luck with it.

This one... felt extremely confusing to me.  The logic and the story seemed fuzzy.  Though I'll give a few points for interesting visuals and quirky characters   And the ending?  Just... strange.  What kind of bond was developed with the smoking woman and why?  I guess I just don't get this one.  Not for me.  

But - congrats on the OWC submission!!

I think I know who wrote this...



Only Kube could come up with something this surreal.  

All kidding aside, the writing was pretty good for one week. Pretty random, though. So much so that you could have put an elephant or Che Guevara on the elevator and I wouldn't have batted an eye. A bit of a Shining/Inherent Vice vibe... or the trippier portions of 2001.

I guess an A- would be fair.

GOING DOWN

I enjoyed your story, and then the ending did what your script's last word say. Until the ending it was very entertaining and I was waiting for the last mindfucking BOOM, a climax that explains everything - if all that happens in his head only and so on and so on.

Are we allowed to comment on our own now?

I fudged it and I know that now seeing as everyone is confused. He's not going to hell. He's not a pedophile redeeming his sins. He's not in some purgatory magical land.

He's just afraid of elevators, and I wanted to visually show it as anxious situations. I thought it was a cop-out to flat out write "I have a phobia of elevators" but apparently I needed to be much clearer. I should've added a line like "Elevators make me feel like when your mom calls you and you haven't talked to her in months" or something.

I was watching a lot of Louie/Mad Men at the time, so it's supposed to be kinda funny and exaggerated (like that scene in Louie where he wakes up to five men banging trash cans in his room). The Smoking Woman is there because sometimes it's easier to overcome your fears when someone is overcoming theirs at the same time. Hence the race. And her not giving him the number is just to say that he doesn't deserve a prize just for going in an elevator.

I'm not sure what that poster meant by odd attitude.

But thanks for the reads and comments! First weekly thing!

Seems everyone is jumping out of their cakes early this time. Weeeeee!

Writer,

Not too sure what this all meant, but I liked it. A lot. Very surreal things happening here, and it gave me a nice sense of dread. Almost dreamlike. Not much else to say really. Great job on this.

Steve