Home Security by Boris Karloff - Short, Horror - After shooting the home owner during a burglary, two thieves must decide whether or not to finish the job. - pdf, format

I enjoyed the set up. The robbers finding the secret laboratory worked well, brought that aspect up to date.

From the point they are down there, though, it got a little goofy, I thought. The explanation was all a little convoluted and contrived.

Not bad.

SPOILERS

Pg 2
"He’s one of the greatest minds of our generation."  You guys are nearly thirty years apart.  That's a different generation.

Pg 5
The F-bombs are a dropping.  I ain't no prude, but you can be more creative with dialogue.

Pg 6
The dialogue at the top of the page is unnecessary or can be trimmed.
By magic, the found the ONE BOOK!

Pg 8
The doc's quite the preacher.

= = = = = = = =
A flesh-eating Frankenstein?
Good effort.

A pseudonym that speaks for itself. Logline sounds interesting.

Looks well written and I didn't want to do this this OWC, but as they're your very first words, I'm going to point it out:

Code Rain pours down...

I'm left wondering in what other direction rain can pour? Rain pours... works far better than, rain pours down.

Over talking in places, saying more than is necessary. Not subtle enough. Too expository.

Oak desks generally are expensive... but I'd avoid oak (unless carved), go for rosewood or an unusually figured yew. If you want to get really fancy, then use something like ebony. Just describe the desk and the wood it's made from without using 'expensive'. Show us how it is expensive. That's my opinion, not saying you should do it.

Code He bends down...

Again, in what other way can one bend?

Awkwardly written in places. As though rushed.


Heaps of tough-to-swallow exposition at the end.

5 out of 10.

Unless you can find a mansion with a secret chamber and a laboratory you can use for free, this isn’t going to be low budget.

As for the story, it was a nice easy read. The whole thing seemed a bit Scooby-Doo and there was loads of exposition at the end but it was decent enough.

Well done for taking part in this challenge.

-Mark

Hi

Sorry quick read.

The idea of a set up to gather body parts has some merits. The way this is delivered doesnt quite, well...deliver.

If I wee you I would make this an inside job - the doctors assistant etc - which makes the twist more plauseable.

The twist should also be later in and not have a lot of explanation

All the best

My opinions are just that, and have been known to be wrong!

Picky bits:-
1) Dialogue felt a little stilted at times
2) Kinda guessed where it was going

Good bits:-
1) Good use of the monster
2) Visually well described

Rules
Not really low budget

Overall this was decently written but didn't have enough 'difference' for me.

Anthony

It's a good story and a very good concept.

could be played with some more though. For instance I did not understand why the doctor had to stage someone stealing from him.
I'd prefer if the Doctor arranged his own death or something.
The stuff he's saying there - people want to steal from him is a bit hard to buy into.

Oh, and I don't think you need a mansion. It could be anything. The mansion puts it over the budget. Why not a house?

Home Security

"He bends down to pick up the fallen bones."

1. I don't understand why he does so. 2. Is he wearing gloves, I guess so, and perhaps I read over it (keyword -fingerprints)...?

Pulling the book was a bit too easy and felt random. It could be developed smarter.

I think you could have displayed the whole search in a more interesting way, foreshadowing the doctor's got shit going on differently.

The climax changed the tone and the feeding of the monster was one of those Yikes moments. Ugly. Nice.

The dialogue of the crazy doctor was a bit too long and a bit too much of explaining stuff in hindsight, that could work easier and more direct. Such as: The doctor didn't need to engage them to fall in his hands. I think it would have been much more interesting if indeed a rival had sent the thieves to find the doctor's secrets.

The thematic what they search exactly, and how, would be much more intriguing for my part. This subject is unclear.

The transition of the shot on p1, leading to Freddy standing there with a gun in his hand worked very well.

Not as good as it could be yet, naturally. More theme needed, perhaps.

I’m at page 6 and though the set up is good, the story is kind of dragging. I’m also unsure if they’re looking for something specific or just looting in general. Freddy mentions grabbing a hard drive. Is this important? The whole reason they’re here? I started to think so, then he mentions finding a TV even though they haven’t seen one yet. It’s pretty clear where they are and who they’re robbing, so I’m just waiting for the other shoe to drop.

Revealing that the Doctor gave Freddy the gun, AND put blanks in it, (and apparently they know each other?), it’s too much; too scattershot an explanation for me to swallow.

LOL. I like that Freddy tries to shoot him again even though he’s just been told it has blanks in it.

Okay, so the Doctor knows Henry, and Henry is the one who provided Freddy with the gun. I think the set-up needs to be reworked to account. If Henry is pulling the strings then he’s the one who suggested this robbery, suggested the house and put a gun in Freddy’s hand. That info should be given up front or else the reveal isn’t really a reveal, it’s just being blindsided by info. Henry should seem like he’s in charge, not straggling along, though you could build in some conflict where it looks like Freddy is “assuming control” and Henry wants out. Like in Panic Room when the masked guy kills Jared Leto.

Not bad overall, though. Aside from the already mentioned issues, this was a pretty good take on the challenge.

The good news...

I read the entire script.

Good setup and pretty clean writing.

The not so good news...

Characters don't seem very real or act like peeps in this situation probably would.

Things get dull after the setup and go downhill from there...to...

The bad news...

The ending...which is contrived, all exposition and explanation, and just not good.  The Doctor speaks 12 times in a row from the bottom of Page 7.  Pretty ridiculous.

Which leads to a grade of...

C+

Overall, not bad. But I’ll have to agree with other comments re: the mansion (most likely) blowing the budget, for a short that is.

The twist was some good ol’ fashioned early cinema, IMO, and I didn’t see it coming.

A brazen take on this would be to swap out:

•     Freddy with ‘The Dude’
•     Henry with ‘Brandt’
•     The Doctor with ‘Jeff Lebowski’
•     The Creation with a ‘Nihilist’

Then lose some of the gore and throw in the bones of Bunny Lebowski, to make it surreal. I’d pay to see that…

Writer,

Not bad, but this took a lot of time to get going. Dialogue was wordy and too much of it, as was the action. Could've gotten to the point much sooner than you did. Once there, you had a twist but it wasn't enough to turn this into a very memorable story. On the plus side the writing was pretty good, with a few twists and turns and good descriptions. Overall, not for me.

Steve

"Awaken, you magnificent beast!"

THE GOOD:  There is talent here, assured writing, and I get the tone you are going for.  Freddy and Henry play off one another just right, and you keep them consistent.  I enjoyed those two.  And the secret door.  Everyone loves a secret door.  And the reveal of the Doctor, handled with aplomb.  I am sure I would have liked this even better had it not been one of perhaps a dozen Franken-themed scripts I've just read.    

THE BAD:  You do get a little over the top with the Doctor near the end.  And it isn't that the big monologue is inappropriate, really, for the style you are working with here.  Some of it is just too much.  A line such as the one I've quoted above -- though it amused me greatly -- only serves to undermine you in the end.  But that's really all I've got by way of negatives.      

bert's grade:  A-  

A solid entry. Lots and lots of Frankentein scripts this time it seems, many of which go down pretty much the same route: intro characters, dance around a bit creating tension, reveal the creature and BANG explosion of violence. Having said that, this was decently executed.

As you'll see in my notes below, my main issues were slightly 'plot heavy' dialogue, and an inconsistency with Freddy's character - who I was a bit bored of by around page 7, we get it, he's a dick. Otherwise it was... good? Sorry, that sounds really limp - I do like the concept of the Doctor asking Henry to recruit Freddy to break in, but I feel you didn't quite tell it as well as you could have.

More below. Well done for getting a script in.

--

PAGE 2
Freddy and Henry do a lot of 'talking the plot' to each other here - we establish that the doctor was a genius, they're here for a hard drive which they're going to sell, and that Freddy has a family - but only because characters very explicitly come out with this information. It comes off as quite unnatural - to me, anyway

PAGE 3
- didn't really buy Freddy's reaction, you've established him as someone entirely unmoved by shooting a man dead (not just unmoved, actively proud of it), and now he's horrified by the photos? A bit of a lack of consistency for me

PAGE 5
- how do they 'definitely' know the Doctor was dead? Perhaps one of them - probably Henry - could check his pulse on page 1?
- Freddy keeps calling Henry a 'pussy', yet his own reaction to the photos and Henry's appearing at the door confuses this. Maybe you're going for his hypocrisy, but I can't quite grasp his character yet. His dialogue doesn't match his actions

PAGE 7
- nice twist - though were the groans just for effect? Why did the Doctor groan earlier, didn't that run the risk of giving the game away? Reinforces the idea of possibly having Henry check his pulse on pg 1, would remove the doubt of the Doctor being 'dead' (for the viewer) and also push Henry slightly further out of suspicion

PAGE 8
- I like the concept, but don't love the way you've handled it. Rather than have the Doctor just tell us the backstory, maybe this could be an extended intro to the script? Henry and Freddy meet in a bar or somewhere, Henry tells Freddy the plan, then they head on up to the mansion. Would give you a chance to feed us the info on Freddy / the Doctor in dialogue, rather than them just state it on page 2. I know you couldn't do that here, you'd go over the page limit, but if you choose to rewrite...?

PAGE 9
- the actual moment of the Creation's awakening needs something more, somehow. Obviously not throwing an electricity switch - too cliche - but pulling out some tubes and the Doctor shouting, then the Creation slowly sitting up, was a bit underwhelming for such a big dramatic moment. Maybe you could whack some music over the top of it.

PAGE 10
- interesting ending, though Henry hasn't been your protag so why end on him? That's a point, actually - does this script have a protag?

Format and style relatively solid. The bones of the story were solid as well - good premise.

I felt let down a bit by the dialogue. It felt a bit stale - unimaginative. In the next version I would look to make it pop a bit more.

I just read this quickly.

I'm sure most of this has been mentioned by others already, didn't read comments before posting:

* greatest mind of our generation, Frank is 32, the doctor is 60 - so probably not the same generation. What about greatest mind of our time?

* some unnecessary action lines, many of them could be removed or merged with others. An example:

Quoted Text FREDDY Come on. We gotta keep looking. Freddy walks toward the door. He stops in his tracks as he hears a loud groan. He turns to Henry.

could be

Quoted Text FREDDY Come on, we gotta keep looking. Freddy stops and turns to Henry when they hear a loud GROAN.

-> 5 lines saved, at least 10 more of those in the script, could easilly save at least one page.

* In the dialog, I realized you use gotta, outta a.s.o. - if you do, I think you should use it always for that/those characters or never, but don't switch between outta, gotta and out of, got to

* Some repetitions in the dialog. Example:

Quoted Text FREDDY He�s got all this money and he wastes it on hundreds of prehistoric books? A goddamn waste.

I do that a lot myself, just takes a loud read of the script to fix those.

* The part where they think the GROAN is a TV worth stealing is quite a stretch. If I heard a GROAN in a foreign house, a TV would certainly not be the first thing which came to my mind. Yet you use that stretch to ignite the following action, now they want to find the TV because they think it's worth good money if they steal it. Feels quite constructed here.

* Good twist: First book Henry pulls on instantly opens up a secret door to a hidden chamber. Must be a really lucky (or unlucky?) guy in a 'huge, square room covered with bookshelfs'. Thought this was another constructed plot point, but we learn Henry is one of the doctor's lackeys, nice one.

* This one:

Quoted Text THE DOCTOR It�s alive!

made me smile. Well done to use that classic sentence here!


All in all I liked this one. It's well written and the twist caught me by surprise. Not my top script but surely at least a consider for me.

Well written, great dialogue and banter between the characters.  I found the ending abrupt...but not really, maybe just ended to quickly.  I also liked the tone, vibe, etc.

*Spoilers*

Ah - this is on my "I like it!" list!  )

Needless to say, yet ANOTHER sendup of Frankenstein, which is to be expected.  But the twist ending is well done - making this one definitely worth the read.

A few quick thoughts: I DO think a few pages could be trimmed to tighten/quicken the pace.  But once it is, it's pretty neat.  A grungy (though not impossibly novel) twist on a classic tale.

Other notes:

--Shouldn't GUNSHOT be capped?
--"Pretty awesome." "Not Awesome" - nice banter there.
--"Edible, too."  Nice touch.

Cheers on this one! )

--J (W)

Started off quite well. The dialogue was good but lost it a bit later. Or maybe I got a little bored.

Well written for the most part. I think I'm beginning to tire of Frankie type stories, which isn't your fault.

Not really buying the end. Felt a bit too Scooby Doo for me.

R

IT'S ALIVE!!!!  Lol!

I liked this one. A bit talky, but most of the talk fit and wasn't idle chatter.

A Brit must have written this. Trolley bed? A gurney?

Not sure about the ending. It doesn't really fit with the classic Frankenstein's Monster MO.

Don't know about low budget, but as we've discussed earlier, it's all relevant to what the filmmakers have available.

I liked it and would definitely vote CONSIDER on this one.

I'm not sure I get the concept here?

Big SPOILERS!

I liked the set up but then the Doctor's speech at the end just made it all a bit ridiculous.  The Doctor says 'people' will try to steal the results of his experiments, who are these people, fellow doctors?  He hires Freddy to raid his house to try to steal these results, with the help of his sidekick, Henry.  But the whole thing is a ploy to get Freddy to test the Doctor's security system i.e. the Creature. So why the elaborate set up?  Why does the Doctor fake been killed and why does he lead Freddy into a room with the Creature, this isn't testing the security at all?  Surely he should have just sat back and watched to see if Freddy could break into his lab and get past the Creature.  It makes no sense to me, sorry.

This might be a bit harsh but I was enjoying it up until the end, where it all went a bit Pete Tong.

Very nice set-up - some nice lil' touches such as when Freddy trips over the skeleton.

I was really intrigued by what was happening and what was to come but it ended up being just a reveal of Franky and what he's capable of. I think at the very least it might have been good if the boys both ended up learning a harsh lesson by being trapped in the secret room with Franky, but it wasn't to be. I don't know what I was expecting more than that, but it wasn't that the Doc was still alive.

I won't bother going into the illogical part of the story cause you've probably had that pointed out.

Some nice dialogue, but a few of your action/description lines need a bit more attention.

These two in particular need some urgent attention:

locks unlock
descends down

To be fair the OWC is always a bit of hurly-burly.

Worth reading for the opening alone.

Ooh, and I just noticed what Dave wrote at the top of the page:

Quoted from eldave1 ...The bones of the story were solid as well...

  

Thanks to everyone that gave this a read and shared your thoughts. Appreciate it.

I'm glad some of you enjoyed it, or parts of it. Once again, I've learned quite a bit from this experience.

Cheers.

Nice work Glenn, this is a good effort.

Quoted from DustinBowcot Nice work Glenn, this is a good effort.

Thanks, mate.

Obviously far from perfect and I know there were a few holes in the plot. Enjoyed it though. Don't think it's worth rewriting but I have another idea and I can take the advice I got here and apply it to it.

Nice script, Glenn. This was my 2nd recommend besides The Phantom's Song.

Quoted from Equinox Nice script, Glenn. This was my 2nd recommend besides The Phantom's Song.

Thanks, Thorsten. That means a lot. Glad you enjoyed it.