If in doubt, go for simplicity... that being said, removing the money would change the first chapter up, quite dramatically so. Any ideas what you'd do instead?

But chapter 1 was were most of the confusion arised, and a large part of this did stem from the money.

I'd still say that if the money is gonna' go, you should consider axing Nicky Costa a well, bro, as his role in this confused me far more than even more than the money did...

I didn't read the whole thing, but from what I read it was pretty damn good.  I liked it.  Not once did I feel like I was strolling through amateur city.  I would actually try to finish this, but I'm too tired and got too much going on.  I can't concentrate.

Hi Mo,

My final notes are below. Sorry, they are not very good, I just don't find myself good and reviewing this type of script. Not my forte.

The first thing to note...taking us to...

MY OVERVIEW

Is that I truly admire your writing voice. It so stands out. It has to be...by far...the most distinctive approach on SS. I cannot believe you can write something so dense in seven weeks. Amazing.

Throwing us to...

THE STORY, aka the narrative. A mean bugger that doesn't pull no punches, (i like that one considering the boxing story) cos it's got to get out there.

Where to start?

Who's story's are we following? - Having read the script, I can't answer that. So, the question for you is, do you want one? Well do ya punk? It is how most stories pan out and what keeps us following, IMO

Thread - what I found hard is keeping up with the flow, the order, the who.are we following  and how are they connected etc. in many ways you have taken a story over a few decades and jumbled it about. Oh, and the thrown in a future looking mystery element.

I never got to the bottom of what a murk was, what they saw in the future, how and why etc I feel this was just left behind. Almost forgotton.

I will finish with what I think you should do, which I appreciate won't be what you want to do,but I share it all the same.

1) keep your style

2) keep more linear - allow the style to jump out without distraction

3) don't be afraid to be clear when needed. I appreciate you do at time, but then for long portions it's like it's gone into a food blender

4) make this more from a single persons POV (a criticism my script got at coverage by the way) so we can follow it. Wolfi dominates it then disappears. And is dead for a chunk, but alive...

5) temper the mystery so that it is the right amount of salt on the story

6) I've run out of suggestions,but I suppose the final one would be not to worry about being normal, in terms of script writing, as the style will sing for itself

Best of luck


Carrying on...p42

P45 she was a champion
So Wolfies after Luther
There's a map to money? That's the map the others say doesn't exist

P49 let me get this right. De Luca wants Apollo the nigger. Wolfie wants to know where someone is
P49 how is the main drenching herself?
Oh and the maids got de Luca child - he's cold
Tall man....is this the future written
Apollo locks his one eye... Found that quite funny
So the son is called Ezekiel Warwick
P65 - I don't who where we are when she's pacing
Luther and Walter are the same...
So Wolfie was a child Slave, raped often and had a child..

Passing comment but recent pages have been clearer on what's happening, although I don't get Apollo

P74 Who is the old man...? Have we seem him before?
Chapter 2
Pages now throwing me off again
P80 Wolfie drops the crowbar...held by blood??
The raven talks....
Maxi...10.,, recounting the boxing promoter?? Seems strange
P83 Wolfies back??.
Chapter 3
Baby lying on a dried up lake ... You do t half have some Images...
Wolfies back as VO
Chapter 4 - 1953?
Wolfie and sienna - not sure what's been about
So far a seperate story of sienna as nanny in an earlier time to the angel child Sophia
Sienna and Louis - it could be relevant but I wonder...let's see
P104 Wolfie murdered...yup all the Images, gun shots, blood, fights, fake deaths, reborn, people living again...I find it hard to reference back
What's a murk? Still don't know ...winged thing?

By119 I think this is 'taking me...' To the drugs cabinet for headache relief

Finished. Every. Single. Line. (Ps that's a joke not a put down, just to be clear)

One or two missing commas but I won't go into that... because it doesn't matter. The first niggle I have is with the double character dialogue for the social worker. She has dialogue for social worker and as woman. Probably best to keep calling her woman and just describe her as a social worker type as you have done.

Wolfie's introduction is a little confusing because he's 40s at first, riddled with bullets. Then in the next scene he's mid 40s, and I can't figure out if this is backward or forward in time. I think his initial description needs to say either early 40s or late 40s. There's a bullet wound, but he's not riddled with bullets wounds as he should be. Perhaps, if you showed him being riddled with bullet wound scars then we get the message more clearly that this is post shooting. It could still be pre-shooting though as it's only one bullet wound scar. I'm sure the narrative will help me catch up later down the line, but some clarity here wouldn't hurt at all.

I'm not a fan of Wolfie's V.O. It's not the V.O. in as much as what he's actually saying. If this was on TV, I'd seriously consider switching it off at this point.

WOLFIE (V.O.)
This world... What has it come to? How does one even become enveloped in the scum that plagues this city in the first place?

There are a lot of words used and it just comes across as cheese to me. From then on, I zone out with the rest of the claptrap. It's ripped from a million different films and comic books, only not done as well. I think you could strip out this poor attempt at preachy dialogue and it will improve the script.

You've done it again with Apollo. One character has dialogue under two character names. It's OK to read, I'm just concerned that perhaps, when it comes time to make this, there may be some confusion later down the line as to how many speaking parts there actually are. From a reader perspective it's fine... but it takes a lot of people to make a film and the less confusing things are, the better.


SLICKED
Vulture in appearance, gonna hand me over the details, or am I gonna have to blow your fuckin’ head off?

I don't understand what he means by 'Vulture in appearance,'

APOLLO
Your fate is murk.

Do you mean, murky?

I am finding myself a little put off by the structure of this script at the moment, or maybe I'm just blaming that for the lack of clarity. It all seems very dream-like, which is probably why my mind is starting to wander. It was OK at first, but now 27 pages in and I still don't feel this story has a clear sense of direction.

WOLFIE
You might be able to stop these savages a second before they emerge but I can sure as shit guarantee that you will never see your real death comin’. You need me, I need you.

The above is a logic quagmire.

Louis Armstrong -- what a coincidence. I used a Louis Armstrong track in mine too.

I'm at 38 or 39 and finally getting into the story.

I'm into the 70s now and tempted to start skipping... pages, that is. I think this would actually play out way better on screen. There's a pulp fiction style to the narrative, like Sin City, that I like. It concentrates on strong visuals with the pulp-like plot more in the background. It hasn't been precisely nailed yet, but for 7 weeks work this is on its way.

I don't care too much for the money aspect in all of this... but it's a sideplot that has its uses. It will be the strong visuals that make this film memorable, in my opinion, and the sideplot helps add more.

End of chapter one. I'll do chapter 2 in a separate post.

Quoted from Toby_E As promised, here's part two of my reply!

Yo, Tobes. Italics like always. Thanks for getting back, mate.

IMO, this script shouldn't be less than about 140 pages.
I have seen The Place Beyond the Pines -- but funnily enough, despite me enjoying that film a substantial amount, I thought its weakness was that we didn't spend enough time with some of the characters. Except maybe Bradley Cooper. Of course, I want the script to be very long, but I don't have the luxury of doing that, on that end though, the longest script to win the Nicholl was I think ~152 pages? But I'm going for under 120 for a viable draft.

It's always hard for me to cut scripts, I think cutting past the first 25 pages in the first chapter would hurt the story some. That first act seems to be my bane. Nicky Costa is also painful to cut, because without him, the story comes from convenience. Say, if he never found the money, and H came across it coincidently, no mobsters would be involved as Nicky never told them that Apollo knew where it was. Granted, it's my job to find these answers, but cutting his presence adds the same amount of exposition and scenes anyway trying to remedy the situation.

To be honest, I actually never imagined Blood's story being longer than this in the outline stage. I of course wanted a few more pages, but I was okay with it being what it was. It was Sienna's and Nicky Costa's which took up the bulk of the story. Although, in saying that, he did play a role in Sienna's story when she comes to California. I'm honestly not sure what to do any more.

My issue wasn't with the actions, but rather you'd spent the past 20ish pages setting Sienna up as this nice character, that her actions just came so out of left-field, with no apparent trigger. I feel she needs a reason for this dark side to come to the fore front.
Haha, this is hard, dude -- because in my mind at least, I don't think she needs a trigger at all in the slightest. Which some peeps are obviously going to disagree with. She's just insane, if I suddenly make her more humanistic, if I give her features that denote there's something off about her from the get go, the thirst for reasoning in the audience's mind increases. "Well, those clues weren't big enough! I want more!" -- it's a downfall for the type of plot point, nobody will ever be satisfied. Like good old Louis says, they don't need reasoning, they're just bad.

I can see why it doesn't feel satisfying though, as I cut this major portion out, which I'm not sure I should re-add to the story. It was that -- Blood settles on Sienna as the woman who raped  Solomon, but the audience doesn't believe it. Why? Because she's as harmless as a fly, like we've always seen her until we actually see her kill Sofia. But this was just pushed down to a 1 page moment where Maxi confronts her and uhh, it didn't want to mesh with me so I cut it. I don't think this will remedy it, I'm not sure what will honestly. I'll see what I do.

then beef these central parts?
I'll see how it goes, mate. I don't think I'll add more story, I'll see what I can cut. It will hurt the script, most definitely, but it might be possible to cut Wolfie's story by 20 pages so we can stay with Sienna for a while as she goes to California. Will dwell on all of this as this is a large change.

does he actually even want the money?
Okay, yeah, I see what the problem is now. In Nicky Costa's chapter, we were meant to have this subplot where he saves Apollo from death in exchange of the information and how Apollo even got this same information. Will work on this definitely.

So I hope my previous comments didn't come across negative
Not at all, brother, same from my comments to your script!

Any ideas what you'd do instead?
So, it seems the money isn't the problem, it's just that nobody knows what Wolfie can do, and what she wants. The latter being the most important part, this is just incredibly easy to fix. I just need to rewrite the first act into something more feasible -- I do agree that a large part of the problems came from there.

Quoted from dead by dawn I didn't read the whole thing, but from what I read it was pretty damn good.  I liked it.  Not once did I feel like I was strolling through amateur city.  I would actually try to finish this, but I'm too tired and got too much going on.  I can't concentrate.

Thanks, mate, I guess that's a good thing about the style since a few professional writers write in a similar manner, but I refined it to something I feel reads like we're having the images splayed across for us turn by turn. We only focus on what we're actually seeing.

Quoted from Reef Dreamer Is that I truly admire your writing voice. It so stands out. It has to be...by far...the most distinctive approach on SS. I cannot believe you can write something so dense in seven weeks. Amazing.

Yo, Bill, thanks for reading the script, mate. I'll get to yours next, but I've just been very busy, and actually will be for a little while longer. I'm glad you admire the style in some sense, even though it isn't your forte. I think constructing scenes like these do take longer, but once you get that rhythm going -- Taking us to... BLACK -- eyes watch us. Squinting. Unsure. Our vision gliding across... etc, etc -- it becomes normal. That was a bad example I made up at the spot, but there are definitely uses for this type of style.

Who's story's are we following? - Having read the script, I can't answer that. So, the question for you is, do you want one? Well do ya punk? It is how most stories pan out and what keeps us following, IMO
It's more that, we're following Wolfie's story, but discovering these threads along the way which expand that same story. There's a large world at display here, it's important to note that Wolfie is the protagonist for most of the story since she's arguably the most active out of all these characters. We could've followed De Luca, Nicky Costa, Apollo or even Blood. The thing is, the story's already in motion and has been in motion -- Wolfie happens to get intertwined in it and then suddenly becoming the driving force in everybody's life. I think it's fine if we settle on the lack of a clear protag, because everything builds off the previous plot point.

what they saw in the future, how and why
Yeah, I'm thinking I'll refine this out in the future drafts as a few people had trouble with it.

make this more from a single persons POV (a criticism my script got at coverage by the way) so we can follow it
I think this criticism doesn't apply to every script, but readers label it when they think that's the reason it doesn't work. Personally, I don't think for this script that the problem is we follow it from a single POV, it's simply that if you do change it to a single POV, it eliminates many of the problems that come with having multi-layered narratives. I'll think about this one.

I've run out of suggestions,but I suppose the final one would be not to worry about being normal, in terms of script writing, as the style will sing for itself
Cheers, mate! I hope so.

So Wolfie was a child Slave, raped often and had a child..
Not a slave, but yes. I'm not sure about the latter part yet, I still haven't decided, if I make it so, then she would've been a little older than 18 when it happened currently -- so that wouldn't entirely work unless I change when she was born. I'm thinking of switching her birthdate 5 years after, so I can use Death Valley's temperature rise as a focal point -- and this would've also solidify Blood's birth. But then again, I had different ideas on how he was born. Something I'll look at.

although I don't get Apollo
Sorry, mate, Toby made a similar comment, but how so? Trying to gauge this out.

What's a murk?
"darkness or thick mist that makes it difficult to see" from Google.

Quoted from DustinBowcot Wolfie's introduction is a little confusing because he's 40s at first, riddled with bullets. Then in the next scene he's mid 40s

Hey, mate, thanks for the read. You're right, but I can't figure out a way for this to work without confusing the audience. I'm up for suggestions, as by calling her the same age, the audience will wonder when it is. I want to say early 40s, when it obviously isn't, but I need the audience to think she was somehow younger in that first scene. Your suggestion could work, I'll give it a go after I read Bill's script.

I'm not a fan of Wolfie's V.O. It's not the V.O. in as much as what he's actually saying. If this was on TV, I'd seriously consider switching it off at this point.
That's a shame, because I'd really like to at least keep something. I had another monologue written down originally, but it was a little more obscure and out there. Although I felt it was too racist and redneck sounding for its own good. I'll see how I go.

You've done it again with Apollo.
This is honestly half/half -- many people recommend, whether professional or amateur, that you don't introduce a character by their actual name until we read their full introduction. Which I agree with, since we're taking a long break before we meet Apollo. Maybe they'll won't forget this specific name, but if it was John, I'd wager some folks would be left scratching their heads on who he was and where we met them in the story.

Louis Armstrong -- what a coincidence. I used a Louis Armstrong track in mine too.
Ha! Really? I must've missed it. I was listening to some jazz prior to writing this, so it was a good chance to implement some actual culture in something set in the late 1940s.

I don't care too much for the money aspect in all of this... but it's a sideplot that has its uses
Yeah, I've began to notice the money isn't the problem entirely, it's just that there's not enough focus on a few different aspects of the script. I might keep the money, but I'll see what else I can do with it. The next few chapters are more dialogue based than Chapter 1, which might make it easier to read. Looking forward to your comments.

Hey Mo,

I got through all of this but, like others, had a lot clarity and comprehension issues. First I want to say that I like that you've got a style of your own that's letting you stand out. I think you're still refining it, but the style itself was actually not my main issue. There were certainly moments I got pulled up, but for the most part I got a handle of the location pretty quickly and could tell what the characters were doing inside that location.

However that, the mixture of time jumps, dreams and visions, a more-complex-than-necessary plot, and the odd manner in which people talked and conversed, all combined to overwhelm me. At times it seemed like every single element that could be made challenging, was.

For me, the most challenging element was the dialogue. I'm not sure why the characters talked the way they did. It seemed at times they were more interested in sounding poetic than in conveying actual information to each other.  For instance, when Apollo (as Man) tells Wolfie, "I know you... and your blood." Not only does it not strike me as something a near death accident victim might say, the term 'blood' is vague. It turns out it means her parents, but it could mean other things too. Wolfie shares psychic traits with other people, could it not describe that bond as well? It also turns out Wolfie has a son named Blood, so this guy could be talking about a specific person. If, however, he'd simply said, "...and your parents" we're done. All that’s left is the question ‘who are Wolfie’s parents?”, which I think is what you wanted people asking there.

Not only did this make it hard to take in the necessary exposition, it alienated me from the characters themselves. It made me unable to key in on the emotions they were feeling, because i often could not intuit an emotion from the odd way they chose to phrase things. An example from page 17...

(WOLFIE
Got a feelin’ that ain’t too much
on the legal end.

UNCLE H
Your fallacies tell you that?

WOLFIE
The fuck did you just say?)

The first place I pull up is Uncle H's line. I’m not really sure what it means (especially in light of the fact that the money isn't legal). I’m guessing the gist is “you’re mistaken”, but it’s a very odd way to phrase it. Since I’m tripped up on the meaning, I'm also not sure how he says it. Jokingly? Sarcastic? Angry? Then when Wolfie responds, "The fuck you just say?", I don't know if she's offended or if she, like me, actually doesn't understand what he said. As a result, any emotional content being exchanged between the too is lost as well.

I offered up a few more examples in my notes, but I wanted to go into it a little up front since it ended up preoccupying a lot of my thoughts while I read this.

Anyway, on to my notes…

Pg. 1 Don’t want to get too nitpicky up front, but describing the WHISPERS we hear as “inaudible” can’t be correct. Perhaps ‘indecipherable’ or ‘indistinguishable’ because we can’t understand what they’re saying?

Off the bat the initial conversation is confusing to me, and I’m afraid I’m gonna have to break it down to explain it...

(GIRL: Don’t mean like that, Miss. I always see ‘em... Just not you.)
Who is “them”?

(SOCIAL WORKER: Everyone?)
So she’s confused too. Good. Though I’d prefer if she asked the more intuitive question I asked above, “Who is ‘them’?”

(GIRL: Whole world sometimes)
This doesn’t clarify much, if anything. She can see everyone in the world? How? When? And why didn’t she just say, “sometimes”? Are ‘the whole world’ and ‘everyone’ not the same thing?

(SOCIAL WORKER: Folks told me you had a little scuffle earlier, wanna tell me your version of the story?)
And yet the Social Worker changes the subject, as if she both understood and is uninterested in the idea of this Girl seeing everyone in the world.

(GIRL: Don’t blink... Or you’ll miss everything.)
This is a complete non-sequitur to the Social Worker’s question.

(“The Social Worker frowns, confused.”)
Okay, good. But then…

(SOCIAL WORKER: Where’d you learn to say that?)
Why not, “What are you talking about?" It’s not like the Girl recited a dirty limerick, or used the word ‘commensurate’ in a sentence. There’s nothing unique or unlikely about the specific phrase or words she used, it’s the phrase’s context in the conversation that makes no sense. Or to put it another way, if the Girl told the Social Worker where she learned the phrase, would it make the Social Worker any less confused?

(GIRL: The ones in the dreams told me. Also said there are more of us.)
I wonder if the Social Worker’s odd phrasing of the question was just an excuse to get the Girl talking about her dreams.

(SOCIAL WORKER: What kind of dreams are those?)
None of her questions are intuitive. Why isn’t she asking about the “us” part instead of the dreams. Children have dreams. That’s not news. Children thinking they’re part of a team of telepaths or something, that's important. I’d equate this to a friend walking up to me and saying, “I just came from the doctor’s office and he says I have an incurable disease.” Only for me to respond, “What kind of office is it?”

Now there’s probably something going on under the surface of this scene. I assume the Social Worker knows more about what’s happening than she lets on, but only because it’s the best way to make sense of her odd conversational approach. But even if there’s an explanation for the confusing bits of every line, there shouldn’t have to be an explanation to make sense of every line. The audience won’t have time to parse it out like I have. They’ll just be confused.

Pg. 4 One the danger of this writing style is you need to take everything into account. You say that the Man and Woman are silhouetted, but you don’t say how. Since they were “towering above him”, I filled in the sun as the source of silhouetting light. Then you said he leans against a wall and looks to a stairwell and now I have to scrap my initial image. Or do I? Are they inside or outside? And I still don’t know what is happening in the environment that would cause the Man and Woman to be silhouetted rather than just seen.

Now I don’t want to make it sound as though the writing is horrible. It’s actually quite good in places. It’s just that the style throws up additional obstacles that you wouldn’t otherwise be dealing with in a more conventional style.

Pg. 6 “Not cleaned as often as it’s used.” What bathroom is?

Pg. 19 I’ve had to read this conversation between Wolfie and Uncle H twice now to try to get everything out of it. I understand what’s being asked of Wolfie, and the leverage being used against her, but I still can’t make heads or tails of Uncle H’s relationship with the ‘wops’ and the Germans and the ‘negro’. I can’t figure out what he has to do with any of it. And this line…

“Planes to Iran cost green. Planning any more of those soon?”

...is the most confusing one of the lot.

Pg. 21 “INT. OFFICE - PRESENT DAY (2000-2015)”

I would suggest changing “Present Day” to “Modern Era” or something. Jan 1st, 2000 is not the present day.

Reading on, I see nothing in the scene that would suggest any specific year at all. How exactly is the audience suppose to catch on to this? If it’s meant to be superimposed, that should be written out correctly.

Pg. 28 Once again, I feel like I would have to reread the whole conversation to figure out why Wolfie is saving Apollo instead of killing him. EDIT: Okay, so she used Apollo to find her family. But it seems a little coincidental that Apollo just happened to have this info. And if this is so important to Wolfie, why hasn’t she been doing this all along? Her entire goal appears to change out of thin air. I’m beginning to think the reason I was lost here was because it requires too many leaps of logic. As with the opening scene, the less intuitive it is, the harder it is to buy into, and having the characters explain huge goal shifts and motivations with somewhat obtuse language (“Do you exchange your family’s fate upon the veracity of those words?”) doesn’t help either.

Pg. 30 “CRACK -- a small panel is knocked loose from above.” Are they entering through a boarded up window? ‘Small panel’ and ‘from above’ are pretty vague descriptors.

(APOLLO: Don't chase!) This is a continuing symptom of a lot of the dialogue. Why didn’t he just say "Wait" or "stay"? Normal people say those things. No one I know would blurt out "don't chase" in that situation. It’s a phrase that’s more at home in scolding a dog. Apollo also says this before the reader is clued in that Wolfie might chase. At the very least have Wolfie run off with Apollo yelling after him.

Pg. 33 Wolfie says, “It’s him”. Apollo says “it’s not”. Am I supposed to know who Hamburg is? Or who they think he may or may not be? Why are they acting indignant that he called the cops? He’s an old dude and they just broke in, what do they expect?

(APOLLO: He only has the information to find your monsters. I do not know their names. Only Jimmy De Luca, the man in the dreams. He can give us them in exchange of --)

I’m beginning to suspect I’ll never know what exactly is going on here. Even when the characters seem to be giving exposition that should help, it doesn’t.

Pg. 34 Every reason Wolfie gives to kill Hamburg if he doesn't talk is a reason to kill Hamburg even if he does talk. I'm not sure why he'd cooperate if Wolfie's just revealed they'll have to kill him no matter what.

Pg. 41  Was ‘debacle’ supposed to be ‘debate’? Debacle doesn't really describe what they're doing.

Pg. 43 I like the idea that the disposable guard has a family, and all the other disposable guards are angry at his death. Usually these types of throwaway characters just wait around to be shot, so it's funny thinking of them playing cards at lunch or something.

Pg. 50 With Wolfie having no reaction to a pregnant sex slave being beaten right in front of her, it’s really hard to care about what she’s after. There needs to be a character we can emotionally tie to or, in lieu of that, the situation needs to be interesting. But right now everyone is a dick, and the situation is too confusing to be intriguing.

(DE LUCA: Past tense. Was scum. Meaning he wasn’t always scum?)
Huh? No. That's not what that means. Is De Luca being cheeky here? The only reason you'd emphasize 'was' is to ask whether he's presently scum. Which he's not because he's dead. But then De Luca says, "Meaning he wasn’t always scum? ‘Least not before he got murdered". So the guy wasn't always scum, then he was murdered and became scum?

Pg. 70 I know by now I might just be playing catch up, but if Wolfie is so heartless that she basically kills everyone she meets, why did she bother saving Apollo? Did she know him? Was that not a random occurrence that happened right in front of her. Why would the person who lets women be beaten right in front of them bother to intervene in a car explosion?

to be continued...

...continued

Pg. 78 I feel like you should be emphasizing Wolfie here instead on The Curtains. You put the curtains and mention her fingers and I’m getting a close up in my head, but it can’t be a close up because then I wouldn’t know it’s Wolfie.

Also, after looking at it for a bit, I realize Wolfie is probably supposed to be Blood. This is another danger with a surreal style, there’s absolutely no reason to believe that Wolfie wouldn’t randomly pop up in some dreamlike scene, so it’s almost an impossible mistake to pinpoint. Even now, I’m still not certain.

Pg. 80 SCATTER isn’t a sound element, as it appears here. Maybe if paired with something, like the ‘SCATTERING of marbles’.

Pg. 82 It seems extremely unlikely that the school would leave it up to Maxi to inform her dad about scars on her brother’s private parts. If they didn’t inform the dad, then they would be informing the police. I suppose they could be covering up for a teacher, but then why tell Maxi. It’s too much to think through and the entire chapter is over in a page, so I don’t have any clarity on that.

Pg. 83 You mention Wolfie again. And again, I’m unsure if it’s intentional.

pg. 95 "Seclude time for yourself" I'm guessing that means ‘make time for yourself’, but once again, why state it in such an odd way. It's not as if it's period appropriate.

Pg. 103 "I think... He was a good man" Based on what?

Pg. 110 The whole Sienna story isn’t really affecting me much. I don’t have any feel for who she is or why she’s doing what she’s doing. Why did she kill Sofia? Why is she killing Maxi? What relationship does she even have to Maxi and Blood that would bring her there, and now that we return to Maxi and Blood, what was up with the raven and that creature from before. It’s just kind of dropped like it doesn’t matter. Once again, the dialogue doesn’t help me figure out much and then there’s cross-cutting through three different time periods. Sienna’s face morphs into Bloods, but they aren’t the same person so what purpose did it serve other than to momentarily confuse me? The whole thing feels like dreams fading into each other, which could be cool, but I have no sense of any narrative or message intended.

Just for instance, Sienna says she was promised more and starts talking about “the cost”. I have no idea what she’s talking about. Is this important or meant to be surreal? It should be important as I imagine because she’s explaining her motive, but even during what should be relatively straight-forward exposition, I find myself unable to follow what people actually mean.

Pg. 112 Why is Blood sitting and talking calmly? Wasn’t he just trying to break the door down because Sienna was trying to kill Maxi? He should be rushing in and cracking her skull open, not lazing about ruminating on boxing. He has no reason to. No reason she needs to know about his career and, as far as I can see, it has no significance to the reader.

Pg. 120 “the Woman who will birth a son that will forever change boxing.” But did we ever really see him change boxing? I saw someone wearing a medal, and Blood and Wolfie sure like to talk about the sport in general, but I never got the sense they were that big. But more importantly, I can’t figure out what it matters to the story whether or not they changed boxing. If they’d been backyard wrestlers would the plot be significantly different? You could still have the mob, some localized fame and some pondering over what the sport did to them. You could probably eliminate sports entirely and retain 90% of the plot beats.

In closing, I wish I could say more or offer up suggestions about the overall story. From where I’m standing it could use more focus, but where I’m standing is a place of incomprehension.

I do wonder if all, or any, of the characters need to be psychic. The characters’ fates seemed to be on rails, and they didn’t really take any serious steps to avoid the inevitable. Maybe if you made a bigger point of them trying to avoid fate, but they seemed to be in denial at best, content to let fate have its way with them.

I also think any commentary about the sport of boxing needs a rework. Wolfie often said the sport ruined her, so it felt at times like you wanted to explore the idea of boxing and the long term effects it has on the boxers. My problem with that was Wolfie was also violently beaten and sexually abused as a child. I could see no evidence that she was a decent person before boxing, nor any indication that boxing was the thing that made her violent. As a result, all her talk about what the sport did to her just came off a self-serving denialism to me. She’s always been bad, boxing didn’t do anything to her. But I’m not sure if that’s what you intended. If you really want to raise the question of the effect boxing had, we need some evidence that Wolfie was a decent, if troubled person before she even got into boxing.

Anyway, that’s all I’ve got. I can see from your exchanges with Toby that you’ve thought this through and have got some really interesting ideas. It’s good to be ambitious in storytelling, but it’s also necessary to have focus. Whatever’s in the story that doesn’t need to be in the story needs to be expendable. I sense you’ve got a lot of darlings to kill here, but if you shave it off in the right places, you can still have something that’s unique and intriguing; that’s dealing with the themes you want while not getting in the reader’s way of understanding it.

Good luck with the rewrite and congrats on finishing a script in 7 (or was it 4?) weeks.

Cheers,
Eric

Code In the Lounge as she feels the knob.

Made me chuckle. It's just so out of the blue.

I'm left with the sense that I have just read a graphic novel. It's a very intense story and one that will take reading a few times to fully appreciate, which as a graphic novel would be easy, as a script, not so much. It takes really having to think about what's going on and concentrate on every nuance.

Find graphic novel creators and pitch them with this story, I feel this is perfect for that market. Film couldn't really do this justice. Your style in general is well suited to graphic novels in my opinion. I read another story of yours, I think it was a short, some crazy sci-fi thing.

You already know what you need to do to improve this script, but I think most of the complaints are purely down to how difficult it is to read rather than any actual story issues. At the same time though, I don't think you should change anything... well, not much. It will work fine as a graphic novel and some of the images will be amazing.

Something for you to think about. Good luck, whatever you choose to do.

Started yours today. Just wanted to let you know that I really dig your style of writing. You've come a long way. Only 10 pages in so far, but it looks good. Very good.  

Quoted from EWall433 I'm not sure why the characters talked the way they did. It seemed at times they were more interested in sounding poetic than in conveying actual information to each other

Yo, Eric, thanks for the read, brother, appreciated. This is a very interesting comment, as I spend a lot of time on dialogue when writing. In this case, I definitely wasn't trying to be thick or overtly confusing, but it's nice reading the comments. Usually, I feel as if my dialogue isn't this 'out there', I just felt the characters and point in time in this specific script forced me to play with it a lot more than I usually do. Will expand on this later.

"I know you... and your blood."
Lines like these -- I know how obnoxious this sounds, but it was on purpose. The confusion of the audience lies in the confusion of Wolfie -- the way Apollo says it, it puts Wolfie on guard, what the hell does he mean by 'my blood'? Does he mean my son? Does he mean my parents? Does he mean our psychics? Hence the whole, what did you just say? I know a script like this calls for the audience to put on their Primer glasses and focus, but stuff like this shouldn't need to be dissected. Granted, I can say "or your parents", but it puts strain on me as I don't want the audience to know they're Wolfie's parents that left her until later. Right now, it's this kooky fellow spouting some crazy shit which induces a reaction from Wolfie.

As a result, any emotional content being exchanged between the too is lost as well.
That specific moment, yes, you're right -- I edited the structure of the scene, funnily enough, all three lines were from different points of escalation, thus, the rhythm gets ruined. Wolfie replies to H saying "The fuck did you just say?" when he mentions her son, and I had parenthesis there too. Again, it's an excuse and the audience could care less, but I'll look into it.

Don’t want to get too nitpicky up front, but describing the WHISPERS we hear as “inaudible” can’t be correct. Perhaps ‘indecipherable’ or ‘indistinguishable’ because we can’t understand what they’re saying?
Nitpicky is good at the start, as that's what puts forth a reader's first and sometimes even last judgement on the script.

Who is “them”?
Again, time period as such -- she's a girl that grew up in 1910 America at an orphanage, so she struggles with words and getting across her thoughts. In this case, this is going to sound obnoxious once more, but I want the audience to decide who 'them' is. I hint it towards the Social Worker saying 'everyone?' like you pointed out, but her saying 'Who is them?' does not feel natural to me at all. It's that, if she says that, I feel as if it's almost aggressive, the Social Worker feels that she's simply playing along with the Girl's game, thus, it doesn't entirely matter what she says as long as long she gets her talking. Think of it like this "I ALWAYS see them" "Wow, you can't possibly see everyone though?" -- then why didn't I just write that? It just doesn't read nicely to me.

Again, to your later comments, the lack of absolutely clearness is a major part of what constitutes good dialogue against mediocre. People's speech is flawed, nobody is as articulate as they think they are. I'm not saying mine is one or the other, the whole point of the scene isn't who is 'them' or what kind of dreams they are, all that needs to come out of it is that the audience needs to know that the Girl can see people's death. Granted, you're probably asking why I didn't just say that -- which is a good point. But then again, you could make every plot point occur in half a page if you really wanted to. I agree that this isn't the best way to start the script, which I'll definitely change as I think other folks had some small problems with it.

Although, I disagree about the Social Worker asking where she learned to say it -- she's young, poor, a girl (in 1913), without parents, maybe it's not too far of a stretch to say she was smart enough to say this, but from what I've seen, I think it's a worthy response.

I just came from the doctor’s office and he says I have an incurable disease.” Only for me to respond, “What kind of office is it?”
Ha! That's a good point, I agree with this too. But on that end, dreams aren't as defined as what an office could be. An office is an office, a dream is anything -- although, there's not much of an answer to 'What kind of dreams?' anyway, so I'm not sure what the social worker was expecting either.

“Planes to Iran cost green. Planning any more of those soon?”
Yeah... This was a troublesome one which I looked at, it's an Easter egg of sorts I guess for those who understand it. In that era of time, surgeries for transgender people was a large struggle. Iran was one of the first countries to deem it 'lawful'. I didn't do my history check on this one as I should have, but I don't think they were doing them in the 1930s? Thus, you're right, this doesn't make any sense. But they were doing them in Germany, although, I felt as if I'd have H say this, the audience would either assume Wolfie's serving there again, or that Wolfie is some secret nazi, and it was a tough time for money in the 1930s so I switched it to Iran. The line shouldn't be there, but it gave me a good chuckle so I left it.

I would suggest changing “Present Day” to “Modern Era” or something. Jan 1st, 2000 is not the present day.
Good point.

And if this is so important to Wolfie, why hasn’t she been doing this all along?
She has, it's just lost in the whole plethora of information. She doesn't know where the ones that left her for dead are, I don't think I explicitly state they're her parents until much, much later into the script, it would be interesting to know how you came to that conclusion. The point is -- she doesn't know who they are, just that the ones in the photographs left her for dead. She does her (piss poor) method of checking the obituary, but other than that, besides hiring the detective, there's not much else she can do. She has nothing but that picture. She also served in the war which is a solid portion of her life, and although I don't state this, the great depression occurred just prior which threw everything into a pile of shit anyway. She has her first real chance -- she knows a supposed psychic, and she takes it. Her goal does not change at all through the script, it's just lost I feel. She will stop at nothing to kill the ones that left her for dead, it's just that it's easy to assume it's ever-changing with H introducing the money and telling her to kill Apollo.

Why didn’t he just say "Wait" or "stay"? Normal people say those things.
Besides being a psychic, he knows Wolfie's tendencies from the hospital. I like that you mention a dog, she always chases. I don't think "Wait" or "Stay" work at all personally, maybe "Don't" would. This isn't a story about normal people.

With Wolfie having no reaction to a pregnant sex slave being beaten right in front of her, it’s really hard to care about what she’s after.
But if it doesn't fit into her character to save her, why should she? She has nothing to do with this, and what can she do? Beat De Luca? She only cares about one thing, whether that makes her likeable or not, she could care less about the maid being beaten. I hoped the audience would stand next to Wolfie, she's not the best of people, sure, but she's better than everybody else we've seen so far (except maybe Apollo). I quite liked this scene too, a bit unfortunate.

but if Wolfie is so heartless that she basically kills everyone she meets, why did she bother saving Apollo? Did she know him?
Excellent point actually, there's no real reason for her to converse with him at the jail either after the focus is on De Luca. Will look into this.

Also, after looking at it for a bit, I realize Wolfie is probably supposed to be Blood
Yep, glad you (and a few other peeps) caught onto this. It's definitely not meant to be Wolfie. A simple typo.

It seems extremely unlikely that the school would leave it up to Maxi to inform her dad about scars on her brother’s private parts
They don't, they simply ask her whether she knows anything about what's happening at home. They want to keep it secret for now, or else it gives the perpetrator a chance to escape the situation if needed. I guess it's a bit of a stretch that they would wait to be certain, but then again, this was a long time ago and we can assume different. I'll definitely look into this though as I too had the same thought.

Based on what?
She's not saying as much as she knows -- will make this clearer. It was a hint that she's manipulative.

Why is she killing Maxi?
She wasn't, was probably the wording. Sienna's just bad, Toby also came across the same point so it's something to look into, although, with the direction of the notes I'm getting, I think I know what and where to go. I'll type them up at the end so peeps can throw their thoughts on the second draft.

Sienna says she was promised more and starts talking about “the cost”.
Again, there's meaning, and the audience should decide for themselves what it is as I hate to ruin it. Page 11, Sienna's vision in Wolfie's dream says "How much does this love cost to you?" -- with then another Girl, which we can assume is now Sofia 100 pages later, emerging. It was at the cost of love, Wolfie's love for her son or Sienna's lack of. She wants to feel, but she can't. Page 111, she says
"Let the love consume you too. Let
destiny eat you alive. Just like it
showed me. Just like I’ll show you."
Again, the audience doesn't need to pick up on it, but it definitely does have meaning.

Why is Blood sitting and talking calmly?
You're right, it was to cut the page length down so I spliced two scenes into one. It didn't work.

You could probably eliminate sports entirely and retain 90% of the plot beats.
I think I could eliminate the whole 'being the best' aspect, which I think I will now that a few peeps have mentioned it -- but Wolfie being a boxer is important to the script. In revenge-type stories, people have skills (as Liam Neeson puts it), Wolfie's is that she's a boxer with an unstable personality. Hand to hand, she'll win no contest with 99% of the population. Maybe even into the decimals if I changed her into a heavyweight.

I do wonder if all, or any, of the characters need to be psychic.
It's simply a story about psychics, but, you know, this is actually a great point. I do try and put emphasis, but there's just not enough space. This actually made me think, and honestly, this whole psychic business is putting a lot of strain on the story. I think this is where the confusion is building, glad you wrote this because I pondered on this for a few days (was very busy this past week so I couldn't write anything here), and I decided that it doesn't need to be there. It just gives Wolfie reason to start her story, but if you eliminate Nicky Costa, Apollo's emergence is by chance (which doesn't work), and as I'm thinking of eliminating Nicky, why complicate the narrative by adding precognition when I can simply have somebody tell Wolfie to find Hamburg or De Luca as part of her own story. Will expand on this a little later.

I sense you’ve got a lot of darlings to kill here, but if you shave it off in the right places, you can still have something that’s unique and intriguing; that’s dealing with the themes you want while not getting in the reader’s way of understanding it.
You're right, I really do struggle with cutting my scripts and it's a problem. Apologies if I came across as defensive in this post, I was simply trying to relay across my thoughts. I don't mean anything by it, and it's always nice to take it into account. Thanks for the read, mate, I'm going to lay out what I want to do with the story soon.

Quoted from DustinBowcot I'm left with the sense that I have just read a graphic novel.

That's an interesting point, never thought about it that way. It could work, in fact, it very well could -- I haven't read any myself, but I heard Watchmen was very similar to its source material. The film's always been a large inspiration in how I write funnily enough, I'll look into it. Cheers.

Quoted from Grandma Bear Started yours today. Just wanted to let you know that I really dig your style of writing. You've come a long way. Only 10 pages in so far, but it looks good. Very good.

Hey, Pia. Thanks for the comment. The writing is usually half/half, some people just hate it, others really enjoy it. It has come a long way! How far have you read the script? I'm going to try and get a second draft done this month if all goes to plan, would you mind waiting out until then? Unless of course, you've done a substantial amount of reading already, then I guess it's fine. After I finish with Bill's and Eric's script, I'll get onto whatever you want me to read. Although, in saying that, I'm still quite busy for a little while so it might take some time.

Okay, I've been thinking about the direction of the second draft and I finally have something I can attach myself to. The story is Wolfie's first and foremost, so it should remain like that for the whole story. That means gutting the chapters out, which isn't problematic as I can simply write another feature about Nicky, Sienna or Blood regardless if I wanted to.

Boiling it down to the basics, the story is about Wolfie trying to get revenge. Because the chapters aren't there, the need for the precognition doesn't matter, so we can scrap that and probably also Apollo. To add urgency, I can make it so Wolfie's coming straight out of the war and is on the hunt right from the beginning. I make it clear what she wants, what she's lost, and what she'll get if she achieves her goal. Then, I can still keep the script's important themes (Wolfie's unstoppable nature, her destruction, insanity, story's repercussions, etc, etc), but dull away the confusion and make it a simple story about an unstable boxer stopping at nothing to find the ones that left her for dead.

Sounds like you are well and truly on the right track with this rewrite, bro. Wolfie's story was definitely the strongest -- in terms of plot -- so it makes sense to focus solely on that.

Hit me up when the next draft is finished.

Good luck.

Quoted from nawazm11 Hey, Pia. Thanks for the comment. The writing is usually half/half, some people just hate it, others really enjoy it. It has come a long way! How far have you read the script? I'm going to try and get a second draft done this month if all goes to plan, would you mind waiting out until then? Unless of course, you've done a substantial amount of reading already, then I guess it's fine. After I finish with Bill's and Eric's script, I'll get onto whatever you want me to read. Although, in saying that, I'm still quite busy for a little while so it might take some time.

I'm only on page 25. Someone said they were interested in one of my features, so I've been scrambling to do a rewrite. Waiting with yours would workout fine with me.  

Hey Mo

Two things;

1) focus on wolfie...works for me

2) whilst I'm not saying your style is the same, you may want to check out script shadow today and the comments on the 72 script.

Cheers