Hi,

Not sure about this. Decent writing, although it's gets unnecessarily convoluted in places. There are clear attempts at humour, but I didn't find it very funny. I suppose it's romantic but his whole story could be a lie. So I don't really see a point. Overall, I don't see a point actually. The whole point of Chris's story was to get them out by imitating bank robbers? Not sure.

Good luck,
Glenn

Interesting logline. You've got my attention.

Hmm... It's well written. Easy to read.

You got the red and the chocolates, but no roses. And I didn't find any of it funny.

I don't know, this is just kind of blah. Chris doesn't seem like a womanizer to me. The twist ending doesn't do anything for me. Fell like I'm gonna forget this one as soon as I finish this review.

Not terrible by any means. Good effort.

Zack

Hey writer,

So it’s basically a sexy play on Stockholm Syndrome, not the Muse track (good riff, shame about Matt Bellamy and his hedgehog face),Sexyholm Syndrome.

It was odd, but I kinda liked it. A little bit of patter between the lads led to a kinda smile, slightly comedic, definitely written in a bouncy fun manner. I guess it’s got the romantic element too, so it’s a romcom! Yay!!

It was decent enough, not amazeballs but none the less entertaining.

Cam

This is a heist story not a romcom. And 6 of the 8 pages didn't really happen, after all. So what was the point?

Writer,

Not bad. It read awkward in parts, and the flow could have been better as well as the storytelling itself. But overall, this was decent. Maw sounds like an old lady name. Don’t know where you came up with that but I’d consider changing it. The reveal was okay. It just didn’t have enough oomph! Nothing read insistent, like begging me to turn the pages. Your attempts at comedy didn’t land. You had a good premise to work with, but your dialogue could use some pop to it. Anyways, decent effort. This might be something to explore further and rewrite after the challenge!

Steve

This one was so so.  

It felt like it was going somewhere until the ending made it ridiculous for me.

There wasn't any comedy aspect for me.  Plus, this love at first sight during the bank robbery seemed like a hard sell to us the readers this was romance.  Nothing seemed romantic.

I'd correct the scene headers during the montage to look like normal scene headers.

Loved the logline for this one, nice setup.

A lot of -- where they aren't needed.

The escape would be better formatted as a montage.

But unusual formatting aside... I kinda enjoyed this, moved along at a good pace and I liked it.

Writer:

The comments re the use/overuse of the double-dash reminded me of William Goldman - he used them a lot apparently.

And our own Bert is partial too, it seems...

Which led me on a little search and this rather amusing and sometimes heated SS debate which ensued with Demento's simple question about double-dashes.

Not wanting to derail this thread, or restart that particular debate, if you want to read or add to the discussion it's here:

http://www.simplyscripts.net/cgi-bin/Blah/Blah.pl?b-screenwrite/m-1395018709/s-0/

It's quite good reading and for educational purposes.

I couldn't understand what they were talking about at the beginning. I think the beginning needs a lot of clean up. And it's how you start your story - it's important. So the beginning threw me away, I must say.

The plot is there and I think it has a lot of potential. But this is very talky and I wouldn't call it a romance because your main girl is not there at all. If you included her in most of the pages it would make up for a better story, too.

As it is now I'm not a fan.

Okay, looks like I missed one, so gotta make sure I’m getting reviews in on all. Don’t want to be “that” guy.

Is this a co-written piece? Interesting if so.

So starting off. Andrew is a brainy fellow?  How do we know that?  Maybe he’s nerdy looking?

Set up is taking a little bit to materialize.  Need to get to the crux of the matter a little sooner, IMO.

Okay, after some back and forth, it appears we’re in the middle of a bank robbery, which makes the “meet cute” of a rom-com definitely in a different setting.  

Chris is smitten with someone just by her eyes?  Hmmm.  It’s a comedy, so I guess I’ll Give that a pass because it’s  a unique take on the usual ways of falling for someone.

We’ve now got more robbers jumping out and the SWAT team mowing down the gangsters. So, just your standard run of the mill rom com!

The ending really doesn’t make much sense logically, but again, everything here is pretty much over the top that I can’t fault it all that much.

In the final analysis, definitely not a rom com, the flowers didn’t really play a part, and the first part kind of dragged until MAW/Elaine showed up. But overall the writing is solid and a few of the jokes (even some of the inappropriate ones) hit.  But still a solid effort overall.

Good job,
Gary

This starts off strong. I like the initial premise. It reminds me of those over-the-top absurd comedy slo-mo shots where someone is at total peace while chaos ensues around them.

But that's not what this is. It tries to make us believe this is real, that this really is a meet cute. That somehow, Chris's insane level of infatuation is so undeniably attractive that Maw (ick) a.k.a. Elaine can't help but to fall for his knight in shining armor routine.

There's no possibility of romance in this situation. It's an action scene with a surprising twist, and that's great if you let it be that. It almost makes up for it at the end, and that ending is what this entire premise is hooked on, and it might have worked if you'd just let us get there without all the tongue-pretzeling and her throwing herself at him. If you'd left it at a simple acknowledgement that he's just her type of crazy, even just giving him her name, something to hint that they might eventually end up together, then all that happens between their meeting and that ending. She could have dipped her finger in his bleeding shoulder and written her email address down on his shirt to better play into the red requirement, and he could have been grinning through the pain. Anything but the "passion" that is entirely unearned.

Great premise, and even though it would be next to impossible to film it's worth rewriting to get the beats right and perhaps making something longer from it.

Hi Writer,

Not bad. This one was different.

You should introduce right off the bat that we are in the middle of a bank robbery, I think you tried to go for the surprise effect, but since this is already in the logline it wasn't as surprising as confusing.

I'm still not sure why Chris falls in love with Elaine. I know he explains it to Andrew at the beginning, but it didn't work for me, not as it is, I'm not sure why…

Chris says some inappropriate things, but I wouldn't say he's a womanizer. Actually, that wasn't bad, I liked the character more than if he was one…

Not sure about the dashes. I'm not against them, but not a fan either.

I'm with Jeff about the montage, remove it - you won't lose anything.

Okay, the end wasn’t bad. It surprised me and I liked the irony of it.

Overall - a fun read, decently written and entertaining, but short on the romance. It would benefit from a cleanup.

Good job, writer.

Nice premise, let’s see what we’ve got.

Whoa, easy on the dashes.

Knowing the logline, I really like how this opens.

Hard to reveal they are basically naked after all that talking though.  Must have been a really tight shot of just their faces?

Harvey cracking jokes at the old lady’s expense seems unlikely, but it’s your script.

Sorry but I hate this innuendo talk from Chris while MAW is hassling him. it's not funny enough to fit.

Ah, it’s just a guy telling a fantastical story to his co-workers.  I literally won one of these challenges with the exact same set-up.

Sure, this one was solid. Like I said, it was very similar to something I wrote so I guess I have to like it on that principle, no?