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I liked this up until the explanation is given for the adventure. It’s fun, and it had one of the best visuals I’ve seen in a while, with the kid rolling towards the sewer grate while a dog is popping his jacket.
It’s well-written and meets all the criteria, but two things sort of nag at me — Barton kind of comes across as a bit of a perv, and why would he risk the boys getting hurt by the dog? I guess that’s part of the adventure, but I’d want to maybe see some of that cleaned up if there was a rewrite.
Also, I’m afraid to ask what the adventure would be in the forbidden mountains.
Still good job here.
Some of my scripts:
Bounty (TV Pilot) -- Top 1% of discoverable screenplays on Coverfly I'll Be Seeing You (short) - OWC winner The Gambler (short) - OWC winner Skip (short) - filmed Country Road 12 (short) - filmed The Family Man (short) - filmed The Journeyers (feature) - optioned
Just past those two hairy boulders and there it is the Rod of Life.
Some of my scripts:
Bounty (TV Pilot) -- Top 1% of discoverable screenplays on Coverfly I'll Be Seeing You (short) - OWC winner The Gambler (short) - OWC winner Skip (short) - filmed Country Road 12 (short) - filmed The Family Man (short) - filmed The Journeyers (feature) - optioned
It starts off slow and awkward. And you have a character named Puffy. I was against liking this. The setup is weak too, but with 5 pages to work with I bought into it.
The sewer hardly seemed like a sewer, but it served its purpose and it did connect to the other location, so okay, I'll buy that too.
I like the kooky angle with the dog whistle (nicely done making the whistle something different!) and stealing the "golden chalice", even though it was just a mug. I liked the spitting the dog whistle out, that make me smile. I liked that Puffy's weakness was turned into a strength and he was perfectly prepared for the dog attack. That was a nice sequence.
What I don't buy into is the ending. I wish Barton had been pulling a prank on one of his neighbours or something. Maybe stealing back a disputed trophy, or taking someone's favourite cup and adding it to his collection of "lost" items. You could even set that up with a lost poster in the beginning. Anything but what we got. His setting the boys up for "adventure" by making them walk through a sewer and get full-on attacked by a dog that was legit trying to bite them just doesn't work with the tone of the rest, and that he's doing it because he's lonely makes even less sense since they only spent minutes with him.
A couple of good characters, Dexter was flat. There certainly is a story here, and it isn't bad, it just needs a better setup and ending.
I enjoyed this one. A lighthearted adventure with some funny moments.
The "marshmallow" intro didn't work for me, I'd suggest changing that. At first, I thought Puffy was a dog or something like that, took me a moment to realize he was a person.
The bubble wrap was a nice touch, but you should introduce it before. It comes a little out of the blue imho.
Apart from that, I liked the characters and the dialogue. The story is rather simple, but at 5 pages, I'm not going to ask for more. It's okay.
There was a sewer, a whistle and some comedy, so criteria was met.
This is one of my favorites so far. The title screams adventure . If I wrote this myself word for word. I couldn’t have came up with that title in a million years. It made me think Indiana Jones for some reason.
The bicycle scene was good. Made me remember when I was a kid and would be riding and the chain would fly off. It was time to take it in for maintenance. Would get WD-40 and handful of my dads tools and get to it.
Puffy really stole the show in this script. Poor kid with that many anxieties. I laughed when he opened the box. You gonna tell a kid something’s magic and don’t open until. Yeah right it’s getting opened first thing.
I thought it worked well how you had Barton exaggerate the conditions. He talked like they was going on a Indian Jones crusade . Barton is good at is craft. He must be loaded throwing hundreds around. Another really good relatable spot. Feel sorry for him because he has to bribe kids just to have a little human interaction. I think he made the story up for himself, for his imagination. Cause he knew he would have to bribe them. Plus some older people get child like in their mind. He can’t trudge the mines. So he has to live vicariously through them.
I’m glad to see Puffy step up to the plate. With his anxiety level ,he went wayyy out his comfort zone taking on the beast. Actually his fear saved his butt. Thank goodness for bubble wrap.
Wrapped in bubble wrap, brought a smile to my face - Puffy opening the box against instruction - another smile.
You have set Puffy up as being scared of everything but he got down in the sewer willingly enough - I guess the space we have on the page didn't allow for this tidbit of character development.
If I was to guess... and that's pretty much all I do in my reviews... I would say your first draft was over the 5-page limit and you had to do some chopping - there are moments and sentences which show signs of being hacked at.
and we circle back to the bubble wrap.... well done, I enjoyed that.
I appreciate the ending, but for me personally, it was a bit of a letdown... I quite liked the idea of a crazy old man sending kids on some kind of treasure hunt - the expectation vs reality angle - expectation = big adventure, treasure. reality = sewer, shitty cup. It was nice, but the old man wasn't crazy ... he was doing something he thought was nice for the kids... I don't know how I wanted it to end really... I'll stop talking now.
Wait a sec... he is a crazy old man, who the fuck sends kids into the backyard of a savage dog for fun?... he's a bit sadistic, and he watches them? there's some creepy undertones here lol
Nicely written and polished, you know what you are doing when it comes to screenwriting - the story was sweet but would benefit from being longer (like quite a few entries) to develop the characters.
What a great character Puffy is. A hundred-dollars seems like a lot of money to be offering kids--that’s grown-up money. Two points you might want to look at: 1) Barton revealing it was all a setup. This takes away from the boys’ sense of accomplishment, and 2) To prove his new-found confidence, maybe Puffy asks Barton if he has any more adventures in the offing.
I'm so happy I read to the end, otherwise all would have been lost. A nice veil of illusion you draped over the story but some of it was distracting (e.g. not showing us that he was wearing bubblewrap to explain the pops). A nice little adventure story with great characters and imagination.