Necessary Means by Chazz Christopher - Action, Adventure - After a newly-retired Green Beret survives an assassination attempt, he slowly uncovers a massive political conspiracy, with the help of the Green Beret recruit who was the cause for his retirement. 115 pages - pdf, format

I look forward to hearing Dreamscale's ripping apart of this one.  : )  I say that respectfully - we've cleared the air, I think.

Seriously, though - this one is out to a coupla handfuls of producers and I would love to get some thoughts on the opening 10-15.  And, if you have time to read the whole thing, then perfect!

Chazz

Hey Chazz,

Good to hear that you and Dreamscale are on good terms.  I think you two are more alike than you may believe.  

I'm only going to read the first 10-15 for now (I'm a bit tight on time at the moment) but I will return to finish up the rest.

On the first page you introduce a bedroom and a woman, but you don't clue us in WHERE she is.  Only a minor problem, but I had to guess that she was in bed because a hand was tussling her hair.  Am I correct in assuming this?

I like your use of sound over the images.  Good opening to the film, and a good contrast of the violence to the softness of the images.  However, you use the word SOUND a lot in that paragraph, all capitalized, one per sentence.  Maybe a note could work better?  This is just an opinion; others may like it this way.

Next is the action scene with Marshall.  Your action paragraphs are really well written; I was never confused with what was happening.  Everything was laid out for me.

On page three, Marshall says "Where did you goqqtsz?"  I'm guessing this was a weird seizure on the keyboard or something?
On the same topic, on page nine you have an empty parenthetical underneath some dialogue.  Not a big problem, but just makes the script look less professional.

You also have some good exposition in here.  The confrontation between Marshall and Shaw reveals a lot about both characters.  The same with Mason Jones later.

I'll stop there for now.  Only a few minor complaints in an otherwise clean read!

Gage

AJ,

Thanks for reading the first 15.

The draft here was amended before it went out - but by the time I realized the problems with this one, it'd already gone up on SS here, and it takes so long for it to actually post, I just decided to let it get posted and take it from there.  I think my 20 month old must have done a bit of typing.  There are a couple of other places in this PDF later on where there's literally just 2 or 3 keys that were held down.  Either she did it or a demon ghost did it.

Or maybe Dreamscale did.  : )

And yes I think I recognize the similarities between the two of us.  Not sure he'd claim to be anything like my weirdness.

Anyway, thanks for reading.  Glad the action is written okay - that has been one of my toughest struggles.  I tend to overwrite (In fact, I am pretty sure there's a couple of places in this script that are still overwritten - I just, for the life of me, can't figure out how to make it tighter).

Chazz

Nate,

I choose to do what I choose to do, on purpose.  As far as what I write: I really only have 2 genres that I write in: comedy and action/thriller.  No sci fi yet.

In fact, my newest script I'm working on isn't *really* a sci fi, it's more post-apocalyptic...it's sci fi, I guess - in that it talks about 300 years from now and suggest alternatives to how life might be post-nuclear war - but it's more futuristic action/thriller/epic.  Falling squarely within the two things I think I can write: comedy and action/thriller.

Chazz

Quoted from nastynate Not to be a dick, but who wants to listen to The Clash "Lost In The Supermarket" right now?

How would that be being a dick?

And no - never been a big fan of the Clash.

Chazz

Ahh, gotcha.

No, you're not being a dick.  Go back to drinking.  It does a body good.

Chazz

Exciting news!  This went out to producers a few days ago & we got our first coverage back: a 'recommend'!  Granted it's the first step in a process but to get a recommend is encouraging & exciting!  Fingers crossed for a possible option/sell!

Chazz

All righty - so this script got a reader recommend and the producer himself is reading the script this weekend.  This producer is a big shot - his list of hit movies isn't a mile long (it's not Jerry Bruckheimer) but he's produced 12 movies that I've seen - and another 10 I've heard of but not seen.  He can get this movie made.

He's willing to read a new draft if I can get it to him.  I'm about 2/3 of the way through a massive overhauling, taking into consideration some notes I've gotten from peer reviews and a couple of pro coverages I've paid for and gotten, plus notes from a producer friend who doesn't have means to get a 50-80 million dollar movie done himself, but is a working indie producer.

Are there 2 or 3 here who'd exchange full reviews in the next couple of days?  I need the rewrite done by Friday.  If you can read my script and give a review/coverage, I will return the favor next week on a script of yours.

Any takers?  I should have this draft done by this evening.  working furiously!

Chazz

Hey Chazz - I've had this on the side burner for a while now, but I haven't had time to commit to a proper read, but somethings did bug me on it so I thought I'd sound them out.

First, congrats on your Talentville position - top three for July.

I'm just going to go for how I see this - I know you've got coverage and everything, but I have to go in blind.

So first time I read it -- I thought maybe you were aiming for a B-movie angle. If you weren't, then that ain't good & I apologize, but it just had Steven Seagal written all over it. Now going by the average Seagal production budget, it's no bad thing to get hooked up to writing one of his gigs, but it's cash over kudos. Fine by me, but not everyone's cup o' tea.

Second time I read it (and we're not going over fifteen pages here) -- it just felt like it was --- too basic. The macho end is a little done to death. I just felt there wasn't that much complexity and story development in the early stages. You can get a macho element over in two paragraphs, but we have to wait until page 6 until we get anything interesting (Nelson). I even get the Shaw element, but if everything had been cut back some, couldn't that have been brought in by p3?

So tons of respect on where this is going -- I think maybe you're putting some impressive markers down, and I think maybe you do have the skills to make it -- I'm just not convinced that this is going to be your seminal piece.

Good luck with it though & all the best with everything else you're working on.

Simon

Simon,

Thanks for reading man.  

I actually completely agree with you on the B-movie thing!  It actually always really bugged me, too!

I wrote the draft that is up here in less than a week, inspired after reading The Disciple Program.  Then I put it up on a couple of places and it got basic kudos because it has a couple of things going for it (at least this is my opinion): stakes are high and the goals are strong.

But the way that one pro coverage guy put it: there's a lot of good PLOT (stuff that happens) but not enough STORY (how the characters react to the PLOT).  I don't know if that makes sense to you, but it made sense to my brain.  And it clicked.

Then also, I got pro coverage from an actual producer who really pointed out some errors with the first act and how I handle the characters there.

The problem is that I have a ton of action, but you don't really ever see how the characters react.

So, with my current draft (unposted here yet) - the first act really focuses on the characters and more logically connects the dots of how we get to the inciting event and the break into two.

I also could not agree with you more on the "basic" level.  I wrote it quick and just have not had time to go back to it and really spend time with it.  Once the readers gave it a recommend (How?  I have no clue, but I'll take it) it gave me the kick in the pants to really focus on how to break it out of "B-movie" basic and make it into something that Tom Cruise or someone of that magnitude would want as a star vehicle.

The response I'm getting from a couple of writers I trust and the producer (not the main one whose readers recommended) who has been reading subsequent re-writes is that it's WAY better than it was.

So, all that to say - you are right.  And I've made it better.

Chazz

Great news about the recommend!

Here is the latest draft:

Necessary Means 8.4.12

I think it's taken several steps up.  Still needs some work...but it's getting closer.

Chazz

So, here's what's going on:

The producer is apparently in the midst of a big production and will get to this in a couple of weeks.  But...the new version got another Recommend, with higher marks, from the producer's reader.  So that's encouraging.

More to come, as it comes.

Chazz

Ok, I'm sorry to say this but for me the dialogue in the first few pages has a tendency to slip into cliche - some of those lines have been lifted straight out of the action-movie corpus without any addition of self-aware twist or irony that I can pick up on...

MARSHALL
What’s with the shit they call recruits these days?

Spielman turns and looks over his shoulder, sees Shaw and his friends punching each other on the arm.

SPIELMAN
You were the same. I remember thinking, ‘Who’s this little shit?’ the first time I saw your skinny ass.

MARSHALL
I had respect.

SPIELMAN
You can’t bullshit me, Marshall! I was there! Been your C.O. off and on for what - twenty-five years?

MARSHALL
Six. Twenty-six years.

SPIELMAN
Time flies. Listen to me - you’venever had respect for anything but what you thought was truth.

MARSHALL
Truth is, I don’t know what the hell I was fighting for half the time.

And I'm really sorry to say that because the writing style itself is great stuff, if I could steal your narrative voice I would - it's all spagged up, pleasant on the ear/eye,  and gets me right in the scene. If there was some magic evil soul stealing ritual, the blood would be dripping over my keyboard as I type because bejezus it's the voice thing I can't do...

Admittedly my little battered comp is struggling with the scribl site and I haven't read past the firt 10 pages, if there's any chance of a pdf I could download and read through in entirety I'd be interested to see how it develops later.

Although it sounds like you're getting loads of feedback already. Kudos for getting it seen.