Thanks very much for taking the time to read it over and critique it. Lot's of really useful pointers in there for me.
I'll keep at it and while I may not perfect the craft I should improve given enough practice.

Cheers

Owen

Quoted from Geezis Thanks very much for taking the time to read it over and critique it. Lot's of really useful pointers in there for me. I'll keep at it and while I may not perfect the craft I should improve given enough practice. Cheers Owen

My pleasure

I'm gonna jump in too, Owen - hope you don't mind. I'll try not to repeat what Dave has already mentioned. (Note, I'm an amateur too, just trying to pass on what I have learnt so far from others)

You seem willing to learn and open to criticism, which already puts you a step ahead of a lot of people.

Quoted Text EXT. OUTSIDE TOM’S HOUSE - MORNING. TOM (47) meticulously waxes his car.

Don't forget to set up the scene. Not simply just what we are looking it, but think of the scene as another "character" - you can infer tone and emotion and put the reader in the right mindset for the rest of the scene. weather is always the easiest example;
Pissing it down with rain or clear blue skies will set a different tone (if it's needed). Try and link it to the narrative, for example - if you are building up the scene for something bad to happen at its climax, you could have dark clouds on the horizon - a looming storm - that's a bit on the nose I know but just trying to make my point lol

The scene could also help to reveal details about the characters - for example, "Tom's House" tells me nothing about it:
Detached with a well-manicured lawn and white-picket-fence?
Inner-city terraced with a rusting old fridge on the lawn?
Seeing a characters house immediately gives us an insight into their character before we have even seen them on-screen.

The most obvious reason to set up the scene is, we need to know what we are looking at - for a read to be enjoyable and engrossing, the reader needs to be able to visualize your story easily.

Moving on - The positives.

There are a lot of positives from your simple scene;
- The dialogue (although often unnatural - which comes with practice) contains conflict from the start, heightens the tensions between the two.
- It gives the characters a goal (obtain the car), and sets up the problem (dad says no!)
- Conflict! builds throughout the scene until the climax (kid storming off, failed to achieve his goal)
- It's not a dead end. attempt to get the goal has failed, but he is not back where he started. The ending note of the scene (Convincing dad to give him a lift) leads on to the next scene

Since we don't know the larger story here - we can't comment - but a scene should ultimately drive to narrative forward (a step closer/further from a goal) it needs to be fundamental to the larger story - if a scene can be cut and the story still makes sense, that's a sign it's not needed.

Heighten the drama with action to complement the dialogue. none of this "Tom is angry" "Tom is Sad"
- Tom slams the waxing cloth onto the bonnet
- Tom's head drops, fidgets with the waxing cloth
Try and use action as much as possible to convey these things. It's the subtle nuances that bring us deeper into a story, makes it feel real and lived in.

That's all I got time for - Remember I'm an amateur, so you know, a pinch of salt and all that.

Best of luck to you

Hi Matthew,

Thank you very much for your input, everything that everyone gives me has been valuable to my learning experience.

I was given a remit for the scene, a father and son argue over a car.
So I wrote it in 10 mins and put it on the site.

Even the few lines and pages that I wrote has had some great pointers given to me and I'm sure I'll keep on improving.

Cheers

Owen

Why don't you add a littke more description for  each character.To visualize and process what they look like?