Woohooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooo!

I'm not going to waste my time writing a bunch of stupid notes on a bloody gude script.  

I love it so much!!!! And you made my day!!!!

There's a few typos. Even ones I absolutely enjoyed.

Like-

The Taylor on page 8. Dang it on that Find/Replace all. Gets us every time.

Here,

>SLICK
Ok..Ray, you stay in the car,
keep it running. Antonio, go
take a dump. I'll handle things
here.

Made me laugh so hard, but I was laughing throughout the entire script.

Here, I'd almost forgotten about him:

EXT. COLORADO RIVER - DAY

Remnants of the Kenworth and Rx-7 litter the water.
Suddenly, Slick breaks the surface, gasping for breath.
He swims tiredly across the current, to a pebbly beach.
He crawls out, lies panting. His body is battered and
bruised.

SLICK
(whispers)
Won't...get
away...from...me...that easily...
He rolls over, stares up the sides of the Canyon. It's all
calm, serene...

**As luck would have it:

>The medic gets in, attaches an IV drip to the patient...
Slick. Reynolds and Taylor are kissing, so don't notice him.

**

Oh Stevie, you don't even know what a joy you brought to my day. I just laughed and laughed and laughed and laughed. And Michael knows how that can go.

Really, I could probably dig deep and find some kind of errors, but I see no need for that at all. The only problem I see is that your set up in the beginning with the tone needs to be fixed so that we know what we're in for. Fix this to grab attention and you'll have her beat.

This script delivers!!! Major!!! Big Time!!! And I would definitely recommend it to anyone.

Way to go!!! I am so very proud of the fact that a writer like you is with me in virtual space here on Simply.

You get 7



And another

11



Sandra

Sandra, thanks for the kind word and the PM. Its made MY day that you had a grouse time reading it!
I know it has a lot of faults that can hammered out but its great that you dig it as is.

Jeff and Jonny...wow, this is feedback of the highest calibre! Imagine you guys were directors fighting over Headlong - awesome!

I've been thinking about it overnight. I don't really see myself doing a serious version - maybe at a later date. I'm gonna sit on the script for a few weeks, let it freshen up in my head a bit. Thanks for all the wonderful tips!

I mentioned in the 2010 goals thread that I wanted to try a horror script - maybe I could turn Headlong into a zombie story...

Cheeers to all.

NO ZOMBIE STORY, Stevie!  NO!!!!!!

Quoted from Dreamscale NO ZOMBIE STORY, Stevie!  NO!!!!!!

Not even a zombie hitch hiker the boys pick up? Perhaps he could have the 3 mill in a tattered backpack from Hell.  It would still be a comedy.

Quoted from stevie I don't really see myself doing a serious version - maybe at a later date. I'm gonna sit on the script for a few weeks, let it freshen up in my head a bit. I mentioned in the 2010 goals thread that I wanted to try a horror script - maybe I could turn Headlong into a zombie story... Cheeers to all.

Stevie,

Please-please-please don't ever write a serious HEADLONG script.

Here's some inspiration on a zombie theme:

A zombie and Frankenstein dance to I Feel Fine with new lyrics inserted below. Te-he.





Zombie Girl and Karmic Frankenstein

Zombie's good to me you know
She's happy as can be you know
She said so
I'm in love; I'm Karmic Frankenstein

Zombie says she's mine you know
She tells me all the time you know
She said so
I'm in love with her and I feel fine

She's so glad
She's telling all the world
That her baby buys her ribbons you know
To wrap herself in topped a bow
She said so

I'm in love; I'm Karmic Frankenstein
I'm so glad that she's my zombie girl
She's so glad
That ghouls will rule the world

And Frankie buys her things you know
He takes her to the Rocky Horror picture show
She said so
Zombie girl and Karmic Frankenstein



Sandra

Sandra, that is magnificent! Top song by the boys too. The first use of feedback ever.

I had a few zombie ideas that would be seperate from Headlong.
One was having the Beatles landing in New York on that historic day in 1964, and the city is gripped in a zombie outbreak. Could be an amusing short...

Another was a full blown zombie epic, in which the last surving humans escape to the past in a time machine, only for a couple of zombies to be sucked through with them. Then you could have all this mayhem occurring in different eras - the Middle Ages, WW2, etc. Dunno, just some random thoughts.

FORGET THE FRICKIN' ZOMBIES!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!


ARGH!!!!!!

Sorry bud, but it's zombie collab time for you and this little black duck. I'll get some stuff written tonight and send 'em over.

Quoted from stevie Sandra, that is magnificent! Top song by the boys too. The first use of feedback ever. I had a few zombie ideas that would be seperate from Headlong. One was having the Beatles landing in New York on that historic day in 1964, and the city is gripped in a zombie outbreak. Could be an amusing short... Another was a full blown zombie epic, in which the last surving humans escape to the past in a time machine, only for a couple of zombies to be sucked through with them. Then you could have all this mayhem occurring in different eras - the Middle Ages, WW2, etc. Dunno, just some random thoughts.

You've got me really excited!!! I can't think of anything more glorious right now than The Beatles meets The Zombies!!!  

Sandra

This was a fun ride. I must say I enjoyed this quite a bit but there is room for some improvement here and there. A lot of things that I noted have already been mentioned so bear with me.

First off, it seems far fetched that the criminals would hide the money in any old RV in hope that someone doesn't rent it. They wouldn't take that chance. Maybe you should change it so that the RV they hide it in is an old one that's falling apart, or a horrible colour so they think nobody would possibly rent it and their money would be safe  for the time being.

It’s obvious that the characters are the main problem here. I agree with the others that Tommy sounds exactly like an adult and it is staggering that Andrea is not involved romantically in any way with the Aussie brothers. I had also noted word for word what Jonny said, the brothers are the exact same except only one of them likes the Beatles. You need to work on them so their personalities are different. I’ve got mixed feelings about Jack and Rose. I didn’t like their fascination about Titanic, but I thought the scene with the Celine Dion song playing was hilarious. They did play a part in the ending but I’m 50/50 if they should stay or go. I thought some of the Jaws quotes were funny but I’ve never seen Supernatural so that all went over my head. I too think that you should make them quote from different famous movies and make the quote fit in with the conversation at the time, there’s potential for some more funny moments.

My main problem was with the bad guys. Slick letting Corey go was kind of weak. They don't have to kill him after he tells them the information, but maybe he could get his guys to beat him up badly, you know, just something to show us they mean business early in the script. I know there is no violence but you could even have this happen off screen. Show us what lengths he will go to for this money. The other two disappeared fairly quickly and had zero impact. Then you switch the focus to Steakhouse and co, who never really convinced me they were bad or clever enough to steal the money from the brothers. Then Slick returned for the finale when I thought you had forgotten all about him. I also noted that I was confused by your character description for Slick. You described him as a hefty man, which I thought was more than a few pounds overweight. Yet, he’s some sort of karate expert. This didn’t fit for me.

Your writing was fine, spare a few typos and grammar issues. The story made me laugh. That’s the important thing. Work on your characters and this can only get better. Congratulations for completing the challenge on time! Good Job.

Happy New Year!

Brian

Hi Brian. Thnaks for the read and kind words.
I've been doing some brainstorming the last few days, seeing how I will change things in this.
I'm defintely gonna cut Henry. out and the jaws quotes. i had planned to make Andrea a romantic interest - and the earlier scenes hinted at it - but i couldn't arsed as it was gonna get in the way of the script's fast pace. Also it was getting too long!
I had thought of ditching her altogether, and having just Tommy and Pop. Or make andrea a real tough sort of chick, who could be even a bit scary to handle.

Um, just  some quick points - Corey is panicing at the start and just hides the money in the nearest spot - he plans to come back and get it asap. I did have an idea that the RV is an old wreck the boys get as part of a dead relative's estate or something - they find the money in there with maybe a dead body attached to it?
also had another(silly?) idea that the boys pick up a zombie hiker early on, with the money in a backpack. they get rid of him, find the money, the signal activates and the chase is on. I want to set the scene early for the zaniniess to follow.

anyway, I'm gonna let it sit for awhile and get back to it. cheers again Brian.

Here's some pics of the RV that inspired Headlong. It was a 1979 Ford Econovan I bought in L.A in 1997 and drove across the States to New York, over three months in 1997.
We did 11,000 miles and didn't have any real trouble with it. The RV was named PLUGGER, after former AFL champion Tony Lockett.

This is at Mission Bay, SanDiego.

Zion National Park, Utah.

  Gettysburg Battlefield National Park.

Cape Cod.

These pics are taken with the 'old' film cameras - remember them?!

Sweet stuff, Stevie! Ah, the memories, huh?

2010 is around the corner, in this corner of the world.  Hope it plays out better than the Hell Hole that was 2009...and 2008...and 2007...and...ah fuck, let's just hope it's a BIGGIE!

Happy New Year!

Happy New Year to you too, buddy. Hope it goes well for you.

Yo, Stevie my man.

First of all, congrats on finishing your 7-week-feature, that in itself is impressive. Second, I’ve got some stuff to say about your script – most of it will not be nice unfortunately – but I mean well and hopefully you’ll find it helpful (remember, this is just my humble opinion – it’s neither right nor wrong).

I had a real problem with finishing this script. The first 50-60 pages dragged on forever, even though you set up the plot pretty quick (or at least what I thought the plot would be). It did get a little better toward the end but at that point I had simply lost interest. Somewhere during the writing of this script, you fell in love with weirdos and you just couldn’t stop bringing in more of them. Granted, some of them were funny – for a while – but most of them just destroyed your story.

The biggest problem I had with the story was I didn’t know where you were going with it. What was the plot? What was the hook? Had you focused on the chase then it could have worked but the brothers didn’t know that they were being chased for the better part of the script so there was never any real tension to it. Instead you bring in all these weird characters that serve no purpose other than making a mess of the plot and sidetracking everything. A good chase flick should be a straight road with a shitload of speed bumps. This, on the other hand, felt like you were stuck in a roundabout.

Right from the get-go, in the opening scene, I had a huge problem with the fact that case had a tracking devise on it…but still Slick and his crew had no idea where it was. It really felt like a waste of time for them to interrogate the car-rental guy – because all they learned was some info that we (the readers) already knew. This “plothole” (if you can call it that) really marred the rest of the script for me because it made the whole point of the chase seem…stupid.

Another problem I had was the dialogue – not nessecarily the dialogue itself but the sheer amount of it, specifically the sheer amount of the dialogue that led nowhere. Pretty much every scene in this script ran too long, mostly because of everyone constantly commenting on everything that was going on when really no dialogue was needed. It was like these guys and gals were always trying to get one last word in before the scene ended. That’s a big no-no. Get in late, leave early. Granted, exposition is needed once in a while to further the plot development but keep it short, keep it tight – no need to have characters explain what can be shown.

This little scene from page 22, while being far from the only one, clearly demonstrates the problem:

Quoted from Headlong INT. RV - CONTINUOUS Brent sees Slick's RV move across his path.            BRENT       What the...? Fair enough – I would probably react the same way            JASON       Same model as this one. Your first reaction to a pending crash would be what kind of car you’re about to crash into? Jason should really not talk in this scene.            TOMMY       He's trying to block us! We’ve got eyes, kid. Tommy shouldn’t talk either            BRENT       Shit, we're gonna... Duh!

All you really need in the said scene is this:

Quoted from Headlong INT. RV - CONTINUOUS Brent sees Slick's RV move across his path.                     BRENT       What the...? He slams his foot to the metal. The RV hurtles towards the shrinking gap between Slick's RV and the fence.

Too many things are just explained to death. Take the med-side effects for example, when Brent asks Tommy about the side effects, Tommy should just say: “Wait and see” – why spoil it? On a related note, I liked the Jaws quotes as a gimmick, but they don’t work at all because none of them actually mean anything within the context of the specific scenes. The Vampire/Supernatural stuff though? Forgetaboutit. Lose it as fast as you can.

In respect of characters, yeah, you’ve got a lot. Not a problem in itself if the characters had been either a) interesting or b) plot-relevant (or preferably both). Yeah, some of them were interesting – or could have been – but most of them were just there for sake of being there. Lose Henry immediately. Why was he even in it? He does nothing for the story. Same can be said for Jack and Rose and that Matt Damon lookalike guy – they add nothing to the story that would even remotely justify their existence – yes, they could be interesting characters if they had any bearing on the plot, instead of just being along for the ride. If you really wanna make me happy you’ll lose Pop too, and if you lose him we can finally get rid of Tommy and Andrea. Tommy talks and carries himself like he’s 20 – and I don’t care for his line about “he’s 12 and knows everything”. BS. 12-year olds know nothing about anything. Andrea, while being a cardboard cut-out, could actually work if, you know, you gave her something to do. Others have mentioned making her a love interest and I think that would be a nice way of making her interesting. Obviously that would require a resculptering of the brothers – something you need to do regardless, cos’ Brason (yeah, I couldn’t tell Brent or Jason apart) are as dull and under developed as they come. These are your main characters – your leading men, but the only thing they were leading me to was to sleep. Please, you need to make these guys interesting in an either cool, bad-ass or funny kind of way – then add some conflict between them.

Road trip movies – at least the good ones (Planes, Trains & Automobiles, Midnight Run, Little Miss Sunshine) – always focus on the personal conflict of the main character(s). Sure, there’s a lot of stuff going on around them but the goal is always for them to solve some personal stuff. In your script, the main focus is on the stuff around them which ultimately means that there’s no real growth to these guys. This also means that they end up like they started – an adventure richer, sure - but still the same ol’ guys.

Then you have the Tranny, the Spick and the Tub of Lard, Reynolds, The Fabs and God knows how many others. To me, all of them were pointless in the context of the current story…or at least what I perceive the story to be.

Btw. why is Pepita constantly saying “Merde”? “Merde” is French. “Mierda” is Spanish.

But, hey, if you’re satisfied with the script as is, Stevie, then please disregard what I’ve written. If you want to turn this into something worth reading, then I think you need to go back to the drawing board. You already have the hook – the chase for the money – keep that, focus on that but please stay away from all the things that doesn’t drive the story forward. And add some conflict. Conflict is king.

Sorry, Stevie, but this just didn’t work for me AT ALL. I wish I could be a little more positive about it, because you obviously put in a lot of work here and I hate to put it down, but as a whole it just didn’t reach me.

Anyway, I want to congratulate you on finishing another feature but, like I said, this one imo. needs a lot of work.

Cheers
Rob