Hi James, glad my notes have given you some food for thought! That house looks perfect - very creepy. I'm looking forward to seeing your trailer when it's finished. Great logo too!!

Hey James,

Before I start, just thought I’d let you know I haven’t read any of the other reviews/comments beforehand to avoid spoilers and frankly there’s a lot of posts to go through, so sorry if I repeat some of what others have already said.

I really thought your intro was intense and quite tragic. It’s definitely a grabber but upon finishing the script – I didn’t see the relevance to the overall story? I mean, I see how Walter actually died but Walter doesn’t really play a prominent role in your story so I was a little confused as to why your opening was heavily focused on this ship/disaster.

I really like reading character descriptions and feel you kind of didn’t really include all that much for Jane, let alone anything for Tom (other than his age, 34). I feel they’re set up as your protags so they should get a little more “description”.

This was definitely a slow burn – Jane and Tom weren’t really introduced to the witch living in their well until page 32. That’s fine with me, I usually trooper through slow burns, love them, but you might lose your audience. You really didn’t have anything “scary” or anything up until that point. I was unsure when the horror element was going to take place.

Page 32 – Haha. When Mark tells the story about the witch. Dude, I loved the idea of a psychotic witch “jumping” around wells into people’s homes and murdering them. Very frightening image to put into people’s heads. This was great.

Page 45-49 – I thought Aunt Bee’s “big scene” was pretty intense and written well. This is what I was definitely waiting for. You also introduced a POV through the witch. At first I was like hmmm interesting, I pictured it like “Evil Dead” POV through the woods. I appreciated it in a way – different because we rarely see a POV through a supernatural entity like this. Nice touch.

Page 53-60 – Terrifying stuff. Really. You killed off the sickly child’s father! Lol. Killing off one of your protags is really ballsy. I like ballsy moves like this. He was likeable but you had Jane as backup and she was a fine backup. I especially like how you had his head bounce around on the stairs.

Page 74/75 – Dialogue about brick dust seems verbatim as in “The Skeleton Key”. You may want to change it up a bit.

Page 76 – So they go through all the trouble to convince and even get the mayor to buy the house and they move into the house but they just suddenly convince themselves she doesn’t exist? Just like that?? Ehhhhhhhhhhhhh

Also I didn’t understand why the witch had to kill James’ bartender? Also I’m not even sure I understood the whole family back story with James and Safiyah and how the witch really played into their lives.
The thought the ending in the hospital was suspenseful and fun to read. No complaints really.

There are some things I’m still “huh” on but I’m sure I’ll it another read to see if I caught everything or hell – I’ll read the 105 posts/comments on this thread and see what I discover.

Decent read James. Great writing and format too, imo.

Oney

Oney,

A big apology from me for such a late response. Am always hugely thankful for a read, especially a feature. It takes me hours. So thank you, I just haven't been that busy about the boards of late.

I'm glad you liked most of this. I also enjoy a slow burn, but will admit I could've done a heck of a lot more with the pages I now feel were wasted.

No need to read the other comments, you were pretty spot on as to what others have said. I even dropped a couple of bucks for coverage and this failed there for many of the same reasons.

I've had a clear mindset of how to rewrite this for several months now, I just haven't brought myself to it. I do plan to tie in the boat scene better, many said to pitch it, but I'm not. I think with todays technology they could actually do a scene like that at a fair budget.

James' backstory and involvement with the family was clear as a bell... In my head. It didn't come out that way on paper.

This was my first attempt at a feature. It might be a little too personal. My actual hometown and some of my hard-edged philosophies on religion are displayed here.

I see you have a feature on the boards and have been doing some reading. I will try to get around to it soon. Thanks again!

James