Dustin,

Opened this last night. Had no idea it was you, but once I did I read some. Youve offered me some advice so quid pro quo. I got only to page seven before  I turned in for the night, but one lingering thing that bothered me was this: your transitioning of your action blocks to mesh into a full slug, then continuing on the next action block.

I've never seen this quite the way you do it. I've seen it with mini slugs, but never a full slug. I guess you're trying to experiment here and maybe do it a way no one has. At least I've never seen it that way.

My opinion is I think it detracted from the read and interrupted your flow.

Your opinion?

Steve

The only time I change to a full slug is when transitioning from outside to inside.

For example a car. Before one gets in the car they are EXT. and yet upon entering they are INT.

Mini-slugs are simply large slugs made miniature, they are still, for all intents and purposes, a full slug and should be read as such. They also only work when interchanging between scenes that run off a main scene. I'm not sure using a mini slug to switch from an interior to exterior is the right move.

So, if it ruins the flow rather than enhance it, which is my true aim, then perhaps the scenes where I transition from into and out of a car for example can be better written so as not to flow into each other.

Personally though, I simply read over the EXT and INT... kinda push them to the side. I don't think that it would be something that would put off a producer.

Cheers mate.

(Still reading the script in the crack of an 80 hour work week. Almost finished.)

I think you're right that the story is more important than the sluglines. In the end a good story is a good story. But anything that interrupt the even even slightly can detract. Maybe it's a very simple solution: Instead of:

"Alan climbs into his

INT. ALAN'S CAR - DAY"

Just try -

"Alan climbs into

INT. ALAN'S CAR - DAY"

Just seems to flow better.

You mentioned that you were putting a lot more effort into the characters on this script. I think it's paying off, especially since there are so many, everyone needs a unique voice and memorable personality. I do admit though, there were points were I got a bit lost character wise. (Reading in multiple sittings didn't help, so maybe it's no big deal)

Couple of small details:

Page 33 -  "Nathan smiles and leaves the room." should that be Alan?

How big of a rock can a crow carry? I've seen one carry a slice of pizza once...

I love the flame thrower. Daphne's crow punching is great too. Can't wait to see what else the villagers come up with. Baseball bat?

Thanks for the review. Yeah there is definitely work to do on this one so don't pull punches. I would probably chop out a lot of the beginning on this... which is probably a fault in a lot of my scripts. I could easily jump straight into the story but I like to keep the set-up, which I suppose is mostly just for the writer's benefit anyway. We set the mood and this then enables us to write the rest. It hurts to delete it sometimes.

Quoted from DustinBowcot I'm not sure using a mini slug to switch from an interior to exterior is the right move.

Hey Dustin. Correct me if I'm wrong, but what I think what Steve means is:

Daphne downs her coffee, removes the memory card from the
camera and heads through her extensive
EXT. GARDEN - MORNING
pausing briefly to breathe in the crisp spring air before
entering her

I'm cool with your mini's as they're all contained within one scene. Problem with moving through slugs in this way is your break-down which will come later on, and will look like this:

EXT. SHEEP FIELD - GATE - DAY
Jim waits...
EXT. DUMAURIER VILLAGE - MORNING - ESTABLISHING
A small...
EXT. GARDEN - MORNING
pausing briefly...
EXT. ST ALBERT’S PRIMARY - PLAYGROUND - DAY
Daphne drops Finlay off...

-- you might have any number of EXT. GARDEN... etc, with no reference points, and if some of your subsequent scenes have different people in them, then someone needs to know that at some point.

Thanks for clarifying. I think I understand what you mean. There shouldn't be any confusion as Daphne's is the only garden in the film. It's not an important scene and could probably be cut all together depending on how the director wanted to handle it. I think it is necessary though to indicate that the bird watching shed actually sits in her garden and not a place she's had to visit.

Although that may be obvious anyway from the baby monitor and then her appearing in the house. They don't have that much range.

I suppose I could call it DAPHNE'S GARDEN...

This script has had a rewrite... It started out at 122 pages and is now down to 98. It was way overwritten and the thing is, I didn't realise it was overwritten at the time. It wasn't 24 pages overwritten. But, it was approximately 7 pages overwritten. I'd been writing for approximately 15 months at the time of writing this and thought I knew it all. Wow. I was so wrong.

Anyway, much tighter script now.

The reason I'm rewriting all these old scripts is because I need things polished. I find myself pitching scripts, then when producers ask to read them I'm afraid of handing it over because I know it needs work.

Anyway, if you fancy something a little bit different to the rest of the horror that's out there, this would be a good choice. I'm confident of this script being picked up one day.

Hello, Dustin...

First, congrats, on dealing out another feature!! No, easy feat. Now, with all those birds, I expected a lot more cars to get pooped on, haha. So, as far, as appearance, it was a smooth read in IMO. However, three-fourth quarters I found myself starting to skim. Usually, when I find myself skimming it’s because I’m feel as though I’m reading the same beat, and I’m searching for the next plot point, twist, new information or whatever people call it these days. The story didn’t lack action, again, nice descriptive narrative, and even the characters as many as there were, I wasn’t too confused on who was who and who was doing what. But, more often than not the action didn’t lead to new information for the characters as far as what’s really going on. Now, I’m not saying a story has to KNOW what’s going on, but SPECULATION from the characters POV, IMO, helps keep the story moving on. A huge pitfall of horror genre is having a hero who’s too passive or only reacting to happenings rather than driving some of the action. Maybe I missed some key information as I found myself skimming. So, I’m going to read some other comments, as well.

Why were the crows attacking? And only stop after the white one dies?
How does the crow/birds reflect on Daphne (main characters) weakness/flaws?


So, I’m under the impression lately belief that all creativity is only separated from those who edit more, so edit, edit, and polish away.


BLB

The crows fly away once the leader is killed. I took the logic from James Herbert's The Rats where once the leader is removed the other rats stop attacking. Something has to cause the attack, otherwise they'd be attacking all the time. I could go for radiation or similar, but I preferred natural causes as it adds more horror.

There was dialogue in the earlier draft that pointed out the 'leader' thing but I dropped it as I thought it was covered by everything else going on.

I need to work on Daphne's flaws. I suppose just having her as a single mother is cutting corners.

I think with our first drafts we cut lots of corners, because the idea is to finish it. Then we spend the following drafts correcting them. So easy to miss a cut corner though. So, thanks for pointing that out and for the read. Much appreciated.

Makes sense. Wasn't familiar with James Herbet's The Rats did a quick read on wiki... No problem, man, looking forward to your next script.


BLB

Didn't realize Dustin was a UK head...

Still tho, I'm not too sure about the mini-slugs... I always hate using them personally. 4 mini slugs in the opening? All in bold.

I might be underestimating the importance of them but could you write your way out of using them? While still maintaining the clarity of the visual within the particular scene?

Quoted from Max Didn't realize Dustin was a UK head... Still tho, I'm not too sure about the mini-slugs... I always hate using them personally. 4 mini slugs in the opening? All in bold. I might be underestimating the importance of them but could you write your way out of using them? While still maintaining the clarity of the visual within the particular scene?

If they're in bold then I see them more as camera directions. Inserts rather than slugs. Because the location doesn't exactly change. We go from the bird watching shed to what she sees through the binoculars or whatever. It's a style choice I'm not inclined to want to change at the moment.

Yes, UK here. I'm in Birmingham.

Quoted from DustinBowcot If they're in bold then I see them more as camera directions. Inserts rather than slugs. Because the location doesn't exactly change. We go from the bird watching shed to what she sees through the binoculars or whatever. It's a style choice I'm not inclined to want to change at the moment. Yes, UK here. I'm in Birmingham.

Yeah that's fair enough, was just curious that's all. I do use mini slugs but it's more like...

INT. DUSTIN'S HOUSE -- DAY

Dustin nibbles on an apple.

LATER

Dustin sits on the couch, watching TV.

Something like that anyway.

Yeah, I use mini slugs as well as inserts.