I enjoyed this Mark. Your writing seems to flow very well. That said this definitely didn't have that Horror feel at all to me. Both the way it was written and in regard to the content, save the eerie moments involving Ginger that seemed to promise more scary moments in the future or climax if you will. Those hinted at promises didn't arrive and it left me a bit peeved.

Again though, like with Burnside you comprised a fast, straight-to-the-point read but the resolution of Ginger just didn't feel that rewarding or finite enough. I don't know. Maybe it's because it just didn't deliver on the Horror aspect for me. Taking that aside it's a cute little tale.

Oh, for everyone else that read... Am I the only one who thought Ginger walking so early was going to have something to do with her Mother being wheelchair bound?

-- Steve

Hey Steve.

Lol.  Quite a coincidence you should dig this one up.  I haven't touched this one in two years and just a couple days ago, I did a rewrite of it and brushed it up to send out to Shriekfest.

Anyway.  You're exactly right that the horror element is missing.  The new draft deals with that and takes care of that problem, I believe.  (I guess I'll find out when I see how it does in the competition.  :-)

And a couple other people have mentioned they thought Ginger walking so early was going to have something to do with her Mother's handicap.  I originally planned to expand this and deal with more of the issues brought up in the short, but it's well on the backburner for now.  If it garners any interest this year as a short, I might feel compelled to bring it to the forefront again.

But thank you very much and I appreciate your thoughts on this one.

Again, welcome to the site, and I can't wait to check something out from you when it's posted.

- Mark

No problem. It's funny how those little coincidences happen. Good luck with Shriekfest. When will you find out how it did?

PS. I'm about to post a short I did a few years ago for Uni. Not quite sure how to go about it though.

Just wanted to submit the updated version of the script to the site.

This is the draft that I submitted to Shriekfest this year and is in the Finals next month.

A big huge thanks to everybody who's read this one and given their insight, but a huge huge thank you to James Willams (Jwent).  One of his suggestions fixed what was lacking in the original script and really officially shoved this into the horror category.

Proof that gingers have no soul....

There was a lot of scary moments in this piece, which is nice.  The problem I had with it, though, is that you crammed everything into twelve pages.  I would strongly recommend that you expand on this story.  Build some suspense.

Make us feel that we are a part of this family.  Then make us feel useless that we can't help anyone.

Shriekfest, eh?


Phil

Congrats on making finalist, Mark. That's three SS scripts now. Has to be some kind of record. Plus, my short film. This draft reads the same to me. Is the new one live? Best of luck!

James

Congrats on making finalist, Mark! This is good company to be in.

Is the new draft live yet? A lot of the thoughts I had while reading this echo what most of the others have touched on already, so I wasn't sure.

Quoted from StevenHarvey No problem. It's funny how those little coincidences happen. Good luck with Shriekfest. When will you find out how it did?

The winners (for screenplays, films, songs, et all) will be announced at the film festival, the first week of October.


Phil

I'll first off like to say that this was a good story. I was really into it. I'm new to screen writing and don't know ALOT about it, other than scripts I've studied and reading.

The only fault I found in it was the fact that you used words like, IS, THEN, ARE, TRYING/STIll. ANDS or BUTS a little too much. I was told and read that several times, it makes the action too wordy.

But hey I'm new, what do I know lol Just trying to help. But other than that very good story.

Hey Phil, James, and Chris.

Congrats to all for making the Shriekfest cut this year, (and all four of us in a different category, so we're not even competing against each other!  Whew.)

The beginning is exactly the same, except I put a couple things in there to foreshadow Gabrielle going into an anaphylactic seizure, which is an idea that James brought up years ago.  (He mentioned how I write procedures really well.)  That element alone added the punch to the ending that was missing from the first draft posted here.  Before, I just had the parents wipe the ants off in the bathtub and it ended there.

I know you also recommended that I change it from ant bites to a bee sting, James, but I just couldn't.  I was really attacked by ginger ants when I lived in Texas when I was younger, and I had to keep those haunting images I still have of the ant wreckage in the bathtub.  (And yes, my attack was just like the one Gabrielle encountered in the story.  I was standing in the yard with the tennis ball, staring at the dog across the street.  I was mezmerized and didn't realize where I was standing until I felt the burning.)

I have full plans of expanding this into a feature, (and am well on my way idea-wise).  Hopefully, if this garners some attention from a capable company, I'll probably start it sooner rather than later.

Thanks again everybody for the congrats.  Hope we all win.

- Mark

Hey Robert.

First off, welcome to the site.

I'm glad you enjoyed the story.

Ah, the use of articles. (is, and, but...).  There was a big deal before about the use of articles and I actually attempted a writing style a couple years ago where I tried to cut out as many articles from my writing as I could, just to see if I liked it.  (E. Annie Proulx, who wrote the novel 'The Shipping News' and is a great writer if you've never checked her out, adapted a writing style like that and it works in her stories.)  I tried it, but everything just sounded too choppy when I read it back to myself and it wasn't my voice.  I never paid attention to the use of articles in this story, but I'll go back and see what I notice about them.

Thanks again for checking it out and letting me know your thoughts.  Have you submitted anything to the site yet?

- Mark

It's a bit late but...Congrats on being a Shriekfest finalist.

I remember reading this when you were rewriting it.

Hope everything else is good.

Gabe