Oh, and I do want to, good sir... thanks!

Yes, check out some of my other responses for further detail on the specifics, but this is actually the back-story/premise of a feature. I wrote it to basically expand on some of the character bios that I have come up with, so far. Not meant to be made, except maybe as an extra to a feature... or just not meant to be made. Lots of fun, though.

The whole concept had been a little up in the air with too many directions it could go, and I thought that (as an exercise) this could help nail down some of the world it is to be set in. It doesn't have many of the things you mentioned, really, because those things are still being created in many ways. I'll say, it did help point the way. By asking your exact question, actually, "Why do I care what just happened?" it's helped me in a creative way to start building a new universe from this seed that has been planted. It's just the seed, though. The feature would be in the present or near-future, so that is why it is basically very bare of narrative or meaning. I just wanted the "feel" of the people in it, and not much more. Really... they're just bad people with a lot of power, and the next question it leaves is, "what are they up to now?" So, there's the kind of thing the feature is meant to address and expand upon. Here, we're just swooping in to witness a few minutes of these people's lives, and that's it. After all, there are some shorts that have their own narratives, and some shorts that just take little snapshots... and some shorts that are just for the heck of it.

Thanks for the recognition of the positive parts, and for sure, I am going through a serious exploration of what sorts of things can work better for it thanks to all of the helpful points made by the group. Glad you checked it out, and appreciate the validation!

William

I’m going into this blindsided as is my preference, apologies in advance if I repeat what has been said.

Page by page notes.

Intriguing intro, some might say a tad over descriptive but it effectively sets the mood and gives proceedings an air of mystery.

By page 4 its clear that you can write well and are setting up what looks like a fascinating story, I particularly like the glimpse of the formal party presumably turning into an orgy of some sort.

However, it’s also clear you need to trim back the writing…a lot. Look to describing only the essential details in as few words as possible. I appreciate that you want to tell us everything since you obviously know the scene and got it visualised to a meticulous level in your head but we don’t need all this information. Paint the picture, cover the necessities to set the scene up and move along.

“The size and quality of the colonial era manor’s hidden
museum provides some hint that the building shelters a large

and well-guarded underground complex deep beneath the earth.”

- Just one prime example of many right here. All this speculative, extraneous detail is unfilmmable and cannot be conveyed on screen so don’t include it. Use the precious space on the page to write about what we can actually perceive. I’m not adverse to the occasional aside to spice up the read, add some flavour but not three lines worth, it’s a waste

“Darwin bends to kneel before dark figure.”

- Put in “the” between “before” and “dark figure” who I presume is the Priest, right?

“Beyond the range of human hearing, in a forgotten language,
this prince of legions exclaims a series forceful commands.”

- Put in “of” between “series” and “foreceful”
“He sinks into a dark, creeping, and permanent depression.”

- Doesn’t read well, again it’s a more internal description than a physical, outward emotional depiction. The adjectives “dark”, “creeping” and “permanent” cannot be detected on screen.

How about rewriting it as “He slumps/sinks in the seat, stares at the ground morosely” Not perfect I know but at least it describes more vividly the action of Darwin, giving the reader an idea of what they are supposed to be seeing.



This is obviously part of something much bigger and that’s cool but it probably shouldn’t be in the shorts section as it’s more of a work-in-progress. Or perhaps you’ve got it finished and this is just a teaser. Either way, it’s a very interesting premise set-up and I do want to know more…but only if you reconcile with yourself that you’ll have to sacrifice the page long descriptions of the surroundings and get things progressing at a faster pace. I’m not one that needs action action action, I like a slow burning story but if it’s a slow burner because of being bogged down by odious novelistic writing then that’s problematic.

Like I said above you appear to be a strong writer, some really nice phrasing in here, a wide, rich range of vocabulary, fastidious attention to detail but you gotta ask yourself, is it suited to screenwriting? If you read any pro script or any on here by a decent writer you’ll know what I’m talking about.

Unless you have done it already, perhaps write the treatment before continuing the screenplay. That way you can get all the detail/plot points/characters/locations you want down on paper, in your own words, and then translate/edit it into a script version.

I’m always intrigued by secret societies; illuminati, free masons, knights templar, etc so the story, at least the beginning that I’ve read here, appeals to me. I’m digging the occultist element too with Darwin’s trip to hell.

I’d love to read more but tighten this bad boy by at least 50%, man.

Best of luck with it.

Col.

I'm so sorry to have taken this long Colkurtz, but my life has truly been filled up with emergencies.

That said, in fact, your points and specific details are quite original in their critique. You even caught a typo I had never noticed before.

I won't expound such a lengthy response as I'm infamous for, or will try not to, as most of my explanations regarding narrative and character development can be found in my other posts.

To give a background, though, my experience with film (and especially animation) lies primarily with story-boarding, assistant directing, and directing. I threw out this short simply to conceptualize the seed of a larger idea, sell it to some of my fellow students, and also give myself a reason to further practice my personal skills in animation; of course, looking mainly at the scene in hell with the demon, for that. It's playful fun, and not coming from the point of view of a writer looking to sell the strictest format, but a director looking to capture an overall mood. It's a piece of concept-art, almost.

It's still utterly illuminating (no pun intended, or maybe so), to hear your detailed points. I'm stubborn about some of the earlier ones, though, in previous critiques.

I'll let all in on a little secret regarding one line pointed out before, as an apt rebuttal... "It is warm among the welcoming crowd..." Pg 2.

That's actually a line about design snuck cleverly among prose. Not to toot my own toot-hole, but here's why: In design, the word "warm" is a reference to color elements. Hues come in cool or warm types; and this is where writers differentiate in training from the rest of their crew, yet should understand how the crew is trained and thinks.

A solid set-designer and/or DP should instantly know that the entire scene will be set in warm, yellowish lighting, perhaps with added fuzziness or what have you, and with walls and decor to match. So, it IS something seen directly on screen, by design, and only masked that way for sheer entertainment's sake. It also describes the basic action of the extras in the scene, and their overall demeanor, all in one sentence at the exact same time. I could try sentence by sentence to describe all of those little details, the light, the wall color, etc., and even do it in short snippets, but have instead summed all of those things up in a single word, "warm," and with a note of beauty to the language, because it would take even more sentences to do otherwise given my mental image. And, it's done with trust that my designers have been to class and will formulate their own beautifully realized pictures, themselves.

It's all about trust. Trust the training of your crew, and they will trust your direction in kind. Trust the actors to be able to improvise "chatting" when it's totally unimportant what is said, as another example... especially if that moment may be silent, and them only waving their hands and moving their lips in the background - but it's not known yet whether vocalization will be given or necessary in the rainy environment until it can be tested with the boom mics. I'm just explaining my general thought-process and method, you see...

By this point of defense, I mean it's been my thinking along the way that my usage of prose has been a matter of trying to do exactly as you said, and use lines as I've described to cover massive on-screen concepts in short order.

I understand that some words, like "fore-court" and others, may throw some readers out of the story, too... but that's also what google and Webster's dictionary are for. Over-written has been a repeated critique, but I couldn't disagree more, and if anything, find this style ten times more efficient by slipping double-meant design elements into the prose, and utilizing broadly descriptive words that might capture the entire screen feeling, such as fore-court, with its aristocratic air. I feel such a thing should lead to the perfect scene, set design, and performance from my actors.

By setting the bar high, the entire crew is challenged to rise to it, which improves the spirit of an entire project. Again, I say this as a person with some Directing and Assistant Directing experience on shorts, one of which has won 1st in VFX in the Tampa Film Festival, called "Mobius," (that profile picture was actually taken on-set) which I began as storyboard artist for (made that winning scene, in fact, of the moon splitting in half), and came to be promoted to Assistant Director by the time of its shooting.


That's a general response, but in all of your own points, Col? I have to say, you really nailed me.

Every one of those lines you specifically mentioned I am forced to call a mistake, myself. As I said, I like to slip in lines with double-meanings for both the emotional and the on-screen screen (even if subtle) descriptions, and sometimes really walk the line with them. When I think about it, every part you quoted (and probably any more that fall under the same category) may actually cross that line. To the line about the underground museum, for example, I have to totally agree. It is literally just a nod to H.P. Lovecraft in its presentation, and gives nothing to the crew except a feeling and reminder of the tone... but as it is, certainly wasteful under the circumstances in its catering to my own personal interests, only.

I only wish to point out that, as part of a style of direction that communicates to an entire crew, sometimes solely to one department or another (and in a world where the lines between film and animation are now extremely blurred), it's been my way and idea of efficiency to combine design elements with multiple meanings into single words or lines. They sometimes look like prose, or sadly go over the heads of those readers not belonging to that specific part of the crew, but they're still markedly efficient in their usage. Out of curiosity (and with respect to where you and other's critiques have been undeniably correct), does such a practice truly fall into a category of right and wrong, with this? With marketability... sure. With creativity? I just don't know...

I like your edits. I like them a lot, in fact. I do come from a school of thought, though, where "ly" adverbs are considered a no-no for scripts, at least in my training where some experienced actors can get genuinely insulted by such adverbs, but I happen to break that rule plenty, myself. Morosely.

Unfortunately, as I've browsed this site, I've not seen a single writer who matches the style of a Scorese or a Wes Anderson, who use incredibly novelistic speech and defend it to the letter, but again, they are directors as well as writers (or really, considered "auteurs") even though they are my heroes and the best examples of my goals with this style. Even the most applauded, here, have simply not even been close to my taste or sense of quality. That's another reason why I have been gone so long, too.    

So, I really, really appreciate you, particularly, because your attention to detail gives a new and focused direction, and it will help my continuing practice now that I can bring this stuff back into my life again, finally.

Will,

You're an interesting character.  

You defend your choice to overwrite, yet pride yourself on choosing a word such as, "warm" for its many succinct insinuations.

I too think your script is overwritten, but there's no need to beat a dead horse.

A few notes as I go:

• Pg. 1  Darwin carries himself in a "staunch demeanor" yet he "nervously smoothes his suit".  These descriptions contradict each other.
  
• Pg. 2  You provide a slug line of "INT. THE PIT - NIGHT", yet you don't describe the room the group is in.  Then the group moves to "an elegant sitting room" yet you don't provide a new slug line.  Then the group moves into a "large room" and yet again you don't provide a new slug line.  Your previous comments say that a script is a technical document, so wouldn't you want to know how many different rooms you will need for your shoot?
  
• Pg. 2  An example of overwriting is when you describe the "serving staff".  Wouldn't the word, "servants", describe the same thing?
  
• Pg. 2  When the crowd claps you say, "A few among the crowd with hands free clap their genuine friendship and support."  Why do only a few of them have their hands free?  Are the rest of them tied up?  Do they have bowling balls in their hands and they're unable to clap?  I'm pretty sure they have sparkling flutes of champagne in their hands, but I don't know for sure.
  
• Pg. 3  Who is the younger man at Bill's side?  Is it Darwin?  Why not just say it's Darwin?  Again an example of overwriting.  You could just say, "Bill waves his hand at Darwin" instead of, "Bill waves his hand at the younger man by his side".  I'm no rocket surgeon but I think it sounds better when I use the name, Darwin.
  
• Pg. 3  You don't need to say that Bill's smile is "respectfully genuine".  Let the actor figure out how to smile.  
  
• Pg. 4  Now they're in a den, and yet again, no slug line.
  
• Pg. 5  What are, "remodeled seeming chambers."?  There's a better way to describe this.
  
• Pg. 5  What is a "modest archway"?  Modest is a relative term.  The Arch De Triumph is modest compared to the Gateway Arch.  Use a better word to describe the arch.
  
• Pg. 5  What's the difference between a "finely calibrated chemical mist" and a "fine mist"?
  
• Pg. 5  If the stone is "hand carved", I'm pretty sure I know the method they used to carve it.  They used their hands, hence, "hand carved".  Perhaps you meant "no known style".
  
• Pg. 6  What are "strange torches"?  What makes them strange?  Are they burning a different color?  Is the torch made of candy?  Are the flames burning upside down?  Strange can mean a lot of different things.
  
• Pg. 6  How does the "ancient way" differ from the "modern way" of wrapping someone in an animal skin loincloth?
  
• Pg. 6  This place sure does have a lot of archways.
  
• Pg. 6  The Alter room should be Throne room.  There's no alter in the room, but there is a throne.
  
• Pg. 7  Is the skeletal figure the Priest?  It's confusing the way you have that written.
  
• Pg. 7  You write, "the ceremony begins among the present witnesses."  Um...yeah.  That's redundant, superfluous, and unnecessary.  Of course the ceremony begins among the people who are there.
  
• Pg. 7  Arches in Hell too?  I sure hope you're going for some sort of symbolism with all these arches.
  
• Pg. 7  If Baal speaks, "Beyond the range of human hearing,", how do we know he's speaking,  "in a forgotten language,"?  We can't hear him.
  

Jordan