Quoted from stevie And not sure about the phone convo being designated VO.  I either use (on phone) or even O.S. Maybe Jeff can shed some Arizona light on that, lol.

V.O. is correct for phone conversation coming from someone not onscreen.

The Arizona light has been shed - LOL!!!

Hey Stevie,

Thanks for giving this a shot.

Quoted from stevie And not sure about the phone convo being designated VO.  I either use (on phone) or even O.S. Maybe Jeff can shed some Arizona light on that, lol. Will keep reading!

And Jeff has spoken and I agree. I've seen it done both ways. I only use O.S. when someone is physically there, but you can't see them on screen as they speak. But I've seen this debated over.. and over... and over... Lol

James

Yeah all good.

Personally, VO to me is only used when a char is like a narrator? I use wrylies for phone convo -

                                         JEFF
                                    (on phone)

                            Yo James. I'm coming to Cleveland next week. Can you hook me
                            up with some trannies?

                                          JAMES
                                       (on phone)
                             Sorry bro. They'll all be at my family reunion in Phoenix.

Maybe you could just do the on phone thing once to establish it. Whatever tickles thy fancy I guess lol

                                          
        
        

Hey James, I get where you're coming from with regards to Sean, especially the part about him needing  to hold on to his last bit of humanity. I just didn't believe that he'd be willing to put himself in such a position of weakness with Robert just to stop his crazy cult members from killing themselves.

I see you mentioned the possibility of Sean having another kill that he struggles with. What if he killed someone deserving, but then discovered that the victim had a small child or baby there that he was unaware of? He could then take the child and leave it outside a hospital or children's home to be taken care of. Then, wracked by the guilt of orphaning the child, he could check in on it, maybe leaving some kind of toy or present. One of Robert's goons could be tracking Sean and see this. Robert could then abduct the child, thus giving him the leverage he needs to draw Sean to him. Just an idea!

I did have a feature as part of the 1+6 week challenge, but it has since been optioned & taken down. I am hoping to get a new script (Cold Fear) up in the next few weeks though.

James, I've read to page 28.

I was really into this! The police procedure stuff was well done and it was moving along nicely.

But when Lexi goes to the nightclub and Sean turns up, it seemed to change too quickly. Next minute we find out that Robert is this cult type leader and he wants immortality. It became an entirely different and reading experience for me. I know This is a kind of prequel with Sean in it but I really liked the buildup with the police work and stuff.

Look  I will keep at it and see how it goes. The change seems to be very abrupt and takes it all down a new path


A couple of points about your formatting - any numbers mentioned in dialogue should be written out as words. You did it in one bit but not in a couple of others, no biggie though. And also, you seem to be having trouble with the char names. Willard Radke should just be RADKE not his full name as it reads odd.  Also you have the medical guy Tim Carswell as TIM, which reads awkward to, especially as he is only a minor char (unless he turns up later, lol).

Anyway, I'll keep on it and get back to you, bro!

Stevie,

No need to continue on if I lost ya. I wanted a very hard turn at the page 25 marker. As per your numbers remark, I only write out less than ten and then use numbers for amounts larger than. I swear I read that in Enlglish class somewhere. Then again, I failed most of those classes.

SteveUK,

Another great suggestion. Thanks. I might be prone to use it if and when I make Sean the main character. As it sits, I think what I did may be a tad unbelievable, but cinematic. A cult leader preaching as his followers take their place for suicide. I think that would be such a great visual transition into the third act. The audience will have to suspend some logic, but I think on screen it would work.

James

Quoted from jwent6688 Stevie, No need to continue on if I lost ya. I wanted a very hard turn at the page 25 marker. As per your numbers remark, I only write out less than ten and then use numbers for amounts larger than. I swear I read that in Enlglish class somewhere. Then again, I failed most of those classes. SteveUK, Another great suggestion. Thanks. I might be prone to use it if and when I make Sean the main character. As it sits, I think what I did may be a tad unbelievable, but cinematic. A cult leader preaching as his followers take their place for suicide. I think that would be such a great visual transition into the third act. The audience will have to suspend some logic, but I think on screen it would work. James

Cheers bro. I will finish it!

Quoted from jwent6688 This was written as a prequel to the two short films I've been lucky enough to have made by some great film makers. I wanted it to be a stand alone story, but somewhere along the way I've missed my mark. Just tossing it on here for some notes, looks like I have a page 1 rewrite on my hands. James

As a fan of "So Pretty" and "So Dark" I'm curious as to how you missed the mark.  What exactly did the production company say about this script?

Quoted from NickSedario As a fan of "So Pretty" and "So Dark" I'm curious as to how you missed the mark.  What exactly did the production company say about this script?

No production company. Just the director. First off it would probably cost $1mil to film. Double the intended budget. Second, The Sean character takes a major backseat in this story, which wouldn't be so bad if my main character was more charismatic. I'm working on polishing this story and then starting over with a version that features Sean as the protagonist. Kind of an anti-hero you can cheer for. Easier said than done.

James

It'd be interesting to backtrack and write part of it about Sean's previous life, pre-vampire.  (If you haven't explored that option already)  

Providing he's not 1,000's of years old as that would make it a period peice and up the production budget.

Just a thought.

Quoted from jwent6688 No production company. Just the director. First off it would probably cost $1mil to film. Double the intended budget. Second, The Sean character takes a major backseat in this story, which wouldn't be so bad if my main character was more charismatic. I'm working on polishing this story and then starting over with a version that features Sean as the protagonist. Kind of an anti-hero you can cheer for. Easier said than done.

Sorry to hear the director wasn't keen on this version. But! There is relief in sight. This is where SS is more valuable than any other site IMO.  

Lets get a discussion going here on how we can help offer up suggestions to make this into what the director wants!

I've read up to page 30 so far. I'm not taking notes, but I will be able to discuss the script when finished. I can see where you might have gone wrong already. Let's start discussions people!!!

PS: I'll be honest with you, I hate the new title. It doesn't do anything for me. Maybe that can be discussed too?  

Thanks, Pia.

As for the title, it's definitely getting the ax, but I needed to call it something for now. I've already gotten good notes from Bert and Ryan on this. I have some good time off during the holiday to revisit this and plan to.

Silverback,

I agree Sean's backstory is intriguing. I wrote it this way because I was targeting a larger audience who's most likely not familiar with the two shorts we already have. I wanted people who know nothing about the Sean character to be able to enjoy this story without having to know anything about the stories already told.

I would prefer this to continue on as a series, but we need someone with a big fat checkbook to show up first.

James

Title suggestion - "You Reap What You Sow"

Having Sean's backstory, pre-vampire, might help the audience identify and understand him better and I do feel having him as a dark protagonist would be a very interesting way forward, but very difficult to write.

You could even include the events of So Pretty, So Dark in the feature to keep the costs down as they are already 'in the can' so to speak.

Jay, giving this a read. Since you told me the producer or director wasn’t crazy about this one, I will comment a little different than I normally do. I will try to see where you possibly went wrong and also what you can do to lower the budget. I told you, I’m the Queen of low budgets.  

I finished this and I have some thoughts in general. I think, over all that you did an okay job, but I can also see where you IMHO went a little off course. But I’m nobody so take my comments with a heapful of salt.

I read and watched the two short films as you know. In my opinion, this prequel did not follow in the same tone or spirit as those two shorts. Sean needs to be a much bigger part of this story than he currently is. We barely see him at all and when we do, he’s not a memorable character at all. He does nothing interesting. We want to see a vampire do vampire stuff! I can understand you want him to have a conscience, my character, Drake, in Arterial Motives is a doctor who by mistake turns himself into a vampire. He struggles all the time with his conscience and the monster he has created, but he’s still a vampire so he does what vampires do to survive. We don’t really get to see Sean do anything. That was a big miss for me. Sean is like Dexter. He kills, but he only kills “bad” people. If you watch Dexter ask yourself what that show would be like if we hardly ever got to see him and what he does. If you were to rewrite this, I would suggest to make this a story about Sean and Lexi.

I had a similar issue with Lexi. Until she finds out about Richter and the records, she’s playing second banana to him. She should be our protag, our hero. She needs to drive the story, but for half of this script, it’s Richter. He makes decisions and tells her what to do. That needs to be changed too.

There are also a lot of story items that don’t do much and just confuses or feels forced. I can understand you having Robert in this. It works having a third party that Sean and Lexi both need to fight. However, again, IMHO, the religios congregation plotline, felt cliche and tacked on. It did not feel necessary to the story at all. I never quite figured out what their point was.

Ditto that for the plotline of Richter having had a girlfriend with a daughter that was ill and him giving the records to Sean. That didn’t really work for me. I just simply didn’t buy it. It felt tacked on as well.

I did like Lexi’s struggle with the incident at the mall massacre. That worked well.

Another thing to me was that this felt like a TV show. People talked a lot. The settings in which they had their conversations changed, but that doesn’t necessarily make the scene visually interesting. They are just backdrops. Make the place the scene takes place in have a purpose.

To me, if you are going to rewrite this, obviously listen to the director, but IMO, streamline the storyline. Cut unnecessary plotlines. Let us know how Sean came to be in the first place. Have Sean struggle with his conscience, but make him more dangerous. Make Lexi our hero. Not someone things just happens to. Make Robert more charismatic and more of a threat.

I wish more people would read this script and offer up comments. Your filmmaker guys do a really nice quality job and it would be nice to see this one become a feature. For a better script, we should have a discussion here about this script so it can be the best it can be.

Anyway, following are just thoughts and questions while I was reading.

Page 1.    I like the green paper note on the pole.

                In regards to budget, the townhouse would be expensive unless the filmmaker has access to one for free. So, is the townhouse’s appearance of importance to the story itself? Perhaps there’s a less expensive way of telling us that he is a doctor with money.

Page 3.    Another thing I’ve learned the hard way is that it gets very expensive to shoot outdoors at night. You need a LOT of lights otherwise the background just sort of disappears. It is of course necessary to do EXT/NIGHT scenes some times, but it’s a good thing to limit those to when absolutely needed.

Page 4.    Do investigators wear blue police uniforms? I don’t know, I’m just asking.

Page 5.    Budget again. You have squad cars and an ambulance and a bunch of x-tras (on lookers). See if you can trim that down. Instead of an ambulance you can have a plain white cargo van that says Medical Examiner on the door or something like that. You also have flood lights lighting up the kill scene. I agree that it makes things moodier and would look better, but to cut budget, have Lexi get up a little later so that Richter arrives to the scene when it’s already dawn. That way you don’t need hardly any lights at all.

                An ME in his 20s? I was under the impression this all takes place in a larger city. Seems sort of unlikely the ME would be someone that young.

                You can also tighten your writing some by cutting a little here and there. The ME takes pictures with a camera. No need to mention the camera. What else would he use? We kind of assume that’s what he uses.

Page 7.    Nolan refers to Lexi as detective, but her badge says inspector.

Page 10.  Do they use a medical examiner or a coroner or both? Why not cut down on cast by having Tim the ME call instead of introducing a new character that basically performs the same duties as the ME? Cost cutting again.  

After the first ten pages, I think things are moving along well. You have peaked my interest with the story. Good set-up and intro of main characters.

Page 20.  Lexington Club. Try to think of another name since her name is Lexi. Unless of course there’s a connection.

I’m now on page 20. I feel the last ten pages were less interesting than the previous ten. Why? Let’s see if I can figure out why. We start out with a two page phone conversations. Phone conversations are never interesting to watch. Necessary sometimes, but never fun to watch, regardless. This is followed by a one page squabble between Richter and Robert. Problem is, it doesn’t seem to be relevant to the current story or move the story forward. It appears to be just that, a squabble. A short piece with Lexi and Richter talking followed by another phone conversation. After this, Lexi moves on to speak with Radke. Lots of dialogue and some exposition. Not bad, but it’s still mostly a conversation. Sure, we learn a lot, but visually there’s not much of interest going on. After the cottage scene, Lexi has another conversation with Richter. This one is in a bar. Again, we need to see something interesting too. If we’re supposed to be intrigued enough by talking then the dialogue has to be amazing. I think the guy you want to like your script is the director, right? Remember, they tend to look at stuff how it will look on film. Just because this takes place at a cottage with a pond, does not make the film exciting to watch. IMO at least. Try to see if you can show us Lexi finding some of these things out rather than have someone tell her.

Also, at this point,my thoughts are that this does feel like a crime drama. Is that what you were after? After having seen and read the shorts, I would have thought of them more as thrillers. If it’s drama you’re after, then fine. If it’s a thriller you want, you need to make things a little more intriguing and exciting, IMHO. I’m no expert, you know this. I’m just trying to help you figure out why they weren’t crazy about this script.

Page 21.  I like the vampire rave. I had a Vampire Ball in my Arterial Motives sequel. Interesting to watch the different people and such, so good job on that scenery. A word of caution though. This is another place where the budget easily takes a hit. Think hard if this scene at this place warrants the setting. I like it, but it would probably cost a bit to arrange the place and then have enough extras to fill it to make a party. Not to mention vampire costumes. Unless they know a bunch of people willing to get dressed up and party for free.

                 I like Karl searching for bodies with cooler temperatures.

Just a question here. What is Lexi wearing? When we first meet her, she’s dressed in police blues. If she’s still wearing that, she would really stick out here. Did I miss something?

Page 22.  Typo in SERGEI’s name in his introduction.

Page 25.  IMO, since Sean tells Robert he knows all about him, it would work better if Sean tells us about Robert instead of Robert informing us.

Page 26.  I don’t know about Robert’s speech there at the top of the page. He says he strips his followers of their materialistic lives and give them something to have faith in, only to end his speech saying they only follow him because he pays them very well. Now that doesn’t make sense at all, if you ask me.

On page 30. I enjoyed the Lexington Club and what went down. My only gripe here is that Sean seemed weak. Isn’t this really supposed to be about Sean and Lexi? IMO, Robert and what happens with him took up all the main parts. Lexi was almost not even present and like I said, Sean seemed weak. Maybe make it less about Robert and his “flock” and more about Sean and Lexi.

Page 33.    Lots of talking heads in these last few pages…

Page 36.    Just a budget related question. Is it necessary that it rains hard?

Page 37.    I thought Nathalia had all her teeth knocked out, yet she seems to be able to speak just fine.

Currently on page 40. My thoughts here are that I wish we could see more of Sean. This isn’t his story at all so far. It’s more about Lexi and Robert too. I want to see the vampire do vampire stuff. Even if he only kills people who deserve it. I want to see it.

Page 40.    Duplicate lines about the paper being tossed onto the lawn.

                  Also, there’s a lot you can trim here. Look at how you describe Lexi getting out of her house getting the paper.     She walks out of her house. Down the steps of her porch. She walks to the edge of her lawn. She picks up the plastic wrapped paper. That’s a lot of unnecessary descriptions there.

Page 41.    Typo. Tattoo

Page 42.    I’m surprised the mailman didn’t go for her gun in the living room.

                  Also, not sure what it would cost to replace the door frame. Not a biggie, just something to keep in mind for lower budgets.

Page 43.    Lexi is kind of a feisty woman. I had a hard time believing she would just sit there quietly while Richter and the paramedic talks about her as if she was a child.

Page 45.    Why does Richter say he’ll grab her stuff from her house? They are already in her house.

                   You’ve already describe the couch being threadbare. No need to do it again.  

Page 46.    IMHO, I think it would work better if the mailman tries to hide the tattoo and Robert has to demand him burning it off. Something that would have a little more conflict. Right now, the mailman suggests to Robert that Lexi might have seen his tattoo and got suspicious. It’s a little too easy.

                  TATTOO

                  Any way  not anyway

Page 49.    I think Richter talks to Lexi like a child again. She is our hero, right? She should make things happen, not Richter. Right now, IMHO of course, Lexi is too weak a character to be our protag.

On page 50 now. I’m still feeling that Robert is taking over the show here. I would prefer to see more vampire stuff with Sean. Robert doesn’t really do much for me. This church business with the followers seem to not fit in with the atmosphere of vampires and a female detective hunting them. As mentioned earlier, I also don’t like that Richter seems to be taking over for Lexi.

Page 53.   I don’t really see where this religion stuff fits in. Maybe it’s necessary for the story and I will find out later, but right now, I would say you can get rid of it and it would not hurt the story.

Page 54.   The montage of congregation members killing themselves felt unnecessary. Almost like filler.

Page 55.   Exciting stuff here and I’m glad to see Lexi stepping up and making something happen. Taking charge.

Page 59.   Breaths  

Page 61.   Robert  hangs up the phone?

Page 71.   Lexi gets hit twice with a shotgun blast. One in her vest and one in her leg. Wouldn’t the pellets spread over a large area? Maybe change weapon?

                 What killed the civilian?

Page 72.   Lexi’s secret is a good one.

Page 82.   The further along I get, the more I’m convinced that this congregation stuff is not working. At least not for me.

Finished. Did Lexi get fired?

Pia,

Thanks for the read and detailed notes. Is entirely my fault that Sean is not in this more. I thought it would be smart to tell a story to an audience who's not familiar with Sean. That they wouldn't need to know about the short films to get it.

AS for Robert, I was trying to make Sean a middle man between good and Evil, which is Lexi and Robert. I thought some of it worked and some didn't. Robert seeking immortality from Sean was a solid motive, but I need to work on him more.

Lexi definitely needs to be more defined. I'm working on that. I like that she's in a tad over her head and means well, while her partner is a pretty cool cat she's trying to keep up with.

As for budget, I was thinking $1mil when I wrote this... well that's not going to happen unless a studio steps in. I probably need to get it around $100k range to be realistic. Probably a total rewrite at that point.

This was a rough draft, I am going to rewrite this version and maybe send it into some contests. I didn't even waste money for coverage on this yet. I heard what I needed to right here.

Quoted from AngryBear What is Lexi wearing? When we first meet her, she’s dressed in police blues. If she’s still wearing that, she would really stick out here. Did I miss something?

Yes, in the beginning she reaches past her police blues and grabs a pants suit from the closet. Was just trying to show she was recently a patrol officer. Not anymore.

Also, as for investigator on her badge, I watch a lot of reality crime shows like the Next 48. I've seen some detective's badge say that, but it's probably just confusing here.

Quoted from AngryBear Page 26.  I don’t know about Robert’s speech there at the top of the page. He says he strips his followers of their materialistic lives and give them something to have faith in, only to end his speech saying they only follow him because he pays them very well. Now that doesn’t make sense at all, if you ask me.

The thugs like Sergei and Anton follow him because he pays them. His "children" back at the compound truly believe in him.

Quoted from AngryBear Page 71.   Lexi gets hit twice with a shotgun blast. One in her vest and one in her leg. Wouldn’t the pellets spread over a large area? Maybe change weapon?                  What killed the civilian?

I like the violence of a shotgun, but maybe I should change it. We have to hunt with shotguns up here, no high powered rifles. A buckshot only contains a few large balls and doesn't spread as wide. Then there's a shotgun slug which is one metal projectile.

The civilian was already wounded. Later died of his/her wounds. I didn't want to go over into detail, but that's what I was thinking.

Lexi quit her job and came clean about her lie. Kind of her repentance, then she begins another lie by hiding what Richter had done when she deletes that video.

Thanks again for the read Pia. Especially on the typos. Thought I had this pretty clean, dammit. If ever I can return the favor, you know how to find me.

James