Revenge by Alfian Ahmad (alzidaney), Ryan Wong, Gan Jiayi - Short, Drama - A young man comes back from overseas to take revenge on his parents' murderer, who were once gang leaders. 13 pages - pdf, format

I enjoyed reading it. Most of the story is engaging and I care about the characters. I liked the scenes between Sean and May. But some tightening might improve the script.

First, I didn't get the purpose of the montage at the beginning. Those shots are not related to each other. If you want us to get into the mood of a revenge-gangster script, how is "A young couple tickling each other" establish that?

Good expositional scene in the toilet. It gives us all we need to know about Sean's desire.

At Sean's house, you didn't introduce Mat and Li. I was a bit confused where they came from.

You need a new slugline when Jimmy leads Sean to the backyard because the scene is EXT, not INT. SEAN'S HOUSE anymore.

When Sean goes back to save May, you need to describe the action more. The action as we see on screen, not just "Sean engages one of them. DEFEATS all of them one by one". How did Sean engage and defeat the guards?

Personally, I don't like that May has a bulletproof vest after she got shot and everything after is all happy and fine. It's a bit cliché. It would be better if May actually dies and Sean can still recite May's tree story. That way the script would fit the theme more. As I understand, Sean did have the desire to take revenge on Jimmy and because of this May dies. Easy to cause damage but impossible to repair.

You also need to correct the tenses, try not to use too many "ing" ending verbs.

Anyway, it's a good read. Thanks.

Thx for your feedback. Its my first script so still unsure about some stuff like the backyard.

Anyway, the montage at the beginning was supposed to get into the mood for shakespeare's quote. I'll see what can be done to correct that.

Thx again for your feedback.

Good to see you on SS. Hope that this will be the first of many scripts you post here.

1. Presumably the Shakespeare quote is over the Montage. You need to make this a little clearer as the way it is written  suggests it comes first. The Montage was a bit bland as well - and a bit literal. Shylock, the character who speaks this line in "Merchant of Venice", is a Jew, a despised outsider, and his point is that he is still human, whatever the Christians think of him. You reduce it here to a woman pricking her finger!

Maybe drop the Montage and just have the quote over a black screen? Or scenes that relate more specifically to what the story is about.

2.

Quoted from "Revenge" He has a habit of rubbing his thumb against the sharp edges of keys to make the dangling sound.

I am not sure what this means - rubbing his thumb along the keys wouldn't make a dangling sound. You need to be clearer on this.

3. No need for the transition or for (Continued)

4. Awful lot of VO's here. I am not a fan of this device and in general it is looked down on now. My feeling has always been that film is visual - it's not radio, and we need to see things, not hear them told to us. This is, however, personal and I know a lot of people still like VO's and use them.

5. All intro's should have been in block capitals, as I am sure you are aware. And you would need to indicate the two Malay gangsters properly as they have lines.

6. I hope I am not being rude here, but I suspect English is not your first language? Some of the descriptions are a bit clunky as a result

Quoted from "Revenge" Everyone retreat their weapons with hesitation and confusion.

for example.

7. As pointed out, the Backyard scene needs it's own scene header (or "slugline").

8. We are not aware that Jimmy is Sean's uncle except through your script - you need to put it on screen, with Sean, for example, saying "Hello, Uncle" or something like this. You do it later in the scene, but it would make more sense to do it at the intro.

9.

Quoted from "Revenge" Her slutty eyes can attract even the noblest of men

Best to avoid this kind of description. Just say she has "slutty eyes" if you want (though I am not 100% what they'd look like!). You could just say that she is "sluttish" and leave it at that!

10.

Quoted from "revenge" He tries to lie his way through.

Again you need to avoid telling us what we should pick up from the dialogue.

11. I would have thought, with all these gangsters around, that it would have been unlikely that Jimmy would have sent May to help dispose of the body?

12. You'd be better off heading the "disposal area" as "Canal side" or somesuch as this heading makes no sense. And you miss off the Day/Night description. Would they do this in broad daylight? (You also miss it off the Motel scene).

13. I must say that it is nice to see a script with some local colour in it - this does give a sense of the surroundings, and that we are not in the West.

14. I am not sure about the section with May and Sean wandering about the beach and the market. As we must assume that Uncle Jimmy would be after them both now, would this be wise?

15. p10 - and another VO!

16. May's letter is in an odd tense. It should be "will" not "would've" and "will have gone" not "goes". Again this may be because of other issues. You also have an action line following this which is, again, stating something that the audience won't know.

17. The scene where Sean storms the house is not particularly well written - what is exactly happening? Are they shooting at each other, using martial arts? It needs tightening up. Also, really, is one man likely to make it past armed guards into the house? (At least without injury)

18. Jimmy's dialogue and Sean's comeback are very American action film - but even if you want to do this, having Sean hesitate after his punchline takes away the effect.

19. No need for BANG! BANG! BANG! Just say he shoots him! You also fail to make it clear what has happened here - again it needs tightening up and some of the descriptive passage from below the dialogue should come first.

Also I'd say that, if Jimmy is alive, he remains a danger - he's a gangster isn't he? He's not likely to retire gracefully from the scene!

20. The bullet proof vest trick is an awful cop out. and a real problem for me.

21. I quite liked the way to went back to the story May had been telling in the Motel. I think it would have had more impact if she was dead and I'd also suggest that this VO might work better at the beginning instead of Shakespeare's quote - with a suitable scene illustrating it.

Not a bad first effort - a few flaws, but it did have some nice local colour and at least made an effort to be a bit different from the norm, even if I am not sure it wholly worked. Better to have tried and failed than to never have tried at all!

thx for your feedback dude! very comprehensive, i like it i'm in the process of reading your remembrance atm and shall post my feedback up soon.

anw, yeah, i kinda had to inject some local flavour in it, as i have to know that that's what makes my country like unique in itself. thank god for you guys, im appreciating this feedback alot.

i showed other people around me, and they can only say things like "oh its okay." "its good!". though i know its not. at least now i know why.

should be seeing better and more works from me in the future

Interesting script, enjoyed the character and the culture.  
Notes:
montage of shots is kinda redundant in a script
snickering at a dead bird?  Whats that about?
I think the action seems a little too spare, contrary to the norm.  Sean incapacitates him?  How?  Flips him how?  Is he using martial arts or just being a badass.  Same with the later scene.
Everyone retreat their weapons, should be 'returns their weapons'
p5  'you should have seen her squealed for her life',  should be 'sqeal for her life'.
Seems like sean was being pretty damn stupid walking into a house full of gangsters with a knife strapped to his leg.  What did he expect to happen?
A smiley familiar only to the two of them.  How do we know that?

Seems like the story is kinda backward.  Like he travels across the ocean the avenge his parents, then just walks into the gangsters house with no plan.  Then magically gets rescued.  Hangs around with his new lover, THEN spends awhile thinking about whether or not to commit revenge.  Everything implied that he had already made that decision.  If he was just going to talk to his uncle that should be implied, then his uncle's reaction would lead to him deciding to go for revenge.  

Also had a problem with May's character.  Totally unbelievable the way they fall in love at first sight.  Even harder since she's someone Jimmy trusts to dispose of bodies.  She'd have to be a hard gangster to be doing that kinda thing.  Maybe if she was Jimmys niece or just some girl and kept seperate from the gangster stuff, but still that would take more time than a short.
My other thought was to have her have a stake in the revenge.  As in she knew his parents, and always suspected Jimmy killed them.  Once she overhears Jimmy admit it she puts herself in a position to help him escape.

My suggestion (and I know its easy to give suggestions on someone elses work)  would be to expand it to give May/Sean a proper chance to fall in love.  Also make it clear that sean isn't sure about committing revenge until after his uncle tries to kill him.  
And if you needed some action to fill in the whole getting to know each other bit, Sean could always help out his Uncle for a bit as he tries to decide whether to kill him.

Anyways good luck with it, certainly has a lot of potential in the characters and settings.

thanks for the feedback. I wasn't sure how much details one has to put in the action sequences hence as such. haha.

Anw, actually, from the start, he's been reluctant on revenge, hence the part in the backyard where he "places his hands over the knife" and then he changes his mind and demands answers from his uncle. I wanna imply very strongly that he's somewhat very confused about revenge. Maybe I should add one more scene at the start.

And I shall take note of the relationship between May and Sean, make it more believable. Thanx with the suggestions and the feedback