Deadly Attraction :: SimplyScripts Screenwriting Discussion Board

To the author -- take what I have to say with a grain of salt.  I'm not hating, I'm just giving it to you straight because sugar-coating has no place in screenwriting.  At least, not if you want to get better at it...

1. The first slug line,  "Late afternoon" = no.  DAY or NIGHT only.  If time of day needs to be specified, do so in the action/narrative.

2. Don't split up a two-line super-impose from one page to the next.  Either fit both lines on one page, or move them both to the next.

3. Verb tense.  "Has come to a skidding stop."  "Smoke is seeping".  Firstly, how are we to know it's come to a skidding stop if the car is already stationary the first time we see it?  We can't see what has happened moments before we arrive.  So you need to paint us a picture.  A bullet-riddled car smolders in the center of the highway.  SKID MARKS indicate a hasty stop.  That kind of thing.  And when it comes to verbe tense, use active, present tense verbs.  "Smoke is seeping" --> "smoke seeps."

4. Do you own the rights to Ring of Fire, by Johnny Cash?  No?  Then lose it.  What you CAN write is something like "a 70s country tune plays on the car stereo."  But no specific song titles unless you own their rights.

5. Is/Are.  You use them improperly a number of times in the first two pages.  "The driver and passenger door is open" should be "the drive and passenger doorS ARE open."  "All door are open" should be "all doorS are open."

6. You're capping the wrong words.  TWO BLOODY bodies = two bloody BODIES or TWO BLOODY BODIES.  And don't cap character descriptions, especially if you're going to cap the adjectives rather than the objects.  "very HANDSOME and DASHING," "cut in the style of a young ELVIS PRESLEY," "a very STUNNING BLOND haired beauty," "Texas BEAUTY QUEEN type."  N-n-no.

7. Your second slugline: "EXT. HIGHWAY - PRISONER TRANSFER BUS - TRAVELING - AFTERNOON.  We can't have two exteriors at once.  We can be EXT. HIGHWAY, and then you indicate a prisoner transfer bus in the action/narrative, or we can be EXT. PRISONER TRANSFER BUS- MOVING (not "traveling"), and indicate that it's barreling down a highway in the action/narrative.  But we can't be EXT. HIGHWAY - PRISONER TRANSER BUS - MOVING.  And again, DAY or NIGHT only, with specific times referred to in the action narrative if needed.

And that's all in the first page (and part of the second).  Skimming ahead over the next several pages I can see these same mistakes are made incessantly.  I also saw a couple instances of "your" instead of "you're" ("your" means it belong to you; "you're" is short for "you are.").  There are also a number of misspells.

But, it's not my intention to bad mouth your script.  The point is, if a reader is to be drawn into your story they can't be distracted by such glaring mistakes -- most especially in a spec script. If this script were to be handed to a pro reader, I strenuously doubt they'd bother reading even as much of it as I did, and lemme tell ya, I didn't read much, because I saw immediately that the writer hadn't done his homework.  You might have written the greatest story in the world, but the poor execution, on the page, sinks it before the story can even be given a chance.

That might sound overly harsh, but pro readers ARE overly harsh.  They have to read a LOT of screenplays; so many that they'll use any excuse they can to lessen their workload.  And a script rife with the kind of errors I've pointed out is all the reason they need to toss your script aside and disregard it.  Then all your hard work, all the hours and days and weeks you spent writing it, will be for absolutely nothing.

With that in mind, you want your script to be the absolute best you can make it before sending it out.  And it ain't gonna be its absolute best if you don't follow spec rules and format.  So bone up, man.  Read as many scripts as you can get your hands on, study and internalize spec script rules and format.  Once you've got those down, the only thing you have to worry about is your story itself.

Also, not to add insult to injury, but your logline is a mess, man.  Punctuation included.  What a logline needs:

1. The protagonist/lead character
2. Their goal
3. The opposition which stands in their way of achieving that goal (could be a person, a thing, a personal character flaw)
4. What's at stake; what might happen if they fail to achieve their goal.  You don't have to name this outright, but you should at least hint at it.
5. Thirty words or less.

For instance:

"A federal Marshall must hurry to apprehend a pair of dangerous felons before the assassin on their trail beats her to them."

Protagonist: check
Goal: check
Opposition (assassin): check
Stakes: check.  Being as she's a federal marshall, chances are she could lose her job, and will likely be held responsible for any further deaths, including the felons if the assassin beats her to them.
Thirty words or less: check

But that's just a quick example.  Aim for that, but in your words.

Good luck.  Keep writing.

- Lon