The Government by Al Agolli - Short - {no logline} - pdf, format

Hey Al.

No logline, no page length?  A shot in the dark for us, eh?  But anyways...

So it's a personal pet peeve but seeing the "handsome" and "beautiful" adjectives attached to your characters bugs the heck outta me.  I've seen it on quite a few scripts  and it seems like they can describe what "handsome" or beautiful" means to them.  Maybe what makes Rob handsome is his chiseled jaw or sapphire blue eyes.  Or what makes Sarah drop-dead gorgeous is her hourglass physique or wavy, golden hair.  Don't mean to vent out on you in particular but I think it's better to describe physical traits like this (if necessary at all) as opposed to flat out saying that somebody is pretty.

"saggy, grey hair."  Strange word choice.

Jack says, "Go to bed.  You've had too much to drink."  I think you've mixed Jack up with Sarah.

"A leggy blonde Kara..."  That to me is beautiful.  This description is short and it works.

"...a flat battery."  Never heard that one before.  A dead battery?

Reading further, I see that Rob is the one that's drunk.  You might want to hint at that much earlier.  Maybe some slurred speech from Rob or a stumble.  I guess that WAS supposed to be Jack's line earlier.

So not much of a story.  I mean I get the message.  The capitalist is really "givin'" it to the worker but other than that, it's just not working for me.  Maybe you were trying to convey government through these characters and/or I'm missing something (I tend to do that) but it was a bust for me.

Something I would suggest is cutting back on the small talk.  You can say a lot by a few choice actions as opposed to a chunk of dialogue.  One example is Jack's intro.  Most of it wasn't really necessary at least for me but a grunt from Jack and that last question towards Rob would easily have done fine and moved the story forward.  Small changes like that can have a significant impact on the flow of your script IMO.  

Hopefully you show up.  I'm interested to hear your thoughts on this.

Johnny

Hi Al,

I was very surprised to see no title page or even a title and as mentioned above no word count either.

I thought the majority of the description was well written and was impressed with how much you did in five pages.

My biggest problem was with Rob’s introduction, there’s no real indication he’s drunk and by the time you have Jack mention this I’d already formed a mental image of him. This really took me out of the story to be honest. In my opinion you need to make condition clear right from the beginning and later have him stumble or something before Jack makes a comment (or maybe it can just be a disapproving look). One line I thought that stood out was “Kara sleeks out of the room with her hips swaying.” This tells us everything without a line of dialogue necessary. Maybe you can try something like this to show Rob is drunk.
Near the end we have “Jack slaps his lap.” I wouldn’t use this unless it’s for an internally rhymed line of poetry.

Overall though I enjoyed it

Jimbo

I enjoyed the script. The descriptions were short and to the point, not too descriptive. I could visualise each scene and the characters without being locked into anything specific, which is exactly what a director wants.

The dialogue flowed naturally, smooth and I enjoyed the conversation between the dad and the son. As other have stated I did not realise Rob was drunk until he said it.

However at the end I was let down as there was no end. A guy bangs his babysitter, that's it. As a scene that is part of a bigger movie this would be great but a short has to tell a story and this fell short on the story aspect for me but overall this is a good script, you did well to cover so much in 5 pages in the right way.

Hi Al

As mentioned by the above comments, a log line is key for potential readers to get an idea of what they are about to read.

Interesting story. You had me captivated at the start, and the middle. The end was a definite letdown. Actually, by the way you were describing Kara, it was already clear (dead-giveaway) that Rob would be 'tapping that' on the side. But your script just ended there. No resolution whatsoever.

You did great at the start, but I think this story needs to be expanded a little bit more. Great job though

-Silva Sly-

It started off good. But even for a short it ended kind of abruptly. If this was a longer  story, that could have just been a nice ending to a scene. But for it to end just like that. I'm like..what did I just read?

It makes sense why there wasn't an log line. I mean based on the script, what could you have wrote... Guy has a loving family then bangs the babysitter?..You should have just called it "Bangin the babysitter", instead of "The government". Don't mean to be harsh..just an honest assessment.. And I know alot ppl tend to put overall enjoyed it. Just to to sound like their not a complete douche. But if honesty is what are your after. Then...overall I didn't enjoy it.

Good luck though.

It was interesting, but why would tom all of sudden talk about the government? That really confused me. I like how you foreshadowed the affair and the babysitter's lie.  The ending was a little down. I wanted to know the consequences of the affair.