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The Perfect Plot by 0 - Short, Thriller - When Donald becomes involved in an old friend's paranoid crusade, it seems like an event that could only have been scripted. That may well be true. - pdf, format
Solid spin on familiar territory. Doesn't over-do the meta stuff, which is nice.
The conspiracy of the first half is so familiar that I think it could be cut down significantly. If Max spent less time explaining and the two had a bit more back and forth conveying personality, I think that'd help the story feel whole.
The trunk reveal came too late, I thought. Could've been placed much earlier without losing anything. It'd make us doubt Max more, but that could totally work in the script's favour.
Agreed with Rick above. A solid story deserving a rewrite.
Story wise this wasn’t for me. Too scattered to keep up with and too many logic problems to keep me invested. Why would Donald just go along with it? If Max is looking for somewhere to hide then why not hide at Donald’s? Character choices end up feeling way too forced for sake of plot.
I realise we’re all writing against the timer but think carefully about what it is you’re wanting the reader to visualise. You lost me early on within the first few lines:
You start off by giving us a repetition of British Countryside in the slug and in the first action line. And this may seem like a niggle but countryside is not what I’m imagining when you tell us we’re flying over wealthy residential estates. You’re also telling us this is happening at NIGHT -- could we realistically be seeing all this and understand what it is if it’s dark? It seems like minor stuff, but it’s important not to lose the reader in a series of conflicting visuals. Better to keep it simple and clear.
Sorry but this wasn’t for me. Too unfocused.
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The script definitely needs work, but those things did make sense:
1. Donald knew him, and we find out he's used to a life of skull-duggery, so why not go with him? 2. The Group knows everything, they will know of their acquaintance, so Donald's house was out. It's probably even bugged or being monitored.
I think the opening, which is badly written, also mentions that the houses are illuminated with spotlights, so the actual visual is OK.
Straight off, it's a lot of dialogue, loads and loads and loads of it. Also there's no variety in pace (may be deliberate), it's 100 miles an hour and it doesn't really stop.
Kept me interested throughout but I'm not really sure about the stuck in a taxi brief being met. They seemed to only be locked in at the end, apart from the boot dweller out back of course.
Anyway, decent enough but probably needs work on pacing, and also questionable regarding the brief.
An interesting one here. It does strain the limits of low budget.
At times the dialogue was a bit long - I think it was well written enough but would have worked better if chopped up into bite size morsels - it got a little tedious.
I will have to re-read. I never figured out what was going on with the girl in the trunk.
Good effort - has some issues - going to give this another read later.
I rather liked the story and concept; the ending was a touch over the top, but I understand and respect that (though I wonder what it would do to the budget!)
Here's a few thoughts/notes I took on this one - not much, they may be of help.
Very well written – a bit TOO literary for a screenplay? Streamline a little more. p. 1 oak door (lower cap) p. 3: For a creative person, this is really unoriginal – love the line! p. 10: attaches itself to the roof (lower cap) Wait – I’m wondering why Donald originally stayed in the taxi once he realized Max was looney tunes. Maybe Max has a gun? (Then later, it’s because Donald’s in on it?)
I do see the character felt trapped, but the large chunks of dialogue had me jumping over it, then I just jumped to the end. Sorry
Cindy
Award winning screenwriter Available screenplays TINA DARLING - 114 page Comedy ONLY OSCAR KNOWS - 99 page Horror A SONG IN MY HEART - 94 page Drama HALLOWEEN GAMES - 105 page Drama
This feels very familiar and doesn't really introduce anything new to theese conspiracy Iluminati types tales...
It's also too reliant on exposition, needs more show than tell, which is, of course, a challenge in a cab!
But I did quite enjoy it, was wondering who was trapped in the cab until the daughter reveal, which felt a little tacked on. With some polishing this could work though.
Not sure that opening slug is written correctly, but I’m not gonna harp on stuff like that too much. I’m just looking to see if this holds my interest really. That’s my approach to shorts.
I’ve done it, I think we’ve all probably done it at some point or another, but man am I tired of reading amateur scripts with screenwriter characters. I tend to think that’s a huge joke around Hollywood. No disrespect to you, but I bet they get scripts from Jo Schmoes all the time and laugh at the fact their script has a screenwriter character.
That being said, this is a clever enough spin on that. A screenwriter who writes the news… now that I get past my complaint, I think that’s actually a pretty cool idea for a character in something.
Max is a bit too manic, while Donald is a bit too calm, imo. Nice contrast between the two, but they never rang 100% true to how I envisioned this going down. Not a huge deal. It is a little too “talky” though.
“Donald’s” plan seems very reminiscent of that Dan Brown book, Inferno. Actually, the “cleanse the earth by killing a chunk of the population” tactic has been used many times at this point.
I’m sure some will say the “trapped” portion of the script comes too late, but to me it fits the theme just fine. I guess the trunk girl actually fits the theme the whole way too. … with that said, the “low budget” went out the window on the last page.
This was pretty cool. Wordy, overwritten probably, but held my interest for the most part. (I won’t lie, blocks of dialogue make me sigh, and a lot of the words here could be slashed.) I could see this being a cool opening scene to something longer about government conspiracies and the like. Not necessarily my genre, but I’d watch it. The writing was solid enough.
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I thought you did well in containing the script largely within the taxi but allowing it some breathing space.
Inevitably we get a few talking heads style scripts within a contained location, mine is, so I think we have to accept this a bit. Plus once directed the dialogue can be mixed up.
The girl in the boot didn't really do much so felt a little unneeded.
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Lots of loose ends. This needed more then 10 pages to really dive into the characters.
I was lost at times. So much long dialog that it slowed down the pace somewhat.
When your dialog is the plot, it really slows down the story. I'm guilty of that too.
Way overwritten. I'd say this writer has spent a lot of time writing prose (novels or short stories).
Keep in mind one thing when writing screenplays. You are writing it with the actors and director in mind. Your descriptions for things like houses should be minimum views. In other words, the more you describe something unique, the harder it is for the director to find that.
You could easily write upscale neighborhood. As I've gone further into writing, I've learned that you really only have to establish bare minimum for the characters/buildings/ etc. Only dive into something if it is DIFFERENT from what we'd expect.
In other words, if a millionaire lived as a pauper, then we'd need to know that. If someone was wearing dragon sunglasses that can summon a dragon later in the script, then we need to know.
I never felt he was trapped in the taxi. Story was hard to follow. It was exciting, but, hard to find any realism in it.
Now, if the guy lead his screenwriter friend there to be crushed, that might have worked better for me...
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I kinda liked this. Yeah, I thought it a tad overwritten at first, but eventually it became engrossing and I was in for the ride. I'm not partial to conspiracy theorists, so perhaps that was the allure, and it kept me turning pages. I though the choice of screenwriter as Max's occupation was a bit off -- could've been a journalist, that would've worked better for me. Didn't really look for typos, grammatical issues. Just followed the story, and this one wasn't bad at all. Good work.