A Sonata in Z by Aaron Mitton - Short, Drama - A cynical young woman makes a discovery about her past that explains who she is.  15 pages - pdf, format

Writer interested in feedback on this work

Hey Aaron

Had a look at first few pages... a few thoughts.

1) You describe Quinn before it is physically possible, she's outside a locked door breaking it down with an axe. Leave the description until she breaks through.
2) You lapse into passive voice, try and keep it active, e.g. she is breaking would be she breaks, she is holding would be she holds.
3) You say Quinn steps through, and then a couple of lines later you say she slowly enters, drop the second one as it's just a repeat.
4) When Noah shouts for her he's not in the cabin, so you could use O.C. (Off Camera) or O.S. (Off Screen), so it would be
NOAH (O.C.)
5) You describe Quinn as exuding confidence and Noah as having a goodness to him... both of these are actually difficult to film, how would we know these things about them? Remember your script is about showing us what can be seen.
6) Some of the dialogue is a little on the nose, i.e. it's describing what we can see anyway, worth re-looking at it and make it less obvious.

You'd nearly lost me at this point as the it seemed to be taking a while to get going and the above issues were slowing the read... and then the phone and her nam, very good twist and grabbed my attention.

7) If the phone is charged to 15% there's no way flicking through a few pictures would drain it, i'd drop it to 5% or lower so it makes it more believable.
she is constantly checking - as before make it active, she checks the phone, or she checks the phone repeatedly. Robert is holding becomes Robert holds etc
9) The Infected need some sort of description, how are they infected and what do they look like?
10) Robert's speech on page 12/13 is a little long
11) How can Quinn be sitting in the same place is Robert has already smashed and overturned the furniture?
12) A second bullet seems a little coincidental... does it need to be just one?
13) I think there needs to be some reason they've come to the cabin, blind luck seems a bit of a cheat.

Overall I think there's something here that is definitely worth a re-write and a polish, there's a decent post apocalypse drama within this.

Anthony

  

Some notes.

Anthony already commented on what can and cannot be seen in the opening.  Remember your point of view as you write.

Some of the descriptions are overlong.  Think in terms of shorter paragraphs, compact language.

As far as story goes, this one is the familiar one of the infected attacking and killing people.  It works as far as it goes, but you might try twisting this one somehow.

I agree with Anthony that coincidence is far too common in this one.  The second bullet, the phone, the charger that Quinn carries.  Why?  Hey, you never know when you're going to find an old cell phone that just happens to match the charger.  Getting to this cabin in the first place.  One of my problems is writing actions or details that are for my convenience as the writer, not as rational aspects of the story.  In a way, this one might be even better if it isn't really Quinn's dad.  She buries him because she adopts him?

Best
Richard

Thank you guys for reading and reviewing it.  This is the kind of stuff I can't get from my friends and family who don't know how to read scripts.  I really appreciate the feedback!

Quoted from RichardR Some notes. As far as story goes, this one is the familiar one of the infected attacking and killing people.  It works as far as it goes, but you might try twisting this one somehow. Best Richard

Thanks for your feedback.  My hope was that this would be interpreted as a drama about a woman learning about her father and her past that just happened to be set in the world of zombies (thus what makes it different). Kinda like how "Maggie" (with Arnold) was about a father dealing with the eventual death of his daughter, and the zombies were the tool to make that happen, not the main protagonist....

I agree that this definitely needs some polishing and I will get right on it!