Red Christmas by Jalen Neal - Western, Drama - A half dead drifter sends a small mountain town into a frenzy on the cusp of the Christmas holiday. 151 pages - pdf format

Writer interested in feedback on this work

I know you probably want input on the story, however I'd strongly consider putting a title page on this with your name and contact info and a copyright statement.  

And, unless you are shooting this script, I'd take out the camera angles. It pulls me out the story which has a very interesting and compelling beginning, but...

"Muddy, covered in snow, VACANT."

The street?

How about, "A COLT .45 REVOLVER lies in the snow.  The GRIP is pearl white, streaked with BLOOD."

"Further up the road a BODY lies buried almost entirely by BLOODY SNOW."

I've forgotten what C.U. means - Close up?  

This is a compelling start and I may continue reading tonight after I've updated the website to find out what happened in Grim Hollow.

- Don

I'm with Don here... This sounds like a story I would want to read, but I don't have an interest in digesting what looks to be a shooting script.  Lose the camera angles, cut tos and other stuff and just give us a cinematic story to be absorbed in. e.g.,

Quoted Text CUT TO: EXT. STREET - MOMENTS LATER Muddy, covered in snow, VACANT. The CAMERA BOOMS down to REVEAL, lying in the snow, cold to the touch, is a COLT .45 REVOLVER. The GRIP is pearl white with streaks of BLOOD.

Should be something like:

EXT. STREET - MOMENTS LATER

Vacant and covered with a combination of muddy slush and snow.

In that snow, a COLT 45 REVOLVER, its pearl-white grip streaked with blood.
=============================================
Or something like that.

The problem is that all the camera directions and cut tos and pan downs are just pulling me out of what might be a pretty good story.

Really quick, I’d also rethink that logline as it doesn’t really give us any stakes, or tell us why the drifter has whipped the town into a frenzy.