Anything For Love by George Willson - Short - When Ralph's wife shows him something she really wants, he decides to go to great lengths to get it. For the Valentine's Day Visual Writing Challenge. 10 pages - pdf, format 8)

Ha!  I can guarantee that nobody will anticipate where this story ends up going.

I don't think I can even comment on this without spoilers, and I don't want to give them.

I'll just say that I enjoyed this one a great deal.  The pace was excellent, as was the whole silly tone from start to finish.  I did find some of the action a little confusing when they were...hm....when they were leaving that place they went to get those things....I had a hard time following some of the action there.

This is too tough to do without spoilers, so I'll quit.

And the title...this isn't the first Meat Loaf reference I have found in this author's work.  Do you think he's a fan?

George I liked this one, but I think there are too much "Indiana Jones" scenes in it Maybe if you get them short it will more readable...

Nice work, George. I enjoyed reading this. There´s just two details I could pick you on.

-You can loose all the inserts, IMO. If you describe a page of statuettes in a catalog, the reader will see the insert of the catalog, without need to call it "insert" in the script. This technical term drags the reader away from the story, specially in this one which is written with such a good flow.

-I´m not fond of character descriptions. I don´t care about their hair color or what are they wearing. But, IMO, you should tell us what are their ages at least.

Despite that, this was a good contribution. Good job.

Cool!  This was a much different take on the whole Valentine dealie and I loved it!

All of the motions reminded me of the muted episode that most cartoons these days do.  No words, just motions.  One thing had me questioning the story, and that was Professor Frank's age.  You introduce him as "a wizened old man of many years" and then before you know it he's running up mountains, jumping over flames and fighting off crazy natives!  I guess it goes hand in hand with excitement of the story.  Reminded me of all three Indiana Jones pictures.

Action packed story with a nice message.  A guy who will obviously go to great lengths to satisfy his woman.  Excellent story, nice pacing.  Great work!

"A red spray covers the helicopter."  That line had me cracking up!

Quoted from bert And the title...this isn't the first Meat Loaf reference I have found in this author's work.  Do you think he's a fan?

Thanks all for the reads so far. I admit two things in this: one, I did utilize some Indiana Jones inspiration, although that is clearly not the heart of the story; two, I only proofed it once.

As for Meat Loaf...while I admit to owning every one of his albums, I'm more of a Jim Steinman fan than a Meat Loaf fan. Jim Steinman wrote every song in both Bat Out of Hell and Bat Out of Hell 2 along with a large amount of other enormously popular songs such as Total Eclipse of the Heart, Makin' Love Out of Nothing At All, and It's All Coming Back to Me Now for other artists. Jim and Meat made each other the names they are today. But yes, I do know the music very well.

While this title was deliberate, I wonder where I may have placed other references...I'm some some may have been deliberate as well, but I'll bet more than a few were subconscious.

I'm glad everyone seems to like it so far. Like I'd mentioned elsewhere, I just pictured the dozen or so silent films I've watched and wrote it with that genre in mind. I've seen some good and some bad ones (Metropolis so far ranking as my number one favorite), so I can only hope this emulates the good ones.

I liked it. Yeah, it was a little like Indiana Jones, but I happen to like those so that was fine. I did not have a problem following the camera through the map, I thought that worked well. I felt like I was watching an old silent movie, which I thought was pretty cool. That way you also get away with using the “inserts”. I also thought format was very good and you write action well.

This was the fourth “Valentine” script I’ve read so far and all of them I have ended up feeling sorry for the guy. Hmmm….

Good Job! :-)

Quoted from George Willson While this title was deliberate, I wonder where I may have placed other references...I'm some some may have been deliberate as well, but I'll bet more than a few were subconscious.

My, uh, "rousing" rendition of "2 out of 3 ain't bad" in SimplyNoir, for starters.


I liked this story, and kind of like everyone above said, a great take on the contest.  Nice job.

Oh, that's right. I'd forgotten about that. That rendition had a dual purpose with the Breanne/Spieler "You're the greatest writer" in the world bit going on too. They, also, were talking all night and getting no where.

Thanks for the read.

Hey George,

This was a whacky take on the assignment. I enjoyed it. The action is very well described and I definitely got an Indiana Jones vibe as I was reading.

I agree with Mr. Z about the inserts. Although technically correct, they do get in the way, especially when you have so many. I've stopped using them myself because I think they pull the reader out of the story.

I was a bit surprised by old man Frank's agility, but I think it added comedy to the adventure. I loved the scene where the natives attack the helicopter. I think it would be better if you used INT/EXT for your slugline rather than cutting back and forth. I could be wrong, but that's how I'd have done it.

Anyway, an entertaining read and very different to the other entries I've read.

This was different, a script with no dialog.  I liked all the indiana Jones stuff,  the crumbling floor and all.  I especially the fight on the helicopter, that was really cool.  It was like those old serials that I see on turner classic movie channel.

I had no clue where it was going, I was surprised that it was going to turn into an action script, he sure must love his wife a whole lot.  Great job.