The Man at the Window by Toran - Short, Horror - A couple who are vacationing in a Cabin are tortured by a supernatural creature that peers in the window. 4 pages - pdf, format 8)

What a snazzy lookin' script. Too bad it screams "amateur!"

You don't really have a story. What you have is one character who gets what he wants without  much of a struggle. What have they been doing for six days?

Good effort, though.

Agreed. This didn't have much of a story. You have plenty of violence and grue on display, but very little conflict. There wasn't any motivation, so I didn't really care about anything.

Nice effort, though. I liked the title. It grabbed me and made me want to read it.

All right, Toran, I assume you're planning on filming this, so I won't call you on the camera directions. You know they don't belong in a spec unless when absolutely necessary.

There really isn't much of a story, and there was no conflict for anyone here.  There might've been, but the characters died too easily.

Some of the dialogue sounded robotic: "don't resort to violence". If this were a comedy, I'd understand why you would use this phrase, but in a serious Horror it's way too hokey.

The other dialogue I felt you just included to explain the story, and you did it in the most plain, uninteresting way possible. "It's been tormenting us for six months straight! We have to stand up and fight back" It was painfully obvious you only included that to explain what little story there was here.

It was amazingly-written on a technical level, but the story itself is just plain. I think you just got lazy here, 'cause I know you can do better. Make it lengthier, show us some bg, more character development. Show us how it all lead
to what we read here.

Just tryin' to help.

--Julio

Yeah. I plan on filming this, thats why I added in the camera directions. THIS was going to be a feature length, but I really couldn't find a way to do it. So I took the story I originally had and made it into a short.

There really isn't a point to this story, though.

Hey Toran; It was alright, but it would have been better if had some more depth. Just a very loose sketch...

Well apart from the lack of story that as already been pointed out, there was just no shock factor to this. It was just too little, too fast. When I reached the end I immediately thought that I had missed something...but no, that was it!

If this was originally going to be a feature I am sure you could have made it into a longer short then it is. Ten pages would probably be enough to turn this into a decent little story. This would give you a few pages to introduce the characters and their plight, show the psychological torture that they are being put through. Lets face it, if a mysterious figure was whispering that it was going to eat you...you would be a bit worried. The way it is now I got the impression that Shawnonly cared because he was woke up.

Also you really need to fix the dialog. Sorry to be harsh but I have seen less corn in a field of cobs.

Quoted Text God damn it, Danielle! This guys been torturing you for six straight days. We have to stand up and fight back!

or

Quoted Text You can never save your wife. She'll die soon. I will slowly drink her blood. Then eat parts of her body.

perhaps they could be

Quoted Text We've put up with this crap for six days. We've got to do something

Quoted Text You won't save her you know. I'll sup on her blood and devour her flesh

Oh and one more thing

Quoted Text A dark figure stands outside the window; their eyes are glowing red. It taps on the window again.

If there is only one figure then it should not be "their eyes", it should be "it's eyes" or something. Their means there is more than one, but you clearly imply that it is one / singular.

As soon I saw the logline for this script I just had to read. Only because it seemed similar to a feature script I have here on this website that is about a shadowy dark figure that peers in through the window of a house and when it  taps on the glass, a child in the home vanishes.

I didn't really care much for the script but one thing I want to comment on is the font you used.  What font is it? It's fantastic and looks nice and is easy to read. Better then that  Courier font that Final Draft uses.

Which brings me to the question that  can someone please answer. Is Courier font the industry standard? Will a producer or agent or whatever accept a script if it is written in any font other then Courier?

I must know cause I would rather use the font seen in this script.

Hey Tonka; I'll weigh in on that as well as another comment on Toran's script.

Since Toran's doing this himself, it doesn't matter much, but for everyone else, it's important. From what I've read Courier is the industry standard because in terms of spacing and letter width it closely resembles the old pica typewriter font.

That's an important standard as it concerns page count and formatting...I could take a 140 page script and whittle down to 120 just by changing to a Helvetica Narrow or a font that uses less space between the letters.

In the Graphic Design world, Courier is a big problem, as that used to be a default font. But in the screenwriters world, I'm pretty sure we are stuck with it

Back to the story... I hope I get the opportunity to see the finished project on YouTube or something!

Hey Toran, you say you were gonna write this as a feature but didn't know how to stretch it to one.  I think you simply put your idea down and left it, it seems to rushed and unfinished.  

There's no real beginning and no conclusion, who's the figure, why is he torturing them and more to the point if he's been torturing them for 6 days why haven't they just left the cabin?

It's hard to care about the couple as we don't know anything about them.

This would be much better if you worked on the concept, fleshed it out and added a bit of tension.

Hey Toran,

Since your shooting this yourself I won't go into all the format issues or the way it is written. But if you ever plan on writing a spec script in the future you really need to know how to put it together. There are books out there that can help you with that, my fav is David Trottier's "The Screenwriter's Bible".

Regarding this script, I felt the story is pretty much non-existing. Every story (even a short) must have a beginning, a middle and an end. This has - let's face it - neither. Your characters are bland and the dialogue is wooden.

This needs work.

Rob

I'm sorry but I can't see the point too. What re you trying to express? We have a piece of violence and nothing more. Why does the dark figure want Danielle's blood for? Why did he pursue her for 6 days? Who's the dark figure? What are his motivations?

By the way, never let a character says "I'll be back in 5 minutes" because we perfectly know he WON'T be back and be killed.

You need to dig your story.


Michel 8)

I have to agree with everyone else. This is, well, bad. The characters are nonexistent, they say unnatural things, and the whole thing goes by so fast that even if you tried to develop a story there would be no time.

It seems apparent that horror is the genre you like to work in. But do not use that as an excuse to neglect story. A good horror story needs just as much of a foundation as any other story. I'm sorry if this review seems harsh but I've read some of your other stuff (The Hunter) and I know you can do better.

Sorry man. The story was uninspiring, uneventful, and is unsellable. You have no story, as that has been pointed out already.

You have a nucleus of a start for something. My recommendation would be to print this out, fold it up, and carry it in your pocket for a day. Every time you reach into  your pocket ask yourself, "How can I make this script better." After a few days, rewrite it. Give it some depth. Give it some reason for being and rewrite your dialogue.

Spencer

I'll have to agree with the other guys. This script has nothing going for it in the way of character development, structure and dialogue. You just have a random sequence of events with some evil figure outiside the window uttering words like "blood" and so on. This script was uninspiring..

Toran,

Do the potential cast and crew you are thinking of gathering a favor and don't shoot this.  There's no story.  There's no substance.  There's no reason to care about these characters.  It might warrant shooting if it had some ingenious twist at the end, but, it doesn't.

I kinda liked it. The corny dialogue kinda took me back, and the lack of story made it seem like an 80's B movie. That's not a compaint though! B movies rock! Overall, I'd say a C+. A fun read as long as you don't bring you're brain along for the ride.

~Zack~

What font are you using? Anything besides Courier would get dq’d from a competition and maybe even thrown out from a prodco.

Who is Danielle? Age, looks, anything. Ditto that for Shawn.

I thought the Dark Figure’s dialogue was quite bad to be honest with you.

The story over all isn’t particularly great either. sorry...

I would suggest letting us get to know Danielle and Shawn some more so we will care about them a little more.

I think you should also let us know more about the Dark Figure. Who is he and why is he doing this? Is he a vampire? He seems to be wanting blood, but that’s about it.

I see that you plan on filming this yourself. That’s good. I support people who want to film their own scripts. I would suggest though that you take some of the advice you’ve been given here in this thread to make this story better. As it is right now, I think you risk having anyone you show this film to react the same way to the story as we have done here.

Good Luck with it.

Pia

Hey Toran:

Just returning the favor because you read Quiet. Though, I will be reading other works from you, because this is obviously unequal since this script is only 4 pages and mine was 108, so yeah, don't worry.


To the story....


Well it's great to see that you're filming this. I'd really like to check it out once it's finished (or if it's already finished and I'm just late). The story was, like everyone said, not really that interesting but it's fine if you're filming because if you're just filming this for fun, that's okay. It's just something you're working on to help you practice (or at least that's what I do).

The dialogue was flat, but I won't go into that because everyone else has. Your font is wrong also, but, like Blakkwolfe said, if it helps you read it better, then go right ahead since you're the director.

Not really that much to say since it's only 4 pages, but yeah, this would be cool to see it on film (probably because I'm more of a visual person and can understand things better).

Sean