The script gets off to a nice start, although
Quoted Text Xavier roughly shoves him down and places his gun against his head. Both Steve and the cab driver scream.
Xavier squeezes the trigger.
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It is assumed that the gun went off. Stevie as a witness might be one thing; the cab driver's days are on borrowed time. But 'then smashes the gun into Paulie�s head.' At first, I thought, score one point for extra brutality. They hated this guy. No...it turns out Xavier only pistol whipped Paulie. Empty gun? Jammed up? I have to know.
You make another error here:
Quoted Text Jonny shoots Ryan in the head. The two enter the club.
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It took me a few minutes to understand that you mean another THUG is alongside Jonny. The way this reads, though, is that Ryan was only wounded and went into the club with Jonny.
But this whole scene feels wrong.
How about Jonny asking Ryan to go inside with him and Thug, l or pulling the gun and forcing Ryan in? After all, wouldn't shooting him outside could be seen by witnesses
outside. As it is, I'm not sure why Paulie gives the order that no witnesses are left behind. Under the circumstances, they
can wait for Xavier and Steve to come out of Fort Apache and kill them
and there are no witnesses. Perhaps it would make more sense if it happened like that, and Nick or Ryan is taking out trash, sees the alleyway shooting,
and then kill or attempt to kill the two brothers. It makes more sense to me. After all, who tipped Paulie that Xavier and Stevie were already there? Someone loyal to Paulie.
Someone in the club. Furthermore, there's no telling how many people are in there. And, if Paulie owns the place, that calls into question of Fort Apache being a 'clean' venue or not. Even if it was clean, there might be a few associates of his in there, maybe connected. So, aside from killing Xavier and Stevie (which he fails to do-they die later) he kills employees and customers. Gunfire will also cause property damage.
See where I'm getting at? Why go through the hassle?
At first I was surprised that Nick called Xavier "boss". But I was okay with it since he would feel betrayed by Paulie. However---that said, why would he trust Xavier? He only met Xavier once- that very evening. We get to some months later, and I'm confused. Wouldn't Paulie know by now Nick survived and/or would still be around? Wouldn't Paulie know that he had a cop's son killed which could result in extra heat on him? Wouldn't he know that Xavier is plotting a mob takeover?
As the story progresses, I find myself more interested in the mob struggle than I do with A list star Anita (if she's so A list, that makes another implausible note in the story, also, she has enough money to hire Xavier to scare Cookie.
and she fears Xavier? I was willing to tolerate the Anita angle until halfway into the script where I get loads of forced exposition and OTN dialog between Anita and Collette.
While I was pleased to find out Nick's true function, it also became more clear that he had more control over Xavier. Xavier tends to get high on his own supply, and is a loose cannon to be sure. But after awhile, the Anita-Nick-Xavier connection wears out. The entire Paulie problem seems to take second fiddle. I'm still not sure who killed the cops and why. (If anything, it brings more heat down)
Overall, it's not a horrible script. with some work, it has some promise. But I tell you. Unless Nick and Antita have a fling, or that he does want to get rid of Xavier and the Anita situation is just an excuse to do so, it makes no sense whatsoever.
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THE MAN (p110) is still Nick. Just say it's Nick.
Some formatting issues (p38,69, 75 for example)
Don't
italic or bold italic in dialog.
STERN becomes INSPECTOR STERN on occasion.
Spell out the word okay. Okay?
-DjS