Whack Job by Antonio Gangemi (tony g) & Aimee Parrott - Comedy - A bumbling accountant takes over as head of the "family" when his Mafioso dad gets whacked. Now he must fraternize with seasoned gangsters to uncover the real killer. 106 pages - pdf, format 8)

I just finished the script and I have to say that it's one of the best scripts I've read in a while. It had an excellent flow, the story was frsh and original, and the dialog was superb. I loved this script. I recommend it to everyone on the site. It's a must read in my book. Very nicely don you two :)

Tony and Aimmee,

I just watched Good Fellas and was up for a comedic mafia story.

COMMENTS:

It was interesting, I'd look up every ten pages and ask myself if I wanted to continue. I made it to the end. So far so good. Format was very good. Dialogue also very good.

Minor mechanical issues: no reason for camera directions (we pull back), check your parentheticals and underlines - I didn’t see any an actor would need, and word choice was strange once in awhile esp vociferously.

Characters: Too many introduced in the restaurant, I thought the main focus of the story was Eloisa based on the opening. Angelo was so unsuited for the job.

Motivation: Angelo didn’t seem upset at his father’s death which made his decision to go along with the promotion not very strong, Frida fell too easily for Angelo (yes, I know what her job was), Savia was the bad bad guy as soon as he suggested the plan for Angelo’s succession, Angelo wasn’t upset enough to waste his valued geek collection,

Story: the fake funeral was such a cliche moment and plot device I almost gagged. Another ‘huh?’ occurred when the kids were having a party in the same building as the shootout. Also, no pressure from the FBI.  No evidence that Savia and company were thugs. We have  to see it, Benny doesn't count.

Comedy: I never laughed during my read. I did keep saying “this can’t be happening... I wonder how this idiot is going to pull this off?” which might be better than laughter.

Conclusion: It was worth my time reading it. If rewritten it could be great.

GARY

Grazie tanto, Jerry. We enjoyed writing it.

Gary, thanks for the read. I'm glad you enjoyed the dialogue. We try to keep parentheticals to a minimum. I didn't notice the camera direction you mentioned ("we pull back").

Eloisa is a minor character -- meant to add flavor to the "scene" at the restaurant. We wanted a big opening, but with more laughs than gunplay. There's a good number of characters in the Sfogliatelle Crime Family, but we kept focus on the relevant thugs.

Angelo being unsuited for the job is the point we were going for. Dial up that he's a fish out of water. The motivation rested more on Savio's shoulders. We thought the best way to steer it back to Angelo was via guilt, i.e. helping out his mother.

As for the phony funeral, Savio needed visual proof that Angelo completed the job w/o Casimiro actually being dead. Having it at the funeral parlor gave Angelo a public stage. Also, it gave us a chance to show Bibiana finally backing Angelo.

The kids being at the restaurant was a ploy to convince Savio that things were status quo at the restaurant. We debated showing them being ushered away safely, but didn't want to tip off that the clowns were agents.

Thanks again for the read.

Tony

I agree with Grademan Post. It was a good read and funny too.

Dialogue : 8/10
Story : 5/10
Characters : 6/10
Script : 8/10
End of the story : 5/10

Make the plot more complicated and give it a twist, like in the movies Snatch, you are not making a serious mafia movie you are making a Funny mafia movie. I got some ideas that i like to share with you.

How about Angelo got kidnapped by a bunch of little low time thief, so they can make ransom to Savio and his brothers. But the word spread out that Angelo is a gold mine. Now the others big time kidnappers start a search of Angelo so that they can make a ransom of their own to Angelo family. (But only Angelo knows where the money is hidden, as mentioned at the beginning of the story).

Angelo is kidnapped but later tells the kidnappers that he is bankrupt. Thanks to the local police, one of the local gangsters comes to know about angelo and orders Low time thief to hand over to him. They come up with idea of selling angelo to local gansters. Angelo on hearing their conversation suggests they should share the money, in return he would not tell the local ganster about their cheating. The deal happens and low time get 500,000$  low time thiefs then transfers half the amount to Angelo bank account. But the local gangster took on of the thief as an insurance policy (Let's call him John)

The other gangster comes to know about Angelo plans with the low time. But angelo saves his and John's life by telling the same idea. The price now is 1 million and divided equally. Angelo is then sold for 1 million to ANNIE, a dread female gangster who hates men. Angelo is happy because he receives the half million (500,000) and now there is a total of 750,000 in his bank account and easy money he can repay back to ANNIE to set him free. But soon Annie comes to know about Angelo state and captures Low time thiefs and his men. Angelo again saves his and others life from Annie asking her to play the same trick with local Minister and politician(Who plots the death of Angelo father with Savio)

So Annie takes Angelo to Minister. The Minister runs a kidnapping Mafia and is the head of all kidnappings. Minister pays Annie Rs. 2 million and keeps angelo and john at his guest house. Angelo and John come to know that they will be killed if Savio doesn't pay the ransom at the right time. At night, Angelo fakes a heart attack and escapes with John. The Minister orders the police for a man hunt. Realizing that he cannot escape to (City), he comes with a new plan.

He goes to the local police station where the Minister is there and surrenders to him. The minister is about to take Angelo back to the guest house when John along with the Minister's supporters and local media arrive. Make a Ending to the story yourself now