Black Winters by Digamma - Short - We are all monsters underneath. 8 pages - pdf, format 8)

I don't think the phonograph had been invented by the 1830s. You might want to move the date for this, since it doesn't seem to matter.

I really don't know what was going on here, so I can't add much. I need my coffee, my brain must be missing crucial details in the reading. Sorry. I'll try to come back to it.

I appreciative the effort at uniqueness and creativity.

This one conforms with the one location rule.
However, a period piece is not low budget. Especially the dress.
The phonograph was invented well after the Civil War. Not 1820.
Got some prosthetic work as well to throw in the budget.
I didn’t understand much of what was happening.
But your format skills kept my confusion breezy.
Feels like part of a feature script.

Regards,
E.D.

Cool title.  The script was interesting and different, for sure.  The historical errors have already been brought up.  I also think the name "Darling" was not the best choice for a male character.

This felt like the end story of a much bigger, deeper tale.  Unfortunately, we're not privy to the backstory, and I couldn't figure out what exactly these two were and why they were changing and why exactly they had to blow themselves up.

Good atmosphere, some good dialogue, but too much was missing from the narrative.  

The previous readers commented on the phonograph being out of place in the 1820's; it actually wasn't invented until 1877.

Another anachronism that I found was in the header.  A country cabin (in the 1820s) didn't have living rooms.  They were single room structures.  If you wanted separate rooms, you should've placed this story in something bigger than a modern day bungalow.

Is it petty that I bring this up?  No.  Not at all.  Right away, you poorly set up your story.  People look at this and think, "Phonograph?  That wasn't around back then."  And, then this stays with them through out the story.

Another anachronism was Maddy and Charles' dialog.  It seemed too colloquial for me.  The messenger seemed a little more dated in his dialog, which made me how this happened.

I did like how you created your own 'creature' for this story.  I would liked to have seen more of it.


Phil  

This was maddening to read. I kept on hoping for that orgasm of understanding when you go "I-I got  it" I did like the atmosphere; perhaps a hint more from Darling would help us out?

Yeah...very lazy, filled with so many typos, missing words, poor grammar, poor punctuation, poor dialogue, and senseless shenanigans.

Phonograph - 1877

Dynamite - 1863

Country Cabin with separate rooms, inclduing a bathroom with "fixtures" - Not sure, but highly unlikely it was around in 1820.

Using a date in your Slug?  Worthless, no one will see it in a filmed version, so if it's important (and remotely accurate), you'll need a SUPER.

You should count how many times said, "Charlie" - I bet at least 10, and I doubt in 1820, Charlie was used as opposed to Charles, though I could be wrong here.

Did you just watch Black Swan recently?  That's my guess.

Sorry, this didn't work on any level whatsoever.

Congrats on completing an OWC entry.

I have to say I didn't expect a history lesson as well as a script when starting this! However, the others have made a few good points about getting the details right if they are to be used. Someone always picks up the error.

Monster/vampire type scripts are not for me BUT I quite like the tone, the mood, of this. I am sure it's not new but two people in a difficult circumstance accepting a fate has a nice edge to me. The script felt it should focus on this. They know what's happening, maybe they know why and they know what they have to do, but it's still hard. Always something left behind to regret. Against this I wasn't sure that the woman really understood and that surprised me.

I agree the name Darling didn't seem right, but easily fixed.

All the best.

Even if period costumes from a local theatre (never say never, peeps!) were used and some set dressing might hide a few things, or if there was a local historical-type park which had old buildings and such, maybe...with the right permissions...

But that's neither here nor there. The script itself is filled with anachronisms as mentioned by others. There's also times where, for example, Maddy speaks, then in the action line "He" does an action. Substitute 'He' for Charles. Sometimes Charles speaks and "She" does an action. Put Maddy instead of 'she' where needed.

The cabin for the period, as mentioned above by peeps, is correct. Thus, over half of your header slugs are annoying and get in the way. That said, you can fix them if you wanted to. There are two possible ways you can do this..

The first (and risky) way:

Instead of INT. BEDROOM- NIGHT, for example, you use a subhead of

BED

or instead of INT. LIVING ROOM- TIME you write

TABLE

Please be aware that I am ONLY talking about "new scenes" in a sub-location, not person A walking to a "location". ALSO while normally "objects" are not legitamite locations, in a one room cabin, you CAN cheat and MIGHT get away with it.
Some will debate me on this, but here is the question. If you wanted to call attention to a certain location in the one room cabin, and don't cry "angle on" or anything like that, how would you consider doing it?


Let's say you visualize a wide shot. Then what I just said would not be needed obviously. But what if you wanted to focus in on a specific place in this big room?

The second (and probably better) way:

One obvious way is to CAP your characters again like so in action but sparingly:


CHARLES
near the door

MADDY
asleep on the bed.


Which visually implies two focus shots of both characters (a replacement for CUT TO, if you will) because these are understood as the subject of the shot.

By the way...the BATHROOM is not in the cabin.  ;D

********************
I know folks are gonna bitch at me for that. But y'know, every now and then, instead of just griping, someone should suggest possible solutions that are close enough to what you had in mind.

********************



The page numbers. Top center. When I noticed it that on page 2 -- I thought that was either careless on the writer's part or they are just starting to learn Word. Sharp enough to know how to turn the doc into a pdf; but forgetful enough to not upper right justify the page numbers. (Most screenwriting programs automatically upper right justify page numbers

Oh, and change Darling's name.
Especially since someone greets them at the door.
(I'm thinking...you know, 'Hello, my Darling"
But maybe that's just me.

Trting to be atmopsheric and creepy with mixed results. Liked the transformations of the monsters and they were original beasties rather than run of the mill vamps or werewolves. Even though the script says the year, there is no Super so someone watching this (unless they were period dress experts) wouldn't see the phonograph as out of place but having said that , the script HAS to be accurate but a simple change of one number would work.
Daz

Tried reading this but couldn't get through it. Wasn't making sense and stories written in a time before the 1950s bore me.

Sean

There is an interesting barren kind of feel to this that is well done. What is not so well done is the copy itself. It needs a lot of red penning.

I had no trouble understanding what was going on here. Two people were somehow turning into monsters and they were prepared to kill themselves rather
than live in such a state. Who could argue that?

Good effort, but clean it up.

Sandra

So change the dates...

I could appreciate the romance in this script. I liked the tone. I liked the monsters. Not sure about Darling.

Would have liked to known more about what was actually going on. How they came to be.

Maybe you'll do a rewrite and make this script longer????

Hope so. I'd like to read the next draft.

Cindy

as Jeff stated, I too thought of Black Swan while reading this.

obviously theres some formatting problems with your slugs. furthermore theres dating issues (which I won't be elaborating on since my fellow posters already commented on the matter).

overall, i was intrigued. however i was left with little answers. i wanted to know more and i really loved the atmosphere. period pieces with monsters in them have always been a guilty pleasure of mine. so perhaps im a bit biased.

rewrite this one and make it longer. B for me.

This wasn't an easy read but when I got to the end I actually found that I enjoyed it more than I thought I would.  There's some good imagery in here with the atmosphere and the transformation of Maddy and Charles but the description is very overwritten and at times is really tough to get through.  Then the typos seemed to increase as the story went on which didn't make matters easier.  Dialogue leaves a bit to be desired.  The way Maddy said she wanted to suck blood or eat flesh came off more humorous than it did serious.  

I think in general it also would have been neat to see what exactly was going on with their transformation.  What you have here at the moment is interesting, but I want a little more.

This does need some editing but I liked it for what it was.  

Nice job for a week.

Greg

As I go:

Page 1: Ahhh, the "How long has it been?"  One of the most epically classic exposition groaners.  Surely there's a better way.

Page 5:  I like the calm dialogue after the big reveal, but it's going on too long.
Probably a less on the nose to reveal her thirst for blood.

Page 6:  The knock on the door should come immediately after Maddy has resisted the rabbit.  Keep the tension up.  This one's in major danger of slowing down too much.

Page 7:  The viewing audience won't know the kid's name is Darling -- they'll think Maddy's calling him "darling".

Thoughts:

Hey, I rather liked this one.  It got a little slow in places.  I don't think you necessarily need to reveal more about the monsters, but I'd like to know more about the characters.  I'd like to see them have more of a story, go through more of a transition.  Maybe spend more time on it being a difficult transition to undergo.  Why is Charles so much better at controlling it than Maddy?

I think the premise is really neat and I think that with a bit more focus on what exactly the audience should be getting out of the Charles/Maddy interactions, this could be a really solid short.

Thanks for the fun read!

I thought this was okay. Written well enough to keep me to the end, I think my main problem was not really finding out how they became what they turned into though. Unless I missed something of course. It didn't even have to be a how, just a bit of dialogue along the lines of 'we should never have gone to those woods', just a little clue.

I don't know how others feel about this, plus the fact I'm still learning myself so am not sure, but I personally feel all numbers in dialogue should be written out. For example 'eleven years' instead of '11 years'. Not sure the official rules on this, another one where some of the more experienced writers can maybe chip in, but from my own personal point of view I prefer to see it written out.

Likeable but not great. It could be though.

Arty.

Yes, numbers need to be written out, unless it's a date or time....or a "number" as in a jersey or the like.

Thanks again for educating me, and maybe others too. Glad to know I had this one right though.

I think you succeed wonderfully creating atmosphere.  However, for me, the dialogue confused rather than developed the story. And the tension in the story takes too many turns for a short work.

I like where you were going with this, but I don't think it's quite there. The dialogue sounded a bit cheesy at parts, and I really would've liked to know at least something of the backstory. It has the beginnings of a nice little romance.

Congrats:)

Again, I find myself agreeing with Greg 100%

The story isn't bad, but the writing, typos and other errors brought it down for me. This one could easily be fixed into something good with a rewrite.

You nailed the OWC assignment though except for the low budget. Period piece and CGI or make-up for the transformation doesn't sound low budget.