Underneath the Vessel by Gage Eggleston (AsteroidJuice) - Short, Surreal - What does it mean to you? 4 pages - pdf, format 8)

Gage,

Great to see some more work from you. I'm fond of the way you write, when I can understand what is going on.

The log-line was a bit vague, but I'm guessing that's what you want. You want us to interpret this in our own ways, which is where my main problem with the script comes in... I have no idea what to take from the script.

TBH, it's weird. That's all I can say, really. I don't know, maybe it's a little advanced for me, but I've read over this script many times and still I don't get it. Would you mind explaining?

Sorry I didn't understand, mate.
Daniel

Hey aj,

Had a quick read and thankfully it was short.

I quite like it when writers go off in a weird direction but, a bit like modern art, only if I get something out of it. It's a personal choice thing.

With this is can't say I got much out of it but it did challenge me in terms of what visuals I was seeing. If I had to guess I would see a parallel with the mushroom as earth, the spiders as nature/life around and humans as ...err... humans. The message being there's a connection between all three. As for the other animals, which weren't described so I had no visual reference, not sure.

It would be a challenge to produce !

Nicely written with interesting visuals -- way too decaffeinated right now to wrap my head around it -- but I ended up feeling like this would work as an animated music video.  Not sure for whom -- Bjork perhaps..:)  

Steve.

Gage, I've read a few scripts like this on Simply, the ones that are quite vague and leave the reader to interpret the meaning.

Personally, I prefer a script to tell me a definitive story and this doesn't really.  I'm guessing the moral is that if the Spiders and Humans worked together they would have survived...but then you threw in a spanner by suggesting the spiders are born from the dead humans?

I'm torn with this.  Some good visuals but I wasn't thrilled by the story, sorry.

I wouldn't be surprised if a few shrooms were ingested before writing this.

Gage, not sure what to say, but that's obviously what you're after with a piece like this.

It does not make any sense to me.  The visuals themselves are the problem here, IMO, because they're really not very visual.  You've got these "creatures" yet we have no clue what they are or look like.

Slug use was a real mess for me.  You covered the gambit of full, hybrid, and mini.

No characters, no dialogue, not nothing, really.

Sorry, but this ain't for me.

Hey guys,

Thanks for the reads.  To be honest I was pretty hesitant to put this on here, and in retrospect I probably shouldn't have.

I recently started progress on my first feature script, but before I did that I just wanted to write something really short and vague, something that came to me and I wrote it down -- automatic writing.

I just wrote what happened in my mind, and looked at it later and found a lot of meaning in it for me, personally.

I'm sure this belongs somewhere (some artsy-fartsy forum, perhaps) but probably not here.  I really just wanted to know how others interpreted it.  I might take it down.

Thanks,
Gage

Hey, Gage.

I love anything surreal so I guess I'll have to skip my shrooms today and read this instead. ;D Just kidding of course.

TBH, I can't say this was good because honestly, there are better scripts to read out there. I'm not saying it's bad though as I could see what you were aiming for.

The script didn't do much for me, I think you were going for some kind of never ending cycle type story? It didn't work to well if that's the case but I thought it was a decent little tale.

Hope your feature goes well. :)

Hey Gage,

Sorry but I'm going to sound like a broken record, mate. I have absolutely no idea what I just read "vague" is an understatement here. Mushrooms, spiders, little men with axes and a creature. This one was lost on me but I'm not known for being a clever person who finds subtle hints in stories...I probably just missed what this was all about.

On the bright side, I thought the writing was good but the story just wasn't for me.

Wish you all the best with your feature.

Good luck and keep writing. :)

Steve

P.S It's also good to see this story brought Mo out from the shadows to review a script. ;D

Hey Gage - Loved it. You're not a lost long member of The Doors are you? That has Jim Morrison written all over it. One thing though, I wish you could have showed us what the creatures looked like. Solid writing - keep it up man!   Dirk

Hey ...

I liked this ok. Not so much with the tiny men though near the end. I could see this being filmed like animated. I've seen shorts similar to this animated at indy theaters. In the one I saw, the mushroom ate the child at the end! LOL So I dig these lil poetic pieces.

The creature needed some kinda face imo. Anything...even if it was a weirdo beetle or something...

It's an artsy piece and I like it  for just that.

As a began to read, I approached the visuals with quite a bit of thought. As soon as the tiny man was introduced, my imagination felt liberated from the page. Sure this piece is open to interpretation, its very creative.  I hope you don't mind if I save it before you tear it down! Hahaha

Cage,

You have somewhat of a disney fantasy, When a tiny man appears in the muschroom, But yet violent massacre slayings mixed in the story. However, Causing the story to take another turn in the spine.

It raises a question.  What if an army of tiny men invades and slaughter and army of spiders,  Then another unknown army of creatures come from out of the blue and invades and slaughters the army of tiny men.

Then it will make us think. What type of would be more powerful and aggressive than men on earth? What type of creature could destroy mankind and leave nothing except mans on carcass there laying on the ground surface and then suddenly, A spider resume from his body.

I have this question, Are the Family of creatures are the same as the small creature who dug the hole earlier.

I would have to say, That the Family of creatures are that Mans own giant footprint.

But you know that it is early spring. And they say, Spring's eternal for the human race.

I like your story very very much. Because it's all about Spring time.