Search Party by Kurt Conety - Short, Comedy, Horror - A hunter in a remote forest makes some disturbing discoveries.  - pdf, format 8)

I don't get it, Kurt.

Writing-wise, not good, bro.  Very awkward and stilted throughout.  You have the exact same scene indicated in your Slug over and over.  Sometimes Minis are the answer, but most likely a more detailed descriptor of where this hunter is would help.  Using HUNTER and WIFE for character names doesn't work at all.

Read some scripts and throw out your won feedback to get peeps to do the same for you.

Happy Holidays.

Kurt,

I'm gonna agree with Jeff... the writing is awkward throughout.

Dried leaves and twigs CRUNCH under the boots of HUNTER, 40s,
who roams the woods armed with a rifle and a duffle bag.
Purplish flesh pokes out from the brush a few yards ahead of
him. As he approaches he realizes it’s a severed human leg.

Your first sentence is phrased awkwardly... saying "the boots of HUNTER" doesn't read very well. Just say "Boots CRUNCH dried leaves and twigs."

Give hunter a name. At the very least go with FAT HUNTER or TALL HUNTER.

Don't refer back to your slug (the woods) in your action lines if possible.

Right now, your whole opening scene is crammed into two paragraphs, which could be broken up. You start off with a description of leaves crunching...then introduce hunter...then he finds a body. This could easily be three paragraphs, IMO.

I'm not saying to make this longer, but I think the pacing could be better. You want him finding the body to be more gradual, not "leaves crunch, there's a hunter, there's a body."

Same goes for the other paragraphs... almost everything is smushed into big paragraphs that could easily be broken up. It'll make this a quicker, easier read.

You don't need to keep saying EXT. FOREST. You could go with LATER as a mini slug, but like Jeff said, a more detailed description of his location would work better. CAVE, CREEK, etc.

Hope this helps.

Will

Hey Kurt,

Seen you around. Welcome to SS. This is a great place to learn the ropes of screenwriting and you get to meet some great people while you're at it.

Basically I agree with what Jeff and Will have already said about this one. The way you use your slugs is quite annoying. I have no idea how it can be solved though. You're in quite a tricky situation as you're dealing with a large location. It becomes difficult to express that you're still in the same forest, but a different part of the forest. What the other two have said about a more detailed description of the location is spot on. Try and give each part of the forest a distinctive feature. So at the start, you might have the hunter walking through a clearing. That way you can format it as follows...

EXT. FOREST - CLEARING - DAY

Next shot he could be walking past a small stream...

EXT. FOREST - STREAM - DAY

It's very similar to what Will has already suggested.

Yeah, you need a name for your characters. At first it didn't matter as I originally thought it would be a script without dialogue, but as it happens, you are incredibly reliant on dialogue, therefore you need those character names.

I don't think your writing is all that bad. Sure you've had a few issues with the slugs, but trust me it's better than a lot of the scripts we come across here. My main issue with the writing comes with the unnecessary detail that simply doesn't need to be in a script. We'll get to that part later.

Your logline isn't all that intriguing to be honest. It just needs a little more OOMPH! to it; something that pushes someone to pick the script up. I'd try something like this. Remember, I'm not typically that great with loglines so I wouldn't trust me that much...

"A Hunter in a remote forest makes some disturbing discoveries set out by his wife."

That, for me sets the imaginations running a little more. The story isn't so focused on this one thing anymore. Now the reader has time to explore the possibilities before, during and after reading the script. Make sense? Let me know if it doesn't.

Story-wise, there's not a lot to it, but somehow it works. I reckon you've got something going. Easy to film on a reasonably low budget. It has a chance.

Dialogue's not all that bad. It just reads a little childish if you know what I mean. I mean here we have two middle-aged characters who talk to each other like they're a young teenage couple. Yes, teenage couple talk to each other like that... Except maybe not about hiding dead bodies so the other can find in some sick game ;D

Got some notes I wrote down.

Page 1: "As he approaches he realizes it's a severed human leg." - Personally, I don't like seeing writing like this. To me "realizes" is a very hard verb to visualize. Whenever possible, describe the physical appearance of the actor instead. You could write the above like this for example...

"He bends down, inspects. His eyes go wide -- a severed human leg."

Page 1:                       HUNTER
                        (to himself)
              Jesus...

- Considering there's no one else in the forest with him, it's pretty obvious he's talking to himself.

Page 3: "The Wife and Hunter freeze, eyes popping at the sound of his voice." - We know why their eyes are popping. No need to reiterate that in the narrative.

PAge 4: "The Lost Man patiently waits out front, shivering as the mountain air stings his flesh." - I've singled this one out for three reasons, all of them related to cutting down on long writing that isn't needed.

1)"The Lost man patiently..." - Not a big deal, but be wary of using adverbs that end in "ly". They often tend to add unnecessary length. The occasional one is acceptable, but once you use them excessively, it gets a little irritating.

2) "... shivering as the mountain air..." - Be wary of any words ending in "ing" as they too add unnecessary length to the writing. Again, the occasional one is fine, but you don't want reviewers to point out your writing as passive and overwritten.

3) Don't include any details involving the senses that the audiences can't physically experience. In film, the audience can only see and hear things. They can't taste, they can't smell and the can't feel. It is for that reason that writing something in the script that involves these other three senses is seen as redundant and unnecessary. Can the audience feel the stings of the mountain air? No. Therefore writing it into the script is pointless. Having said that, there is no reason why you can't imply their senses using visuals.

Using these three techniques to cut down on your writing could see you have a much better crafted sentence. Remember, when it comes to cutting down, every letter counts towards something.

Try this...

"The patient Lost Man waits out front, shivers."

On page 4, you seem to have a change of location but it is not shown with any use of slugs. I assumed that the Hunter's last bit of dialogue takes place outside the cabin, when in reality we have jumped back inside. The few seconds it took to work it out could take away from the narrative flow... Something you don't want.

Look it's not nearly as bad as the others have implied. Yes, you've got some things to learn, but that's why you're here, right? A few writing issues and maybe you haven't quite grasped decent dialogue yet, but this is by no means bad. Hey! You finished a script... Every draft written is another step taken.

Please send a PM if I haven't been clear on any points. I'll do my best to elaborate.

Keep writing. Have a Happy New Year.

Dan

I liked the first couple of paragraphs as far as getting me intrigued with the story. It got me interested very early on. But I agree with the other guys that the wording was a little awkward. Also, I definitely think naming the characters would help the read.

The dialogue seems to disrupt the tone a little too much. Although, I assume that’s the point because you want it to shift from thriller to comedy. But it just doesn’t seem like fluid or realistic dialogue to me.  

The LOST MAN character kind of comes out of nowhere.  The exposition of him stumbling through the woods should come a few scenes earlier to develop the tension more IMO.  

I think at the end of page 4 you may be missing a slug. Is the couple inside or outside?  You have EXT. CABIN for the when the LOST MAN finds the head but then never go back INT. for the couple’s dialogue.

The ending just kind of left me unfulfilled. Although I don’t completely get the ending, I have to say that overall I liked the script. I think you definitely have a cool little story here.

-Colin

So I agree with most of what was said previously, especially by Dan, so no need to repeat what they said. One thing in particular that jumped out at me:

Page 1, when he comes across the torso, he mutters "Jesus..."  I read that as he is shocked at what he has found, when in fact he was looking for it to begin with (oops--spoiler alert).  Seems his reaction should have been more in line with the way he reacted to finding the other body parts.

I could visualize the story, so that's a good thing, but a little more detail could be added to help flesh out the story some more, or you could add a little twist to make the ending pay off. For example, the hunter could have spotted the lost man in the woods shortly after stumbling upon the body parts, perhaps giving the appearance that the lost man had something to do with this horrific crime. Maybe we see him tracking a bear that could have done this. Something like that might add depth to the overall storyline.

Keep it up and hope to read more from you.

Gary