Times Are Changing by Eleven - Horror - Old and new witches have different ways of doing things. (PG ) - pdf, format 8)

This was going well until the character named "HECATE'S FRIEND" spoke.  He should have a name.

People never order "four beers"  They always order a specific kind of beer or they ask what's available.

This had so much promise, but it never delivered.

::SPOILERS::
A battle between two warlocks (not witches) is a great idea.  Unfortunately this didn't live up to its potential.  
::END::

It also ended abruptly which I can definitely understand due to the time crunch.

I submitted mine very late and didn't get a chance to tighten it up to what it needed to be.

Jordan

I read the entire script.

Sorry to say this, but the writing is not good on any level.  Characters, character's names, dialogue, action, even plot and story - not good.

But, it's not horrible, either and you ended with a bang - literally.

It's difficult to say in detail exactly what's wrong here, but I am pretty sure this may be one of your first attempts at writing a script, and with time, I'm sure you'll see.

As Jordan said, naming a character "HECATE'S FRIEND" is just goofy, and he speaks numerous times as well.

If nothing else, you never want to end with a line of dialogue all by itself on the last page.  You easily could have made some edits and this would move off Page 9.

Good job entering the OWC!

From the start...the whole business side and public side was confusing to me.

I have never heard anyone ask others to 'keep it down' in a bar establishment unless maybe a fight was about to start. It was strange reading that.

No Fade out at the end. I did like the bullet thing at the end. :) Nice.

Pretty good for a week's work.

Times are changing

Logline - not much of a logline, more of a tag line

Woman not introduced but man is, nor the bar hand
Is the bar hand Sara? Oh no it's not, but it's written that at first
"Nobody this pathetic etc - missing words I assume
Some dialogue seems off alignment

Finished

Not sure you needed all the characters, it just made it a bit more confusing.

I liked the young versus old, the play off between two men, trying to prove themselves. The cocky young man the weather old soul. The application of new technology was good as well.

Story wise it needed something more for me, a connection, a resolution that that was attached to the stakes. Sara died, the boys lived, so what.

Why not have the old man discuss returning to his family with Sara, may be he's disenfranchised from his son. But he can't. However, after the face off he realises every son needs a father and he should return etc etc

Got potential, also nicely self contained.

Grade c/c+

Written by Batman - signs this could be a pisser.

Not a great opening page, reads a little confusing - public's side and business side? Some characters capped, while other's not but I think there is too many to start off with - jump straight into the action. We don't need to know where every character is standing.

Where are we? At the bar? On a table with Salem? Salem and Sara - could be confusing.

What is Hecate talking about?

The bar-hand or Sara? I'm getting really confused - try to be consistent.

Yeah, Hecate's jokes are going right over my head. Hopefully we get to the actual story soon.

Okay, so the bar-hand and Sara are different - this needs to be clearer or the bar-hand could be taken out and Sara could bring the drinks out.

What is smoldering eyes? Could be difficult to pull that one off.

Hecate seems to be talking to himself, like in the third person... is that right?

I like that you're setting up some conflict but I really hope they get to the point soon - all this talk about age and what not.

Ha ha! Shattering the bottle was pretty cool and I liked Hecate's line "Beep, beep"

I thought these guys were warlocks?

"The car EXPLODES" What car? This indicates that we've seen a car before but we haven't... I hope Salem got the right one.

Hecate's friend sounds a bit gay - was that intentional?

Holy shit! Her face exploded, looks like the fun and games are over and this shit just got serious.

Okay, not bad but I felt this story was very bland - just two guys arguing at a bar but with the exception that they're warlocks (but they kept saying they were witches) I felt sorry for Sara because she had her blown off for serving some guy a bottle of whiskey.

Like the last one I read, the opening 4 pages were rather wasteful but this one did get better as it went along and the spells they used were cool but it was a story that was rather lacking in the end.

I thought there was some very awkward writing throughout, and the dialogue could be better handled. The good news was there was lots of white space and it read fast.

Good effort and congrats on completing the OWC. :)

Steve

Hey writer,

Nicely done. This made me want to keep reading. A good sign. At first I thought you might have too
Many characters here, but all ended well. The writing was crisp, you drove a good pace, and the baddie got his just due.

However, the end dialogue fell a little flat for me. I think Your last couple lines of action, and the last
Line of dialogue could be added to the heighten the sense of irony here, if that makes any sense. Either way, well executed nonetheless.

Steve

Pg. 1 This is a pretty cluttered character intro. Some of it’s right and some of it’s wrong.

Pg. 3 The writing is making this hard to follow for me. Example:  “Hecate’s smoldering blue and red eyes meet Salem’s static ones. They stare for a moment with a look of awe and recognition.” It’s unclear to me who is looking at who in “awe and recognition”

Pg. 5 “Sara ushers the others through the back door.” Who are the others? Everyone in the bar? On the next page it speaks of Sara as if she’s elsewhere, being seen on a phone, but it was never clearly stated that she left the building with everyone else.

I can see there’s a story worth following up on here, but without a clean up on the writing its just too hard to get at.

Congrats on completing the OWC.

A good take on the challenge -- old fashioned witchcraft vs. new age techno witchery.  The story was okay for me, a fast read, though the writing could do with a bit of cleaning up in places -- perhaps a little rushed to finish?

Some fun moments.  The way Salem blew up the car was a nice touch and I did like the ending; though it might be a stretch to link the V.O at the intro to the V.O at the end.  I’d almost be tempted to repeat Salem’s opening line over Hecate’s chant to remind the reader where this started.
  
‘I know that’s a girls name.’ -- I did a quick look for Hecate online and wondered why you’d switched it to a guy.  Think you could have had some fun presenting Hecate as a she.

Overall it felt a bit rushed through to the conclusion and I think this would benefit from a little more meat on the bones and a sturdier set-up to really let these characters come to life.  Although I can appreciate the constraints don't always allow for it.

I'm not sure why you didn't capitalize the bar hand. And from what I can guess, he's not going to be important until later on. Better to just mention him there and then.

Who is Salem? Is he the bar hand? Confusing.

I'm not liking the character names so far, the references are just really obvious and read poorly.

Hecate is a girl's name, right?

Dialogue isn't working for me so far.

"Salem’s static ones." What?

"I know that’s a
girl’s name." Ah, nice, thought you just searched up "names for witches" and picked a random one. ;D

The dialogue feels synthetic, the back and forth doesn't read nicely, they both sound the same really. But I do like the idea, not really horror but it definitely uses the modern angle to its advantage. A lot of potential but the characters and writing needs to be fleshed out. It kind of goes in highs and lows where you're pulled into the narrative then thrown out again because of writing errors. A good effort, I liked it.

Grade: C+

Read this one. I didn't think it was great, but not horrible either. It was a quick read and I never got bored. I just don't know if I can pinpoint why it wasn't good. Maybe the biggest issue for me was that I really hated Hecate. He really grind on me. On the other hand, he did get what he deserved in the end. I felt good about that, but not as satisfied as I should have felt. Maybe it was the way we got to the end? Lots of character introductions that wasn't really necessary. The only people we really need are Salem, Sarah, Hecate and his friends. The rest are just background people and don't really have an importance to the story itself. None of the characters came across as witches/warlocks to me. They tell us we are and then shit happens, but no one really says or casts a spell. That would've been nice to see. I think with a little better banter between the two, a little more threatening from Hecate would have increased the tension. So, all in all, not bad, but fell a little flat for me.  

No comments read before.
Non-native speaker – take it or leave it.


Times are changing

Hello.

Ok. Read it through. It was getting a faster read after 2-3 pages, what I liked.

The handy display kill was disgusting. There's something sterile about the looking of a smartphone. To have the rest of an exploded head shown on display. EEEEHH. It's a very subtle picture to me.

You are giving an overall good impression of the bar itself.

The main characters where not pleasant to me. Salem was even a little bit wrong constructed, illogical. I think you wanted to make him the wise good guy, but he reacts a bit naive arrogant, almost as much as his opponent Hecate. So I didn’t' care who goes up and beat the other down.

You choose the bullet kills everything-move. Ahmm. Done very often. Maybe it seemed classic to you…

Solid however.

I was a bit iuffy on the names of the characters ("Salem" "Hecate") but I found myself curious about the bar-hand in the BG. Not only is he uncapped, he's barely in the script. And why not give Hecate's friend a name? With the nudge-nudge-wink-wink of the names, how 'bout Bella Donna? I would have even accepted Samantha. Play it cute, might as well pull out the stops, know what I'm saying? No, you probably don't.

Anyway...

I did like the setting, a sense of class structure and/or the young witches in debate with the older witches. What arey drinking, though? Four beers? Na....like I said, go all out. Witches Brew, gosh darn it! :)

No fade out at the end, but the ending was still effective....but wow. That ending just about has a page all by itself. Since there's a lot of talk, one edit here and there, and you could fit that ending on p8 as opposed to the few lines on p9.

Maybe it doesn't mean the price of peas, but it stands out in an odd way. Not good or bad, just somewhere in between. Not a horrible effort though.

What a cheeky little ending, which closes this one off well, IMO.

I actually liked the use of names, the old vs young and how this one played out. Thought it was interesting and different.

Didn't really like how Sara died and the boys didn't though. I also agree that the last page looks off with Salem's dialogue on it's lonesome, this could have been easily cleaned up. And 'Fade out'??

Other than that, good effort. :)

I'm sorry!

I got to FADE IN: and had to quit.

Just kidding. This really wasn't bad at all.

It read smooth enough and kept my interest.

A little too many people for such a short story when just a few will do.

Overall, pretty good.

Shawn.....><

I thought this was decent. I had some issues with the business/public sides as well. Very awkward description of the geography. I also thought the man and bar-hand were completely ancillary characters that could've been done away with entirely. Would've made things a lot simpler.

I think the general concept wasn't bad. A good interpretation of the "modern" angle. Using a phone and car keys for spells was strange though. It took me a while to wrap my head around that. Still, I got it.

It did get needlessly violent at the end though. I mean, the way things were going, it didn't seem Hecate, clearly the antagonist, was going to pull something that petty and nasty. He and his posse seemed to be enjoying an honest challenge up until then.

The one thing that really didn't work for me was the dialogue. I can't really say what was wrong with it other than it didn't sound natural. It was weird. I don't know if everyone sounds really dated or overly eloquent or what but something about it doesn't sound right. I had no idea what Hecate was talking about when he came in for example. It seems like he was supposed to come off as really menacing later on but usually, he was just awkward.

Also, what was up with all the hush hush business? "Please boys, this is a local bar. Keep it down." I get that maybe there's not a lot of people there but since when our people supposed to keep it down in a liquor-serving establishment? Doesn't make sense.

The ending was okay. This is the second script I've read thus far where a witch/warlock has pulled out a gun. I don't think the buildup worked quite as well here.

Anyway, okay, I suppose.

How spaghetti western of you at the end.  For me, this was unbalanced in a few areas.  Most notibly the character intros and the dialogue moving toward the end.

An awkward way to write business side public side of the bar.  It works to some degree, but the way it is presented is jumbled.  There is some well paced action and the dialogue sometimes hits the marks, but a lot of this tapers into banter.  It's a good idea to put two different types in competition with each other and it drives up the conflict nicely.  I guess it sometimes stayed in one place too long.

Sara's head exploding made me chuckle as well as the friends.  I thought the ending was good, seemed well timed, but it may have been better if most of the dialogue was on Hecate's end during their exchanges.

Good story & I enjoyed the conflict through competition.

Johnny

I enjoyed this bar scene. I always enjoy the wise old folks getting one up on the young and arrogant.

I thought the overall structure and dialog worked, but the shooting left me a bit wanting however. Perhaps the intention there was to have that Indiana Jones type humor to it - when he just shoots the guy making a big show of wielding his long sword? That part just didn't work for me though, because even though guns may be better than swords, I don't think anyone really thinks guns are better than magic. But overall, well done.

Weighted Matrix: https://docs.google.com/spreadsheet/ccc?key=0AsBznn8D13zOdGJValQtbHU1LUNPVWQzY0gzajRTTUE&usp=sharing

Producer's Notes: https://docs.google.com/document/d/1NNGaVlrrpkjIfp-BRGjpTE03W1e5lZuRceJ3wQECYaI/edit?usp=sharing

18. Times Are Changing by Eleven - Horror - Old and new witches have different ways of doing things.
Brief - Old and young warlocks have a spell fight in a public bar

Location(s)  - Bar
Cast - 8
Protagonist(s)  -
SALEM, 58, old and worn out  
SARA, 31, an attractive woman
Antagonist(s)  -
MAN, 43
WOMAN,43
BARTENDER, 40,
HECATE, 22, youthful and good looking
FRIENDS 3X
Genre & Marketability - Supernatural Action. This is great for feature quality production, but unaffordable for a short.
Comments  -  Don't bold the title on the title page. Turn off your screenwriting program's mores and continued's feature. Okay, pg1 and you've already got five actors I gotta pay. Better use them wisely. Nine by pg2, (Groan). Exploding car = $$$$. And these are classic warlocks in modern times, not modern warlocks = fail. A dozen cast requirements and exploding cars and people running around burning are exactly how you begin to understand the difference between writing pie-in-the-sky stories and stories that are budget minded = likely to be produced. Good use of a single location though. Two thumbs up! If I was looking to distribute a classic witch in modern times, with some casting paring and SFX consideration I'd be interested in this premise.
Script format - fair.
Final word - Criteria fail + too expensive.

$10,000 - $20,000      Lo/Hi Estimated Budget Range
/ 8.1               Screenplay Pages
= $1,235 - 2,469     Estimated Cost Per Screen Minute

Adherence to Given Criteria:
Modern Witches and/or Warlocks - Nope. Classic warlocks in modern setting
Horror - More supernatural than horror