The Lagoon by Tashtego - Short, Shark, Adventure, Horror - Two Union soldiers hunt for hidden gold at the end of the Civil War 11 pages - pdf, format 8)

Interesting idea, soldiers seeking treasure. The story was a bit shaky in some areas, probably due to the time constraint. My biggest issue was the dialog. It started out kind of sounding proper for the time period then somewhere in the middle you completely lost it.

Pg. 1 -- What is this? "We__"  

Pg. 2 -- Again? "Gold? Now, what__"

Is it like, fill in the blank?

Pg. 3 -- "Could be Robert E. Lee's left nut hid down there"  LOL


This definitely needs some cleaning up but congrats on completing something for this OWC.

It’s a curious thing that treasure maps seem to surface at times of war. The Crusade made the Templars a wealthy bunch, Edmond Dantès found his way to riches in The Count of Monte Cristo, The NAZI's pillaged Europe to no end, finding treasures one could only dream of, and now… two yanks? I love this freakin’ story!

I’m sure there are errors within, as with all OWC’s, considering the time allotted and topic to mull over, but I’ll let the seasoned writers chew you up.

Your writing is very good, in my humble opinion. Ya, this is my fav so far, well done!

This is a good ol' adventure tale with a sly slice of humor to it.  A classic set up with the dying old coot giving up the location of the treasure.  Always seems to work that way, doesn't it?  

I think I would have liked the actual hauling of the chest from the lagoon to be more challenging and suspenseful for the two of them.  Maybe even having one of them attacked by the shark, and the other guy has to make a decision about whether to help his friend or save the gold.

Not really sure you needed the whole "guardian of the sacred waters" angle.  IMO, better off Bush(who else? lol) be just some inbred, lowdown killbilly looking to murder and or rape these two infiltrators.  I think his death would have worked better that way, instead of him forgiving the shark for chomping his nuts.  

Packed a lot of story into a limited number of pages, so good on ya for that.  Also had the line of the owc so far:  "We're gonna need a bigger horse."   ;D

Not bad. IMHO though, the very first scene needs to get to the point faster. It's 3 pages long. All it needs to do is establish that this takes place right after the war and there's a treasure map. You don't need 3 pages to tell us that. The meat of the story is how they find the treasure. The part with the shark should be longer and more intense. I don't even think you really need Bush. He tells us about the "master" and curses the guys, but that never comes into play, so it doesn't really matter. I also thought the ending was a little too easy. They go home and live happily ever after? If that's the case, then they need to struggle a LOT more in order to deserve the treasure. It left me feeling like they just were lucky and that's not really satisfying in any story. At least not to me.

Well written though and I did like it overall. I just would have liked to see a quicker beginning where we get to the interesting part faster. Make the middle, the lagoon and treasure part, more exciting so we get a sense of them being deserving of the gold.

Good job for a week's worth.  8)

Pia made a good point. Getting three pages in when the whole map handoff should have been the opening minute.

Even though the payoff in the end, was soft, this was still a pretty fun read.

Nice job!!!

Shawn.....><

Not too bad. The second half read WAY faster than the first. Also, I want to mention this never really struck me as period as I read it. I had to force it in my mind, and I think that could be a possible reason for the slower first half.

I thought the dialogue about "who's the better swimmer" was a good idea, but I'd suggest O'Donahue stating first that Peters is the better swimmer, giving his cleverness more belief.

Some sentences were overwritten, like Bush's description, and some clarity stuff like "shotgun parts".

The story wasn't bad, in the spirit of The Good, the Bad, the Ugly, but the ending was convienant. I was left wanting to see the conquences to the cursed gold.

Good effort, not too shabby.

Johnny

I just read some of the other comments here, stating that these two guys didn't receive any bad karma, considering the gold 'be cursed'. The writer left this part open with the last line. These guys are headed home, north I presume, and so is the shark...

"The fin drives straight out to deep water before veering to the left and heading...north."

Kind of like an 'ORCA' retribution thing ... oh yeah!

Hey writer,

Not bad at all. Original premise, writing was good but your actions could use done tightening. Didnt seem to detract from the story, though. I really enjoyed you homages to the original Jaws here.  "We're gonna need a bigger horse" is a great use of that line, as well as Quinta famous utterings.

Overall, well done, original and funny in spots. Pretty good effort for the time. Congrats on entering.

Steve

This felt like something else. Treasure Island meets The Good, the Bad and the Ugly.

I thought when I started reading this I wasn't going to like it but it got better as it went along. Sadly it wanes a little near the end.

Quite a lot going on. Wasn't bad. Did feel like ye olde adventure and there's something quite enjoyable about this and all that.

R

I like this.

You fit in a LOT of story in such a short space of time and do it quite well. You don't need to have the old guy taking so long to die and pass on the map; although I do agree it adds a nice bit of a backstory. If you trim that down you could add more tension to the actual retrival of the chest which is far too easy and quick.

I knew what was going to happen to the loon as soon as he stood next to the water and I doubt a great white shark could extist/attack in such conditions but it was still good.

I love the way you link this to Jaws and suggest the town is cursed. My favourite so far, but saying that I've only read 5 but well done, this meets all the requirements of the OWC both stated and implied.

Nice dialogue so far, writing could be more descriptive but that's just preference.

"Could be Robert E. Lee's left nut
hid down there" Ha, good stuff.

His death was a little comical, didn't seem like he was on the verge of dying when he was blabbing on about the treasure...

Don't get me wrong, I like the fact that the story is clearly going in a certain direction but it feels a little too structured. And because of that, everything has this bland tone to it. 'We have a treasure map, let's go and find treasure, no problem. Oh, there's a legend about an evil that lurks there? Ha, we're soldiers! Screw that!' Do you know what I mean?

Yes, finally, a script that milks the tension with the shark scene. Too many where I've seen "The shark suddenly jumps up and eats a character whole".

Not sure about the north at the end, probably a reference to a movie or script. I'm no good with that stuff.

But yeah, probably in my top 3 of the 20 I've read so far. Great job, writer. Solid work. Not much to say, glad you revealed the curse angle, ends the script on a nice note. I think you might have even had another scene planned if you could use another few characters. Would've been cool to see this flash forward of one of the aging soldiers with a gold piece in their hand and their blood pooling around it. Good stuff.

Agree with Ryan -- "we're going to need a bigger horse", perfect.

Good dialogue out of the gate and pretty well written, also.  The intro runs a little long, IMO, but I’m liking what you’re setting up.

Page 3 – Still enjoying this, but again, IMO, no way you need 3 full pages for it.  Some of your action/description lines need a little work, but no major issues so far.

Page 4 – IMO, the dialogue here between the 2 isn’t nearly as well done as earlier.  It’s much more OTN and also not really necessary.  Also, this page seems rather cliché – I’d skip the whole page and have them take off, as we knew they would based on the prior dialogue – you don’t need to handfeed us all this…we understand.

Is “FOREST” really what you’re intending?  I didn’t do any research into this area, but for some reason FOREST gives me the wrong visual picture.

Your lagoon description is good, but I actually would like more…or maybe I’d just like to know what month it is, so I can picture this better, as there’s quite a difference in Summer and Winter in this area.

Page 5 – Again, the dialogue here is unnecessary and OTN.  I’d skip it and give better visuals.

Page 8 – a little too easy to get this treasure, IMO, but I’m liking the mysterious stranger coming in.

Page 10/11 – Nice call outs to Jaws!  Funny.

Good ending, good story, pretty decent writing and dialogue.  One of my faves for sure.

Congrats on entering.

Lagoon

Oh a period piece, nice difference.

Gold? Now, what__ '  i would normally us -- to show an interruption

not sure you needed to have the men repeat shaw's words in the debate

FLASH - a pair of crazed eyes...  wasn't wholly sure what we were meant to see with this. classic OWC clarity that can be fine tuned on a re write

Bush's response to the shark is somewhat unusual

prize for best quote...

We're gonna need a bigger horse.

Well that was a good tale and a event set up.

Like many others this will benefit from some time to tidy up. But i like the essence of a folk lore tale, a setting just after the war, a lagoon, even the feeding of the soldiers to keep her happy, as you do.

having now checked out other comments i agree on the slow start.

'We're gonna need a bigger horse' lol, loved this line.

This was a pretty good little adventure story. There was some good banter, though some was a bit 'on the nose'.

Good visuals and an ending that brought a wry smile to my face.

Overall a cracking effort.

Hello.

I think you could easily cut one page of the first 4. It's a bit tale like. Maybe Shaw's dead should be more dramatic. It starts as a romantic pirate story with a secret treasure and all that, but they are soldiers in that moment and a comrade is dying in their arms. Feels too hybrid in case of the genre by now, but interesting on the other side.

I don't like the next scene. They repeat what happened before and talk about a third person which is gone a second ago who has said exactly all those things. Another setting and another situation, where they both could decide to search the gold and take their decision "subtle", could help. It's like they go out of the tent and say: Let's go to the lagoon. But you know what the old man said.... - explanations and repeats of the tale and mystic and high tide etc....

A shiver
ripples through his body though its a fairly warm day.

Soldiers don't feel cold for the rest of their lives. War made them resistant. Shivering is a defensive reaction they lost; they had too many life and death situations and experienced coldness for a long time- especially in such a disaster as the civil war. Cold water is a rational experience they can easily classify. Their musculature would reflect: it's too cold I'll die so I won't do it- or they will do their task. Just an example that you should know them better.

"Lets just find this fucking
gold and get on the road home."

Very optimistic

The shark holds the old man, shakes him. Not violently,
almost...tenderly.

The action of Bush against the white shark and the dialogue between the guys after that attack is not well balanced. It reads like a fatal injury, but in your vision the shark can play with Bush in his jaw. Concerning the whole turn: If you go for ridiculous, humorous stuff from this point on, it's not good enough for my taste.

Your screenplay is too much a hybrid of soldiers, pirates, sharks and finally comedy.

The theoretical try of mixing a lot of themes isn't bad. You explain too much via dialogue and it's not funny enough in the ending to say, well, this chaotic concept was successful.

Right off the bat I like the setting. This challenge has a pretty good spread on that.

Not to start a format flame war  :) but the use of underscore was jarring. Reminded me of Mad Libs. I was tempted to fill in the blank.

Pg. 3 I hate it when dying characters can’t just cut to the point. Surely he could say, “Shark...big…shark”

This Bush guy’s pretty talkative. It seems a shame to have him die so quickly after stepping onto the scene. He’s your exposition and your shark attack victim, but he’s not much else. This is another one that I think could’ve benefited from getting to the crazy ole shark keeper earlier. We would get to see what he does rather than hear him explain it.

I do like that this is another Jaws prequel. A curse actually makes sense considering all the sequels.

Congrats on completing the OWC

what I like:

Hunt for treasure...a quest...I dig it.

what needs work:

It's a shark story...no sign of ocean until later.

Could use conflict between characters to spice up. There is zero conflict until the end.

A man whose body is within the jaws of a shark will not talk so much as this guy does.

Why would people at home not recognize them after only 4 years?

Maybe tell us why the lagoon is sacred.

Different approach. Union soldiers seek treasure.

Nice foreshadowing from the deathbed, something dangerous protects lagoon. Builds tension for when they arrive. I like how you add another element of danger. They're being hunted by some madman in the woods. Consider removing dialogue about crazies out there. Leave it suggestive with the stalking POV.

I liked the characters here. And their squabble about who's the better swimmer. The reveal of madman's motive was disappointing. Another crazy guy making offerings. For me, it didn't mesh tonally. Keep the historic approach. Maybe he's just blood crazed from war. He likes to watch bodies get torn up by the vicious shark. Simple insanity. Just an idea.

He coukd still curse their lineage. I really loved that homage to Jaws. The curse doesn't need to be real, per say. Legends would keep it alive. Really, this crazy shark breeds other crazy sharks. I loved the following dialogue... crazy as a cut snake." Great saying, great flavour. And another homage, this one the best of this particular reference... need a bigger horse. Hahaha.

Good prequel to Jaws. Good setting. Intriguing set-up. Good dialogue. I wish shark attacked more. And more obstacles for soldiers to acquire treasure. Good entry as a whole.

Pretty good, writer. Especially for a weeks time. I'm a sucker for treasure hunting stories and I felt you handled this one very well. Part of me would have loved to see the two guys struggle with recovering the gold. The shark could have been more of a factor than just a pop up at the end killing Bush. All in all, a worthy effort and a very entertaining story.

Congrats on completing the OWC.

23. The Lagoon - Two Union soldiers hunt for hidden gold at the end of the Civil War.
Brief - Origins story of Union soldiers who retrieve gold treasure that curses the town of Amity.

Characters to Animate/Voice - 4
O’Donahue, Peters, Shaw, Bush
Scenes to Build  - 5/4
US Civil War tent INT, Union camp, forest, lagoon + cliff,
Accessory Visual - 22/20
Satchel + open, canvas map, horses walking, POV shotgun sights, crazed eyes, climb down, shirts off, water ripple, bare + bleeding feet on cliff rocks, shark fin, pair swimming w box, spit tobacco, blood in water, shark pull into water, big blood stain in water, ax, box, gold
Accessory Audio - 7
Military camp din, horses walking, forest sounds, tobacco spit, water part + splashes, big splash, bubbles

Genre & Marketability - Adventure drama
Script format - Fair
Comments  -  Use “--”, not “_” to denote an interruption of dialog. Dialog seems a bit wonky. Classic cliché death of Shaw. For economy’s sake I’d condense the Union Camp and Forest scene together + ditch the horses. Nice “bigger horse” statement. Oh, and a nice origins creation. Very nice.
Final word - Pass. Although I really like the origins idea this execution is clunky and I have no sensible quick fixes for it. Sorry.

10/15           Lo/Hi Estimated Build Hours per Screen Minute
x 10.5          Screenplay Pages
= 105/158     Total Build Hours Time Cost

Takes 5 pages to get to the point. That's bad in an 11-page short. To be honest, I haven't actually read it all. I skipped once I saw all the dialogue... and it didn't grab me from the beginning.

It has a shark attack. well late into the script, but it's there. I got so bored I almost missed it. Too inactive for me.

Interesting idea out the gate here. I think the dialogue between Shaw and the boys could've been shortened a bit. I like that you have created some emotion though in the first part of this story. I have to think even though Shaw gave them the map...it may've been cool to see them find it on him ...and his last words were to try to warn them or stop them before he died.

But men and their treasures. "Its the least we can do in the old man's memory." I'm not sure this is why they'd be after the treasure. People thought, can't resist knowing a treasure is somewhere without going after it(no matter what the danger).

At the ocean end? Being nit picky, but didn't you say a river ran into it earlier?

Cute little mention of Amity at the end. I liked this story. It needs a bit of work like all the others but it was good overall. Good job.

I liked your concept. Two soldiers on a search for treasure. Dialogue wasn’t half bad. The story started off a bit slow. Picked up half way then slowed down toward the end. Would've like to known more about that curse.

So the shark has Bush in his jaws..(almost tenderly) and Bush is just casually ok about it. Saying his last words to the two soldiers.. Ehh… I don’t see a great white biting down tenderly.

Were gonna need a bigger horse…. Nice one

I liked your story, writing was pretty good. Unfortunately the shark only makes a brief appearance toward the end. Felt like you could have done more with that.

Overall. Nice job

Best of luck