Let Go by Johann Vernillet - Short, Drama - Alan went through a traumatic car accident and he is reminded of it annually by his dead best friend. 6 pages - pdf format

Writer interested in feedback on this work

Just gave this a quick read, a few thoughts... just my opinion of course

1) The formatting is a little off, the title page should be just whote, no need to shade it... same for the sluglines
2) In a script the action lines should describe what you intend the audience to see, it must be intended for the screen, so sections like
'ADAM is laying in his bed dreaming about this little girl. She is 12 years old with long blonde hair. He has been having these dreams every night. He is abruptly woken up by his alarm.'
don't work unless you intend this to be a dream sequence and film it... if this is the case then it needs to be a separate scene.
3) Action blocks should be brief and punchy and clearly show the action, you need to re-read some of these to make sure they are clear.
4) You need a new slugline when changing scenes... Adam goes from his bedroom, down some stairs and into the kitchen, this needs re-formatting.
5) Characters names only need capitalising the first time they appear in the script.
6) You don't need direction like 'the camera follows them', a director/dp will figure that out themselves.
7) There's a few places where you've omitted words, have another read through.
8) Some of the dialogue reads a little flat, try saying it out loud and see how it sounds.
9) He finds a note with co-ordinates on and realises that they are the co-ordinates to his ol house... this doesn't ring true as houses aren't normally known by their co-ordinates (zip or post codes normally), so it feels wrong unless he's a map reader.
10) You need to re-format the following
Well then let's go. (pats Adam on the shoulder) She'll be there.
The patting bit is action so needs a line n it's own/
11) Same with the next few lines... parentheticals in dialogue aren't on the same line as the dialogue, check out some of the scripts on here to see how it's done
12) The end reveal doesn't work for me, Jake doesn't seem phased by his dead friend appearing out of nowhere and the end sequence is all just Jake explaining what's happened, no action.

Anthony
You can read & comment on my latest...
Bump in the Night - http://www.simplyscripts.net/cgi-bin/Blah/Blah.pl?b-short/m-1416179287/
Graft - http://www.simplyscripts.net/cgi-bin/Blah/Blah.pl?b-short/m-1416751412/

This one has a lot of stuff that is difficult to portray. We can't see inside a character's head. Use either action or dialogue to get the info to the audience.  Also, some of the action doesn't need to be shown, such as the walk into the radio station. No need to park the car either.  Take them from car to broadcast booth. The audience will infer that they parked and walked in.  Give your audience credit for figuring out what must have happened.  Show only what the audience can't reasonably infer.

The ending doesn't have enough setup. If it was that easy to help the soul move on, it should have happened long before, no?  After all, his friend could have revealed the truth at breakfast.

Best

Richard

Hi Johann

Based on this script, I have made the assumption that you are new to screenwriting. The writing itself is very amateurish - not meant as a negative, just an observation. So my comments will be based on this assumption.

There is a lot here that I could comment on, but I will see how active you are around here before I delve too deep.

Anyway

Positive first - Loved the story, not much more to say on that, got a real Dead Mans Shoes vibe to the vision of the friend. So well done.
Also well done on starting with shorts, very wise.

Right, onto the writing. I'll be brief for now.

Remember that this is a SCREEN play, you would do well to write visually - re-read it, and with every line think "how can this be shown on a screen" - you will see that a lot can be removed.

Example

Quoted Text . He has been having these dreams every night.

You are missing some slug lines (which, while i'm here, should indicate DAY/NIGHT etc). For example.

Quoted Text EXT. FRONT YARD ADAM and JAKE get into the car and drive to the store. They arrive at the store.

The slugline puts us in the front yard, but the action below has us in a car journey, then pulling up outside a shop with no new sluglines. These should be used for all changes of location.

Another observation - show, don't tell

The best example of this in your story. is at the end. He takes him to a cemetery, and then tells him she is dead? why not just show us the grave with her name on the stone?

The dialogue doesn't quite work for me either, but as I have presumed you are new to this, it comes from practice. best way to work on it is to read it out loud (preferably to friends/family) to get a feel of what is natural.

I'll end there.

Anyway, like I said, I really liked the story. Good job on getting a story down.

Best of luck

Matt

Nice little story really.

Use intercut to show scenes side by side when the're inside a kitchen

Dialogue a little weak, but can be worked on to gain a more realistic conversation.

Not bad for a beginner I'd say.