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SimplyScripts Screenwriting Discussion Board  /  Short Scripts  /  Interview With A Serial Killer
Posted by: Don, June 16th, 2016, 8:03pm
Interview With A Serial Killer by Buck Biestek - Short, Comedy - A serial killer recalls the day he entered this earth before heading to the electric chair. 20 pages - pdf, format 8)
Posted by: cloroxmartini, June 17th, 2016, 1:40am; Reply: 1
Link not working for me.

Serial Killer is funny? Hmmm...
Posted by: Don, June 17th, 2016, 11:14am; Reply: 2
Link Fixed.

Apologies

- Don
Posted by: cloroxmartini, June 17th, 2016, 12:12pm; Reply: 3
The humor is not my style and of all things watermelon?
Posted by: Buck, July 5th, 2016, 9:17am; Reply: 4
Thanks for the input.
Posted by: Warren, July 7th, 2016, 10:23pm; Reply: 5
Sorry, Buck, but I did struggle to get through this one.

The dialogue is on the nose and takes up a lot of the script. Most of it would be two talking heads in a room which doesn’t really make for much of a story.

The formatting needs some work, you don’t have time of day at the end of your slugs.

The constant CLOSE on is too much. A lot of camera directing as well, remember it is our job to write the story not direct or edit it.

There is also a lot of "we see" and "we hear", you need to show us this, not tell us. Scripts need to be visual.

You have songs from the Rolling Stones and Pink Floyd playing, I'm guessing you don’t own the rights to these and probably wouldn’t get them for a short anyway so they should probably go.

Hope this helps in some way.
Posted by: SAC, July 10th, 2016, 2:53pm; Reply: 6
Buck,

I tried but was out around page 5. One issue of note is your camera directions. If try not to use them unless you were filming this yourself. Other than that, as much as you used them they can get a little tedious an hinder the read, which it did for me.

The fart jokes were just overkill. You had three farts in three pages or so, and you used it right off the bat, perhaps for a cheap laugh. Which they can achieve, just not here.

The dialogue wasn't doing it for me either. By four pages I was wondering what this was all about, or if one of the characters would get to the point.  And there might have been one down the line, but based on what I'd read already I wasn't up for taking the journey.

I'm guessing at, what, 20+ pages, there could be an explanation and some funny stuff happening. And I'll bet if you cut this way down, delete the farts an camera angles and unnecessary dialogue, you could probably turn this into a tight 12 page script.

One thing I did think was hilarious was the serial killers name -- Hercules Geraldo Smothers! Now that was funny. Hope this helps a little.

Steve
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