Too Hot by 0 - Short, Comedy - When his air conditioner goes out on a 104° day, a man goes to the store to get cool where he is followed by the manager. - pdf format

Writer interested in feedback on this work

OK, here we go...the 1st of the bunch, and I'm starting with comedy.

Logline is awkwardly written.

Title page strangely "centered".

Opening line reads poorly - just intro your character right away, as opposed to saying "a forehead".

"He sinks with bewildered." - Doesn't make any sense.  Not a good start, sorry to say.

Writing is very awkward throughout.  Slugs not well done.

"flatens" - ???

Passages not broken up correctly - 1 idea, 1 shot.

HA!  Funny about the "CUSTOMER" thing.  Nice!!

lays/lies - learn the difference!!

"threatoning" - simple spelling errors throughout.  Looks like no editing was done here at all.

Well...this doesn't work for me, other than maybe 1 or 2 funny lines, and the entire setup and execution obviously screams for some dialogue.  It's almost as if we're watching a silent film.

I can't give this a grade, like I usually like to, but let's just say this won't be a favorite of mine.

A simple idea, not well executed, but we get the idea,

Probably a rushed job.

I liked the idea of toying with the manager, like a hide a seek, always looking for a cool zone.

And a twist that the air con could have worked in the first place. You need to deliver that line better, but it can work.

It’s the kind of script that could make a nice, simple, to film sketch. Needs some fine tuning but, you know, it could work...

Fair effort.

The old AC not plugged in chestnut.

Not bad and the writing was OK

A little game of Cat and mouse in the store with the manager was pulled off pretty good other than that... I knew where it was going. Maybe because I'm an Electrician ;D

Good job on entering

There is some sloppiness here (incorrect title page, extra spaces between words, etc) but regardless, I somewhat liked this.

You do have hiccups right out of the shoot.

Quoted Text INT. HOUSE - LIVING ROOM - DAY Perspiration beads across a forehead. [quote]CHARLIE (30s), swipes the sweat from his brow.

Just intro Charlie - don't need the separate lines.

Quoted Text His eyebrows rise in surprise. He looks out the window. A thermometer reads: "104° F".

Surprise seems like the wrong word here - he know's it's hot. I would go with something more like anger in his eyes.

Quoted Text He turns the knob to the left. He flips it faster to the right. Nothing. He sinks with bewildered.

bewilderment maybe?

Anyway - the point being the writing needs tidying up. But - huge congrats for nailing the theme (hot weather) and I did find some humor in the antics. There is potential here.

Enjoyed the ' manager" joke, thought that was clever.

Other than that there was a few laughs throughout. The second he fell to the floor I kinda figured where it was going. Not sure if the shopper was needed in this, though I liked how she was helping Charlie out. Not a issue, but why wouldn't the cop go after the shopper that rammed the manager with a cart?


Good work.

Just a small tip. Whenever possible avoid settings in a "house" or "store". That's about as bland as can be. Much better to name it Charlie's House or Hooper's Store. That little bit of extra effort goes a long way to help the reader visualize the scene.

Ok, I live in AZ, it's 11:42 am on a Sunday morning and it's already 105 here. 104 although miserable, is not as debilitating as Charlie makes it out to be. So I have a hard time buying him melting as he goes into the store. But again, I'm a Arizona native. Just another day here.

Charlies affection for packaged meat and the notepad bit honestly make me wonder if he is mentally challenged.

Why does the cop follow him home? Did he commit a crime I missed?

You have a simple setup of a story here, but nothing happens after. Charlie just messes around at a grocery store and that's it. He needs more of a goal. To buy a missing part to fix the AC or something. As is, he's just wandering around the store and that's what the story does, it wanders.

It's not written poorly, just a weak story, but maybe the best use of heat I've read so far so I'll give you that.

Keep playing around with this one. It could turn out well.
At the moment, the story doesn't resonate with me but that could just be preference.
It feels like it could make a good animated short, perhaps.
Feels overall like it might be more for kids. No problem with that, though.
Keep going!

Hey writer,

Comedy is such an individual thing, it's really quite personal. Alas, this didn't tickle my funny bone. It kinda based itself on in unplugged ac unit joke, then took a massive detour to get there, and script sandwich filling in the middle wasn't that funny either (IMO obviously). Ramp it up to 11, stick in some outlandish visual stuff, really out there though, that's my own personal tastes.

It was a bit messy too, with typos and double spacing incidents, especially in the early part. Rushed job?? Not sure.

Anyway, sorry but not for me, but we'll done on entering,

Cam

Ha! This one actually made me laugh. The summer heat also played a big part, so good job there.

The writing wasn't great, but far from terrible. The lack of dialogue seemed out of place here. These people would be talking. Also didn't quite understand why the Shopper rammed her cart into the manager. And where was the suspense?

Not bad by any means. A solid, lighthearted story. Good work here.

Zack

Title is way too far towards the top of the page. Poor start right out of the gate.

Quoted Text Perspiration beads across a forehead.

Is "beads" a noun or a verb? I hope the former. I agree, it does read awkward.

Quoted Text He sinks with [no extra space] [bewilderment].

Some writers here have been saying that INT. STORE and INT. HOUSE are too generic, but I respectfully disagree. If they're the best you can use, I say use them.

Quoted Text Looking through the glass doors as Charlie approaches.

Incomplete sentence.

Is he literally melting? Like the Wicked Witch of the West. I guess that satisfied Pia's Oz hint. ;)

Quoted Text The glass door opens and he enters. Charlie spreads his arms wide, welcoming the cool air[,]and breathes a sigh of relief.

"way."

Our first of what will probably be several orphans. Very poor writing so far... and this is just the first page.

End of the page. My interest is waning. If it gets any worse, I'm out.

Quoted Text He (no extra space) gives it a little pat to tidy it up, then turns away.

Aaaand… I'm out.

I read it and laughed once at the bit where he stuck the CUSTOMER bit of paper on. But ironically, that section highlight my biggest critique of this script. A no dialogue challenge should be attempting to convey a visual story that's clever enough to seem natural. If you look as this section -

The manager shakes his head no. He points to his badge that
clearly reads: "MANAGER".
Charlie pulls a pad of paper and pen from his pant pocket and
writes something. He holds the paper up on his chest and
points to it. It reads: "CUSTOMER".
Charlie smiles as he looks for a reaction. The manager stares
at him. Charlie stares back.
Charlie watches the manager puts his hand on his hip and tap
his foot impatiently.
The female shopper steps in front of the manager. She puts on
her glasses and watches him.
Charlie snags a package of ribs and wraps them around his
neck. He presses them down tight. He sinks a little in
comfort.
The manager's eyes bulge in disbelief.
The female shopper shakes an angry finger in the manager's
face.
The manager sends Charlie a look to kill.

This has the feel of silent movie. There would obviously be plenty of dialogue flying about here. So my only advice is to find better reasons to stay quiet. Perhaps when he walks into the shop, there's a two minute's silence announced for fallen veterans. Then the struggle of people trying to communicate and have an argument in silence becomes FUNNY.

In fact - if I'd had that idea before - I'd have entered a one-pager called A MINUTE'S SILENCE - where people have a huge altercation over a fan or whatever but have to mime it out of respect for the dead.

Okay, writer.

You did get me to laugh at the name tag joke.

This must be a silent film ala Charlie Chaplin, but with a present day setting.  More like a Benny Hill silent sketch with Benny Hill as the man seeking relief from the heat and the little, old bald dude as the store manager.  There, I just made it funnier.

The parameters were met as far as the heat and no dialogue, and a weak attempt at the end with a policeman for the suspense element.

I work in a grocery store so I appreciated the story about weird customers.

I'm afraid the joke about the ac not being plugged in fell flat.  IMO

Nice effort.  Another rewrite and this could be a funny little silent short.

Good luck.

Some awkward writing. Too many specific actions for the actors kept on jarring me out of the story.

However, for me the comedy elements worked. I imagined this guy as Mr. Bean. That really helped and even made the no dialogue make sense. Some genuine funny moments in the store with the manager.

Unfortunately it doesn't go anywhere at the end but a decent effort.  

-Mark

As a whole this felt a little rushed to me.

Lots of errors littered throughout the script made it hard work to enjoy.

The story itself worked pretty well and abided by the parameters for the most part. I think the lack of dialogue would be an issue in a stand alone piece but you handled the heat element nicely.  

I think you have something here but at the moment the writing is too messy for it to really stand out.

Solid effort for a week, though. Good luck.

Writer,

This reads more like an updated but classic silent film style short. I think that was your intention here. At first I thought it was gross that this guy way using raw meat to cool himself off, but then the absurdity of the story came to me with the silly silent film angle and I kind of enjoyed the rest of it. Liked the ending with the AC being unplugged. Duh! Anyway, pretty good, but lacks oomph!

Steve

I loved this short comedy. The character had a clear goal and obstacles from the get-go. If I am to complain about anything I would say there should have been more funny moments in the story.

This was a good attempt. Thanks for participating.

The first couple of pages were boring, but it did pick up once the antics in the store started escalating. I wish there was more of that and fewer beats where the most dramatic thing happening is two people staring at each other.

This could work if you go full Looney Tunes, really amp up the physical comedy. Think of the guy as Bugs Bunny and the store manager as Elmer Fudd, and the angry lady as Daffy Duck, and you've got yourself some comedy gold. (Obviously don't rewrite it with those characters, just be inspired by them.) And if you aren't old enough to remember those classic characters, they're coming back so you'll learn what I mean soon enough.

As it stands, this isn't very good but it is a good effort to meet the challenge.

Out of the gate I LOVE THIS concept. Could use a better title maybe.

Really like how you started with the heat being an issue. Great use of the parameters here IMO.

with bewildered -- probably typo

Thinking it may've been harder for Charlie to get in the store and to act like a normal shopper if he was, for example, homeless... they always try to run homeless people off.. but a regular Joe (or Charlie) could hang out in a store forever :)

Charlie picks up the meat and presses it against his cheek,
his forehead. --OMG LOL at this. Love this visual.

I do LOVE the end where the AC wasn't even plugged in ...

Great little comedy here.

Just want to thank everyone for reading and commenting. I will probably do a rewrite pretty soon.

Thank you again.
This was a lot of fun.