Slam-Dunk Love by -  Billy P - Short, RomCom - A Los Angeles attorney plans a Valentine's Day surprise for an associate he's smitten with, but a change in her attire throws things into doubt. 8 pages - pdf format

Writer interested in feedback on this work

I thought that basketball was going to play a much larger role in this.

pg. 1 - ‘stands under his door’, reads awkward. I would write ‘stands at his door’.
pg. 1 - Funny when he stands up to declare his affections :)
pg. 4 - I think you need to make it more clear Alexandra removes her jacket before entering the meeting.

I found that most of the dialogue in this was stilted with too many irrelevant and unfunny lines. The romance aspect was more effective, though was also lacking in my opinion. Still, I feel this has potential to be improved with some changes to the dialogue and additional pages. I could see this as a feature with more of Mark trying to unsuccessfully woo Alexandra, until he finally does.

Writing is crisp and clean.

The premise - height issues - is a good one.

The dialogue did this under for me. It was stilted and dis not sound natural.  That becomes an issue when it's a dialogue heavy story

The story issue I see -- you're making the dialogue do all the heavy lifting.  That's not necessarily bad, but... this was just okay for me.   I have always found this genre excrutiatingly difficult to write.  So hats off to you.

I see where you were going with this. The physical mismatch often looks amusing, especially when the tall is very tall. I think you made a nice choice but didn't quite pull off the story as is.

My advice to you, apart from the interplay between them being way too formal is to make it more difficult for Mark to win her over and the misunderstandings more comedic. In a typical RomCom the flowers would have been mistakenly given to another woman vying for his affection and the game would be on.

Also, Alexandra says yes to all his advances. In fact at one point she asked him to lunch and he said no, which threw me a bit.

I'd focus on the mismatch even more if I were you. If you do a rewrite make her a basketball player, make her
personality casual and him a bit stuffy and uptight, then ramp up some misunderstanding with gifts he keeps sending her to woo her i.e she thinks they're from someone else perhaps. A good RomCom needs an obstacle to the path of true love.

I liked the way you wrote the environment around them, I could picture the streets, got the vibe etc. Well done there.

There is so little conflict here. Everything comes up roses for everyone, pun intended. The only hint of conflict is the misunderstanding about the jacket, and that doesn't lead anywhere except to drag the story a little longer.

The dialogue was kind of stage-play fake, not real at all.

I did appreciate the height issue. It's not often used, and here it wasn't even an issue, but it was still nice to see. I just wish there was more of a story here.

Good job entering, but it didn't work for me.

Hi,

This was very dialogue driven. The problem being the dialogue wasn't very interesting or human. It just felt they were talking to tell us the story.

The story could actually be a sweet one, but as told not for me.

Glenn.

Hi Writer

Straight away there are things for the readers benefit, not the viewer - hope it doesn't continue.

As pointed out - stands "under" his door is strange.

I'm not a fan of this writing style, personally preference maybe.

I'm half way through and I'm a little bored tbh. Not a lot driving this story forward.

Finished - Didn't really gain any traction for me, as others have pointed out, the dialogue needs a lot of work. The only reason I finished is because this was a OWC, and I want to finish them all - If this was a normal script on the site, I doubt I would have.

The comedy visuals of the tall/short would play out well, but you could have played on it more, chance for some big laughs in there that were missed.

Good job on the challenge

Matt

FADE IN should be left aligned, not right aligned.

Opening passage is loaded with unfilmables.

"stands under his door" - WTF?

Page 4 - Dialogue doesn't ring remotely true and this whole setup is rather dumb, IMO.

Action/description passages way too wordy and loaded with unfilmables.  Story dull, dialogue bad.  I'm afraid I'm out.

*

Hi Writer,

Your character descriptions need a lot of work. Unfilmable to the point of being pointless in a script. I don’t mind an unfilmable description if it gives us an insight into the character but stuff like:

Quoted Text junior partner at the downtown firm

Quoted Text a newly-hired blonde labor attorney

Quoted Text the visual antithesis of a florist.

-- don’t give us a visual or any useful character descriptors.

Quoted Text Mark sits at his desk, still unsure about what Alexandra meant earlier

There are actually quite a few unfilmables throughout, but things like the one quoted above have no place in a screenplay. How will the viewer know what he is thinking?

The weakest part of this script is the dialogue. It’s too matter of fact and on the nose. Subtext can be hard to figure out but the only way to do it is to read lots of scripts and keep practicing.

I see potential but you will need to work at it.

All the best.

2 pages in and the exchange in dialogue is very fake. There's no character to what they're saying it's very robotic.

Mark hands him a $20 bill. ... wow i thought he was handing him 20 billion for a second... those are some expensive flowers. Usually numeric values are written out.. twenty dollars

Try to keep your actions down to at the most 4 lines otherwise it looks blocky.

He hands her chocolates and roses and calls her Dear then pages later" Would I make you uncomfortable by asking you out?"

I think it should have been the other way around lol

I thought this was gonna be about basketball ..

Not much going for this I'm afraid as far as story very bland

Good job on entering

I'm with the rest on the dialogue. And it just kind of chugged long with no surprises, leaving me... meh.

Opposites attract? It's nice that Alexandra doesn't mind dating short guys, but Mark may be an inch too far. His brand of romance is rather banal, and she just drops into his lap without much effort on his part. Make him work harder to win his true love.

This was a good story!

The only thing that I would get rid of was the extra jump in time to the future at the end.

I don't think it added anything to it.

Keep it in the time we're in and maybe see how creative you can get with the ending.

More comedy would be nice, but yeah, the story is really good.  :)

BTW... I did get with the antithesis of a florist!  ;D I imagines a big guy with hairy arms who likes to drink a lot of beer and he's wearing one of those undershirts without sleeves. That was good.

Sandra

Okay, so...

I don't think the height thing is such an issue these days, so wasn't convinced by the 'conflict' that created.

I completely did not buy that she'd wear such a jacket to a law firm where she'd just been hired as an attorney - it doesn't match the professionalism implied by the setting.

I also didn't buy that en educated thirty-something would resort to such cliche, and cheap, gifts.

As mentioned, some of the dialogue reads a little off... but I think that can be fixed with an edit or two.

And as mentioned, having the flowers delivered to someone else just seems such a better way to go for creating a romcomy type misunderstanding.

Maryland Therappins jacket - what is it? Like world known designer or something?
Why should I google it, I shouldn't. I won't!

And then, Mark is asking Barry to give Alexandra flowers in a very strange way. It's like he's asking to give flowers to any tall lady that comes his way.
Maybe he should give him her address. That way he'll be sure that Barry doesn't give the flowers to the wrong woman.

The dialog here doesn't always flow.
MARK
Did you--
ALEXANDRA
Did I what?

Mark is still confused by her response.

I wonder why he's confused and "still confused" He inferred Barry gave the candy and roses to the wrong woman I guess.
But that was very expected.

Unfortunately the further I got with the read the more questions I had. I don't know if I should list them all here.
This doesn't work for me that's all. Happens I guess.

Hey writer,

Myeeehhh, it’s a 9 page kinda play on the difference between a short arse and a tall lady. Bruce Bigalow Male Gigalo (don’t judge me) managed more comedy on a similar scene over the space of 30 seconds.

It had romance! Comedy? Not so much.

Well done on entering.

Cam

Edit, edit, edit, edit! Clumsy dialog that needs to be diced and sliced and cut into slivers. Character backgrounds described with no indication in dialog or action as to who the people are. He's short, she's tall. End of story. Who cares what their clothes look like? Who cares what's at the subway station? Who cares about going to Seattle? Cut, cut, cut, cut! Where's the complication? Obvious beginner.

Most of the issues have already been covered. Biggest one for me is - we need more conflict. Even the missed handoff was easily overcome.

Good job on entering. Keep writing!

Without reading the comments that have come beforehand.

I didn't notice any comedy element.  It was more drama and romance.

I wasn't drawn into the story.  Just felt like it took too long to get anywhere.  The ending was bland too.  With the title and basketball bit.  I would have thought this would have featured a lot more than it did.

Nice angle on the height difference.  Overall, this didn't do it for me.

Hi Writer,

Definitively romantic, but light on the humor.

I liked that you introduced a physical mismatch. Well done.

It is dialogue-heavy and not much happens, it needs some more conflict.

There are some unfilmables, but writing is good.

Overall - not bad, but it needs work.

Good job on entering. This one was a tough challenge.

To be honest, there’s not much going on here. The only conflict is the missed flower connection at the subway, and that turned out perfectly fine. I guess you were trying to turn the height difference into something of a conflict, but even that didn’t matter.

The dialogue is way too on the nose and expository. Needs to be cleaned up. Also, it was weird where a character would be talking in voice over (v.o.), when I think you meant they were just talking to themself, in which case you should just say in parentheses: (to herself).

Needs a little more depth to the story, and the humor is fairly slight for a rom-com.

Best of luck,
Gary

Bunch of things I wanna nitpick about the open – don’t need to tell us he’s a junior partner or she is newly hired.  Opening line of dialogue should pop more. “she stands under his door” is just weird writing.  I'm not gonna harp on that stuff going forward, but just keep it in mind.

The dialogue is strange in a bunch of spots.  Stuff like “I’ve long wanted to be an attorney” doesn’t sound authentic at all. Mark just saying “okay.” “Tomorrow, the morning of Valentine’s Day…” Etc.  These don’t sound like real people, even if you’re making them intellectuals.

Sorry to say, it’s also not very interesting conversation.

All the action lines are overwritten.

Too much Voiceover. “Hurry girl – you’ll be late!”  pretty sure we can understand her rush just from a descriptive line there, the dialogue is useless.

So much reliance on clothing… I get that you had to incorporate red, but just leave it at the jacket, don’t care about her blouse etc.

There isn’t much legal jargon, but none of it is interesting.  This is lacking heavily in the “com” aspect of the challenge.
“ok talk to you later.”  “bye” – just kill dialogue like this.  If you can’t have them say something defining or funny, don’t even have words exchanged.

Sorry for coming back to this, but none of these people sound real! “Why didn’t you call me to say she never appeared?” no one talks like that!  Especially in a rom com.

Exposition city.  “Here is what we did, robot wife.”  “Yes, wasn’t it a hell of a ride, android husband? I am tall for some reason.”

I sound like a douche, but there’s just nothing interesting here.  Guy likes tall girl from office – society doesn’t want them together because they work together and … she is taller than him?  He wants a stranger to give her flowers for some reason, but she wears the wrong color jacket, and then fast forward 2 years, they are happily married.  Very light on rom, completely void of com.