Hi Bonginkosi,
Notes as I read.
Quoted Text INT. MANGOPE HOUSEHOLD. BEDROOM - DAY |
Not a big deal and may just be personal preference, but I go with a dash over a period to break up locations, so:
INT. MAGOPE HOUSEHOLD - BEDROOM - DAY
Quoted Text A young girl in her pajamas, sits on top of her bed. Hair
messed up, no make-up but still, she’s undeniably beautiful.
Her name is SARA, 18.
|
Some unnecessary overwriting here, I'd change this to:
Sara, 18, beautiful despite her messed up hair and panamas, sits on her bed.
Again this isn’t really an issue, but I I'd do a voice over like this:
FRIEND (V.O.)
Quoted Text The door opens. Sara walks in, sits on her bed. Her friend
walks. Dressed like a true SLAY QUEEN. She goes for the
mirror and starts touching up her face. She has clearly been
here before.
|
I'd try changing some of the words up. There are so many ways to say 'walks' that would be more interesting on the page. Also adding "her friend walks" reads a bit awkwardly. I would give the friend a name from the start, then it would be easier to incorporate it into the action so:
The door flies open, Sara strolls in with CHRISTINA, 19, in tow.
I'm not really sure what a SLAY QUEEN is. I'd keep colloquial terms to a minimum unless you have a very specific target audience.
Quoted Text CAPTION: ELEVEN MONTHS EARLIER.
INT. MANGOPE HOUSEHOLD. KITCHEN - MORNING
Sara prepares tea. Her mother , MS MANGOPE, 40s, sits on
"her" chair, with her hands gently resting on top of the
kitchen table. She reads a bible.
|
So I think you need to change the order of this. Start with the scene heading, then give us a visual, then superimpose (caption) the information over that. Like this:
INT. MANGOPE HOUSEHOLD - KITCHEN - MORNING
Sara prepares tea. Her mother, MS MANGOPE, 40s, sits on
"her" chair, with her hands gently resting on top of the
kitchen table. She reads a bible.
SUPER: ELEVEN MONTHS EARLIER
Another thing, the "her" chair would need to come through in dialogue to be relevant. There is no way an audience member would know that if it's important to the story.
Quoted Text Sara pours water on the kettle |
water into
Quoted Text MS MANGOPE
That man destroyed me, my innocence
and left us to starve! I had no one
else to support me when your dad
walked on us...While I was Pregnant
with YOU! |
This is a pretty good example of on the nose dialogue. Sara would know all this information already, so Ms Mangopa is really saying it for the benefit of the audience, unfortunately that can come off as exposition if it's not handled well.
There are a few typos here and there than need cleaning up.
I think you need to call FRIEND/CALLER/SLAY QUEEN CHRISTINA from the start, it's unnecessarily confusing.
I'd go back and swop a lot of the "walks" for something more entertaining.
Done, I can't say there is too much of a story to this one, but it does say it’s the first episode. What plan did you have for this? Without know the bigger picture it's hard to really comment.
I think a few easy changes would clean up the writing a bit.
At the moment I don’t really like Sara. I did initially but then she says this:
Quoted Text What if he
could help me right now? Pay my
tuition...Or maybe he works for
some media company, has
connections, has money...Or
worse...he’s poor. Somewhere with
no food or clothes and needs my
help. |
So she wantS to know her father for what he can do for her and if he can’t help her that’s bad. It makes her seem selfish and immediately makes me dislike her. Again this might be a part of a bigger character arc, but without knowing the full picture I can only comment on what I have.
This one wasn’t really for me.
All the best with it.