Harry,

Does it fit the challenge?


Yes - as far as I could tell it's one location, two characters (plus one additional with <3 lines). It fits within the crime genre and there is certainly a dead body in the room.

Did I like it?

For a one week effort, it does seem well-polished and looks great in terms of on the page style.

Osborne and Hanson certainly have fairly well-established dialogue with only occasional OTN bits. I found their reliance on bickering and swearing at one another a little off-putting. The nature of their relationship could have been established a bit more promptly.

I think an example of where this doesn't work too well is how they back and forth about substantially obvious "clues" - like how did the killer get in? When we (the viewer) have already seen the broken door. Unless you're trying to establish real incompetence from these two it doesn't feel needed.

Not sure what I was expecting but this really quite anticlimactic - it's hard with six pages, but you've only really thrown us in mildly entertaining/mysterious scene and then just kind of had the two cops talk about it, then leave. We know it's Hanson's frist call and he doesn't like the blood, and that the wife won't speak. Then it ends. But why?

A lot of unnatural exchanges between the two cops and in the end nothing comes out of it except one is a rookie and another is an experienced bitter cop.

This one didn't work for me. We see crime scene investigations all the time, you didn't really bring anything new to the table. The characters' banter just felt flat to me. I think this could've been more interesting if you kept it between the wife and the rookie cop, made the senior cop the third variable. Just my thoughts.

James

The descriptive blocks are a little clunky – denser then needed.

The detective repulsed at their first crime scene is a bit tropish – been done a million times.

You really don’t need the old woman – she adds very little.

For this one – there really is no there – there. It’s like a scene from a larger story rather than a complete story itself.

Sorry, but for me the dialogue was pedestrian – stereotypical.

I think you're suffering from lack of story here. You have a short scene that seems to be from something  bigger. There isn't a pay off. I kept waiting for something to happen but it just didn't. I think the dialog would become better if they had a more tense situation to deal with. As is it's flat.  Have the old broad pull out a gun or something. Take us by surprise, add tension. Give that rookie something really big to tackle.

When I read this I thought maybe the prompt was 'you've just got an hour' as they're in such a rush to get initial findings sorted before the coroner arrives - why? Normally in this sort of scene we learn something interesting from the coroner.

The rest of it just felt a little forced for me, nothing inherently wrong with the scene but too formulaic and familiar to hold my attention.

And the end seems to be they leave the scene... needs work imho.

Unfortunately, this didn't work for me for a couple reasons. The big one is that the banter between Hanson and Osborn was clunky. Typical cop stuff but nothing really new or fresh. Second, off the bat, Hanson presents himself as kind of a clown and then he's constantly ridiculed by Osborn. I thought he would have a chance to really redeem himself, but there wasn't much of a payoff. It just...kind of was.

As a scene in something bigger it may be okay, but as a short I feel like it needed more.

Greg

This one dragged on for me which isn't great for a short.
No story ,twist or impressive dialogue to keep me interested.

Sorry just a bully cop who practically every line was to put the rookie down which seems very unbelievable.

Dead body and the rookie getting ready to throw up at the sight is done over and over.
Not sure what the point of the old woman, I actually thought it was a shot of redemption for the rookie and he was gonna make her talk.
Kinda in your face to the older cop... but no

Pretty dull I'm sorry to say.

Good job on entering

Neither Osborn nor Hanson sound like they know what they’re doing. The dialogue doesn’t develop character, or advance the story — it  ends the same way as it begins, with a body in the room. And the Wife contributes nothing. All of which leads me to believe the writer intentionally wrote a bad police procedural…

Meets the parametes but more like a scene than a story and the banter between the two didn't sound natural, nor did they sound like cops.

Sorry.

-Mark

Congrats on completing the challenge.

There’s definitely potential for more here. Maybe have the ticking time bomb be getting the info out of the wife before something bad happens like a bomb exploding or something along those lines?

Not much else to say. It feels like it was cut short.

Gabe

Opening passage is so overwritten and then you end with an orphan.  4 lines that should be 2.

Same thing with the 2nd passage - wasted words, repetition, not well written at all.

Is a 3rd character OK here on the very 1st page?  I didn't read the parameters recently, so not sure.

This doesn't seem very realistic at all - the setup, the dialogue, the actions and reactions - all very poorly done.

For me, so far, this doesn't seem to meet the parameters, with the 3 peeps.

Dialogue getting even worse...OTN, unrealistic, just very poor.

The end.  Really?  That's it?  Oh man, not to be mean, but this almost feels like a joke...a bad joke that no one laughs at.  There's absolutely no story here at all. Nothing...not even a thread.  It's dull, unrealistic and serves absolutely no purpose.

Not for me.

I find the dialogue really awkward and not natural. Miss? She's 78. The detectives conversation right in front of the wife is like she's not in the room. And the 'rookie' didn't see the body on the floor in front of him? And they didn't talk about killing and murder in the academy?

And what was the conflict and resolution to this? The dead body made him feel sick but he left before he did? I'm lost on the whole story, sorry.

Hi,

This felt more of a cliched skit rather than a crime drama. The dialogue was stiff and predictable  at times. This scenario has been played out time and again in police procedurals ever since they became a staple of a television schedule.
But in saying that, if you used your remaining four pages to flesh out out the characters a bit more and cut back on the ongoing derision of Hanson and made more of the back and forth to expand the story, you could have a great scene on your hands.

Well done.

I think James is onto something with the idea of the main action playing out between rookie and the victim's wife.

Perhaps your seasoned cop is stuck in traffic  - your third variable might come in terms of gems of dialogue when he finally turns up to the scene. Maybe he's chomping on a breakfast McMuffin, Rookie tells him off. Turn the tables on the stereotypes.

I wonder what this poor bastard was doing down here in the middle of the night.
Some logic issues and I didn't quite get this cause it's his house. He's either got up up cause he's heard an intruder, or just the usual - toilet, glass of water etc.

I told the officers earlier that I'm not in the mood to answer questions, now please leave me the hell alone!
Quite a mouth on that woman, let me tell you.
Not really... Her husband was just murdered in a pretty graphic way and the only profanity she uses is: hell.

I'd make this more colourful. Smart mouths usually go with younger women - in general. Or, you could intro some comedy with this elderly woman really having a foul mouth. That would add comedy to a grim crime scene, give it a surreal comical tone.

Certain things don't add story wise and I think that's a plot problem. You've got an old guy stabbed fifteen times which doesn't sound like a smash n grab. It sounds like a targeted personal attack.

In which case the wife could've made it look like a break-in when it was in fact a crime of passion perhaps? Make the characters younger maybe, if you choose this path?

We won't know until the guys at the station can make that woman squeal.
The guys at the station? Aren't these two guys the investigating team? Make her squeal? Squeal is usually an informant term.

Alternatively, maybe the rookie is eating on the job/contaminating the crime scene? Maybe when seasoned cop turns up late he realises rookie has made a mess of things, maybe he steps all over the crime scene, and the plot turns to how they can get things cleaned up to cover their arses - seasoned cop is ultimately responsible. Maybe in the middle of it all - if you still go with wife being the third variable, she confesses to killing her husband. You just need to surprise us more and work the dialogue from there.

The concept is a good one: an investigator at his first murder scene.

I like the line "Why did you send me such a dumbass partner?"

Some of the lines offered explanation when there was no need for it: example: "You're at a crime scene, act like it."

Some of this felt like fairly standard police talk.  

First off thanks for the feedback everyone. There's a lot of it to go through, so bear with me.

I felt I needed to redeem myself after the less-than-satisfactory police ending in the OWC version of Homa (the second draft of which is now available btw).

I wanted to establish that Osborn is a seasoned, no-nonsense police detective and Hanson is a rookie who's just getting his feet wet. With this in mind, they would have a very contentious relationship starting out, so that's what I was attempting to convey through the dialog.

There ended up being two possible third-factors. The first is Hanson's inexperience and trying to walk on eggshells around Osborn trying not to look stupid. The second, and the one I intended, is that they may not have enough information to put a report together and are going over the facts in an attempt to get it.

To be honest I was a little disappointed that so many people knocked the dialog. Personally coming out of it I thought it was the best dialog I had written in my still young screenwriting career. I've had a history of clunky dialog and I thought this challenge would remedy that. Clearly I still have some work to do in that department.

It's a little difficult (at least for me) to come up with a story that will fit within a few pages. I guess that's part of the challenge aspect.

The ending was the best one that I could put together in a short period of time.

Quoted Text And they didn't talk about killing and murder in the academy?

I meant to convey that they would have, but not about what it's like to witness the aftermath of such things. Thus why Osborn says "Look, kid, there's a ton of things the academy doesn't prepare you for. This happens to be one of 'em."

Quoted Text You've got an old guy stabbed fifteen times which doesn't sound like a smash n grab. It sounds like a targeted personal attack.

What that meant to convey was that, as Hanson says, the culprit broke the front door window with the intention of robbery, but when he saw the victim he panicked and killed him.

Finally, Harry Boesch is a character in a series of amazing crime-suspense novels by Michael Connolly. That's who I was trying to channel with Osborn.

Thanks everyone once again for commenting. I'll get Writer's Choice someday. Someday...

Just want to chime in and say sorry you were disappointed, Mark.

At risk of sounding patronising you have a terrific never say die attitude which is half the battle.  Yes, just keep at it!

I actually pulled one of my OWC entries once mid challenge. Couldn't bear to hear more of the feedback.

Anyway, here's a link to a screenplay - based on Connelly's seventh novel, Blood Work, scripted by Brian Helgeland.

It might be up your alley.

https://www.google.com/url?sa=t&source=web&rct=j&url=https://www.dailyscript.com/scripts/blood_work.pdf&ved=2ahUKEwiH74XPvovsAhXJ9nMBHRl2ARAQFjAAegQIBxAB&usg=AOvVaw3lW_lKWOyV1YEeQOwmO217

Quoted from LC Just want to chime in and say sorry you were disappointed, Mark. At risk of sounding patronising you have a terrific never say die attitude which is half the battle.  Yes, just keep at it! I actually pulled one of my OWC entries once mid challenge. Couldn't bear to hear more of the feedback. Anyway, here's a link to a screenplay - based on Connelly's seventh novel, Blood Work, scripted by Brian Helgeland. It might be up your alley. https://www.google.com/url?sa=t&source=web&rct=j&url=https://www.dailyscript.com/scripts/blood_work.pdf&ved=2ahUKEwiH74XPvovsAhXJ9nMBHRl2ARAQFjAAegQIBxAB&usg=AOvVaw3lW_lKWOyV1YEeQOwmO217

Thank you so much for the encouragement! To you knowledge, is there anything I can do to try and improve while I wait for the next OWC?

Pretty cool that one of Michael Connelly's books got made into a movie. Pretty much any of them are movie material. Fun fact: Brian Helgeland also wrote the movie "42" which Chadwick Boseman was in.

Mark, my advice is to first read again the scripts that did well this OWC. Examine why they were crowd pleasers.

Then read more - Pro scripts and amateur and compare the two.

There's an A-Z of movie scripts you can download here:
https://www.simplyscripts.com/movie-scripts.html

Oscar winning scripts here:
https://www.simplyscripts.com/oscar_winners.html

If you have a favourite and it's not in that bunch, write the title+screenplay+pdf into any search engine and you might get lucky.

Search 'how to write good screenplay dialogue' in any search engine and likewise tons of links will come up:
Search greatest dialogue film examples too and watch the video scenes.

http://www.screenwritingspark.com/the-ultimate-screenwriting-dialogue-guide/
https://scriptmag.com/features/the-7-deadly-dialogue-sins

See how dialogue is used to create a natural rhythm for specific characters, notice contrasting dialogue with different characters etc. Look up the differences between vernacular, jargon, slang and colloquialisms.

If you're going to write a character in a specialist field i.e., medical, legal, police, etc., research first to see what jargon they use.

Listen to the way people speak.
Read out loud your own dialogue and/or get someone you know to read it so you can listen to see if it works, sounds natural etc.

After all that, remember this was a OWC dialogue exercise. A lot of scripts will not be as dialogue heavy.

With film and screenwriting as you know, the emphasis is primarily on the visual so you don't want to veer into novelistic writing but what dialogue you do write needs to pop, sound colourful (not boring, expositional, or predictable) and add another layer to your visual narrative.

Oh, and, I can't remember who said it in feedback in the challenge but someone made an excellent point along the lines of: none of us speak in complete paragraphs.

Just keep writing.
Next OWC will be October.  :D

P.S. Poor Chadwick Boseman, he was a real talent, seemed like an all round nice guy and was sadly taken too early.

P.P.S. An old article about Connelly scripts in development hell. Of course the Bosch series came out after this.
https://deadline.com/2010/12/author-michael-connelly-vs-paramount-how-harry-bosch-was-rescued-from-hollywood-development-hell-91548/