LOGLINE: Two students investigating the nature of time discover a way to send messages to the past and soon find themselves fighting desperately to change the future they’ve been shown.
WRITER: David Marmor
SCRIPT BIO: 2016 spec script repped by Peter Dodd of UTA.
STORY:
We're first introduced to Max (30s) by way of high contrast VHS footage from a home handy-cam from the 90's. Max is only a kid at the time, and he's intrigued by a science experiment his father and a colleague are working on.
It involves a dark black crystal that doesn't make much sense in the opening scene, but we later learn if you shoot a laser into the crystal and control some other variable, the crystal can delay or speed up the laser coming out the other side.
That's the nexus of this story. Once you get your head around this slightly tenuous concept, once you buy into the idea that a crystal can not only delay information but speed up information then the story really is incredible.
What do you mean by 'speed up information?' I hear you ask. Good question. The idea is that if you're about to do something, the crystal knows you're about to do it, and will do what you were about to do, BEFORE you do it.
Confusing - right? But for the sake of the story, let's move on, and just 'ACCEPT' that this crystal CAN transmit information through time.
Max teams up with the lovely Louise, an undergrad student studying physics, and together they manage to harness this magical crystal's powers and create a device where they're able to send messages back in time.
They soon receive a message from themselves in the not too distant future, a few hours forward, telling them that they're being hunted by some government group. And sure enough, it's true, a government henchmen and his cronies are soon hunting them down.
The power of being able to send messages back in time has to be the ultimate weapon ever created, you could literally do anything with such power. Change the outcomes of wars, prevent assassinations, anything you can think of could be done.
That kind of power is something every government and ruling body in the world wants.
Max and Louise are soon on the run from a government agency willing to kill them to get this device. Their only hope of survival are the message they're receiving from their future selves.
The question becomes, will they survive and if so, what will ultimately become of this incredible new device and the power it wields?
INITIAL REACTION:
I've talked about intelligence before on this blog. Today is a good example of when a script has obviously been well thought through.
Compare this script with the script of Mobilized.
This is a script that an intelligent person has really thought through. Mobilised read like a 9 year old was regurgitating 50 different films and mashing them together into one. The intelligence behind Mobilized was sub-par to be kind about it.
This script is very considered.
It's not bullet proof. This script's biggest asset - It's IDEA - is also one of its weakest points.
It posits that the hero of the story can send messages through time via a mysterious dark crystal. That's what this story hinges on - if you can buy into that premise, then you're in for a great ride, but if you find that too hard to swallow, then the rest of the story falls apart.
I'm one of those that buys into the premise While it's wholly unrealistic in real world terms that such a crystal exists, within the CONTEXT of the story written it's believable.
And that's a very crucial thing - you can do ANYTHING you want in a story, so long as you do it in a convincing way. So long as you create rules and stick to them in the world you're creating, no matter how absurd in real life, the audience will go along with it, so long as you stay true to the rules of the world your create.
CONCEPT:
This is a killer concept - Scientist is able to send messages back in time. It's not entirely new - but when you get into the execution of this idea - it comes across as fresh.
As the general public gets more and more film savvy, the bar for what will keep people entertained is slowly being raised.
Film ideas that got people to go to the movies in the 80's are laughable these days. Watch any Chuck Norris or Dolph Lundgren movie and you'll see what I mean.
CONCEPT RATING: 8/10
CONCEPT TIP: Inject intelligence into your writing. Take the script you're presently working on and ask yourself, are you challenging the audience? Or are you just trying to create something that will appease the masses? If you push the bar, if you really think through every beat and aspect of your story, it will only benefit you and your script.
FORM:
Form wasn't perfect here, it was a little over written and there was over use of bold and italics.
But as I've said before, form is the first thing that producers and agents forgive so long as you are telling an intelligent, creative story.
FORM RATING: 6/10
FORM TIP: Form is the easiest thing to learn when writing scripts. Spend some time researching the best way to format your screenplay. There's lots of good resources - How Not To Write A Screenplay - is one of the best.
The second best way is to READ a lot of screenplays that are out there. Look at the way they are formatted. Think about what formatting guides work for you as a reader and what distracts.
STRUCTURE:
Structure here was okay. I don't think that Max actually had a FLAW.
It's setup at the start that his parents die in a fire, and that's what's driving him to be able to send messages back in time. But that's not really a flaw.
It could be a flaw, if his obsession is causing problems in his life, but it's not really doing that. He is obsessed, but not in a detrimental way.
When your hero doesn't have a flaw, structure begins to waver. As happens in this script.
But there is one small up side to eschewing traditional structure, it means you can surprise your audience.
The heroes journey structure was quite a new thing in the 90s. It is now very well known. So well known that it has become formula. The real skill in screenwriting these days is to KNOW the hero's journey and use it, but to do so in a way that isn't obvious.
Sometimes a writer can luck it by writing a non-hero's journey film and it's really engaging BECAUSE we have no idea what will happen next. I think that's the case here in Invariant.
The writer didn't follow a traditional structure, which would be death to the script in 99% of cases, but here the script works.
Why?
Because of the first positive thing I mentioned about this script. It's INTELLIGENT and every beat is well thought through.
We also have other elements driving the story.
While there isn't a closed-end goal - the heroes do have a series of micro-goals -- being that their lives are in danger. Some powerful government agency is out to kill them and get this device.
Their micro goals are to evade capture along the way. Now, this only works because of the setup of the film. We have a scenario where a future version of themselves is communicating with the present day version of themselves to help them survive. That's mind bending in a Matrix kind of way.
Had this been a film about two convicts who escaped jail and go on the run, then it wouldn't have been so interesting. There's only so long we can watch a couple of the run from the law.
STRUCTURE RATING: 6/10
STRUCTURE TIP: Surprise yourself. If, as you're writing you're able to write a beat in that you didn't expect to happen, then you will be sure to surprise your audience.
Try the paint-yourself-in test. When you next have your hero in a tricking situation, rather than have them get out of that situation the easy way, go the hard way. Write them into a corner.
Then this is the test - try to write them OUT of that corner - but in a way even you didn't see coming. It might take you a day or two to figure out how to get them out of the corner, but when you do, you will have a moment in your screenplay your audience didn't see coming. It will also add to the intelligence of your script.
CHARACTERS & DIALOGUE:
Max and Louise are well rounded and well created. They're not perfect, but as they stand I'd give them 8/10's each. All the other characters aren't so well rounded, which would normally be a problem, but here, in this script, because we don't know so much about the bad people chasing them, that only adds to their enigma.
Dialogue isn't anything to write home about. And in fact, in this very strong script I'd say that dialogue is the weakest element.
There's not much difference between the way Max and Louise talk. If you took away the character names you couldn't tell who was who by the WAY they speak.
CHARACTERS & DIALOGUE RATING: 7/10
CHARACTERS & DIALOGUE TIP: Dialogue is a really powerful way of creating vibrant characters. When your dialogue pops, your characters will pop.
Why is that?
Because when you put time and effort into understanding HOW a character speaks and WHY they speak that way - then you're really starting to understand WHO your characters are.
When you know who your characters are, you're better able to make character based decisions. Meaning - you make decisions in your script that are TRUE to the nature of your characters.
VOICE:
Voice is pretty good here. If the writing was trimmed back a little and the formatting mistakes were cleaned up, if the dialogue were tweaked and a decent flaw added to Max then the voice in this script could be exceptional.
VOICE RATING: 7/10
VOICE TIP: Perfecting each of the aspects of your script will bolster and improve your voice.
PRODUCTION:
If this script were cleaned up as I have mentioned, then yes, I'd definitely put money into this. But I'd insist that it be kept to a 10 mill budget.
Sci-fi is hard to make money on. There are exceptions to this rule - Matrix, Star Wars etc - but when you have something like this script - which is essentially an everyday thriller set in the ordinary world with ONE sci-fi element (send messages back in time) - then these kind of films are hard to get much more of a return than 50 million.
SUMMARY:
Intelligent concept very well executed.
OVERALL RATING: 8/10
Monday, 11 April 2016
Thursday, 7 April 2016
MOBILIZED - DRAMA - CRIME
LOGLINE: A group of ex-army infantry soldiers who run a mobile food truck in Vegas must fight back when they are extorted by a local Mexican gang.
WRITER: Wesley K Clark II
SCRIPT BIO: 2016 spec script from Tantillo entertainment and ICM.
STORY:
The story starts well. We find a group of infantry soldiers in the middle of a minefield in Afghanistan. The leader of the pack, Master Sergeant Perry (45), has just activated a trip-wire.
Most people would shit themselves in a situation like this, but not Perry or his band of men. They're unrealistically calm - even when they suddenly come under fire from enemy snipers.
Cut to some time later, a year, maybe two or three, and we're in Las Vegas.
Here, we find out that all the men made it out of that tough situation alive and well.
We join Perry who has just invested everything he has into a mobile food truck.
He's invited all his army buddies to come and work with him, and rather than do something with their own lives, these men stick together and start working on the truck, trying to sell grilled cheese sandwiches.
With me so far?
Pretty exciting stuff huh. (sigh)
They set off into a rough part of town and setup selling their grilled cheeses opposite a Korean food truck.
The Korean food truck is killing it, the queue for their food is a mile long. Our army men aren't having an easy time selling their grilled cheeses.
But slowly over the course of a few days, they start to make money.
Just when things seem to be going well -- a local Mexican gang member tries to hit them up for $500 per week - roughly 10% of their weekly takings.
This happens at around the page 30 mark.
That's right for 30 pages we've watched these army men setup a grilled cheese truck.
Sigh(#2)
Perry and his men go to the local police to report being extorted, but apparently there's no laws against extortion. Sigh(#3).
Things soon escalate, when Perry's son has the shit kicked out of him by another gang member at his school.
Perry then escalates things further by kidnapping the gang member that beat his son and threatens to kill him.
One of Perry's men is then shot in the face by a 12 year old gang member.
Perry and his men then decide to take this gang on head to head in an all out assault.
The question becomes, will violence save the day? Will Perry and his men get away with multiple homicides?
INITIAL REACTION:
I loved the open scene. Or rather, I thought I loved the opening scene, until I saw the way the rest of the script was written and handled.
Then I realised that the opening scene was as corny and unrealistic as the rest of this script.
This script pretty much does everything wrong.
I kept waiting for it to get intelligent - I kept waiting for the great moral of the story to hit me - but there isn't one.
I think Donald Trump would love this film.
It's about ex army vet's killing suburban Mexicans.
I would actually go so far to say this script is borderline racist. It paints Mexicans as black and white evil, and the army vet's as angelic heroes.
It's the sort of story you would expect to come out of the Reagan area.
Even in the ending when the army guys go to take down the 'gangster' - I thought, okay, here we go, this will be where I'm proved wrong - all the army guys will die and it will have been a great big setup leading to a point where the script had a point to make - being "violence doesn't solve anything."
But no.
This script advocates using violence to resolve conflict.
There was nothing intelligent here - it was a pure revenge script - it would make a great addition to the Expendables franchise. Expendable 8 - Grilled Cheese Chaos!
CONCEPT:
Ex army vets setup a grilled cheese food truck and battle local gangsters for turf.
Does not get me excited.
Would you pay money to see this in a cinema? Or does it sound like something you'd maybe catch if you had nothing else to do and it was on Netflix?
I can get behind the kernel of the premise of this idea - army vet's reintegrating with life after being in war. That's a very worthwhile topic.
My problem here is the flag waving, overly patriotic execution of this base idea.
Even with that said, hasn't that idea been done and done? There's just not enough here to justify this being made into a film.
CONCEPT RATING: 3/10
CONCEPT TIP: Put your concepts through the CINEMA TEST. Write down the core concept of your story then ask yourself, if this wasn't your film, would you PAY MONEY to see that in a cinema . And here's the trick to this test - be honest to yourself. It's harder than you think.
FORM:
Form wasn't good here.
It was actually under written. I often complain of over writing - but here we went in the opposite direction. It was so sparsely written, that at times it felt like the writer got bored of writing and wanted to sum up what was happening in the most overly concise way possible.
Bold was also used here. Do not use bold in a screenplay ever. It screams rookie.
There were also instances where the writer write a slugline - then went straight into dialogue. Never do this. Always write a description of what's happening in the scene. Without a description we don't know who is there, and what they're doing.
Really simple stuff.
There were also spelling mistakes galore and often whole words missing from sentences.
FORM RATING: 4/10
FORM TIP: Learn the screenwriting form rules. Read How Not To Write A Screenplay.
STRUCTURE:
Structure was terrible here. I can assure you the writer has no idea what the hero's journey is. None of the characters have an inner journey what so ever.
Everything that happens here is external.
Without an inner journey your structure is going to be weak.
Take the inciting incident - when the gangster tries to extort them - this takes place around page 30.
That's terrible. The inciting incident should happen at around page 10 - 15 at the very latest.
The inciting incident in JAWS happens in the opening scene.
After the inciting incident the story then waffles on for act 2 - until they finally decide to take down the main gangster which is kinda like act 3.
But not really.
When a character doesn't have anything to overcome within themselves, then it's very hard to create an interesting structured story around them.
If anything, Perry actually starts the film with NO FLAW, then develops a flaw throughout the film.
At the start of the film Perry is essentially a law abiding citizen and a pacifist. By the end of the film he is a murderer who advocates the use of extreme violence to resolve conflict.
STRUCTURE RATING: 1/10
STRUCTURE TIP: Learn how to use the Hero's Journey to give your story a second layer. First layer is the external stuff that's happening to your hero. The second layer - the emotional later - is what's happening to your hero inside them. This second layer is what we, the audience engage with and connect to.
CHARACTERS & DIALOGUE:
While there were maybe 10 characters here, really there were only two.
One good guy. And one bad guy.
ALLLLL the army guys spoke the same way. ALLLL the army guys were cardboard cut-outs of each other. I think there was one difference in that one of the army guys didn't want to use violence and one did, but ultimately the one who didn't finally decided that he did.
The 'bad guys' were equally identical.
There was a 12 year old, a 20 year old and say a 35 year old. They were all carbon prints of each other.
Dialogue was also dull as hell. Not one character spoke in a different way to any of the other characters. Except to say that the Mexican gangsters spoke in the single most cliche way imaginable. They finish every sentence with 'Homey'. Just another element of this script that leaned toward stereotypical racism.
CHARACTERS & DIALOGUE RATING: 3/10
CHARACTERS & DIALOGUE TIP: Differentiate your characters. Give them quirks. Give them opposing personalities. Especially when you have a high character count.
When you have a group of 5 or so people together and they all speak and sound the same and all agree with each other - it's going to get boring quickly.
Remember this - DRAMA IS CONFLICT.
Every scene should have conflict. A scene without conflict is boring. Simple as that.
TAKE A LOOK at American Beauty. Almost every single scene in that film has conflict.
Our main character is in conflict with EVERY OTHER character in that film.
His wife hates him, his boss hates him, his daughter hates him, his neighbour's father hates him. That's a great example of conflict driving a story.
Can you imagine that film if he got along with his daughter and wife and boss? Where would that film be now?
VOICE:
Voice suffered here because of --
Weak concept.
Poor form.
Almost no structure.
Carbon copy characters with carbon copy dialogue.
When your script is weak in all these areas your voice is going to come across as weak also.
VOICE RATING: 3/10
VOICE TIP: Break down your screenplay into the elements I do on this blog. Identify the element/s of your script that need work and refine them until each aspect pops.
PRODUCTION:
I wouldn't be surprised if this did end up in the Expendables franchise.
Seriously.
Stranger things have happened.
I would not put money into this film as I don't see a return.
Even if you got major talent behind it, it just doesn't have enough going for it to get bums in seats to make this a profitable film.
It'd be a 20 mill production at least and add to that a $30 mill P&A budget (prints and advertising) then factor in that you need to make 3 times your production budget at the box office to just BREAK EVEN - do you see this film making $150 million?
I surely don't.
SUMMARY:
Poor concept executed weakly.
OVERALL RATING: 3/10
WRITER: Wesley K Clark II
SCRIPT BIO: 2016 spec script from Tantillo entertainment and ICM.
STORY:
The story starts well. We find a group of infantry soldiers in the middle of a minefield in Afghanistan. The leader of the pack, Master Sergeant Perry (45), has just activated a trip-wire.
Most people would shit themselves in a situation like this, but not Perry or his band of men. They're unrealistically calm - even when they suddenly come under fire from enemy snipers.
Cut to some time later, a year, maybe two or three, and we're in Las Vegas.
Here, we find out that all the men made it out of that tough situation alive and well.
We join Perry who has just invested everything he has into a mobile food truck.
He's invited all his army buddies to come and work with him, and rather than do something with their own lives, these men stick together and start working on the truck, trying to sell grilled cheese sandwiches.
With me so far?
Pretty exciting stuff huh. (sigh)
They set off into a rough part of town and setup selling their grilled cheeses opposite a Korean food truck.
The Korean food truck is killing it, the queue for their food is a mile long. Our army men aren't having an easy time selling their grilled cheeses.
But slowly over the course of a few days, they start to make money.
Just when things seem to be going well -- a local Mexican gang member tries to hit them up for $500 per week - roughly 10% of their weekly takings.
This happens at around the page 30 mark.
That's right for 30 pages we've watched these army men setup a grilled cheese truck.
Sigh(#2)
Perry and his men go to the local police to report being extorted, but apparently there's no laws against extortion. Sigh(#3).
Things soon escalate, when Perry's son has the shit kicked out of him by another gang member at his school.
Perry then escalates things further by kidnapping the gang member that beat his son and threatens to kill him.
One of Perry's men is then shot in the face by a 12 year old gang member.
Perry and his men then decide to take this gang on head to head in an all out assault.
The question becomes, will violence save the day? Will Perry and his men get away with multiple homicides?
INITIAL REACTION:
I loved the open scene. Or rather, I thought I loved the opening scene, until I saw the way the rest of the script was written and handled.
Then I realised that the opening scene was as corny and unrealistic as the rest of this script.
This script pretty much does everything wrong.
I kept waiting for it to get intelligent - I kept waiting for the great moral of the story to hit me - but there isn't one.
I think Donald Trump would love this film.
It's about ex army vet's killing suburban Mexicans.
I would actually go so far to say this script is borderline racist. It paints Mexicans as black and white evil, and the army vet's as angelic heroes.
It's the sort of story you would expect to come out of the Reagan area.
Even in the ending when the army guys go to take down the 'gangster' - I thought, okay, here we go, this will be where I'm proved wrong - all the army guys will die and it will have been a great big setup leading to a point where the script had a point to make - being "violence doesn't solve anything."
But no.
This script advocates using violence to resolve conflict.
There was nothing intelligent here - it was a pure revenge script - it would make a great addition to the Expendables franchise. Expendable 8 - Grilled Cheese Chaos!
CONCEPT:
Ex army vets setup a grilled cheese food truck and battle local gangsters for turf.
Does not get me excited.
Would you pay money to see this in a cinema? Or does it sound like something you'd maybe catch if you had nothing else to do and it was on Netflix?
I can get behind the kernel of the premise of this idea - army vet's reintegrating with life after being in war. That's a very worthwhile topic.
My problem here is the flag waving, overly patriotic execution of this base idea.
Even with that said, hasn't that idea been done and done? There's just not enough here to justify this being made into a film.
CONCEPT RATING: 3/10
CONCEPT TIP: Put your concepts through the CINEMA TEST. Write down the core concept of your story then ask yourself, if this wasn't your film, would you PAY MONEY to see that in a cinema . And here's the trick to this test - be honest to yourself. It's harder than you think.
FORM:
Form wasn't good here.
It was actually under written. I often complain of over writing - but here we went in the opposite direction. It was so sparsely written, that at times it felt like the writer got bored of writing and wanted to sum up what was happening in the most overly concise way possible.
Bold was also used here. Do not use bold in a screenplay ever. It screams rookie.
There were also instances where the writer write a slugline - then went straight into dialogue. Never do this. Always write a description of what's happening in the scene. Without a description we don't know who is there, and what they're doing.
Really simple stuff.
There were also spelling mistakes galore and often whole words missing from sentences.
FORM RATING: 4/10
FORM TIP: Learn the screenwriting form rules. Read How Not To Write A Screenplay.
STRUCTURE:
Structure was terrible here. I can assure you the writer has no idea what the hero's journey is. None of the characters have an inner journey what so ever.
Everything that happens here is external.
Without an inner journey your structure is going to be weak.
Take the inciting incident - when the gangster tries to extort them - this takes place around page 30.
That's terrible. The inciting incident should happen at around page 10 - 15 at the very latest.
The inciting incident in JAWS happens in the opening scene.
After the inciting incident the story then waffles on for act 2 - until they finally decide to take down the main gangster which is kinda like act 3.
But not really.
When a character doesn't have anything to overcome within themselves, then it's very hard to create an interesting structured story around them.
If anything, Perry actually starts the film with NO FLAW, then develops a flaw throughout the film.
At the start of the film Perry is essentially a law abiding citizen and a pacifist. By the end of the film he is a murderer who advocates the use of extreme violence to resolve conflict.
STRUCTURE RATING: 1/10
STRUCTURE TIP: Learn how to use the Hero's Journey to give your story a second layer. First layer is the external stuff that's happening to your hero. The second layer - the emotional later - is what's happening to your hero inside them. This second layer is what we, the audience engage with and connect to.
CHARACTERS & DIALOGUE:
While there were maybe 10 characters here, really there were only two.
One good guy. And one bad guy.
ALLLLL the army guys spoke the same way. ALLLL the army guys were cardboard cut-outs of each other. I think there was one difference in that one of the army guys didn't want to use violence and one did, but ultimately the one who didn't finally decided that he did.
The 'bad guys' were equally identical.
There was a 12 year old, a 20 year old and say a 35 year old. They were all carbon prints of each other.
Dialogue was also dull as hell. Not one character spoke in a different way to any of the other characters. Except to say that the Mexican gangsters spoke in the single most cliche way imaginable. They finish every sentence with 'Homey'. Just another element of this script that leaned toward stereotypical racism.
CHARACTERS & DIALOGUE RATING: 3/10
CHARACTERS & DIALOGUE TIP: Differentiate your characters. Give them quirks. Give them opposing personalities. Especially when you have a high character count.
When you have a group of 5 or so people together and they all speak and sound the same and all agree with each other - it's going to get boring quickly.
Remember this - DRAMA IS CONFLICT.
Every scene should have conflict. A scene without conflict is boring. Simple as that.
TAKE A LOOK at American Beauty. Almost every single scene in that film has conflict.
Our main character is in conflict with EVERY OTHER character in that film.
His wife hates him, his boss hates him, his daughter hates him, his neighbour's father hates him. That's a great example of conflict driving a story.
Can you imagine that film if he got along with his daughter and wife and boss? Where would that film be now?
VOICE:
Voice suffered here because of --
Weak concept.
Poor form.
Almost no structure.
Carbon copy characters with carbon copy dialogue.
When your script is weak in all these areas your voice is going to come across as weak also.
VOICE RATING: 3/10
VOICE TIP: Break down your screenplay into the elements I do on this blog. Identify the element/s of your script that need work and refine them until each aspect pops.
PRODUCTION:
I wouldn't be surprised if this did end up in the Expendables franchise.
Seriously.
Stranger things have happened.
I would not put money into this film as I don't see a return.
Even if you got major talent behind it, it just doesn't have enough going for it to get bums in seats to make this a profitable film.
It'd be a 20 mill production at least and add to that a $30 mill P&A budget (prints and advertising) then factor in that you need to make 3 times your production budget at the box office to just BREAK EVEN - do you see this film making $150 million?
I surely don't.
SUMMARY:
Poor concept executed weakly.
OVERALL RATING: 3/10
Tuesday, 5 April 2016
LAST ONE ALIVE - HORROR
Logline: The lone survivor of a masked-slasher massacre attends a remote post-traumatic stress disorder clinic where she meets four other girls who have also survived similar attacks and must fight for her survival when all five of their masked slashers converge on the isolated clinic to kill each other’s “last one alive.“
WRITERS: Shane Krause & Shayne Armstrong
SCRIPT BIO: Spec script sent out in 2016 from Management 360. Adam Marshall, Evan Silverberg.
STORY:
We open on JAMIE FINCH (18) in the throes of horror cliche - she runs through a forrest, chased by a horrific serial killer dressed in a demonic way.
She finds a cabin in the woods (cliche #2) where she battles the demonic serial killer to the end. Or so she thinks.
We cut to some time after the attack and find that Jamie was the last one alive.
But here's the thing, she isn't the only teen to have survived such a horrific serial killer. There's a bunch more girls at a remote clinic that are all 'healing' together after having been the sole survivors of other masked serial killer's sprees.
It's decided that Jamie join them at the clinic to see if she can truly get over the horrors of her past.
We spend some time getting to know the four other girls who describe their own attackers, each more horrific and debauched than the last. We also meet the head doctor - Dr Hill - a beautiful woman, and her assistant - REID (26) - a bookishly hot young man.
There are a series of challenges the girls have to go through as part of their recovery process - mostly they involve confronting their fears, which means confronting life sized effigies of their serial killers.
As you can imagine, things soon gone horribly wrong when not one but ALL of the serial killers turn up at the clinic and start hunting the girls down.
The question becomes - who will survive - who will be the Last One Alive?
INITIAL REACTION:
This one is batshit crazy. Mostly in a good way. It's by no means a perfect script, and there are definitely bullet holes and story execution problems - but for the most part this is a really solid script.
The main thing it gets right is understanding CLICHE.
I reviewed a CIA thriller set in a US embassy recently that was nothing but cliche after cliche. It was as though that writer had no idea of what other films had come before.
Here, the writers use every cliche in the book, but they are AWARE that they're doing so.
Take the trope of The Last Girl Alive. That by its self is a cliche. But when you have 5 girls all together in a clinic who have all been the Last Girl Alive - that's no longer cliche. That's poking fun at the trope of The Last Girl Alive.
I've never seen or heard of a horror story that had 5 Last Girls Alive banding together to fight off their five serial killers.
I haven't even mentioned the twist ending - and out of respect to the script and the writers I won't - other than to say it's great - and although I was quietly hoping this particular twist would be there - it wasn't telegraphed - like some twists are.
Take Shutter Island as a great example of a twist that's telegraphed from the opening scene. It was so obvious what the twist would be that the person I went to see that film said just as we were sitting down - 'God, I hope he's not searching for himself. That would be so lame.'
Before the film had begun, knowing only what we did from the trailer, he had guessed the twist.
CONCEPT:
Knocked it out of the park. 5 Last Girls band together to fight off their 5 serial killers.
That's high concept and just what Hollywood wants - it's something we've all seen before - something we're all familiar with - but there's a fresh angle as there's 5 of them - not just one.
Sooooo simple.
CONCEPT RATING: 9/10
CONCEPT TIP: Take something we've all seen before and find a unique way of looking at it.
FORM:
Form was this scripts weakest point. The writing here wasn't A grade. It was densely written. There were also a lot of things in the script that can't show up on the screen - i.e - what people are thinking or feeling.
It's not good enough to say that Jamie is sad, or angry, or she's thinking unhinged thoughts - you need to SHOW us how Jamie is feeling or SHOW us that Jamie is having unhinged thoughts.
How do you do that? By Jamie's actions. If she's nervous, show her being nervous, show her making nervous mistakes. Don't just say she's nervous.
The script comes in at 111 pages - with some cleaning up it would easily come in at 100 pages.
But here's the thing about form - if you have a killer concept executed in a killer way - form is the first thing agents and producers forgive.
FORM RATING 6/10
FORM TIP: Don't let form hold your script back. Unless you've proven yourself with produced films that have MADE MONEY - don't give readers ANY excuse to dislike your script. The cleaner your writing, the leaner your writing, the less spelling and form mistakes you have - the better your chances of impressing your readers.
STRUCTURE:
This is the second weakest area of this screenplay.
Until the mid point when the killers turn up and cause chaos - there is no goal.
When a film has no goal - it will move slowly.
Here's an interesting thing - while you can READ a script with no goal and be engaged - you'll find that same story when made into a film - will drag like an anchor - why?
For what ever reason, when things are in the written form we have a longer patience than when things are in the visual form.
The second major fault with the structure of this screenplay is the POV.
You would expect or hope to spend around 90-95% of the time with Jamie - but alas - as the script goes on we move more and more away from Jamie.
Now there are times when it's IMPERATIVE that we DON'T see Jamie for the sake of certain reveals and plot points, but there are a lot of times when a moment is happening and it COULD have been from Jamie's POV, but it's not.
Thirdly - I'd need to read the script again - but I'm pretty sure there are some logic inconsistencies.
Take The Nightmare for instance - this is one of the other girl's serial killers - but he moves with super human speed in some scenes.
That's a problem two fold.
One - I thought we were only dealing with humans, no supernatural elements.
Two - consistency - if The Nightmare moves super humanly fast in one scene - then why doesn't he move that fast in another scene?
STRUCTURE RATING: 6.5/10
STRUCTURE TIP:
The more I review scripts the more I notice that heroes often don't have discernible flaws, and scripts often have POV problems and lack goals.
When outlining your next script focus on these three things.
POV - Always have the scene viewed by your hero - UNLESS you HAVE to go away to another character for the sake of story. As a rule, 90% of your film should have your hero in the scene.
GOAL - Always have a goal. It's okay to change the goal. It doesn't HAVE to be one goal from the start to end - in fact it's often better to establish a NEW GOAL around the mid point.
Even if you have to have mini-goals - like in Back To The Future - we all know the opening scene to that film - then Bam! Marty's late to class. He's got to get there on time - it's a goal that drives only a few minutes of the film - but imagine if he didn't have to get to class on time? That opening sequence wouldn't have popped the way it does.
FLAW - Read the Hero's Journey books - understand what a flaw is and why it's important.
CHARACTERS & DIALOGUE:
Dialogue was fast, fun and snappy. It wasn't perfect by any means - and there was some straight up unapologetic expositional dialogue late in the piece where the twist is openly explained to us by a character.
Characters were all pretty well defined. When you have what is essentially an ensemble film - 5 main characters - it's easy for those characters to blend into each other.
Not the case here - they all had their own personalities and really felt well thought out.
Some of the ancillary players seemed under developed - but that's small fry and an easy fix.
CHARACTERS & DIALOGUE RATING: 7.5/10
CHARACTERS & DIALOGUE TIP: If you have a large character count - be sure to differentiate your characters. Lesser writers would have made all the 5 girls seem like cardboard cut outs of each other.
VOICE:
Voice is bat shit crazy here. But it works for what it is - a self aware horror.
Voice could have been better if --
-- The writing were better.
-- Structure issues were fixed.
-- The script were trimmed back.
VOICE RATING: 7/10
VOICE TIP: You can see the way I break down scripts on this blog. Do the same process with your script/s. Give yourself honest ratings in each area, then work on the areas you think are lacking.
A strong voice comes from every aspect of your script being written the very best you can.
PRODUCTION:
I'd put money into this. I'd want a director who cares about the script to direct. I can see this failing if the director just hashed it together.
But if you got a decent talent on board to direct and did another couple of passes on the script fixing the problems I've mentioned, and if it was brought in at the $5mill mark - then this script will make money.
SUMMARY:
A strong concept executed fairly well.
OVERALL RATING: 7.5/10
WRITERS: Shane Krause & Shayne Armstrong
SCRIPT BIO: Spec script sent out in 2016 from Management 360. Adam Marshall, Evan Silverberg.
STORY:
We open on JAMIE FINCH (18) in the throes of horror cliche - she runs through a forrest, chased by a horrific serial killer dressed in a demonic way.
She finds a cabin in the woods (cliche #2) where she battles the demonic serial killer to the end. Or so she thinks.
We cut to some time after the attack and find that Jamie was the last one alive.
But here's the thing, she isn't the only teen to have survived such a horrific serial killer. There's a bunch more girls at a remote clinic that are all 'healing' together after having been the sole survivors of other masked serial killer's sprees.
It's decided that Jamie join them at the clinic to see if she can truly get over the horrors of her past.
We spend some time getting to know the four other girls who describe their own attackers, each more horrific and debauched than the last. We also meet the head doctor - Dr Hill - a beautiful woman, and her assistant - REID (26) - a bookishly hot young man.
There are a series of challenges the girls have to go through as part of their recovery process - mostly they involve confronting their fears, which means confronting life sized effigies of their serial killers.
As you can imagine, things soon gone horribly wrong when not one but ALL of the serial killers turn up at the clinic and start hunting the girls down.
The question becomes - who will survive - who will be the Last One Alive?
INITIAL REACTION:
This one is batshit crazy. Mostly in a good way. It's by no means a perfect script, and there are definitely bullet holes and story execution problems - but for the most part this is a really solid script.
The main thing it gets right is understanding CLICHE.
I reviewed a CIA thriller set in a US embassy recently that was nothing but cliche after cliche. It was as though that writer had no idea of what other films had come before.
Here, the writers use every cliche in the book, but they are AWARE that they're doing so.
Take the trope of The Last Girl Alive. That by its self is a cliche. But when you have 5 girls all together in a clinic who have all been the Last Girl Alive - that's no longer cliche. That's poking fun at the trope of The Last Girl Alive.
I've never seen or heard of a horror story that had 5 Last Girls Alive banding together to fight off their five serial killers.
I haven't even mentioned the twist ending - and out of respect to the script and the writers I won't - other than to say it's great - and although I was quietly hoping this particular twist would be there - it wasn't telegraphed - like some twists are.
Take Shutter Island as a great example of a twist that's telegraphed from the opening scene. It was so obvious what the twist would be that the person I went to see that film said just as we were sitting down - 'God, I hope he's not searching for himself. That would be so lame.'
Before the film had begun, knowing only what we did from the trailer, he had guessed the twist.
CONCEPT:
Knocked it out of the park. 5 Last Girls band together to fight off their 5 serial killers.
That's high concept and just what Hollywood wants - it's something we've all seen before - something we're all familiar with - but there's a fresh angle as there's 5 of them - not just one.
Sooooo simple.
CONCEPT RATING: 9/10
CONCEPT TIP: Take something we've all seen before and find a unique way of looking at it.
FORM:
Form was this scripts weakest point. The writing here wasn't A grade. It was densely written. There were also a lot of things in the script that can't show up on the screen - i.e - what people are thinking or feeling.
It's not good enough to say that Jamie is sad, or angry, or she's thinking unhinged thoughts - you need to SHOW us how Jamie is feeling or SHOW us that Jamie is having unhinged thoughts.
How do you do that? By Jamie's actions. If she's nervous, show her being nervous, show her making nervous mistakes. Don't just say she's nervous.
The script comes in at 111 pages - with some cleaning up it would easily come in at 100 pages.
But here's the thing about form - if you have a killer concept executed in a killer way - form is the first thing agents and producers forgive.
FORM RATING 6/10
FORM TIP: Don't let form hold your script back. Unless you've proven yourself with produced films that have MADE MONEY - don't give readers ANY excuse to dislike your script. The cleaner your writing, the leaner your writing, the less spelling and form mistakes you have - the better your chances of impressing your readers.
STRUCTURE:
This is the second weakest area of this screenplay.
Until the mid point when the killers turn up and cause chaos - there is no goal.
When a film has no goal - it will move slowly.
Here's an interesting thing - while you can READ a script with no goal and be engaged - you'll find that same story when made into a film - will drag like an anchor - why?
For what ever reason, when things are in the written form we have a longer patience than when things are in the visual form.
The second major fault with the structure of this screenplay is the POV.
You would expect or hope to spend around 90-95% of the time with Jamie - but alas - as the script goes on we move more and more away from Jamie.
Now there are times when it's IMPERATIVE that we DON'T see Jamie for the sake of certain reveals and plot points, but there are a lot of times when a moment is happening and it COULD have been from Jamie's POV, but it's not.
Thirdly - I'd need to read the script again - but I'm pretty sure there are some logic inconsistencies.
Take The Nightmare for instance - this is one of the other girl's serial killers - but he moves with super human speed in some scenes.
That's a problem two fold.
One - I thought we were only dealing with humans, no supernatural elements.
Two - consistency - if The Nightmare moves super humanly fast in one scene - then why doesn't he move that fast in another scene?
STRUCTURE RATING: 6.5/10
STRUCTURE TIP:
The more I review scripts the more I notice that heroes often don't have discernible flaws, and scripts often have POV problems and lack goals.
When outlining your next script focus on these three things.
POV - Always have the scene viewed by your hero - UNLESS you HAVE to go away to another character for the sake of story. As a rule, 90% of your film should have your hero in the scene.
GOAL - Always have a goal. It's okay to change the goal. It doesn't HAVE to be one goal from the start to end - in fact it's often better to establish a NEW GOAL around the mid point.
Even if you have to have mini-goals - like in Back To The Future - we all know the opening scene to that film - then Bam! Marty's late to class. He's got to get there on time - it's a goal that drives only a few minutes of the film - but imagine if he didn't have to get to class on time? That opening sequence wouldn't have popped the way it does.
FLAW - Read the Hero's Journey books - understand what a flaw is and why it's important.
CHARACTERS & DIALOGUE:
Dialogue was fast, fun and snappy. It wasn't perfect by any means - and there was some straight up unapologetic expositional dialogue late in the piece where the twist is openly explained to us by a character.
Characters were all pretty well defined. When you have what is essentially an ensemble film - 5 main characters - it's easy for those characters to blend into each other.
Not the case here - they all had their own personalities and really felt well thought out.
Some of the ancillary players seemed under developed - but that's small fry and an easy fix.
CHARACTERS & DIALOGUE RATING: 7.5/10
CHARACTERS & DIALOGUE TIP: If you have a large character count - be sure to differentiate your characters. Lesser writers would have made all the 5 girls seem like cardboard cut outs of each other.
VOICE:
Voice is bat shit crazy here. But it works for what it is - a self aware horror.
Voice could have been better if --
-- The writing were better.
-- Structure issues were fixed.
-- The script were trimmed back.
VOICE RATING: 7/10
VOICE TIP: You can see the way I break down scripts on this blog. Do the same process with your script/s. Give yourself honest ratings in each area, then work on the areas you think are lacking.
A strong voice comes from every aspect of your script being written the very best you can.
PRODUCTION:
I'd put money into this. I'd want a director who cares about the script to direct. I can see this failing if the director just hashed it together.
But if you got a decent talent on board to direct and did another couple of passes on the script fixing the problems I've mentioned, and if it was brought in at the $5mill mark - then this script will make money.
SUMMARY:
A strong concept executed fairly well.
OVERALL RATING: 7.5/10
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