Today I thought I'd do something different.
This is not by design, but by chance. I just sat down to watch Dead Man Down and found it so bad I couldn't keep watching. So I figured I'd figure out what was going wrong from a screen writing angle. But even with the added intrigue of analysing why each scene wasn't helping the story, I eventually had to give up on watching Dead Man Down.
I then stumbled upon Little Miss Sunshine on Netflix and started watching. LMS seemed to be doing everything right. So I started taking notes to look at what was going on at a screen writing level that made that film so successful.
DEAD MAN DOWN Vs LITTLE MISS SUNSHINE.
You might think that comparing these two films is like comparing chalk and cheese. They're completely different genres, DMD is a noir crime thriller, while LMS is a feel good family drama.
But here's the thing.
It doesn't matter what genre you're working in, the principles of story are the same.
Firstly before I get into the story element comparison, let's look at the stats...
IMDB:
LMS: 7.9 (79%)
DMD: 6.5 (65%)
METACRITIC:
LMS: 80%
DMD: 39%
ROTTEN TOMATOES:
LMS: 91%
DMD: 38%
BOX OFFICE:
LMS:
Budget: $8m
Gross: $100m
DMD:
Budget: $30m
Gross: $18m
So....
From looking at these numbers LMS was a runaway critical and financial success, while DMD lost a huge amount of money, and is an overall critical failure.
Let's compare elements of the two films to see where LMS went right and where DMD could have done better.
CONCEPT:
LMS: (From IMDB) A family determined to get their young daughter into the finals of a beauty pageant take a cross-country trip in their VW bus.
DMD: In NYC, a crime lord's right-hand man is helped by a woman seeking retribution.
Okay, so they've both got one thing in common - there's nothing terribly new or interesting about their concepts. One is a straight up road-trip family drama, the other is a run of the mill revenge story.
So neither had the advantage going into production. Some stories have such HUGE ideas behind them that the concept is what sells the film. Not here. They both had the same disadvantage from the start.
ENSEMBLE vs SOLITARY PROTAGONIST
LMS is clearly an ensemble film. Each character is introduced individually in the opening sequence. We meet the suicidal brother, the son who doesn't talk, the daughter bedazzled by beauty pageants, the heroin snorting grandpa, the irresponsible mother, and the father who believes blindly in his own work.
There is no doubt that LMS is an ensemble film. Each character is equally important as all the other characters. Sure, it could be argued, that perhaps Olive (the daughter) is the 'main' character, as the film is about getting her to the pageant in California, but here's why it's not a SOLITARY PROTAGONIST FILM...
First of all, the POV is constantly shifting between all the characters. We never spend any more time with one character over any other character. All the characters (with the exception of the mute son and the suicidal brother) are active, they're all doing things that drive the story forward. And they all have FLAWS. I'll get into flaws soon...
Now let's look at DMD. In the opening scene it is Colin Farrell's work colleague - Darcy who we first meet by way of his opening monologue. In the opening scene of the film - our hero says NOTHING. He is not active and not moving the story forward. MISTAKE #1.
As the opening sequence ensues, still, Colin is not the one driving the story forward, instead, the protagonist shifts from Darcy to Alphonse.
It's not until after the first opening sequence that we finally settle on Colin's character. What's he doing? He's sitting at home. Literally doing nothing. MISTAKE #2.
The problem with this kind of opening is the audience doesn't know who the main character is. If the film is going to be an ensemble piece, then let us know that EACH of these characters is going to be equally important, as LMS does.
DMD turns into a solitary protagonist film, but it does it too late. After 17 minutes of watching, we finally assume that this story is about Colin. But even then, it's almost just as much about Beatrice (Noomi Rapace's character.)
So the lesson learned from this is - know what kind of story you're telling and be clear to let the audience know right from the start. Is it ENSEMBLE? Or is it SOLITARY PROTAGONIST?
As a side note, there's also another type of film that neither LMS or DMD are, which is called a TWO HANDER - where you have two clearly defined protagonists -- best example is AMERICAN GANGSTER.
The next main thing to consider about these two films is...
EMPATHY
In DMD, there is absolutely no positive empathy for Colin's character in the first 20 minutes. Then we get TOLD by way of clunky exposition that Colin lost his family - and he's infiltrating the gang that killed them.
Now empathy via clunky exposition is better than nothing - BUT imagine if we had actually SEEN Colin with his daughter and wife, loving and caring for them, THEN we see them killed. That way, we would have REAL empathy for Colin.
It's like when you read an article about someone you've never met who has died untimely. Sure, it's sad, but really it doesn't touch you in any real way, as you didn't have any connection to the person.
Now let's look at LMS.
There's not a lot of obvious empathy beats in the opening 20 minutes of the film here either. Hmmm, so why is it that we CARE so much more about these characters?
There's two main reasons --
Firstly, IDENTIFIABILITY.
The characters in LMS and their quirky dysfunctional lives are much closer to the lives of the majority of viewers.
I hate broad generalisations, but I think it's safe to say that one of the few broad generalisations that actually holds water is that most families are dysfunctional on some level or another.
We can identify with the family in LMS.
Now look at DMD. Colin's character is a strongman for a drug boss. How many of us have experience in that slice of life. I'm sure many have, but I would argue that the majority of viewers would find it easier to identify with the characters in LMS than with the characters in DMD.
The second aspect that endears us to the characters in LMS over DMD, is believability and reality check.
The characters in LMS are only 10% surreal. Slightly amped up versions of real people you'd meet in real life.
The characters in DMD were wholly unrealistic. Take the first time that Colin and Noomi meet in the restaurant (which was so obviously shot on green-screen it was horrible).
There was nothing real about that meeting. As well as it was acted, the CHARACTERS didn't feel real. When a scene feels phoney and unrealistic, we're less likely to be drawn into the scene - we're less likely to develop any empathy for the characters.
FLAWS.
As I've discussed before on this blog, the flaw in your character/s is what defines their inner journey. Their flaw is an ill personality trait that holds them back from being in a better place.
Now look at LMS - EVERY CHARACTER HAS A FLAW.
The son hates the world and refuses to speak.
The grandfather is a heroin addict.
The father believes his own garbage.
The brother is suicidal because of unrequited love and being usurped by a work colleague.
The daughter places too much value on beauty.
It took me a while to realise what the mother's flaw was.
It's responsibility, or rather the lack of it. She smokes cigarettes. Which kill you. That's irresponsible. (The smokers out there will be shaking their heads at that, but really you're lying to yourself - smoking kills - fact.) She also serves her family take away food. She doesn't shield her daughter from any of life's ills. She allows her daughter to enter in beauty pageants. All of this is summed up when Pual Dano says to his mother at the end, 'You're her mother, you're supposed to protect her..."
For an ensemble film to work, every character needs to have a flaw, and every character needs to go on a journey. It is this INNER journey that we as an audience relate to.
When we see characters with flaws, we also empathise with them - why? Because we recognise that no one is perfect, including ourselves, and that's what life is all about - identifying and over coming our flaws to become better people.
Now look at DMD.
It can be argued that both Noomi and Colin are flawed characters. What's their flaw? They're both obsessed with exacting revenge. Now the problem with typical revenge films is that REVENGE is not treated or considered a FLAW in these types of films.
It's actually considered an honourable trait.
Think about how that works in real life.
Granted I couldn't bring myself to finish watching DMD - but I'm pretty damn sure that NEITHER of these characters LEARN by the end of the film that REVENGE is a negative flaw in their personality - something that is filling their life with pain and misery.
I guarantee you, that this film is a celebration of REVENGE.
Being obsessed by revenge is not a positive personality trait. It only leads to more sorrow and pain.
So if you take that flaw out of the equation, what flaw is there in either of the two main characters in DMD?
Nada.
Zip.
Nothing.
When you don't have a flaw in your protagonists, you don't have an inner journey. Without an inner journey you don't have a vicarious connection between your audience and the film, nor do you have any guide for the structure of your film.
The second and third acts of your film rely heavily on your character/s having inner flaws. Protagonists without flaws means your film's structure is going to wander.
GOAL
The goal in LMS was set at the 17 minute mark. Get Olive to the beauty pageant in California in two days time.
In DMD - the goal was unclear. I think Colin wanted to kill his boss. But he was also being forced by Noomi to kill the guy who caused her to crash in her car, and caused her face to be 'scarred.'
Lesson to be learnt here is that your story goal needs to be CLEAR.
TICKING CLOCK:
In LMS they have 2 days to get to the pageant.
In DMD there is no clock. No time frame what so ever.
When a story has no time frame, it will start to wander, and drag out.
We also have to believe in that goal.
Now while I personally think beauty pageants for pre-teens are sick - I got behind this one in LMS - as it meant a lot to Olive. Because there was such a good job of making me like and empathise with Olive, I really wanted for her to go to it.
In DMD - in principle I'm vehemently against revenge - especially if it's murder. No one has the right to take another person's life, regardless of scenario. But if you give me the right reasons, perhaps I could get behind it. Now the problem with DMD is that there is no really good reason given.
Firstly, he's going to kill the guy who hurt Noomi to stop her from going to the police as she has dirt on him. That's hardly a good reason to kill someone.
Secondly, he's out to kill his boss, but because I didn't get to know his wife or daughter, I haven't been given the chance to care about them. So the motivation to get behind Colin's goals isn't there.
STRUCTURE:
LMS has a really clearly defined structure. We can see a very well executed ordinary world, where we met all the characters, learn their flaws - then we're hit by the call to adventure - which is the phone call saying that Olive got into the Little Miss Sunshine contest.
We then have a clearly defined first act turn, where we see them on the road to California
The structure of act two plays out well, then segues into act 3. I won't break the whole script down, as that'd actually justify a blog on its own. But suffice to say because all the characters have clearly defined flaws and there is a clearly defined goal with a clearly defined ticking clock, the structure was great.
Now look at DMD.
Firstly, I'm not even sure who the main character is for the first 20 minutes. When it finally settles on Colin's character there's no real flaw or inner journey going on. There are TWO goals, which splits the focus of the story up, and consequently things get confusing. As there's no ticking clock there's no urgency to anything that's happening and the story structure falls apart.
CHARACTERS:
The people in LMS feel real. As I said, slightly elevated versions of real people.
In DMD, the characters feel like stereotypes. There's nothing real about any of the characters at all.
DIALOGUE:
The way the characters speak in LMS is brilliant. It feels REAL.
The way the characters speak in DMD, feels fake, it feels written. And you can't say, well, DMD had lesser actors who couldn't deliver the lines so well.
IN FACT I would argue that the actors in LMS were not as well known as COLIN FARREL and NOOMI RAPACE.
Everyone knows who Colin is, and I would argue that a huge number of people have seen The Girl With The Dragon Tattoo.
So there you have it. The core elements of why the STORY in LMS worked and why the STORY in DMD really needed a hell of a lot more work before it went into production.
Both DMD and LMS are available on Netflix in most countries around the world. I'd highly recommend watching both films and comparing the STORY elements.
There's a lot to be learned about story telling from both films...
Wednesday, 27 April 2016
Thursday, 21 April 2016
LOGLINES - ARTICLE
What is a logline?
It started out back in the day when big studios had countless unproduced screenplays and they needed a quick reference system. Rather than reading a synopsis that can be up to ten pages long, they needed a short form answer to the problem.
Thus - loglines were created for each script - a single sentence summary of the entire story.
Why is it so necessary to have a logline?
As a writer you will be asked countless times, what's your film about?
The worst possible answer is -- "Well, it's about a lady, and she's got some problems, with her family -- but she really wants to --"
You see where I'm going with that. It's boring as hell, and what it really says about you as a writer is that you don't actually know what your story is about.
A logline is less than 50 words. You can memorise less than 50 words really easily. If you have two or three stories you've got ready to pitch to people - then you can easily memorise two or three sentences.
Loglines can be tricky to write.
There's a saying, if you want me to speak for an hour give me the day to prepare, if you want me to speak for five minutes give me the week. (Or something like that.)
The idea is, the fewer words used, the harder it is to make your point.
To distill an entire story into less than 50 words is incredibly difficult.
Fortunately there's a formula to it.
The following are the elements you need to know about your story to formulate a good logline.
FUNCTION, FLAW(S), GOAL, INCITING INCIDENT, ANTAGONIST, STAKES, TICKING CLOCK
Your Hero's FUNCTION is how they fit into society.
Nurse. Doctor. Fire Fighter. Police Officer. Etc.
It's not limited to job titles. it could be vagrant. Or serial killer. Neither vagrant or serial killer are 'jobs', but they do describe a position in society.
Next you need your Hero's FLAW. Your Hero's flaw is the inner demon that is holding back your hero from achieving what it is they need to achieve to live a better life.
So, take the example of Police Officer. Our Police Officer's flaw could be that he's aquaphobic. He has a terrible fear of water.
Now wait up - what does aquaphobia - a fear of water - have to do with a police officer?
This is a major point that needs to be made - the FLAW of your HERO should be RELEVANT to your STORY.
Now, in most scenarios a fear of water is not relevant to a police officer's life or career. So unless your story is set on - say - an island - where there's lots of water - or your police officer is part of the coast guard, auqaphobia isn't relevant.
This is one of the great things about writing a logline. It tests your story concept before you go on to spend months writing it.
There's nothing worse than finishing 100 pages of writing - then distilling your screenplay into a logline and ONLY THEN realising that your Hero's FLAW doesn't really have anything to do with the story.
So....
Once you have your characters FUNCTION and FLAW.
Next you need the film's INCITING INCIDENT.
First - what's an inciting incident?
An inciting incident is something OUT OF THE ORDINARY that TESTS the Hero's FLAW, and propels them on a journey.
Now that - TEST THE HERO'S FLAW - part is really important.
If you have a police officer who is afraid of water, then the inciting incident MUST have something to do with water.
So let's take the example of JAWS.
What's the inciting incident there? It actually happens in the opening scene.
The Girl is eaten by a shark.
That's your inciting incident, as it will test Sheriff Brody's flaws.
That's right - FLAWS - plural.
Sheriff Brody has two flaws.
ONE is that he's afraid of water when he's a police officer on an island.
The second and most important flaw - is that he's IRRESPONSIBLE.
What? I hear you ask? How is Sheriff Brody irresponsible?
He hasn't fixed the kids swing set and one of his children gets hurt playing on them.
He lets his kids play in a boat - when he knows there's a shark out there.
That's just two examples of how Sheriff Brody is irresponsible.
The inciting incident is JAWS is great as it propels Brody on a journey that will test both his flaws. He will have to become responsible for the lives of everyone on the island, and to do that he will have to face his great fear of water to go and kill the shark.
So, we've got our --
Hero's FUNCTION, his FLAW(S), and the INCITING INCIDENT.
Next we need a GOAL.
What is Brody's goal in Jaws?
Protect the people of the island? Yes, that is a goal, but it's an OPEN ENDED goal. It's a general goal. How is he going to protect the people of the island?
Goals that are closed ended work better. In this instance - he must...
KILL THE SHARK.
That's his closed ended goal.
Next we need the SHADOW.
The shadow is the bag guy - the villain, the antagonist.
In JAWS the MAYOR of the town is the bad guy. He's the one that wants to keep the beaches open.
Next is TIMELINE - or TICKING CLOCK.
In this instance, the town Mayor insists on keeping the beaches open for the fourth of July.
Jaws is a funny one - it doesn't have a perfect ticking clock, but there is the notion that if Brody doesn't go out to sea and kill this shark immediately, there WILL be another death. So in that sense, there is a ticking clock.
Because the beaches are kept open by the mayor - it's only a matter of time before someone else gets eaten by the shark.
The final element is STAKES:
In this instance, there is the stakes of SOMEONE'S life. That's pretty big stakes. There's also the financial stakes of the entire town. If the shark is not killed - the town will not earn enough money during the summer months to carry them over for the winter months.
So.....
Let's look at all our elements for the logline:
FUNCTION: Island Sheriff
FLAW(S): Fear of water. Irresponsible.
GOAL: Kill the shark
INCITING INCIDENT: Young woman eaten by shark.
ANTAGONIST: Island Mayor
STAKES: More shark victims. Town bankruptcy.
TICKING CLOCK: Before the next victim is killed. (While important to the story, it's not essential for this logline.)
These are the elements you need to make your logline sing.
Here's a logline using ALL the elements.
When a young woman is eaten by a shark, an irresponsible island sheriff terrified of water must go to sea to hunt and kill the shark before the next victim is killed when the island mayor insists on keeping the beaches open for the tourist trade to save the town from bankruptcy.
But there's no hard and fast rule.
Remember, what you're trying to do with your logline is to create an interesting hook to sell the idea of your story.
Here's a leaner version of the same logline.
When a young woman is eaten by a shark, an irresponsible island sheriff terrified of water must go to sea and kill the shark to prevent more deaths, when the island mayor insists on keeping the beaches open for the tourist trade.
That reads much cleaner.
I'd call this your BASE LOGLINE.
Once you have your base logline - you can then embellish a little -- add some adjectives to spice it up, rearrange the structure a little to see what works best.
After a harrowing shark attack leaves a young woman torn to pieces, an irresponsible island Sheriff must overcome his phobia of water and take to the sea to hunt the man eating monster before it strikes again, which is sure to happen as the imbecilic town mayor insists on keeping the beaches open for the tourist trade.
Best of luck with your logline writing...
It started out back in the day when big studios had countless unproduced screenplays and they needed a quick reference system. Rather than reading a synopsis that can be up to ten pages long, they needed a short form answer to the problem.
Thus - loglines were created for each script - a single sentence summary of the entire story.
Why is it so necessary to have a logline?
As a writer you will be asked countless times, what's your film about?
The worst possible answer is -- "Well, it's about a lady, and she's got some problems, with her family -- but she really wants to --"
You see where I'm going with that. It's boring as hell, and what it really says about you as a writer is that you don't actually know what your story is about.
A logline is less than 50 words. You can memorise less than 50 words really easily. If you have two or three stories you've got ready to pitch to people - then you can easily memorise two or three sentences.
Loglines can be tricky to write.
There's a saying, if you want me to speak for an hour give me the day to prepare, if you want me to speak for five minutes give me the week. (Or something like that.)
The idea is, the fewer words used, the harder it is to make your point.
To distill an entire story into less than 50 words is incredibly difficult.
Fortunately there's a formula to it.
The following are the elements you need to know about your story to formulate a good logline.
FUNCTION, FLAW(S), GOAL, INCITING INCIDENT, ANTAGONIST, STAKES, TICKING CLOCK
Your Hero's FUNCTION is how they fit into society.
Nurse. Doctor. Fire Fighter. Police Officer. Etc.
It's not limited to job titles. it could be vagrant. Or serial killer. Neither vagrant or serial killer are 'jobs', but they do describe a position in society.
Next you need your Hero's FLAW. Your Hero's flaw is the inner demon that is holding back your hero from achieving what it is they need to achieve to live a better life.
So, take the example of Police Officer. Our Police Officer's flaw could be that he's aquaphobic. He has a terrible fear of water.
Now wait up - what does aquaphobia - a fear of water - have to do with a police officer?
This is a major point that needs to be made - the FLAW of your HERO should be RELEVANT to your STORY.
Now, in most scenarios a fear of water is not relevant to a police officer's life or career. So unless your story is set on - say - an island - where there's lots of water - or your police officer is part of the coast guard, auqaphobia isn't relevant.
This is one of the great things about writing a logline. It tests your story concept before you go on to spend months writing it.
There's nothing worse than finishing 100 pages of writing - then distilling your screenplay into a logline and ONLY THEN realising that your Hero's FLAW doesn't really have anything to do with the story.
So....
Once you have your characters FUNCTION and FLAW.
Next you need the film's INCITING INCIDENT.
First - what's an inciting incident?
An inciting incident is something OUT OF THE ORDINARY that TESTS the Hero's FLAW, and propels them on a journey.
Now that - TEST THE HERO'S FLAW - part is really important.
If you have a police officer who is afraid of water, then the inciting incident MUST have something to do with water.
So let's take the example of JAWS.
What's the inciting incident there? It actually happens in the opening scene.
The Girl is eaten by a shark.
That's your inciting incident, as it will test Sheriff Brody's flaws.
That's right - FLAWS - plural.
Sheriff Brody has two flaws.
ONE is that he's afraid of water when he's a police officer on an island.
The second and most important flaw - is that he's IRRESPONSIBLE.
What? I hear you ask? How is Sheriff Brody irresponsible?
He hasn't fixed the kids swing set and one of his children gets hurt playing on them.
He lets his kids play in a boat - when he knows there's a shark out there.
That's just two examples of how Sheriff Brody is irresponsible.
The inciting incident is JAWS is great as it propels Brody on a journey that will test both his flaws. He will have to become responsible for the lives of everyone on the island, and to do that he will have to face his great fear of water to go and kill the shark.
So, we've got our --
Hero's FUNCTION, his FLAW(S), and the INCITING INCIDENT.
Next we need a GOAL.
What is Brody's goal in Jaws?
Protect the people of the island? Yes, that is a goal, but it's an OPEN ENDED goal. It's a general goal. How is he going to protect the people of the island?
Goals that are closed ended work better. In this instance - he must...
KILL THE SHARK.
That's his closed ended goal.
Next we need the SHADOW.
The shadow is the bag guy - the villain, the antagonist.
In JAWS the MAYOR of the town is the bad guy. He's the one that wants to keep the beaches open.
Next is TIMELINE - or TICKING CLOCK.
In this instance, the town Mayor insists on keeping the beaches open for the fourth of July.
Jaws is a funny one - it doesn't have a perfect ticking clock, but there is the notion that if Brody doesn't go out to sea and kill this shark immediately, there WILL be another death. So in that sense, there is a ticking clock.
Because the beaches are kept open by the mayor - it's only a matter of time before someone else gets eaten by the shark.
The final element is STAKES:
In this instance, there is the stakes of SOMEONE'S life. That's pretty big stakes. There's also the financial stakes of the entire town. If the shark is not killed - the town will not earn enough money during the summer months to carry them over for the winter months.
So.....
Let's look at all our elements for the logline:
FUNCTION: Island Sheriff
FLAW(S): Fear of water. Irresponsible.
GOAL: Kill the shark
INCITING INCIDENT: Young woman eaten by shark.
ANTAGONIST: Island Mayor
STAKES: More shark victims. Town bankruptcy.
TICKING CLOCK: Before the next victim is killed. (While important to the story, it's not essential for this logline.)
These are the elements you need to make your logline sing.
Here's a logline using ALL the elements.
When a young woman is eaten by a shark, an irresponsible island sheriff terrified of water must go to sea to hunt and kill the shark before the next victim is killed when the island mayor insists on keeping the beaches open for the tourist trade to save the town from bankruptcy.
But there's no hard and fast rule.
Remember, what you're trying to do with your logline is to create an interesting hook to sell the idea of your story.
Here's a leaner version of the same logline.
When a young woman is eaten by a shark, an irresponsible island sheriff terrified of water must go to sea and kill the shark to prevent more deaths, when the island mayor insists on keeping the beaches open for the tourist trade.
That reads much cleaner.
I'd call this your BASE LOGLINE.
Once you have your base logline - you can then embellish a little -- add some adjectives to spice it up, rearrange the structure a little to see what works best.
After a harrowing shark attack leaves a young woman torn to pieces, an irresponsible island Sheriff must overcome his phobia of water and take to the sea to hunt the man eating monster before it strikes again, which is sure to happen as the imbecilic town mayor insists on keeping the beaches open for the tourist trade.
Best of luck with your logline writing...
Tuesday, 19 April 2016
IT HAS US - HORROR
LOGLINE: When they move into a new neighborhood, a grieving family who recently lost a daughter are subjected to an experiment that plays off of their fears and paranoia.
WRITERS: Michael Ryan Assip & Peter Lancucki
SCRIPT BIO: Spec script went out in Jan repped by Truth Magician Co. | Mary Cybriwsky
STORY:
We start on the day that CASSIE (7) drowns in the swimming pool of the Pope residence. MELINDA (30s) is at home when it happens, but a faulty pool alarm fails to alert her when her daughter has gotten into the pool and drowned.
Addie is also 7 years old and is Cassie's identical twin sister.
We cut to a year later.
The Pope family consists of Addie (7), Melinda (Mom), Duncan (30s - Dad) and Hunter (15 Addie's sister).
We join them as they drive toward their new home. They're relocating for a chance to start fresh after dealing with Cassie's death.
They arrive at their new home in a small estate in a small town called Colchester in Pennsylvania.
On the drive there we get to meet the family. Everyone has their own weird quirk, but there's nothing out of the ordinary with them - they seem like a regular dysfunctional family.
When they get to their estate, they notice that the majority of the other houses are boarded up, they don't have many neighbours.
Not long after they move into the new house, weird things start happening. They experience chills in the house, and Melinda discovers warnings around the house telling them to get out.
We soon learn that Melinda suffers from anxiety and is supposed to take medication to keep her condition under control.
While Duncan goes off to work at his job every day Melinda is left at home to look after the home affairs. One day a spirit hand reaches up out of an iPad and injected a veritable syringe into Addie's eye. After this strange experience, Addie's nature and demeanour drastically change.
In fact, she is no longer herself, she is now behaving more like Cassie - her twin sister - used to.
Things get weirder and weirded at the home, moving progressively into an insanity of sorts. Every delusional experience that Melinda has is explained away by Duncan as a result of her not taking her medication.
There's something nefarious taking over the family, the question becomes, will the Pope family survive?
INITIAL REACTION:
This was an interesting script. At first, when I finished reading it I thought I really enjoyed it. But then I started to reflect on the bullet holes in the script and have since decided there is a lot of work that needs to be done on this one...
My first complaint is the lack of POV. It is very important when writing a FEATURE FILM to make sure the audience knows who the MAIN CHARACTER IS.
There are three aspects of a MAIN CHARACTER --
POV - the character whose eyes we see the film through.
ARC - the character who experiences change.
PROTAGONIST - the character who takes action and drives the story forward.
In most films that are successful, ALL of these three traits will be embodied in ONE character.
Films where these three KEY personality traits are separated into different characters don't do so well.
Now, in this script - it took until about page 20 to figure out that this was Melinda's story.
Most of the action is centred around her.
But here's the problem - for the first 20 or so pages the POV (point of view) shifts around between Melinda, Hunter, Duncan and Addie.
When you don't have a clearly defined POV character then the vicarious connection between the audience and the film is broken.
The POV character is essentially WHO the audience becomes. So when that POV character gets hurt, the audience FEELS the character's pain.
Remember, film is all about eliciting emotion in the viewer.
When your POV is shifting between characters then we don't focus in on one character and our connection to the film is not as strong.
There's also another major problem with this film -- PASSIVE vs ACTIVE HERO.
Melinda is passive throughout the film. Not always, but the majority of the time.
Someone might argue that lots of things are happening to Melinda so she's not passive. The problem is that the things she's doing are all REACTIONS to other things happening to her. That makes her passive.
In stories that really resonate with audiences there is ONE MAJOR occurrence that sends the HERO on their journey. There is one event that sends the HERO off to TAKE ACTION.
A hero can only take action when there is a goal.
This is another area of this script that didn't really work.
There was no clearly defined goal.
The Pope family was being 'haunted' for choice of a better word.
There isn't any one particular thing that Melinda is fighting to achieve. You could say she's trying to figure out what's happening, then trying to leave the home, but the second part of that doesn't happen until the third act of the film.
For two acts there isn't any time dependant goal.
When a story lacks GOAL and URGENCY, it's going to flounder.
CONCEPT:
"When they move into a new neighborhood, a grieving family who recently lost a daughter are subjected to an experiment that plays off of their fears and paranoia."
Let's break that down --
Family is subjected to an experiment that plays on their fears.
Hmmm.
The main problem with this concept is that it's very broad and open ended. You can't see any kind of goal.
There's also no irony. You don't HAVE to have irony in your script - but it certainly helps in a LOGLINE.
In this logline there is no clearly defined hero either. It's 'The Family.' So that's another error. Straight off the bat this logline says that the writers aren't aware that 95% of ensemble films DO NOT MAKE MONEY.
I'm sure there's someone out there reading this that's thinking, 'What about Crash?, that was ensemble and was an awesome film?'
That's the exception to the rule, that's not the rule.
Crash is the ONE ensemble film that made money. List 10 ensemble films and go and google their box office take. 9 out of 10 will not have made three times their budget at the box office - which is what's required to break even.
CONCEPT RATING: 5/10
CONCEPT TIP: Keep your story concept focused. When you have a BROAD concept without goals and tangible elements your idea won't resonate as well.
FORM:
Form was great here.
The writers have a beautiful writing style. There is no bold. They rarely use italics, and descriptions are kept pertinent.
It's well worth the read just to look at their layout of words on the page.
FORM RATING: 8/10
FORM TIP: Keep descriptions lean and only describe what we can SEE on the screen. Never write what a character is THINKING.
STRUCTURE:
This is a HUGE bullet hole in this script.
Without a clearly defined HERO - it's hard to know which character's flaw will guide the structure of the script.
Remember, story structure is closely related to the hero's inner journey, and their inner journey stems from their flaw.
This was Melinda's story, but unfortunately she didn't really have a flaw.
Her husband Duncan was constantly asking her if she was 'taking her meds' -- but she always said she was.
Now I'm sure the writers would argue that Melinda's flaw is that she suffers from paranoia.
That's okay - so long as there is something that Melinda is DOING or NOT DOING that causes her paranoia.
It's the ACT of DOING or NOT DOING that is the flaw.
A FLAW is almost always a DECISION.
No one DECIDES if they have a medical condition. You don't just wake up one morning and say, hey, I think I'm gonna be paranoid today.
It's the DECISION to NOT take your meds that leads to the paranoia becoming unmanageable.
Anyhoooooo
My point is, that Melinda doesn't really have a clearly defined flaw. And just saying that she's paranoid is not a good execution or understanding of what a flaw really is.
Duncan actually has more of a flaw that Melinda does. He won't mention Cassie's name. He won't think about her. He refuses to discuss anything about her.
This is a great flaw. Why? Because he is making a DECISION not to confront his inner demons.
Unfortunately Duncan's flaw isn't what's driving the structure of the film.
For this reason structure is waaaaay off.
STRUCTRUE RATING: 5/10
STRUCTURE TIP: Be sure to understand what a FLAW is and how to use the flaw of your hero to guide the structure of your screenplay. For a really simple version of structure read Save The Cat.
CHARACTERS & DIALOGUE:
The writers executed fairly decent characters and mostly enjoyable dialogue. One thing that really popped for me was that the characters were constantly turning a scene on its head with quirky dialogue.
Just when you think you know what a character will say in response to a question - that character suddenly says the opposite. I was constantly surprised by the characters and dialogue.
On the negative front as I just discussed, Melinda needs a decent flaw. And while Duncan has a great flaw, nothing is done with it. He just has a flaw.
CHARACTERS & DIALOGUE RATING: 7/10
CHARACTERS & DIALOGUE TIP: Give each character a flaw, then make each character have their own journey. If you do this, your script will sing!
VOICE:
Voice was okay here. I was often confused with what was happening. Clarity of the story comes from the writer's voice.
Some writers are really good at making sure you know where you are and what's happening at all times. Others write with less focus.
This script was one of the lesser focused pieces.
VOICE RATING: 6/10
VOICE TIP: Clarity. Clarity. Clarity. You, as the writer become SOOOOO involved and entrenched with your story you forget that it's your job to convey the story in the cleanest clearest way possible.
Here's a rule of thumb.
An 11 year old should be able to read your script and COMPLETELY understand it.
PRODUCTION:
Now this is an interesting one.
When I finished reading this I asked myself, would I put money into this?
My first reaction was, yeah, sure, I can see this making money.
BUT THEN...
I analysed the script. And after writing this analysis, I've come to realise just how many major problems there are with the script.
I now no longer would invest money. That's not to say this script isn't salvageable, but even when you look at the core idea -- it's still not a Holy Shit! idea.
This shift of opinion stems from something that I've noticed since I've been reading tons of scripts.
It's easy for a screenplay to be a GOOD READ, but when that same story is put to film, all the bullet holes and mistakes I've talked about are ACCENTUATED.
This script is good that it's contained - almost entirely set at the house - that's a huge asset for the script. And that the cast count is low. Less than 8.
There is some special effects, but nothing too much.
I could see a decent producer bringing this in under $5 million. Anything over that would be a risky investment.
OVERALL RATING: 6/10
Weak concept executed in a so-so fashion.
WRITERS: Michael Ryan Assip & Peter Lancucki
SCRIPT BIO: Spec script went out in Jan repped by Truth Magician Co. | Mary Cybriwsky
STORY:
We start on the day that CASSIE (7) drowns in the swimming pool of the Pope residence. MELINDA (30s) is at home when it happens, but a faulty pool alarm fails to alert her when her daughter has gotten into the pool and drowned.
Addie is also 7 years old and is Cassie's identical twin sister.
We cut to a year later.
The Pope family consists of Addie (7), Melinda (Mom), Duncan (30s - Dad) and Hunter (15 Addie's sister).
We join them as they drive toward their new home. They're relocating for a chance to start fresh after dealing with Cassie's death.
They arrive at their new home in a small estate in a small town called Colchester in Pennsylvania.
On the drive there we get to meet the family. Everyone has their own weird quirk, but there's nothing out of the ordinary with them - they seem like a regular dysfunctional family.
When they get to their estate, they notice that the majority of the other houses are boarded up, they don't have many neighbours.
Not long after they move into the new house, weird things start happening. They experience chills in the house, and Melinda discovers warnings around the house telling them to get out.
We soon learn that Melinda suffers from anxiety and is supposed to take medication to keep her condition under control.
While Duncan goes off to work at his job every day Melinda is left at home to look after the home affairs. One day a spirit hand reaches up out of an iPad and injected a veritable syringe into Addie's eye. After this strange experience, Addie's nature and demeanour drastically change.
In fact, she is no longer herself, she is now behaving more like Cassie - her twin sister - used to.
Things get weirder and weirded at the home, moving progressively into an insanity of sorts. Every delusional experience that Melinda has is explained away by Duncan as a result of her not taking her medication.
There's something nefarious taking over the family, the question becomes, will the Pope family survive?
INITIAL REACTION:
This was an interesting script. At first, when I finished reading it I thought I really enjoyed it. But then I started to reflect on the bullet holes in the script and have since decided there is a lot of work that needs to be done on this one...
My first complaint is the lack of POV. It is very important when writing a FEATURE FILM to make sure the audience knows who the MAIN CHARACTER IS.
There are three aspects of a MAIN CHARACTER --
POV - the character whose eyes we see the film through.
ARC - the character who experiences change.
PROTAGONIST - the character who takes action and drives the story forward.
In most films that are successful, ALL of these three traits will be embodied in ONE character.
Films where these three KEY personality traits are separated into different characters don't do so well.
Now, in this script - it took until about page 20 to figure out that this was Melinda's story.
Most of the action is centred around her.
But here's the problem - for the first 20 or so pages the POV (point of view) shifts around between Melinda, Hunter, Duncan and Addie.
When you don't have a clearly defined POV character then the vicarious connection between the audience and the film is broken.
The POV character is essentially WHO the audience becomes. So when that POV character gets hurt, the audience FEELS the character's pain.
Remember, film is all about eliciting emotion in the viewer.
When your POV is shifting between characters then we don't focus in on one character and our connection to the film is not as strong.
There's also another major problem with this film -- PASSIVE vs ACTIVE HERO.
Melinda is passive throughout the film. Not always, but the majority of the time.
Someone might argue that lots of things are happening to Melinda so she's not passive. The problem is that the things she's doing are all REACTIONS to other things happening to her. That makes her passive.
In stories that really resonate with audiences there is ONE MAJOR occurrence that sends the HERO on their journey. There is one event that sends the HERO off to TAKE ACTION.
A hero can only take action when there is a goal.
This is another area of this script that didn't really work.
There was no clearly defined goal.
The Pope family was being 'haunted' for choice of a better word.
There isn't any one particular thing that Melinda is fighting to achieve. You could say she's trying to figure out what's happening, then trying to leave the home, but the second part of that doesn't happen until the third act of the film.
For two acts there isn't any time dependant goal.
When a story lacks GOAL and URGENCY, it's going to flounder.
CONCEPT:
"When they move into a new neighborhood, a grieving family who recently lost a daughter are subjected to an experiment that plays off of their fears and paranoia."
Let's break that down --
Family is subjected to an experiment that plays on their fears.
Hmmm.
The main problem with this concept is that it's very broad and open ended. You can't see any kind of goal.
There's also no irony. You don't HAVE to have irony in your script - but it certainly helps in a LOGLINE.
In this logline there is no clearly defined hero either. It's 'The Family.' So that's another error. Straight off the bat this logline says that the writers aren't aware that 95% of ensemble films DO NOT MAKE MONEY.
I'm sure there's someone out there reading this that's thinking, 'What about Crash?, that was ensemble and was an awesome film?'
That's the exception to the rule, that's not the rule.
Crash is the ONE ensemble film that made money. List 10 ensemble films and go and google their box office take. 9 out of 10 will not have made three times their budget at the box office - which is what's required to break even.
CONCEPT RATING: 5/10
CONCEPT TIP: Keep your story concept focused. When you have a BROAD concept without goals and tangible elements your idea won't resonate as well.
FORM:
Form was great here.
The writers have a beautiful writing style. There is no bold. They rarely use italics, and descriptions are kept pertinent.
It's well worth the read just to look at their layout of words on the page.
FORM RATING: 8/10
FORM TIP: Keep descriptions lean and only describe what we can SEE on the screen. Never write what a character is THINKING.
STRUCTURE:
This is a HUGE bullet hole in this script.
Without a clearly defined HERO - it's hard to know which character's flaw will guide the structure of the script.
Remember, story structure is closely related to the hero's inner journey, and their inner journey stems from their flaw.
This was Melinda's story, but unfortunately she didn't really have a flaw.
Her husband Duncan was constantly asking her if she was 'taking her meds' -- but she always said she was.
Now I'm sure the writers would argue that Melinda's flaw is that she suffers from paranoia.
That's okay - so long as there is something that Melinda is DOING or NOT DOING that causes her paranoia.
It's the ACT of DOING or NOT DOING that is the flaw.
A FLAW is almost always a DECISION.
No one DECIDES if they have a medical condition. You don't just wake up one morning and say, hey, I think I'm gonna be paranoid today.
It's the DECISION to NOT take your meds that leads to the paranoia becoming unmanageable.
Anyhoooooo
My point is, that Melinda doesn't really have a clearly defined flaw. And just saying that she's paranoid is not a good execution or understanding of what a flaw really is.
Duncan actually has more of a flaw that Melinda does. He won't mention Cassie's name. He won't think about her. He refuses to discuss anything about her.
This is a great flaw. Why? Because he is making a DECISION not to confront his inner demons.
Unfortunately Duncan's flaw isn't what's driving the structure of the film.
For this reason structure is waaaaay off.
STRUCTRUE RATING: 5/10
STRUCTURE TIP: Be sure to understand what a FLAW is and how to use the flaw of your hero to guide the structure of your screenplay. For a really simple version of structure read Save The Cat.
CHARACTERS & DIALOGUE:
The writers executed fairly decent characters and mostly enjoyable dialogue. One thing that really popped for me was that the characters were constantly turning a scene on its head with quirky dialogue.
Just when you think you know what a character will say in response to a question - that character suddenly says the opposite. I was constantly surprised by the characters and dialogue.
On the negative front as I just discussed, Melinda needs a decent flaw. And while Duncan has a great flaw, nothing is done with it. He just has a flaw.
CHARACTERS & DIALOGUE RATING: 7/10
CHARACTERS & DIALOGUE TIP: Give each character a flaw, then make each character have their own journey. If you do this, your script will sing!
VOICE:
Voice was okay here. I was often confused with what was happening. Clarity of the story comes from the writer's voice.
Some writers are really good at making sure you know where you are and what's happening at all times. Others write with less focus.
This script was one of the lesser focused pieces.
VOICE RATING: 6/10
VOICE TIP: Clarity. Clarity. Clarity. You, as the writer become SOOOOO involved and entrenched with your story you forget that it's your job to convey the story in the cleanest clearest way possible.
Here's a rule of thumb.
An 11 year old should be able to read your script and COMPLETELY understand it.
PRODUCTION:
Now this is an interesting one.
When I finished reading this I asked myself, would I put money into this?
My first reaction was, yeah, sure, I can see this making money.
BUT THEN...
I analysed the script. And after writing this analysis, I've come to realise just how many major problems there are with the script.
I now no longer would invest money. That's not to say this script isn't salvageable, but even when you look at the core idea -- it's still not a Holy Shit! idea.
This shift of opinion stems from something that I've noticed since I've been reading tons of scripts.
It's easy for a screenplay to be a GOOD READ, but when that same story is put to film, all the bullet holes and mistakes I've talked about are ACCENTUATED.
This script is good that it's contained - almost entirely set at the house - that's a huge asset for the script. And that the cast count is low. Less than 8.
There is some special effects, but nothing too much.
I could see a decent producer bringing this in under $5 million. Anything over that would be a risky investment.
OVERALL RATING: 6/10
Weak concept executed in a so-so fashion.
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