2018 BLACKLIST - SPARK

This script finished at the bottom of the 2018 blacklist. 

Sometimes you read a script that does everything right and it becomes an inspiration. You re-read the script looking at how they executed the various aspects of the screenplay so well. You learn from this - you learn from someone who knows what they're doing.

Sometimes you read a script and it does everything wrong. Even though it does everything wrong I find these scripts inspirational - because just like the script that does everything right, these scripts show us what NOT to do. 

Today's offering, Spark, does many things wrong. 

Let's look at them and see what we can learn. 

First the story. 

Naomi is our hero, we meet her as she's graduating from Stanford. She is African-American and Naomi's family are the "lone black faces in a sea of mostly white."

We then find Naomi at a well to do family home, celebrating her graduation. 

She is met by an array of well wishers who she is reluctant to talk with. 

We next find Naomi living with her new flatmate - Diane. 

They go out for a drink, Naomi meets a hot bearded guy called Ben, takes him home and they have a one night stand.

Naomi has been recruited for a tech firm and she starts her new job. At the new job it is competitive, but Naomi is strong and capable. 

Soon, there's a new employee at the company. You guessed it! It's Ben.

Awkward!

Ben and Naomi discuss it and decide to keep their relationship professional. 

But it doesn't take long until they start sleeping together. 

Getting bored yet?

I am. 

Ben and Naomi are put on a client case together. They have to wine and dine an elderly executive to keep the client happy. 

Naomi and Ben's affair continues until Naomi finds out that Ben has a girlfriend. 

Are you still bored?

I am. 

As revenge, Naomi tries to sabotage Ben's relationship by putting a small lipstick stain on his shirt. 

This almost ends Ben's relationship and he gets justifiably annoyed with her. 

Ben then invites Naomi to a client dinner, but he purposefully gives her the wrong time and she turns up late, making her look stupid. 

You'd think that was 1-1 - but no, Naomi reports their arguing to her boss saying that Ben has been inappropriate with her in the office environment. 

The script then skews into Naomi being treated like a pariah, and socially cast out from the company. She's put on 'administrative leave'.

Naomi feels that she has been treated this way because of her race and gender and sets out to destroy the company and Ben. 

There's so much wrong with this script that it's great! There's so much to learn from it. 

Firstly, did you notice that there was nothing high concept about it? It is a plain- straight forward drama. 

There's very few producers out there who want to make a straight forward drama in the feature film format. Dramas work much better in the TV series format.

If you want to stand a better shot of getting your feature film script made, it's better to give it a unique angle, something that makes it stand out from the rest. Something that makes it high concept. 

Next, there is no goal. Not until the very end of the script when Naomi decides that she wants to crush Ben and the company. But that goal isn't established until around page 90.

If you want your script to keep your audience engaged you need to have established a goal by page 25. Page 30 at the very latest. 

The dialogue was plain and very average. With the exception of Diane, every other character sounded the same. 

To make your characters sound like they're real people you need variance in the way they speak. Think of the people in your real life and how they speak. Does everyone speak in the same manner? No, of course not. So to give your script life, vary the way your characters speak. 

START LATE FINISH EARLY

It's simple - start the scene as close to the main beat then finish the scene a soon as you've executed that beat.

In this script characters were constantly saying Hi, how are you? Characters were constantly entering new locations, walking places, taking Ubers places, driving.

You're not moving your story forward if your characters are travelling places. 

Cut out the fat, cut straight to your characters in the middle of a conversation - preferably a conversation that involves - CONFLICT.

This brings us to the next short-coming of this script. 

CONFLICT - or rather the severe lack of it. There's basically no conflict in this script until Naomi finds out that Ben has a girlfriend. 

That happens around page 50. 

Until then there is no conflict. No conflict means your audience is bored, bored, bored. 

Like I was reading this script. 

EMPATHY is another huge lacking of this script.

There are two types of positive empathy. Active - that's where the hero DOES things for other people that we like them for. Then there's passive, this is when bad stuff happens to your hero and we feel sorry for them.

While this script had ample doses of passive empathy for Naomi, I can't think of a single beat where Naomi went out of her way to help someone other than herself. 

When you don't have positive empathy beats for your hero, then you're not connecting with your audience. 

Predictable - this script threw me no curve balls. After about 10 pages I was predicting where the script was going for there rest of the entire screenplay. 

If there's one sure thing that's death to a movie it's predictability. When your audience guesses what's coming next and they're right, then they check out. They grow bored very quickly. 

Never have a character tell another character what the audience already knows. This script was guilty of this little screenwriting crime on a couple of occasions. 

If we've just had a big reveal in one scene, what ever you do, don't cut to the next scene where character A tells character B all about what just happened in the previous scene. It's really boring for the audience to wait for a character to catch up with what they already know. 

There was also no urgency. Not every script needs a ticking clock, but they sure help to keep your audience engaged. 

Now, this script had no goal and no urgency, so you've effectively got a character who doesn't have to get anything done in no particular rush. 

This is not a winning formula for writing successful movies. 

In summary - I'd give this script a 3/10. It's a great first effort, but it would make a very dull, predictable film that wouldn't make any money. 

There is a lot to learn from this script, however. That's why I love reading unproduced screenplays - there's always something they can teach us.