Monday, August 24, 2009

GMOs From Indiana (Screenplay)

Bio: Jay Wertzler lives, works, and writes in San Francisco, CA.

Logline: When Jamal's father, Gregory, produces genetically modified crops for his town, something mysterious happens to those who consume them. (HORROR)


Comments --

Jay,

I’m going to ignore formatting/grammar and talk about big picture stuff –

Page 1 – description can be shortened. Aim for paragraphs of 3-4 sentences. Sometimes you’ve pulled 6 or 7. Like a bad party, arrive late leave early.

First pages -- aside from generously long description, you start off with a bang. You’ve set up a menace, your inciting incident happens quickly, by page 3. This is solid screenwriting -- capturing the interest of the audience.

Jamal. The name makes me think of Slumdog Millionaire. Intentional or not, I would consider changing it to be safe. Optional consideration: If you rename him Jeremy you can still play up the nice play of characters mistaking Jamal to Jerome.

Love interest set up early. Good. You made Lana (Smallville fan?) 19, Jamal 17, age should be a factor, but it isn’t. Perhaps work in conflict of her being older than him.

Page 4 - You cut to a science film. You don’t do this again until thirty minutes later, or 1/3 of your film. Would audiences forget? Should you write it in again on page 15 to remind audiences?

Page 6 – Set up of Gregory and Jamal’s relationship dynamic. From a few beats, I understand the character relation of both these characters. Intentionally or not, you reveal through subtext and in few words as possible Gregory’s disappointment with Jamal’s career choices. Silences and “uh huh,” speak more than additional lines could. Aspiring screenwriters take note, Jay utilizes subtext in the Gregory Study scene well.

On page 6 you write about frozen corn cobs. This is solid character exposition. Insofar, as you do a good job of setting up the Mendelson family and working in plot information. It’s small beats like this that screenwriters should consider, because they help visual the characters we’re going to follow for the next ninety minutes while working in story.

It takes you 7 ½ pages to establish –

  1. Scientist death (inciting incident).
  2. Jamal’s work, asshole boss, love interest.
  3. Family dynamic (Gregory/Jamal), where Jamal lives, corn (GMO).
  4. Set up for the creature/alien.

I’d argue you can do this in four/five. A problem with your spec is the beginning starts slow. Once we leave the movie set and move into the home environment, I’m bored. I’d trim elements from the home and move onwards with setting up the opossum element. The first ten pages of a spec script have to grapple the reader and glaze his interest. What’s a fast way to lose interest? Description. And generally, unless it’s cars blowing up or a fire fight, the bets are stacked against you.

For example, let’s take a look at your first page. 95% description. You tend to write elegant prose, “chalk slams against the cold surface with a harsh finality,” not terse description. You’re writing a screenplay, not a novel. Your first six lines of descriptions could be shortened to one –

Test tubes. Micropipettes. A hand scribbles equations on a board.

I’d argue you get across the same idea of your six lines with the revision of one line.

Moving to page 5. Description is overloaded.

You could start with this –

A farm. 1920s. Down to the cinderblocks.

A biplane sits on the dirt runway.

Jamal parks his truck, exits, turns towards some cows

JAMAL
Hey ladies.

I’d work on creating as much white on the page as you can. I’m usually critical of description, so I’d like to take a moment to point out description that is necessary and that works. Page 11, “the soil is darker, fresher,” this is important set up for the shit about to go down. Good.

Screenwriters could learn from your choice of action verbs. Saunters/moseys/trudges/snakes/etc.

Page 15- I’m being picky here, but here’s the correct way to format a phone conversation –

INTERCUT GREGORY/JAMAL --

GREGORY (V.O.)
(on phone)
Greg here.

JAMAL
(on phone)
Dad, I’m coming home early. We sold out.

GREGORY (V.O.)
(on phone)
That’s great news! How much cash?

Etc. After the intercut, it’s important to set up location or the whereabouts of Gregory. Here’s an opportunity to make whatever Gregory doing visually interesting. We’re writing for the screen, so if we have Gregory sweeping the porch/doing the dishes/smoking pot, etc. for the audience to visualize while he’s on the phone. Just nab in description after one of their lines. (V.O.)’s indicate which side we’re looking at while the parenthetical remind the reader what’s happening in case they skim description or just forget.

OR (handling phone dialogue)

Establish both locations:

INT. MARKET – DAY

Jamal opens his phone. Dials.

INT. FARM- DAY

Gregory washes the dishes. Answers the phone.

BEGIN INTERCUT

JAMAL
Dad?

GREGORY
Yes?

We don’t want any reason for a script reader to reject our submission. Improper formatting may be one. Let’s avoid it.

Moving on.

Page 18-23. You do a good job with foreshadow. Love the “goddamn method actor” line.

Lana and Jamal go from innocent flirting (she doesn’t even know his name on page 10) to making out pretty quick (page 24). I’d recommend building this connection more. For example, you spend a lot of time at the farmer’s market and Jamal planting seeds. I’d trim down some of these scenes and have a solid one or two page scene of Lana and Jamal connecting. You start with them running away from a crazed farmer shooting at them. Why not talk about that later? Have Jamal approach Lana with “you been shot at lately?” Then they giggle and laugh and build all the subtext for your big kiss on page 25.

The scene with Jamal and Lana flying is cute. I love it. Everything after they “hook up” I buy (the flicking of dirt, tomatoes); I just don’t buy them building towards a “hook up.”

Conflict. Conflict. Conflict. Where is it? Page 30 and I’m not sensing urgency or strife.

I’ve noticed you write “[insert character’s] eyes widen.” This is interesting because I run into this problem all the time. How do you describe to the reader that our characters are interested/shocked/surprised? We can’t write emotion as screenwriters we have to use visual cues to represent emotion. I’m going to list out a list of important descriptions I find useful –

  1. Takes a deep breath and…
  2. Brow furrows…
  3. Eyebrows knit...
  4. Grinds his/her teeth…
  5. Jaw drops…

Lana loses her ear. In District 9 (spoilers!), they utilize a similar technique in Wikus’ transformation from human to prawn (alien). He begins to lose fingernails, an arm, etc. I bring this up because you have a similar thread here. Lana loses her ear, her fingers, etc. This is good, stomach lurching story-telling. In District 9, the audience squirmed when Wikus began to change. I think you’ll enact a similar response.

Shopping carts doubling as weapons. Always awesome. Nice job setting up a chase sequence in the grocery store. Unfortunately, it doesn’t seem like you get the Hollywood-sized punch you could have out of the chase sequence. This is the one of the more exiting sequences viewers will be treated to 45 minutes in. I’d work on extending the chase from grocery store to car. Maybe have a crop-eater attack them, and Jamal has to defend their lives. As writers we’re always trying to throw a many obstacles as possible in front of our protagonists. Your story is lacking conflict. Ramp it up with chase sequences.

Page 43-46 – Crop-eaters. Jamal’s walking through town to find his manila envelope. He’s disguising himself as a crop-eater to avoid certain death. As an audience member, I’m unclear on how dangerous the crop-eaters are to non-crop-eaters (humans) at this point. I’m unsure if Jamal not disguising himself would result in death. You need to set up a scene earlier (or in the grocery store) of another human character getting mauled to death/clubbed/staked/however they kill, because I need to understand what the crop-eaters do with people they don’t like. Then, I’d get behind Jamal, and hold my breath hoping he makes it out alive. You do this with Winston, perhaps move that scene to earlier?

Page 52 – Varying sentence structure. You start four paragraphs with the name “Jamal.” As writers, I think we can strive to be more creative. I’d work on using descriptive verbs to vary up the way paragraphs start. For example –

  1. Slowly, Jamal regains footing and continues…
  2. Looking over the fire and plumes of smoke he sees…
  3. Gently, he repositions Lana…
  4. Trudging through dirt, Lana on his back he holds her legs with one arm…

You can often even cut out he/she/character name by capitalizing a verb. It may read choppy, but it varies sentence structure.

Line suggestion: “You grow some damn good lettuce, son.” to “You grow some killer lettuce, son.”

Page 62 – We’ve got conflict. Now, the crop-eaters have projectiles. This raises the stakes extremely well. I’m scared for Jamal.

Page 63 – “You are what you eat.” Snappy.

Page 69-71 – You handle the science exposition pretty well. It’s hard in screenplays to get that right. It’s short, concise, and to the point. Congrats.

Page 71 – “I risked thousands of dollars, your future, my career—all for those results. And for what!” Bad. This sounds very much like a, clichéd, bad TV show/B movie line of dialogue. As pivotal as this plot point is in your screenplay you should handle this line more carefully. Suggestions –

  • “My life’s work…Gone.”
  • My career’s gone downhill…and for what?

These aren’t spectacular. Trying to get the ball rolling…

Why doesn’t Lana attack Jamal? This needs to be addressed. All the other crop-eaters have attacked Jamal.

I’d be careful of having the plane’s propeller chop up crop-eaters. This happened dramatically in 28 Weeks Later and comically in Planet Terror. A lot of my friends hated when it happened in 28 Weeks because they’d seen it as a joke in Planet Terror.

Overall, you’ve essentially written a clever spin on the zombie genre. Your movie builds with a rom-com element then shifts into territory of a zombie hack ‘n’ slash. The main problem with your script is the lack of conflict. Your climax is overloading the conflict, but aside from that, it’s far and few between.

Let’s think about the best zombie movies. Look to what they do right.

Dawn the of Dead (remake).

  1. Inciting incident – Zombie girl bites parents.
  2. Act 1 climax – Ana is overwhelmed, cries.
  3. Midpoint – Kenneth kills Frank.
  4. Act 2 climax – babies!
  5. Climax – reinforced van + chainsaws

28 Days Later.

  1. Inciting incident – animal activists release plague.
  2. Act 1 climax – They find other survivors.
  3. Midpoint – Frank dies.
  4. Act 2 climax – military base.
  5. Climax – Jim goes Rambo.

Both of these movies have something similar. The midpoint is a death (Frank twice?!). I’m going to plot your movie for reference.

GMOS.

  1. Inciting incident – scientist dies/goo plague set up
  2. Act 1 climax – Lana eats infected corn
  3. Midpoint – Lana loses her ear
  4. Act 2 climax – Winston dies
  5. Climax – escape from Gregory

Both 28 Days/Dawn have conflicted packed into the first 45 pages of their script. They keep throwing obstacles in the way of their characters, and for the most part, GMOs has a very rom-com element that affects the horror. Ultimately, it depends on what type of movie you want.

As for rewrites, I’d work on Jamal getting Lana as part of the conflict. In rom-com’s the love element becomes the conflict. You need to make Lana harder to get. That would help your first 45 pages. Then, after Jamal secures Lana and she eats the corn it truly becomes a sad story.

If you want to move towards a more conventional zombie story, it may help your marketability. The love interest may set it apart. 28 Days handles the Jim/Selena element while maintaining the post-apocalyptic/zombie conflict.

Your movie ends strong. The oppurtunity for a sequel ripe. Congrats, Jay, I’d love to see rewrites on this spec.

Readers: feel free to criticize my comments or the script. Round table is the best type of table.

5 comments:

  1. Thanks for the great and detailed feedback, Neil. This was the kick that I needed to start another rewrite. Luckily I haven't looked at it for a few months, so hopefully I can approach it with fresh eyes and your criticism in mind.

    If anyone else out there reads even a little bit, I'm eager to hear your thoughts!

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  2. Let me just start off by saying that I am not much of a fan of horror or zombie movies/scripts. With that being said, I couldn't stop reading the script. I wanted to see what happened in the end. I think that is very important, there have been many scripts I've read that it was way to easy for me to put it down and move on. I felt invested in the characters and the story moved along with enough suspense that I NEEDED to finish it.

    A criticism I have though is the length. When I downloaded the PDF I looked at the number of pages and saw 87. I was very surprised and excited to read an 87 page script. I started reading and honestly I lost track of time but began to gauge in my mind what page I was on. I looked up and noticed I hadn’t reached page 35 yet!!! I didn’t time myself reading this but it was a very long read for 87 pages.

    Neil is right, you need to get more white on your pages. Your descriptions are great and I could picture everything in my mind. The only thing that wasn’t conveyed the whole time was a sense of urgency with the characters. I also think that when these CROP EATERS first show themselves there should be a little more of a shock moment. I felt like you know it in your head (I have a really hard time with this) but you didn’t translate that shock/awe of seeing these things for the first time. Maybe you wanted it to be more subtle and people not notice right away…but when that rock gets lodged, I just expected more maybe? I actually had to go back and read a little because I felt I missed something?

    All in all though…good writing, good story, great idea. Do you have a sequel ready for this? Oh and I have to disagree with Neil on the plane chopping off some CROP EATER heads. I say do it…just don’t over do it. It was brief in the script and if its brief on film it will work. GOOD LUCK!!!

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  3. Andrew, thanks so much for the feedback! This is great stuff. Note about the propeller scene: I happened to write that scene just before 28 weeks later came out (and Planet Terror as well)... wouldn't you know it. Hah.

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  4. I have seen that with my writing too Jay. I will write something "unique" or a "wity" line that I haven't heard in a movie. Then wouldn't you know it, it ends up in a movie.

    First screenplay I wrote I was 12 or 14. About a "secret agent" kid who worked undercover for law enforcement. Then 5 years later Agent Cody Banks came out. Not the same story at all but the premise was dead on. Wonder how old that writer was?

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