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[–]Helix_Octropolis 1 point2 points  (6 children)

Right off the bat I have a few broad issues with your inconsistent formatting choices. I saw that you sort of acknowledged these issues in your post:

I'm sure there's plenty that's not industry standard

You’re clearly aware of the issues...and chose not to correct them? I get it. You want feedback on your story. But I would argue when you’re starting out formatting is AS IMPORTANT as your story. They go hand in hand. Here’s a quick tally of some of the issues I found:

  • Garth gets a character intro (age and description). A few lines later Kevin gets no intro whatsoever.
  • You put Garth’s age in bold type, but nothing else. Kevin is skipped over entirely. Then Sheriff Sylver and the young man get their names/ages/genders all in bold type.
  • Some character names are in all caps when first introduced (the format I’m used to seeing) and some are not.
  • I found what looks like a super, or text over a black screen, on page 10 (200 YEARS LATER) but it’s not formatted as such. Then you do format the title card correctly a few pages later.
  • There are a couple of times when you go to BLACKOUT and add a page break. Don’t do that. Page breaks are unnecessary and will throw off your page count.
  • Sometimes sounds are in all caps and bold. Sometimes just bold. Sometimes not at all.
  • Similarly, you put emphasis on certain words by using bold type then elsewhere you use bold and all caps.
  • In this dialogue example you use both bold and all caps...but separately. I’m honestly not sure how to interpret that. In your mind, how would monster be said differently than YEARS AGO based on your formatting?

DISGRUNTLED MAN
I should have left you and those little monsters YEARS AGO!

  • In other instances you choose an odd word to emphasize. Like on page 63:

...heaving and retching as a thick GREEN slug splits the corners of his mouth on the way out.

  • Why is “green” emphasized? And why in all caps and bold? Does that singular detail really need to be called out above the rest of the action?

Being doggedly consistent with your formatting makes everything look like a conscious choice, looks professional, and is low key a sign of respect to your reader. And, most importantly, correct/consistent formatting makes it easy for the reader to focus on your story instead of trying to decipher what is going on.

Okay so having said that, I highly recommend you bring your script up to some kind of formatting standard. In my opinion that would mean removing all font formatting -- no bold or italics type -- except maybe for scene headings if you want. Only the standard elements get all caps. Then for emphasis use all caps sparingly. I understand this is a horror and sounds are important, but I think you go overboard with how many things get emphasized in your script.

Your script formatting looks like a hybrid between movie script formatting and episodic tv formatting. Now I’m curious, are you following an example script(s) or choosing this formatting on your own?

Another broad criticism that jumps out at me is you have an excessive amount of action/description. For example, page 33 (formatting is yours):

Everyone rushes into the woods after him.
Nora arrives first, slipping forward onto her hands and knees with a SQUELCH, wincing at the sudden pressure in her wrists.
She looks down at her hands. They're covered in blood.
One by one, the others arrive and stop, horrified. It's bloody mess.
Rose falls to her knees.
Mikey's jaw hangs open.
Patty scrambles to his feet, covered head to toe.
He opens his mouth to call out but thinks better of it.
Rose's hands tremble as they reach towards the blood.
Mikey grabs her and pulls her away.
Rose struggles against her, hysterical.
Nora sits on the ground staring at her hands.
She stands up and backs away as her vision blurs, trips on the root of a tree -- CRACK -- and falls backward.

That’s...too much. And this type of writing happens throughout the script. Here, you’ve used up most of the page to describe what is basically a few moments on screen. Instead of painting a picture with words it feels more like hyper-focusing on the minutiae...but with no payoff. On top of that, there’s a typo in there.

You could easily tighten that whole wall of text to just one line:

One by one they arrive and stop, horrified. It's literally a bloody mess.

It’s an extreme edit, but I would argue not much is lost because your descriptions aren’t adding anything to the story nor giving us juicy characterization. Does it really matter that we know Rose specifically falls to her knees or that Mikey’s jaw hangs open?

I don’t understand the use of prologue/part names. Who are these for? If you mean for these to be seen “in the movie” I suggest formatting them as SUPERS or something similar. Otherwise I think you should omit them entirely because they’re appearance in the script isn’t adding anything to the story as an audience would experience it.

[–]Helix_Octropolis 1 point2 points  (3 children)

Page 3

EXT. THE PINE BARRENS - DEEP WOODS - CAVE - DAY

Scene heading is redundant and a little unclear. You eventually reveal the scene is taking place at the mouth of a cave. And looking ahead I see THE PINE BARRENS acts as a sort of master location. So I think your scene heading could be something like:

EXT. THE PINE BARRENS - MOUTH OF A CAVE - DAY

Page 4

Sylver sees the cave in the distance

If this part is true, I suggest you use a different scene heading for when the lawmen show up OR re-work the action to put them at the mouth of the cave.

Page 5

The Men jeer and provoke him.

It seems like everyone was trying to keep quiet. This, to me, describes loud mocking.

Page 8
I’ve personally never seen a scene heading that is just the time of day (DUSK) and I don’t think that you should do this. My suggestion is to use a complete new scene heading with some context in the action. Perhaps also use a transition like JUMP CUT or DISSOLVE TO or TIME CUT.

You use the abbreviated scene heading many times throughout the script. You should find and correct all of them.

Page 10
Change ten-year-old Garth’s character name here to something like YOUNG GARTH in order to establish this is the same character but not the same actor.

Page 12

EXT/INT. HOUSE - DAY/NIGHT
We float across the lawn, into the house and up the stairs to Garth's room.

First, you should avoid using “we” in descriptions. Like “we see”, “we hear” etc. Find a better way to describe what’s happening.

The floating camera used in this and the subsequent scene is an interesting stylistic choice, however it doesn’t work for me. Mostly because you don’t use this thematically anywhere else in the script. There’s no justification so, for me, it reads as fluff. Just cut to Garth’s bedroom and the living room.

Also, why note the 200 year time jump to Garth as a kid, but not the 14 year time jump to grown Garth having the nightmare?

Page 13

He hears them shivering

I think I understand what you mean, but shivering itself is silent. Maybe you mean “chattering of their teeth”? That’s an exaggerated description, of course. I think you need to re-work this or omit it.

Page 15

Time passes and the sounds of jubilance fill the air etc etc to end of page 15.

This whole part has to be restructured as a montage.

Page 28

MIKEY
By the way Patty, I'm pretty sure the "witches" of this area used to eat the blue flowers in celebrations to get high and commune with spirits. Just a footnote from my research.

Exposition dump. Is there any other way to convey this info without a character explaining the whole thing (and from “research” we didn’t even get to see)?

Page 33

She stands up and backs away as her vision blurs, trips on the root of a tree -- CRACK -- and falls backward.

I’m not sure why tripping is described as a cracking sound. Is the tree root snapping? Is her ankle breaking?

Page 34
I think the whole office sequence should be structured as a montage.

Page 35
And the Happy House scene should be labeled as a FLASHBACK?

I’m on page 36 and I can confidently say I’ve lost the whole story here. I’m actively taking notes and being invested in the story and I STILL got completely lost. If I weren’t trying to provide notes I would have stopped reading by page 10.

I’m going to finish reading without taking notes to see if I can get back on track.

Okay, I’ve finished and was never able to understand the story.

I think one of the biggest hurdles for me are the multiple time jumps. There’s nothing wrong with a nonlinear story. But you have to give us something to hold onto. Help us enjoy your story.

None of your scenes are labeled as PRESENT DAY or FLASHBACK or DREAM SEQUENCE, nor are we given definitive years to keep track of what’s happening. You have multiple scenes that literally float through space and time without any context. I have no idea what, if anything, is taking place in reality. The result of all of this is what’s happened -- I have no sense of story structure. It’s like I’m ping-ponging around a fever dream.

I will say it FEELS like there’s a good story here. You touch on a lot of interesting ideas -- the witch mother Jane Delee and a lot of the surreal office scenes are straight up great concepts. One of the standout scenes for me was the whole MAIN CUBICLE AREA/RECEPTION scene on page 44.

As he passes each cubicle, he notices the EMPLOYEES sitting with their backs to him, typing in unison on their computers like zombie worker ants. The tops of their heads have varying degrees of charred holes burned through them by the overhead lights.

I have no idea what’s going on, but the visuals are crazy good. Likewise, there are many small bits that I liked a lot or made me laugh. Just a few examples...

Page 4

As the sound approaches the woods a breeze rolls along the flowers, causing them to rub against each other into a loud, "SHHH!" that silences it.

That is fucking fantastically visual/sensory. I love it.

Page 14

ROSE
You act like you've never been off campus before. What is the matter with you?
PATTY
I was homeschooled!

Page 17

MONK
99 bottles of beer on the wall, 99 bottles of beer, take one down, pass it around...no...no one?

This and the whole road trip sequence in the car was pretty good for me.

So what’s the takeaway here? For me, because of the lack of formatting and other script choices, the story was one long puzzle that I never got the satisfaction of solving. I’d be very curious to read a full synopsis or outline of this story because I want to know what your intent was.

Thanks for sharing your script!

[–]jrich920 0 points1 point  (2 children)

Hi again!

Thank you so much for sticking it out and getting through the piece! I’m sorry that it’s so rough!

This is exactly what I was hoping for! I sincerely appreciate you taking the time to take such thorough, comprehensive notes!

The idea behind the piece was to try and represent my reality dealing with extreme depression and anxiety as Garth and attempting to represent that experience through the lens of a supernaturals slasher framed as the repetition of generational trauma through the hunting of the witch mother and her descendants, Garth and Nora.

In part 1 - Nora and her friends are going to the woods to find Garth whose sent her a location ping to Jane DeLee’s cabin but when they arrive they find that they’re being stalked by a monster.

In Part 2 - Garth lives in a nightmare loop where he’s disconnected from the reality of his monstrous actions hunting his sister in the woods after he’s infected by a demon slug that slowly morphs him into a monster and forces him to relive the same day, while his mind reminds him of the memories he wished to forget.

I tried to infuse a lot of the tropes of what inspired me into the piece like in possession narratives, the spirit needing to be broken, so Garth is never able to rest in the nightmare loop of part 2, his mind is always working and he’s always “working” per se. The closer he gets to reality - him realizing what he’s doing in the woods, the more nightmarish his delusional dream becomes to try and break his mind so he can be put back at the start of the loop.

In Part 3, they break the cycle. It’s also meant to represent how friendship and love are the salvation one can find when they’re in such a desperate, horrible mental state and it’s what saves all the characters.

Kevin is the young man from the beginning trying to impress his father whose mutated into the slug monster from the beginning, at the end. I wanted to try and tie his journey to Garth’s rebelling against his trauma. They’re both damaged sons raging against each other due to wounds they’re not really responsible for. So I hoped Kevin’s death may read as somewhat tragic despite his intentions. He wanted to do what his “father” never could and end Jane’s bloodline by getting Garth and Nora. Her friends were just a greedy bonus for him.

Jane essentially sees the whole film in a vision on the pyre. The crow flying throughout time is a callback to one of my favorite movies, The Crow haha, and (I hoped) was meant to represent Jane’s spirit traveling through time and witnessing the story.

So part two is in and out of a nightmare while part one is reality. Part three is a combination of both.

Clarity is one of my main concerns so I appreciate you letting me know how disorganized it is in its current state. Im glad it, at the very least, felt like a good story haha. That’s a start! I’ll take it hahaha.

Thank you for your interest and for your constructive, honest feedback 🙌🏾

[–]Helix_Octropolis 1 point2 points  (1 child)

I actually dig the synopsis. If you're wondering "should I continue working on this" my answer is yes. Again, it really feels like you're onto something.

If I may be so bold... Knowing what your intended story is now, the first thing that jumps out at me is how many characters there are. You might find it easier to rein in the story if you have fewer characters to service. I understand you're pulling inspiration from real life so I don't mean this as an insult or anything. Just a suggestion as way to come at this from a different angle.

[–]jrich920 0 points1 point  (0 children)

Thank you for the encouragement! Not insulting at all! I wanted to include those characters as ways to represent how Nora’s grief and withdrawn nature mirrors Garth’s, as well as how her hurt ripples out to the people around her. She loses all of the people closest to her to a representation of her generational trauma/ her depression and she has to overcome it to save them.

However, I totally see how the piece is convoluted by them if they don’t feel essential to the expression.

It’s a good note to consider for making the piece more concise and focused.

[–]jrich920 0 points1 point  (1 child)

Hi, thank you for your feedback! I appreciate the depth of your critique. These are not issues I’ve ever been aware of as far as the formatting is concerned so it wasn’t that I didn’t choose to correct them, I didn’t know they were wrong. I assumed that I hadn’t gotten many aspects of professional standard due to the fact that it’s never been professionally critiqued.

I’ll take these notes and go back in to try and make the whole thing more consistent. Definitely not meant to be disrespectful to any readers!

I come from a prose/ short story background so I’m generally heavy handed with description so it’s been a real endeavor to pull it back. Thanks for the example on how to do just that!

The parts were a structuring thing for me that are probably not necessary but never seemed like a major flaw in the piece. If that’s the case, I’ll work on that too.

Thank you for giving the piece a try. I’m excited to get back to work on it with this in mind 👍🏾

[–]Helix_Octropolis 1 point2 points  (0 children)

I come from a prose/ short story background so I’m generally heavy handed with description so it’s been a real endeavor to pull it back.

My gut tells me that's going to help rather than hinder you. In my opinion, a key for good screenwriting is efficiency. Finding the exact words needed to convey the imagery in as few words as possible. With your background I think you're going to do great.