After Sundown

T

theAlchemist

Active member
Logline: A man in trouble will soon find out that damaged souls take hell for granted in their quest for revenge

It's more or less a sort of prologue to a much longer story I have in mind.
Had to hurry a bit to make the deadline so not completely happy with some dialog.
Hopefully I haven't made too much of a mess of the English and the story by making this a bit nonlinear.:undecided
 
Well told story this one. I questioned the Deputies motives though. Why did he want Dutch so bad he was willing to chase him into the wastelands by himself? Over some money? And why did the dad let him go by himself only to go out after he is shot? If He was so sure Dutch would kill his son why let him go, get killed, then go get the body, vowing revenge? Makes no sense to me. The ending didn't do much for me, but I guess because it is actually the start of a larger story. I will say your ability to describe action/setting/scene is very good. I definitely see the potential for a much larger story, not as a stand alone 10 page short though. This was an easy read, had me anxious to see what happened next.

Thanks for sharing.
 
Good job! I like the title, a true western title.

At first glance, the descriptions are too long and might be broken up into 4 lines.

I notice the numbers on the left, must be from your software.

good story. Not sure I was ever drawn into any of the characters though. I have that problem when I write too. Its hard to flesh them out.

The dialogue a little stiff in places.

No ones land, might be No Mans Land.


Good job and good luck!
 
I think that this works well as a short. Stylz mentions that the ending didn't work for him and it's the start of a story. I disagree. I think the ending wraps up this snapshot nicely. This script feels like it was designed as short from the jump, which is something I think a lot of people miss when they're writing scripts for this fest, or one of the DVXUser film fests. We have a time limit, so that doesn't mean squeeze a feature into 10 pages, it means to tell a story that's only ten pages long. Good job on that front.

I also like the fact that you tackled western as your genre. One of my personal favorites. I hope to do a western one day.

The silhouette scene for the gunfight was terrific. I love the visual metephore of the sun going down as the light of the deputy's life going out.

My biggest critique of the piece is the dialog. It didn't feel like western dialog. Too modern I think. Especially some of your word choices. Dutch was much more eloquent then I think he should have been. I understand that he's a cut above your average western villain, but you might go back to him and all the characters and think about the dialog as spoken word, not as written word. That might help you clean it up some.

I also didn't think the flashback by the deputy was necessary. You pretty much covered that part of the story in the scene between the sheriff and deputy when Dutch rode through town. I'd polish that scene a little more, bring in the reward, and cut out the flashback. As it is the flashback pulls me out of the overall story when I should be engaged in the conflict between the deputy and Dutch.

I hope I don't sound like I'm being too harsh. I think this script has a lot of potential. With another coat of polish or two I'd love to see this produced as a short film.
 
Very good story. The dialogue did seem a bit awkward in spots but I zipped through the script pretty fast and never got bored.

Pretty good scene description as well. I also enjoyed the ending quite a bit.

Cheers,

Mike
 
krestofre said:
I think that this works well as a short. Stylz mentions that the ending didn't work for him and it's the start of a story. I disagree. I think the ending wraps up this snapshot nicely. This script feels like it was designed as short from the jump, which is something I think a lot of people miss when they're writing scripts for this fest, or one of the DVXUser film fests.
Click to expand...


Imagine--

Citizen
-Superman where are you going?

Superman
-after Lex Luther

Roll Credits


So what happens between the dad and sundown?
I'm not saying all scripts must end with a closed ending but.....
 
And if Superman was a 10 minute film, I'd be fine with that. If After Sundown was a two hour film, I'd agree with you. :)
 
You suggesting short films have a different story structure than feature? Anyways, to each their own, if we all thought the same it would be a boring world.:cheesy:
 
I like the overall mood of the piece. Your descriptions capture the dingy, parched feel of the West and I like the silhouette imagery for the most part.

I'm a little unclear as to the motivations of the characters this story.

1) If the sheriff loves his son so much that he'll pursue a legendary murderer across the desert out of vengeance, then why doesn' the sheriff try harder to stop his son from going after Dutch in the first place?

2) If the deputy knows that Sundown Dutch always kills at sundown, then why doesn't he wait for a more opportune time to apprehend him? I know silhouette stand-offs look good on screen, but they have to be justified.

Another question I have is what makes Sundown such a formidable opponent, if not his quickness? The sheriff says "...there's more to him than you can see..." but I didn't see anything except that Sundown out-drew the deputy.

This is just a suggestion, but I think it would be interesting if the sheriff and Dutch have a history together. This may explain why the sheriff chooses not to apprehend him in town. This seems to be hinted at but isn't clear.

Lastly, there were a number of grammatical errors and awkwardly phrased sentences throughout the script.

"The DEPUTY rides his horse in the barren desolate
wastelands. The sun shines bright on them and the deputy
is bathing in his sweat."

The plurality of the pronoun in the second sentence should agree with that of the subject of the first sentence. Also, "bright" should be an adverb. It should read "The DEPUTY rides his horse through the barren, desolate wastelands. The sun shines brightly on him..." Or, if you wish to reference both the deputy and his horse, "The DEPUTY and his horse ride through the barren, desolate wastelands. The sun shines brightly on them..."

The phrase "undergoing sun" is mentioned more than once. What does this mean? Is the sun setting?

"He holsters the revolver and walks
further his hand always close to the trigger."

I think "...with his hand close to the trigger." would be much clearer. "Always" denotes a continual or continuous act or state that spans a long period of time (ie. He always orders the soup du jour, or She always keeps a gun under her pillow).

I don't mean to be nitpicky, but little flaws such as these add up over the course of a read. I think if you keep at it, this will be a good script.
 
Last edited:
Nice to see some good and supportive feedback. Gonna react on some things later. Need my time to read another 25 scripts and trying to comment on them in the weekend. :D

But for now, thanks for reading and for taking time to post your feedback. :)
 
Given that your location is Amsterdam, I'm given to forgiving stuff like "the undergoing sun" when I think what you mean is "the setting sun." :)

The biggest thing I don't get is, if Dutch is passing through down during the day, why would the Sheriff be concerned about trying to arrest him? He almost has to reach town right around sundown; and then we need to have the Sheriff see something about him that his son/deputy doesn't, something that makes him nervous, and something that ties into what happens to the son/deputy the next day (as mentioned, there does need to be something extra about Dutch that helps him beat the son/deputy other than just a quick draw, to justify the name and his mystique).

Also, you could do a little more with suggesting that the flashback scenes are actually flashback scenes. :) Not only in designating them as such in the script, but possibly also coming up with a consistent "trigger" for the deputy to be remembering things (for example, for the transition from scene 6 to scene 7, you have him specifically close his eyes, which is what got me thinking about the idea of a "trigger").

Nice to see a Western script entered. If an Western made in Italy is a "spaghetti Western," what are we going to call one from Amsterdam? :D
 
You must log in or register to reply here.
Back
Top