"BAD BEHAVIOR" -- Short Film Script

OrangePlanet

OrangePlanet

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This is a screenplay for a short film that I hope to begin filming soon. I'm dying for some honest feedback about it but keep in mind, I'm just a student and no where close to a professional. It is 33 pages and should not take very long to read. I have just recently registered the script with the WGA-East.

The link to the .pdf is below. Thanks very much in advance!

Cheers. :beer:
 

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I just read it. I gotta tell you man, I really like this script.

The dialogue flows really well, it really seemed like every character had their own voice and personality. It's well written and not confusing at all.

My only small problem was the ending, although I do love the twist, when it comes back out into reality, the real ending seemed kinda forced. Travis rationalizes all these things in his head and decides that giving up is the only way for them to get out alive, but then a solution just falls into his hands, almost literally. It is realistic in the fact that he is searching for a way out, and when he sees the coffee is clicks, but the fact that neither of them get hurt and it all works out seems a little to dues ex machina.

But I think if you stick with that ending it will be met with approval. But from one writer to another that's my 2 cents.
 
Thanks very much for your input!

It's funny that you mention the ending because in the first draft, the scenario Travis imagines in his head was the actual ending. I just felt that it may be too heavy but I could be wrong. What you mentioned about him deciding to give up and THEN noticing the coffee is very true. I just wonder whether the downer ending or the open-ended ending would work better.

Either way, again, thanks for checking it out.
 
Wow, that was an enjoyable read. I found myself totally invested in the story, wanting to know what would happen next. I also like how the first ending was all in his head. With the "real" ending I kinda agree with Ezekial that it might not be the best way to go by concluding the film with Max and Travis leaving unhurt with the wallet. Maybe they could make it out, but still not have retrieved the wallet.

One other thing that stuck out to me on page 22, you might want to consider leaving out the line of the job going wrong. As I was reading when I came across that it kinda took me away from the suspense you had carefully built up to that point. The writing was good enough for you not have to kinda spoonfeed us that bit of information.

Other then that, this definitely was a great piece of work. If you could use an extra DVX100 when you're shooting or any actors I'd be glad to help.
 
Thank you for reading it and I'm glad you enjoyed it!

I totally agree with you and Ezekiel about it wrapping up a little too nicely at the end. I took your advice and cut out the part where Max finds the wallet and left that subject open-ended. So you know they got out of the house but whether they got away scott-free is up to the imagination of the reader.

Also about the page 22 "job that went wrong" line, you're absolutely right. It was a redundant piece of information that the reader can already understand without hearing it directly from his mouth, so I cut it out.

And, now that you mention it, I absolutely could use another DVX and quite possibly some actors. I've was planning to have two of my friends, who are co-producers as well, play the leads but there are other roles I have not yet casted like the man who owns the home. I'm a little torn between using my friends with no real acting experience or trying to find real actors to play the leads. I think that choice could be a pivotal decision in the overall outcome of the film. Either way, I'll know as soon as we get a chance to do some table reads and rehearsals whether or not they are capable.

But anyway, thank you for offering to help. I can use all the help I can get and you certainly sound like a knowledgeable source. Glad we live in the same town.
 
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Hey,

I really like the script. The whole idea is really good, legit, and solid. I kind of went all out on feedback here though. Probably way more then you wanted but maybe it will be helpful. And this is totally just my opinion and suggestions. Hopefully none of it comes off negative. There were just little things that kind of made me feel confused or put off. I kind of have a weird stance on films though. Oh, and I just typed them out and didn't check grammar and all that so I apologize for lots of errors. Anyways here's the list by page number:

p. 2- When Travis says "The year 2009, ya know..."

I'm not a big fan when years are used. It's like someone wearing an American Eagle shirt instead of just a plain color. It would be more timeless if not able to be dated.

p. 2 - Probably need to tell what Travis trying to fix and get his money back for. You could even have a flashback to him in the store and talking to the lady when he's saying what he said to her. And kind of go in and out of the flash back. Might be cool.


p. 4- Max "Wow."

Max seems kind of passive and so I could see him maybe saying like "huh..." or something. "Wow" just seems kind of strong or whatever.


p. 4- Travis "...'****' more times then Joe Pesci in GoodFellas..."

Seems like a name drop a little and also another thing taking away the timelessness.


p. 4- Travis "Yeah. And I'm gonna get my money back..."

I don't think this lines in needed. I think its implied with the nod and the Max comment. Seems better to visually imply and leave it at that when possible.


p. 5 - It seems like they are stealing way more stuff then they can possibly carry. Maybe creating havoc and breaking things and then only packing away the expensive stuff.

Maybe Travis should put on the nice shoes he finds in the closet. Maybe Max should just be trying all the different liquors then breaking the bottles against a wall or something

Instead of Max throwing a tennis ball maybe he should be cornered and calling Travis's name and after Travis finds the gun he should come downstairs and shoot the dog.


p. 7- Travis "...selling cleaning supplies to people in nice houses that we knew we'd never be able to live in."

Something about the dialogue here seems confusing. Maybe "to people in nice houses. Houses we knew we'd never be able to live in," or "...never be able to afford


p. 8- less dramatic Woman at door, "NO THANK YOU!


p. 9 -Travis maybe omit "I could scream" and just have the first part in the line.


p.9 - Max "Go on Welfare?" I don't think they qualify for welfare. Maybe something like beg or some other job. Maybe just first line. I always think less dialogue is better. Let the actors do some work and portray whatever.

p.11- You've got Travis saying "bam" on page 9 about the stock market. I would mix it up and have him say something else on "...an open window, crawl in, and bam." maybe just say "****" instead. Like its easy. That's what we say in Texas.


p.11 - Max- "I can't be someone's *****, man." He kind of is Travis's ***** but I like him saying it in the line before. Just not twice. Make it ironic or whatever without saying it.


p.11- Travis "police response time...7-10 minutes around here." How would he know this? Maybe just leave out "around here."


p.12- Travis "...masks throughout every single job..." Maybe just say "...masks the whole time, no exceptions."


p.12- Travis "enough money to pay our rent next month." If Max's grandfather left the house to him why are they paying rent? Maybe just say the electric bill or eat or something. And maybe instead of saying "The only reason we have a house to live...", instead have him saying " ...we have a decent place to live....is because you grandfather left you that house."


p. 13 - Great job of making fun of frat guys. Good stuff.

p. 14-15 I think Max shouldn't clean the big window. Maybe just have him say "..works with all sized windows." then have Frat Boy #2 on page 15 say his line without the, "Yeah that's great." But I would include all the stuff about the frat guys cracking a smile and all that but just move it up to after Max cleans the second window.

I would have a shot of Travis walking around the house some more while Max is cleaning the toilet. I wouldn't have frat guy spill hot chocolate. I would cut this a little shorter it seems to go on for awhile. So at the end of p. 15 after Max cleans the toilet. I would just have Max saying a variation of his line (p.16) "As you can see, SureClean..." while he's cleaning the toilet. And then having him coming out of the bathroom saying he's finished and then having the frat guy's saying "That's great." and then picking up the dialogue on p.16 after they walk into the foyer.


p. 17- Maybe I'm sick in the head but maybe instead of the frat guy saying " Well now what, faggots?You wanna clean the sink too?" you should have him saying something like " Well now what, faggots? You wanna demonstrate a cleaning of our asses too?" and of course change the line later down in the page too in order to match.


p.17 -I'm going to totally change Max's reaction. He should still have the toilet cleaner in his hands and squirt the blue formula on their precious shirts and then when they get angry and step toward him he should use the window cleaner in his other hand to shoot it in their eyes. They should then kick them around a little or maybe scuffle with them but have an obvious advantage but get elbowed in the nose or something Maybe piss on their couch. Then start back up at the bottom of page 18 with them walking down the street.


p.18- Max "I wanna do it." seems kind something. Maybe have them continue walking and since they just left kind of a dramatic situation Travis is going to be sort of out of it so I think maybe have this

Max-"Let's do it"

Travis (confused and tired and not paying that much attention, dazed)- "Uhh?"

Max-"Steal ****."

Travis-"Really?"

Max- "Yeah."

Travis turns to Max and puts his arm around his back while shaking his hand.
-Then freeze facing toward them with the street behind them.

p.20- Max "Oh...Well I'm glad one of us knows about this stuff." I would just have him saying "Oh..."


p.20- Travis "...fence some of this ****." I've never heard this fence expression. But again I live in Texas so maybe different sayings or whatever.


p.20- "They hug.".....while patting him on the back. More of a man hug right?


p.21- Henry "Yeah, I think I know a guy..." Maybe give him a pause here and maybe an "ummm..." or something. If he's surprised by the loot he might be stunned and not be able to just shoot a name out right away. Also, he might should just have his number in his cellphone. Change the lines to say "...something like that. I think I got his number right here." (pulling out his cell phone)


p.21- They should probably have the truck in the back and loading the stuff from the back so the neighbors don't see what's up.


p.21- I like the voice over after the meal at the fancy restaurant but I think you should end it right before the pause and omit "So now that you know the background....the job that went wrong."

I have and idea. It's kind of artsy but since it's a short it might work. After he says "...Just around the corner." It should stop and and then rewind (pretty quickly) back to the beginning showing all the previous scenes. Maybe have a rewind noise. Just a thought.


p.22 Travis "We had just preformed our twelfth robbery..." They hadn't completed it so maybe changing it to "We were almost finished with our twelfth..." or "We had almost successfully performed our..."

Then also switch up "...had gone smoothly" to "...was going to end smoothly" or something.

p.23 -After Max says "Oh...I don't know I just swept everything off the countertops


p.26- Not too keen on this self loathing starting with -Max pauses and hangs his head low....- I would just drop it and go to the next scene- EXT. STREET - NIGHT


p.27- More loathing....Max "Oh, God, I have to do it?...." I would suggest after Max snaps out of it and says "Yeah, sorry." and then go to Travis "Now listen..."


p.31- The dialogue at the top of the page with the MAN saying "You know, you guys...." and then his next "You guys...." seems like it could be taken out. The descriptions of his thoughts probably could be taken out too unless they are going to be shown. Maybe describe his face in anguish. Anyways, I would just go from-...accelerated breathing and heartbeat.- on page 30 to- Travis fires his gun...- on page 31.


One thing else. I think you need to establish the MAN lives alone (being the dick he seems to be) or that his family is gone somewhere. I think if you just get rid of them stealing women's jewelry and then on p.23 when Travis looks at the picture frame and Max says he just swept of the countertops I would have a zoom in on the picture frame with the guy standing with only his dog. and then Travis saying "Lonely guy" before he throws it back in the bag.
 
my first impression was format was weird. dialogue stretched to right margin. second thought was at 33 pages, it's too long for a short. those are the dickhead reader comments off the cuff. i'll read it and tell you what i actually think of it.
 
Robertm - Wow. I didn't excpect that much attention to be payed but I gotta tell you I really appreciate every word of it. You brought up a lot of good points that have made me re-think, like you said, the little aspects of it. I agree with probably 85% of what you suggested I will have to read your ideas through again as I'm revising. I'll let you know about what changes I do or don't make.

Rubbersquare - Yeah, you'll have to forgive me for the strange formatting. When I got this new computer it had only WordPad and not Microsoft Word so I had to write on the sh*ttier of the two. And when I finally got Microsoft Word and transferred it, it came out all over the place. So I'm going back and aligning the dialogue more towards the middle and not so skewed to the right. Also, as far as the length goes, I've read in some festival guidelines that if somethings under 45 minutes then it's considered a short. I don't know if that's an accepted rule or if it's just that particular festival, but I don't expect it to be any longer than that. And once the editing process is done, I'd hopefully like for it to be under 30. EDIT: I just looked at your imdb page and I gotta tell ya, "The Bet" looks pretty awesome, how could I see it?

Thanks guys for taking the time to read it!
 
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Just for future reference, this is OrangePlanet. I changed my user name because due to certain issues I had to change the production company name and OrangePlanet didn't really feel relevant any longer. So, sorry for any confusion.

Anyway, I've changed the ending of the script so they don't get out *completely* unharmed. After Travis throws the coffee in the man's face and tackles him to the ground, they wrestle with the gun. The gun goes off but the two guys keep wrestling and eventually Travis gets control of the gun. He pistol whips the man unconscious and Max and Travis head for the open window. As they are about to exit, Max notices Travis stumble to the ground and realizes, in the scuffle, he was shot in the stomach. Travis tries to tell Max to go without him and let him take the wrap. Max refuses to let him stay behind and forces him out the window and helps Travis to the car.
 
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sorry so late on this...

there are two sides of me responding. one side is the anal "you're doing it wrong" often hypocritical side - and the other is the film geek side.

the film geek side says "love the dialogue, very natural and fun"
the anal idiot side says "you shouldn't use camera direction or 'we see' in the script"

anal: the "note" about how it should be shot, bad form.

film geek: the BIG DOG was dispatched too easily, though reminded me of my parents' house.

anal: palm pilot should be capitalized.

anal: the exit from the house, in contrast to the need to describe camera angles, seems rushed. all of a sudden there is a "the get together and jump out." it feels rushed (from the writer's side) and sloppy.

film geek: i started to get a sense of "funny games" or some sort of impending home invasion (this is written as i'm reading, so i have no idea if it will happen or not). if not, good misdirection. if yes, too predictable.

anal: page 9 the "pause" should be a "beat"

film geek: i wanted max be the one who took things to the "max" rather than the other way around.

anal/film geek: page 14 when travis is thinking about how much things are worth, how are you showing how he is doing this? if the character is looking at the stuff, how do we, as the audience, know what he is thinking? this is a tough one for scripts. and often something that falls to the director. so, as the screenwriter, write device - maybe going the fincher route where whatever travis sees rings up a dollar value as a super, or something like that. or as they explain how SureClean will clean things, also, even sensationalized, how much it is worth.

film geek: just want to say again, the dialogue is pretty dang good and natural.

anal: page 22, restaurant is spelled wrong.

film geek: shut up, anal, this is good.

not sure how it all panned out though. it seemed a bit like "we're just being us and nothing is happening" and then "man" shows up as a sort of minor threat, but not really, and then nothing really happens to end up changing who travis or max are.

not to mention, 30 pages (minutes) is long for a short and short for a feature.

dialogue is damn good tho. just think about what they're doing and why.

far from the best critique, but hopefully something here helps.
 
Hey, man thanks for your comments. And I like the way you separated the anal side from the film geek side, haha.

You brought up a lot of good points, though.

Max being the one that takes things to the "max" - I had never thought about that before but it makes total sense.

When Travis is checking out the valuables I like your idea of the superimposed dollar signs racking up money or I could do something with it in the voice-over but that seems a little too obvious.

When they're leaving the house the first time, I do need to be more specific about what's going on and how.

And as for the ending, I changed it around and posted the new ending a few posts up. I wanted the film to express how even though you might think you have everything planned perfectly, unexpected things will go wrong. And even though crime might seem like an easy way to get ahead it can put you further behind than you were to start with. So instead of having them get out unharmed, Travis wrestles with the man at the end and ends up getting shot in the stomach. I'm still debating whether or not he gets out alive or he dies there. Either way they needed some sort of consequence to get my point across. Not to mention that chances are the wallet is in the house and will inevitably lead to their arrest. But I want the viewer to make their own assumptions on the point of the wallet.

And about the length, you're right. But I really don't think it needs anything more added to it and I really wouldn't want to take anything away except maybe cutting the frat-boys scene down a bit.

Anyway, I appreciate your kind words about the dialogue that makes me feel more confident about it.

And if you know anyone else that would be willing to read it and email me some feedback or something I would REALLY appreciate it. But if not, that's fine too. We're just about to start rehearsals so I'm trying to get as much feedback as I can so I can cram in some changes as fast as possible.

Thanks for reading it!
 
Tim, I've just read your script and I'm interested :) But I have a few complains. First of all, I believe the flashback is just a little too long. Also there are a few small things I didn't like, but overall I was interested, as I have just mentioned. Pretty much the first script I was able to read from beging to end and it gave me some thoughts about screenwriting.

Won't say it's good or anything (not that is isn't), I'll just leave that to other people. Critisism is better.
 
I don't have any crontructive critism as I am just beginning to write but I just want to let you know that I enjoyed reading this script. Very inspiring. I'm going to continue writing now. Thanks!

-Brian
 
Donatas.Kaulinis said:
Tim, I've just read your script and I'm interested :) But I have a few complains. First of all, I believe the flashback is just a little too long. Also there are a few small things I didn't like, but overall I was interested, as I have just mentioned. Pretty much the first script I was able to read from beging to end and it gave me some thoughts about screenwriting.

Won't say it's good or anything (not that is isn't), I'll just leave that to other people. Critisism is better.
Click to expand...

You're exactly right about the flashback sequence. It seems as if, by the end of it, the cops would've already been there. Good call, I need to trim that down.

Anyway thanks for reading it and as for screenwriting I would highly recommend it if you're thinking about it (I don't know if you do already). If anything its a good release from stress and great fun.

Cheers:beer:
 
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Brian Appling said:
I don't have any crontructive critism as I am just beginning to write but I just want to let you know that I enjoyed reading this script. Very inspiring. I'm going to continue writing now. Thanks!

-Brian
Click to expand...

I'm glad I could help, man. And thanks right back at ya. :beer:
 
TimCollins said:
You're exactly right about the flashback sequence. It seems as if, by the end of it, the cops would've already been there. Good call, I need to trim that down.

Anyway thanks for reading it and as for screenwriting I would highly recommend it if you're thinking about it (I don't know if you do already). If anything its a good release from stress and great fun.

Cheers:beer:
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Yeah, I do already. Actually I became interested in it since I got a camera. There are a lot of feelings you expierence while writing I believe :) Anyway, good luck with writing. In your place I would be very careful with accepting critisism. There should be a whole topic about the creative process and critic of it, since only the person who writes, know's how it should be, therefore, even what some would call bad dialog, could be completely good and related to the story in artists mind.

I'm sorry, it just feels very nteresting to me to be writing in english.

EDIT: Oh yeah, and cheers to you too. But sorry, I don't drink.
 
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Donatas.Kaulinis said:
In your place I would be very careful with accepting critisism. There should be a whole topic about the creative process and critic of it, since only the person who writes, know's how it should be, therefore, even what some would call bad dialog, could be completely good and related to the story in artists mind.
Click to expand...

I'm not sure I follow what you mean ?

And, that's okay, you don't have to drink to cheers. :beer:
 
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