Feedback on a short dramatic script

M

mrWr0ng

Well-known member
This is a short, currently titled "Broken," that is my second dramatic short. I've written a few features and more shorts, but they've usually all rotated around comedy, action/comedy, or horror/comedy. But this one isn't meant to be funny at all.

Synopsis: Johnny, a crack-addicted runaway, is found by his father and returned to the abusive household he escaped from. In the short time he's back at home, he discovers how both his brother and his mother are coping with his alcoholic, abusive father. His addiction gets the better of him, and after he finishes gathering items to pawn but before he can escape, the father returns home and draws him into a final confrontation.

It's 15 pages, an early draft. My grammar's not too great as I tend to bounce around in tenses a lot, but I'd appreciate feedback on how to fix that. Otherwise, let me know if it's a little too cliche - I was aiming for an easy-to-shoot (location wise) short that was at least emotionally powerful, with an angle that hasn't been approached before. Hopefully this is it.

Here's the link: http://www.jlboyce.com/scripts/BROKEN_20070216.RTF

Thanks
 
I'm enjoying the read, but you have to aviod stuff like this ...

Across from her is LITTLE BROTHER, the Speaking Teen from before, now fully dressed.

Without names, I had to go back and re-read two pages to make sure I got who you are taking about.

Later you introduce him as

Little brother
I'm gonna be back late - Mike and I are going to a movie with some other kids from class.

Just a tip!

A
 
Coupla things. I think you give too much detail in the stage directions. Like here:

"He shuts the door behind him and sits on his bed, forcing the tip of the lightbulb open.
He empties his pockets onto the bed. A lighter, paperclip, various items. Out of his sock comes a tiny ziplock bag containing crack."

I think all you really need is "He shuts himself in the bedroom and takes a crack bag out."

The situation is strong, and feels authentic but I found myself tempted to root for the father. Afterall, he did rescue Johnny off the streets. I thought that was an interesting element and keeps the father character from feeling cliche. If someone asked me to rewrite this I'd try and make the dad the protagonist. He seems to dominate the story as it is anyhow. Why not make him #1?

Generally speaking, on a strictly personal level, I like the goodytwoshoes type of story. In other words, something that addresses the better elements of humanity.

Lastly, I feel like that type of reverse time opening has had its 15 minutes of fame. It's a novelty and it seems like too many people use it lately. I don't see how it helps you.

If I was an actor I think I'd love to do a short like this.
 
Alex,

I kept the names out mostly because, at least for me, I'm trying to keep a perspective of "this is happening anywhere." The lack of names (both in the script and in the dialogue) are, I hope, keeping the character sort of anybody/everybody.

Brian,

You're right that I get too detailed on stage direction. I'm thinking about directing it myself, so I didn't bother to hold back. I also wanted to keep the father like someone you could root for - he's sort of a mix of protagonist and villain, he has the best interests of both kids at heart, but the terrible way he goes about expressing those interests leads to the abuse and his demise.

I'm torn on the reverse time opening, too. I'm aiming for a tragedy type of feeling, and I think that if I show the big ending, people figure out how it ends really quickly, which leaves the rest of the film as a slow-motion apocalypse where the audience wants it to turn out better, but gets kind of a helpless feeling watching all the worst come to the surface. It looks like it worked, I hope :)

Thank you guys for reading it. I'm glad I'm on the right track
 
mrWr0ng said:
Alex,



I'm torn on the reverse time opening, too. I'm aiming for a tragedy type of feeling, and I think that if I show the big ending, people figure out how it ends really quickly,
Click to expand...

This is true. So...why not invent a different ending? What you have is more of a self destruction. This type of ending, the one you have, is hard to pull off. AMERICAN BEAUTY nailed it. 92 IN THE SHADE by Thomas McGuane also nailed it.

Good storytelling toys with our expectation, keeps us off balance, surprises us. I think you've got some good raw material here.

Endings are a *****. That's what I know.
 
You're absolutely right. I was aiming for an American Beauty feeling. I think something might be doable with the back-on-the-streets ending, it could give a lift up or at least change the direction.

I'm not sure of the feeling I want the audience to have at the end, so maybe when I finally figure out if I want it to be happy or sad, I can put something together. I honestly haven't given that part much thought yet
 
MrWrOng, it was good but again as some of them have pointed out it reads more like "Directors Thoughts" then a true screenplay but it definitely has some real good potential.

Also the depth of character that you are trying to reach could be played by only seasoned actors. Any slack in the acting could make it look realy average so you have to make sure that you have some real good actors.

keep it up.

Cheers,

-Krish
 
nameless and faceless

nameless and faceless

I like the idea of an 'anybody, anywhere' approach, but IMHO you ned to pick one recognizeable name, like lonely teen, or even little brother, but keep it consistent. Switching from speaking teen to little brother makes the reader work too hard to enjoy the story's depth.

A
 
One last thing, I referenced an obscure 70's film "92 in the shade" adapted by Thomas McGuane from his own novel. The book has an ending similar to yours, when it was adapted to the screen McGuane fought the studio to keep the dark ending. As I recall he lost that fight. I've never been one to dismiss studio wisdom, even when someone of McGuane's stature is involved.

It's Peter Falk, Warren Oates, Margot Kidder, Harry Dean Stanton. Written and Directed by McGuane. Oh my...
http://imdb.com/title/tt0072594/
 
I've always felt weird about endings. Typically I like happy endings. But I also like to try to base my films around the idea of what can happen and what actually does happen. This one's a tragedy, in the sense that no character in it can escape their own flaws long enough to prevent the worst. I think that's an aspect of human character that we normally try to overlook, because it's so dark. So it's sort of a mix - the brother is in a better spot, as he and his lover are sticking together, but Johnny was just too far gone to come back.

Is it the best way to express the situation? It certainly makes you think about it - and out here, I come across people like him far too often (which inspired the story), the problem with so many people on drugs like crack and meth is that oftentimes, they're just too far gone to come back. I want that darkness to remain, as a warning to others who watch, that even in the magical world of film, sometimes these drugs are just too powerful.

Alex, I'll definitely fix up the name. You're right that it makes the reader work too hard, and I want to make sure it flows. I was just thinking of not giving away the relationship at the very beginning, but it's not a twist I plan on keeping terribly under wraps, so I'll go ahead and fix it up.

Krish, in my experience I've found it's always better to overwrite, because you can always pull back. Like if you're singing, you want to go past the note you want to hit, then pull back to get it right - but if you do too little and try to come up underneath it, you have to work that much harder to get it right. But it's only a first draft, so it'll probably get cleaned up more as I look at my notes and scene analysis and figure out what works and what doesn't.

This is great feedback, thanks everybody!
 
Hey, liked the story. I agree with the others that the names were hard for some of it - I think Mother and Father are fine, but when I see names like Little Brother used on characters other than someone who is only mentioned or appears in passing it makes me think of the Berenstein Bears (not necessarily what you want in this kind of story, but thats probably just a problem with me). Regardless of that, I see what youre talking about with the characters being anyone, but since youre probably going to direct this and those names wont even matter to an audience member watching the finished product, I dont think it would matter to give an actual name to any or all of the characters. (PS is Mike the 'friend' from the beginning? If so, why not just refer to him as Mike?)

I would have to disagree with the others a bit, I didnt see the father as a protagonist at all. If anything, I saw him as the unstoppable antagonist. I got the point that hes bad and abusive, but it seemed to me that he was abusive just to be...well, the bad guy. I saw in his lines that he claimed he was trying to help, but just saying it doesnt always put the point across, we have to see actions as well. How does dragging a drug addict back home to beat the crap out of constitute helping? Sure, it may in his mind, but still the character seems flatly antagonistic to me because of the actions. I wouldve liked to see a little more about him actually wanting whats best, or having a moment when he wasnt either threatening to beat someone up, beating someone up or beating someone up with an evil glare. Also, I would rething how many times he says 'what the f--- are you doing' after he comes home, seems like its almost every line out of his mouth.

The other thing that struck me as odd about the dad was the dinner table scene. He seems to encourage the little brother to go to a movie, but going to a movie with friends isnt exactly an 'aftercshool activity' like being on a sports team, etc. I would figure the dad would be suspicious if the little brother wanted to go out with friends as he didnt want him to turn up like Johnny.

I dont know what draft youre on, but I would also think about whose story this is before you shoot. It was touched on before, but it seems like the dad is almost a main character, Johnny seems to be the main character now, yet it opens on the little brother and his friend, and we have some time spent solely on the mom as well. They all have good stories and interesting qualities, but the problem with something of this length is inserting this kind of characterization yet still making it somebodys story (of course it doesnt have to be, but if not it can come off as disjointed).

For the opening, I might do away with the ending-as-beginning all together. I think it makes it completely obvious what will happen once we see who the brother is and that the dad is abusive. If you keep it, the slow-mo rewind is your call - I think its too much like Memento, but again your call. As mentioned by others, this will hinge a lot on your performances, but alas thats always the case with strictly dramatic pieces - can make or break them. Good luck and hope it turns out as you envision!
 
Thanks Wade, the feedback is very thoughtful and considerate!

You're right about the father - I think he's the weakest character, I'm writing him solely as the force and not as the character. I want to go back and change that... I was hoping to shoot this ASAP but I think it's got too much potential to be rushed, and you're right on that.

For the perspective, I'm writing it more from the idea of the dissolution of the family, not from any one character. Each character is on a trajectory that they can't pull away from, so rather than being any one person who has an opportunity to act independently, it's more like 4 locomotives on a collision course. But this is also why I wrote the beginning the way I did - it's meant to be obvious what's going to happen, so that instead of wondering what will happen, it's already known... the audience can focus on the why and how instead.

But the backwards movement is pretty cheesy... I think I will drop that. I've got a couple of other ideas, though, so maybe they will work better. I'm gonna try writing them out today.
 
I thought the story was good. Very intense.

In deciding whether to have a happy ending or not - I would go with a more uplifting ending given the amount of hardship that takes place during the majority of it.

I like the use of the medals - maybe flesh that out more as a means to define the Dad.

I like how you described the beginning but another idea might be to start the film showing the little brother and friend looking over Johnny. Then maybe flash to the gun scene, or the militant father, or the medals - as a means of visual confusion - and then into the real-time story. That way we would have a mish-mash of images and the intention of the story becomes sorting those things out. In that way you keep the technique that the end is also the beginning of the story. Just an idea.

I struggled with the inactivity of the Mom. I know that's her character but damn - she's in the worst position of any of them.

Another idea, and maybe you were alluding to this already - but are you framing this as a military family? Maybe the dad wants his sons to become soldiers and instead he's angry at what they have become - and in fact it's all in spite of him and the way he treats his family. That could be a great driver for this material. I feel like it needs something more like that - an undercurrent that carries it. You hit on something good with the medal - I would extend that plot device out a little more.

All in all, it is a powerful story. Nice work.
 
mrWr0ng said:
. and out here, I come across people like him far too often (which inspired the story), the problem with so many people on drugs like crack and meth is that oftentimes, they're just too far gone to come back.
Click to expand...

This I think is your theme and can make for a more nuanced finale. Reaching the point of no return is an emotional event and I don't think it needs punctuation with gun powder.
 
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