Trigger Finger

Farnsworth

Farnsworth

Active member
"Nobody shoots that good. Nobody. Unless his trigger finger's got a mind of its own."


First draft done, just waiting on some feedback for a polish.
 
I enjoyed the writing. Your descriptions and dialogue flow easily and beautifully. Possibly your plot was a bit thin and a tad predictable but the characters felt real nonetheless. Thanks for the story, its almost like the opening of an old school Mel Gibson movie!
 
Hehe this was quite an enjoyable romp / Spoilers/

This script to me is a bit like a guilty pleasure, I love gunslinger movies, / gunplay action / spaghetti western etc and thats all in here.

What in some way i think lets it down a wee bit is the cliched 'strapped to a chair garage' scene and the angry 'you messed up my shipments' boss. Im surprised folk bother to write those kinds of scenarios now - which is the thing about this script - the concept of the 12 guys, the hero getting a chance etc - its great, and builds REAL suspense towards the end.

I was like oooh... how is this going to go (and of course we get our delicious little twist.) So not bad, but i would suggest tinkinering with the settings, so you don't have folk making so many pre-judgements on the opening scene/setting.

But well done mate i enjoyed it.
 
Really thought this was neatly done in the way it was written. Liked the telling of it a great deal, a smart use of the flashback, especially with the ricochet moment.

Not sold on the story, think the twist is more straight than turny, and having set it up so that I wanted to know where it went I think I was a wee bit disappointed it didn't really go anywhere. But still, I think a good job.
 
I liked this! Well written, and you've got some good dialogue. I liked the problem with the shears - it bought a nice comic moment to a script that could otherwise have been a bit heavy.

I guessed the ending a couple of pages before the end, but I still think it was well written. Besides, I can't really talk about obvious twists - my entry has one too!

I agree with Lawriejaffa about the setting. I don't think a garage is necessarily going to give people preconceptions about the story - it didn't for me - but I do think that having six people in one garage would be a bit too cramped, especially from a filming perspective.

It might make it a bit more dynamic if you set it in the warehouse of the original shoot-out, blood stained walls and everything. Just my suggestion.

Really loved the script, well done!
 
Enjoyable tale. I think lawriejaffa is right on about some of the plot points. A few of them are overdone. I think you could easily improve the script just by changing the motivation of the gunman. I don't think the audience necessarily needs to know why he's taking out these bad guys, but if it was something more involved that just thugs moving a shippment that could add a lot to this story.

Saw the ending coming, but it's still a pretty good moment in the script.
 
Your basic two-car garage. Dusty, utilitarian. Some
shelves with paint cans, empty washer fluid jugs. A spare tire in the corner. Garden tools hanging from hooks on the walls. Big garage door with sunlight dribbling through a crack at the bottom.

*I think a lot of extra words here, which means a lot of extra reading. 'Utilitarian' is probably enough,

Your basic two-car garage. Dusty, utilitarian. Big garage door with sunlight dribbling through a crack at the bottom.

This …

He’s tied with about fifty feet of garden hose.

Can’t say I’ve seen that yet. Cool idea.

This …

They form up in a circle around him, some lean against the walls, one sits on the spare tire,

*If it’s a two car garage, and Guy is in the middle, be hard to ‘form up’ in a circle and lean against the wall and sit on tires in the corner at the same time.

I think ‘the guy’ should have a name by now. Goons, a guy and Leonard.

*****

As soon as the finger was cut off I knew the ending.

Maybe you were going for the mtsterious man with no name, but it was kinda irritating.

Well written but could use a haircut on the extra words used to set up and explain actions.

Plot is a little soft.

Very enjoyable and quick read. Nice work.

aw
 
Hey guys, thanks for all the feedback. Can't say I disagree with most of it.

At the risk of seeming to be making excuses, I intended to just get the basic flow down in the first draft and then rip out all the cliches in the second draft. Then, of course, I ran out of time and ended up submitting an only slightly tweaked first draft. So I do agree that there are some overly familiar elements in there.

I do like not giving the guy a name, though. Somehow, giving him a name robs him of his mystery.
 
Strong story. Nice swift and easy read. Could see the end coming (but again might be just me, but felt I seen it somewhere before). I liked not giving him a name (worked in Layer Cake). But you could give him a name in the script - just not use in dialog/story. Motivation was unclear - to me. Why was he killing them? Maybe a page or two on his back story or flashback (unless you want this to remain a mystery).

Overall nice work and good luck with it.
 
Nice work! It was a great story and at no point did I feel lost as I read it, nor did I even consider putting it down until the end.

I actually didn't see the ending coming. I thought he was going to use his left hand for a classic 2-handed grip and his middle finger for the trigger finger. Back at the garden shears scene, I thought he was going to be forced to fight them with the shears as his weapon. So all these little surprises/twists (to me, maybe I'm dense) made it even more fun to read. I can't wait to see it on the big screen. ;-)
 
Very nice script for what it is. I agree with the above that there is no reason or explaination for his hatred of the goons. But, saying that, it is well written and I enjoyed the interigation. Nice ending, even if it was easy. I enjoyed reading it, well done.
 
I liked the fact that there was no specified reason for him to have shot the guys, or why he hated the goons an leonard so much, and the fact he didn't have a name. Had it been a full length script, I think those things would have needed explaining, but it works well in the short to leave them unexplained - definitely adds to the mystery!
 
alex whitmer said:


*I think a lot of extra words here, which means a lot of extra reading. 'Utilitarian' is probably enough,

Click to expand...

I just wanted to bring up a slight difference of opinion on this. No offense to Alex, of course. :)

Check out the first paragraph of the script for "Blade Runner":

-----------------
INT. TYRELL CORPORATION LOCKER ROOM - DAY


THE EYE



It's magnified and deeply revealed. Flecks of green
and yellow in a field of milky blue. Icy filaments
surround the undulating center.
----------------

Writing detail is not automatically a bad thing. It clearly doesn't worry David Peoples. :)
 
Farnsworth said:
Check out the first paragraph of the script for "Blade Runner":

-----------------
INT. TYRELL CORPORATION LOCKER ROOM - DAY

THE EYE

It's magnified and deeply revealed. Flecks of green
and yellow in a field of milky blue. Icy filaments
surround the undulating center.
----------------
Writing detail is not automatically a bad thing. It clearly doesn't worry David Peoples.
Click to expand...

That movie sucked! Sure in it's time it was remarkable. But I just watched it again and it wouldn't fly today. I found my self yelling at the screen on occasion because of the bad writing. Take this example. The police dude is explaining what the robots are to the blade runner? Really, I would expect that he knows all of this already, but thanks for explaining it to the audience. But remember once you're are famous and/or successful you can write whatever you want and get away with it. :)
 
Chris_Keaton said:
That movie sucked! Sure in it's time it was remarkable. But I just watched it again and it wouldn't fly today. I found my self yelling at the screen on occasion because of the bad writing. Take this example. The police dude is explaining what the robots are to the blade runner? Really, I would expect that he knows all of this already, but thanks for explaining it to the audience. But remember once you're are famous and/or successful you can write whatever you want and get away with it. :)
Click to expand...
Sorry, dude! The movie rocks. Especially the original cut.

Just my 2 cents.

Let's not get off topic though. :)
 
Alex kind of beat me to the punch.

Don't get me wrong, I am a brutally hardcore right-brainer and normally not a critiquer of the technical. But...
The ACTION to DIALOGUE ratio was way out of whack. As is, it reads somewhat like a novel. This script probably should be around 5, maybe 6 pages long.

Now that I got that outta the way:

I did enjoy Trigger Finger.

I was especially impressed with your captivating use of 1 location (+ the brief flashback). That, when done well, always impresses the hell out of me. Also, I love the garage because it has never been done before.

The ending was predictable...but only if you are looking at is as a twist (which I didn't). As a man-with-no-name story it delivers closure on-time and still hot from the oven.

One other point...Although I dug this story, I may be having a wee bit of trouble finding the "pulpiness" factor. Hmmmm

:beer:
 
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