Friday, January 20, 2012

Week 3 - A Cool Fuel Duel

INT. KITCHEN - DAY

JOHN (early 40's) and LINDSAY BIRNBAUM (late 30's) serve their daughter MAYRA (6) breakfast while persuading her to endorse their respective vehicles.

John slides a stack of pancakes down to Mayra.

JOHN

See, Mommy thinks her car is special because she can charge it on an iPod dock.

LINDSAY

(applying copious syrup to MAYRA's breakfast)

Mommy's car runs on lightening! Isn't that neat?

JOHN

(cutting the pancakes for Mayra)

Not really though.

LINDSAY

Is lightening electricity?

JOHN

Yeah, but-

LINDSAY

And does my car run on electricity?

JOHN

Sure, but that's not-

LINDSAY

Then my car runs on lightening!

Lindsay slides Mayra a big ice cold glass of milk.

MAYRA

What does your car run on, Daddy?

JOHN

My car runs on exploding dinosaurs!

MAYRA

Daddy wins!

Friday, January 13, 2012

Week 2 - Baby on Bird

INT. DOCTOR'S OFFICE - DAY

DR. BRIDGES observes the test results and turns back to face his concerned patient SANDRA.

DR. BRIDGES

I'm not sure what to say. Everything seems fully-functional here. Is it possible that the problem lies with your sexual partner?

SANDRA

Oh, no! I don't have a partner. I've decided to go the stork route.

DR. BRIDGES

The stork route?

SANDRA

Yes. I've heard that babies are often delivered to caring mothers free-of-charge by well-trained storks?

DR. BRIDGES

Yes, well, that's a common misconception.

Friday, January 6, 2012

Week 1 - MacLeod Realty

INT. MODEL HOME - DAY

ANGELA and RICK pace the length and width of the garage counting silently to themselves. REALTOR KELLY observes the practice impatiently.

ANGELA

And do you happen to know the square footage of the garage?

KELLY

(consulting her notes)

It should be an even 400.

RICK

Is that enough for two SUVs?

KELLY

Well, I guess that depends on what you're calling an SUV.

ANGELA

We both drive Highlanders.

KELLY

In that case, I think there can be only one.

Wednesday, November 23, 2011

Excuses, excuses.

EXT. SANTA MONICA COURTHOUSE - DAY

BRUCE FINK, 38 overweight and coffee-stained, shuffles up the courthouse steps fifteen minutes late for his own divorce proceedings, in keeping with his soon-to-be-ex-wife's expectations.

High atop the steps, KAREN stands with her lawyer, arms akimbo.

KAREN

You look like shit.

BRUCE

Sorry I'm late.

KAREN

What happened to the nice pants I bought you?

BRUCE

I had to have the waist taken out.

KAREN

Is that waist with an 'I' or an 'E'.

BRUCE

Fuck you, Karen.

Thursday, June 23, 2011

Half of a conversation...

EXT. PARK - DAY

A young man chats on a phone in a park.

PHONER

Well, maybe you can borrow some money from your dad or something.

A pause.

PHONER

Really, prison? What for?

A pause.

PHONER

Wow. Well, I guess it could have been worse.

A pause.

PHONER

It could have been THIRD degree murder.

A pause.

PHONER

First is worse than third?

A pause.

PHONER

Well, sooorrry. I'm not a lawyer. I thought it was like burns... or karate belts.

A pause.

PHONER

Yeah I get that... noooooooow.

Tuesday, April 19, 2011

I don't know. CAN you?

INT. BAR - NIGHT

A MAN steps in from the cold through the thick carcinogenic exhaust of the evening crowd.

His eyes come to rest on a WOMAN at the bar, her beauty radiating through the tufts of smoke.

He approaches.

MAN

Can I buy you a drink?

WOMAN

What do I look like? Freecreditreport.com?

MAN

Sorry, MAY I buy you a drink?

Monday, December 6, 2010

Equal Wrongs

My submission to the Kid In The Front Row's second annual Screenwriting competition (which I won last year). My new submission was a finalist this year!

Here are the rules, followed by my submission.

- You must have these THREE characters: Margaret, Abdul and Regina. These are the ONLY characters you can have.
- Your story takes place at the Headquarters of: 'The Equal Rights Committee.' The only locations (within the headquarters) are: Meeting Room, Kitchen, Secret Shelter.
- You must include this line of dialogue somewhere in the script: "Who the hell is Mark Flamstein?"

INT. KITCHEN - NIGHT

MARGARET, 27, dressed business casual and angry in a sexy way, bursts into the break room kitchen.

Close behind her, ABDUL, 31, overweight with a loose tie and untucked shirt, strolls in with a smirk.

MARGARET

I cannot believe this is happening! At the Equal Rights Committee of all places!

ABDUL

(feigning ignorance)

What’s the matter, Maggie? You seem upset.

MARGARET

You’re just loving this, aren’t you? Another perfectly capable, qualified woman is overlooked so a man can be promoted instead.

ABDUL

I’m confused. Do you want Equal Rights or to be treated better than everyone else?

MARGARET

Oh, come on, Abdul! I’m more than qualified for that position and you know it.

ABDUL

I am every bit as qualified as you are and I’ve been here twice as long as you. How DOESN'T that make me the ideal candidate?

MARGARET

You have NOT been here twice as long as me.

ABDUL

When I started here, Mark Flamstein was the committee head. He left, what, seven years ago? When did YOU start?

MARGARET

Whatever. That’s not even my point!

ABDUL

What is your point, Maggie?

REGINA, 25 and cute if she would ever smile, meanders into the kitchen.

REGINA

What are you two screaming about this time?

MARGARET

Surprise, surprise. Abdul got the promotion after all.

ABDUL

Maggie’s just a little jealous is all.

MARGARET

This has nothing to do with jealousy... and STOP CALLING ME MAGGIE! This is about yet another woman being swept aside for the perpetual gratification of the American male!

REGINA

Ooh, this is getting juicy!

MARGARET

You don’t even take the job seriously!

(to REGINA)

I mean look at the way he dresses!

(back to ABDUL)

How do you go into a meeting looking like that and come out with a better job?!

ABDUL

I thought untucked shirts were all the rage... No?

MARGARET

(back to REGINA)

And remember when they caught him stealing people’s lunches?

(to ABDUL)

They could’ve fired you for that.

ABDUL

Oh, come on! Everybody’s stolen food from this fridge at one point or another! It’s a madhouse down here!

MARGARET

I haven’t!

Regina looks down in embarrassment.

REGINA

I have.

ABDUL

See!? Regina knows what I’m talking about!

MARGARET

Don’t you DARE try to guilt Regina over to your side of the argument.

ABDUL

Well it doesn’t matter anyway because after this week I shouldn’t even find myself on the same floor with you two anyway.

Abdul snatches a sack lunch from the top shelf of the fridge. He peeks inside and slides out a small bottle of milk.

MARGARET

Why keep your lunch in the break room kitchen where we commoners can steal it now that you have a fridge in your new office?

ABDUL

Who said this was MY lunch?

Abdul takes a long sip of the milk as Regina reads the name scribbled across the sack lunch on the counter.

REGINA

Who the hell is Mark Flamstein?

Abdul chokes on the milk and spits it up all over himself.

Friday, September 10, 2010

Land Before Your Time

INT. ELEVATOR - DAY

PATRICK ages in an elevator with JUSTIN BIEBER. They talk about movies.

JUSTIN

...and the racing scenes are awesome.

PATRICK

Yeah! The thing with the jeep almost reminded me of Jurassic Park.

JUSTIN

Of what?

PATRICK

The scene in Jurassic Park where the T-Rex is after the jeep.

JUSTIN

I don't know if I've seen that one.

Patrick is confused.

PATRICK

If you've seen Jurassic Park? With the dinosaurs and the Goldblum and everything?

JUSTIN

Must've been before I was born.

PATRICK

What? No, this is recent. This was like '93.

JUSTIN

I was born in 94.

PATRICK

You're shitting me.

Bieber shrugs. The elevator stops.

PATRICK (CONT'D)

This is my stop.

JUSTIN

I have a ways to go.

Patrick exits.

Wednesday, July 28, 2010

Sequels, Remakes, and Reboots

In response to a task assigned by The Kid in the Front Row, today I will be discussing my thoughts on the recent proliferation of Sequels, Remakes, and Reboots. As no two of these are precisely the same beast, I will be breaking them down one at a time.

Sequels

Sequels have an undeserved negative stigma. From a producorial standpoint, the reason a sequel is even considered for production is because an original film proves successful. So from the start, a sequel has name recognition and characters that have worked before. Most original films are at an automatic disadvantage in this case as most films do not have worthwhile characters and have to spend a considerable amount of screen time defining people that the audience might not even connect with. Not the case with sequels. You know these guys, they are tried and true.

I think where sequels often fail is when they are compared to the earlier films of the franchise instead of being judged independently. Is Godfather 3 a true failure? Maybe compared to Godfather 2 it is. But what isn't a failure compared to Godfather 2... other than Ghostbusters of course. I can't think of anything. Judged independently of the franchise, I would call Godfather 3 deserving of its Best Picture nomination at the very least.

In some cases, as with the aforementioned Godfather Part II, a sequel outdoes its original. The Toy Story franchise appears to have done this twice now. Spiderman 2 was better than the first according to most people, and I've always preferred the second installments of the Gremlins, Short Circuit, Terminator, and Alien series. As well as, I'm sure, countless many more. But as an audience we gloss over those. We focus on the Transformers 2's and the Spiderman 3's and point to them as the true indicators.

Third installments have an even harder time. They are victim to a "trilogy curse" which is something akin to the "Poltergeist curse" in that it is relatively unsubstantiated, except that Poltergeist three is pretty bad. What I mean is most third installments are good. Make a list of every one you can think of and cross off the bad ones. I'm sure you will have crossed off fewer than half. Now make a list of movies in general and cross off the bad ones. Interesting. Look at your Back to the Future Part IIIs, your Last Crusades, your With A Vengeances, and don't compare them to BTTF or Raiders or Die Hard. Just watch them. Enjoy them. They're good movies.

Some franchises take until their fourth installment to fall completely flat but often this is the fault of the time spent between numbers 3 and 4. Complain all you want about The Phantom Menace, Live Free or Die Hard, and Crystal Skull, but some franchises are just hitting their stride with the fourth or fifth movie. For example, Leprechaun in Space (the fourth of the series) is the jewel of my Pot of Gore DVD boxed set. Hands down.

What's important to remember is that, with the obvious exception of the occasional Lucas or Spielberg film, simply adding a film to a franchise doesn't actually affect the original. You can always go back and watch what you loved in the first place and not have to worry about all the guns being replaced with walkie talkies.

Remakes

In keeping with the pattern I've laid out. Remakes can go either way. You have your A-Team's where people flip out over the casting a UFC fighter, ignoring the fact that the acting shoes he's meant to fill belong to Mr. T. That movie went through a lot of writers, a lot of producers had their hands in it, and as any film geek will tell you, it's awful. Unless he didn't read that somewhere and actually sat down intending to enjoy the movie, in which case, I'll bet he did.

The reason for this is simple, remakes are not automatically bad. Just occasionally.

Where I usually find myself most disappointed is when a foreign film is adapted and watered down for American audiences. This is not to say that all adaptations of foreign films fail their predecessors, I much prefer Vanilla Sky to Abre Los Ojos, but when I hear things like the now defunct remake of Old Boy coming from Steven Spielberg and Will Smith, I have to assume they are changing the punch-line. Of course, this is an unfair judgment as the film never came to be, perhaps specifically because of a futile attempt to preserve the ending in the face of producer intervention. Much in the same way, I have lately found myself unfairly biased against Matt Reeves' Let Me In. Judging from the trailer alone, it doesn't stand out enough from the original for me to want to see it, and at best the ending can only resemble the original's. To tone it down would be a shame and to outdo it would be unnecessary. This unfortunately leaves Matt Reeves in the remake territory of Gus Van Sant. And yet, I would be thrilled to see any country take on remaking Kinji Fukasaku's Battle Royale, watered down or not. My first real disappointment of this nature was with the American version of the Vanishing. I remember wondering why someone would adapt something and then change only the most appealing part of the original. At least Vanilla Sky had the common sense to recast Penelope Cruz.

I hesitate to refer to films like the Social Network or Monopoly here because I don't know if they are remakes in the strictest sense. More likely these examples are considered adaptations. But hesitation implies I must go on. People get incensed when they find out something like the Country Bears or a Geico advertising campaign is actually getting produced and there garbage script isn't because they assume that any possible film would have as little substance as the original incarnation itself. And so I bring up a point John August recently made on his own blog which is, the vaguer a license you are adapting into a film, the better the film can possibly be. August uses Pirates of the Caribbean in his example. The ride doesn't have an implicit story, so the writer gets to make one up. If I was forced to adapt a doll to the screen, I would absolutely choose Stretch Armstrong over G.I. Joe because Joe has a background. He has a specific profession. He has an entire history in the form of an animated series. What the hell is Stretch? What's the mythology there? Be creative! Make it up!

Reboots

George Lazenby got laughed out of a job when the more astute audience members of Her Majesty's Secret Service noticed he wasn't Sean Connery. So they brought Connery back for a bit (because after leaving the Bond films he was so desperate for work he took reduced pay for films like Zardoz) and by the time Roger Moore showed up, audiences had accepted that now, since more than one person had already played Mr. Bond, they could accept a new face. Also, blasphemy: Roger Moore is my favorite. And here's why; he is in the better movies. He's not the best Bond. But I'd rather watch Man With the Golden Gun or Moonraker than any of Connery's lot. As far as I'm concerned, Roger Moore was the first successful franchise reboot.

Since then it's relatively slim pickins. Star Trek was a popular one, stemming largely from the fact that people will like whatever J.J. Abrams does, especially if it also happens to be really good, and the original Star Trek film was something of a flop. I think where people are turned off is when a film is rebooted within a decade of an original. It throws people off. So when the last decade saw the casting of not one, not two, but three Hulks in the span of three films, there is something of a fatigue to it. Although strangely, despite my point, I am excited to see Ruffalo in the role. Spiderman less so, as I fear the worst, in the form of a Twilight/Spiderman mash-up. Also, the announcement that Fox is looking to reboot the Fantastic Four franchise simply because failing to do so would cause rights to the characters to revert back to Marvel aka Disney, does not instill confidence in even the most avid of fans. But as often as people want to make Batman movies people will be lining up around the block, occasionally with good reason.

In summary, sequels, remakes, and reboots are not inherently bad... at least, no more than original films are inherently bad. In fact, I would argue, on a purely percentage basis, they are more successful, critically and financially, than original works.

And then, flying in the face of my own logic, I pray nightly that Ghostbusters 3 never comes to fruition.

Thursday, July 1, 2010

So I Won All Five Contests Already!

Oh wait, nope. Didn't even make the quarterfinals on any of them. Oh well. Must be a lot of great scripts rolling around. I particularly enjoyed this nugget of wisdom with the announcement of the Silver Screenwriting Quarterfinalists...

"this year, the scripts that didn’t make the cut were far worse than the scripts that didn’t make the cut last year."

So that's encouraging.