Exordium

[dkl4335]

Log Line: The most significant technological breakthrough in the last 100 years leads to the most terrifying discovery of all time. Now, on the precipice of extinction, one woman will fight to preserve our humanity against one man who would reshape our species in his own image.

It's pretty long, I know (25 pages) but I wrote the narrative with a lot of detail to help with my development of the script. Hopefully if you have the patience, you'll be rewarded with a good story. All feedback is welcome! (And hi...as a new member to the forum!).

[marc]

Welcome to the forum! And thanks for the submission. I'm sure some of our members will check out your treatment and post feedback soon.

[WriteNow]

dkl4335, welcome-

So glad to see a new face contributing here. I like the title of your treatment and the log line has gotten my attention. I'm going to take it with me on a camping trip next week and come back with my thoughts.

Also, I wouldn't worry about the length. Treatments are tending to be longer these days. Partly because with larger, fx heavy films, you have to be pretty descriptive, even in the early goings, so the producer/studio/financiers have a good idea what the price tag will be, and so that set/character/production designers have more to work with.

[dkl4335]

Thanks for taking the time Writenow...I really look forward to your comments. Have a great camping trip!

[WriteNow]

OK then-

First off, sorry for the long delay in getting around to critiquing your work. As much as I love helping out here at MovieTreatments.com it's pretty far down on my list of priorities at the moment for various reasons and that makes putting off my work here much easier than putting off other things so . . . oftentimes I won't come through with a critique as fast as I'd like, or as soon as I had promised.

Anyway, on to the treatment.

As I said before I love the title. It's meaningless to me in and of itself but has some vaguely precious, sought-after quality. A rare element that can do something amazing? A new alloy that is so special people will kill to find out the secret to making it? A rock band? I don't know, but it has got me thinking and if this title were plastered on a bus or billboard and you (well, not you , dkl4335) and a friend spotted it I'm sure something like that would occur. "What?" "Where?" "Who?" "Why?" and most importantly- "When does it open?"

Grab them with the title. Check.

First off I noticed the professional layout and overall feel of your treatment. It's long, too. This is a good thing- as I mentioned above. I've noticed lately that people who write longer treatments will include a very short (1-2 max) synopsis at the beginning. Even if it isn't requested, this can only help you. (Everyone note this, it is good advice I promise you.) In Hollywood, I oftentimes would wonder just when my treatments were being tossed in the can by some bored exec. Was it before the amazing plot twist that IS the movie? Was there anyway to prevent that? Sure, you can tell your readers what you are going to tell them before you tell them. Like a topic paragraph in a Comp 101 paper. But if your treatment is short, under fifteen pages or so then it's a bad idea. Even though we writers all know that the studio execs who decide our fate are complete fools (unless they buy it), you're not doing yourself any good implying that they can't handle ten pages of text.

So, twenty-six pages if fine. For me, twenty is the magic number. But it's not written in stone. "Take only what you need to survive," said a friend on this topic (quoting which film forumites?). If it takes twenty-six, it takes twenty-six. A screen writing teacher once told me the best writer needs the fewest pages, something I've never forgotten.

Also, I see you have registered it with the WGA. For the small amount of time and money it takes to do this there's no reason not too UNLESS you have no intention of shopping the project OR you write at such a furious pace it's just a hassle. (I'm not kidding about that, either. I friend of mine would crank out a full script (almost) weekly. He just let them pile up and after a few months and a few dozen scripts it would have cost a bit of money so he just put a fake number on the title page and figured it was just as good. Kind of like the people who plaster fake home security stickers on their windows. He never sold anything, anyway.)

I recommend everyone double-spaces their work. For the simple reason that it makes it more inviting, easier to read. Twenty-six single spaced pages will take longer to read than fifty-two double-spaced ones. (Or feel that way.) Trust me. Of course that cuts half your text or gives you a fifty-two page treatment so what do you do? Cut, cut, cut is pretty much the only option. But single spacing is fine, no one will complain. For me though, I've always double spaced and always will. (I wish I had a story about a single spaced treatment I shopped for years before making it double spaced and selling it instantly! But I don't.)

First paragraph, very important. And it's good. We have a hook planted (the flash? what was that?) and some nice details. But I'm already worried. You've got half a page spent describing the chaos in the control room that you could have gotten across with something like "chaos erupts in the control room." Sure, it reads nicer the way you did it but keep in mind someone else will probably write the script and change- or ignore- small details like that, if the director actually films them. When it comes to treatments if it's not essential to the story, ditch it. You know those paint-by-number things that kids do? Consider yourself to be making a write-by-numbers template for the eventual screenwriter. Just the blank framework, enough to let the details flow out easily later but not enough to bog things down.

"Langford smiles wryly . . ." Don't use the word wryly. Hollywood people hate it, because it's really overused in treatments and screenplays and especially because it seems amateurish. I even think Syd Field wrote a chapter in one of his books about unnecessary, overused words and he used "wryly" as an example. Plus, I don't think anyone actually knows what it means.

Anyway, a few pages and so far we have a murder-mystery with a little end of the world scenario thrown into the mix (it's 2012, of course). Timely, that. Our male lead is a no-nonsense homicide detective and our female lead is not yet on the scene. The probable "bad guy" is completely revealed shockingly early it seems, but maybe I need to keep reading. (And the good news is- I want to keep reading, to find out what's really going on. You've hooked me so far-)

This bothered me, though: "In the car Langford and Ruiz speculate as to why Simmons didn't mention [Benning's absence] initially, but finally relegate it to insignificance." Really? Two veteran cops hashing out a murder decide that Simmons omitting her during their discussion is "insignificant"? It's their only lead and she's been "sick" so he just decided to forget about her completely? This is something of a "Oh, come on!" moment for me. Of course, we the audience will think this points to a cover-up by Simmons. And sure enough in the next paragraph that's revealed to be the case. It makes our cops seem a bit lacking in their deduction skills. It kind of deflates the audiences "lost in the movie" feeling when the audience surrogate- Langford- seems to act in an unbelievable way.

Also, I'm starting to notice the "novel-like" way you are writing. It's good writing, but overly descriptive and unnecessary for a treatment. The four or five sentences describing Reece and the way he walks, and what that lets on, for example. I would lose all of it. Say "An average-looking man deftly negotiates the city environment on the way to his hotel." It's a structural consideration, not a stylistic one. There's just no place for so much description in a treatment. But at least it's well-written.

Now, the hotel room scene itself is good. But- we haven't seen Benning yet, correct? So we don't know (officially) that they are talking about her (even though we saw the picture) until . . . well, I'm not sure. It's revealed to the reader but not mentioned in the action. " . . . how he knows the target, Catherine Benning." Just seemed like an odd way to reveal that. Nice job with the priest's last words though, getting around the 'no dialogue' rule of treatments effectively.

We are told about Jack's daughter briefly, how loving she is and how close Ruiz is to her . . . and I'm already worried about her. She will probably be taken hostage or outright killed, I predict. In any event she will certainly come up again, mostly likely as leverage.

[WriteNow]

"A counter indicating two views of the data had taken place that day." A police station/internet/bank data page view counter? This is referring to the web page itself that he's viewing or maybe its some fancy police program? I don't know, it's just a little detail that screams "You are watching a movie" to me.

Now this is nicely written- the whole bus terminal scene. I like how you momentarily obscure the cops identities so we don't know who's been stabbed or what's going on. It feels like I'm watching the movie unfold- probably the greatest thing a treatment can accomplish. And it took me a moment to realize that the "two cops" were not "our" two cops. I was lost in the action. Great.

And what's this? The "Big Reveal"? So soon? Hmmmmm. It's definitely an interesting concept (for those that haven't read it the mystery device is basically a telescope into the past and . . . future? It says only future events "unaffected by human consciousness" can be seen but I don't quite follow . . .) Nonetheless by making us able to view the past (a star's death) it has predicted our future (our death, on Dec. 12th, 2012 no less). Oh, and the pole's are also going to reverse, which will kill us all anyway, so that's a double dose of extinction. Lots of exposition about spaceships and a new planet and other stuff that is a little hard to swallow, but this is a movie, after all. Oh, and a massive earthquake is about to hit so everyone should hurry it up a bit . . .

Wow. Suddenly we've gone from murder mystery to disaster movie with just one scene. I am curious, and a bit concerned, to see how this all plays out. Still hooked, now a bit cautiously.

So we do some traveling and then BAM! we get treated to another deftly written action scene- the (attempted) raid on the house. I have to say dkl4335 that you have a knack for writing action. Very clear descriptions, and even better- a sense of physical space, and everyone's relationship in it. Hopefully the director will follow your lead and not give us the quick-cut, shaky handheld style often used today.

(I'm not going to list all your typos- not that they are that bad- but I keep noticing "missing" words, i.e. "Jack secures the pilot to the chair after assuring that he isn't carrying any weapons . . ." I'm assuming "himself" was supposed to follow "assuring" but you just skipped over it accidentally. I've seen it happen enough to mention so I'm letting you know. And for you and everyone- PROOFREAD your treatment. It must be flawless on a basic grammatical level. Do not give anyone an excuse to throw your hard work in the trash.)

Now we have more exposition, doled out in a similar manner to the last exposition-heavy scene, given via slides and video like a class presentation. I like it, it's almost as if you are saying "Here's your exposition, but at least I'm jazzing it up for you". Good thing Benning had the speech all set up and ready to roll, isn't it? (Another "movie moment", but it's not too bad.)

. . . wow . . . LOTS of exposition . . . and . . . we're officially in "Movie-land" now. Biological computers, synthetic DNA, nano-mytes that need a human host . . . whew. Well, I guess if you're going to go down this road it's best to go "all-in" as you have. ("The Matrix" did this as well, to great effect.) One question I have is why would they only have two people set up to be the hosts for the transport computer when it's such a critical aspect of the whole plan?

And what's this? A cheat? Angel recounts Benning's explanation for knowing Jack's daughter was to be the host, sidestepping the 'real' explanation? Actually a good strategy when dealing with far fetched exposition. Still, how was she able to see things that would have been affected by human consciousness? In any event we now have another "propeller" (my term for those things that keep the story moving forward) in the question of why would Simmons want to sabotage the other getaway ship?

Very nice scene when Zack is about to enter the shuttle but has to wait for the download to finish. That could have been nothing special but I can now envision a very tense moment, strange glances from other passengers, steady loss of bars on the phone, etc., a mini action sequence, really. And like all great scenes it has a beginning, middle, and (happy) end. I know this isn't a script writing website, but this applies to treatments as well. Basically, each scene should be a mini-movie. Even if it's only half a page. Thinking this way will actually make the writing process go a lot smoother. Some people worry that using any "process" or framework with make their writing generic or even artificial. But really it frees you from the constraints of the medium by accepting them as the necessary framework that they are so you can work within that framework effectively, and say what you want to say. (If you want to learn more pick up anything by Syd Field. Everyone else in Hollywood has. I met Syd once and he told me, "It's funny that I got so famous telling everyone else how to write screenplays when the truth is that I was a mediocre screenwriter at best. But the one thing I do know is how a screenplay should be written. Just don't ask me to write one." I asked him if I could quote him on that and he said, "No". So don't tell anybody

We're told that the DNA imprint process can take "anywhere from four to twenty-four hours" but that Stevie finishes in "less than three hours" so you might want to add that it "[usually takes] anywhere from four to twenty-four hours". Either way the point is made, but I guess it depends on how big of a deal you want to make about Stevie's quick performance.

We are treated to another stellar mini-movie when our heroes quickly escape approaching police cars in a private jet. Sure, it's been done, but it's done well here. Keep 'em coming.

And like clockwork we have another scene of exposition. No slides or video screens this time, but a cruising jet makes a nice scene for a speech about our characters backstory just as well. Although this information feels a little superfluous by now. Reading it, I felt like I know it already. Not to imply that it feels like a cliche (and it is), more that you've done a good job dropping hints so far that we are able to make (correct) assumptions about our characters.

But I do think that the Reece flashback is not needed. It's actually great, in and of itself. A nice little dramatic mini-movie. It's just at this point in the film it's a little (important?) detail that could easily be pared down to a few quick lines by Reece, and even then perhaps a little earlier in the film (while he and Benning are awaiting Langford's return, perhaps?) Also, I'm not a big fan of flashbacks, especially abrupt, once-in-the-film cases like this.

One thing I need to mention on the grammatical side (and I'm sure this is full of typos itself) is that I've noticed several instances where you switch tenses in the same paragraph, even the same sentence. It's just nitpicking to some degree, but again, things like this can only hurt you when it comes time to try and sell your work. It's more than worth it to make a few extra passes to eliminate simple mistakes like this, or- better yet- ask a friend or two to read it for you since after awhile it's easy to become blind to our own typos.

Also, I have to say at this point I would like to know more about our villian. Not necessarily the answer to "why?" just yet, but, something . . . He has kind of gotten the shaft when it comes to characterization. As any screen writing teacher will tell you- you MUST have a strong hero and an equally strong villain.

Now we finally get on board the Nova Domus (my Latin is rusty but I believe it means "new domicile/house") where Burns must track down the Captain. The way it's written it seems Burns explains the whole situation to him, though it's expressed in just one line. Maybe you could find an elegant way to skip it altogether? We could cut right after the security guard directs Burns towards the captain and picks up with him just having finished his big speech/explanation to him?

And I'm uncertain (as of now) about Kara's fate. Given the reactions of the people watching I'm assuming she will die as a result of the whole DNA-sabotage situation, but I'm not really sure. Even if we find out what happens to her later (she dies?) I think you intend for us to know what will happen already, and giving that you mentioned the organ-shutdown and whatnot earlier you probably just need to make it clear that Kara's done for. Her organs "grayed-out" on the monitor but she seemed fine for the time being.

Looks like Simmons has a right-hand man in "Col. Westgrave". I would have liked to meet him earlier in an attempt to foreshadow the inevitable showdown between him and Reece.

Also, I am getting a nice backdrop image in my head of the shuttle and it's surroundings. Maybe a few words about the "massive ship, gleaming white and towering over the landscape" or something like that? It will help out those readers with less-than-vivid imaginations and would be (for me) a welcome flourish.

[WriteNow]

. . .

Now we get back to some action and the anticipated showdown between the two secondary leads, one on the good side, one on the bad. And it seems they know each other? Another good reason for a little getting-to-know-you time with the "bulldog", Westgrave, earlier. Nevertheless the scene is nicely done, like all your other action scenes. Fast, fluid, and it unfolds clearly. Although I do have to say that the misfire/out-of-bullets scenario always makes me say to myself, "He really should be dead". Being that the hero didn't actively do anything to not get shot, it isn't to heroic at all. Like the difference between the hero diving out of the way of a speeding car versus the care exploding before it reaches him.

But it's great scene, and I'm starting to hope you do a pure action movie next. One annoying thing- why wouldn't Reece kill Westgrave? I mean, he's already racked up quite a body count on lesser thugs, so why not eliminate someone who, when he awakes, will no doubt still be a major threat? This is akin to the hero not picking up a fallen enemy's weapon even if it's superior to his own. Just one of those movie-isms I would try to avoid. Much like . . .

The villain who speaks to much. Simmons lays it all out for us while admonishing Catherine. This is a tried and tested cliche, though, oftentimes because there's simply no other way to give us so much information so late in the film. So, it's fine, writers do it all the time, and no one is going to criticize you for it, except maybe Roger Ebert. But producers out there reading your treatment will know and understand and the audiences watching your film won't know and won't care. It's a cliche, but an acceptable and very effective one. Although, in this case, the villian makes a good point and it kind of makes me want to change teams suddenly, even if it's going to be a losing battle.

And now the bad guys(?) take off in the shuttle, leaving our heroes stranded. Not to worry, a heretofore unknown last-ditch transport exists. (Bennings wouldn't have mentioned this huge, very important detail until the last possible moment? That's a definite movie-ism and could easly be remedied by having Bennings tell the group that there's another chance and having Langford ask if she's referring to that "hail mary" Bennings mentioned earlier? Or something like that. Even better, while on the jet and getting Reece's backstory somebody could ask Bennings what if they miss the shuttle and she responds that there is another chance . . . Then we move to the next scene without hearing what it is, getting some anticipation going.

Back to Cape Canaveral the Gryphon takes off and we get a great scene with Reece and Bennings, and their acceptance of their fate. This could have easily come of as cheesy, melodramatic, unintentionally funny, or worse yet, flat and boring. But it's really nice, a great goodbye to our two favorite characters. I might ditch having the clouds part and the sun coming through, though, as it straddles a fine line with "overdone" on the other side.

" . . . [T]hey'll simply blast them into a whole new dimension." Well, that's a great line.

The docking sequence goes surprisingly smoothly. (Also, is Stevie a lesbian? That seems to be alluded to when she notices the attractive spacewalking girl.) I'm torn on whether or not you're missing out on a nice, quick, and very tense scene of a mini-crisis during the docking attempt (Walter dies? Or sacrifices himself?) I would go for it, it's too good an opportunity to pass up. Especially since you probably should make the most out of the Gryphon, it being the the film's Batmobile-type very cool/unattainable/high-tech machine. I'm sure the trailer and commercials will hype it up when this film is eventually produced, why not make the most of it by writing a killer action sequence for it? Then blow it up-

(I'm still unclear as to why the ships can only be navigated by one person with nano-myte infused DNA as opposed to, say, a steering wheel or plain old computer, but perhaps I missed that earlier.)

Now we're back on earth again with Reece and Bennings (side note, always address your characters with just one name, first or last doesn't matter. You started with all last names and then switched to first for some, but not others. It's unnecessarily confusing, that's all. As for the scenes on earth, they are good, but unnecessary. Your dialogue "cheating" is really obvious here, with a few lines of dialogue spun into half a page of prose given the inability to actually write dialogue. You do it well, though (much, much better than most) but here it's a little excessive, especially for a "weekend" scene. ("Weekend" scene = just for fun/no story advancement.) I was wondering if we would revisit the unlikely couple and perhaps witness the destruction of the earth. On the plus side I like the fact that both people stay true to their characters- Reece doesn't suddenly fall in love and propose to Bennings, for example. However, you kind of copped-out with regards to showing the gamma blast. Either do it, or don't. I wouldn't show it at all, ending the scene with Reece sitting there, Bennings dead beside him, no indication of the blast. Nothing you can come up with will be able to match the audience's imagination as to what an extinction-level gamma blast would look like, and this isn't a disaster movie anyway, so why bother, since that's not why we're here. On the flip side, if you want to show it at all I would go whole hog and show us some cities getting leveled, forests getting incinerated, the oceans boiling, etc. But I wouldn't recommend that at all. After all, our focus is now on the ships, that's where our heroes are (Reece doesn't count anymore having taken himself out of the "hero" game) and that's where the action is. At the absolute most I would center us on Reece and his expression as the blast approaches, then cut to the ships. But in any event, the whole thing is over half a page- too long, especially at this point in the film. It's like hitting the brakes on the momentum that you spent so long building. Honestly, if it were me, we'd cut to Reece and Bennings on the beach, no dialogue, no action. Two quick lines in the treatment and that's it. Keep us guessing, too. Did Reece and Bennings fall for each other? Is she dead next to him or sleeping after hours of lovemaking? You get the idea-

Holy hell- what an ending! I did NOT see that coming. I was banking on Simmons being sent to some Event Horizon-esque "hell" universe or something to that effect. But what you did was very nice indeed. A few problems, though:

There is no falling action. Falling action, as you may know, is the stuff that happens after the climax. It could be grouped in with "epilogue". Remember Avatar? When the Na'vi people were leading the humans off the planet at gunpoint? You don't have that at all. But, I'm thinking it's okay. Because, barring a full reveal of the "new" Earth, there's not much you could do. Although an ending like this will likely be criticized as anticlimactic this is partly your fault for the stellar action sequences earlier on that made your viewer/reader expect the biggest and best one for last. Personally, I like it-

The villain doesn't get his comeuppance. This is more of a serious problem. All that work, all the struggle to stop him were for nothing. He got his ship, his population, and his planet. We have no reason to assume he didn't set up a colony and rule it as king, just living it up. And that's not good. He needs to suffer, needs to pay. Somehow, someway. I would highly recommend you do something to rectify that. It gives us zero closure for that particular (large and important) plot thread, and that's almost never good. Whereas, with Stevie and the gang we get a kind of open-ended closure ("They made it! But what's down there . . . ?") this gives us none at all. The antagonist has to die, or something equivalent (go insane, get castrated, I don't know) or the audience is not going to like it. This is the first thing a screenwriter would change when writing the screenplay, and the when it actually gets made I'm sure the studio will shoot a few different endings anyway to swap out for the focus-testers. So- get rid of the bad guy. Somehow, someway. I'm thinking navigational error (being that he wasn't "balanced" or "good" maybe when he jacked in and was at one with the universe it decided he was a bad guy and sent him into the middle of nowhere.)

Kill him.

And we're done-

I hope my criticism has been helpful to you. Again, sorry it took so long. If you want some more help or have any questions then please respond here in the forum for all to see and learn from. If you're shy, though, you can always PM me.

I honestly like this treatment very much. I really kept reading not because I had to, but because I wanted to find out what was going to happen. It's very "hook-y" like that. One general complaint is that Langford is kind of dull for a protagonist. He gets overshadowed by most of the other characters and seems to have a minimal role in many of the film's key scenes.

And grammar, got to fix that, it's essential. Enough typos and your hard work goes right into the trash can. There's no excuse for having grammatical errors and typos in a final draft.

And thanks for sharing it with us here. It's a much-appreciated addition to the growing library of treatments on this site. And this one goes to show that, at least since I've been here, they're only getting better. Now get to work on your next one and post it here.

Oh, one last thing. What's Exordium?