Hey all, Harry here with Disturbed's Script Mine... Now, you might remember that Disturbed is our resident digger of scripts... the guy that goes through those unproduced, unrepped, unknown screenplays from regular folks like YOU... then finds the cream... and we give em INK... Now, what with the writer's strike and acting strike on the brink of our lives... Hollywood has been fairly addle-minded with some of the nonsense that it has decided to pick up... SNAKES ON A PLANE, THE LAZY DETECTIVE are just a pair that surface to mind. Well, we here at AICN believe we can find better.... So Disturbed is on a neverending mission for the good of humanity... finding scripts that you folks in Hollywood SHOULD HAVE FOUND.... Screenwriters that YOU SHOULD KNOW.... and we being the progressive backslappers we are... wish the writers the best of luck. After Disturbed's first column... all of the mentioned screenwriters were contacted by a bevy of agents and production companies.... Did they make a sale? I don't know, but it was that group of writers first break... their first chance to have that voice on the phone and someone wanting THEM to SEND THEM their script.... not the other way around. So folks... if you think you've GOT it, send it to Disturbed... we'll see what we can do....
Hey there, all.
I opened my trusty EditPad an hour ago, and haven't written a word until now. I walked away from it. I ate some lunch. I thought about how to subtlely include the plugs and such that I wanted to...well, I give up. There are a couple things I want to plug, and if I just make certain key words links, you'll all recognize them as plugs right away anyway, so I'm just going to do it straight out. I want to plug DVDAngle.com , for whom I have just begun writing reviews. I also want to plug Kaiju Big Battel which is definitely of geek interest. Check it out.
All right, enough of that nonsense.
I've finally finished, and I've got the two best scripts I was sent sitting on my desk beside me. I'd like to mention that all four of the writers from the first column recieved script requests from agents and prodcos. I hope that this column can help out struggling writers, and I hope that the column grows so that I get even more, and better scripts.
Oddly enough, both of the scripts feature angels, but are very different.
Here we go.
HELLCITY
By Macon Blair
To be honest, when I read the note accompanying this script I wasn't looking forward to it particularly much. FX heavy? The capitol city of hell? Eh.
So I put off reading it for a while, and when I finally did I found that it was actually good. Funny, tongue-in-cheek, and fairly bizarre. I got a distinct 80's vibe from this script, but I'm not sure why. Possibly the inescapable use of good old makeup effects instead of an overload of CG (though there would certainly be CGI involved.)
Bill was a private detective in life, and he was damned good. He was so good that he ignored his wife until the day she was killed, at which time Bill took his own life. Suicide automatically gets you a ticket to Hell, while his wife is in Heaven. Bummer.
Hell is populated by humans and various sorts of demons. Humans live there, they have jobs, they have apartments, they have lives. Just not pleasant ones. Demons are around as government workers, cops, and roommates. Everyone has a mandatory demon roommate. Basically, the job of a Demon is to be a major asshole to all the humans. Bill's roommate likes to draw on the picture of his wife Allie that he keeps hidden, amongst many other things. The idea is that there is reincarnation within Hell. You take your licks, don't screw up, eventually "die" and move on to a nicer part of Hell. Eventually to Heaven.
Bill is contacted by a demon named Mary D'Metre and asked to do some detective work for her. Seems Lucifer has been acting awfully strange lately, so much so that there's talk of mutiny among the ranks, and she'd like to get to the bottom of it. So if he helps, she offers to move him uphill to a nice part of Hellcity. Even waive the roommate.
So, of course, he accepts. He not only uncovers what's going on with Big Lou, but the seeds of an anarchist human movement, and eventually gets himself on the road to redemption.
This script is...pretty out there. It's funny, bizarre, has a few pretty nice action scenes. The main drawback is it would cost a fortune to give it really nice production values. Still, worth mention on here.
Contact Information:
462 3rd St. #4R
Brooklyn, NY 11215
(718)499-6139
***
HEAVEN SPENT
Screenplay by Adam McDaniel
Story by Adam McDaniel & Charlie Stickney
The thing that stuck with me from this script is how visually it's written. I could picture almost every shot. I can imagine it being shot very cold, with lots of whites, rather like The Sixth Sense was.
The script opens in 1977 with a five year old boy named Micah's parents being killed when a train hits their car. Micah is on a stretcher, in real bad shape. He's fading away. A little girl makes her way through the crowd, seemingly unseen. She kisses Micah's forehead. His eyes snap open and he takes a deep breath.
The story resumes in the present, with Micah stuck in an office job he hates. Fairly familiar territory between Fight Club, American Beauty and Office Space, but still done with humor. Micah is miserable. He dreams of things like beating himself to death with a whiffle ball bat. He's pretty without hope. He decides to kill himself. Thing is, he screws it up. Coltan, Death's messenger (Death is a busy guy, after all) is waiting for Micah in the living room. Micah had been scheduled to duy at a specific time, and he's still alive. Coltan gives him a specific time to kill himself the next day. Death has a busy schedule.
From there it gets a bit more complicated, involving Micah's uncle who raised him, a deaf little boy named Tobey, and Micah's guardian angel, Christine. I felt the script sort of lost steam toward the end...I think it needs a rewrite with a dose of some more of the humor so present in the first, say, two thirds of the script, but I enjoyed it a lot. It blends poignance and humor quite well. A very good script.
Contact Information:
501 E. Verdugo Ave. #2
Burbank, CA 91501
(818)955-9306
***
And that's it. Only two this time, that's the way it goes I guess. I didn't quite get as many submissions this time as last due to eliminating the email submission option. Hopefully with the news that the first batch of writers got inquiries, I'll recieve more this time.
As before, no email submissions allowed as it's just too much of a hassle, not to mention hard on the eyes. I'd suggest making sure your script is registered with the WGA before sending it to anyone.
I'd like it if you include just a short note with a summary so I know what to expect, but I won't make that a requirement.
Submissions can be sent to:
Disturbed's Script Mine
12633 Woodside Falls Rd.
Pineville, NC 28134
As always you can reach me at Disturbed@aintitcoolmail.com
I'm off to finally finish reading Donnie Darko... And then Adaptation, which arrived yesterday. Mmm.
-Disturbed
