All Reviews

A great script. Well written. Great luck moving forward.

I'll keep this short. I thought this script was pretty tight. It's an interesting idea, and the main cast is fairly well fleshed out. I also liked that you shied away from more extreme violence in some scenes, allowing the tension and suspense to drive the story instead of extreme gore (More on this later though). The only notes I would have are this:

Be careful with the characters of Larry and Terry. While both characters serve their purpose, they at times borderline going over the top. Normally I would be fine with this, but the rest of the characters are so grounded that they stick out.

The next one does contain a bit of a spoiler. The ending needs higher stakes. While I liked that you refrained from more extreme violence for the early part of the script, the ending, the chase, and Dan's attack are the moments where you can let loose a little bit. You also let Bonnie off the hook. Yes, she is alone in the end, but she is a character I was kind of hoping to see get gnawed on a little, if not ripped to shreds. (She's cheating on her handicapped husband with an underage boy, not to mention the fact that in many ways she is responsible for all of this.) That final moment of her in the lake lacks a lot of punch because she does come off as such a nasty character, and yet she gets through all this pretty much untouched.

Other then those two things, I thought the idea was solid, the pacing was strong, and the side story with Bonnie and Dan was interesting. I also thought Jim was a great lead character, and I was really invested in his story.

I'm no stranger to critiquing scripts but this is my first review on AS. Please keep in mind, these are just my own opinions, so whether I point out whether some aspect of the script is really good, or something doesn't work, it's all subjective. Use all your reviews and see if the same problems keep getting mentioned.

First, I was attracted by the title, "Origin of a Species"--very nice. The two-sentence blurb gave me the sense that a new type of rabies was about to terrorize a small town. Labeled a thriller/suspense, I figured this would be a fun read.

However, it turned out to be ordinary rabies, which can still be very frightening in a story. But you spend so much time with other story lines that distract from the potential of a viral outbreak that I was never drawn into the story. I can appreciate creating subplots with their own drama going on along the edges of a life-and-death main plot, but you give these other "dramatic" subplots so much ink that they got in the way of the main story. In addition to that, the main story line took too long to unfold so that the whole thing read like a potential thriller bogged down by competing MOWs.

For example, the gravity of the situation doesn’t hit the main characters till page 57 when Mercer tells Jim about the dead boy and the dogs; that is, this is when the race is on to stop the dogs from killing again. I think you waited too long for this scene. And then, you followed this with a scene where Mercer and Jim have a talk about quitting smoking and relationships for 3 pages. Brought the tension you had just created to a stop. You do a similar thing with the two shirtless guys in the woods that may or may not be the next kill, then give us 7 pages of Bonnie defending herself to Dan’s mom and the principal. Brought the tension to a halt. It slowed more on page 79 where another 3 pages of subplot start (Dan having typical teenage argument with religious-crazed mom).

The scene on page 39-40 where Jim finds his dogs missing would make for a better plot point 1, if you can back it up to page 20, 25. It seems perfect… the dogs are infected and now are missing, further complicating things. The other stuff about religion and teacher-student sex seems superfluous and does nothing for the tension of the original premise of a town ravaged by rabies. A few early "kills" to get the town nervous would greatly heigten the tension, as would the cops doing their jobs by discovering clues as to where the dogs are going and how bad the virus is changing (as opposed to talking about their pasts) .

The characters didn't do much for me. Bonnie is engaged in sex with her underage student, Dan. Dan is quarreling with his moon-bat mom. Larry is a turd of a neighbor. And the lead Jim doesn't really do anything until the middle of the story other than fight with his neighbor, fight with his wife, and pet the dogs.

Though this may all sound harsh, I think you could still turn this into a descent thriller. You have better than average dialogue--that's half the battle as dialogue is typically the one thing most writers struggle with most (though you do throw around exclamation points way too often). You wrote a couple of engaging scenes like the one on pg 45 where the track team is hunted down by dogs (would've liked to see more scenes like that earlier on… helps build up the tension faster} and another one around page 70 to 73 where Larry gets mauled then the cops come in and the helicopters circle overhead looking for the dogs (they truly know now that they need to stop these dogs fast--you need more scenes like this earlier in the script). And the premise of rabies morphing into a new killer virus that terrorizes a town and will force the dog owner to hunt down his own dogs has lots of potential.

Unfortunately it took too long to get to the good scenes and the action blocks you write are too wordy, makes for a tough read. Consider jettisoning a lot of the unrelated stuff. The student-teacher thing, the border war with the neighbor, the overly religious mom... it's all too much distraction from the main focal point. I think you could cut out all three of those subplots, throw them into a separate script that is strictly a drama, and have the beginnings of a 2nd script. But for this script, the characters had few redeeming qualities and did little to help their causes. The true action didn't start coming until the second half of Act 2 and it seemed like Mercer and Jim (after spending time shooting the breeze in the car) suddenly stumble across the dogs, then Bonnie winds up just floating in the middle of the lake, then THE END. No redemption for her moral-less acts? The only audience members I can see liking her are other 16-year-old boys. More importantly, your hero didn't have to do much to bring an end to the threat--it was pretty much handed to him on a silver platter. Give him more obstacles, maybe more dogs get infected, may people go rabid, whatever... I've no doubt you can come up with more life-and-death hurdles.

Again, this isn't a dig at you or your writing. As I've tried to make clear, you have some good things going on here. You just need to focus more on the main story line, get to the major scenes quicker, and your thriller will be more thrilling, in my opinion. See what others say.

Just my two cents. Hope this helps.

It's good, and beautifully written. A bit verbose though!

The scene with running over the deer is odd, because you write that the deer was '2 feet away' from the car. That feels a little specific, and even if there was very little time to react, 2 feet at the speeds we're going at is way too little. Can you just say 'a few feet' or something less specific.

Characters a really good and well rounded, albeit a little cliche.

I can see why you won prizes, and can see why you're on the dev slate...great stuff.

This is an interesting script with a compelling premise. It straddles genres—generally considered to be a liability in Hollywood, but I’m drawn to stories like these. The early dog attacks are suspenseful and you grabbed me with the threat of rabies. I was eager to see what would happen with the potent mix of the failing marriage and the rabid dogs. I also thought that you were making an interesting point about the current state of education in America but I'm still chewing over the larger thematic point of your script. Not quite sure what it is, but maybe I just have to think about it a bit more.

If you wanted to push it more firmly into the thriller/horror zone, I would say that your template is Jaws. You have a lawman protagonist (ex lawman, in this case) whose town is beset by a marauding monster. The lawman has an unfaithful wife (this subplot, which was quite prominent in the novel, was wisely cut from the movie).

The problem, as one of the other reviewers has pointed out, is that your protagonist is passive. In Jaws, Sheriff Brody, despite a terrible fear of water, is compelled to leave dry land and pursue the monster out of guilt. By knuckling under to the Mayor’s wishes, he has delayed closing the beaches and in doing so caused the death of a young boy. To atone for his sin, he has to go to sea and fight the shark.

Your protagonist should also feel terrible guilt and be compelled to go after the dogs. They are, after all, Jim’s dogs. It is Jim who (as one of the other reviewers also pointed out) neglected to get them vaccinated–pretty basic care for a dog owner. He seems not only passive, but rather slow-witted in putting together the attacks and his own missing pets. Finally, he seems more broken up about his dead dogs than he does about the human lives they have taken.

Frankly, between that and his willingness to put innocent lives at risk by gazing at his girlfriend's windblown hair while doing a hundred m.p.h. through the town, he comes off as a jerk. This is a man who is supposed to be protecting the public, not endangering it. However, I really liked the revelation that Bonnie was instrumental in Jim losing his leg.

In fact, between Jim, Bonnie, Dan, Larry, Terry, there’s almost no one to like in this story. Everyone is, in his or her own way, reprehensible. By the end of it, I was rooting for Gretchen. Sure, she’s rabid, but she deals very effectively with the problem of the fence and Larry’s intrusive property line–go Gretchen!

In all seriousness, I realize that you’re aiming for something that is less of an action thriller and more of a psychological study than a movie like Jaws. I also realize that the characters in psychological studies can be less likeable than the heroes of action movies. I make the comparison only to point out that your protagonist has to be much more strongly motivated. All the elements are there for this; Jim just doesn’t seem to respond to them.

I also agree with the reviewers who have pointed out that the dogs must attack earlier in the story. Jim must become aware that his dogs are causing the problem and try to do something about it. The dogs must be actively evading Jim and perhaps even pursuing him.

In short, if you’re going to set up the elements of a horror/thriller/monster movie (which is what your cover image would certainly indicate), at the end of the day, we want it to come down to a battle between the hero and the monster—Jim versus the dogs. We got a hint in the script’s final pages of how poignant that battle can be, with Jim forced to kill his beloved pets. But as it stands, that battle starts on about page 93 of your 99-page script—about 53 pages too late, in my opinion.

Your other choice is to go with the psychological study of a collapsing marriage set against the backdrop of a town ravaged by a pack of rabid dogs. In that case, I think you’ll have to have far more scenes between Jim and Bonnie. We’ll have to feel some hope of their relationship healing, or at least get a glimpse of what it was like before it all began to crumble so that we can root for them as a couple.

But as soon as Jim finds out that it’s his dogs who are killing people, if he doesn’t stop sulking and go out there to try to stop them, we’re going to lose all sympathy for your hero. His dogs are out there killing children and other innocent characters. So in that case, you might want to give ownership of the dogs over to one of the other characters.

I think you have some hard choices to make. I hope my 2¢ here helps you to make some of them. . . or not! As it stands, your good work on this script has already paid handsomely and your other viable strategy is to quit while you’re a hundred grand ahead!

Congrats!

This is a well written script. Good premise and an easy read.

I really like the three main characters. They have a lot of depth and each has their own pluses and minuses.

The secondary characters need a little bit of work. I like Mercer and Troy, but the mother seems pointless. What's her role in the story?

Having said all that, there are some fairly big holes that need to be filled. The main problem is with the rabid dogs. How do three dogs contract rabies? Just by Gretchen licking the blood? How do the other two get it? Does she bite them? Is it normal for rabid dogs to hunt in packs? Isn't this a virus that makes them go crazy? Would rabid dogs have the wherewithal to come back and kill the nasty next door neighbor?

How did the first dog die? And how did he wind up inside the slide? That scene was unclear to me.

Also, you have to be careful with your scene descriptions. This is a blueprint for a movie. Does Jim really "leap" into the truck? Does he really "run" out of the house, or does he hobble?

Does a 7 year old really take off the dogs collar?

At 99 pages, this script comes up a little short for an action movie, and there simply isnt enough action. We dont get the first dog attack until page 46. Thats too long.

This story may work better as a short story or a novel. It's a good premise, but not necessarily a good movie. The ending leaves me wanting. Why is bonnie left alone in the water? Where is the resolution?

Spurgeon and Sprenguard? A little close, no? I thought maybe that was going somewhere, but it didn't

Lastly, Dan seems like a pretty standup guy. He's got the balls to sleep with a cop's wife, why does he melt down and scream like a little girl when he encounters the dog.

Congrats on the script and good luck in the future.
JM

The main Character should be changed from an retired or disabled Police Officer to someone that doesn't know anything about dogs and just has pets. A Police Officer's K9's would be vacinated at the highest level, even if retired, from rabies, and any other malaise that hits a GSD.

A Police Officer wouldn't just wash down concrete with a hose; he would also scrub the concrete with at least a solution of clorox and water if not something else specifically made as an anti-bacterial as concrete absorbs urine, parvo etc...

Also, Let's assume there were even one GSD running alongside a "Track Team". The Track Team would stop and seek some kind of height advantage. Maybe the last guy up a tree doesn't make it, or some such action, but no action even initially, doesn't hold true.

All dogs can turn given the right circumstances; however if you want to use this premise you have to go back to a botched batch of Rabies Vacine that the GSD's received, maybe in a flashback or a side investigation.

This could be a very cool movie. My advice would be to hook up with some of those guys who work on Underworld and see if they can give a new twist to the rabid dog look.

Robert D

I posted this on Scriptshadow. It's worth repeating here.

I quite liked this one. It kept me interested till the end.

There are a couple of particularly effective moments. When the cross country team is running along the sidewalk and they are suddenly joined by the three German Shepherds, the writer made a choice to nicely elongate the inevitable. The lads exchange smiles when they notice the dogs have matched their speed, thinking they’re sharing a cool running moment with the canines – and they all run along together. Yet, we know something is about to happen. And it does. I was impressed with how much stronger this makes the moment than just having the dogs come out of the woods and attack.

Another surprisingly strong scene is when Bonnie arrives at the Principal’s office to be accused by Terry, Dan’s very religious mother, of corrupting her son. Now, we think it’s because Terry knows Bonnie has been having sex with Dan – when all she’s really complaining about is the curriculum Bonnie teaches her students. Yeah, the religious wrath thing is a little far-fetched (though maybe not so much in the USA, I’m not sure.), but it is a nice moment where your expectations get nicely flipped.

The overall tone of the piece is consistently solid. It reminded me a lot of "In the Bedroom" -- not because of the story, but because of the simmering tension which imbues every scene.

I am a little confused by the ending. Is the final shot of Bonnie in the water somehow indicating a regression in evolution? A return to the water, the place of origin of our species? If so, it’s overkill. And if it’s not, then I’m not sure what to make of it.

Still, a pretty solid script. Good on you, Mr. Gossett.