David Jones (Vancouver)

This script succeeds on the strength of its vivid and gripping writing. Both the dialogue and the action prose are compelling. I started reading it out of curiosity and went all the way to the end in two sittings. You have a great way with a scene. I also found the characters to be well realized.

I just have one niggling complaint about your prose: What is this weird construction “Maxxe sat by the window reading, Cat by her side”? I think I know what you’re trying to do, but every time I encountered it, I read it as past tense and it threw me off.

I think the biggest problem with your script is that it contains very few surprises. You get to the promise of your logline quickly (which is good): An actress desperately wants a bad-girl role in a movie so that she can to broaden her repertoire and break out as a movie star. But before she even gets the part, her two best friends warn her that, given her tendency to immerse herself so completely in her roles, this could be risky!

And. . . guess what happens?

The good news is that this problem is fairly easily solved. Just don’t have the friends predict what’s going to happen.

The second problem with your script is quite subjective, so take this with a grain of salt: I’m not sure that I like where it goes. It’s not that your ending isn’t believable or doesn’t make sense. It definitely does make sense that Maxxe, given her history, would want to figure out who she really is. The problem is that when your audience gets to the end of the movie and they don’t know who this character is, either . . . are they going to care?

I mean, it's not as if she's never been able to figure out who she really is because she's spent all her time caring for her sick mother or working day and night to find a cure for cancer. She starts out as a selfish bitch and ends up as a selfish introspective bitch. And while I agree that there should be a special place in hell reserved for people who propose marriage in public, blaming Adam for all her problems was particularly galling.

I don't want to suggest that you create some pat character ghost to explain why Maxxe is such a blank slate. . . but even a hint of how she became so damaged might engender a little sympathy for her.

That said, it’s an interesting problem, and the journey was fascinating. It’s the kind of movie that you Brits seem particularly adept at, movies like The Long Good Friday or The Krays. I call them pathology movies. They’re a tough sell in Hollywood, but if a powerful enough director or star falls for your script (which I can see happening) it could be made in America.

Finally, your script is somewhat talky. Except for a few montages, it consists almost entirely of dialogue scenes. Characters tend to explain exactly what they’re feeling or thinking. While your dialogue is consistently compelling, it’s often on the nose. Sometimes I wished the characters would just shut up. Don’t be afraid to leave us having to work a little harder as to what is going on in their heads. They don’t have to explain everything to us.

That said, it was one hell of a read. I find it hard to believe you’ve only been writing for a year. If that’s true, you must be a natural.

For what it’s worth, I think Mum's right.

So, I started reading your first draft of this project and was quite put off by the general wordiness, the overall length of the script (particularly for an animation) and the length of time it was taking for the story to begin. I was going to quit reading, to be frank.

Then I saw that you had written additional drafts, downloaded the fourth, and noticed a huge and immediate improvement. Someone obviously made it clear to you that the story had to get going by page 10, or your script is in trouble, and you responded. Good work.

On the good side, you have a solid premise loaded with dramatic and comic possibilities, some funny situations, and a nice mix of characters, each of whom presents plenty of opportunities for humor. The story world of animals who have rich interior lives and are able to communicate with each other is good, and is well suited to an animated film.

The broad structure of the piece is sound, from the initial problem of Sophia showing up and horning in on Bones’ territory to Eddie mailing himself to the Keys and then the pets having to save him. It’s a rescue story, and rescue stories are almost bulletproof. It’s hard not to be rooting for these characters.

Also, you have a nice knack for presenting your protagonists’ problems, and then complicating them even further. That’s good, too.

I think the biggest problem with your plotting is that solutions to the pets’ problems present themselves far too easily. Also, minor characters are often solving the pets’ problems for them, rather than making things even worse. The pets have to get on board a boat to head down a river? Who shows up but a friendly mouse to help them out by telling them the boat’s schedule. The pets (meaning you) have to be smarter about solving the problems you get them into.

That said, the climax solution of getting the news team to find Eddie was actually quite clever. I was wondering how you were going to pull that one off!

Probably the worst thing about your script is the dialogue. I don’t know what to tell you except that it’s often on-the-nose, flabby, and just not very funny. The curious thing is that the jokes you set up are often very good: The cat who seems to be choking up emotionally, then just coughing up a furball, is really funny. As is the alligator who wants to be an actor. I especially liked some of the visual gags, like everybody in the Keys exiting their boarded-up houses, jumping into their cars, and driving away the moment Eddie shuts the door. It’s like something out of an old Merry Melodies cartoon. Chuck Jones would be proud.

So it’s not that there aren’t good gags in your script, it’s that the actual words you use to tell the jokes—the dialogue—are so often weak and on the nose. Even the non-humorous dialogue just has to be smarter and tighter. I don’t know what to tell you to do except read lots of good scripts and practice. In a comedy, even more so than in other genres, good dialogue is crucial.

I also think you have a problem with the character of Sophia. While I like the idea of her coming into the story and shattering Bones’ relationship with Eddie. . . I just don’t buy it. Am I missing something, or do they issue guide dogs to kids with broken legs? How, exactly, is Sophia supposed to be helping Eddie?

I can see how if he had been blinded, Sophia could be his guide dog, but this just doesn’t make sense to me.

Finally, I don’t know if any of the other reviewers have mentioned this, but a spec animation script is pretty much a lost cause. While posting it here on Amazon is a good bet (they seem far more interested in producing material for the kiddies than adults) this is probably your last hope for a sale. All of the major animation studios develop their own concepts from scratch or from existing properties—TV shows, books, graphic novels or live-action films. The chances of your getting this script made—even if it were executed perfectly—are almost nil.

Sorry to be such a wet blanket. If this is your first script, you have plenty to be proud of here. The gulf in quality between your first and fourth drafts indicates to me you’re a quick study, and that one day you’ll be writing really strong scripts.

So, I read this script because I wanted to compare my reading experience to your Black List reads. And I thought, well, seeing as I’ve read and evaluated the script, I might as well review it here.

The script has a great opening, is well written, and has fine period detail. You always give us just enough detail to set the scene and convince us completely of your setting, but never wallow in it. I was with Charlie and rooting for her from the start.

Unfortunately, I think your script has a big problem. As written, things are far too easy for Charlie. That may seem a surprising thing to say about a character who starts out in such dire circumstances—orphaned, then torn from her brother at a tender age. And once John has been killed and the die cast for a tale of revenge, it would seem that Charlie has her work cut out for her: In a time without modern communications and cameras, how do you find one man in a huge country, and then, as a lone woman, exact your revenge for his crime?

First you have to find him. But as one other reviewer pointed out, that turns out to be pretty easy. Charlie, or her trusty ally, Frank, almost trip over him. Charlie wants to be a stagecoach driver? That doesn’t prove too difficult. She seems to breeze through almost every job interview.

Similarly, after a little target practice, Charlie has no difficulty dispatching the gang who attempts to rob her stagecoach on her very next trip. Some nice action, but again, Charlie barely breaks a sweat. Instead of having a pang of conscience over shooting a rabbit, she should be forced to grapple directly with her decision to kill a man. Maybe one of the bandits is mortally wounded (falls under the stagecoach's wheels after she wings him) and they have to transport him back to town to a doctor. He dies in horrible pain before they get there. Charlie pays an emotional price for doing the job she loves.

But Charlie’s biggest difficulty should be that she’s a woman impersonating a man. And yet very few people seem to question her gender—except for Frank, who’s so smitten that he won’t spill the beans. Another lucky break for Charlie!

In general, Frank is just too ready and convenient an ally for Charlie. At the risk of re-writing your script for you, what if it were Charlie who is smitten with Frank, and after being forced initially to present herself to him as a man, faces the problem of having to out herself to him before they can have a proper romantic relationship? (I know, that’s not the way it really happened) My point is that Frank should be making things more difficult for Charlie, not easier—at least until the point in the story when Charlie’s task shifts from finding Ingram to bringing him to justice.

Once that shift occurs, things get a little tougher for Charlie, but not nearly as tough as they should be.

Her biggest setback is losing her eye. That’s a nice low point for your drama, but I think that it would raise the stakes and remind us of why Charlie is there in the first place if somehow it is Ingram—and not some random stable accident—that costs her that eye. You’ve got a perfect opportunity for that when she first confronts him at his house.

To sum up, there simply isn’t enough screen time devoted to the journey/task promised in your logline: Find and punish Ingram. From the point where Charlie's mission is set, there are too many scenes that have Charlie interacting with characters who are helping, rather than opposing her. You seem to understand instinctively that your storyline requires reversals and complications, but they're all too quickly dispatched with.

I do like the stagecoach race as the venue for their ultimate confrontation, but in my opinion, that race is about a third the length it ought to be. I believe that it should take up most of your third act. You’ve got some nice complications in there—the rockslide and the rope bridge—but again these difficulties are too quickly and easily overcome.

Ending it with the shootout with Ingram after he cheats on the race is also good. I liked the reversal of at first winning the race, then having that stolen from her, and the final shootout for the ending. All that is great.

It may well be that I’m suggesting you write a different script than what you set out to write. I’m just saying that given your logline, I didn’t get the script I had hoped to read. And from a pure marketing standpoint, a revenge western (which is a recognizable genre) with the added twist that the protagonist is a woman impersonating a man would be a far easier sell than the odd chimera you’ve given us with this draft.