9 September - jParker - Elegy

[jParker]

Well guys. I hope that was an enjoyable experience for you. Thoughts?

[TracerTK]

Hi jParker, I just finished reading the screenplay and found it very interesting however there were a few parts that made me questions what was going on. The first was that he received a call and hit ignore. The way it was worded sounded like Amy was calling him which made me think that she cheated on him or something.

 

Second was why did he have an answering machine when he had a cell phone? It didn't make a whole lot of sense as to had that. 

 

I liked the scenery that you painted through out the script which was easy to follow.

 

The last bit that threw me off was him breaking the glass. I think it would take a whole lot of force to break a beer mug and didn't fully understand why he did it in the first place or also why he decided not to jump in front of the train.

 

This is the first screenplay I've ever read so please take my critics with a grain of salt.

 

Overall I would continue reading your works.

 

thanks  

[jParker]

Thanks Tracer. You're right about the cellphone thing. I've rephrased it in the running draft.

 

As for the answering machine, if memory serves, it was not uncommon to have both a cellphone and an answering machine in the early 2000s. The broken glass is a bit of a hand wave; having accidentally broken my share of glasses though, I must say that the range of durability is substantial. 

 

Glad to hear that you'd keep reading. That is my goal.

[Mandamon he/him]

This piece was moving, but very depressing, but then, I'm not much for sad stories.

 

A couple things occurred to me as I read:

Not sure why a random dog barking would snap Jeff out of suicide.  He seems ambivalent to his own dog the rest of the time.

 

How many days has it been?  There's an unfinished insurance claim, and beers all around the house, but Jeff is still have very early stages of mourning, almost in shock, and still says he's married when talking to the woman in the bar.  From that I got the feeling it was one or two days, but from the rest of the story I got the impression of a couple weeks.

 

I also thought the answering machine was a bit of an anachronism.  Depends on when you set this, but I don't think you say.

[Guru Coyote he/him]

Maybe I'm old and anachronistic. I do have an answering machine on the land-line, and I do also have a cellphone. It's rather common in my experience. Especially if you have both cell and land-line.

 

In regards to the script itself, I haven't read many, so I have no real idea of how one 'should' be. I thought it was well written in the sense that it communicated what was to be seen on screen. I'm not sure, but I thought there was a slight mix of pure 'what we see' and narrative and dialog.

 

Now to the 'story.' Most of the story made perfect sense to me, even to the bit with him not jumping 'just because a dog barked.' I think you have something in there about him remembering his own dog scratching the door etc.

What I didn't quite get - and this is me talking as a fellow story-teller - is this: what is your intention with this piece, what did you want to communicate? Is there a message/moral/twist etc?

Or is the goal here to simply draw a picture of grief? 

Or did you want to have the viewer wonder what exactly had happened? If that's it... well I thought it was rather obvious he had just lost his woman.

 

Anyway, I think it works well in painting Jeff's grief and loss, I just don't really see where else you might be aiming, if anywhere

[jParker]

Thanks guys.

 

Guru, my intent with this piece was to illustrate grief and how some people deal with it (i.e. they try to go about their business and fail miserably). I try to stay away from messages or morals in my stories; frankly, there's enough of that sort of thing in the world. Usually I strive for one of two things: to have an emotional impact or to spark conversation. Needless to say this was the former.

 

Also, I put the dots pretty close together on Amy's death. The director said that was his only complaint: he would rather have found out towards the end, sort of as a twist.

[Guru Coyote he/him]

Ok, the grief and emotional response parts sure work. I'd agree with that director though... it might be nice if there was a little more mystery as in 'what's going on here?' to keep the attention up.

 

One thing I thought worked rather well in the emotional response was Fred and his ignorance of what Jeff was dealing with.

[jParker]

That's actually why I introduced Fred: to act as a foil for Jeff's grief. I'm glad that went as intended haha. 

 

Good news for Mandamon: next submission won't be nearly as depressing. Or at all, really. 

[Robinski he/him]

Hi jp,

 

I feel like a heel, but here goes...

 

[Page 4]

 

Is the car moving when Amy unbuckles her seatbelt? I presume that it is, I dare say we’ll find out, but at this point I don’t know and I think I should, one way or another.

 

[page 5]

 

‘slewn’ – I think should be ‘strewn’.

 

 

Overall, I'm kind of underwhelmed. There’s a fair bit of cliché in the situations that we find Jeff in. His wife is dead, he drinks, he rejects friends and colleagues, he drinks some more, he rejects offers of company and friendship, unable or unwilling to allow himself to feel anything other than pain, guilt, etc.

 

I think the redeeming feature is the moment there it seems like a thought of his dog being left alone, abandoned, is what turns him back from attempting to take his life. I found the intercut with the image of the dog scratching at the door effective. I suppose what I'm saying then is that the last couple of scenes are effective, but for me it wasn’t enough to outweigh the well-worn and, to be frank, clichéd events and situations that lead up to the conclusion.

 

This said, I think it would be a good challenge to re-write the piece with the aim of giving the preceding events a spark, making them different and interesting by changing them to replace the clichés with something different, trying to take a leaf from Tarantino or Sorkin (for example) and making the dialog surprising, even shocking, while still following the same general thread. Maybe the apartment is absolutely spotless because Jeff has taken to cleaning and tidying obsessively, which could be highlighted by a huge overreaction to some small sign of dirt. Don’t know – just spit-balling.

 

Thanks for sharing!