the movie is more of a fantasy, not following the rules of a character adapted story. Anyways, waiting your feedbacks. WANT YOUR SUGGESTIONS AND COMMENTS
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EXT. FOREST - DUSK

A man dressed up in a burgundy cloak is walking in the middle of a forest, the camera follows him.

Two middle-aged men, dressed in blue cloaks, see the man ahead of them; who apparently are following. They try to follow him without him noticing.

They see the man they are following walking in a pathway to an empty looking house
(which represents an end point to their journey.)

INT. EMPTY HOUSE

The two men go in the house; the room is flooded with smoke.

They find a table, at the end of the room, with 2 boxes on them. A man in a burgundy robe that asks them to choose one of the boxes.

So the first person chooses a box, the man in burgundy takes out the book in the box and places it on a scale. The box outweighs the scale.

The other man picks a box; the book is placed on the scale, it is lighter than the scale.

They both look ahead at the man with the burgundy robe, they suddenly see his face. It a man with a red face, beard and 2 white eyes.

They both fall down on the ground.

The camera zooms in on the first man’s closed eyes. Then tilts up to his head, then moves quickly in a black area.



CUT TO:

The camera moves in from a black spot to a forest in the dark with a blue light covering it.

Two distinguished stones are present on the ground.

CUT TO:

The camera zooms out of the first man’s eyes, who is in a grave now. He opens his eyes slightly, he feels calm for some odd reason.

Then a light in his grave sneaks its way in. It is a person in a white cloak and light covering the person’s face.

The white person asks the man “What did you believe?”
Then touches the man’s heart. The man’s heart lits up.

The man’s heart replies “The Truth.”

We hear a buzzing sound.

CUT TO:

The other man in the other grave, his soul wakes up and hearing himself breath. He is terrified of the darkness and the coffin he is in.

Then the man’s grave gets in tighter and tighter till his knees are so stuck together and feels his arms squeezing his ribs.

A person in a dark robe comes in and and touches his heart and nothing happens to his heart.

The man in the black robe gets out a hammer and starts breaking his bones from toe to head.

CUT TO:

A young man walking in the forest where the graves are, with a sad look to his face as if he wishes he is in the place of those people underground.

The camera dolly’s down from above the ground to under the ground seeing the man in the dark grave screaming for help with no one hearing.

After every bone in his body is broken, dust surrounds the coffin, and then leaches come in and chew on him. He feels every bit of pain that is there.

Then suddenly the bottom of his coffin opens, we see a red light, where hot steamy wind is coming out of it. He slowly slides down towards it.

CUT TO:

The man in the lit up coffin hears it, and still shows no emotion of fear as if he has been through this before. His grave is wider and feels more comfortable to him.

The person in the white robe reveals their face. The person touches his face to put him back to sleep.

DISSOLVE TO:

The man in the burgundy seems to be running away from someone, trying to catch his breath. He is drooling and there are cuts on his lips.

He notices a gate in front of him, he rushes to enter.

We see a cross falling on the ground breaking in half.

Then cut to a man who is kneeling to the ground outside the gates, the camera slowly moves up on him as he rises and walks in through the gates.

The sky turns red.



FADE OUT.

This message has been edited. Last edited by: GODFATHER,

I thought it was interesting . . . spiritual. I like different ideas and concepts about Heaven and He11 and this one could be very visual.

Are you going to shoot it?

quote:

Originally posted by Mark M:
I thought it was interesting . . . spiritual. I like different ideas and concepts about Heaven and He11 and this one could be very visual.

Are you going to shoot it?

ya im planing too..i wanted to lay off the big dialogue script type and do this, something weired that has a message

Honestly - I'm not sure I get what the message is. The first two characters didn't do anything wrong, and the surviving character didn't do anything right. It comes across as kind of a half-baked rehash of Judeo-Christian concepts, but without any specificity.

Sorry, but

"What do you believe?"

"The truth."

is so facile that it could have been taken straight from Matrix: Revolutions. If you make this more nuanced and less obvious, it could be decent. As is, it's a sledgehammer of obvious religious tenets combined into an amorphous mass...

this is not a 3 act structure story, its an abstract, its not about character flaws or good or conflict, but about a fantasy/vision about what death is like.

its not mainly about religion. in religion a person doesnt have a scale and ppl dont walk in houses and stuff like that, its a metaphorical piece about death

how would it be less obvious?

if you replaced the actors with cats

I didn't say anything about requiring a 3 act structure. I'm not sure what you mean when you say it's an "abstract" (a summary of a research paper?), but it doesn't mean that no story is required. You can't simply string events together and call it a short film. Even dreams have a narrative.

It has a strongly religious feel, whether you intended that or not, and it comes across as overblown. How could it be less obvious? Well, nearly everything in it as written is some kind of heavy-handed symbol. A series of symbols doesn't accomplish anything since there's no plot to use them with.

quote:

Originally posted by Evan Kubota:
I didn't say anything about requiring a 3 act structure. I'm not sure what you mean when you say it's an "abstract" (a summary of a research paper?), but it doesn't mean that no story is required. You can't simply string events together and call it a short film. Even dreams have a narrative.

It has a strongly religious feel, whether you intended that or not, and it comes across as overblown. How could it be less obvious? Well, nearly everything in it as written is some kind of heavy-handed symbol. A series of symbols doesn't accomplish anything since there's no plot to use them with.

what do you mean there is no plot
there is a man who chooses to walk in a pathway and gets judged for following that path and the same for the other man with a different outcome

i really need more comments and suggestions guys

guys please i need feedback

quote:

Originally posted by GODFATHER:
guys please i need feedback

Ok Ok! I thought it was good. You want it to make a dreamy kinda feel to it right? Well bashing everyone of the guy's bones isn't really gonna keep in the path. Maybe you want it to do whatever, I don't really know. You shouldn't rely too much on feedback, just your own artistic vision, and be able to realize the mistakes and revisions you can make by yourself.

Vantango Films

Im just going to say this: A lot of people say that there is a certain form that a movie or a short film or anything has to follow. Even if they give that form a lot of space to shape itself within, people give the concept of (Ill use short film here because we're talking about it) short films a set of walls within which they expect any short film to exist. When we say something like, your symbolism and metaphors are too grand or lacking in subtle craftsmanship, well thats really more a matter of taste. Some people prefer the nuanced subtleties of the master storyteller who weaves a complicated web of significance. Others like to see the message or underlying archtypes upfront in plain view. If that weren't true then we would never have had a surrealist movement with great artists like Salvador Dali and Anthony Gaudi or to strike closer to our sphere of creative endeavour Federico Fellini. So, even though I personally like interweaved subtlety, why would we want to fence in our art form with ridiculous restrictions that are arbitrary and meaningless under any objective lense. My only comments directly for your script is that, and im assuming you are going to film it, if I was going to do it I would want the visuals to be stunningly put together. I'd be very careful with the set up of my shots and the colours that you allow into the frame. But good luck with your work.

The only thing that matters is that its entertaining. Forget any artsy gibberish, movies are entertainment. It doesn't matter how much symbolism or metaphors you try to pack into a movie, if it sucks then it sucks. I can't stand it when people think that when symbolism or metaphors are used that those movies should be judged differently. I don't like this script because that's all it has is metaphors and symbolism. The characters are nothing and the entire thing has been done before. The lines "What do you believe"..."The truth" is EXTREMELY cliche.

It's fine to criticize something for being cliche, but to criticize a film for not being entertaining or not fitting into your conception of what movies are is ridiculous. Are you so arrogant that you believe your definition of 'film' is the only one in existence or the only one that is valid? The movies that are shown in theatres are by necessitiy entertaining, or intriguing, but that's because they cost millions to make and the studio system requires the viewing public to pay the bill. So if we were talking about a commercial film, then you'd be absolutely right, but I don't think we are. Just like there are more forms of literature than just narrative fiction, there can be a lot more forms of cinema. It's a medium that, largely because of the studio system, has been unexplored artistically. Now I don't want to rant against the studios here because every now and then they make something bright and beautiful but there are many other avenues for expression within our medium. We don't know yet how many possible forms of film might exist or develop or spawn from the fertile minds of filmmakers without preconcieved borders. Where would literature be today if we never allowed poetry to develop? Where would we be if art never developed beyond the classical masters or music or any art form? To trash someones experiment just because it doesnt fit your mold is a sin against the creative development and exploration of film. If you personally believe his writing to be cliche that's fine, I found it somewhat cliched as well. But to judge someone simply for being experimental is dangerous and extremely close minded.

I think mrpink's point was more about *not* simply accepting something as "experimental" or "symbolic" and judging it differently because of that. I have to agree with his main point, although not necessarily regarding entertainment as the only criteria.

If you can't criticise something just because it isn't how you think it should be, what is left to criticise? That's the entire basis of making comments and suggestions - they are based on your own perspective.

If godfather didn't want feedback, and it sounds like he doesn't, he shouldn't have started the thread. That's probably a better idea than responding to each suggestion with a defense.

quote:

Originally posted by holdemmrpink:

quote:

not necessarily regarding entertainment as the only criteria.

Entertainment is the very basic criteria of how a movie should be judged. Yes, there are lots of more specific things you can look at when comparing movies but if a movie isn't entertaining then no one will watch it and the entertainment industry depends on the audience. No one can deny that. What I'm saying is that symbolism can't save a movie with poor/no characters and metaphors can't save a movie that leaves the audience unsatisfied. I'm not saying I dislike this script because its experimental, I'm saying I dislike this script because it didn't entertain me. And I watch movies becuase I want to be entertained.

Im not saying that critical judgements can't or shouldn't be made of a film because they are artistic or experimental. What I was saying was that they shouldn't be made because the person was being artistic or experimental. If you feel the experiment was a failure or that there are many obvious cliche's, then by all means call them on it. But you can't say that entertainment is the sole criteria that movies should be judged on. And you shouldn't chastize all aspects of a project merely because it failed to bring you a pleasing distraction. There are so many other reasons to make a movie, so many other forms that a film can take. If you don't think a script would be very entertaining then go ahead and say you didn't find it to be so. Just don't say this project is a failure simply because it is not entertaining. Do you think Kafka wrote Metamorphosis in order to entertain people? I don't think so, yet it has immense value as a literary work. Cinema is still comparitively in the early stages of it's life. Art, sculpture, literature and music have had millenia to develop. Film as an art form is relatively new so yes a large amount of what has been made was designed to entertain people. But how can you possibly argue that all film should be primarilly judged on the hedonistic values of pleasure and temporary distraction?

well said, King Molson.

I'd also like to add that like beauty, entertainment is in the eye of the beholder. Not everyone is going to be entertained by your movie. people will like it, people will disslike it. You can't please everyone so you might aswell just do it the right way and please yourself. Make the movie YOU want to see. There will be people who like it.

TO VANTAGO: i dont want it to have a dream feel, the film is more of a fantasy, its not like someone will wake up you know.

TO KINGMOSLON: Thank you

HOLDEM: maybe the line sounds familiar, ok, but the script HASNT been done before, b.c its a mix of reality and fantasy IN a reality setting, and no movie isnt entertainment, and if it is then its just about money, and if its just about money might as well stop thinking and just do the work and thatsx DULL. A movie should entertain yes, but if its all about entertainment for you, i feel sorry for you.

EVAN: obviously i woudnt make the topic if i didnt want feedback, i do want feedback, but i havent been on the computer lately b.c im busy, i wish u had something more useful related to the story to say

a dream feel to a movie doesnt necessarily mean the movie IS a dream, it just means it has a strange atmosphere where nothing is really what it seems.