#Performance Anxiety - Short - 13 Pages

18 messages · Page 1 of 1 (latest)

spiral field
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Eyeing this up as my Killer Shorts entry for this year...

stuck sigil
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I will dive into this later sounds fun

winged fiber
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@spiral field

Okay, so I'm sure you know this, but you're going to need to get the rights for "Father and Son" by Cat Stevens, and I've heard of him, so make sure to budget for that if you're planning on paying for this yourself.

Pfft, cat--or frog!--scare. That made me smile. You do a great job of establishing the slasher subgenre of horror in the first sequence. The audience will at least guess that Nick is up to no good even before seeing Samantha. I would suggest making the action lines sound even a little more horror-y to get us in the zone, but you do a good job as is.

Minnie opening the trunk for no particular reason doesn't really make sense to me. Easy fix, though: maybe she heard noises from the trunk--after all, there's a live woman in there.

The montage of Nick being terrified of getting caught is amusing. I'll admit I didn't quite link the scenes together as larger sequences in my head until the second read-through, which was probably because I was hungry, so I'm glad I looked it over again.

"Get back in there." Pffft. One minor issue with the middle of this piece is that I have trouble determining how many days have passed since the opening sequence, and a couple days vs. a couple weeks would have different feels, so I get a little lost. You may want to tighten that up.

Also, yeah, being a slasher would get you some pretty good exercise, wouldn't it? That gag is gold.

Most of the dialogue is serviceable--I wouldn't say it pops, but it does what you need it to do.

The montage of dates goes a little quick for me, though that may just be me. I think you might need a framing structure for them, though as to exactly what type I'm not sure.

The final scene could also use a little more buildup. In general, I think you've rushed the end a little and it does the piece a disservice.

Overall, you've done a good job, but not quite a great job yet--I think you need another draft. I'm interested to see what comes of that next draft, though!

spiral field
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Thank you! Yeah I wrote it in one evening, the idea just came to me so I got it down as quickly as I could. I agree with it needing to be a bit more “horror-y” as it’s definitely more of a comedic piece at the moment.

winged fiber
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That's perfectly fair. It's a great idea for a horror-comedy, and I respect that you needed to get your first draft down. I wrote a synopsis in one (yesterday) morning too.

spiral field
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When you want me to take a look at yours, just let me know!

winged fiber
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I have my post up publicly. Whenever you're feeling it would be nice!

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(Just posted it.)

spiral field
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Oh 🤣 perfect. I’ll take a look now!

winged fiber
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Yay!

stuck sigil
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Hey, just had a read on way home from work. It's fun, and an easy read too so well done. Couple of notes from me:

  • the sentence structure as Nick approaches the broken down car. I'd reverse it, so “Nick creeps toward the car, illuminated by blinking orange light”.

  • Minnie needs a reason to go to his trunk. Like does she have bags etc?

  • if she can get on wifi why note tether to Nicks phone?

  • the end is very abrupt and almost a totally different tone to the rest of the script. The violence and description is so graphic compared to the rest it feels jarring.

  • I like the premise and wonder if there is a world where in the end he ends up a victim of a female serial killer?

spiral field
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Thank you!

broken ridge
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If Nick is going on that many dates, it might be helpful to write in some kind of charm or allure he has. “Plain and forgettable” doesn’t sound like someone who goes on many dates. 😆I liked the cut between “what kind of exercise do you do” and him chasing victims around and thought it was funny. I would go over that dialogue though… it doesn’t strike me as very natural (it might be good enough to cut from “do you work out?” to the chase scene). I’m also wondering how that rock ended up on his coffee table -just why it’s there in the first place.

plain willow
# spiral field A serial killer deals with the fallout of a failed murder. Short Horror / Comed...

Overall, I think there's a really good concept here. A serial killer that's just.. kinda bad at serial killing.

I liked the opening scene and how it establishes the tone and character. The fact that it goes awry and could lead to him getting caught potentially does give us a bit of tension. But maybe you could give us a little more insight into how miserable and boring he is when he isn't serial killing and why he needs to do this so bad.

I like that the scenes move quickly when he's disposing off the evidence and throwing his axe into a lake.

The montage of him fumbling the murders was by far the funniest part, with him just letting one of the women go when his car doesn't work being my favourite.

Which brings me to the ending, I feel like it goes against what you were doing with the rest of the story with how straightforward easy and graphic it was. Was there some sort of thematic relevance or symbolism that I maybe missed out on?

spiral field
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Wow you’ve been digging deep in the feedback channel! I wanted to have the ending be the “success story” cliche, but obviously reversed because it’s about murder. To be honest I can’t really remember as it was a while back 🤣, thanks for the notes though, I’ll make sure to put them down.

plain willow
spiral field
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I’ve recently uploaded the first draft of my horror comedy if you want to give that a look? I’d be happy to read anything of yours in return!