Comments Made During the Contest

Adam Grage (Level 4)

Unforunately this script suffers from having no dialogue. The general terms used make understanding what James is thinking hard to follow.

Especially at the end where all James does is look down at himself and back at Dave and then to the camp. Back and forth several times. I found myself skimming some of it because of that.

Maybe there is a way to bring the internal actions out more but I am not sure how that could be achieved.

Ali Barr (Level 4)

I like this story. It will make an intense film. It was one of the more difficult ones to read though because there was almost TOO much detail. Too heavy on description of what the actor would do, where to look, etc. It disrupted the overall flow of the story for me.

I would just trim it down so the essential action is there. Details enough to see in the minds eye but that's it. The director will set up the shots or storyboard the action. EXAMPLE: "He looks to size up.... so that...." could simply be "He studies the route and the distance to camp." A good actor will allow us to perceive what he is thinking.

I definitely felt for James and liked his character. Tough scenario. I'd like to see this one.

Audrey Webb (Level 5)

I don't get it. How did James unable to get back to the same spot where he'd been. Did I miss something? I read it twice, but still couldn't visualize it.

Austin Jones (Level 4)

This is a great idea and an engaging dilemma but I feel like it is just a walk through of something that happened. I think you could be a little more selective with what you describe...there is so much detail of every little thing that happens that I started to lose sight of the story as a whole. There should be more flow and pace to create more tension because you have a very tense plot! I was also a little confused about the rope in the end...so James went all the way to the summit still tied to his friend? That seems like a lot of rope...especially if he goes far enough not to hear the cave in. It is also odd...and I am not a climber so I really do not have any knowledge of this...but it seems odd to me that the camp would not be in the same direction that James and Dave were coming from...how is it that Dave is cut off and not James? If you go up one way don't you come down the same way more or less? I like this story and it is a wonderful internal conflict...I just think that you can shape it more. Nice job.

Brian Wind (Level 5)

"We" are not in the story therefore "we" should not appear in a script (unless a character is using the word in dialgoue.) "We see this" or "We see that" are incorrect. If written properly, we'll know what we will see on the screen because all a script really is, is a blueprint of what we will see.

The story was good, but I had a few questions that didn't really get answered. Why couldn't Dave call out to his friend? (Aside from the fact that this was a silent script.) I didn't really figure out why there was such finality to Dave being left behind either. Wouldn't Jason just go to the camp, call for help and have a copter up there saving Dave within a couple of hours anyways? I can't imagine that Jason was just planning on carrying Dave down the mountain to begin with so leaving him behind (to get help) actually seemed like the most logical solution right from the start.

Anyway, nice job.

Caroline Coxon (Mod Emeritus)

Use Present Simple tense - James lies - rather than Present Continuous - James is lying. It makes your work read more crisply.

Using 'We back away' etc. is best avoided. Just describe what is on the screen. Of course it's us seeing whatever it is!

'Touching The Void' which I've both read and seen, is coming strongly into my mind. That aside, I like reading material that is set in interesting places.

Caroline Fraissinet (Level 1)

Gripping; excellent work.
The only real criticism I would have (and this is nit-picking) is that there's a lot of "nodding" throughout. Try to keep it down to a minimum because it could get redundant.
Otherwise, very well written!

Chris Messineo (Founder)

Most importantly, I think you have a wonderful story here.

However, it is written far to much like prose. You give us every detail and it slows down the action and the drama. Tighten it up, cut everything you can, and choose carefully the details you share with us. The audience will fill in the rest and it will make for a much quicker read.

I hope you rewrite this as I think it could be great.

Dan Lennox (Level 5)

This was a very good story. It's tragic how greed can sometimes cause us to make poor decisions that can have devastating consequences.

Nicely done!

Don Riemer (Level 4)

Great script, and a perfect choice for this contest. The absence of dialogue felt natural and flowed very well. Wonderful sense of detail... are you a climber? The whole scenario is very vivid and real. My only big negative comment is that I don't for a moment believe that James would have left Dave on that ledge and gone for the summit by himself. If Dave had been conscious, sure, but not like this. That just felt totally unbelievable. But the ending is great.... James faking circumstances to make it look like Dave cut him loose. Really neat. Great job.

Donna Malies (Level 2)

Great opening. You gave a full visual on what's it like to be a climber. It also show/tell the character's emotions.

Elias Farnum (Level 5)

The formatting needs to be worked on - scene headings are all wrong.

"James stands and looks at the camp coldly thinking of a plan to save himself from being in trouble." There is no way I can see this on screen.

I thought the story unique, and horrifying. A good vehicle here for the silent challenge.

Erich VonHeeder (Level 4)

Great work. My only (minor) comments are that I would have liked to see a little more closure at the end. Maybe a quick, futile attempt to stand shows us that Dave is doomed and James will escape...or Dave standing shows us that James is nailed. I think that would make this a self-contained vignette, instead of hinting at a "next chapter." Also, I feel like there may be a more streamlined way to capture James's decision making at his two major decision points...something a little more compact than having him look back and forth at two destinations four or five times. But again...minor comments for a thoroughly enjoyable piece.

Jim Montgomery (Level 3)

Had a problem with the deep crevasse. How did it get there, or better yet how did they get on the ledge in the first place? This script would have worked a lot better if you could have used dialog at the end "James .... James you sob!

Kirk White (Level 5)

I think your story is actually quite good and heartbreaking. but the script reads too much like prose. every little action, from him looking up and then down, is described and you go way too much inside the character's heads. Just write the action and let the actor fill it out. I feel you have a lot of technical know-how about climbing...so you should just let the action speak for itself. I think the image at the end of his friend waking up and watching him descend, helplessly is powerful. I'd suggest really streamlining this script and sticking to painting the action in broad strokes...not so much detail.

Lewayne White (Level 4)

Decent suspense, but I'm not sure that I'll buy that James would leave Dave behind.

Margaret Ricke (Level 5)

While I was reading this I came to believe that you aren't a climber and that you've never been that high up on a mountain. Maybe you are and maybe you have, but I didn't get that from your writing. You chose to place these two friends on a mountain, though, and the mountain should be treated as a third character. It does, in fact, have a bigger role to play than Dave does. James' adversaries are himself and the mountain and Dave's only role is that his life is what hangs in the balance.

Marnie Mitchell Lister (Level 5)

I liked the concept and definately liked the twist at the end but I do feel this story would have benefited if it were shortened to maybe 3 to 3 1/2 pages. I think this would have helped the tension build up. You have James looking down, then looking up a lot. I think if you said in one sentence that he does this several times it would still get the point across and move the story along faster. There were quite a few things like that, that just seemed repetetive.

Also you to a lot of "telling" in your screenwriting. You can't tell us how someone feels or what they may be thinking. This is even more challenging with no dialog but bottom line is, if we can't see it on the screen, don't write it. That's what makes screenwriting so hard.

But keep it up because you had a really good idea for your story.

Matias Caruso (Level 5)

Strong opening.

You have a character struggling with a huge moral dilemma. Choosing between two wrongs is always a good source of conflict.

My problem is that this conflict is immediately resolved when James manages to pull Dave back up. Then James decides to make it to the summit, which is a strange decision since moments before, both his life and his friend’s life were at stake.

Once he decides to gamble with both their lives, I no longer cared if something bad happened to him.

This was a little hard to read, some of the descriptions would be a serious challenge for an actor to pull off.

Micah Ricke (Level 4)

I will be honest, I had a hard time with this one. I like description. I like visual description. But you're a bit too descriptive and indepth. It seems that the story could have been done in a few short pages.

One other nit-pick, the descriptions of Dave and James are unnecessary. I can put together that they're fit and wearing climbing kits from the rest of the story.

Best regards,

Neal Barringer (Level 0)

Released the suspense of "who's hanging on the rope" too early. also, too many internal thoughts.

Rustom Irani (Moderator)

I like the fact that Dave is not aware of the fact that he came very close to dying earlier. This makes the audience more empathetic towards his character but at the same time we know James is being selfish, yet I guess he saved Dave's life once before.

I think though your opening is a great sequence we need to rewind just a bit more to find out how Dave got into his position. It is important because what movies have taught me about mountain climbers is that 9 times out of ten they're gonna chop of the rope.

"Vertical Limit" comes the closest to mind.

You do have some description that is more character thought than actual action, and then you have action that actually conveys that emotion and brings it out in the audience.

"James stands and looks at the camp coldly thinking of a plan
to save himself from being in trouble. When he has settled on
what he will do he looks at Dave and is briefly distracted
from his plan."

This example towards the end is one of those. He executes his plan, by chopping the rope in half. It is a cold plan and well calculated. You don't really need that description. Time and pacing can be conveed through action, if that was your intention.

Technically you were fine, though I would have liked some audio clues as well.

Great descriptions and dramatic tension though.

Keep writing.

Sally Meyer (Moderator)

What I liked about the story was the feeling of love that James had for Dave. They planned to go to the summit together and for whatever reason, Dave got sick. But James decided to go on ahead and take a picture for the both of them.

What I thought needed tweaking was the length. You could easily condense the story and make it twice as full, in terms of shorter action lines and not dwelling on all the details of the rope, the boots, the climbing etc.

I think the story is good and I enjoyed reading it.

Sylvia Dahlby (Level 5)

I liked the man vs the elements start & the survival theme. Good approach to a script without dialog. But the story started losing me fast. It reads like a novel in parts. Uneven use of present tense and passive verbs "is" was jarring - and the camera direction "as we back further" slow it down & pull me out of the story. There are also many points in the exposition where we are inside James's head, how do we see he is happy there's plenty of daylight left or that he's "thinking carefully" or "tired but triumphant" or "suddenly concerned" or "not confident"? Get rid of the editorial and focus on the action.

Tony Oldham (Level 4)

I think the writing here could be more economical. We are told almost every single movement and I would prefer each bit of action to be broken down with shorter description. But a good effort.

William Bienes (Mod Emeritus)

I wouldn't want to be James' friend.

The writing was good. I'm not really into the struggle of man vs. nature, but the story kept my interest and was well drawn... survival of the fittest.

Very solid effort and a sobering one at that.

William Coleman (Level 5)

This read more like a short story than a film script. I don't mean that you should have inserted a lot of camera directions, but I think it could have been broken down into beats, each a building block that came to the climax.

However, it grabbed me and held my interest. There was no need for dialog since Dave is unable to speak so you didn't push it to remain silent.

The ending was appropriate. In many ways it reminded me of that wonderful documentary about that disastrous Everest climb that Jon Krakaur described in his book, Into Thin Air - but it was your own work.

I sense you have climbed - as have I - since there is an air of authenticity about this piece.

Comments Made After the Contest

Philip Whitcroft (Level 5) ~ 12/31/2008 4:49 PM

Thanks for all your comments. I've done a quick rewrite of this that tightens it up a lot and includes some dialog.