Comments Made During the Contest

Adam Grage (Level 4)

I enjoyed this piece. It seemed kinda boring at the beginning, but the alien bit made it interesting.

I think it would have been better for the woman to survive, maybe even have her recounting what had just happened below on the boat and then have the alien attack her at the end on the boat.

Just a suggestion.

Ali Barr (Level 4)

This was very good. Great way to use a world where dialogue is useless. The ocean is always scary to me because it is an alien world in itself. To wrap this up tighter, I might recommend full closure and full circle of your title and opening scene by having the alien stick the woman into a specimen container for "Scientific Study" of his/her own just as she had done to the cuttlefish in the beginning. That allows a full journey to occur from Scientist to Specimen. I like to wrap it up. See what you think.

Audrey Webb (Level 5)

This is a great segment of a longer movie. It has suspense, action, and drama...all the great components of a tremendous scene. I just wanted to see more around it. The ending is not satisfying.

Do you have an idea of a longer movie that this could be slipped into?

Austin Jones (Level 4)

Really nice visual bit of yarn! Good solid story. I did miss the having the title page and something about the ending is unfinished...like it's missing its moment to settle or if going the other way the abruptness is not set up enough for a punch ending. But over all very nice.

Brian Wind (Level 5)

Me trying to give advice on how to improve this would be like Uwe Boll advising George Romero on how to make a zombie film so I'll just let you know I loved everything about it from start to finish, give you an excellent and move on with the reviewing. Great stuff. Keep it up.

Caroline Coxon (Mod Emeritus)

It's good to read something set in different surroundings. It promised very well, but then...I guess nothing that surprising happened. I was expecting the divers to be attacked by some kind of creature, is what I mean. It would have been great if the ending had been less predictable.

Good that you wrote in small chunks of good descriptive text.

Charlie Hebert (Mod Emeritus)

Very good, nice using scuba diving as there can be no dialogue.

Found the story interesting and well written. The ending was a bit predictable. Would have been a nice touch if the woman had thrown the camcorder into the boat before she got dragged under.

Chris Messineo (Founder)

Great craft. Very well written. A real page/screen turner.

My only complaint is, I want more. It feels like the opening to a much longer story. I want to know more about the man and woman as well as the alien.

This is very good, but I think if there was a little more depth to this story it would be excellent.

Dan Lennox (Level 5)

Great sense of adventure and building tension, but the ending seemed flat. It became predictable as soon as the Alien grabbed the Man.

I thought your descriptions and actions were done nicely, everything flowed well, and the pace was good. It kept me hooked just to be let down at the end.

I would definetly do a rewrite on this one with emphasis on the ending.

Don Riemer (Level 4)

Nice set-up. great description. (Are you a diver?) The story was a bit weak. It felt unfinished at the end, more like Act 1 of a longer script, than a complete 5-page short. You had a great parallel between humans and aliens both collecting specimens.... I'd have loved to have read a similar parallel, of the alien choosing to let one "specimen" go, or perhaps tagging a specimen for tracking. That might have been cool.... the woman gets away after a struggle with the alien, thinking she's escaped safe and sound, only to find there's an implanted tracking device under her skin.

Elias Farnum (Level 5)

The writing was crisp with good visuals throughout, a unique background, being underwater was the perfect foil for this challenge. But, I wish you would have had more set-up with the alien. Maybe something of how exactly it got there.

I didn't know what a cuttlefish looked like so I image searched, and those things look alien enough. At first I thought there might be some type of Godzilla cuttlefish coming and was almost disappointed when it turned out to be an alien. Good job nonetheless.

Erich VonHeeder (Level 4)

Nice idea to set your script for this contest underwater. A great tactic for opening wide lines of communication (excessive pointing and gesturing) that would normally be unavailable.

I always enjoy a good alien/monster attack scene. But I feel like I can't score this super high though, simply because it was pretty standard: people discover alien artifact, people get caught off guard by alien, people get eaten/killed/abducted.

Think of how you could stray from that well-worn path...

John Foley (Level 4)

Good visuals to the story. The action was described well. I just did not connect to any characters within this story. It may have been effective or funnier if in the end the alien captured one of the characters and place them in a specimen jar. I was looking for more than just a monster or in this case alien attacking just to do so.

Kirk White (Level 5)

I actually forced my lunch meeting to wait while I finished this! I thought it was really good through and through. Not much on character development but amazing technique and craft...great pace. Really nice work!

Lewayne White (Level 4)

Very cool. Seems like the teaser at the beginning of a movie.

Margaret Ricke (Level 5)

The writing on this is good, but the story doesn't have a point. Your descriptives are pretty well done. Your form is good. I would rather see this as a full-length feature film. With dialogue. Well done overall.

Mark Christmas (Level 2)

I didnt expect an alien creature to be in this script... It was a definite suprise. Other than that, the story had nothing too crazy or different. Try describing the creature in more detail. A good sci-fi script nonetheless.

Marnie Mitchell Lister (Level 5)

This was pretty cool. You had a great idea for no dialog with the SCUBA divers. Pretty good tension build up although some of your descriptions seemed repetetive. Other than that it was an easy and entertaining read. :)

Michael Thede (Level 4)

Small detail, but having some dive experience myself, I've learned that the thumbs up signal means "UP" not "OK"--for "OK" you actually want the OK sign. I like that you've set this underwater. It's always a bit freaky to imagine encountering something like this underwater as we're clearly out of our natural environment down there. I also like how you've got the collectors becoming the collected, in a sense, as that seems to be what the alien is doing. I don't, however, believe that the woman would shed her "utility vest" during her ascent. That vest is in fact a buoyancy control device which, when inflated, would actually accelerate her ascent and keep her floating on the surface when she reached it. I'm guessing you're not a diver. Perhaps some research is in order before moving on the re-write. :)

Neal Barringer (Level 0)

Good action, suspense, and tension. Not an effective ending, resolution, wrap-up or cliff-hanger.

Philip Whitcroft (Level 5)

This might be good within a wider story. I had trouble viewing the alien as an alien because there are some very strange things in the seas and the alien is described as resembling them so could it be a sea creature?

Rob Gross (Level 4)

Very good. Good irony in this one, the hunters become the hunted.

You had a good rhythm/tempo to the story. I liked how you made sure to let us know about the air running low. It added intensity to the story.

The woman almost got away...but we knew she wouldn't! Maybe have her get into the boat and speed away. It would give us the impression that she got away. Then BAM! She's nailed by the alien.

Loved this.

Rustom Irani (Moderator)

This was quite a good sci-fi/creature story in five pages.

But it seems as part of a larger piece as some sci-fi stories are wont to do. I just wish there was more to the creatures description and motivation than just being malevolent.

I mean aliens in movies always get a bad rap 9 times out of 10.

If you tried to show irony in the fact that like the scientists it's collecting samples of creatures from earth than it is quite clever but "Predator" already did that in a more hunting for trophies kinda way.

Your descriptions were vivid and eerie and that is what the genre is all about.

You could do without describing the facial expressions as the danger is quite imminent and music could help in that regard. (Though you couldn't hint at that here.)

Technically you were fine.

Keep writing.

Sally Meyer (Moderator)

I gave this a good, because the writing was very visual, and the story did keep me going for a long time, but then I felt the ending fell flat. I wanted something to happen, and all that really happened was that they were killed by the alien creature. I didn't get a sense of who the characters were and I think that is needed. There has to be something on a more personal level, to allow the audience to engage in the story.

I did like the writing though, it was fast and easy to follow, if there'd been more of a kick at the end, I would have given you very good. I gave this a good.

Spencer McDonald (Level 4)

Really good story. I could play the entire movie in my head. I was able to place myself underwater as a scuba diver watching and I have never skin dived. The only that confused me just slightly was the first scene around the shark cage. It was murky to me (ha ha) and had to read it a couple of times to understand the scene. Maybe it' me and if that happens it may need clarity. That was my only thought about the alien with ink and tentacle story.

Stephen Brown (Level 5)

Well done with this. Another good subject choice for no dialogue. Your writing is fine and the story flowed. The only problem I had with it was, the alien needed more explanation. That seemed to be a big question mark and the only reason I'm giving this a VERY GOOD instead of an EXCELLENT.

Tony Oldham (Level 4)

Really well written and easy to follow. A nice atmospheric action sequence that works well.

William Bienes (Mod Emeritus)

The writing was very good, clear images and solid descriptions. The story didn't interest me. It went along and played out the way you thought it would.

Comments Made After the Contest

Chris Messineo (Founder) ~ 6/1/2008 1:16 PM

This was a great story. Is there more to it. I want more. :)

Brian Wind (Level 5) ~ 6/1/2008 1:24 PM

Sylvia, this was my favorite script of the month. Excellent imagery throughout. Nice job!

Ali Barr (Level 4) ~ 6/2/2008 5:22 PM

I really liked this one, I thought it should have placed for sure.