UPDATED: The Lucky 7 [now 8] loglines that I have agreed to read!

UPDATED BELOW with an 8th script.

So the loglines are in and it looks like we had about 63 Black List submissions for yesterday's offer.  I said I'd select up to eight scripts out of those loglines and read at least 15 pages.  As it turns out, when I went through and picked out the loglines that seemed like the most interesting reads, I ended up with seven, so that seems like a good place to leave it.

Among the rest there were several "second tier" choices, so in the event that all seven of these have me dropping them at 15 pages, I might be inclined to check out some of the second tier ones.  Still, I picked these scripts because the concepts seemed like the ones I was mostly likely to enjoy - and also because if I were to endorse them, they would probably be the most likely sorts of concepts to garner other interest.  (That probably explains the heavy bias towards thrillers.  I'd hoped for a few more comedies or rom-coms, and while there were other good loglines, I didn't feel them demanding my attention.

So without further ado, here are the Lucky 7!

My Future Ex-Sister-In-Law 
Genre: Romantic Comedy
Logline: A new couple must hide their relationship from their respective siblings—a divorced duo who hate each other.

Mickey Stanton and the Legions of Darkness! 
Genre: Action/Comedy/Supernatural
Logline: When a commander of the underworld leads an unholy invasion to the surface, three lowly gas station attendants will battle his vile horde to stop them from wreaking havoc across the entire planet!

Cold Crossing 
Genre: Thriller
Logline: A desperate woman hatches a risky plot to escape her abusive husband, but when complications put her little girl in the crossfire, she'll sacrifice anything and anyone to save her daughter.

Where Death Follows
 Genre: Thriller
Logline: When the FBI guns down his father, the teenage son of a serial killer goes on the run from a relentless and unstable Federal Agent who will stop at nothing to see him dead.

Chambers
Genre: Psychological Thriller
Logline: A wallflower college student, horrified at the discovery of a torture chamber hidden by his recently deceased father, struggles to save a young woman still trapped in it while his domineering brother wants to continue their father's work.

H8RZ (HATERS)
Genre: Crime/Mystery/Thriller
Logline: The lone survivor of a massive school explosion is held against his will while the administration, police and school board appointed lawyer sift through a story of blackmail, cyber-bullying, and murder, to try to figure out exactly what happened.

Farewell, Great Leader 
Genre: Drama/Thriller
Logline: A filmmaker and his actress ex-wife are abducted by Kim Jong-Il and forced to make a Godzilla knock-off propaganda film. Their only hope of escape is to use the film's final explosive stunt to cover their tracks.

I'll try to work my way through most of these within the next week and post any reviews either early next week or right after the 4th of July holiday weekend.  I think I'll go through the other submitted loglines and maybe offer indications of why some of them didn't get chosen, so be checking the comments on the earlier post throughout the weekend as I work my way through those.

Have a good weekend everyone!

Update 7:00pm Friday - This is embarrassing. When you guys post a comment here, I get it sent to me in an email. I was using those emails to keep track of the most interesting loglines and then culled the list down from there.  Well, I goofed up and must have accidentally deleted one of those emails which included a script I was interested in.  I didn't discover this until I went through the comments to reply and realized I'd forgotten one.

(Don't worry. I've scrutinized all the loglines and there weren't any others that fell through the cracks, so this will be the only update.)

So I'm pleased to announce one more script will be joining my to-read pile:


Wicked Garden
Genre: Horror / Horror Comedy
Logline: A troubled teen inadvertently unleashes an evil garden gnome, who's hellbent on protecting his garden, and must stop it before it kills everyone he loves. In the vein of "Child's Play" and "Gremlins".

My sincerest apologies to you all for the oversight, especially to the writer.

I will read your Black List submission!

Many of you have asked about this and I have decided to give the public what they want.  Yes, I will read your fucking screenplay....

...IF you follow the rules I lay out in this blog post.

Many of you may remember back in October when I offered to read the first ten pages of any script whose writer provided a link to their Black List posting in the comments over a four-day period.  I had allowed for such a long period of submissions because I honestly thought I'd only get a few submissions and I didn't want to have only three or four applicants.

I, uh, underestimated the response. Like, by a LOT.  I had ten submissions within the first hour, which is even more remarkable when you realize I always post at midnight PST, when fewer people are likely to reply.  I ended up with 70-scripts that met the deadline, so I knew that if I ever did this again, there'd have to be changes.

The ultimate aim of this venture is to help out people who have taken the plunge on the Black List website.  A script needs two ratings in order to get onto the Top Uploaded and Top Unproduced Lists, which are some of the most valuable ways of attracting attention.  You can always take the chance that someone will discover your script and rate it, or you could pay for Black List reader reviews.  I have to imagine that getting one rating out of the blue is hard, and getting two is even harder.  Because of that, I want to help and possibly encourage other Black List members to dive into the submission pile.

I have no intention of hurting anyone's script by giving them a bad rating.  I want to find something I like, nay LOVE.  If I come across a fantastic script, it would be my honor to promote it on the blog and draw some more eyes over there.  But surely you understand that for my endorsement to mean anything, I have to be raving about the script.  I'm not going to give notes or "that was good for a first draft" platitudes.  I'm going to be saying "READ THIS SCRIPT!"

The best way to find scripts I love is going to be by thinning the herd so that I'm not spending time on concepts that "aren't for me."  Pay attention, because this is important - your logline must sell me on the script.  Yes, this time I'm not promising to read every submission.  The only submissions I will read will be those with loglines that interest me, just as if you were sending me a query.

The genres I'm most like to respond to are action, rom-com, horror, comedy, thriller and anything "high concept."

What am I less likely to be drawn to? Period pieces and torture porn.  So keep that in mind if you're considering joining the Black List just to take advantage of this opportunity.

To qualify, you must submit your comment from the time this post goes live to 11:59pm this evening.  24 hours, no exceptions and no extensions under any circumstance.

Your comment must include the following - Title, Genre, Logline and a link to your script's page on the Black List.  And remember that a logline is a sentence or a couple sentences.  Be concise, don't write me a paragraph. The link to your script's page on the Black List MUST be in the comments. Do not email me. Do not Tweet me. I will ONLY read scripts publicly pointed out here.

My aim is to select the 8 loglines that intrigue me the most and I will read at least the first 15 pages of each of those scripts.  In the event that you guys deliver a lot of awesome loglines, I'll consider going over that limit, but they're all going to have to be really good for me to consider giving that much time.   I probably will let you know if your logline was or wasn't selected, but I probably won't go into much detail why.  Don't take it personally - some ideas aren't for everyone.

I will offer no comments on any of the scripts I didn't finish reading. Don't ask me what you did wrong. Don't ask me for feedback. I doubt I'll have time to respond to everyone, and so to be fair, I will respond to no one.

I will be holding all scripts to the same standards as the material I read for my job. There's no such thing as "good for an amateur" on this scale. Scripts will be judged according to how they measure up to professional submissions.

If I really like your script I will spotlight it in a post on my blog, but know that it would probably have to rate an 8, 9 or a 10 for me to do that.  I'll do my best to write a review that sells people on the script.  It won't be full coverage, and I won't spoil any major secrets or plot twists.  If you want to get a sense of how these read, check out my reviews of MCCARTHY, DEAD CORPS and ALICE OF OZ.

So good luck, gang.  I hope to be very impressed by the submissions in the comments.

P.S. This goes without saying, but I'm not making any claim of who I will pass the script on to and I will not attach myself as a producer or anything.  No crazy promises - and no exploitation.

Webshow: Bad Newscast Exposition

In this week's video, I take on a writing trick that is rarely used all that well - using a newscast scene to fill in exposition.

The Writers Guild of America West and Black List announce alliance!

From Press Release:

WGAW and Black List Form Strategic Alliance

Los Angeles – The Writers Guild of America, West (WGAW) and script-hosting website The Black List have formed a strategic alliance with a mutual goal to advocate on behalf of writers, as well as benefit Guild members by providing them with a credible platform to help spotlight their work within the entertainment industry.

“The Writers Guild of America exists to advocate for writers, and it’s a mission we share. We couldn’t be more excited about working in cooperation in that effort, and, personally, as someone who came to Hollywood because of a deep admiration of storytellers, it’s quite a special moment,” said Black List Founder Franklin Leonard.

“Since the inception of this list, Franklin’s work has been all about celebrating writing and writers. I’m thrilled to make him an official partner of the Guild,” said screenwriter and WGAW Board of Directors member Billy Ray (The Hunger Games, Captain Phillips).

As part of the newly formed alliance between the WGAW and the Black List, all WGAW members will be able to add their script titles, loglines, tags, and representative information, as well as monitor their work’s ratings and user traffic, free of charge. WGAW members will also receive a 20% discount on paid Black List services to host their scripts and obtain reader evaluations of their screenplays. In addition, all scripts uploaded to the BL website by WGAW members during the first 30 days of the alliance announcement will be hosted for one month free of charge. Future months’ script hosting will be charged at the 20% discount rate all WGA members are entitled to receive.

In turn, the Black List will feature WGAW-related educational and resource information on its website, including information on the WGAW’s FAP (Feature Access Project) and WAP (Writer Access Project) programs, both of which aim to provide increased employment opportunities for diverse writers by making their work available to industry professionals, as well as links to WGAW Registry, the WGAW’s official screenplay and intellectual property registration service.

In conjunction with the launch of the WGAW-Black List alliance, the Guild will host a members-only educational event on Tuesday, July 9, at its headquarters featuring Black List founder Franklin Leonard, who will present a history of the List, demo its online service, and answer questions, including how Guild members will be able to access some of its services for free and others at a discount rate.

While one of the major challenges facing many screenwriters is “getting read” – by agents, managers, producers, or industry executives – the Black List has emerged as a viable tool for writers, both aspiring and professional, to increase the visibility of their screenplays in the marketplace. Since launching last fall, the Black List’s script-hosting website has been responsible for dozens of writers – from Los Angeles to Sweden – finding representation with major agencies and management companies, as well as more than a dozen script sales.

THE EVOLUTION OF THE BLACK LIST

In 2005, Black List founder Franklin Leonard surveyed almost 100 film industry development executives about their favorite scripts from that year that had not been produced as feature films. Since then, the voter pool has grown to about 500 film executives, and over 200 Black List screenplays have been made as feature films, which have collectively earned over $16B in worldwide box office and have been nominated for 148 Academy Awards, winning 25, including five of the last ten screenwriting Oscars. I

n September 2012, the Black List launched a membership site for industry professionals that functions as a real-time Black List and screenplay recommendation engine. In October 2012, Leonard extended the Black List’s mission further by allowing screenwriters from the world to upload their scripts to its database for a fee, have them evaluated by professional script readers and, subject to that evaluation and their recommendation algorithm, sent to over 1,000 film industry professionals for consideration. For more information on the Black List, please visit: http://blcklst.com/

The Writers Guild of America, West (WGAW) is a labor union representing writers of motion pictures, television, radio, and Internet programming, including news and documentaries. Founded in 1933, the Guild negotiates and administers contracts that protect the creative and economic rights of its members. It is involved in a wide range of programs that advance the interests of writers, and is active in public policy and legislative matters on the local, national, and international levels. For more information on the WGAW, please visit: www.wga.org.

Black List questions

Jerry asks:

I've got a Black List question that's been bothering me for the last weeks and I honestly don't know who to turn to for an answer. I'm so desperate, I've asked on the Done Deal forums and you know how that place is. I'm really hoping you can answer this, even if you make the question public. 

I uploaded a comedy script on the BL about a little over a month ago (3/8 to be exact) and I paid for two reviews: one came back an overall 7/10, the other a 3/10, which gave me the discounted read. I took it and the 3rd review came back an overall 9/10 with no component under a 9. I won't include the link because I'm not trying to get you to read it, I'd rather just have your opinion on the matter. The 7/10 also scored 8s on the character/dialogue and I was included in the Friday e-mail, I also was included twice for the overall 9/10 review and I ended up with 13 downloads. 

My question to you is: what is the time frame on getting a response? Should I now treat these downloads as any other read? Am I looking to wait 4-6 weeks like any other read? I also have to add that while I've received pretty good scores, I've also got an additional 4 rating from one of the industry folks and that my script has a top five standard deviation on the entire site, so I'm pretty sure it's polarizing. I am currently unrepped, but I've seen other folks who've scored high on the BL get signed within days of uploading. Am I just being impatient or should I get another read? Even if you can't answer this, thank you for at least letting me vent.

This email is several weeks old, so I doubt the advice is of much use to Jerry, but for others in this situation, read on...

I would probably suggest giving it a couple weeks after the email.  Some users might be intrigued by your logline, but a Black List script is probably going to end up being a lesser priority than, say, a CAA submission.   My gut would be to treat them like any other read.    Assume it's going to take a few weeks before you know anything.

With you having already paid for three reviews, I'm not sure what good a 4th review would do for you.  As you've noted, the ratings suggest the script is polarizing, so if your overall average is decent, is it worth the risk of drawing another low score?

And yes, it's completely possible to hear from someone within days of getting your paid review back - but I'd say those results are more likely when the script has appeared on one of the top lists. 

One thing I might suggest you try while waiting for replies is sending out queries to other potential reps.  Mention your strong review and perhaps you might get a few more people requesting your script.

Future Filmmaker Friday - Campus MovieFest's "Under Euclid's Watch"

This weekend brings Campus MovieFest back to Hollywood.  You might remember my posts about this program last year.  Campus MovieFest is an organization that travels from college to college providing participating students with Apple laptops and Panasonic HD camcorders. Each group has one week to create their own short film. At the conclusion of this, a red carpet finale is held to select the best films from each school, which then advance on to the finals at a gala event held in Hollywood.

I put out a call on Twitter for submissions from Campus MovieFest filmmakers and the team Red Tape Films from Indiana University responded with a link to their entry, "Under Euclid's Watch."  The film is a nominee in the Finals, in the Best Director catagory.


Good luck this weekend to the film's cast and crew:
Brendan Elmore - Captain, Writer, Director
Taylor Robinson - Producer, Director of Photography
Chandler Swan - Writer, Director
David Gordon-Johnson - Actor
Nichole Eberle - Actor
Jack Johnson - Actor
Troy Ehret - Actor, Production Assistant
Greg Goodin - Production Assistant
Sango Django Jeevan - Actor
Ryan Chase - Composer

Webshow: "Don't Be Lazy"

If there's one thing I really hate seeing in scripts, it's laziness.  Today's video discusses a bit of lazy writing that I've seen turn up in too many romantic comedies over the years.