An excerpt from my script review for Roofman which will be available 04/06/26:
5.) Format
This Saturday I had absolutely nothing going on.
Brought the boy home from college Friday afternoon, and he spent all day Saturday with the girlfriend.
The girls got back from Florida late Friday night so they were pretty lazy with no soccer matches.
And the boss had to work the closing shift at her barista job.
With no Premier League on, this left me pretty much all day to myself.
I started with the first 3 episodes of Daredevil season two, which were pretty good.
Then the middlest and I watched Sisu which I didn’t realize the trailer I saw with the old man driving the truck was actually the sequel Sisu: Road to Revenge.
We enjoyed the first film, but wow was it more brutal and graphic than we were anticipating.
After that, she tagged out and I mentally prepared for Dune: Part 2 in anticipation for the third installment coming out this year.
We watched the first one during Covid, and liked it, but for whatever reason neither the boss nor I were in any real hurry to watch the second one.
Having a bunch of free time, I completed that task.
Why am I telling you all this in the format section?
First, this section tends to be the shortest part of reviews unless something is drastically wrong, so what better place to include my untamed stream of consciousness?
Second, with Roofman being on Amazon Prime, I had every intention of reading it and then watching the film with the family, completing my Easter weekend movie marathon.
I didn’t, however.
Why?
It was too long and Jeff’s alter ego annoyed me too much.
This is really sad, since this film was one I was excited to watch once it hit streaming.
Channing Tatum is a fun guy in these sorts of roles, and the idea of hiding out in a Toys R Us is not only novel, but has entertaining potential.
Unfortunately the character development of him interacting with other humans while living a secret life turned me off.
Okay, so the format…
122 pages is entirely too long for the type of story this is, especially when you factor in it’s a cumbersome read.
You could easily go through and eliminate some of the more annoying scenes that were meant to be endearing, but just came off creepy.
(Focus on Jeff with Leigh’s kids. Leigh was probably surprised that Jeff/John’s “special knock” at her door wasn’t to tell her he was a sex offender.)
The other thing that really annoyed me?
Like “holy fuck” annoyed me…
All the “side by side” dialogue, meant to display that characters are talking over one another.
Remember, “side by side” signifies talking over one another, not interrupting.
One technique implies talking at the same time, while the other is more like one completing another’s sentence.
First of all, this technique should be used sparingly at best, but think of how an audience will hear your story unfold in this manner.
If characters are constantly talking over one another, it’s going to be impossible to follow what is going on.
Second, just because writing software like Final Draft allows for this sort of formatting doesn’t mean you need to use it.
Fuck…this overuse reminds me of the time my younger sister discovered the synonyms function on Word as she was writing her paper to get into AP English.
As she went through she’s right clicking like a fiend, trying to use “smarter” sounding words that often didn’t fit.
It didn’t work for her, and just like this format didn’t work in the script.
And this goes for a lot of “special use” techniques in screenwriting.
Remember, using it more doesn’t make you look like a better writer.
If anything, it could signal the direct opposite.
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