Here’s a review I did last year for T’ville member Scott Vasey. He’s since revamped the script with all the reviews received by myself and over a dozen other reviewers… and to my knowledge, he’s gained some traction with it.

So, this review is for the version I read in June 2014. There are spoilers in here for that version of the script, though since I haven’t read the new one, I don’t know if they still apply.

Review of The Snake
Written by Scott Vasey
A hardened survivor joins a determined father for a journey across the post-apocalyptic American West filled with natural hazards, herds of bloaters, and the brutal remnants of humanity.

Reviewed by Geoff Morton (posted Jun 22, 2014)
(Screenplay | Horror, Western, 96 Pages)

Shed The Skin

Hey Scott.

Second script of yours. Second zombie story. Much different experience.

Grim. Spartan. Good. It was all of those things. You’ve definitely got yourself a promising project on your hands here. After all the rounds of reviewing you’ve been through with it, I wonder if I have anything to offer.

I’ll give it a shot.

The Shaggy Dog pt1

CONCEPT

In a world, where a zombie virus has decimated everything, two men will travel up The Snake river, to find the daughter of one of the men, who might or might not be alive in Portland.

Is the concept original? Not completely. Zombie stories have been around forever. This is a Save The Cat’s “Golden Fleece” story, a journey upriver, like Apocalypse Now or Heart of Darkness, to an end point that will see the journey get harder and harder.

Have I ever read this particular story, or seen it as a movie? No. So, kudos on that. You’ve got originality in your favour in terms of the specifics of this particular one. It’s made up of familiar elements, but this specific story feels like yours.

Does it subvert expectations? Hah hah hah hah hah, excuse me while I choke on my tears here.

I’ll get back to that later.

The Shaggy Dog pt2

STORY

By its Road Movie nature, The Snake had a largely linear feel to it. Until the very end, when it circled back on itself in classic fashion, it chugged along, scene after scene of The Quest to reach Portland, and what we thought was our Protagonist’s daughter.

Because the story didn’t spend a lot of time in one place, there weren’t any recurring absolutes. No characters that really wove in and out of the story, which in a sense hurt it a bit. The linear paradigm that The Snake follows pretty much precludes that. It would be nice though, if you could find an opportunity to weave that sort of thing in – a character who appears early, that disappears for a while and comes back in a new context. Necessary? I don’t know, but it feels like that sort of element is lacking.

GSU – Goals, Stakes, Urgency

Goals – to reach Portland, and find Hudson’s daughter. This was first and foremost a priority through most of the script, and holding tight to that did wonders to keep the tension up.

Stakes – at stake was Hudson’s daughter. Never met, but talked about and showed on video, which at least made her a character of sorts, and not an abstract concept. This story utilized that well, playing on the Adult Fear trope of losing a child, to help connect with the audience.

Urgency – It felt pretty urgent. Every day delayed would put Hudson’s daughter at further risk of being lost. Was there an absolute ticking clock though? No. Could there have been? I don’t know. The nature of the story itself, and the length of time that had passed since the apocalypse, meant that Hudson was more holding onto a dream than anything, and contact with Portland had long been lost, so I’m not sure what kind of absolute ticking clock could be introduced to raise the stakes.

Maybe if Hudson himself were dying of something, some non-bloater ailment that will kill him, and he wanted to see his daughter one last time before he died – that might provide a ticking clock – but it might also undermine much of what else is in the story.

A-B- and C-Stories

A-Story – the physical quest – to find the daughter. This was well handled.

B-Story – Hudson and Clint. The soft family man and the hardened warrior, travelling together. Clint did much to keep Hudson alive, and to try and toughen him up. It felt like Hudson toughened up a bit, Clint’s influence, and it felt like Clint softened a bit – Hudson’s influence, but since the story ended with Clint in some ways still an absolute cipher, that’s really hard to judge.

C-Story  I’m at odds over who the protagonist of this story was, especially given how it ended and the circular nature of that ending. It didn’t really feel like either of them grew all that much. Hudson toughened up a bit, and was set to find his daughter on his own, without Clint, so he definitely had come that distance. But… you know… that ending.

Leaps of logic and suspension of disbelief – handled well. Once you accept zombie apocalypse, the rest should be smooth sailing. The quality of the writing itself was such that the story drew you in and didn’t let go. Nothing sent me hurtling from the story.

Well, except for, oh, I’ll talk about that later.

The Shaggy Dog pt3

STRUCTURE

The Snake was very well structured. A tad short, but so efficient in its storytelling that it never overstayed its welcome or felt undercooked.

The first act, leading to them heading up The Snake, introduced us to everything.

The second act was the journey upriver . Complications arose, were overcome. The video player with Hudson’s daughter was lost around the midpoint, which marked a shift in the story – Hudson had lost his daughter proxy – he’d either have to find the real thing, or have  nothing. There’d be no more fantasy to fall back on.

The midpoint also saw them lose most of the gear they’d collected “Fun and games” is over. Shit’s getting real. They’d be able to retrieve a bit, but the point is, they’ll have to rely more on their wits than on collected tools.

The third act is where the upriver journey ended, and complications could no longer be simply overcome. The story changed directions here, leading to some unexpected developments. And, that ending…

Was it properly set up? Maybe. I have notes on that. Hopefully they can help suss out ways of making that ending feel a little more… something.

It was largely character driven – they were on the quest because of Hudson’s need. The complications were world-driven, based on the nature of the world in which this story is set. The third act, the complications created based on the world, were solved through more character driven actions. It didn’t feel like stuff happened just for the sake of it. And that’s good.

Well, except for, you know.

The Shaggy Dog pt4

CHARACTERS AND DIALOGUE

We follow two main characters – Hudson and Clint.

They’re very distinct from each other. Hudson’s the softer family man who clearly wasn’t made for this world. Clint is as harsh and unyielding as the desert sun. Both of them behave very appropriately for their respective characters.

Sometimes too appropriately – Hudson’s squishiness could get a little bit annoying. He’d survived this long in the world, but sometimes the way he was written left you wondering how? Clint’s flinty toughness really shone through in everything he said and did – though the ending made it clear there were a few mental issues in there.

Those were hinted at during events like the rabbit obsession.

So the contest between hard and soft raged through the entire story… and the ending made it clear that “hard” wins. I do wonder if it might have been good to show something more worthwhile in Hudson’s character though. That even if he wasn’t made for this world, he still had something to offer it.

The dialogue was very efficiently written. You could definitely tell Hudson’s from Clint’s dialogue. Each were clearly grounded in who they were. The staked worldviews, as I like to talk about, and filtered through them.

I make a few notes on dialogue through the script. Some opportunities I saw. If they work for you, great.

Clint, of course, was so cryptically written that I found his stonewalling a little irritating. I make notes on that too. It may be worth your while to address this. It’s easy to write a character who says as little as possible. It’s a challenge to write a character who says more than the minimum, but does it in such a way that he’s still saying as little as he wants to, but by design. Virgil, in The Usual Suspects, is an amazing example of this.

The Shaggy Dog pt5

WRITING STYLE

Very crisp. Very efficient. It used as few words as possible to tell the story, and it suited the starkness of the terrain in which the story is set. Bravo. When you compare this with Refuge, which was still loaded with flab, this is the model of economy. But that’s not a backhanded compliment  – it would be the model of economy, regardless. The comparison with Refuge just cements it.

It reminded me very much of the first Gunslinger book, by Stephen King. A lot of short, terse sentences that totally fitted the western genre, with the brutal terrain under an unforgiving sun. Good job.

You’ve still got some issues with “its” vs “it’s”. I’d do a search and check those out. I didn’t mark them in my notes.

I noticed your use of the word “withdraw”, when you mean to pull something out of a bag or something. That word really jarred me, for some reason. Technically, it’s correct but it always felt wrong. To withdraw something from a bag. To withdraw your knife from someone’s chest. Felt too clinical and literary for the material. Maybe I’m just being fussy.

OVERALL

Very well written story. Loaded with trailer moments – I could definitely see this playing on the big screen – and I could see going to see it.

One thing that it felt like it was missing was some living humans somewhere in the second act. In the movie Apocalypse Now Redux, Coppola stops the story dead by having the crew stop at a French plantation, before they did the last leg of the trip to Kurtz’s camp. It was overlong, but there was still something there. It was a last refuge. It was people. It was a last chance to turn back and enjoy humanity in the craziness that was Vietnam.

I think your script could use that. A sequence where they come across a farm or something. On the river.  A place of temptation. Maybe it’s like The Sirens in The Odyssey –  a farm full of women who can take care of themselves, who want to give birth to the next generation, so they entrap travelers, seduce them for their seed, and then kill them. A little surreal, and maybe out of place, but I think the story really needs an attempted seduction, that Hudson and Clint have to turn down – a seduction of a home, that precludes continuing on the quest. A warm bed. A warm body to lay with.

Archetypally, it would totally fit in your story. Specifically, though, maybe it wouldn’t fit… but I think it’s worth suggesting anyways.

The Shaggy Dog pt6

How does that feel?

Bit of a kick in the nethers?

Cause, you know what? That’s what The Snake is. It’s a god damned Shoot The Shaggy Dog story.

http://tvtropes.org/pmwiki/pmwiki.php/Main/ShootTheShaggyDog

You gave us a story that drew us in, on this quest. This journey upriver, with a father who just wants to find his daughter. You made us feel. You made us hope against hope that she’d be there waiting for him. Even though the dwindling page count made it feel increasingly unlikely. Even though the total tone of the story really didn’t lend itself to happy endings…

You still made us look forward to it.

And then you took it all away, man. You took us to the end of the story, where we’re looking forward to our resolution, and went all

“Na na na na na nah, not gonna happen. Suckers!!!!! It was never about Hudson finding his daughter, it was about crazy ol’ Clint taking on one identity after another, finding imaginary surrogate families and people to spend time with.”

Man. That was cruel.

And very well done. Kudos.

In hindsight, a few clues were laid out, with some of the things Clint was doing, and what he would and wouldn’t talk about.

Do I appreciate it on a storytelling level? Hell yeah.

Do I appreciate it as an audience member who was invested in Hudson’s quest?

Not in the slightest.

I admire it. The ingenuity, the coldhearted way you weren’t scared of not giving us our happy ending. But did I enjoy that aspect? No.

Did I enjoy the overall story? Yes. I’d even recommend it to people.

But it’s grim, man. Really heartbreakingly grim.

You shot the shaggy dog.

Artfully done. I’ve left you some story notes on how I thought you might approach a few elements a little differently. If you can use them, great.

If not…

The Coens would be proud.

You shot the god damned shaggy dog.

Page by Page Script Notes…

PAGE 1:
Read2
Knowing what I know, I can only imagine that the snake’s just shed his skin… on to his new life.

PAGE 3:
Read2
Does Clint ever show HIS right arm?

“Beeloved”?

—

Question – and this could be approached two ways.

Hudson asking if he could join Clint. Now, knowing that Clint sheds identities and takes on his travel companion’s, in some ways, would it make more sense for Clint to invite? Given what he has planned?

Or does he just wait for those others to try and insinuate themselves into his life, ergo, it makes more sense for the other person to make the joining offer.

Could you draw slight attention to that?

In Gladiator, Commodus tells a story about a sea snake that lets little sea creatures take tiny bits out of it, biding its time until it strikes. Are there any snakes that employ that behaviour?

Something you could make a metaphor for Clint out of? Maybe a snake that does a real good job of looking like a stick, so that no other animal thinks twice about getting close until it’s ready to strike…

PAGE 4:
Read2
Nice job on your zombies – with the beet red eyes, all bulgey. Or “protruding”, as you call them.

Makes for a distinctive type of zombie than your usual ones.

And this batch isn’t limited to humans, either. Birds could be infected, which means that no matter how much you try to protect your encampment, you could always have the disease fly in.

PAGE 9:
Read2

HUDSON
Slavery, robbery, muh… muh… murder.

Clint nods with each tick on the laundry list.

I think you have an opportunity here. Unless Clint is completely sociopathic and/or psychopathic, I’d say that the things he does weighs on him a bit. You have an opportunity to let that leak a bit, but make it completely open to interpretation by the audience, who isn’t going to know what I now know on the second pass:

HUDSON
Slavery
(Clint nods)
Robbery

Clint nods.

HUDSON
Mu-mu-

Clint flinches a bit.

CLINT
Murder. Yeah.

It’s something I’ve explored with a bit, letting one character finish another’s thoughts, instead of just answering in the affirmative to everything. It makes the moment feel less one-sided, less passive, and like I said, can let leak a little bit of Clint’s inner stuff.

PAGE 10:
Read2

HUDSON
I’m heading to Portland, myself.
CLINT
What’s in Portland ‘sides rain?

If you’ve retained Clint’s later revelation about Portland, then I think you need a little leakage here too, like maybe just eyes narrowing or a tilt of the head. Not to direct on the page, but to give the slightest tell that he knows something about Portland, but not what.

And I don’t think your audience would necessarily pick up on it on first blush, but it would make it feel less like a cheat when Clint reveals it later.

—

I once read that one profession of character you should never write about is actors, because they’re experts on putting on a show. Because they’re impossible to read, they’re also impossible to truly identify with, because you never really know if what they’re expressing is real or a show.

I guess what I’m suggesting here is not to make Clint too-too-too convincing an actor. Don’t give him away, but don’t make it feel like an ass-pull when he does what he does later.

PAGE 11:
Read2

So does Clint justify in his head what he does, by getting the other people to invite him?

CLINT
Then just sack up and say it.

PAGE 13:
SERIES OF SHOTS

Personally, I’m not a big fan of montages. I don’t think you need these in particular.

Not that I’m saying get rid of what happens in them, but instead I’d actually just give them regular Scene Headings and action lines. Even if they’re each short scenes, I think they’d be stronger as actual scenes.

There’s something about montages or series’ of shots that I find very diminishing of intimacy. It’s a pull back, away from the characters, but not in a good way.

Maybe it’s just a personal preference, but I’d have taken this series of shots and made it a half page or more of actual scenes.

—

Read2

The head of a corpse, once a woman, rises from the grass.The corpse is heavily bloated and pasty white.

I think you should differentiate between Bloaters and Corpses. Much like TWD calls them Walkers.

If they’re dead and gone, corpses. If they’re dead and moving, Bloaters.

That’s what I think, anyways.

PAGE 15:
Read 2

Noticing something of a recurring theme with Clint.

PAGE 17:
Spacing issue

PAGE 20:
Read2

HUDSON
You’re a tough nut, Clint. I’ve known some tight-lipped guys before but you take the prize.

Now, obviously Clint’s following the “Tell no lies and you have none to keep track of” school of thought, but I wonder if his tight lippedness might diminish some of the fun of reading/watching this.

Because you’re playing him so close to the vest, you’re not giving us, the audience, a lot to root through.

But what if he did give a few details away. And if he’s done this a few times, what if every one he pulls from is from a different one of the identities he’s pulled from.

This could get interesting, especially if Clint’s actually got some mental issues and he disappears so completely into his roles that he forgets who he truly is after he steps into it.

They could end up blending together in his mind, and he gives Hudson contradictory information, that we either pick up on, or don’t. And Hudson doesn’t. Or something doesn’t sit right, but Clint’s able to deflect handily enough that it’s not an issue.

I think it might be worth exploring. I don’t want you to give away the farm with Clint, but making him a little more accessible, even if it’s lies or fantasy, might make him more engaging.

The stone wall routine, the silent stranger, doesn’t give us as much to invest in.

—

Just another thought.

The sharing of the cigarettes. If it’s not tobacco, but pot, it could be interesting to flip the dynamic. Hudson uses it to settle his nerves.

But Clint doesn’t want to touch it for fear of its effects loosening his tongue.

PAGE 21:
He powers it on and hits the play button.
NATALIE,(5), stares into the camera, smiling.
NATALIE
Happy Father’s Day, Daddy!

I like what you’ve done here – even though we didn’t get to spend any time with her, the way you’ve had him driven to find AA batteries adds to her importance – his passion to watch this makes it important.

If he’d just had it, and it’d worked, it’d mean less. That he’s going through such pains to get it working again makes it special.

—

I do have to wonder, having read the whole script, if rather than Clint snoring, he should be watching Hudson watching his video.

—

Again, series of shots here. I really think they should be actual scenes.

1) Clint looking through his binoculars. Feels like there should be a reaction of some kind, even if it’s a pointing in the direction to travel next.

2) You’ve got a great almost-bonding moment here. Although in an alternate version of it, you could actually switch it around –

Clint, unexpectedly, starts whistling “home on the range”

Hudson, thinking it’s a bonding moment, sings the first line.

Clint stops whistling. Just stares. Hudson stops singing.

Clint starts whistling again.

Would this just be a pointless rearranging of your scene? Maybe. But it could be a bit of an emotional scene for the audience.

There are a lot of movies that have their best scenes when characters start to sing, unexpectedly – like Armageddon with “Leaving On a Jet Plane”. To tease us with that, and then snatch it away, could help underscore the bleakness of the terrain.

Just playing with ideas here.

4) The eagle perched with the dead snake. I see this as a portent, a bad omen regarding them taking The Snake. I’d push it forward a little bit. Not bury it in a “blink and you missed it” montage.

You could even have one of the characters interpret it as such, like Hudson, and have Clint push on ahead, regardless.

PAGE 22:
CLINT
We gotta move on. They each got a horse.

If you wanted to save a line, you could swap out “They each got a horse” with “They’re mounted”.

Canada’s got the Royal Canadian Mounted Police, so it’s a term I’m well acquainted with.

PAGE 23:
You could have Hudson try to make a joke – “Or houseboats, maybe”, which Clint completely ignores.

Seems a logical progression – “homes”, “boats”, “houseboats”. I thought you might have been heading there as I read it.

PAGE 24:
“The men spot”, not “They men spot”

PAGE 25:
Read2

Good ol’ evasive Clint.

PAGE 29:
I like the fight between Clint and Hudson. I like to talk about worldviews, and words/action filters, and here you have the finest example of it.

Clint’s hardened, and he sees objectives, and what you have to do to achieve them.

Hudson’s softer. More emotional and nurturing. And the attachment he’s formed for the horse is a proxy for the one he can’t actively express for his daughter.

And so you have each of them acting upon their respective worldviews – not just arguing, but doing.

They don’t just shout each other down. Clint batters Hudson into submission, not just to win, but to drive home his point about Hudson’s priorities – his daughter.

Nice job.

—

That being said, I have to question the coke bottle taped to the gun. Is that to make a silencer?

I hear that only works in the movies.

PAGE 30:
And Hudson not wanting to eat the horse. Nice to see you’re carrying through the consistency of character.

PAGE 35:
Clint apologizing – it’s either inconsistency of character, or extra facets.

Not completely sure I buy it, given the cold practicality that he normally shows, but I’ll go with it.

Unless it’s another facet of his cold practicality that he figures an apology he doesn’t mean might make things smoother with Hudson.

PAGE 37:
Nice to see that Clint’s not infallible.

PAGE 39:
Well this complicates things.

Almost at the midpoint… structurally sound – the shifting of the story’s energy, the upping of the complications. The twisting of the knife, so to speak.

PAGE 43:
And the water’s ruined the DVD player, Hudson’s last remnants of his daughter, unless he finds her alive. Ups the stakes, this metaphorical loss. No more half-measures. No more placeholders. He either finds the real thing, or she’s gone forever in all forms.

Very fitting. Nice.

PAGE 46:
Read2

Room for humour here.

I don’t know about down in the states, but up here in Canada, we need licenses for fishing. They’re cheap, and don’t take long to get, but you don’t want to be caught fishing without them.

Do you have the same down there?

Cause if you do, having one of them, probably Clint, say “My license expired” might be a nice bit of a chuckle. A lighter moment in a heavy, heavy script.

PAGE 49:
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I like this. A staple of the zombie movie, well, any movie, but a real pleasure here, is watching them improvise traps and escape mechanisms.

PAGE 50:
Read2

Might the Bloaters not pounce on one of their own if it had gotten fresh blood on it?

PAGE 51:
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Yeah, I maintain, I think you’d do wonders for the identity of your script and the experience of reading it if you called them Bloaters instead of corpses.

PAGE 52:
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Clint hangs his face in the water and washes away the blood.
HUDSON
You all right?

Missed opportunity here:

I’d have Hudson pull his gun on Clint. Force Clint to, well, not beg, but put up an effort to prove Hudson that the blood’s not his. That he’s not bit.

It’d show some more backbone on Hudson’s part, and push Clint a bit too.

—

Conceivably, you could take that even further, and Clint advances on Hudson, continually saying that he ain’t bit, the blood’s not his –

Until he gets so close he can take the gun from Hudson. Which ends up being a lesson – that Hudson’s still too soft. That despite pulling the gun, he’s still prey to someone like Clint.

“If you had the sack to survive this world on your own, you’da shot me ten steps ago.”

PAGE 59:
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Two bloaters patrol the walkway that circles the tower.

So is this following Walking Dead rules, that if you die in this world, you turn, whether or not you were bit? Or were they conceivably bit before they climbed the tower?

PAGE 60:
I’d uppercase the word CAMOFLAGE, just to help reinforce the impending Camo threat.

PAGE 63:
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A recurring obsession with family stuff. Clearly something that Clint honestly did lose. Though it’s hard to trust the specifics of what he’s said through the story.

PAGE 65:
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A large fir tree has fallen across the river, completely blocking their path.Writhing corpses have stacked up like driftwood along the length of the tree.

Great visual. Has the makings for a classic setpiece.

PAGE 67:
I think you mean “gasp” for air. Gulping is what you do when you’re drinking.

I’d play with shorter dialogue for the slaver. Sentence fragments.

SLAVER
Hold still ‘n hands up, gents.

Pistol down. Nice’n’easy.

Not a twitch, boy.

On the ground. Hands ‘hind your back.

PAGE 71:
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CLINTAll right, but we ain’t takin’ in no strays. Just ‘cause we got the same enemies don’t make us pals.

You could play with the classic quote – “The enemy of my enemy ain’t necessarily my friend”. Or maybe you started with that and made it yours. Just a thought.

PAGE 72:
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Might have been a good opportunity to show one coming back.

PAGE 74:
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Okay, big divergence. Baldy telling us about Portland. Look forward to seeing what comes next.

PAGE 75:
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I think you need to dwell more on the growing schism between Hudson and Clint. Hudson should be much more adamant about wanting the truth.

PAGE 77:
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Okay, I like the shift in energy, with the plan to go take on the traders, but I wonder if it comes at the expense of the forward drive to find Portland. It feels like a distraction. A veering away of a story’s spine that had felt very straight before now.

But it doesn’t have to.

What if somewhere in that conversation with the rescued people, someone mentions that the Slavers had an all-terrain truck of some kind. One that they’ve been using to sweep the area’s roads.

That could be a destination for Hudson and Clint. A truck that they could use to drive the rest of the way to Portland in.

Whether there is one or not doesn’t necessarily matter. If they’re staging a raid on the slavers to steal that truck, it’s then not a distraction. It’s just another part of the journey.

Or Clint himself could lie and says that he bets they have one – he’s been involved with the Camos before, and they’ve always had off-road vehicles. This batch would too.

Even if it’s a lie, I think it could fit.

PAGE 84:
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Seems like this was an opportunity to use Clint’s scalpel again.

PAGE 89:
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I’m not sure I’m buying Clint’s lie in this one. About Portland.

It seems to me that rather than Clint putting forth his own lie, he should be doing what he did at the beginning of the script and listening to them, fashioning his story to line up with their goals.

Volunteering Portland, since he already knows it’s gone, and the bald guy earlier did too, seems like a burnt location. Its value’s been used up – Hudson was the one with something invested in it.

I’d have Clint find out what they had were invested in, and craft his new story as best he could to match up with theirs…

So that they would invite him along, the same as he maneuvered Hudson into inviting him along, with as few details as possible.

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