An Open Forum question via email from Olov Lindstrom:
I was wondering if I could have your opinion on something. Maybe the answer to this is out there somewhere but I can’t seem to find it.Right now I’d say I’m about 75% of the way through writing my first script. I got into this writing because I woke up one night after having a dream that was just such a great story that it just needed to be told! Before that I had no intention of becoming a screenwriter. I’m just telling you this to let you know from where I’m approaching the writing. I’ll be trying to sell the script, not myself as a screenwriter. Basically I saw the movie, now I feel everyone else deserve to see it too!
Right now it seems my script will end up being about only 80 pages. It’s a thriller/action story. Sure, I’ve kept it quite lean but I feel all the turning points, subplots, dialogue etc is in there. So.. is this good or bad from a selling point of view? Is 80 pages too short? Should I keep it like this or try to expand on it?
Interesting. A few weeks back, we had an Open Forum question about whether it was okay to submit a 187-page script. And we were fortunate to have several professional script readers and story analysts provide their thoughts in comments. Hopefully we’ll get the benefit of their wisdom on this query, too.
First things first, you should check out this post which goes into detail about several dynamics related to screenplay page count – how scripts are ‘shrinking,’ which genres have more / less page counts, and so on.
While acknowledging that we no longer talk about a 120-page screenplay as the norm, speaking personally I’d still say that if I got an 80-page script to review, I’d go into the read anticipating that the story might be pretty thin. Yes, I know that the movie Buried, which recently sold at Sundance to Lionsgate for $3.2M, had a script that was only 80 pages long, but look at that story’s premise:
Paul is a U.S. contractor working in Iraq. After an attack by a group of Iraqis he wakes to find he is buried alive inside a coffin. With only a lighter and a cell phone it’s a race against time to escape this claustrophobic death trap.
There the issue is more about how do you sustain that premise for 80 pages? But most movies clock in with at least a 95-minute run-time. So I would still carry a yellow flag into my reading of any script that was only 80 pages long.
Now I can’t deny the possibility that your script could work perfectly at 80 pages. However seeing as this is your first script, before you start sending it out to agents and managers, I strongly suggest you get some feedback. For while you may think it works as is, perhaps other readers will find that they don’t get to know this character or that character well enough, the plot resolves itself too easily and would benefit from more complications and reversals, etc.
We just started The GITS Club which is a community of writers who provide feedback and peer reviews of original material. There are other more established online outfits like Triggerstreet.com that do pretty much the same thing.
But I would not recommend to “try to expand it” just to pad the page count. Instead I would encourage you to perhaps spend more time digging into your characters, seeing if they have anything more they may want to ‘tell’ you. Maybe look at your plot again to see how many major plot points you have. How many sequences? If you have less than 10 of the former and 8 of the latter, maybe it would behoove you to re-open your plotting process to see if there are some twists and turns you might have overlooked.
Be clear: That process is not about trying to generate more pages, it’s about trying to surface more of the authentic story that could be lying there, waiting for you to discover it.
But at the end of the day, if you feel confident that your 80-page script works as is, then I say go for it. If the story is a strong one, Hollywood is not going to balk at an 80-page script.
Script readers and story analysts, what say ye re an 80-page script? What would be your first impression? What prejudices might you carry into that read? What would you advise Olov to do?
What's my first impression when I see that my next read is only 80 pages? "Yippie! This'll be fast!"
Though I admit, my first thought after that is that it would probably be a lot easier to justify giving a consider to a script with a little more length – the impression being that a script that short would lack depth. However, I think Scott is already giving the best advice one can give in that situation – see if there's more that you can add to the story – not just for the sake of adding length, but adding depth.
On the other hand – I recall reading the script for FEAST soon after it won Project Greenlight, and it too was little more than 80 pages. Not only did both I and the Development VP who got the script have a bit of a laugh about the length, we also felt that as a piece of writing, it was utter garbage.
But the movie apparently did well enough on its budget to merit two further sequels, and the entire production process made for a hell of an entertaining third season of PROJECT GREENLIGHT, so what do I know?
I used to work for one of the big agencies and unless a director was attached an 80 page script would never go anywhere.
Action scripts usually run 100-110 pages and it's not unusual to have 3-4 scenes on a single page. What's the scene count? 250 scenes isn't uncommon in an action script. Is the 80 page count simply because the writer isn't breaking scenes and structuring in the way the market demands?
Thanks for a very comrehensive answer!
I'll be selling this story on concept rather than a perfectly written script, but at least I'm gonna try to make it as good as possible.
Changing from Courier Final Draft to Courier New added ten pages!
And I think that Archie's comment makes a lot of sense in my case. I have very few scenes with establishing shots, transitions etc. There are not that many scene breaks either.
Correcting this I believe should put me somewhere around 100 pages. And then I'll start sending it around for feedback. (so far I've only had feedback on the core story)
Again, thanks a lot for the answer!!
/Olov
I had the same problem when I started out and I got an excellent piece of advice. A screenwriter told me to check my act breaks. Each Act should be roughly one third of the script, so if Act One ends on page 5, there's my problem.
It was very Syd Field, but when you first start out that's exactly what you should be doing. His advice worked like a charm and now I don't even think about page count.