over 120? ever? or never.

[AJ]

can it EVER be over 120 pages?
or is that the kiss of death?

genre? romantic comedy

[Revisionist]

Preferrably never. Scripts that are circulation now are generally in the 100 to 110. With 110 being at the high end. Romcoms generally run under 100; around 90 to 95.

When I read a script and flip through to the last page to check out the count... 120 makes me sigh and immediately want to put it down. I'll start it but there's always that nagging page count in the back of my mind. I know it shouldn't make a difference but it's there.

And it's there for agents, producers and talent too.

120 for a romcom? Definite kiss of death.

[Revisionist]

That is of course, irrelevant if you're a super fvckin' talented writer who can glue the reader to the pages... All of them.

[dpaterso]

Aren't romcoms supposed to be shorter and snappier than thrillers and actioners? 120 seems excessive.

Did you catch Steve Martin in BOWFINGER? First thing he does when he looks at the script is flip to the back to check the pagecount... *

I should imagine pro screenwriters can turn in whatever length they want for projects that have already been discussed. Amateurs submitting scripts on spec work by other rules.

Edited to add:
* just thinking... I probably picked that up from one of Bill Martell's tips, so it's not my observation...

-Derek
My Web Page - naked women, bestial sex, and whopping big lies. (http://hometown.aol.co.uk/DPaterson57)

[odriftwood]

Ditto what Revionist said.

Just read a horror/action script the other night that created a whole new world, new mythology and was jammed packed with action, thrills, supsense, SFX, character and plot....

115 pages.

It got a recommend (actually it got a "make this movie now.)

[PurpleCurtain]

I even try to get my big epics in under 120 these days...and I can. So I'm guessing you can get your romcom well under 120.

I don't know how polished your script is at this point, AJ, but I find that, no matter what, if I am having length issues I can always find ways to trim the page count.

Here are some tips off the top of my head:


Really go over your action lines with a fine-tooth comb. If you have something like this (note right now that all of these examples are going to be stupid and badly written because it's too early for me to be creative and this is about editing anyway :) ):

"Mary is crying as she watches John walk away."

You can cut that in half with:

"Mary sobs as John leaves."

There are always stylistic issues to consider when doing this sort of thing, but 9 times out of 10 the shortest possible description is perfectly adequate...and you will almost certainly find that doing that, all by itself, will shave several pages off of a 120-page script.


Do some very anal "copyediting." This is pretty similar to the previous tip but it's just different enough I thought I'd give it its own section.

If you have an action section or dialogue that looks like this on the page:

blah blah blah blah blah blah blah
blah blah blah blah blah blah blah
blah blah blah blah blah blah blah
blah

Tinker with it until you can cut that final line, because, well, it will save you a line. A line here, a line there, and suddenly your 120-page script is a svelte 112-page script.


Keep dialogue fat to a minimum. This should be obvious, but what the hell, I'm on a roll.

In real life, people say "um" and "well" and "you know what I mean?" (and so forth) a lot. In movies, there's no time for that...and it's boring. Again, there may be times when you do want to write like that for some sort of stylistic reason, or maybe you have a character with some sort of quirk...but more often than not, this kind of fat is just fat. Get rid of it.


If it doesn't move the story along or provide any character depth, AXE it. This is the "kill your babies" tip. Try to read your script as objectively as possible, and remember that, no matter how funny the scene is or how brilliantly written a monologue might be, if it isn't moving the story along, it's stopping the story in its tracks. Get rid of it. A good writer will always find ways to do a killer job with what's left, so don't be overprotective of what you consider a particularly well-written section at the expense of an entire script. It gets easier to cull this stuff as you get more experience (at least I find it much easier now than I did with my first few scripts.)

That's all I can think of off the top of my head, but I'm sure others will have tips to add.

The bottom line, though, is this: You can make it shorter and, in the process, you can make it better.

Good luck!!

[AJ]

thanks for all the tips
what about playing with the margins ... spacing ... a little ... to save a page or two? no??

one thing i wrestle with is i have a lot of split screen stuff in my script that -- format-wise -- takes up a lot of space ...

by the way, alexander payne has a note at the end of the printed version of sideways that discusses how the script is 134 pages long ... he sarcastically asks if anyone has a problem with that

it's funny

[PurpleCurtain]

Personally I wouldn't muck with the margins, especially if you haven't gone through the script word for word to make absolutely certain every single word, every description, every scene is essential.

And you know what? Maybe your script really is perfect at 120 pages (I'm not being sarcastic). If that's the case, stand by it and trust that readers will be so captivated within a few pages that the fact that it's longer than the standard will soon become irrelevant.

However, if it's not perfect...fix it. :)

[nickj]

I used to struggle all the time with script length. Here's a couple of things I've leaned:

Pretend a producer asked for the first 20 pages of your script. Pull up your script and find a really cool scene somewhere around page 22 or 23 (or even later). Now, you want the producer to see this scene because it's just terrific. Your job, then, is to pull out stuff before that scene that maybe isn't so cool, that maybe the producer (and the audience) doesn't really need to see.

When you do this, you start to realize that some parts of the script aren't all that important. Some clever lines of dialogue aren't all that clever. You may like them, the reader may like them, but when you cut dialogue or scenes that aren't vital to the story, you're actually rewarding the reader with a story that moves faster--the reader will like the story more.

Rule of thumb: Don't worry about entertaining the reader with what's on the current page, try to entertain them with what's on the NEXT page. In other words, make sure the reader always wants to know what happens next. No matter how good the current scene is, what holds the reader's interest is the promise of better scenes to come.

[TwelveMile]

I've been a story analyst and script consultant for 16 years. I wouldn't even bat an eye at a great script's 120 pages. As long as the story is compelling, that length is just fine--as is 118, 115, 121, 111--even 125, 127, etc., etc. If it's a great script, it's a great script. If it's a terrific story, it will NOT be discarded simply for (what I consider perfectly normal) page counts!

Meager scripts with page counts of, say, 87 pages, 89 pages, 92 pages--unless those are scripts for kids' movies, I know what I'll find when I read them--serious second act subplotting problems.

[Revisionist]

Hey, Twelve:

Meager scripts with page counts of, say, 87 pages, 89 pages, 92 pages--unless those are scripts for kids' movies, I know what I'll find when I read them--serious second act subplotting problems.

I was curious why the "norm" of romcoms would be around 90 to 95 with this statement. I personally don't write comedy so it's irrelevant for myself.

Everyone knows if it ain't a compelling read then it'll get round filed. But are the numbers for romcoms wrong? I've always wondered because my current scripts going to come in around 150 before the rewrite that'll bring it to, hopefully, 100 - 105. But a lot is spent on characterization. Pages and pages of it. I find overwriting defines the 'people' better and you get more of a taste for their personalities by doing it this way.

So, why don't roms run the same length? They're expected to characterize just like all other genres. Or is it a myth?

Because I hate myths. They hinder the creative process.

[TwelveMile]

>>So, why don't roms run the same length? They're expected to characterize just like all other genres. Or is it a myth?

Comedies do tend to run shorter than dramas, but not generally by half an hour, unless it's a kids' movie, or a very lame comedy that only had 90 salvagable minutes (usually the sign of a studio dumping a story onto the screen in, say, February, and hoping no one notices how bad it is until they make a few bucks.)

Comedies tend to come in with 1:40-1:50 running times. Every once in a while you'll see one run a full two hours, but that's not typical. It does happen, though. So think scripts at 100-110 pages. And if there is rapid-fire dialogue (which takes up a lot of pages, but plays very, very fast), it's certainly not unheard of to have a comedy run 120 pages at the script stage.