How similar is TOO similar

[Verbalcody]

I have an idea for a script that involes 4 young men who are lousy criminals, and mess up their hold ups and such anyways not to go into detail about that but I've just recently seen Bottle Rocket for the first time, and its a very similar movie. Now, my screenplay would have no romance angle, and really is nothing like bottle rocket in its style of humor. The characters are much younger and have completly different reasons for doing what they're doing. So how similar is TOO similar? Should I scrap this because theres been a movie that has 2 scenes of lousy criminaling? Or should I write it anyways?

[wcmartell]

Check out THE HOT ROCK (movie on DVD).

Your bumbling crooks are going to pull some sort of robbery, right? Well that robbery is what has to be *different* and original.

Saw BOTTLE ROCKET at a fest before it came out, so my memory is fuzzy, but I think there was a robbery at the end, and most of it was the guys in the motel. Since the motel is where the romance took place, and you don't have a romance, you don't have any reason for all of that motel stuff. That leaves you with a robbery, right?

Don Westlake (THE HOT ROCK is based on one of his novels) probably has 20 novels about John Dortmunder and his gang of lousy criminals. Each book is different because the robbery is different.

In DROWNED HOPES they find out about millions stolen years ago and buried in a small town. The problem is - they built a dam a few years back, and now that whole town is under water!

In THE HOT ROCK they steal a huge emerald... and then the guy with the gem gets arrested... so they have to resteal it from the middle of a police station!

In DON'T ASK they rob a *boat* with a priceless relic onboard - but the water creates a major hazard.

In BAD NEWS they are pulling a reverse robbery - they are swapping the bodies in an Indian burial ground so that one of the guys can claim they're related (DNA) to an Indian chief and inherit a casino.

Westlake also writes serious crime novels under the pen name Richard Stark - a *great* thief. They've robber riverboat casinos, they've robbed *islands*, they've robbed rock concerts, they've robbed rare coin shows, they've robbed a military base payroll (and been chased by tanks), the last one I read they robbed a Bill Gates-like millionaire's ultra high security house... when they discovered that he has a secret gallery of stolen paintings (can't go to the police, can he?).

So you need to come up with an interesting robbery idea. Something so cool that no one will even think about BOTTLE ROCKET - they'll be too busy thinking about your robbery.

- Bill

PS: Basic answer whenever there's a movie similar to your script idea - highlight the *differences*.

[Willis4000]

I've been worried about this issue recently as I'm interested in writing a time travel film with a protagonist who also happens to be a skateboarder.

Also the current idea seems a little similar to men in black so it needs alot of work to prevent it from going that way (secret goverment agency from the future that protects the timeline, the protagonist works for this goverment agency).

[Winter in New York]

Personal taste here, but I find films about incompetent crooks beyond boring. I mean, how many times have we seen that already? And I can't remember the last one I saw that a) I liked, or b) did something remotely new with the concept.

Winter in New York