PGL submission rules...

[Bill Marquardt]

How many of us actually read the rules? I just read this one...

B. Screenplay Submission Guidelines.
Promoter seeks to produce a film that falls into one of the following categories: horror or thriller. While any screenplay that adheres to the rules of the Contest as specified in these Official Rules, and that does not violate the terms of the Participation Agreement agreed to as part of the Site registration process, will be accepted into the Contest, Contestants should be aware that scoring will be weighted in the discretion of Promoter to favor these film genres.

(emphasis added)

Yikes! Now I need to start a new screenplay and finish it by Feb 28 if I want to enter.

[sppeterson]

I'm particularly pleased by that---but now I have to go through my script and replace a bunch of words with "freaking"...

[Bill Marquardt]

Yes, they also desire a "PG-13" rating, as I presume they believe a horror/thriller at that level is most marketable. I just find it a bit off-putting that good scrpts from other genres will have a tough time overcoming the handicap. i also believe they should have placed more emphasis on this information, instead of burying it in the requirements where only a few weirdos like me will actually read it.

Got it, gang? Thriller or horror spec, for a PG-13 audience. You have until Feb 28 to rewrite your rom-com and add some gore.

C'est la guerre.

[RKBentley]

On page 59.


And thankfully the sex scene was revised.

18 days to go....

[scripter1]

Thriller script

Closing on page 30. Started 3 days ago. {go me!}

Bellydancing scene. Hmm. Might sneak in under the radar.

[gwhurls]

Grrr...

I just wrote a long diatribe on this and it got lost because EZBoard sucks.

Basically it said: "Caviat emptor" to anyone that doesn't read the rules.

Caviat emptor = Let the buyer beware.

[GothamWriter]

So would you bother entering if you had a comedy instead of a horror or thriller?

Even though one might lose points right off the bat, this seems like to good of an opportunity to not pursue further.

Plus it is exciting and fun to be a part of.

[RachelSqueeze]

Comedy

My problem is that my strength is comedy. Sure, I could write a new thriller in 20 days, but knowing my track record, it wouldn't be very good. I do most of my writing in the rewriting.

My fear about entering a comedy is that it'll be torpedoed right off the bat. I entered a comedy about filmmaking last time and received this criticism:
"You even said the first time around that you didn't like movies about movies."

Now, I hadn't seen the first season of PGL, so I didn't know that Chris Moore said that. The big problem though is that this particular reviewer thought the LivePlanet folks were going to read his review, and wrote it to them, not to me. And he shot my script down for its genre.

For my money, it's too much of a longshot to enter a comedy. Thirty bucks is thirty bucks.

Thoughts?

- RS

[gwhurls]

re: comedy/Rachel

My fear about entering a comedy is that it'll be torpedoed right off the bat

If the "Negative Nelly" contingent is correct, your reviewers haven't read the rules and won't know that comedy isn't the preferred genre.

This year, we have a decent chance of getting non-bias reviewers, since the directors will be required to read three, and they've (theoretically) got no personal agendas for the screenplay side of the contest.

Your reviewer was an idiot. Plain and simple.

The one problem with the contest I've always seen is that we don't get our peer reviews till after the results are tallied. If they were revealedyou could have rejected that review for a good reason and maybe had it stricken. This is of course why they don't let us see our reviews - because they'd have everyone rejecting every review that is in any way negative. :rolleyes Six of one, half dozen of the other.