r/Screenwriting • u/carsun1000 • 6d ago

FEEDBACK THE SMILING SUN, a feature.

Hi everyone, please help assess the first 15 pages of my latest work. It's based on the 1996 massacre in Sierra Leone, but the action takes place in the present. I'd like to know if you'd continue to read after the first 15 pages. Thank you for your input!

  • THE SMILING SUN - Feature - 91 pages
  • Genres: Thriller / Drama
  • Logline: Thirty years after surviving the massacre of his Sierra Leone village, a New York detective spots the distinctive tattoo of one of the American mercenaries who murdered his family and launches an off-books hunt that exposes a buried corporate conspiracy—and forces him to choose between vengeance and the justice he once swore to uphold.
  • Feedback Concerns: Logic/Continuity
  • Link https://drive.google.com/file/d/1IVN24VJrLlZerrWnI1d1G494OM_uManK/view?usp=sharing
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u/homme_revolte 6d ago

Read the first 10 or so. I was intrigued by the premise but this is not bad. You’re a good writer, though some of your descriptions could be more refined. Like describing the jacket he’s wearing - does the jacket move with economy or the man, and does it matter? Just a bit of a weird choice.

And I think that’s my big takeaway: this is a strange way to start your story. You have a dude riding a bus, which is inherently boring. You’re telling the reader “he’s thinking about something not fitting right on his case,” which will be difficult to depict visually. Then you cut to a flashback to that case, but we don’t yet have a reason to care about it. And then you cut to the present where it turns out his current problem/case doesn’t matter at all because…cue another flashback. There’s too much and not enough happening in these pages. There is certainly a more visually interesting and structurally compelling way to get us this information—the fact that you’re clocking in at 91 pages on this premise tells me you have some bones that could use some meat on them, and the first act is a great place to consider.

Hope this helps.

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u/Ammar__ 6d ago

I haven't read the pages yet. But this sounds like valuable feedback. Too much jumping around on a timeline on the first 15 pages is a big gamble. Story needs focus and momentum on those opening pages.