Exercise #8: Discussion and feedback

[Creole Ned]

This is the feedback thread for Exercise #8: Pick a favorite movie or book and, using original characters, write a story which recognizably occurs in parallel to the events in the film/book.

This post will be updated as entries are submitted.

Mutual (http://creolened.com/fiction/mutual.pdf) (Love Actually (http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0314331/), 2003) - Arioch
Unsinkable (http://write.jckrbbt.com/docs/unsinkable.pdf) (Titanic (http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0120338/), 1997) - jackrabbit
The Blues Brothers (http://www.paladinsplayroom.com/stories/The%20Blues%20Brothers.pdf) (The Blues Brothers (http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0080455/), 1980) - Paladin
The Dogfish (http://creolened.com/fiction/dogfish.pdf) (Jaws (http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0073195/), 1975) - Creole Ned

EDIT: added IMDB links for each story.

[jackrabbit]

Arioch:
I haven't seen Love, Actually in years, so while I remember the airport at the end, that's about all I remember.

The story is brief, but set up well, and well written. I like the introduction of Janet, and the peek into how she observes things. When she meets Maya and they interact, the sign language is hard to follow. I imagine trying to explain it is a challenge in itself, but for me it cluttered up the paragraphs and pacing trying to parse it out. I'm not sure how else you could do it, and I'm sure on film it would seem more natural.

The ending is a little abrupt, but I like the way you make the reader recall back on what they'd read earlier. I did a bit of "The card? Oh!". Nicely executed.

jckrbbt:
As I mentioned I fucked this up.

I actually quite liked my main character, Oscar until he becomes a chump. I had him planning to kill Jack in the earliest revision, and it made the story funny, but made Oscar a unforgiving prick. I changed that and then the timetable didn't add up with what we know occured in the film. I looked for plausible scenes in the film, and ended up turning it into what you see above.

While I'm not happy with the end product (I'm quite embarrased that I wrote a fanfic) I like the way it's written, and I enjoyed trying to write UK English. Hopefully I didn't overdo it.

I'm disappointed that I had an opportunity to do a fun exercise, and ended up falling flat.

Paladin:
I love the premise of the story, and the source of the parallel. I wish again I'd seen the film more recently so I could appreciate the scenes better.

Some of your descriptions feel more natural and quick, like Betty's accent, the explosion of toy store color, etc, but some sentences are heavy with unnecessary details. There was a particular line about Mike glancing at his watch with a sigh. It's overloaded with details that it doesn't need, and the length of the sentence makes it even heavier. I think you're clearly seeing the scene in your head, and trying to convey too much at once. Let it be more natural, like Betty's accent.

I like the interaction with Mike and the mom at the register, cause I can see a mom asking a question like that. It starts off strong and you could probably use it flesh out Mike in that bit.

I like the closing paragraph, but was really hoping you'd wrap it up with a reference to Frank Oz being in the film.

[Creole Ned]

I've added a link to my story and apologies in advance, as it's only the first scene. I did try to give it a bit of an "ending". I'll try to finish the story as soon as possible but this cold pretty much killed all my writing over the last few days, so I'm lagging behind. Feedback on the other submissions shortly!

[Paladin]

Arioch:

I haven't seen "Love Actually", so I'm afraid I can't give any feedback on how well you captured the spirit of the characters. To me, reading this story without having seen the movie, they both seem fleshed out enough that I'd believe they were the major characters in the films, so kudos for that. Like JR, I found the sign language scenes hard to follow. In fact, it wasn't until reading JR's review that the idea the character was signing, instead of just trying to communicate with gestures and hand motions, hit me. Perhaps I missed it, but simply saying she was signing with her first "dialogue" would have at least gotten me there. Saying what she signed, as opposed to describing the gestures, might have been more natural as well. It would have changed the whole flavor of the story though, and maybe not benefitted it. Still, I think you did very well, and I got the characters set in my mind solidly from it.

Jackrabbit

While I'm not a big fan of the movie, I've been a fan of the Titanic story since I was in fifth grade and read "A Night To Remember" (4 times that year). I thought your dialogue was good, and not overdone at all. It's really hard writting in dialect, especially when it's not your own. It can be easy to go from being a character to a charactiture, and I don't feel like yours ever did that. I didn't think Oscar was a prick, and I'm glad you didn't make him try to kill Jack. I don't think that would have fit very well with the "old Oscar" you created. The pacing was ok, although the action from the iceburg to the end seemed a little rushed. Also, while you avoided cliche' with Oscar for the entire rest of the story, your ending struck an iceburg in that regard.

Paladin
I'm pretty happy with the results. The story went pretty much from my head to the page in one sitting, and I really expected when I sat down and watched the scene last night to check the details that I'd mostly be fixing little things. Wow, did I blow it. I had the original story set in the morning, with Mike heading to the mall on his way to work. Basically playing hooky all morning, dodging his wife on his way out the door and sneaking off for breakfast before the mall opened, Mike was pulling a 40-year old Ferris Bueller's day off until the Blues Brothers ruined his day and put him on TV. Then I watched the scene and discovered it was set at night, and entire scenes had to be rewritten. I think the ending ended up stronger for it, although I think I may have made a mistake by going for a punch line at the end. But, since the source material was a comedy, I felt it was somewhat appropriate.

[Creole Ned]

Arioch:

I haven't seen "Love Actually" so I can't verify the authenticity of your story vs. the movie but assuming the characters are your own, I don't see any problems there.

The first sentence is terrific in its simple directness, setting things up with the three words "Janet is mute." Nice foreshadowing with the address index card in the third paragraph, though I admit I had to go back to catch it after finishing the story.

My only real problem with the story was the authorial tone used in some places, mainly when information or exposition is being presented ("you won't find this on Wikipedia...", "There are close to 200000 people leaving and returning from Heathrow every day. Even if Janet would have been a more social person, the chances of meeting someone she knows would be slim.") I may not be able to explain this well but the voice seemed a bit intrusive to me, like a narrator talking too loudly. In the case of the second example, I think you could either cut out the number entirely or just generalize it a bit, something like "With thousands leaving and returning from Heathrow every day the odds were slim Janet would ever meet someone she'd know". This is probably a bit picky of me and the others may not feel the same way, so take it with a grain of salt.

It seems a little awkward to say Janet loves flying when she hasn't flown for 28 years. I love pizza and brother, I'll tell you, I wouldn't wait 28 years between pies. :bg:

I'd trim the paragraph with the hand grab a bit, leaving out the speculation of a pervert and you could probably just point out her fear at not being able to scream without elaborating on it.

The recollection between Maya and Janet is filled with lots of nicely-told detail. I like the image of Maya having "silent laughter escaping through her fingers", although I have to confess, it wasn't clear to me if the two were actually signing to each other, since the first few gestures seem to be things that aren't ASL-specific (the witch's hat, pointing to the luggage).

I also wasn't clear on the sadness over Janet apparently not being pregnant (again?) Was this something that might make more sense in the context of the film?

Again, you nail the ending with the card being handed at the end. If I need a guy to write the beginning and ending of a story you are the man.

Overall, I enjoyed this meeting of characters and it was interesting to see you switch from a dialogue-heavy story in exercise #7 to one that is dialogue-free without problem. Good work.

jackrabbit:

Yeah, you pretty much blew the rules of this exercise out of the water by having the main characters of Titanic front and center. Whoops! But then, my Lovecraft parody turned into an homage, so who am I to judge?

Like with Arioch's story, I admire you for trying something different, in this case telling a period piece from the perspective of a young Englishman. Capturing dialect and tone without making it seem hopelessly hokey (see "The Winds of Sin" (http://creolened.com/fiction/winds_of_sin.pdf)) is not an easy feat. I think you were mostly successful here.

I did not like the opening and closing narration that bookends the story. It feels like a cinematic device and didn't seem to add much, though I understand it matches the same device used in the actual film. I guess I didn't like it much there, either. :P

The routines the main character goes through on the ship -- the cleaning, serving and such -- are laid out clearly and you get a good sense of how he views his place in the ship's pecking order.

The whole murder sub-plot kind of comes out of the blue and out of character. My one big suggestion for the story would be to cut it entirely. It doesn't just make the protagonist unsympathetic, it makes him appear to be a psychopath. That's an interesting angle but it doesn't seem to fit with the story you've written.

"This Jack was all mouth and no trousers" -- I don't know what exactly this means but I love these little off-the-cuff expressions the character has. He seems very intense, very animated.

In the paragraph where the protagonist meets Rose and the others and escorts them to a lifeboat, it's not immediately clear that Rose is part of the group. Just needs a tweak to the phrasing but it did throw me the first time I read it.

Concluding with a line from the Celine Dion song makes the whole thing come off as a parody, which I kind of think wasn't your intent. Maybe I'm letting my disdain of Ms. Dion cloud my judgment here.

Overall, I think this worked decently, even if it failed to meet the parameters of the exercise. The character and setting are conveyed well, even if there are a few odd phrases here and there. Again, I liked that you did something outside of what you'd normally write. I gravitate to my safe place a lot, so it's good to see some of us not do so. :)

Paladin:

The weird thing about this story is that when the cars came crashing through the store it made me think of how easily someone could have been killed, which makes the whole chase scene in the movie seem not so funny. Like I said, weird.

There are nice bits of detail here but I'd agree with jackrabbit in that some are a bit overburdened, a problem that would be solved with another pass on editing.

In the opening paragraph it's unclear where Mike is, though turning the "Closed" sign suggests a store of some sort (or a car dealership?) Not a huge detail but it could be made clearer.

The descriptions of the diner are nicely done, though the restaurant seems incidental in the end. The exchange with the woman in the store is believable and I like the wry comment that ends the story.

Overall, this works well even apart from the source and you certainly picked an interesting way to convey parallel events happening alongside the movie's story. The biggest issue, as mentioned above, is a little too much description at times. Less really is more! I could go into detail but I don't want to seem nitpickier than I already am.

[Arioch]

Damn, sorry for only commenting now.

Jackrabbit
As a nonnative speaker (and never having read one of your stories before) I actually didn't realize that you wrote this one in another tongue, so to speak (although the mention of "Yanks" should have giving it away). I agree with Ned that the murder plotpoint doesn't really work that much anymore, and comes quite out of the blue as it is. I like your description of the actual sinking, as well as your inclusion of Kathy Bates. The ending, though, is groan inducing, but that's what you were going for, so... mission accomplished! I am really happy that you noticed yourself how fanficcy that whole thing was.

Paladin
I really liked the whole setup, that the only scene your story and the movie have together is over in a matter of seconds. I understood the story as if Grover was the only missing puppet, so I didn't really get his urge to buy a bunch of new muppets. The last three women Mike interacted with were all described as pretty/atttractive, that made Mike seem like the kind of guy for whom this is important (or who has quite low standards); I would have maybe a somewhat more distinctive adjective, so you'd know why they are pretty, but this would probably clash with the critisism of the other guys of being too descriptive. I was a little dumbfounded by the last sentence, until I googled it. Still, I found the ending sort of sudden.

Ned
I like how different every one did their story. Jackrabbit in total fanfic mode, Paladin choosing a one-sentence-guy as his main character, and you describing a whole scene from another perspective. There is a nice, relaxed vibe to your words, and you described the action scene quite well, but maybe that just seems that way because I saw Jaws just recently. I still wonder about the Title, though.

Arioch
The scene where my story fits in is actually a bit of a cheat, as the last scene of Love Actually is a quickly growing number of scenes form Heathrow Airport, people hugging, kissing, laughing. I had for a long time this idea of writing a pair of mutes eho hadn't seen each other for a long time, and I just wanted to try if I can do it. Also, I tried to break out of my comfort zone, thus leaving past tense, first person perspective, all male casts, humour and dialogue behind me.

@Jackrabbit: I didn't intend for them to use sign language. I thought the gestures were quite universally understandable, but apparently that didn't work so well; a common problem for me when I write is that I falsely assume that the reader knows as much about my characters or the story as I do.

@Paladin: The characters don't appear in the movie at all, so thank you :). Again, I need to rewrite the gesture part. I still think that I lack some skills to make it so that it not only conveys what I want it to, but is also not boring or confusing to read.

@Ned: I agree on both the narrator and the pervert part. The first one stems from my recollection of the movie having a similar narration at the beginning, but that turned out to be wrong. The line about Janet loving to fly etc. was on purpose, though, to show that she is a person who very seldom allows herself to do something just for the joy of it, who is inhibited. I left the part about Janet's pregnancy vague on purpose, I thought it was enough to show that there was a lot of pain in her, which she mostly suppresses. But, on both counts, I probably could make things more clear.

[Creole Ned]

Ned
I like how different every one did their story. Jackrabbit in total fanfic mode, Paladin choosing a one-sentence-guy as his main character, and you describing a whole scene from another perspective. There is a nice, relaxed vibe to your words, and you described the action scene quite well, but maybe that just seems that way because I saw Jaws just recently. I still wonder about the Title, though.
The story started growing a bit bigger than I anticipated and when I got waylaid by a bad cold I knew I wouldn't finish it in time. The title is the name of a boat that plays a significant part in the rest of the story, though for the standalone scene I submitted I probably should have renamed the piece to something like "The Raft".

I have Jaws on DVD so I watched the scene in question after writing my story. I was three days off on when Alex got attacked (and corrected the date). There's no raft in the film that I could see but it had become too significant for me to remove and hey, maybe the camera just never focused on the raft.

Arioch
The scene where my story fits in is actually a bit of a cheat, as the last scene of Love Actually is a quickly growing number of scenes form Heathrow Airport, people hugging, kissing, laughing. I had for a long time this idea of writing a pair of mutes eho hadn't seen each other for a long time, and I just wanted to try if I can do it. Also, I tried to break out of my comfort zone, thus leaving past tense, first person perspective, all male casts, humour and dialogue behind me.
Bolded the relevant part. Using these exercises to try something new is something I very much encourage. It's not necessary, of course, but it can provide insight into your own writing and thought processes. I've stuck pretty close to my comfort zone so far.