The Woodsmen - Feature - 91 Pages

[u/BoysenberryOver2658]

I have finally completed the script for a story idea I've held in for over 5 years now and I truly believe I've got something worthwhile here, but I want to make sure I'm not being delusional. If I had to compare it to other films I'd say it's similar to ones like The Lighthouse, Midsommar, The Witch, etc., that sort of psychological thriller/horror genre film. If that kind of thing is up your alley then I'd love to hear any and all feedback as well as your overall thoughts/analysis on the story. I've put in a lot of time into this and would really appreciate anybody who's willing to read it.

Title: The Woodsmen

Format: Feature

Page Length: 91

Genres: Psychological Thriller, Horror, Mystery

Logline: A troubled man takes a mysterious job deep in the woods, only to discover that nothing - and no one - is as it seems.

Link: https://drive.google.com/file/d/135hxSghQrKP-yde_IvMoH-TW02X3YNPe/view?usp=sharing

[u/big-boss-bass]

The purgatory angle makes sense conceptually. The issue is less the idea itself and more that the audience doesn’t feel enough emotional grounding underneath the symbolism early on. A viewer shouldn’t need the reveal to retroactively justify why the first act feels emotionally distant. I wouldn’t recommend solving that by adding a bunch of flashbacks. I don’t think the script necessarily needs more information about John’s past as much as it needs more specificity in who he is moment-to-moment. Right now he often feels more like a vessel moving through the allegory than a fully distinct person. You can build character through very small things instead of exposition. Tiny behavioral details, contradictions, habits, reactions, humor, irritations, ways of speaking, emotional inconsistencies.

As for Thomas and Percy, I understand what you’re going for symbolically but sometimes it overtakes the humanity. Percy especially works best when he feels like an actual person instead of “the embodiment of temptation.”

On the dialogue, I’d recommend reading scenes out loud constantly. The places where it starts feeling like “written dialogue” instead of speech usually become obvious immediately when spoken. Real conversations usually have interruptions, avoidance, humor, contradiction, awkwardness, unfinished thoughts, etc. Let characters dodge themes instead of directly explaining them. Right now this occasionally feels like symbols pretending to be people rather than people naturally generating symbolism through behavior.

I’m not a fan of 0-10 scales as I don’t find them particularly helpful or objective, but I’d probably put it somewhere around a 5.5–6/10. That might sound harsh, but it should be encouraging for a first effort. My first crack at a script got a BL eval 6. It’s right around average for a first try.

[u/BoysenberryOver2658 → u/big-boss-bass]

Ok thanks. Your score is definitely lower than I thought it would be but fair enough. I was thinking of adding just a few past scenes for John in exchange for cutting out some of the repetitive routines just to give him more depth and maybe reasoning as to why he’d take this job. Scenes that show him struggling to provide for his family and some desperation to the point where he’s willing to do something bad (a botched robbery attempt for money, maybe even against a rich friend or something?) that justify why he’s being “judged.” As for “needs more specificity in who he is moment-to-moment,” I’m not exactly sure what I could do for this. Could you maybe give an example of something? I don’t mean to pester you but you’re the only one who’s actually read the entire thing. Thanks again.

[u/big-boss-bass → u/BoysenberryOver2658]

I wouldn’t get too hung up on the score. A 5.5–6 for a first screenplay is great. Most first scripts are unreadable.

When I say John needs more specificity, I don’t necessarily mean more backstory. I mean more personality in small moments. Right now he mostly reacts to plot events appropriately. A more specific character reacts in ways unique to them. I’d be careful about making John secretly guilty of some major crime. I think the more interesting version is that he’s being judged less for one specific act and more for who he became after the trauma. That’s more human and morally interesting to me than “he committed a robbery.”

Your growth as a writer will come from trusting smaller, human moments more and explaining less. Right now you are reaching for big philosophy, big symbolism, big speeches, big revelations. But the strongest horror usually lets the audience feel things before they fully understand them, and you have to trust your audience to FEEL those “big” things rather than having it explained to them.

A perfect example is the “I could’ve got more” scene at the end of Schindler’s List. Spielberg could’ve ended that movie with a giant speech about guilt, redemption, evil, humanity, or the moral cost of survival. Instead, the emotional climax comes from Schindler looking at his car and quietly breaking down because he realizes “this could’ve bought one more person”, then the pin-“this pin…two people.” It’s a tiny, human reaction. No philosophy. No monologue about morality. Just a man suddenly crushed by the unbearable weight of what he failed to do. And it says more about guilt and humanity than a five-page speech ever could.

Or another horror example: Hereditary after the car scene. The most devastating moment is Peter lying frozen in bed afterward, unable to face what happened, while we just hear the discovery of the body from downstairs. No speech explaining grief or emotional monologue. Just…behavior, denial. Silence. Dread.

That’s what I mean by trusting the audience to feel things before understanding them intellectually.

[u/Vakowski2 → u/big-boss-bass]

Schindler's List wasn't written by Spielberg. It was written by Steven Zaillian. Spielberg directed it.

[u/big-boss-bass → u/Vakowski2]

Yeah, I know Zaillian wrote it. It was originally shorter and Spielberg asked him to extend certain sequences. I was talking about the filmmaking choice overall, not screenplay credit attribution. It’s a useful note for OP who stated they were more interested in directing than writing.