As a last resort to garner attention for my screenplay, I turned to The Black List. I paid for two professional reviews and both of them were like night and day. The first review was lousy - the script received bad marks all around with an overall rating of 3. The second review received a much higher rating of 7, with markedly higher grades all around. Because of the vast difference in review ratings, The Black List gave me an option to purchase a third review at a discount, which I did. Should the third review be a favorable one, my script will likely land in The Black List's "top scripts" pile, thus becoming more visible to potential industry professionals who might consider purchasing it or representing it for purchase.
The Black List - in addition to a place that lists all of the highly touted screenplays floating around Hollywood that have not yet been made into movies - is a place for unknowns like myself to post their screenplays as well as pay professional readers to write reviews about them. My science fiction/fantasy screenplay, "Space and Time," was finished last year, and after months and months of failing to generate interest for it by querying agencies and production companies, I finally took the dive into The Black List.
In order to have your screenplay hosted by The Black List, it costs $25 per month. A paid review costs $50. So, I initially spent $125 to post the script to the site and to have two readers review it.
Unfortunately, I have no faith that this process is going to help me in the end. The first review where I received a rating of 3 out of 10 was apparently written by somebody who didn't read the script. The second, more positive review was mostly glowing. But because the reader felt my script was too ambitious and unique, its prospects for getting made were low. It was thrilling to read that my script "scores major points for originality, as it’s so highly ambitious and unique that it’s safe to say there’s nothing else out there like it, but under all the huge plot risks is a really well told story of complex characters, with goals and stakes, and a narrative that propels with purpose."
It was sad, however, to read, "This is special material, but it's unfortunately so extravagantly ambitious and complex that it's hard to imagine it being anything more than a popular stunt sample such as BLOCKHEAD (the Charlie Brown spec) or AMERICA: THE MOVIE, which is great for a sample but that's it. And as awesome as it would be to see an army of giant spiders take on a cyborg Hitler ... it's just not commercially viable or realistic, so prospects are low."
I knew when I was writing the script that it would take some money to make it, and that the story was something unlike anything ever conceived. But I had hoped that somebody in Hollywood with half a brain would realize that people are getting tired of all the remakes, reboots and ripoffs. The only reason they're popular is that there's nothing else in theaters to see. Here is a blueprint that could turn into something great. It is commercially viable. I won't get into all of the plot details, but the reader who provided the second review failed to realize just how commercially viable "Space and Time" truly is. The elements that comprise it include time travel, space travel, aliens of various sorts, flying saucers, dinosaurs, giant spiders, man-eating sharks, Bigfoot, and the villain is Adolf Hitler. There is no greater villain to all of mankind than him. How could all of these things together not be commercially viable? Every time you turn the TV on there are shows airing about aliens, Bigfoot, sharks, dinosaurs and Hitler. People can't get enough of it. Here, I throw all of them into the same pot with a story that's "so highly ambitious and unique that it’s safe to say there’s nothing else out there like it," a tale that, despite "all the huge plot risks is a really well told story of complex characters, with goals and stakes, and a narrative that propels with purpose," and I'm told it's not commercially viable.
Am I being told that from now until the end of time the only large-scale space opera/science fiction fantasy films studios will take a chance on are Star Trek and Star Wars movies? That's what it sounds like.
More specifically, does The Black List instruct its readers to knock off points for any script that - regardless of how much the reader likes it - would cost a lot of money to make or is too unique compared to the glut of "been there/done that" flicks constantly being shoved down the public's throat? Shouldn't a decision about that be reserved for the people in Hollywood wearing the money belts?
The Black List - in addition to a place that lists all of the highly touted screenplays floating around Hollywood that have not yet been made into movies - is a place for unknowns like myself to post their screenplays as well as pay professional readers to write reviews about them. My science fiction/fantasy screenplay, "Space and Time," was finished last year, and after months and months of failing to generate interest for it by querying agencies and production companies, I finally took the dive into The Black List.
In order to have your screenplay hosted by The Black List, it costs $25 per month. A paid review costs $50. So, I initially spent $125 to post the script to the site and to have two readers review it.
Unfortunately, I have no faith that this process is going to help me in the end. The first review where I received a rating of 3 out of 10 was apparently written by somebody who didn't read the script. The second, more positive review was mostly glowing. But because the reader felt my script was too ambitious and unique, its prospects for getting made were low. It was thrilling to read that my script "scores major points for originality, as it’s so highly ambitious and unique that it’s safe to say there’s nothing else out there like it, but under all the huge plot risks is a really well told story of complex characters, with goals and stakes, and a narrative that propels with purpose."
It was sad, however, to read, "This is special material, but it's unfortunately so extravagantly ambitious and complex that it's hard to imagine it being anything more than a popular stunt sample such as BLOCKHEAD (the Charlie Brown spec) or AMERICA: THE MOVIE, which is great for a sample but that's it. And as awesome as it would be to see an army of giant spiders take on a cyborg Hitler ... it's just not commercially viable or realistic, so prospects are low."
I knew when I was writing the script that it would take some money to make it, and that the story was something unlike anything ever conceived. But I had hoped that somebody in Hollywood with half a brain would realize that people are getting tired of all the remakes, reboots and ripoffs. The only reason they're popular is that there's nothing else in theaters to see. Here is a blueprint that could turn into something great. It is commercially viable. I won't get into all of the plot details, but the reader who provided the second review failed to realize just how commercially viable "Space and Time" truly is. The elements that comprise it include time travel, space travel, aliens of various sorts, flying saucers, dinosaurs, giant spiders, man-eating sharks, Bigfoot, and the villain is Adolf Hitler. There is no greater villain to all of mankind than him. How could all of these things together not be commercially viable? Every time you turn the TV on there are shows airing about aliens, Bigfoot, sharks, dinosaurs and Hitler. People can't get enough of it. Here, I throw all of them into the same pot with a story that's "so highly ambitious and unique that it’s safe to say there’s nothing else out there like it," a tale that, despite "all the huge plot risks is a really well told story of complex characters, with goals and stakes, and a narrative that propels with purpose," and I'm told it's not commercially viable.
Am I being told that from now until the end of time the only large-scale space opera/science fiction fantasy films studios will take a chance on are Star Trek and Star Wars movies? That's what it sounds like.
More specifically, does The Black List instruct its readers to knock off points for any script that - regardless of how much the reader likes it - would cost a lot of money to make or is too unique compared to the glut of "been there/done that" flicks constantly being shoved down the public's throat? Shouldn't a decision about that be reserved for the people in Hollywood wearing the money belts?
