louisbardel@stageandscreenwriters.com
EVERY SUMMER
by Hal Pritzker
(121 pages)
LOGLINE: A rising young boxer's first love, with the wrong girl, eventually threatens his relationship with the right girl.
GENRE: Coming-of-age/first love, period piece (1950's flashback). Strong sports and show business elements.
SYNOPSIS: Still-vigorous, 70-something Frank Madison is shocked and saddened to see a newspaper obituary of a very prominent actress, Paula Weisman.
Flashback to the summer of 1954. Rising boxer Frank Madison, 19, believes he finally has escaped the seamy roots, smothering poverty, and emotional difficulties stemming from his youthful years in a drab, decaying Brooklyn neighborhood.
Madison’s salvation is boxing.
A 1952 Olympic middleweight gold medal, and an impressive start as a professional, have propelled Madison. As a growing light-heavyweight, he is regarded as a ring "comer." Finally, life seems good.
Then, that summer of '54, Madison's life is turned upside-down. At Greenwood Lake, in the verdant Ramapo Mountains of New York State, where he is training, Madison — by a capricious quirk of fate—meets stunning, charismatic, mercurial Paula Weisman.
Madison had started to believe that he could handle most anything inside the ring. But now, the startled young fighter finds that he is thoroughly unprepared for the new and unexpected tangle of events, and emotional challenges, presented by Weisman…quixotically chosen by Fate to be his First Love.
For all of her vivacious, free-spirit attitude, 17-year old Paula nonetheless has her own burning ambition: to be not only an actress...but a Star.
And she will let nothing or no one—including Madison, and their relationship—stand in her way.
After an unexpected, but, for Madison, devastating estrangement, Paula abruptly re-enters his life. Now, he must deal with her…and his dormant, simmering feelings. His disturbed mindset is further complicated by
by a suddenly evolved romantic triangle, also including the “right girl,” Sandra Harrell.
Coinciding with his eventual romantic issues, Frank and his manager and trainer must deal with the sabotage tactics of the notorious, octopus-like promoting organization, the Twentieth Century Boxing Club, headed by the ruggedly handsome, but sinister, Jack Cavanna.
NEPTUNE'S VAGABONDS
by Hal Pritzker
(127 pages)
LOGLINE: When a UFO almost hits a surface-riding sub, and crashes at the bottom of an ocean trench, four special Navy divers investigate.
GENRE: Sci-Fi, adventure, with comedy and romance elements
SYNOPSIS: Ken and "Shep" Seidel, Paul Valentine, and Virgil Walker are special divers for the Naval Demolition Service.
When a series of ocean tremors, and tidal swells, rock the area in the Caribbean Sea, near the Bahama Islands, the four divers are told to investigate.
Also to be investigated is the fate of a group of local divers who had disappeared while initially trying to learn some answers.
But there are major surprises in store for Ken, Shep, Valentine, and Walker.
First, they learn that they actually were sent to the Caribbean for another, potentially more sinister, reason...to learn what suddenly had dropped out of the sky and almost hit a surface-riding American submarine.
Then, at the bottom of an ocean trench, they have a Roswell-like encounter.
Aliens, sinister foreign divers, The Bends, deadly sea snakes, and a shark fight threaten the divers.
Posted 4/10/10
Side Effect
by Chris Loud
Genre: Dark Comedy
Synopsis
Side Effect is about two brothers who try everything to be normal after the tragic death of their parents, but everything they do makes them feel guilty. Each brother believes he caused the fatal car crash. From getting coffee to sitting down in a chair, their minds always find a reason to feel guilty for the act. Their personalities show an almost sarcastic and comedic approach to their issues, but you can see their desperation. One of the brothers, Jacob, begins to fall in love with a prostitute named Windy, while Noah schemes a way to justify committing crimes within their malfunctioned, guilt-riddled world. Since they've tried every pill, every shrink, and seemingly every remedy under the sun, they decide to do things that would make a normal person feel guilty to perhaps train their brain to tell the difference between real guilt and the unnatural guilt. They start by buying and selling drugs, stealing a car, and soon escalating to the possibility of murder. Noah suggests that Jake murder Windy to complete their desparate task. He hopes the unnatural guilt will subside and instead the guilt will be focused on one or more of these sins, which to Noah seems like something more normal and manageable. With the help of Windy, Jacob begins to realize something strange about Noah. In the end, a gun is fired and things change, but Windy the prostitute remains alive.
Characters
Jacob: Younger brother to Noah, early twenties, naive and gullible. Desperately wants to love, and to go one minute without feeling guilt. Believes he caused the fatal car crash that killed his parents.
Noah: Older brother to Jacob, early twenties, controlling and bull-headed. Always scheming to find a way to feel better, and can convince Jacob to to anything.
Windy: Early twenties. A prostitute who becomes a surrogate girlfriend for Jacob. She lets his insanity pass by until it begins to directly threaten her life.
Posted 11/2/08
THE ADVENTURES OF A ROVING ROMANTIC
by Louis M. Bardel
Genre: Romantic Comedy
This movie is by the young, for the young…and definitely for the adventurous.
Californication meets Crash meets Alfie, with a dash of Hard Times thrown in just to give it some street cred.
Fucking, graffiti, speeding cars…check out what makes these young people tick.
What if tonight was the end of the world, how would you live?
Rudy Holmes, a lush-lipped poet, has the answer. Pearls of joy in a woman’s bedroom and in the diverse streets of L.A., for him the city pulses with possibility.
But is it worth it without the love of your life? Does he want to go on living this way?
A study of character, a feast for the senses, The Adventures of a Roving Romantic tells the tale of a modern-day troubadour.
Posted 9/22/08
THE FACE OF EVIL
By Vito Dinatolo
Terror is afoot, the news reports blare it hourly. Everyday young soldiers are coming home from war...and sometimes terror comes back with them. One of those men is Private John Williams, for whom terror came back with a vengeance. When John comes home after an accident in Iraq, he carries back a lethal virus that turns each of his friends into frightening creatures.
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Premise 1. A drug to enhance troops’ performance on the field is secretly developed by the US government. The drug is given to John and his platoon, but it turns out to be unstable and contagious.
Premise 2. A routine inspection in a suspected terrorist house turns out to be a fatal mistake. John invades a house with his platoon but the family reacts in self-defense, triggering more violence where innocent people die. John will carry his demons back home.
Soon out of bullets and options, John and the few survivors are trapped in the house, surrounded by the creatures. When the eclectic sergeant Miller comes in their rescue with loaded weapons, they manage to escape and blow up the house with the enemy, but the virus has already spread outside and evolved to the point that zombies can now hide among humans, like sleeping cells.
Apparently a terrorist chemical weapon, John will find out the US-made drug runs in his blood.
Posted 9/22/08
The Needle
Scene 1
by Michael Quinones
Characters: Lee [protagonist], Alex [teammate], Bobby [pitcher/opponent], Greg [playmate], father
Adolescents of all shades are playing stickball in the street with a 13-year-old Lee at bat being heckled and encouraged simultaneously.
Alex- “C’mon bro’ don’t let that mutha fucka strike you out. Hit the shit out tha ball B!”
Lee frenzied, intent [tongue sticking out of his clenched lips] and anxiously shaking the stick in anticipation of the next pitch.
Pitcher- [An older boy of 15-16 years old grins and glares at Lee while his teammates cheer him on from behind]
“You little faggot you ain’t shit.”
[Fires a pitch past Lee, who swings and misses, that hits the strike box and he laughs incredulously]
“You must be crazy little man!”
[After swinging and missing Lee half cries, sniffling in exasperation as he’s now down to his last strike. People on the block, sitting on stoops and fire escapes heckle and encourage simultaneously. As embarrassment builds he gains his composure and harnesses the cacophony of voices and sounds to focus as he looks around glancing in several directions seeing various faces of hopelessness from young to old exemplifying broken dreams. Determined not to fail he resolves to seize the moment. Next pitch comes in with a fury accompanied by the pitcher’s contempt and cold demeanor. In a triumphant moment of clarity, spirit of hopeand determination Lee cracks the ball over the wall clearing the bases and wins the game. Mobbed by his friends in triumph he runs toward the steps of his building in pursuit of a drink and tell his father what he had done.]
Greg- “Yo, Lee c’mon man les’ play another game man!”
Lee- “In a minute, lemme go inside real quick to get a drink!”
[Lee darts up the steps, kicks open the entry door and skips through the hallway jumping and reaching high up to touch the cracks on the plaster in excitement while the dim, dusty naked bulbs flicker. He grabs the key attached to the navy blue rope around his neck and unlocks the three locks to the apartment door]
Lee- “Papi where you at?
[Lee opens the refrigerator to grab some cold Tang that he drinks from a green pitcher. He closes the refrigerator door looks around and neither sees nor hears anyone. He goes to take a piss in the bathroom looks up and pulls the chain on the old fashioned raised box toilet tank. He leaves the bathroom and thinks about his father with anxiety but with an excited smile on his face.]
“Papi you shoulda saw me! I won the game. I hitted a homerun Papi.”
[Receiving no response Lee gets even more anxious, curious and somewhat scared he peers around the partition wall in the shotgun apartment into his father’s bedroom to see him slumped backward on the floor head canted to the side and apparently dead with a syringe sticking out of the inner hinge of his left arm.]
“Whaa? No waaaay! No, no Papi no! Papi please no, no, no…Papiiiiiiiiiiiii!
[Shrill scream that can be heard piercing through the whole building and street. People on the block look at each other incredulously.]
