by John | Dec 9, 2019 | Our Winners, WMC
The last WriteMovies competition of 2019 – our 20th anniversary year – is over. It’s been a fantastic contest, with amazing scripts at every stage – but in the end, there can only be one victor. And today is the day that we announce the winner!
What is it that separates our winner from the rest? How do we make that decision? We’ve given our hints and tips in the past, but here’s a quick guide for all you screenwriters as you hone your craft…
- Come up with a concept that we haven’t seen before. Your script needs a unique selling point that will make people sit up and take notice!
- Grab us in the first ten pages. These are the most important pages of your script, your chance to make a good impression; make sure you don’t have a weak opening.
- Get us invested in your characters before hitting us with the action. We need a reason to care about the things that are happening – and that means we need to care about the people those things are happening to!
- Make sure you understand the basics before trying anything more complicated. The true masters of the craft know the fundamentals inside and out, and often the best scripts are the ones that implement do the simplest things well.
These are all things we’re looking for when judging – and the things that guided us when making our decision this time around as we picked… the WriteMovies Fall 2019 Screenwriting Contest winner!
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Winner |
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MONGER,
David Axe |
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| 2nd Place |
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3rd Place |
THE PINCH,
James Raynor |
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HAVENWOOD,
Jai Brandon |
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Honorable Mentions |
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GHOSTED, WITH LOVE,
Bob Canning |
BREAKING POINT,
Christina Ward |
ROCK’N’BISCUIT,
Craig Miller |
THE PAPER ROUTE,
Danny Howell |
MINDSET,
Edward Smythe |
HOLLYWOOD WOMAN,
Jesse Lopez |
CODE.7390,
Johnny Gilligan |
SUNSHINE STATE: DUENDE,
Kai Thorup |
WHEN NIGHT AWAKENS,
Ken Paiva |
by John | Nov 25, 2019 | Our Winners, WMC
This is where the competition starts hotting up! We’ve been hard at work reading and judging for our Fall 2019 Screenwriting Contest, and after some careful decision making, we’ve decided on our semi-finalists…
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by John | Nov 15, 2019 | Our Winners, WMC
A couple of weeks ago we announced the winner of the first ever WriteMovies Horror Award: MONGER by David Axe. Now it’s time for the next round of results with the Fall 2019 Screenwriting Contest Quarter-Finalists!
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by John | Aug 26, 2019 | Our Winners, WMC
An historical drama set in Roman Britain adapted from the novel by Rosemary Sutcliff, OUTCAST captured us from the first page to the last with its superb world-building and dramatic story. Congratulations to its writer, Sarah Bellwood, for placing 3rd in our Spring 2019 Screenwriting Contest!
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by John | Aug 16, 2019 | Our Winners, WMC, WriteMovies News
It’s one of the most exciting moments of the year for us here at WriteMovies… Yes, it’s the moment we get to announce the winners of our most recent competition: the Spring 2019 Screenwriting Contest!
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by John | Aug 2, 2019 | Updates
When we announced our Quarter-Finalists, we said at the time that the bar had never been higher. The same is certainly true for our Semi-Finalists; what an amazing bunch of scripts! Congratulations to everyone who has made it through to this stage of the competition!
The standard here was so good, we had an incredibly tough time choosing which scripts were going to make it through to the next round. With so many fantastic stories to pick from, you’ve never made our jobs so difficult – or so enjoyable!
When judging scripts, we keep a lot of different things in mind. The uniqueness of the concept, the quality of the writing, the structure and execution of the story. But we’re also looking at potential; with a year of free script development as a prize for our top three, we’re looking for scripts that can go even further and be taken to another level.
If your script didn’t make it through this time, it’s hard not to feel disappointed – but you should remember just how tough the competition has been . Even making the Quarter-Finals of our Spring 2019 Screenwriting Contest was an achievement, so well done!
As ever, if you’re not certain why we haven’t put your script through to the Semi-Finals, we’d recommend that you buy one of our Script Report services. That way you can get professional standard feedback on your work – and get free entry to our next competition, the Fall 2019 Screenwriting Contest which is now open for submissions!
And so, here we announce a group of scripts that we couldn’t be more proud of. Ladies and gentlemen, here are the WriteMovies Spring 2019 Screenwriting Contest Semi-Finalists!
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Semi-Finalists |
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| BISCAYNE, Adam Hersh |
THE ENCHANTED OPAL, Alan Smith |
CARAVAGGIO, Alasdair McMullan |
| TORONTO THE GOOD, Andrew Moodie |
GLEIS DER VERGELTUNG, Astrid Korten |
LADY IN RED, Astrid Korten |
| DIE TRANE, Astrid Korten |
MADE IN AMERICA, Rikki Rivera |
STARRING… JOHN DILLINGER, Bill Walker & Brian Anthony |
| RACE MUSIC, Eric Weber & Hasan Oracius |
ITER APOCALYPSE, Jean-Francois Oviode |
A CHANGE OF PLANS, Jeffrey Ward |
| UN CRIME PLUS QUE PARFAIT, Joel Prost |
KID SOLDIER, Kelly Karam |
LENA’S RULES, Ken Comer |
| PLANET SPARTA, Link Miller |
THE TIME-TRAP, Mark Flood |
THE REVOLT OF THE WHALES, Michael Rhodes |
| VOYAGE DANS L’HISTOIRE, Nanny Silvestre |
CINQUIEME ETAGE, Natacha Astuto |
THE SAX, Pascal Kulcsar |
| SHIRO, Pascal Kulcsar |
SURGEON HONG, Paul Gross |
OUTCAST, Sarah Bellwood |
| FRESH START, INC., Scott Taylor |
THE CHEESE DANCE FILM FESTIVAL, Steven Bednar |
A TASTE OF PRIVILEGE, Steven Bednar |
| APOCALYPSE, Tyler True |
LOVE IS EVERYTHING, Tyler True |
DER LETZTE BUS, Urs Aebersold |
Finalists and Winners are due to be announced on August 16th – watch this space!
by John | Feb 22, 2019 | Updates
It’s time for more Winter 2019 Screenwriting Contest results! There were a lot of great scripts in our Quarter-Finals and it was tough to make this next round of decisions, but after careful consideration our judges have decided on our Semi-Finalists!
There’s often a fine line when it comes to the different rounds of our screenwriting contest. Some scripts only just miss out, and it can be difficult to know why. A lot of the time, it comes down to the execution of basic elements – structure, characters, and dialogue.
Take a look also at this article that our Director, Ian Kennedy, wrote when we announced Quarter-Finalists: What your writing submissions are telling us, 2017-2019. If you’re making any of these mistakes, they could be holding you back!
But what else have we found with these latest Winter 2019 Screenwriting Contest results? Well, a few things that have often helped our Semi-Finalists stand out from the rest:
- Unique Concepts. If there’s something in a script we haven’t seen before, it immediately makes us want to read on. See what Ian wrote in his article about the number of scripts with a vehicle smash at about page 10 – when we’ve read the same thing so many times, it quickly starts to become dull. On the other hand, when we encounter something new – that’s really exciting!
- Specific in genre and the story they wanted to tell. With a number of scripts, we found it difficult to tell what genre the writer was aiming at and it was a while before the story began to take shape. These unfocused openings usually fail to hold our attention. Be specific about your story, and be clear with its genre!
- Engaging characters. Ian wrote it in his article but it’s worth repeating again here: “Make us care and get fascinated with your main characters and their world”. When we care about the characters, the script takes on a whole new life. Don’t rely on clichés or stereotypes, but create rounded characters we can engage with as if they were real people. And not just the protagonist either, but the supporting characters and villains as well!
And with that, it’s time for the moment you’ve been waiting for. Here are our next Winter 2019 Screenwriting Contest results: the Semi-Finalists!
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Semi-Finalists |
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| BAD LUCK VS KARMA, Aaron Davis |
TÖDLICHE ERINNERUNG, Urs Aebersold |
SPACE RACERS, Jason Azcar |
| THE DAWN OF EVE, James Bingham |
LE SECRET DU KATANA NOIR, Christian Bourgeois |
LA VENGEANCE DU COBRA, Christian Bourgeois |
| THE WALL, Anthony Buono |
UNE CHANCE POUR GUERIR, Christine de Chauvelin |
PSYCHOANALYTIC TALES, Christine de Chauvelin |
| STRUCK, Elaine F Chekich |
THE HUNTED, Mark Flood |
WITHOUT BORDERS, Chris Gebhardt & Jenn Russi |
| LAST CHRISTMAS, Owen Gower |
BAD LISTING, Brent Hartinger |
KOBOS, Adam Hersh |
| HOLLYWOOD’S MOST WANTED, Manny Jimenez Sr. |
THE SAX, Pascal Kulcsar |
AGENT 355, Laura Lambert |
| IN THE ABSENCE OF JUSTICE, Stephen F Maynard |
PROMISE OF TOMORROW, Andrew Pennington |
THIS IS NOT REVENGE, David Pierotti |
| BOY MOST WANTED, Tuck Tucker |
ESTHER’S DEN, Persephone Vandegrift |
THE CRACK IN PEGGY SUE’S FLOOR, John Woodard |
Keep an eye out for more Winter 2019 Screenwriting Contest results from us, as we move on now to judge our Finalists and winners – and decide who takes away the Grand Prize!
