TODAY'S NUGGET: Long Kiss Goodnight (1996) - Visceral Reactions That Lend Action Packed Energy on the Page

[Quick Summary: When a married schoolteacher with amnesia appears on tv, she is outed as a counter-assassin and becomes a target of former colleagues.]

TWO THOUGHTS:

1)  FEMALE ACTION STAR & THE BOX OFFICE. To me, it's important to understand the box office, so as to be aware of what audiences are paying to see. 

Today's script about a "girl-with-the-gun" struggled at the 1996 box office.  Interestingly, not much has changed, even as of this weekend.*  

2) ENERGY ON THE PAGE. I do admire Shane Black trying a female led action film at the height of his popularity.

He has a knack for conveying energy on the page, which is often difficult to do.  

Here, I like how the protagonist experiences visceral reactions that motivates her into frenzied action. 

For example, in the scene below: 
- The protagonist has lost her memory and is calling herself Samantha, though her real name is Charly.
- She is stretched out on a water wheel that's fed by cold river water.
- The bad guys are torturing her to see if she's really an amnesiac.
- I like that the energy comes from the character's emotions.
- One source is from confusion.  Samantha does not know her violent past. 
- Another source is from anger, from being wronged.  She has no idea why she's being tortured and this type of survival vengeance is particularly vicious and unstable. 

INT. BASEMENT OF OLD MILL - THE PRESENT

... UNDER THE WATER - HELL - SAME

Here we are again, in the world of silence and blinding PAIN. Despair and madness but now there's something else -- Now there's RAGE.  [The primary motivators are confusion, anger.]

It takes losing most of the FLESH from her right wrist... But she frees the hand. WRENCHES it loose. The water turns soupy red around it. GROPES, blindly. Fingers NUMB, so fucking cold -- Breath, running out. No air. NO TIME. [Her physical struggles to free herself are like her mental struggles to make sense of this weird situation.]

She darts her right hand forward. Toward the obscenely bobbing CORPSE of Nathan. Does something grotesque, jams her hand DOWN THE CORPSE'S PANTS -- [I like that she's a thinking protagonist & remembers what Nathan had said earlier.]

Hideaway gun, it's right where he said, right beside Mr. Wally. PSP-25 Semi-auto, steel jackets. She waits. Rage inside her. Death in her hands.

MEANWHILE, BACK ON THE SURFACE

The wheel CREAKS. Groans. The terrorist in the western boots watches her emerge, face first -- She comes up firing. [This is a great image, but also metaphorical.]

The first slug takes him in the knee. Blows it to scraps. He collapses, howling. She shifts aim. THE RED BUTTON. No hesitation. BLAM-! Hits it DEAD ON. Stops the wheel. Incredible.

Doesn't blink. Unties her captive hand. BLOWS TO SPLINTERS the wood surrounding her feet. Leaps to solid ground as 

ANOTHER ANGLE

Daedalus looks up from his prone position. In agony. A vision from Hell approaches: A fiendish blue-skinned woman in a sodden nightgown. Blood leaking from one wrist. She has rise, REBORN, from the icy waters.

DAEDALUS: Samantha... Please..!

CHARLY: Who's Samantha? [She's still angry, but also learning more about herself.]

She shoots him in the other knee. He HOWLS. Gun, empty. She tosses it aside. In a nearby crate: ASSAULT RIFLES. Snatches up a Kalashnikov and clip. Kneels and says:

CHARLY: You see it in the movies, badguy says, "Talk to me and I'll let you live." We're gonna run a variation, it goes like this: Take to me..? I'll let you die. 

She fires again. 

WHAT I'VE LEARNED:  I liked that the emotions led the action, and that they aren't put on hold during a fight. It's messy both physically and mentally as her memories surface.

The Long Kiss Goodnight (1996)(2/24/95 revised draft)
by Shane Black

* This weekend, another female led action film was released,  From the World of John Wick: Ballerina (2025).

As of yesterday, Deadline stated that the film made $25M, on a reported budget of $90M, and went on to speculate the reasons why:

"There's also the sense that many have already seen these girl-with-the-gun movies before, and there are plenty of copycats on streaming (i.e. Charlize Theron's The Old Guard, Gal Gadot's Heart of Stone, Jennifer Lopez's The Mother) - so why rush out? But this one is through the lense of John Wick, and ya know, stunts! But you can't just swap out our favorite puppy-loving, gun-toting surfer dude for a female lead, and that's potentially why more of the Wick-faithful aren't going."

TODAY'S NUGGET: The Last Boy Scout (1991) - Varying the Amounts of Suspense + Surprise in Escalating Stakes

[Quick Summary: After a hooker dies in front of her boyfriend and the p.i. she hired for protection, the two men uncover a political conspiracy while finding her killer.]

TWO THOUGHTS:

1)  MISOGYNISTIC? Critics have called this film misogynistic (example here). On the page, I didn't particularly think so, but I can see how the overall film could be. 

2)  ESCALATING STAKES.  Writer Shane Black is well known for his action scripts.  One of the keys is that the stakes escalate in unpredictable ways. 

Also, the combination of suspense (ex. we know the dynamite is going to explode) and surprise (ex. explosion has unexpected consequences) isn't formulaic.  

For example, in the scene below: 
- Hallenbeck is the p.i.  Jimmy is the victim's boyfriend. 
- They found dynamite on the victim's car. 
- Hallenbeck takes the dynamite as evidence and moves it to his trunk. 
- Suddenly, two thugs hold them up their car keys.
- Notice that the mixture of suspense and surprise seems to build organically, which adds to the thrill. 
- Note: Though the slugline only says "interior", the action soon spills into the exterior parking lot.

INT.  HALLENBECK'S PLYMOUTH - NIGHT

...Hallenbeck smiles. Calmly turns and throws the keys as far as he can. They land off in the woods.

HALLENBECK: Oops. Don't know my own strength.

TALL MAN: You dumb bastard, you're going to pay for that. Jake, open the trunk.

Jake steps forward, raises the Beretta to shoot open the lock. Hallenbeck tenses, waiting. Looks to a sloping hillside off to his left. Jake FIRES at the lock. The BULLET BLOWS THROUGH the TRUNK -- and HITS three live sticks of DYNAMITE.  [I like that the action here is not telegraphed early.  Jake raises his gun, but he might change his mind --> Hallenbeck reacts, waits --> Jake fires --> bullet hits --> dynamite.]

Joe is already throwing himself and Jimmy down the hillside as the night lights up like a sunburst. The trunk lid is blown fifty feet in the air.

Glass sprays in every direction... Jimmy and Joe careen down the hillside like rag puppets. Lurch to a stop at the bottom. Bruised. Bloody. [We expect the scene to end here, maybe with a quip.]

Side by side, sucking wind -- until a noise intrudes, the sound of CRUMPLING METAL... getting LOUDER. They look up -- and there's the flaming car tumbling end over end down the hill, toward them. [Instead, there is an unexpected surprise of a falling car. It's like "out of the pan, into the fire."]

JIMMY: Son of a bitch!

They dive aside just in time as the car plows past them and slams to a stop against a tree. Burns. Jimmy looks at Joe. Joe looks at Jimmy. 

WHAT I'VE LEARNED: I liked the combination of 3/4 suspense and 1/4 surprise because: 
a) it's purely about escalating stakes, and 
b) the emotion feels genuine, uncalculated, and not following a set formula.

The Last Boy Scout (1991)(2/25/91 with additional revisions)
by Shane Black
Story by Shane Black and Greg Hicks

TODAY'S NUGGET: Last Action Hero (1993) - Knowing How to Pace Action Sequences

[Quick Summary: When Danny finds a magic ticket that allows him to go into movies, he helps his favorite action hero Slater fight crime.]

This is a great idea and I can see why they're trying to remake it ever since. However, I did get bored with the many action sequences.  

On the other hand, I was impressed with the pacing and flow of action.  

There's definite tempo (bad guys, good guys, build tension, crash!), but also knowing when to stretch and when to speed up.

In the scene below:
- Slater has been injured.  It is all up to Danny on a girl's bike vs. bad guys in sedan.
- The writers make you feel how it feels to be Danny (headlights looming at him).
- They also secretly speed up our mind's eye (fall out window, lying on grass).

We're talking a TWO-TON SEDAN versus a GIRL'S FIVE SPEED. With Smurfs. They race toward each other. Collision imminent. DANNY is sweating. Teeth gritted. Eyes squeezed nearly shut.

DANNY: This is gonna work...it's a movie, I'm a good guy, this has got to work....

The headlights LOOM in front of him. Blinding. RUSHING FORWARD.

And it hits DANNY like a thunderbolt:

DANNY: I'm the comedy sidekick. Oh, shit, I'm the comedy sidekick. IT'S NOT GONNA WOOOOORRRK!

Needless to say, he swerves, jumps the curb, doing fifty, races for the edge of a hillside as we

EXT. STREET - NIGHT

SLATER appearing, huffing and puffing --way in the background, a TINY SCREAMING DANNY can be seen on a bicycle as he goes through a second story window.

Shouts. More breaking glass. Curses in Yiddish.

EXT. STREET - NIGHT

SLATER turns, sees DANNY falling out of another window, lying on the grass.

EXT. STREET - NIGHT

DANNY, groggy, as SLATER reaches him.

DANNY (a whisper): I think I scared 'em pretty good.

WHAT I'VE LEARNED: This script makes you feel what Danny is feeling in real time, which is due to pacing. Slow down for emphasis, faster over boring parts.

Last Action Hero (1993)(10/20/92 draft)
by Zak Penn and Adam Leff
Current draft by Shane Black and David Arnott
Production Polish by William Goldman

TODAY'S NUGGET: Kiss Kiss Bang Bang (2005) - Outlandish Dialogue Needs _______

[Quick Summary: A thief and a p.i. witness witness a female body being dumped, which leads to an unruly L.A. mystery.] 

I really liked this script because Harry (thief) is a first rate raconteur.

His dialogue is fast, off the seat of the pants, and effective. It gets him out of the most absurd situations.  

I just couldn't stop reading, so why does it work so well? 

One reason may be the scene structure, i.e.,  solid setups and payoffs.  

The dialogue can be extreme and outlandish AS LONG AS the structure holds it together:

ex. Harry and his partner rob a toy store. His partner is shot and killed.
- Harry runs and is wounded. [Setup is that Harry is running scared]
- He runs into a building and opens a random door to a casting call.
- Sweaty and bloody, he is still picked for the next audition. [Twist]
- He goes along with it because a cop is searching the building. [Increased stakes]
- The audition scene is a confrontation between the police and a killer (Harry). [Callback to when Harry's partner was shot.]
- Harry reads the lines, which could easily be his own confession. He falls apart. [Payoff]
- Harry is so convincing that he is hired. [Payoff of dialogue being so great] 

WHAT I'VE LEARNED: Always, always, always structure first.

Kiss Kiss Bang Bang (2005)
by Shane Black