TIDAL WAVE: THE PLOESTI RAID

[bill]

Hello, my name is Bill Bradle, and I am a published history writer (Goliad: The Other Alamo).

I’ve written a script, Tidal Wave—The Ploesti Raid, based on an actual World War II event—a politically motivated air attack that begins in North Africa when 178 B24s take off to fly 1500 miles, 50 feet off the deck to bomb Hitler’s oilfields in Eastern Europe. The crews are told it’s a cakewalk, Churchill says “It will be worth it if no one returns.”

We feel the script combines the action of Saving Private Ryan, the planning detail of The Dirty Dozen, and the pathos of Gallipoli.

The story revolves around three planes and their crews.

Hail Columbia, the lead plane piloted by Colonel John “Killer” Kane, the blasphemous, brawling son of a Baptist minister who fights his own men, the Desert Rats, to make them tough enough to take on the Germans.

Teggie Ann, flown by Colonel Addison Baker and Kane’s opposite number. A pompous, by-the-numbers West Pointer who hates the Germans only slightly more than he hates Kane.

And Thundermug, a barely airworthy, last minute throw-in flown by the worst pilot in the U. S. Army Air Corp, Lt. Russ Longnecker, and his rookie co-pilot, Deacon Jones.

Award winning and innovative director Robert Child is attached to direct. You can see his work at www.robchild.net/. Rob has developed a detailed budget, actor list and New Mexico filming sites to maximize tax advantages.

Tidal Wave—The Ploesti Raid has the potential to be a successful action movie because it is real, everything actually happened. A real action movie with real action heroes.

Looking for input and any help getting a studio/producer interested.

Thanks.

Bill

Attachments:

[atb]

Hi, Bill. And welcome to The GITS Club.

Congratulations on the success that your script has already reached... Robert Child is indeed an innovative director. You're many steps ahead of other aspiring screenwriters already.

So, if you don't mind me asking... What kind of input are you looking for? Want us to comment on formatting, structure, dialogue, narrative voice, etc? Or just drop you a line if we happen to know of a producer that may be interested?

Because I'm not so sure this is the place to turn to if you're looking for the latter. If you'd like the former, then I'm sure many of us would love to read the script and give you an opinion on how to improve it.

[bill]

Great note.

Not sure. I just found this site and was reluctant to post the script as it is pretty much finished. Finished after 10 years and a ton of rewrites ranging from minor to major.

But overcame the reluctance because we are talking movie making, I think, not just script writing. The reality of script writing is that if the movie doesn't get made it is only an exercise in script writing.

I have examined my motives in writing scripts and decided it is a combination of wanting to get a particular story made so a multitude of people will come to know the story (70%), wanting to have success in cracking an industry that is nigh on impossible to crack (20%) and desire to make my Oscar speech (10%).

So, yes, the project is advanced and convincing Rob to be involved gives me a feeling of great accomplishment. But here are some other questions I have--

1) Do other people enjoy the script?
2) Is it too much a war movie? I don't think so just as I don't think Saving Private Ryan is too much a war movie.
3) Why doesn't the industry want to make movies like this and only established directors/writers can? For example, I doubt if one of us could rewrite True Grit and get it made but the Coen brothers can. And the theaters were packed when we went to see it.
4) How does one get it into a agent? I threw it over the transom to 20 agencies and they all came back unopened or not acknowledged which probably says more about our legal system than our film industry.

Again, great note. Made me think about motives and processes. But again, a script that doesn't get made is just a script. The green lighting and financing and production are just as big, if not bigger, pieces of the puzzle.

Looking forward to comments.

Thanks.

Bill

[77kart]

Hello Bill,

Read your script, here are some notes. Best of luck with it.

Review of Tidal Wave

A major challenge for you is to decide how willing you are to take liberties with the truth.
I recently saw an interview with Simon Beaufoy - I think I found the link on GITS - where he says that even in documentaries, you can have truth or you can have a good story. Or take the example of Band of Brothers which took many liberties with the truth. Or, check the lists of top films - AFI 100, WGA Top 101, imdb Top 250 - and see how many of them are even based on the truth, much less truthful. Bottom line: decide if you want to tell a true story or a good story.

Your scene description needs to be abbreviated. This is a script, not literature. 4 lines max per paragraph, preferably fewer. Sentence fragments are good. Plenty of white space. Also there are a lot of formatting errors: sounds should be in caps, slug lines are formatted wrong, some action is incorrectly formatted as dialog, characters first appearance in description should be in caps (Pitcairn).

You don’t need to bookend the first and last scenes. Most great films don’t. If you do it, do it for a reason. IMO, it's weak in your script.

Way too many technical details. Nobody cares about the technical details. Audiences care about people. IMO, your next rewrite should focus on the people and relationships.

The number of major characters is confusing, especially in the beginning.

What’s the connection between this raid and Dambusters? Low level raid discussions are not interesting. Make it about a person, e.g., the Dambusters guy, filled with guilt at how many people were killed in the raid, attempts to redeem himself by preventing the Ploessi raid from happening.

Stakes, stakes, stakes! Why do I care if they blow up Ploessi? Set high stakes, then raise them, e.g., Guns of Navarone.

You’ve squandered a huge demographic, as in 50% of the population. Specifically, no woman will willingly goto see this film. There’s nothing in it for them. Show me a wife, a girlfriend, a mother, a relationship or friendship.

p37 and p39. Way too much technical stuff. Audiences don’t care. Delete 90% of it and what you keep, show visually.

p41. I like the conflict between Smart and Kane. Why not expand that as a theme: the remf vs the guy in the plane.

Major problems:
- You don’t have a clear protag. Pick one man and make it his story, e.g., Tom Hanks in Private Ryan.
- You don’t have a clear antag. You have a lot of candidates but you don’t develop them in that role. Suggest you cull a few and spend more time with the survivors to make them complete characters.
- Structure. Should be 3 act or similar.
- Almost no subplots. The story is all linear. You need a few subplots, developed during the story, completed at the climax. Think Guns of Navarone.
- A lot of the technical detail is unnecessary.

Other notes:
p64. The naked guys in the plane reduces tension. You want to build it.

Consider reading Goldman’s Adventures in the Screentrade, the chapter about “A Bridge Too Far.” Goldman says operation Market Garden is almost unknown in the US whereas in Britain, where they cherish their disasters, everyone who fought in the battle published his memoirs. You have a similar struggle making Ploessi relevant. Also, his search for the spine of the story, which determined what details were in and which were out.

p67. Why is the dialog telling us the lead nav was on the crashed plane? Show, don’t tell.

p72. The singing crews diminishes the tension.

Is it dangerous to fly 50 ft off the ground? I’d imagine so, especially when weighted with a few tons of bombs. But you haven’t established it. Consider dumping the machine gun accuracy exercise and focusing on this, building it up for suspense. Why not go in at 100 ft, the preceding story describing how dangerous that is, then on the raid, force them to goto 50 ft. Raising the difficulty incrementally keeps the audience guessing and interested. If I remember correctly, the Dambusters had a similar problem.

Don’t direct the camera. You’re the writer, not the director.

I like the idea of Longhead, the loser, being the only one to make the run. The image of 1 plane going east and 89 planes going straight is a good one. It’s a good subplot. But, you can do more with it. Give Longhead more screen time.

Sluglines. Make them smaller and tighter. Put the extra info in the first line of description.

p87. The Baker anecdote is good. BUT, you need to set it up better in the preceding pages. Heroic action is rarely objective drama. (see The Tools of Screenwriting for difference between objective and subjective drama.)

This is a high budget film: special effects and period piece.

You’ve achieved a certain level of doubt in the mission, like Private Ryan. But, in Private Ryan, they made it a theme: when is one man’s life more valuable than anothers? Same theme was well done in The Guns of Navarone. Try to develop your themes.

The bomb stuck in the back of Long’s plane is a a good device. High stakes, an objective in danger, surprising but logical.

The attack sequence goes on for a LONG time. Consider shortening it and spending some time with your various antagonists: the German defenders, some innocents on the ground or slave laborers in the factories, the German head of defence, the remfs back in Washington or wherever who are planning cya. Subplots!

The Princess would make a great subplot. BUT, you have to set her up earlier.

p106. Go home or land here is a great twist but you need to raise the stakes for it.

Good tension coming up to the mountain, worrying if they’ll make it.

Hand of God is deus ex machina and hence weak.

Barwell is a good device. Maybe he should die. You have to take a toll, otherwise the victory isn’t appreciated.

The bookend ending isn’t needed and is weak.

Good luck with it.

[marc]

Bill,

I haven't read the script, yet. I took a quick look at it, though.

You asked why agents and studios always send the script back and why, for example, the Coens can make almost any movie they want to.

As for the Coens, I bet the theaters weren't as packed when Blood Simple came out. Now with True Grit they reunited with Jeff 'The Dude' Bridges and all of them are awarded with Oscars. So I bet this contributes much to the appeal.

You are a published writer, so I guess you know more about the trade than I do.

77kart already did a detailed analysis of the script so I will only point out the things that stood out for me at that quick glance.

These are basically things that I read and hear again and again, so I think it is safe to point them out, because I would imagine that these are the main problems that might keep away agents and studios.

First thing that strikes the eye is the wordiness. It's far too much black. Also you might consider to write a new paragraph for each shot. Always when there is a cut on screen and a new image is cast in the reader's mind.

Sometimes you write super long wrylys. Maybe a line of stage direction would be more suitable. A wryly should only tell the actor how to say the line. I think if the wryly has the purpose of keeping the flow it shouldn't be longer than one sentence.

Also it is said that one shouldn't write which songs to play as long as it isn't in the public domain. Like that Dinah Shore song at the end. Maybe it is public, or you even got the rights, don't know. Just saying.
Also I read they don't like it if you tell them how to design the credit-sequences. This is the job of the production crew and they will decide how it is done. I guess these producers and readers, etc. are pretty nit-picking.

And then there is the topic itself (better, the title). I personally never heard of the Ploesti Raid. Well, could be my lacking interest for history in school. And maybe more people are familiar with it in the US.
I didn't really know what to expect when I read the title. Thought about surfing .
The day the operation took place was called "Black Sunday". Maybe that is an alternative, since it already conveys that this isn't going to end well. Just thinking aloud.

But it sounds interesting. And maybe it is good that not too many people are familiar with the event. A history lesson in combination with a thrilling action-war-movie-plot. Sounds like a potentially entertaining flick. But it has to be that. Entertaining. Since I haven't read it yet, I can't judge. 77kart remarked that it lacks a clear protagonist, etc.

I think all these factors may lead to the result that you haven't got representation or a studio attached to it, yet.

But you got a director who wants to make it, so I think that is a great accomplishment. I congratulate you on that. I bet you will get it made in the end. But maybe you need to do another rewrite.

I read somewhere that the writing process doesn't stop until the last shot is wrapped. So you say that a script that hasn't been made is just a script. And a draft that hasn't been rewritten is just a draft.

Best of luck with your script.

Marc

[bill]

Thanks to Marc and 77kart for taking all the time. Noted the comments on tech and wordiness and will review.

Some specifics--sorry about the bookends but I love them. The 'inspiration' was not the cemetery scene in Saving Private Ryan--which is not in the original script--but an old Dustin Hoffman movie, Little Big Man. I was hoping to build the forgotten part of the story, have the audience going who is this old guy? What did he do? Who is the young guy, obviously military, home from the war because somebody is dying?

The Dambusters--put in to get some action up front plus make the audience go What is going on? I thought this was about the American air force? But the main purpose is to show this ain't going to work. The Brits tried it and got wiped out. So action for audience up front and give a sense of doom and anxiety.

Number of characters--should have seen the first draft. But still a valid point though I tend to give the audience the benefit of the doubt and think they can muddle through.

Demographics. The women audience. Wrestled with that but really felt the air go out of Enemies at the Gate when the love story started and Flyboys--don't get me started. You can almost hear people say demographics, we need to consider demographics. For now, will leave it. Actually, my greatest fear is somebody trying to work in the Tuskegee Airmen.

Have read Goldman and thought of him often struggling with Bridge. I don't think he ever thought he really got it and I probably don't either--maybe the events are too little known though I think Bridge suffered from being a star cameo movie which distracted from Goldman's script--see Robert Redford paddling the boat.

Glad you like Longnecker. He's my favorite.

Interesting comment on cost--Rob and I discussed it but he is convinced he can do it. He is waiting for a quote out of Canada on CG costs but take a look at his Wereth 11 clip--he did the whole hour for less than $500,00 and that included going to Belgium.

Love Barwell--couldn't kill him off. This is one darling I can't let go.

Deux ex machina but it happened. Agree it has elements of DEM but not overly so so I kept it in.

See bookends above.

Marc,

Note the wordiness and black space. Will take another look.

I think Dinah Shore is in the public domain--should be anyway. Credits are discretionary--I just liked the listing of all the planes involved and if the tribute to Coop doesn't get in the picture, I'm pulling the script.

Nobody except dedicated air nuts know about the Ploesti Raid. Mostly forgotten which makes it a great story, I believe.

Love the surfing comment. And good catch. We have been going back and forth on Black Sunday. It was the working title. Maybe we will switch again.

I'm a little hung up on 'clear protaganist' and think this is a bit overdone in movies which make them bad--like I am William Goldman or something but I feel the protaganist is a bunch of guys, scared to death, being told not to worry about it but knowing that a lot of them are going to get killed.

I really appreciate the time and effort put in to the posts. We've gotten pretty far but writing/filmmaking is not for the faint of heart. Rejection is no fun but we will keep throwing it up against the wall.

"Nobody knows anything." Words to live by.

Thanks again.

Bill

[mscherer]

Bill,

Do you have the Life Story Rights for each of the principals? I realize these gentlemen have all passed into the great beyond, but their families may have objections.

Just asking....

As for the script... I didn't read the whole thing. Couldn't. Here's why:

1. Way too dense. Some of your actions are ten (1) lines long.
2. Way too many MOREs.
3. Way too many CONT'Ds. Counted 110.
4. Way too many parantheticals. Some of which are multi-line. Counted 303 of these. Thirty-seven (37) of which were PAUSEs.

All in a 119 page script.

Good luck with this project.

[bill]

Thanks everybody for all the comments/suggestions. Will let you know how we progress with this project.

Bill

[eprobe]

I loved reading about Ploesti. I can't wait to see it on the big screen. What's the status of this movie?

[bill]

Hi, Eprobe. Thanks for reading. I can't wait to see it on the big screen either but getting something made, as we all know, is pretty difficult. Here is where we are at--

Rob got the script in to Dale Dye--actor, director and, more importantly, Spielberg's military advisor on Saving Private Ryan and The Pacific. Thought we were really going places but he had to leave for Hungry where he is making a war movie. So don't know if Ploesti is sitting on his desk, in his briefcase or in his wastebasket.

Tony Bill, Flyboys, took a quick look but though Rob's budget was unrealistic. Have had this comment from a few people. Rob is convinced he can do it and if you look at his work on Wereth 11, I agree with him.

Rob is on a tour promoting his documentary Wereth 11 and has point out, quite correctly, that he is a director, not a producer.

So we need somebody that can get behind the project and do the heavy lifting--as in money and getting it greenlighted. I think I wrote it with Spielberg in mind because he has the interest (his previous movies and his dad was a radioman on a B-25) and he can get anything done. But there is probably a cottage industry out there of people trying to get projects to Spielberg.

Again, so if anybody has any ins with a producer or an agent that can get the script into a producer, I will be forever grateful.

Eprobe, again really appreciate the comments.

Bill

[John A Rupkalvis]

My name is John Rupkalvis, and I had researched the low level B24 raid on Ploesti, Project Tidal Wave, in connection with a feature motion picture project "The Young Liberators" several years ago. Unfortunately, the producer (Mr. Chris Condon) passed away before the filming of principle photography started. He would have been a very good person for this, since he actually flew in a Liberator during WWII, although his tour of duty was in the Pacific theater.

He actually had a script, written by Mr. Grigescu, a well-known writer in Romania and other Eastern Bloc countries. I don't know if he is living any more either, but I knew his son, who told me that his father was an eye-witness of the low level raid. He had a farm in between Bucharest and Ploesti, near the infamous railroad tracks. According to international law, he actually legally owned a B-24 for a few years. It had crash landed on his farm, and the crew, fearing capture by the Nazis, abandoned the still-intact plane and ran into the woods, never to be seen again. Then, when the Russians came after the war, they confiscated the plane, and cut it up for scrap metal. A real story in itself.

Anyway, if you are interested, I would be glad to share with you anything that might be helpful in your project. I know that Chris would have been glad to hear anyone reviving the project.

By the way, this weekend, the Collings Foundation is flying a B24 into Burbank airport, if you are interested.

John A. Rupkalvis
[e-mail]