I've gotten more feedback on the first draft of the script (thanks Ben and Mariel). Most of the major feedback is fairly consistent, which is a great sign (i.e. everyone mostly agrees on which are the bad parts and good parts).
There's a lot of confusion about what's in-world and what's not -- plus I've clearly been far too subtle in many places, both about in-world details and backstory. I think this is all fairly easy to fix with minor tweaks.
Ben doesn't like the voice-over nor the ending. I'm willing to cut the back the voice-over in parts, but not entirely. I've made a 180 (well, more like a 150) on the voice-over already, since I've decided to use location sync sound on all the new scenes and use what we can from the previously shot audio (ug). I was originally going to do VO on the whole film (totally crazy but it would have saved me from dealing with sync sound).
While the 24/7 VO is gone, I still need some VO to get into Mary's head. That's key to the character and the theme of the whole thing. Plus, the audio is so crappy on some of the Europe and Mexico stuff that I really need VO to salvage those shoots.
But I agree that the VO can be trimmed in many places. Show, don't tell. Yup.
Ben's problem with the ending is more challenging. Okay, the ending needs slight work. But not as much as he wants (Mary gets the girl?!?).
In any case, I'm really happy with the decision to make Mo a woman. She's really going to rock.
The biggest challenge will be to reconcile the footage from Europe (shaky camera, no boomed sound, skeletal script, plus questionable direction). The voice-over will paper over some of this. We'll see. I am loathe to reshoot any of these scenes, but not totally against it if the rest of the film works and that does not.
Interestingly, both Ben and Paul Barnett (of Windline Films and Co-Director of Confessions of a Burning Man) are trying to convince me to think bigger about the project.
I see this as my student film. With luck, it will get made on a shoestring using essentially volunteer talent and crew. I need to learn the craft of filmmaking and this is my test run.
They both, however, are arguing for me to go big. Ben (who has seen the script) says it is definitely strong enough to try to go Indiewood with it -- real actors, real financing, etc. Paul (who has not read it) says that SAG is cheap and once you have the some B-list stars (who will join if it's a good script for day rate minimums), you can raise money since that means distribution. Sounds so easy.
For me, I don't want to wait for the Indiewood lottery ticket. If I wait for the industry to support the film, it will never get made -- I'll be waiting around forever. More importantly, I really don't think I'm a strong enough director yet to even approach them.
With this film, I'll make it, enter a bunch of festivals, sell some DVDs to friends/family and then move on to the next project having proved I can direct.
But, just in case, I may send the script to some agents. Can't hurt to get on their radar right?