Final Draft

A depressed writer (with some inevitable personal problems dictated by the Universal Movie Law) strives to complete a screenplay and has himself locked up in his flat above a garage by an actor friend. Needless to say, writer's block hits him hard and the characters from his past - wife, school bully, deceased brother and a Stephenkingesque 'clown after sundown' among others - jump at the chance to perform their hallucinative act to the poor man on the brink of sanity.

With nothing too brilliant or original to flag, this cheapie still provides some frights and might evoke some thoughts if you happen to be the thinking type. The main character is likable enough to keep the interest in his downhill life alive, but it still is a one man film about a one man's story, and if the inner struggles of a writer in a block don't make your heart beat double pace, you'll regrettably find this film to be a very slow moving, somewhat predictable and repetitious. At times it's also a bit complicated, as the multi-leveled past comes alive in random samples through the writer's hallucinations.

As indie flicks go, this one is quite neat and worthy a look. The problem is, all this has been done before, better and with much, much more money in the budget.

James van der Beek plays the part well - drifting gently away from his role in Dawson's Creek. Though this sort of film has been done before, the isolation in 'Final Draft' provides a much more difficult part for the lead, which James plays with the candour of an experienced actor. Definitely worth a watch, I would select this title over numerous others in the genre; especially Stephen King's 'It' which is far less frightening. It is also refreshing to see a new film approach horror in a traditional manner - not one of the commonplace gore-fests that are dime-a-dozen in the box office recently. For an indy film, it is definitely a good foothold for all involved; being the director's second film and a first for the writer, who also stars. There were few parts and it might have been refreshing to see some higher calibre actors play the supporting roles, though the parts were all played well. A foot in the door for James van der Beek, who with any luck will land a part in a film with a bigger budget sometime soon.

Jonathan Dueck's 'Final Draft' doesn't show us much what we haven't already seen before. The director tries to make it mysterious, suspenseful and ambiguous but not much happens until the last half hour. Darryn Lucio writes and costars. While the premise is interesting, the pacing is at fault. It takes almost an entire hour for the story to take off. 'Final Draft' seems to take much of its inspiration from Stephen King's 'It' and 'Secret Window'. Even though it's made within a small budget, it' quite well-made and the visuals in the last half hour are quite well done. The dark and gloomy atmosphere is The characterization was quite clichéd and that makes the situations less interesting. James Van Der Beek turns in a decent performance as the tormented writer suffering from writer's block and fighting his past but the rest of the cast is uninteresting. So, there is nothing refreshing about 'Final Draft'. It's painfully slow, clichéd and tries too hard while failing.

I saw a trailer for this movie and was looking forward to seeing it.I really liked James Van Der Beek in the movie called "the plague". Final draft starts off with his character having a weird nightmare and then starts off pretty normal from there until he starts to encounter strange people.There are not many characters in this film but it was still well acted.James plays Paul, a lonely writer who seems to only have 1 friend and a past that we see clips of through his home videos.He is determined to write a screenplay and locks himself in his apartment to write a story from his childhood about a clown who gets set on fire and dies on stage during a performance as some kids are laughing at him as he perishes in the flames.The clown then comes back from the dead to get revenge on the now grown up kids.Paul and his brother were at the show as kids.It has troubled him ever since and he is haunted by thoughts of the kids laughing at him dying being the last thing the clown saw before he died.He is seeing spooky visions of the clown and the people around him are being terrorized mysteriously.Cabin fever sets in and he is living bad dreams.It is hard to distinguish between reality and fiction in this movie, and is a little confusing because there were so many flashbacks in his head happening all at once without much detail or explanation.The characters were a bit undeveloped but it was still a decent movie that makes you think.

Paul Twist (James Van Der Beek) is a screenwriter, who suffering writer's block and he wasn't been writing for two years. When his friend/struggling actor David Hockin (Darryn Lucio) asks him to write another screenplay for him to star. After Paul mentions, he dreams about an clown was frighten about. David wants him to writes an supernatural slasher/horror film about the clown. Since Paul only has an idea in his head, when David made the deal. They want the script in three weeks and Paul thinks, the only way he could write it. If he's locked in his apartment for three weeks. When his friend agree with the odd situation. Now Paul starts writing his script but he also thinking of what went wrong with his ex-wife (Tara Spencer-Naim), his brother who committed suicide (Devon Sterling Ferguson), an bully from his childhood (Adam MacDonald), his imaginary friend (Jeff Roop), an model he fantasized a lot (Melaine Marden) and especially himself.

Directed by Jonathan Dueck made an OK watchable film but nearly dull surreal horror drama. This has an good premise, although it does reminds me of the work of Stephen King movies like "It" and especially "Secret Window". But oddly enough, it reminds worth a look for Van Der Beek's decent performance. Who certainly deserves better material than this movie. Nothing really makes sense in this unpleasant independent feature and some viewers will find this off-putting as well. Actor:Lucio also wrote the screenplay of this instead forgotten movie. (**/*****).