Ten Was Way Too Many.
We love your movie idea!
Ya, “The Ten Commandments!” We have some notes though.
First, Moses’ beard has to go. Robes aren’t fashionable either. We need to hook the kids. Contact Stacy in wardrobe. She’ll help pull together a new look.
Moses is 80 when he leads the Israelites out of Egypt? Too old! He should be about 30. A young 30. Think Timothée Chalamet but good looking.
What’s Moses’ wife’s name? Sephora? Beautiful! The product placement writes itself! We can’t throw away a gold mine like that on a secondary character though. She’ll need more screen time. Can she part the Red Sea instead of Moses? No wait, have her accept those tablets from the invisible guy? What? Yes, “the Commandments” from “God.” Don’t bother me with the details. Make it happen!
Speaking of the tablets… sorry, “the Commandments,” ten is way too many. We’re writing for the TikTok generation. Get it down to four. Preferably three.
So, what if that ruins the movie’s name, give it a new one. How about “Exodus?” No, “Exit Plan – The Revenge!” I love it! Genius!
Stop sulking, every movie gets tweaked. I’m doing you a favor. Here, I’ll help you cut the list. Yes, “the Commandments.” Sheesh, you creatives are sensitive.
“Thou Shalt Not Kill” is not going to work. This is an action movie for Pete’s sake. What? Of course it’s an action movie, we don’t do documentaries or whatever it is you want to call this script. Reboot of a classic? Cecil B. DeWho? Never heard of him. Who’s his agent? Dead? Who, him or the agent? What, both? What are the odds of that? Well, we all have to go sometime, I guess.
That reminds me, there’s not enough explosions. Can the Egyptians drive muscle cars instead of Chariots? Historical accuracy? This is Hollywood, not… uh… historywood. Put them and the Israelites in muscle cars and strap some rocket launchers on them. Think “The Road Warrior” meets “Furiosa: A Mad Max Saga.” What? The same franchise? Great, that means it’s already a proven recipe. We’re really cooking here!
“Thou shall not take the name of the Lord thy God in vain.” Nope. PG movies never make money. We need to give the people what they want and what they want is swearing. Lots of it. There’s going to be so much swearing in this movie that if you tried to take out all the f-bombs you’d turn it into a silent film. Kill it.
Next! “Thou shall not commit adultery?” “Thou shall not covet thy neighbor’s wife?” We can’t have a movie with a bunch of married people running around being faithful to each other. Where’s the sexual tension? Kill them!
“Thou shall not steal,” “Thou…” You know what, this is taking too long. Just keep the first one and the one about parents and… ya, you can keep the Sunday one too. If we haven’t crushed opening weekend by Saturday night, we’re dead anyway.
Great, that gets us down to three “Commandments.” Still a little long but… relax! I can sell this upstairs now that we have the rocket launchers. If there are any issues, we’ll fix them in rewrite. What? No, this is post-draft tweaking. Rewrite comes after punch-up but before reimagining and executive polish. Relax! The changes will be so minor you’ll barely notice them.
For now, we’ll cram “the Commandments” into the narration of the heist prep since that’s already a boring talking scene. Most people will probably go to the can then anyway.
What do they steal? Why “the Commandments” of course. Is this your first heist film? It goes setup, betrayal, explosions, heist setup, second betrayal, heist, third betrayal, explosions, good guys win. Then possibly more explosions. Depends on the budget.
This is going to be one hell of a biblical epic, action, heist movie!
Oh, one last thing, how married are we to the name “Moses?”