Review: DOWN IN THE BAYOU

Script review for triggerstreet.com

DOWN IN THE BAYOU - by Kathren Murray

A family animation with an aquatic setting: Finding Nemo and The Little Mermaid have that nailed. A family animation about captured animals escaping into the wild: look no further than Madagascar. The biggest obstacles for Down In The Bayou to overcome are its familiarity and the world-class quality of the films it draws comparison with.

There are, of course, some nice original elements. A white alligator protagonist is a cute and unusual choice – but using a predator as a children’s hero carries inherent risks. If all the animals and insects are characters who can talk, when is it OK for the hero to eat some of them? Right on p.1 we’re shown a fly weeping over the body of another fly swatted by Gat – yet there’s no empathy shown for the dragonfly Caddo catches on p.60. I found this inconsistency strange. The Lion King sidesteps this issue by having Simba eat only insects which aren’t given the same personification as mammals and birds – I’d recommend doing the same; remove the personification of the fly and make it clear that Caddo eats only insects.

A bayou is a separate arena to the ocean but more needs to be done to differentiate it. The ocean is a broader canvas and can accommodate a huge range of species and settings – how many species are present when Sebastian sings Under The Sea, or across the vast journey to find Nemo? Remember Arial fleeing the shark through the sunken wreck? Or the way a reef is like a whole town for Nemo’s community? Compared to these technicolor wonders the bayou we’re shown seems a little flat. There are plenty of nice touches; the crawfish and oysters playing zydeco music, the herons and the snakes. Benoit’s dialogue is one of the scripts strongest elements for anchoring its location, but I still feel more can be done here. At the start, Benoit lives in a log. In the storm Caddo’s hiding place is battered by a log. When Caddo flees Crusty, he does so through a log. There needs to be more visual elements to the bayou’s underwater world than mud and logs, it’s too dreary for a genre traditionally splashed with primary colours.

The familiar elements need to be spun in original directions. Benoit the sidekick crayfish is obviously comparable to Sebastian the sidekick crab, but his spirituality and accent do enough to make him unique. However, when he ends up in a kitchen action sequence, just like Sebastian did – the similarities are too much. The Jumbalaya device is integral to Benoit’s story so the scene is necessary, but it’s essential that the original elements are emphasised to avoid easy comparison. Sebastian is simply trying to escape the rampaging chef – Benoit is trying to rescue his kin. I recommend re-working this element to include the other crayfish in the action. Perhaps have Benoit organise their ladder building and escape from the pot earlier, without Cook noticing – then have Benoit direct them like a general directing an army in their battle with the Cook and Hal. Having Cook fight a battalion of crayfish would definitely spin the scene in a unique direction.

My primary concern with the story is Caddo. His story should be the most interesting and powerful but it’s overshadowed by Benoit’s. Timon and Pumbaa only ever support Simba, and Sebastian and Flounder only ever support Ariel, but Benoit has a whole plot of his own which is more complex than Caddo’s and Benoit’s personality is more developed and attractive. Caddo’s goals are never strong; he’s a weak personality who just drifts along as directed. He doesn’t think to escape, Jack suggests it. He doesn’t manage to escape, the storm frees him. He doesn’t fight to survive, Benoit directs him. Only very, very, rarely does Caddo take any action of his own initiative. I strongly recommend the writer focus on this for their next draft. Have Caddo ask Jack if there’s anywhere a white alligator can live without becoming a pair of boots. Have him try to escape and fail, perhaps have him pray for help escaping before the storm comes. Have him try to catch dragonflies and fail before asking for Benoit’s guidance. Turn Caddo into a little fighter right from the get-go rather than that becoming the pinnacle of his growth. He also needs more personality than his current lost and scared little boy stereotype; he needs to be witty, mischievous, ballsy, ambitious, or something!

My secondary concern is with Caddo’s antagonists. Caddo’s goal is to reach the sanctuary and his antagonists are those who stand in his way; Crusty, Armand and Gat. Crusty seems to have it in for Caddo because the little guy stole his audience back at the farm, this becomes rather weak motivation for his continued antagonism once they’re both out in the bayou, and indeed Crusty is talked around extremely easily. Armand just wants to eat Caddo and is an incidental antagonist. The snakes are reminiscent of Ursula’s eels, but in The Little Mermaid they’re the servants of the antagonist, here they’re just a passing nuisance. Gat is his true adversary – but they can’t come into conflict directly, Caddo is in the water, Gat is in the boat, so their conflict is diluted through Hal, a gaff hook and nets – drastically reducing the impact of their confrontation. I’d recommend having Gat be a champion alligator wrestler who dives into the water as soon as possible to catch Caddo, rather than waiting until Crusty forces him overboard. Rather than seeming incompetent, Gat needs to convey intimidating natural aptitude and strength – that way Caddo’s survival is much more of an achievement.

With regards to structure, I recommend shaving as much as possible from the beginning of the script as the first act is currently overlong. There’s no need for the story to start at Caddo’s birth – we could enter the story once Caddo is isolated in his own enclosure with the ‘normal’ gator kids teasing him without it making any difference to the flow of the story. I also highly recommend the opening scene involve Caddo rather than Gat.

As it is, I think the script is quite good – certainly good enough for children to enjoy. But without any musical numbers or in-jokes for the adults there’s not enough here to satisfy the modern demands of the genre.

I did enjoy reading and the writer should be proud of their achievement but there’s still plenty of scope for improvement. I hope my analysis and suggestions have been helpful, if you’d like to discuss any of them further please feel free to get in touch.