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Politically factually Correct?

ussinners

ussinners

While you might hate the dialogue, are the facts they're spouting true? This is political, but I'm hoping someone will know the answer. I think it's correct, but I could be fuzzy or out and out wrong.

Here it is:

QUINCY: I want a lawyer.

MARK: A lawyer? Why would an innocent man, who didn’t do anything need a lawyer. You have been yelling about not doing anything, right? (no response) Why would someone like that need a lawyer?

Quincy doesn’t respond.

Long beat.

MARK: Well, you see Quincy boy, any person in an armed conflict that can be properly detained under the laws and customs of war, can have a military tribunal trial.

QUINCY: What? I… I…

MARK: But, Bush had the balls to change the law to add in scum sucking mother fuckers like yourself who don’t wear a uniform. But, conspire against the United States of America to be held as Enemy Combatants.

QUINCY: I don’t understand.

JOANNE: You’re not entitled to a lawyer. You’re not entitled to a trial under United States federal law.

MARK: You’re not being held with the rights of a United States citizen. No twelve jurors. No quick and speedy trial. As a matter of fact, your tribunal won’t begin till all hostilities against the United States have concluded. When you think that will be? (long beat) Exactly.

JOANNE: You can be held indefinitely.

QUINCY: Obama changed that… That’s gone…

MARK: No, no, no, no. He did away with the term. Enemy Combatant, ooh scary. Don’t want to frighten the bleeding heart liberals. To hell with God fearing Americans who just ask to be safe in their homes. But, the conditions don’t really change. Just a horse of a different color. See Obama wants to be everyone’s friend. Good will, peace on earth fucking shit. Bush had the guts to be a leader who didn’t give a shit what these third rate fucking countries thought of us. Bush knew how to get shit done.

Thanks: George
 
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I have absolutely no clue if it is factually correct. But that is some bad screenwriting. It needs a lot of work. And by a lot of work, I mean throw it out, completely.

Whoever wrote this wasn't interested in telling a story. They were more interested in getting high on their pulpit. Don't preach to me. Tell me a story. Better yet, SHOW me a story.
 
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+1 crackerfunk

Now in these two lines you have a beginning of a story..

QUINCY: I want a lawyer.

MARK: A lawyer? Why would an innocent man, who didn’t do anything need a lawyer. You have been yelling about not doing anything, right? (no response) Why would someone like that need a lawyer?

That could go a million interesting places, but the rest is just propaganda..
 
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Sorry. This is a theatre piece and not a screenplay. It's also important exposition, which is why I'm asking. If it's factually correct, then it's character. If it's factually incorrect, then it has to be changed.

Also, I don't see the preachiness or the propaganda. I think it shows Mark's political affiliation, and his contempt for the current administration. I don't agree with it, but I'm not him.
 
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If it’s factually accurate, I don’t know.

If this is written already then okay, but if I was writing it, I would try to deliver the exposition in advance/reverse to off-set or soften the blow.

That is to say, Quincy recites (Advances) some facts, Mark counters (Reverses) with other facts.
Back and forth, each drawing the info AND character from one another out of conflict.

To the mix I would have Joanne launching a tag team/blind side assault on Quincy from a level that isn’t based on fact.

This way Quincy can defend himself to her, but in doing so opens him self up to what Mark will prey on.

To make it all work (somehow), I guess I would make Quincy someone in deep shit that IS a lawyer, but can’t HAVE a lawyer.

-Thanks-
 
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If this is a characters personal contempt for an administration
does it need to be factually correct?

Are you asking is it a fact that President Bush had the balls to
change the law to allow people who conspire against the United
States of America to be held as Enemy Combatants?

Are you asking is it a fact that one is not entitled to a lawyer
under U.S. Federal law?

Are you asking if President Obama did away with the term “Enemy
Combatant”?

Are you asking if it’s a political fact that Obama wants to be
everyone’s friend?

I’m not sure what you are asking about.
 
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If I had to break it down, are these factually correct?


MARK: "Any person in an armed conflict that can be properly detained under the laws and customs of war, can have a military tribunal trial" (I believe I took this right out of the law word for word)

MARK: But, Bush changed the law to add in people like yourself who don’t wear a uniform. But, conspire against the United States of America to be held as Enemy Combatants.

JOANNE: You’re not entitled to a lawyer. You’re not entitled to a trial under United States federal law.

MARK: You’re not being held with the rights of a United States citizen. As a matter of fact, your tribunal won’t begin till all hostilities against the United States have concluded.

JOANNE: You can be held indefinitely.

QUINCY: Obama changed that… That’s gone…

MARK: No, no, no, no. He did away with the term. Enemy Combatant. But, the conditions don’t really change. Just a horse of a different color.


(BUDDY) This is the first draft, a lot is going to change. But, these facts are important to the entire story. These have to be factually correct.

You folks are much smarter then I am. I openly admit to being a moron, and there's so many if ands and buts, I just don't get it.

I think the answer I need lays within this Congressional Research Service Document: Enemy Combatant Detainees: Habeas Corpus Challenges in Federal Court. February 3rd 2010 (that's pretty current)

This is taken from page 26.

Possible Application to U.S. Citizens
As originally enacted, the 2006 MCA provided that military commissions could exercise personal jurisdiction over alien “unlawful enemy combatants.” Pursuant to modifications made by the 2009 MCA, military commissions may now exercise jurisdiction over alien “unprivileged enemy belligerents.” Despite the difference in nomenclature, the two terms are used to refer to similar categories of persons.
Some observers raised concern that the 2006 MCA permits the President to detain American citizens as enemy belligerents without trial. The prohibition in the 2006 MCA with respect to habeas corpus petitions applied only to those filed by or on behalf of aliens detained by the United States as enemy combatants. However, both MCAs can be read by implication to permit the detention of U.S. citizens as enemy belligerents, although it does not permit their trial by military commission, which could affect their entitlement to relief using habeas corpus procedures.
A plurality of the Supreme Court held in 2004 in Hamdi v. Rumsfeld, that the President has the authority to detain U.S. citizens as enemy combatants pursuant to the AUMF, but that the determination of combatant status is subject to constitutional due process considerations. The
Hamdi plurality was limited to an understanding that the phrase “enemy combatant” means an “individual who ... was ‘part of or supporting forces hostile to the United States or coalition partners’ in Afghanistan and who ‘engaged in an armed conflict against the United States’ there,” but left it to lower courts to flesh out a more precise definition. The U.S. Court of Appeals for the Fourth Circuit found that the definition continued to apply to a U.S. citizen who returned to the United States from Afghanistan and was arrested at the airport. More recently, the Fourth Circuit appeared to have expanded the definition of “enemy combatant” to individuals arrested in the United States on suspicion of planning to participate in terrorist acts without necessarily having engaged in hostilities in Afghanistan, but this ruling was part of a judgment
that was thereafter vacated by the Supreme Court. (See discussion of Al-Marri, supra.)
In theory, the executive branch could detain a citizen as an enemy belligerent and argue that the definition of “unprivileged enemy belligerent” provided in the 2009 MCA, which does not explicitly limit its definitional scope to aliens, bolsters the detention authority already possessed by virtue of the AUMF. Constitutional due process would apply, and the citizen could petition for habeas corpus to challenge his detention. However, under the 2006 MCA the citizen-combatant would not be able to assert rights based on the Geneva Convention in support of his contention that he is not an enemy belligerent. In that sense, U.S. citizens could be affected by the 2006 and 2009 MCAs even though they do not directly apply to U.S. citizens. On the other hand, since the 2009 MCA’s definition for unprivileged enemy belligerent applies on its face only for the purposes of chapter 47a of Title 10, U.S. Code (providing for the trial by military commission of alien unprivileged enemy belligerents), it may be argued that outside of that context, the terms “enemy belligerent” and “enemy combatant” should be understood in the ordinary sense, that is, to include only persons who participate directly in hostilities against the United States. This interpretation seems unlikely, given that it would also mean that this narrower definition of “enemy belligerent” was also meant to apply in the context of the 2006 MCA’s habeas corpus provisions, such that some aliens who fall under the jurisdiction of a military commission under the 2006 MCA would nevertheless have been able to argue that their right to
petition for habeas corpus or pursue any other cause of action in U.S. court is unaffected, a reading that does not seem consistent with Congress’s probable intent. Further, it does not appear that Congress meant to apply a different definition of “enemy belligerent” to persons depending on their citizenship. Congress could specify that U.S. citizens captured in the context of the armed conflict against terrorist organizations be subject to trial in U.S. court for treason or a violation of any other statute, or prescribe procedures for determining whether U.S. citizens are subject to detention as enemy belligerents, if constitutional, but it has not done so.

Can anyone understand this?

For CONTEXT: Quincy is implicated in a terrorist car bombing in NYC, by a Pakistani who has ties to the Taliban.
 
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This exposition just feels so forced and unnatural. Nobody would ever actually talk like that in real life. Perhaps it's intended to reveal character, but it feels like I'm being preached to. I think this scene could be done SO MUCH more succinctly.

I'm kind of going off-the-cuff here, but just to illustrate my point, here's what I might do with it:

QUINCY
I want to talk to my lawyer.

MARK
(laughs)
That won't be happening.

QUINCY
I'm not talking to you until I see my lawyer.

JOANNE
That's weird; everybody else says the same thing, and yet, they always end up talking.

QUINCY
(panicked)
I want my lawyer.

MARK
(smirking)
Where do you think you are?

Quincy looks to Joanne with fear; she smiles at him before crossing the room to meet Mark. Mark winks at Joanne, with a shit-eating grin on his face.

MARK (cont.)
Say what you will about Dubya, the anti-terrorist policies he enacted sure do give me greater freedom to take away yours.

JOANNE
(leans in and talks quitely)
You're not going anywhere. You won't get a lawyer. You will answer our questions. Now we can make this easy. Or we can make it difficult.

(End scene)

I'm not going to pretend to be an expert on either writing or anti-terrorist law, but I think this scene would benefit by keeping the lines short -- one or two sentences max. Write it in a style that feels more natural for real conversation.

Also, I'm afraid I just don't buy into your line that this exposition is intended to reveal character. It does reveal character, but only that of the playwrite. Whether intended or not, the playwrite's political leanings are coming through loud and clear, and it's kind of offensive. In my version, I gave Mark an opportunity to show support of W.'s anti-terrorist policies, but without adding judgement as to whether or not they are morally justifiable. I think it's worth considering your audience. Half of your audience might agree with W's tactics; half will probably not agree with them. Do you really want to alienate half of your audience by ramming politics down their throat? It's fine for Mark to be conservative, but his character shouldn't be used as an excuse for the playwrite to jump on a soapbox.
 
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That's absolutely right. It is possible to get your information out and still tell a good story, but that dialog doesn't seem like it's even trying to tell a good story. It's like reading one of those old Star Trek novels that would bring the entire plot to a screeching halt by explaining some engineering gimmick on the Enterprise.
 
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I’m not saying this the case here, but I can see how a stage play MIGHT have solid embodiment Case For and Case Against characters that do battle with swords of preachy, propaganda like, throat cramming jargon or rhetoric clashing as a dramatic device of social commentary that in essences demonstrates how things in our world might BE propaganda that IS preached to us from various pulpits, and us the audience (society) .. (who obviously don’t walk around speaking like a law or a contract reads, all the same might be subject or bound to that law or contract) ..might be left helpless in understanding or changing any of it.

-Thanks-
 
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1. First draft. What's a major rule of a first draft? Get it on paper. That's what I did.

2. Dialogue can be argued forever. Cracker Funk, my dialogue would make it on stage before yours. You don't simplify dialogue for stage. It can be direct (Neil Simon), indirect (Sheppard) or downright bizarre (Genet). But, it's never simple. Writing a stage play is much more difficult then film because of the confined space of the action. All you have is dialogue to tell your story.

3. You can't judge whether this is the beginning middle or end of the story. Because you don't know what comes before or after.

4. This piece is going to be non-judgmental. It's going to present all sides (as many as I can think of) and then let the audience decide. Whether it works or not, I don't know.

5. MOST IMPORTANT: Of course it has to be factual. What's the use of presenting an audience subject matter on an controversial issue, and then not care about the facts? Never take the facts lightly. If you're wrong in one aspect, it diminishes the impact of everything else. Wrong once, possibly wrong twice. Don't give detractors ammunition when it's not necessary.

6. It really was a simple direct question.
 
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I think what previous posters meant by saying that it need not be factual if it's true to the character, is that it's a fact that in politically controversial topic, there are a lot of people who have strong opinions and don't have the facts straight (will not name names, as tempting as that is lol).

So you would still be presenting truth to the audience.
 
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"not be factual if it's true to the character" + "I don't quite understand what you need to be factual"

The difference is opinion vrs fact. I would think (as poorly as people believe it's written) that it's obvious Quincy is being interrogated by two law enforcement officials. He wants a lawyer and they're giving him reasons why he's not entitled to one. "Bush has balls" is opinion, "you're not entitled to a lawyer because.." is fact. I was asking about the facts, not the opinions.

This is not a gray area where law enforcement officials can lie. Because the case can be dropped it they're exposed. Plus, if you want to present them properly, 99% of the time they don't lie on the law. If he's entitled to a lawyer, then I have to make him entitled to a lawyer.
 
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"PRESIDENT MANTIS"

here,make this film.........3 ACTS:
obama vamps into a "giant praying mantis being" between the hours of 8 am & 10 am{feeding time}....he then seeks out small children on a "class field trip" at the white house.......he then eats their brains & stuff.....
on the bus ride back to the school,the teacher asks,,"where's cindy,tommy,roy & wendy"?...........joey reply's,,,,"they met the president"......{insert erie music here}...........:weird:
 
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ussinners, in screenwriting, there's a general rule-of-thumb to keeping most dialogue to one or two senteces. I know nothing about playwriting, but it makes sense when you say that you follow completely different strategies. Mainly, it isn't the length of the dialogue that throws me off -- it's that it just doesn't feel natural. All that exposition -- I just don't see anyone talking like that in real life.

Of course you just get it down on paper for your first draft. It's also a good idea to listen to honest critiques of it. I know you started this thread to ask about the factiness, but myself and a few others are mentioning the dialogue. It's worth consideration for the second draft.

As far as the truthiness is concerned, I guess we just come from different schools of thought. For me, telling a good story is priority #1, and all other things considered must serve to tell a better story. My goal isn't to give a civics lesson; my goal is to entertain.

Lastly, are you really that surprised that you're having a difficult time getting your original question answered? People here know lots of stuff about filmmaking, and love to talk about it. Politics? You might be better off emailing a question to a few college professors, or maybe a few journalists, or maybe a few government officials. Best of luck, sincerely.
 
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ussinners said:
This is not a gray area where law enforcement officials can lie. Because the case can be dropped it they're exposed. Plus, if you want to present them properly, 99% of the time they don't lie on the law. If he's entitled to a lawyer, then I have to make him entitled to a lawyer.
Click to expand...

It's a fact that cops and prosecutors do lie and intimidate suspects. I can refer you to a trial going on right now of a police commander who 'allegedly' allowed torture in order to get confessions (source: http://www.chicagotribune.com/news/local/ct-met-burge-trial-20100526,0,1597005.story).

That was civilian criminal justice at work. Now, if this person was not even given the rights of a US citizen, why would you say it's not realistic for the interrogators to lie to him?
 
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Dreadylocks said:
It's a fact that cops and prosecutors do lie and intimidate suspects. I can refer you to a trial going on right now of a police commander who 'allegedly' allowed torture in order to get confessions (source: http://www.chicagotribune.com/news/local/ct-met-burge-trial-20100526,0,1597005.story).

That was civilian criminal justice at work. Now, if this person was not even given the rights of a US citizen, why would you say it's not realistic for the interrogators to lie to him?
Click to expand...


They are allowed to lie when seeking a confession. Such as "Your partner spilled the beans. He told us..." even though they don't even know who the partner is. That happens all the time. But THE LAW they can not lie about.

As for the Chicago case, I point to what I wrote "99% of the time". There are good and bad law enforcement officials. But, if you want to present something in a non-judgmental way, you have to present them in the best light. They can lie to the suspect about anything but the actual law. They have to protect his rights, so it doesn't come and bite them in the ass during trial.

Cracker Funk said:
I know nothing about playwriting, but it makes sense when you say that you follow completely different strategies. Mainly, it isn't the length of the dialogue that throws me off -- it's that it just doesn't feel natural. All that exposition -- I just don't see anyone talking like that in real life.

Of course you just get it down on paper for your first draft. It's also a good idea to listen to honest critiques of it. I know you started this thread to ask about the factiness, but myself and a few others are mentioning the dialogue. It's worth consideration for the second draft.

As far as the truthiness is concerned, I guess we just come from different schools of thought. For me, telling a good story is priority #1, and all other things considered must serve to tell a better story. My goal isn't to give a civics lesson; my goal is to entertain.

Lastly, are you really that surprised that you're having a difficult time getting your original question answered? People here know lots of stuff about filmmaking, and love to talk about it. Politics? You might be better off emailing a question to a few college professors, or maybe a few journalists, or maybe a few government officials. Best of luck, sincerely.
Click to expand...

I never said I wasn't going to change the dialogue, it's a first draft. But, I might not, I have to see how it goes. Everyone has commented on a few lines of dialogue that needs to be exposition. There are times in both stage and screen where facts have to come out. This is a perfect example. This information needs to be told, it's the glue to everything that comes next. It happens at the appropriate time, when he's first being interrogated. This is the time a suspect would ask for a lawyer, then the news is sprung on him.

How can you talk about story when you have nothing to judge it by? This is 1/8 of a page out of 40. This scene itself runs almost 10 pages. Yes, that's normal for a stage play.

Stage dialogue is usually anything but natural and normal. Even a character who is a dolt uses the most incredible language. It's a completely different medium. Maybe my play will suck, I don't know. But, I want to give it a shot.

I've e-mailed journalists, professors, lawyers, and a host of others. They don't answer. It's a one in a million shot. Most writers/film makers have a tendency to follow the news, especially politics. It keeps them informed and well-rounded. So, this was worth a shot. I've gotten some answers regarding the facts from another screenwriting site I visit. But, even they aren't positive about the law. If you go back about 6 or 7 posts I posted what some lawyer just wrote about US Citizens being Enemy Combatants. Try making sense out of that.
 
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