Studio Rejects My ‘Gravity’ Pitch

With the film ‘Gravity’ getting great reviews at the box office this weekend, I can’t help but feel a little bittersweet.  You see, I was originally set to write this film.  However, as you can see from the below notes on my script, studio executives were anything but pleased with my work.

p.2 – There aren’t that many people heading up to Space.  Let’s get rid of the scene where they get stuck behind, then pass a ‘ship full of rowdy teenagers blasting their music.’

p.4 – Let’s also get rid of the scene where the crew has to turn around and head back to Earth because Dr. Ryan Stone forgets her shoes.  It adds nothing to the film and it seems hard to believe that NASA would allow someone to launch into space without checking first to make sure they had all of their gear.

p.10 – While we really like your intriguing premise that people are mysteriously disappearing from the International space station, we hate that this mystery is solved four pages later when it is revealed that ‘someone left the door open.’

p. 15 – The line where Dr. Stone says “amazing to think, we live down there,” your instructions say she points to the Earth and then you instruct special effects crews to “make sure the globe is turned to a good angle so the key isn’t showing.” This is a high-budget film.  We won’t be using a globe to represent the Earth.

p.21 – The characters can’t keep going out for ‘smoke breaks.’  They would die, as you’ve already established.

p.25 – “Dangerous space debris destroys the Space Station.  Dr. Stone clings on for life.  The debris finally passes.  She is covered in banana peels and fish bones.”  Why would space debris contain so much household trash?”

p.35 – Dr. Stone’s befriending of a Volleyball named Spalding seems like a direct rip-off of ‘Castaway.’

p. 41 – Dr. Stone obviously has a PHD and is an astronaut.  Why, therefore, is she so confused as to why she can’t seem to light a match in space?

p. 52 – “Dr. Stone sees the Chinese Space Station. She makes her way towards the vessel but then sees a sign in the window.  ‘Sorry we’re closed. Come back in the morning.’  Dr. Stone shakes her head and turns around.”  Why would a space station need such a sign?  And why wouldn’t she just try to knock anyway? It’s a life or death emergency.

p. 60 – “About to give up, Dr. Stone contemplates suicide.  ALF from the show ALF appears to her in a hallucination and encourages her to carry on.  Stone can’t tell if ALF is kidding or not.”  ALF doesn’t seem like an appropriate fit for this film.  Even if he did, this would not be the place for comedic relief.

p.75 – “Dr. Stone activates thrusters and careens through the atmosphere, and lands in a lake.  She arrives on shore. It’s a planet almost exactly like Earth.  Jupiter.  She hears a rifle cock.  Dr. Stone slowly turns her head around.  It’s a Martian standing over her.  ‘Get off my lawn!’ he growls.”  First of all, the scientific community would be furious if we suggested that uninhabitable Jupiter is almost exactly like Earth. Second, what is a Martian doing on Jupiter? And finally, why does he speak English.  We’re going with a different writer, sorry.