[WriteNow]

Wow. You were not kidding about this one being bleak, Rex. I feel like a need hug or something. Right out of the gate this idea is a tough sell (but you already knew that) but it's also pretty great. Also pretty confusing.

First off- love the title. It's central to the plot, it's simple and it makes an impact. I can just see the one-sheets now with the lettering superimposed on the crash site.

Second- format is spot-on. This is what a treatment should look like, in my opinion. Just words on paper, nothing special. Even used my favorite font. The numbering of acts, (i.e. I, II, III) is unnecessary but not likely to get you in any trouble.

Now to the story itself. Really, really dark. Really kind of depressing. It's well done, and I really like it. But there's some problems.

The last one first- what happens in the end? Our hero takes off his space helmet and ends up being able to breath on Mars? So he can't be real (or human). Which would make him either a.) a ghost, b.) a robot c.) a hologram, d.) something else?

The clues to his "real" identity are (I think) the fact that he didn't get the disease, and something to do with his wife's eye color. I'm guessing something about manufactured memories (the VR memories) and the eye color was a mix-up of some sort letting him know what was really going on.

So- I'm confused. Who is Samuel? Why did he survive the Martian environment? And why did he crash the landing craft?

Also, we meet his crew briefly (with some nice, quick chracterizations) and they soon get sick and die. Not much interaction for Samuel, though. He's just there. Why is he so isolated even when he's surrounded by people?

A year ago I probably would have said this film is hopeless. Its a muddled mess with mostly one character and everything goes bad for everyone. Like your tagline, "No hope."

Then I saw a film called Moon. If you haven't seen it, you should. Your script shares a lot of similarites with it. It's about one man working alone on the moon who suddenly bumps into . . . himself. And it is very confusing and very depressing BUT- there is hope. In the end we get a resolution that feels real yet gives us hope that not everyone has to die horribly.

But, then again, I doubt you want that. You want a "bleak, neo-dysoptian" sci-fi tale and that you have. It's cool. I wouldn't mind some answers, although perhaps its meant to be ambiguous? Either way, I get the feeling you wrote this some time ago and are pretty set in stone on it, and if so that's fine. There's just not much of an audience for films like this. It's a niche market, to say the least. If George Clooney couldn't make Solaris a hit, then there's trouble in depressing sci-fi movie-land.