BEST SCENE SCREENPLAY READINGS

BEST SCENE SCREENPLAY READINGS

The "best scene" take from features and TV pilots of winning screenplays.

BEST SCENE SCREENPLAY READINGS
  • WILDsound Festival Best Scene: THE SENTINEL, by Damián Gajardo

    https://youtu.be/wWBwXUuE3l0

    CAST LIST:
    Narrator: Elizabeth Rose Morriss
    Athena AI: Hannah Ehman
    Captain Bishop: Geoff Mays

  • FEMALE Festival Best Scene: ALL THE KING'S HORSES, by Nancy Franklin

    In a 1960s rural community, a young girl navigates her coming-of-age only to discover family secrets of mental illness, love, and loss that change the course of her life.

  • FEMALE Festival Best Scene: ZOMBIE HOT SPRINGS, by Candace Rose

    In a zombie world, a badass waitress from Iowasets out to cureherzombie brother with a magical hot spring - while dodging cultists, undead flashmobs, and a sexy ex-turned-zombie- hunter. Along the way they discover that family isn't who you're born with - it's who you survie the apocalypse with.

  • THE TRIAL OF ROMAN WEINZAPFEL, by John M. O’Leary & John W. McMullen

    In Indiana in 1842, an unhappilymarriedwoman accuses a young, immigrant priestof raping herin the confessional. His vow to keep the Seal of Confessionprevents him from speaking in his own defense. Aclimate of xenophobia and anti-Catholicismfuelsa sensationaltrialandviolent, shameful eventsthatult...

  • FEMALE Festival Best Scene: BEASTIES, Amy Kolquist

    Desperate to escape her abusive, Christian Nationalist family, a teenage girl finds an unlikely ally when a female werewolf from a pack dead set on killing her family lands in her home, and the attraction they develop for each other forces them into a fight for their very survival.

  • HORROR Best Scene: The P.I.'s (Paranormal Investigators), by Krista Crawford

    When a disgraced ghost hunter reluctantly returns to her hometown, she faces a paranormal fight for her life as she tries to mount a comeback.

    Years after escaping a family and hometown that shunned her, Bates thought she had it all. A successful ghost hunting career and show, a beautiful woman ...

  • HORROR Festival Best Scene: Vamp Snail, by Carrie Alicia Hawks

    In this animated feature film, vampire snails begin a battle to protect their home, enlisting a cross-species brigade including bats. The tale takes place in Cancer Alley, a region of Louisiana affected by hundreds of petrochemical plants.

  • HORROR Festival Best Scene: BELOW THE TRESTLE, by Allen Sircy

    After his brother is killed near an infamous trestle, a teenage YouTuber sets out to prove the legend of the Pope Lick Monster is real—only to discover that the truth is far more tragic, and far more dangerous, than he imagined.

  • THRILLER/SUSPENSE Festival Best Scene: YOU HAVE ARRIVED, by Jacqueline Dolisi

    After being abducted by a suburban couple running an underground trafficking ring, a determined young woman discovers her missing best friend among the captives and rallies a group of women to fight back, outsmart their captors, and take their freedom by force.

  • WILDsound Best Scene Reading: BLEEDING BEAUTIES, by Jason Parks

    Inside The Laced House, a luxury cosmetic clinic wrapped in velvet and silence, seven patients are stripped of their identities and forced into grotesque fairytale roles-voiceless mermaids, sleeping dolls, obedient swans, and sculpted princes. Through invasive procedures, psychological conditioni...

  • WILDsound Festival TV Best Scene: UPTOWN SANTOS, by Jonathan Ramirez

    In the gritty streets of New York City an unlikely young man is influenced by the charismatic yet ruthless acts of his uncle as he rises to the top of a major crime family and faces unexpected challenges.

  • FANTASY/SCI-FI Best Scene Reading: THE HARMONY SAGA, by Timothy Bradley Reinhold

    The Harmony Saga is a five-part mythopoetic cinematic universe culminating in a transcendent sixth finale. Combining visionary science fiction, sacred myth, and philosophical depth, it follows the rise of a divine AI, the collapse of a galactic Church, and the rebirth of cosmic balance.

    https://...

  • ACTION/FANTASY Festival Best Scene: DJINN, by Matthew Karram

    In a Middle Eastern refugee camp, 16-year-old Saeed discovers a magical ring containing a Djinn (spirit) while hiding from bullies. The Djinn offers him three wishes. With his first wish, Saeed asks for protection from his tormentors, leading to the death of the bully Hassan. For his second wish,...

  • ANIMATION Festival Best Scene Reading: AMERICAN FAIRY TALES, by A. S. Templeton

    At the dawn of the twentieth century, a pampered young American girl has her life turned upside-down by a series of harrowing encounters with fantastical characters.

  • TV FESTIVAL Best Scene Reading: IN ALL BUT BLOOD, by A.S. Templeton

    On a colonized exoplanet threatened by a solar storm, an Eagle Scout escapes the safe confines of Alpha Colony to search the hostile alien wilderness for his missing brother.

  • LGBTQ+ Festival Best Scene: THIS IS BAT COUNTRY, by Kerry Ann Boyko

    A washed-up vampire playing PI turns a murdered girl to preserve her testimony—but she refuses to play sidekick in his pity parade. Together, they navigate an underworld where identity is fluid, transformation is inevitable, and survival means reclaiming what others tried to erase.

  • LGBTQ+ Festival Best Scene Script: STRIP CRAFT, by Wilson Large

    A former cop’s search for her missing sister leads her into the dark world of a witch’s coven, where ancient rituals and forbidden magic force her to confront her deepest fears and uncover the truth about her family’s past.

    https://instagram.com/stripcraftmovie

  • HORROR Festival Best Scene Read: TEXAN WEREWOLF IN MANHATTAN, by Terrence Ross

    What was the last great American werewolf movie? If you answered, An American Werewolf in London, you win the prize. Its combination of reality, humor and absolute terror, hasn’t been matched. Instead the few werewolf movies that have been made have mostly been exercises in gore and heavy breathi...

  • WILDsound Festival Best Scene Reading: CROWNED LIES, by Kirene Bolsen-Long

    Dive into the high-stakes world of beauty pageants where appearances are not just deceiving—they're deadly. In 'Crowned Lies,' a seemingly glamorous event spirals into a treacherous game when Emily Brooks and her fellow contestants uncover a corrupt scheme involving the pageant’s top officials. A...

  • WILDsound Festival Best Scene Reading: DAFFODILS, by Andry Platrites

    Torn between the weight of her secrets and the desire for freedom, a single mother is forced to reveal the truth about her past, her sexuality, and her ex-husband to their children.

    CAST LIST:

    Narrator: Sean Ballantyne
    Aria: Hannah Ehman
    Grace Rose: Val Cole

  • FEEDBACK Festival Best Scene: CALIGO INN, by Shaun Delliskave (pgs 48 to 50)

    A rising political star retreats to a secluded Virginia inn to draft a campaign platform that will secure him a spot on a presidential ticket—but as nightmarish visions blur with reality, he’s forced to confront the ghosts of those he sacrificed to climb the political ladder. Caligo Inn is a psyc...

  • ENVIRONMENTAL Fest Best Scene: POLAR BREAK, by Thomas M. DiGiacinto (interview)

    Set in Churchill, Manitoba—The Polar Bear Capital of the World—Polar Break is a survival thriller where climate change isn’t exposition, but existential pressure. As the ice-free season pushes past record limits, starving bears flood the town. What begins as a containment mission spirals into a s...

  • HORROR Festival Best Scene Read: NECROTICA, by Wesley Steven Drent (interview)

    Six years after the Zombie Apocalypse, a suicidal widow must protect an orphaned child as the world descends into literal Hell on Earth.

    CAST LIST:

    Narrator: Geoff Mays
    Sophie: Elizabeth Rose Morriss
    Fiona: Hannah Ehman

    Get to know the writer:

    1. What is your screenplay about?

    Necrotica ...

  • HORROR Festival Best Scene: SCALE 35, by Joanna Lee Ramos (interview)

    A female Veteran obsessed with her weight finds a magic scale that makes her lose weight fast but at a high cost.

    CAST LIST:

    Narrator: Sean Ballantyne
    Dr. Manger: Geoff Mays
    Brend: Elizabeth Rose Morriss

    Get to know the writer:

    1. What is your screenplay about?

    Obsession with food, weigh...