The Painful Creative Journey

Last night I had my roommate, Tony Bui, a Sundance-winning filmmaker, give me his review of my "Mama" script for feedback. It wasn't easy. He's liked my premise and pitch, but he wasn't thrilled with where the script went. He felt it was obvious and had some main characters he didn't care about.
He talked about what he thought could be powerful if I just removed half the characters and rewrote it as a slightly different story. (reinforcing themes that drew me in the first place.)

It was hard to take this after a year or more of developing this script.

But you know, he was right.

The script in it's present form could be enjoyable, even produce-able, but not necessarily put me in the league of writing I'd like to be known for. Tony is working right now with Ted Hope on his next project, who produced many of the best indie films of the past 15 years. (Brothers McMullen, The Ice Storm, American Splendor, etc.) and was just passing on wisdom he says producers like Ted would be looking for.

So after so much time developing this script it was hard to hear but Tony knows what he's talking about. The question became: Do I want to move ahead with this script in its present form to just get a film going, or do I want to spend at least several more months rewriting it to try and take it to another level?

I'm leaning toward the latter, already coming up with new ideas. But it wouldn't be a lie to say it's painful being almost 40, wanting this for 20 years, and having to delay it some more. For good reasons, but I guess this is a test of the craft.