“This is an intense crime thriller that at its core is a story about love, tenacity, and different levels of friendship. What carries this film isn’t just the rivalry between Billy and Marsden, but the strength of the three main characters. This is definitely a viable script with noteworthy characters.”
“The Diamondback brings an epic action crime drama with a western tone and vibe. Michael does a stellar job of crafting compelling characters and immersing readers into a fully fleshed out story world and time period of the early 1960s as you’re hooked right from the get-go.”
“The Diamondback has breathtaking images, great action and a second to none premise. There’s a painful beauty that resides on the page - I could feel the heartbreak while being awestruck by the script’s charm. The script is tightly written...I don’t know if I’ve ever gotten so wrapped up and cheered for a bad guy so hard before. The command of the material really showed a lot of talent.”
The Diamondback
Logline: Based on true events, a young Marine veteran with nothing to lose decides to rob a trio of banks with his two best friends, but a tenacious cop makes catching him his personal mission, setting up a collision-course cat-and-mouse game that careens in and out of jail.
Synopsis: January 1963, Phoenix, Arizona. After losing his job, Billy Lee Deckard, an ex-marine skilled in desert survival, decides to rob a few banks in order to buy the California ranch that he and his late wife had always dreamed about. He asks his best friends and fellow ex-marines, Frank and Jeremiah, to help him pull off the jobs. Frank, a plumber with a Napoleon complex, and Jeremiah, a lawn mower who struggles with the racist hardships that Phoenix imposes on him, ultimately accept Billy’s offer.
Following a streak of successful robberies, the gang gets pursued by the police in a high-speed car chase after a robbery goes wrong. While Frank and Jeremiah get away, Arizona Highway Patrolman Pete Marsden chases Billy into the Sonoran Desert. Although Billy outmaneuvers Marsden, he is forced to hide out in the desert, evading hundreds of possemen, search parties, bloodhounds and helicopters. After an impressive twelve-day stint in the desert, Billy turns himself in after a Diamondback Rattlesnake delivers him a deadly bite.
Having become a local anti-hero and earning himself the nickname “The Diamondback,” Billy gets sentenced to twenty-five years in Arizona State Penitentiary - Florence. With an unwavering ambition to escape, Billy schemes an escape plan with Frank, Jeremiah, and dense fellow convict Seamus.
A story of bank robberies, multiple escapes from prison and several famous stints in the desert, The Diamondback is a film about escape - and more importantly, a story that tackles what it means to feel alive.
Selected Accolades:
Semi-Finalist, The Academy Nicholl Fellowships in Screenwriting 2021 (Top 150 out of 8,191)
Finalist, Screencraft Action & Adventure Screenplay Competition 2021 (Top 50 of 1,300)
Finalist, Miami Screenplay Awards Winter 2021 (Top 10 out of 700)
Coverfly Top 1% (out of 60,000+ Screenplays)
The black devils
Logline: In 1942, an American-Canadian brigade is forged into the first-ever Special Forces unit. After a year of revolutionary training, their first mission is a suicide climb up a Nazi-held mountain—the key to breaking through to Rome.
Synopsis: The Black Devils tells the true story of the First Special Service Force—an experimental commando designed for the harshest conditions of war. Led by Robert T. Frederick, a lead-from-the-front Colonel with everything to prove, and Howard Van Ausdale, a Native American prospector with an instinct for terrain, the Force is handed an objective most deemed impossible.
After three failed Allied assaults in the mountains of Italy, ‘The Force’ is sent on a daring assault up the cliffs of Monte La Difensa—a Nazi fortress guarding Hitler’s Winter Line. If they succeed, they’ll redefine what it means to be a soldier; if they fail, the one and only route to Rome is lost.
Brutal, emotional, and unflinchingly real, The Black Devils is a visceral WWII epic about sacrifice, camaraderie, and the birth of modern Special Forces.
Special Ranger
Logline: When a Texas Special Ranger investigates suspicious cattle movements along the Texas–Mexico border, he’s ambushed and left for dead. Having accidentally uncovered a vast criminal network, he’s forced underground, and launches a one-man war against the men who betrayed him.
Synopsis: In the unforgiving borderlands of South Texas, where barbed wire stretches for miles and the law rides alone, a quiet war is being waged. Cartels are using the billion-dollar cattle trade to funnel drugs across the border—hidden in plain sight.
Enter the Texas Special Rangers: specialized cowboy detectives tasked with protecting the integrity of that trade. When one Ranger follows a trail of corruption, cattle, and blood, he’s gunned down and left to die. But survival turns him into something else—something ruthless.
Fueled by vengeance and guided by his own brand of justice, he takes the fight back to the men who betrayed him. Special Ranger is a modern Western thriller about power, revenge, and the gray area between justice and the law.
The Shadow of Sky Springs
Logline: When John Beckett, a blue-collar technician, learns that his daughter is being blackmailed by the son of a powerful family, a confrontation turns deadly. With no other options, he must rely on his street smarts to orchestrate a cover-up and outwit the police.
Synopsis: The Shadow of Sky Springs is a US adaptation of Drishyam, set in the snow-covered, sleepy town of Sky Springs, Colorado. When a boy goes missing, and whispers of foul play begin to swirl, John must navigate a maze of small-town politics, class divides, and buried secrets. With powerful enemies watching and the truth threatening to surface, he’ll do whatever it takes to keep his family intact.
A slow-burn thriller about loyalty, deception, and one man’s unwavering determination to do what he believes is right.
The Life of riley
Logline: The Life of Riley is a coming-of-age story about a broke Ivy League student whose life is turned upside down when he finds out he’s about to be a father. An aspiring musician in love with another woman, he must decide whether or not he will pursue his dreams or reroute his life for fatherhood.
Synopsis: Pasadena, CA, 1978. Just before heading back to Cornell for his final semester, Riley Elliott learns that Becca, a high school fling, is pregnant with his child. Back at school, as Riley’s band begins to take off, he falls for Kate, a smart and beautiful bartender with plans to move to New York—right where the music industry awaits him.
Torn between two lives—one filled with creative ambition and love, the other grounded in duty and sacrifice—Riley is forced to make a decision that will define his future. Based on a true story, The Life of Riley is a tender, clear-eyed look at young fatherhood, fractured families, and the cost of doing what feels right.