This practice session was cut very short due to an interruption. I only got about five minutes into it (literally!) and didn't go back to finish it later. Here's what I got in five minutes.
Character:
Random word Gum becomes Barney Gumble (The Simpsons).
Random word Security becomes security guard
Prop:
vegetable
Line of dialogue:
Random word pigeon becomes, "Did you send the invitations by carrier pigeon?"
The genre was randomly determined to be Film de Femme.
I immediately went to a woman getting ready for a wedding. She is standing in the lobby of a building (presumably her apartment building) and there is a security guard there. The vegetables came in when someone carried them in a bag and [tripped | did something] spilled them across the floor. She saw the vegetables themselves and said, "Are you trying to kill the guests? You know that half the family is allergic to [some vegetable]."
She's on her cell phone, and the security guard is there trying to calm her, determine how he can help her. The line of dialogue would be said into the phone after she asks the security guard if he received a package of invitations, or a package from [x] printers.
How is this a film de femme? What would make this scenario interesting? (What if the vegetable guy really were trying to poison the family and she discovers the plot? She could eventually uncover it and discover that the groom was getting cold feet and was trying to sabotage everything.)
Lisa (our Femme) walks into the lobby and asks Barney the security guard about a package arriving for her.
Barney: No, ma'am. No package today.
At this point, right when I was about to start on the setup scene, I was interrupted. Fortunately, the script already seemed to have a direction. I probably would have followed up on the whole, "groom trying to sabotage everything" theme. There's no way this would have culminated in a wedding anyway since that would be too expensive to plan and shoot unless there happened to be a wedding that day and the bride and groom didn't mind us filming them. Fat chance.
Thursday, September 30, 2010
Wednesday, September 29, 2010
This Bitter Earth - reading
Finished "This Bitter Earth" by Bernice L. McFadden. Lappy did it. Fortunately, it's not a murder mystery, so I'm not giving anything away with that statement. This book was indeed about a bitter existence. I recall one moment of joy, one or two really tense moments, and a whole lot of sadness and the general dealing with life's problems. This is the second in the series, something I seem to have a tendency to do to myself (I haven't read the first). Do I have the will to go back to the first in the series? It might be a little too real-life to fulfill my interest in escapism.
Wednesday, September 22, 2010
Gold Coast - reading
Finished "Gold Coast" by Elmore Leonard. Though a little dated (or maybe it's just accurate to the time period in which it took place), it was a decent story that used stereotypes pretty well.
Saturday, September 18, 2010
Falcon Seven - reading
Finished "Falcon Seven" by James W. Huston. Despite the author telling me things far too many times, I really liked this one. It was a fun ride from the opening scene!
Monday, September 13, 2010
48HFP practice session 3
48HFP writing practice #3, written on Sept. 12, 2010.
Character:
Random word moderate becomes Lucy Moderatz (from While You Were Sleeping) - changed to Luke/Lucy for gender
Random word spy becomes spy
Prop:
Random word rag
Line of dialogue:
Random word insult becomes, "This is a deliberate insult against me and my people." (from Dexter, The Lion Sleeps Tonight)
Genre: RANDOM (1-22)
Time Travel Movie or Doppelganger Movie
Set-up work:
Take several pictures of an actor. Print them out. Put them in a "studio" type setting on the walls for reference. Use makeup and prosthetics to make the actor look fairly different from the person in the pictures (themselves).
SCENE: PRELIMINARY WORK
In the background of the scene are several PICTURES of a person from different angles including some close-ups. In the scene is Luke/Lucy (herein referred to as LUCY), sitting in a chair, nude but covered with a DRESSING GOWN. Working on her is PATRICK, a cosmetic surgeon. He is marking Lucy's face up with a (washable) MARKER. Standing next to Lucy is PHILLIP, a handler. He is giving Lucy her next mission. While Patrick works, Phillip tries to remain at Lucy's side, and as he perceives he is in Phillip's way, he moves around Lucy, but never goes far from her.
PHILLIP
Do you understand your mission?
LUCY
I am to infiltrate the building as Michael/Michelle Davinport, the person in these pictures. I will go first to the security office on the second floor and enter the code Zulu 18 Mike to disable monitoring of the 18th floor. I will then go to the 18th floor and Ms. Davinport's her office, disable her with a tranquilizer dart and secure her passkey. I will stow her in a closet and secure it.
PHILLIP
And if she's not alone?
LUCY
Tranquilize her and take out anyone else that's in the room.
PHILLIP
Non-lethal where possible.
LUCY
Of course.
PHILLIP
And then?
LUCY
Make my appearance.
SCENE: CHANGE IN APPEARANCE
There could be a scene that looks surgical in some way where the actor's appearance is brought back to that of herself without prosthetics/SFX.
SCENE: EXECUTING THE PLAN
(This is actually a combination of several scenes on the way in.)
Things will go basically according to plan at first. She gets to the building, gets into security and disables the system for the 18th floor. Then gets to the 18th floor and sees the office where she needs to go. Ms. Davinport is in her office, standing behind her desk. Lucy shoots the dart at her.
[Securing with a tranquilizer: Can we take a blowgun and do a fast pan shot from the actor to herself in two parts that are later recombined. As long as we can do a quick cut between them so that the same actor is shooter and victim, it should be fine.]
After shooting the dart, Ms. Davinport (same actress) gives an "oh, my" and collapses back into her office chair. That's when Lucy notices a young (20-something) assistant and a very young (10-teen) child staring in horror at her. For all they know, the other person in the room was just assassinated by herself!
Lucy isn't sure quite how to proceed due to the child being present. After a moment's pause, she springs into action and takes out the assistant. She then turns to the child and says, "I don't suppose I could buy your silence with some ice cream later?"
The child begins to scream and swing a plastic three-ring binder at her, but Lucy cuts off the scream by putting a hand over his/her mouth. She drags the child into a closet and secures him there with some duct tape over the mouth and around the wrists and ankles. She checks her watch and realizes her time is short. She doesn't notice, however, that the child's binder cut her cheek. In fact, she thinks she's perspiring and wipes at it absently with the back of her hand. She puts Ms. Davinport into the closet also.
She enters a security code on Ms. Davinport's computer and turns on a webcam/skype-like program, with which she makes a call. On the screen we see a person in a suit. She talks with him, declaring her outrage at having taken [company | state] secrets. "This is a deliberate insult against me and my people." When she allows the other person to get a word in edgewise, he tells her he notices the cut on her face and the smear of blood. "You must have already dealt with the assassin I heard was coming for you. Congratulations. Lucy displays a moment of confusion but immediately covers it up. "We are cutting ties now." She hangs up.
She thinks for a moment, then makes another call. As the number dials, she says, "this is risky, but..." Another person in a suit appears on the screen. "Secure the building," she orders. "There is about to be an assassination attempt." They begin to ask about her face, but she hangs up immediately.
For a moment, the room is quiet. Lucy collects herself, wipes the blood from her cheek and sits at the desk quietly. A moment passes. The door bursts open and an assassin enters the room, gun (or some weapon) in front of her. He shoots and she is hit. She falls back into her chair and then down onto the floor behind the desk. The assassin immediately leaves. We hear a struggle in the hallway. Shots are fired and the assassin is hit. He falls back through the doorway and into the room. Security people enter the room and find Lucy's body, thinking it's Ms. Davinport.
One of the guards checks the hallway. "Is she alive?"
The other guard peers around the desk at Lucy. "I don't think so."
"Hot damn. For a minute there I thought we were going to have to kill her ourselves. How did she know about the assassin?"
Show the real Ms. Davinport in the closet just coming around, listening to the guards talking. Her eyes widen when she realizes they think she's dead and that they were actually going to try to kill her.
The guard turns to look at his buddy. "I don't know, but you're right. That was a close one." Lucy sits up quickly from behind the desk and shoots a dart at the guard standing watch at the door. The guard by the desk doesn't know what just happened and begins to move towards him until he spots the dart sticking out of his back. He turns just in time to see Lucy shooting another dart at him. He's down.
Lucy writes a note: "Merry Christmas." She then leaves the room and heads down the stairs as another security guy heads towards the office. They barely miss each other. Fade to black. Roll credits.
Several times I had to restrain myself from 1) adding too many actors, 2) turning it into an arrest scenario as the last practice ended and 3) keeping the story going. It had to end somewhere.
In looking back at what I wrote, I realize I didn't work in the prop at all. It wouldn't be too hard to do at all. For example, there could have been a rag available for Lucy to wipe the blood off onto. I also need to make sure the dialog in the setup says the character's name. For example, Phillip could start off by saying, "Today, you are not Lucy Moderatz. Instead, you are...", prompting Lucy to say Ms. Davinport's name. From there, the dialogue can continue as given.
I was conscious, this time, of incorporating some prosthetics work and fake blood work, since the person we work with for special effects is good at that sort of thing, and really didn't have anything to do at this year's session.
Because of interruptions and timing, I didn't actually use the whole hour for this session, but I think the basic storyline is there. It could be worked into a script with some better dialogue in a couple hours and shooting could start as soon as we had a location to use. Of course, that's always the trick. You wouldn't think securing an "office" setting would be so hard, but this year's 48HFP taught us otherwise.
Character:
Random word moderate becomes Lucy Moderatz (from While You Were Sleeping) - changed to Luke/Lucy for gender
Random word spy becomes spy
Prop:
Random word rag
Line of dialogue:
Random word insult becomes, "This is a deliberate insult against me and my people." (from Dexter, The Lion Sleeps Tonight)
Genre: RANDOM (1-22)
Time Travel Movie or Doppelganger Movie
Set-up work:
Take several pictures of an actor. Print them out. Put them in a "studio" type setting on the walls for reference. Use makeup and prosthetics to make the actor look fairly different from the person in the pictures (themselves).
SCENE: PRELIMINARY WORK
In the background of the scene are several PICTURES of a person from different angles including some close-ups. In the scene is Luke/Lucy (herein referred to as LUCY), sitting in a chair, nude but covered with a DRESSING GOWN. Working on her is PATRICK, a cosmetic surgeon. He is marking Lucy's face up with a (washable) MARKER. Standing next to Lucy is PHILLIP, a handler. He is giving Lucy her next mission. While Patrick works, Phillip tries to remain at Lucy's side, and as he perceives he is in Phillip's way, he moves around Lucy, but never goes far from her.
PHILLIP
Do you understand your mission?
LUCY
I am to infiltrate the building as Michael/Michelle Davinport, the person in these pictures. I will go first to the security office on the second floor and enter the code Zulu 18 Mike to disable monitoring of the 18th floor. I will then go to the 18th floor and Ms. Davinport's her office, disable her with a tranquilizer dart and secure her passkey. I will stow her in a closet and secure it.
PHILLIP
And if she's not alone?
LUCY
Tranquilize her and take out anyone else that's in the room.
PHILLIP
Non-lethal where possible.
LUCY
Of course.
PHILLIP
And then?
LUCY
Make my appearance.
SCENE: CHANGE IN APPEARANCE
There could be a scene that looks surgical in some way where the actor's appearance is brought back to that of herself without prosthetics/SFX.
SCENE: EXECUTING THE PLAN
(This is actually a combination of several scenes on the way in.)
Things will go basically according to plan at first. She gets to the building, gets into security and disables the system for the 18th floor. Then gets to the 18th floor and sees the office where she needs to go. Ms. Davinport is in her office, standing behind her desk. Lucy shoots the dart at her.
[Securing with a tranquilizer: Can we take a blowgun and do a fast pan shot from the actor to herself in two parts that are later recombined. As long as we can do a quick cut between them so that the same actor is shooter and victim, it should be fine.]
After shooting the dart, Ms. Davinport (same actress) gives an "oh, my" and collapses back into her office chair. That's when Lucy notices a young (20-something) assistant and a very young (10-teen) child staring in horror at her. For all they know, the other person in the room was just assassinated by herself!
Lucy isn't sure quite how to proceed due to the child being present. After a moment's pause, she springs into action and takes out the assistant. She then turns to the child and says, "I don't suppose I could buy your silence with some ice cream later?"
The child begins to scream and swing a plastic three-ring binder at her, but Lucy cuts off the scream by putting a hand over his/her mouth. She drags the child into a closet and secures him there with some duct tape over the mouth and around the wrists and ankles. She checks her watch and realizes her time is short. She doesn't notice, however, that the child's binder cut her cheek. In fact, she thinks she's perspiring and wipes at it absently with the back of her hand. She puts Ms. Davinport into the closet also.
She enters a security code on Ms. Davinport's computer and turns on a webcam/skype-like program, with which she makes a call. On the screen we see a person in a suit. She talks with him, declaring her outrage at having taken [company | state] secrets. "This is a deliberate insult against me and my people." When she allows the other person to get a word in edgewise, he tells her he notices the cut on her face and the smear of blood. "You must have already dealt with the assassin I heard was coming for you. Congratulations. Lucy displays a moment of confusion but immediately covers it up. "We are cutting ties now." She hangs up.
She thinks for a moment, then makes another call. As the number dials, she says, "this is risky, but..." Another person in a suit appears on the screen. "Secure the building," she orders. "There is about to be an assassination attempt." They begin to ask about her face, but she hangs up immediately.
For a moment, the room is quiet. Lucy collects herself, wipes the blood from her cheek and sits at the desk quietly. A moment passes. The door bursts open and an assassin enters the room, gun (or some weapon) in front of her. He shoots and she is hit. She falls back into her chair and then down onto the floor behind the desk. The assassin immediately leaves. We hear a struggle in the hallway. Shots are fired and the assassin is hit. He falls back through the doorway and into the room. Security people enter the room and find Lucy's body, thinking it's Ms. Davinport.
One of the guards checks the hallway. "Is she alive?"
The other guard peers around the desk at Lucy. "I don't think so."
"Hot damn. For a minute there I thought we were going to have to kill her ourselves. How did she know about the assassin?"
Show the real Ms. Davinport in the closet just coming around, listening to the guards talking. Her eyes widen when she realizes they think she's dead and that they were actually going to try to kill her.
The guard turns to look at his buddy. "I don't know, but you're right. That was a close one." Lucy sits up quickly from behind the desk and shoots a dart at the guard standing watch at the door. The guard by the desk doesn't know what just happened and begins to move towards him until he spots the dart sticking out of his back. He turns just in time to see Lucy shooting another dart at him. He's down.
Lucy writes a note: "Merry Christmas." She then leaves the room and heads down the stairs as another security guy heads towards the office. They barely miss each other. Fade to black. Roll credits.
Several times I had to restrain myself from 1) adding too many actors, 2) turning it into an arrest scenario as the last practice ended and 3) keeping the story going. It had to end somewhere.
In looking back at what I wrote, I realize I didn't work in the prop at all. It wouldn't be too hard to do at all. For example, there could have been a rag available for Lucy to wipe the blood off onto. I also need to make sure the dialog in the setup says the character's name. For example, Phillip could start off by saying, "Today, you are not Lucy Moderatz. Instead, you are...", prompting Lucy to say Ms. Davinport's name. From there, the dialogue can continue as given.
I was conscious, this time, of incorporating some prosthetics work and fake blood work, since the person we work with for special effects is good at that sort of thing, and really didn't have anything to do at this year's session.
Because of interruptions and timing, I didn't actually use the whole hour for this session, but I think the basic storyline is there. It could be worked into a script with some better dialogue in a couple hours and shooting could start as soon as we had a location to use. Of course, that's always the trick. You wouldn't think securing an "office" setting would be so hard, but this year's 48HFP taught us otherwise.
Tuesday, September 7, 2010
48HFP practice session 2
Here is my second practice session. Again, I limited myself to one hour of writing time.
The Character:
Random word, "forecasting" gives me Weather Forecaster. There were no character names in the search results, so I took this for the occupation.
Random word, "spur" gives character name Todd Spurrier.
The Prop: scale
Line of dialogue:
Random word, "amendment" gets, "You betrayed me, but you can still make amends" from Inception.
Genre: Thriller/Suspense
I will say from the outset that I am not thrilled with these specifics. Ha ha.
Need a green screen for the weather forecaster to stand in front of. The studio at FRCC would work.
From wikipedia:
Information cover-up; fight scene; chase scene
Ransoms; captives; heists; revenge; kidnappings; investigations; mind games; stalking; confinement/deathtraps; obsession; conspiracy theories; false accusations; paranoia
Villain-driven plot where the villain presents obstacles for the hero to overcome
I'm seeing a crime scene presented in flashes, perhaps photographer's flashes.
Opening scene: It's dark. An outdoor crime scene is presented in flashes from a photographer's camera flash perspective. Each flash is only on the screen briefly (long enough to see what is in the scene). It shows things knocked over, a puddle of blood, maybe some blood sprayed on the wall of a building, and the dead body of a woman.
The location of the scene should be recognizable from multiple angles. In fact, one of the pictures should be taken from outside, and that would show up later on.
Fade to black. Pull a "24 hours before" segue.
Todd Spurrier is a weather forecaster for the local TV station. He got the forecast totally wrong last night and again today, though, and viewers are angry. Todd is very distracted by a non-work-related issue. He's being blackmailed.
At work, he is signed into his bank account, almost literally pulling his hair out trying to come up with the money to ransom his wife. She was kidnapped the night before. (Flashback to kidnapping scene?) The kidnappers called him last night (flashback to the call?) and gave him ransom demands that exceeded his ability to pay. They emphasized no police involvement or she dies. In fact, the killers say they'll stab her in the neck. (Recall that the body was stabbed in the neck.)
When a coworker comes up to his desk, he quickly switches to the current local radar.
Coworker Lisa (whose approach is obviously no attempt at sneaking): "Hey, Todd."
Todd (startled): "Gah! Jeez, don't sneak up on me like that, Lisa!"
Lisa: Sorry. You look a little distracted. What's up?
Todd (scrambling to come up with a convincing lie): I'm just looking at the radar for the next segment.
Todd tries to look convincingly at the screen and at a piece of paper with a map printed on it. Lisa looks over his shoulder.
Lisa: "Yeah, you better put a little more time into that. They're starting to call you, 'Todd Spurious.' Get it? 'Cause your name's Spurrier?"
Todd (irritated): "I get it."
(beat)
Lisa: "Well, that might explain something. Look at the scale on this map here."
Lisa points to the scale at the bottom of the printed page.
Lisa: "This one's in feet. That one's in miles."
Lisa then points to the scale on the computer screen.
Todd: "Oh, yeah. (nervous laugh) That should fix it. Thanks."
Lisa walks away looking at Todd oddly. She passes by another coworker.
Lisa (whispered): "There's something *odd* about *Todd*."
Other coworker: "What else is new?"
Focus back on Todd, working feverishly at the computer, obviously not working on weather forecasting. He picks up the phone.
Todd (on phone, talking quietly but emphatically): "I need to close my account. Which branch should I go to?"
He listens a moment.
Todd: "Is that the one on Main Street?"
(beat)
Todd: "Okay, thanks."
Todd hangs up the phone. He copies the forecast he did for the last segment and pastes it into a new email and sends it out to the on-air folks with a note, "Here's the next forecast. I'm feeling sick. Have Dan cover my shift?"
Todd gets up from his desk, grabs his coat and briefcase/bag. He leaves the office and gets in his car. He dumps the contents of his briefcase in the (very nice) car with no concern for what is in it. He goes to the bank, closes his account (putting the money in his now-empty bag. His cell phone rings *as soon as he emerges from the bank*.
Kidnapper (on phone): "Did you get the money?"
Todd (too loud): "Yes" then after seeing the looks of others around him, quietly: "Yes, I have the damn money. Now what?"
(Running out of time on my hour timebox.)
He's given instructions on where to meet. It should be at night in a fairly remote area. In the intervening time, he tries (unsuccessfully) to eat something. He talks to himself. He comes up with several paranoid delusions about how they figured out to target him, how they got past the security system in his very nice house, about how his wife never goes out during the day. He actually begins to piece together a scenario where she is working with the kidnappers to try to take the money and run. She came from a poorer family and her family never liked him. They think he's a cheater and treating their daughter badly. Talking to himself, he reveals that she actually cheated on him and he took her back. He finally convinces himself that she was involved.
He checks his watch several times. Finally, he drives to the place where the exchange is to happen. By this time, he's a wreck. His clothes and hair are disheveled. He sees the kidnappers. They bring out his wife. The usual exchange thing goes on here. It's successful. Then Todd decides it was all too easy, and he's going to go after the kidnappers to get their license plate or something. His wife throws her arms around him and holds him back.
Todd: What are you doing? Let me go! I need to get their license plate!
Veronica: Don't! Let them go. They'll kill you if you try to follow them!
Todd pushes her away and turns to go. Veronica lunges forward and trips him, causing them to get away (a car engine is heard driving away in the background.)
Todd turns to Veronica, angry. "You betrayed me, but you can still make amends."
Veronica: What are you talking about? This?
Veronica starts towards the fly of his pants. Todd pushes her away.
Todd: How can you think of that at a time like this? You're working with them, aren't you?
Todd spies a knife on a nearby table, grabs it and turns on Veronica. "You were in bed with them. Did you blow them, too? You weren't a victim. You were their whore.
Veronica: NO!
Todd: You've lied to me before. You lying cheater. Your word means nothing.
Todd moves towards Veronica. Veronica runs outside, Todd chases. It ends up with him turning a corner and dropping the knife. It sets up on a rock (might be able to shoot its landing backwards). It gleams in the light. Veronica doubles back and runs past that corner of the house, trips and the knife goes through her throat. She dies. Todd regrets everything. He calls 9-1-1.
What are the odds we could get a police car to "arrest" him?
As he is pulling away, someone is covering the body with a sheet. Camera flashes can be seen in the reflection of the police car window. Inside the police car, Todd looks horrible, but he is smiling, faintly.
Fade to black.
At this point, I ran out of time.
All in all, I think I can work with this one. It might take another couple hours to massage it into something worth shooting, and another hour or so to come up with a shot schedule and dialogue script, particularly if i get some help with those. It's still not great, and there are a few places where there are holes in the plot (and lots of holes in the dialogue), but those can be patched up as we go along, I think.
The specific challenges we would have are 1) securing a police car and officer for the arrest, and 2) filming in a bank. We'd probably have to fake both. While blue and red lights flashing would probably suffice for the one, and the arresting officer could be a detective instead (so suit instead of uniform), banks are notoriously freaked out by people not playing by the rules. They're also not very open on the weekends. It would be tough.
The Character:
Random word, "forecasting" gives me Weather Forecaster. There were no character names in the search results, so I took this for the occupation.
Random word, "spur" gives character name Todd Spurrier.
The Prop: scale
Line of dialogue:
Random word, "amendment" gets, "You betrayed me, but you can still make amends" from Inception.
Genre: Thriller/Suspense
I will say from the outset that I am not thrilled with these specifics. Ha ha.
Need a green screen for the weather forecaster to stand in front of. The studio at FRCC would work.
From wikipedia:
Information cover-up; fight scene; chase scene
Ransoms; captives; heists; revenge; kidnappings; investigations; mind games; stalking; confinement/deathtraps; obsession; conspiracy theories; false accusations; paranoia
Villain-driven plot where the villain presents obstacles for the hero to overcome
I'm seeing a crime scene presented in flashes, perhaps photographer's flashes.
Opening scene: It's dark. An outdoor crime scene is presented in flashes from a photographer's camera flash perspective. Each flash is only on the screen briefly (long enough to see what is in the scene). It shows things knocked over, a puddle of blood, maybe some blood sprayed on the wall of a building, and the dead body of a woman.
The location of the scene should be recognizable from multiple angles. In fact, one of the pictures should be taken from outside, and that would show up later on.
Fade to black. Pull a "24 hours before" segue.
Todd Spurrier is a weather forecaster for the local TV station. He got the forecast totally wrong last night and again today, though, and viewers are angry. Todd is very distracted by a non-work-related issue. He's being blackmailed.
At work, he is signed into his bank account, almost literally pulling his hair out trying to come up with the money to ransom his wife. She was kidnapped the night before. (Flashback to kidnapping scene?) The kidnappers called him last night (flashback to the call?) and gave him ransom demands that exceeded his ability to pay. They emphasized no police involvement or she dies. In fact, the killers say they'll stab her in the neck. (Recall that the body was stabbed in the neck.)
When a coworker comes up to his desk, he quickly switches to the current local radar.
Coworker Lisa (whose approach is obviously no attempt at sneaking): "Hey, Todd."
Todd (startled): "Gah! Jeez, don't sneak up on me like that, Lisa!"
Lisa: Sorry. You look a little distracted. What's up?
Todd (scrambling to come up with a convincing lie): I'm just looking at the radar for the next segment.
Todd tries to look convincingly at the screen and at a piece of paper with a map printed on it. Lisa looks over his shoulder.
Lisa: "Yeah, you better put a little more time into that. They're starting to call you, 'Todd Spurious.' Get it? 'Cause your name's Spurrier?"
Todd (irritated): "I get it."
(beat)
Lisa: "Well, that might explain something. Look at the scale on this map here."
Lisa points to the scale at the bottom of the printed page.
Lisa: "This one's in feet. That one's in miles."
Lisa then points to the scale on the computer screen.
Todd: "Oh, yeah. (nervous laugh) That should fix it. Thanks."
Lisa walks away looking at Todd oddly. She passes by another coworker.
Lisa (whispered): "There's something *odd* about *Todd*."
Other coworker: "What else is new?"
Focus back on Todd, working feverishly at the computer, obviously not working on weather forecasting. He picks up the phone.
Todd (on phone, talking quietly but emphatically): "I need to close my account. Which branch should I go to?"
He listens a moment.
Todd: "Is that the one on Main Street?"
(beat)
Todd: "Okay, thanks."
Todd hangs up the phone. He copies the forecast he did for the last segment and pastes it into a new email and sends it out to the on-air folks with a note, "Here's the next forecast. I'm feeling sick. Have Dan cover my shift?"
Todd gets up from his desk, grabs his coat and briefcase/bag. He leaves the office and gets in his car. He dumps the contents of his briefcase in the (very nice) car with no concern for what is in it. He goes to the bank, closes his account (putting the money in his now-empty bag. His cell phone rings *as soon as he emerges from the bank*.
Kidnapper (on phone): "Did you get the money?"
Todd (too loud): "Yes" then after seeing the looks of others around him, quietly: "Yes, I have the damn money. Now what?"
(Running out of time on my hour timebox.)
He's given instructions on where to meet. It should be at night in a fairly remote area. In the intervening time, he tries (unsuccessfully) to eat something. He talks to himself. He comes up with several paranoid delusions about how they figured out to target him, how they got past the security system in his very nice house, about how his wife never goes out during the day. He actually begins to piece together a scenario where she is working with the kidnappers to try to take the money and run. She came from a poorer family and her family never liked him. They think he's a cheater and treating their daughter badly. Talking to himself, he reveals that she actually cheated on him and he took her back. He finally convinces himself that she was involved.
He checks his watch several times. Finally, he drives to the place where the exchange is to happen. By this time, he's a wreck. His clothes and hair are disheveled. He sees the kidnappers. They bring out his wife. The usual exchange thing goes on here. It's successful. Then Todd decides it was all too easy, and he's going to go after the kidnappers to get their license plate or something. His wife throws her arms around him and holds him back.
Todd: What are you doing? Let me go! I need to get their license plate!
Veronica: Don't! Let them go. They'll kill you if you try to follow them!
Todd pushes her away and turns to go. Veronica lunges forward and trips him, causing them to get away (a car engine is heard driving away in the background.)
Todd turns to Veronica, angry. "You betrayed me, but you can still make amends."
Veronica: What are you talking about? This?
Veronica starts towards the fly of his pants. Todd pushes her away.
Todd: How can you think of that at a time like this? You're working with them, aren't you?
Todd spies a knife on a nearby table, grabs it and turns on Veronica. "You were in bed with them. Did you blow them, too? You weren't a victim. You were their whore.
Veronica: NO!
Todd: You've lied to me before. You lying cheater. Your word means nothing.
Todd moves towards Veronica. Veronica runs outside, Todd chases. It ends up with him turning a corner and dropping the knife. It sets up on a rock (might be able to shoot its landing backwards). It gleams in the light. Veronica doubles back and runs past that corner of the house, trips and the knife goes through her throat. She dies. Todd regrets everything. He calls 9-1-1.
What are the odds we could get a police car to "arrest" him?
As he is pulling away, someone is covering the body with a sheet. Camera flashes can be seen in the reflection of the police car window. Inside the police car, Todd looks horrible, but he is smiling, faintly.
Fade to black.
At this point, I ran out of time.
All in all, I think I can work with this one. It might take another couple hours to massage it into something worth shooting, and another hour or so to come up with a shot schedule and dialogue script, particularly if i get some help with those. It's still not great, and there are a few places where there are holes in the plot (and lots of holes in the dialogue), but those can be patched up as we go along, I think.
The specific challenges we would have are 1) securing a police car and officer for the arrest, and 2) filming in a bank. We'd probably have to fake both. While blue and red lights flashing would probably suffice for the one, and the arresting officer could be a detective instead (so suit instead of uniform), banks are notoriously freaked out by people not playing by the rules. They're also not very open on the weekends. It would be tough.
The Wailing Wind - reading
Finished "The Wailing Wind" by Tony Hillerman. I couldn't get into this one, and it's kindof made me not want to pick up another Hillerman story. Is that wrong? It's #15 in the Navajo Mysteries series, so maybe if I started with #1, I would have liked it more. Alas, not likely I will try.
Friday, September 3, 2010
48HFP practice session 1
Quick overview of 48 Hour Film Project: Show up on Friday evening. Get a character, prop, line of dialogue and genre. Make a film. Turn it in on Sunday evening. All teams get the same character, prop and line, and each team (within a section) gets a different genre.
I was listed as the writer for this for 2010. Before we do this again, though, I wanted to practice writing for this type of competition. I came up with a methodology to set up the specifics of the practice, starting with gathering the character, prop and dialogue. First I would go to the web site http://watchout4snakes.com/creativitytools/RandomWord/RandomWordPlus.aspx (which is a random word generator). From this, I would generate four random words:
Character: Search word was "near." Michael Neary, near-death patient.
Prop: Slide
Line of dialogue: Search word was "tobacco." "Shame on you."
Genre: Dark Comedy
Finally, I decided to time-box my attempt to ONE HOUR.
First I did a little brainstorming. What kind of slide? Water slide? Hard to find for fliming. Slideshow slide? I don't have any. Slide trombone? Again, not available. Guitar slide? Maybe too subtle. Microscope slide? Good possibility. Baseball slide? Not really a noun. Rockslide? A bit dangerous to film on, though maybe we could do something with CGI. Or maybe not. 48HFP does not equal CGI! (Mostly.) Given that he's a near-death patient, I went with microscope slide.
So a patient is running out of time. Every time he conducts a test to ascertain his condition, he gets worse. (The cause of the worsening is the test itself.) As we come into the story, the patient is near death. He is conducting a test. It involves injecting himself with an unidentified compound and drawing blood. Each time he does this, the world gets a little weird.
"I need to get some more medicine." --> show him walking into a marijuana dispensary. [Should be about 60% of the way through the film.]
Outline
1. Patient doing tests and treatments on himself to cure some disease he thinks he has. Experiences odd things in the world while under the influence of the treatment.
2. Results come in: he's getting worse. He plits this on a chart and we can see his condition is deteriorating.
3. He looks to others for help and refines his process. He tries the process on himself again and the results are more intense. He takes this as a good sign and increases the rate of treatments.
4. Towards the end of the film, he tries to give himself another test to see where he is. He can't do it and passes out.
5. We see him unconscious for days. (Watch the clock spin, the calendar change.) He wakes up cured because during his unconsciousness, he was unable to run tests on himself. He wonders aloud, "who changed my calendar?" [need desktop calendar that displays only a single day on a page.]
Script
SCENE: IN THE LAB
INT. LAB - DAY
MICHAEL NEARY looks haggard. His eyes are sunken. His LAB COAT is dirty and stained. The LAB DESK is strewn with slides of blood. A MICROSCOPE is in the middle of the desk. A NOTEBOOK sits to one side (whichever side he writes with), with a PEN on top of it. A LAPTOP COMPUTER sits on the other leg of the L-shaped desk. There is a CLOCK on the wall, visible in the scene.
Michael sits back from the microscope and covers his eyes in fatigue. He sighs, leans forward and resumes peering through the microscope, trying to get it to focus.
MICHAEL
Ugh. That is definitely not what I wanted to see.
Michael picks up the pen from the notebook, makes a note in it, and places the pen on the other side of the microscope. A CHIME is heard. Michael looks at the laptop and presses a key. The screen comes up displaying a chart. Michael types something, and the chart changes to one with an additional data point. The chart shows a distinct downward trend, and the latest data point is the lowest entry to date.
MICHAEL
That's it. I'm dying. Any minute now the bright light is going to appear and dead relatives are going to start calling.
A bright light shines on Michael. Surprised, he sits up straight all of a sudden and holds his breath. He glances towards the source of the light only to find that his friend has come into the lab. The light was a reflection off the door's window. When he realizes what caused the light to appear, he visibly relaxes and slouches again, returning his eye to the microscope.
KEVIN
Hey, Michael. You don't look so hot. You feeling alright?
Michael doesn't seem to respond. He continues to stare into the microscope lens.
KEVIN
Earth to Mr. Neary. Come in, Mr. Neary.
Michael sits up and looks back at Kevin.
MICHAEL
(Indignant)
I can't believe how insensitive you are. You know I'm dying, right? Just look at these numbers.
Kevin walks over behind Michael and looks at the laptop. Michael shows the downward trending chart to Kevin.
KEVIN
Are those right?
MICHAEL
(Irritated)
Yeah. This is what I'm fighting against. Those results are an _HOUR_ apart today. I was about to give myself another treatment.
(Irritation lessens, slightly)
Think you can stick around?
KEVIN
Are you sure that's a good idea?
MICHAEL
Of course it's a good idea. It's going to help, right?
KEVIN
If you say so.
Michael takes a beaker containing a COLORFUL LIQUID, mixes it with a SPOON and drinks it. You can tell by his expression that it tastes awful. Kevin cringes as he watches Michael drink.
KEVIN
(looking queasy)
I need to go. Sorry, pal.
MICHAEL
Wuss!
Speaking the word, "Wuss," Michael drools colorful liquid down onto his lab coat, making a new stain. He grabs a PAPER TOWEL and attempts to clean it up.
MICHAEL
Damn it.
Michael straightens up and then collapses onto the desk, head on his arms.
SCENE: HALLUCINATIONS
EXT. PARK - DAY
Michael is surrounded by funky colors as he runs and spins through a park setting. Total acid trip sort of thing. At the end of the scene, a chime is heard.
SCENE: BACK IN THE LAB
INT. LAB - DAY
Michael sits up from a puddle of drool - a comically large puddle. The clock on the wall shows that it is now later in the day. He rubs his eyes and dries his face on paper towels. The computer chimes again. Michael dismisses a reminder and checks the time.
MICHAEL
Oh, shit. I'm late!
Michael closes his laptop, stuffs it into a backpack - and it should be clear that fitting the laptop into the pack is a TIGHT FIT - and leaves the lab.
INT. HALLWAY - DAY
We see Michael walking down the hallway. His walk is a little unsteady. Other people pass him in the hallway walking in the opposite direction and give him a wide berth. Michael makes his way to the front door and goes outside.
SCENE: LUNCH
EXT. PARK - DAY
[At this point, I wanted to get more of the story out and so abandoned script formatting in favor of freeform writing.]
(In this scene, Michael goes to a restaurant and meets up with Kevin again. Kevin sees him first and tries to hide, but when Michael spots him, he brightens and fakes being happy to see Michael. They chat. Michael starts to munch on Kevin's lunch. Are you hungry, Michael? Should I get you a menu? Michael says no. He's too distracted to even give the question enough thought to actually answer it. He's going on and on about the treatment and how he thinks he's getting better. We hear the chime coming from the backpack. Michael actually gives himself the test in the restaurant. Kevin is trying to keep others from noticing what he is doing. They get strange looks from other restaurant patrons. Michael actually pulls a microscope from his backpack, some slides, a needle, etc., and runs the test right at the table. As he's pulling out the microscope, the waitress comes over to offer him a menu, but she's completely put off by what he pulls out of his pack. Out comes his notebook and textbook. More and more stuff comes out, the sum of which would have been impossible to fit inside the small pack. He runs the test right there. We go through another hallucination sequence. When it's done, Michael wakes up at the table in the restaurant, with a dozen plates with scraps of food on them. Some food stains his lab coat which he has on again. He looks around and realizes he's alone. The bill is on the table, totaling $102.57. "Shame on you," he says to himself. He repacks his backpack and leaves the restaurant quickly.
He runs to the marijuana dispensary to get more medical supplies.
He runs back to the lab and gives himself a huge injection, passes out for a long time (essentially hibernating, burning off all the food he ate), wakes up and feels fine.
[Time's up! One hour of writing time has elapsed.]
Looking back on it, I can say it's not horrible, but it's not good, either. While the hallucination scenes might be fun to film, it's certainly no winning script. But it's something. I'll have to do this again some time.
I was listed as the writer for this for 2010. Before we do this again, though, I wanted to practice writing for this type of competition. I came up with a methodology to set up the specifics of the practice, starting with gathering the character, prop and dialogue. First I would go to the web site http://watchout4snakes.com/creativitytools/RandomWord/RandomWordPlus.aspx (which is a random word generator). From this, I would generate four random words:
- I would take the first word and search IMDB for characters. This gives me the character name.
- The second word is for an IMDB character search to get the character's occupation.
- The third word is the prop. (It might take a few tries to get something appropriate.)
- The fourth word is used to search IMDB for a quote. One of the sentences from the quote would be my line of dialogue.
- Finally, the genre is a straight-up random selection from 22 possibilities.
Character: Search word was "near." Michael Neary, near-death patient.
Prop: Slide
Line of dialogue: Search word was "tobacco." "Shame on you."
Genre: Dark Comedy
Finally, I decided to time-box my attempt to ONE HOUR.
First I did a little brainstorming. What kind of slide? Water slide? Hard to find for fliming. Slideshow slide? I don't have any. Slide trombone? Again, not available. Guitar slide? Maybe too subtle. Microscope slide? Good possibility. Baseball slide? Not really a noun. Rockslide? A bit dangerous to film on, though maybe we could do something with CGI. Or maybe not. 48HFP does not equal CGI! (Mostly.) Given that he's a near-death patient, I went with microscope slide.
So a patient is running out of time. Every time he conducts a test to ascertain his condition, he gets worse. (The cause of the worsening is the test itself.) As we come into the story, the patient is near death. He is conducting a test. It involves injecting himself with an unidentified compound and drawing blood. Each time he does this, the world gets a little weird.
"I need to get some more medicine." --> show him walking into a marijuana dispensary. [Should be about 60% of the way through the film.]
Outline
1. Patient doing tests and treatments on himself to cure some disease he thinks he has. Experiences odd things in the world while under the influence of the treatment.
2. Results come in: he's getting worse. He plits this on a chart and we can see his condition is deteriorating.
3. He looks to others for help and refines his process. He tries the process on himself again and the results are more intense. He takes this as a good sign and increases the rate of treatments.
4. Towards the end of the film, he tries to give himself another test to see where he is. He can't do it and passes out.
5. We see him unconscious for days. (Watch the clock spin, the calendar change.) He wakes up cured because during his unconsciousness, he was unable to run tests on himself. He wonders aloud, "who changed my calendar?" [need desktop calendar that displays only a single day on a page.]
Script
SCENE: IN THE LAB
INT. LAB - DAY
MICHAEL NEARY looks haggard. His eyes are sunken. His LAB COAT is dirty and stained. The LAB DESK is strewn with slides of blood. A MICROSCOPE is in the middle of the desk. A NOTEBOOK sits to one side (whichever side he writes with), with a PEN on top of it. A LAPTOP COMPUTER sits on the other leg of the L-shaped desk. There is a CLOCK on the wall, visible in the scene.
Michael sits back from the microscope and covers his eyes in fatigue. He sighs, leans forward and resumes peering through the microscope, trying to get it to focus.
MICHAEL
Ugh. That is definitely not what I wanted to see.
Michael picks up the pen from the notebook, makes a note in it, and places the pen on the other side of the microscope. A CHIME is heard. Michael looks at the laptop and presses a key. The screen comes up displaying a chart. Michael types something, and the chart changes to one with an additional data point. The chart shows a distinct downward trend, and the latest data point is the lowest entry to date.
MICHAEL
That's it. I'm dying. Any minute now the bright light is going to appear and dead relatives are going to start calling.
A bright light shines on Michael. Surprised, he sits up straight all of a sudden and holds his breath. He glances towards the source of the light only to find that his friend has come into the lab. The light was a reflection off the door's window. When he realizes what caused the light to appear, he visibly relaxes and slouches again, returning his eye to the microscope.
KEVIN
Hey, Michael. You don't look so hot. You feeling alright?
Michael doesn't seem to respond. He continues to stare into the microscope lens.
KEVIN
Earth to Mr. Neary. Come in, Mr. Neary.
Michael sits up and looks back at Kevin.
MICHAEL
(Indignant)
I can't believe how insensitive you are. You know I'm dying, right? Just look at these numbers.
Kevin walks over behind Michael and looks at the laptop. Michael shows the downward trending chart to Kevin.
KEVIN
Are those right?
MICHAEL
(Irritated)
Yeah. This is what I'm fighting against. Those results are an _HOUR_ apart today. I was about to give myself another treatment.
(Irritation lessens, slightly)
Think you can stick around?
KEVIN
Are you sure that's a good idea?
MICHAEL
Of course it's a good idea. It's going to help, right?
KEVIN
If you say so.
Michael takes a beaker containing a COLORFUL LIQUID, mixes it with a SPOON and drinks it. You can tell by his expression that it tastes awful. Kevin cringes as he watches Michael drink.
KEVIN
(looking queasy)
I need to go. Sorry, pal.
MICHAEL
Wuss!
Speaking the word, "Wuss," Michael drools colorful liquid down onto his lab coat, making a new stain. He grabs a PAPER TOWEL and attempts to clean it up.
MICHAEL
Damn it.
Michael straightens up and then collapses onto the desk, head on his arms.
SCENE: HALLUCINATIONS
EXT. PARK - DAY
Michael is surrounded by funky colors as he runs and spins through a park setting. Total acid trip sort of thing. At the end of the scene, a chime is heard.
SCENE: BACK IN THE LAB
INT. LAB - DAY
Michael sits up from a puddle of drool - a comically large puddle. The clock on the wall shows that it is now later in the day. He rubs his eyes and dries his face on paper towels. The computer chimes again. Michael dismisses a reminder and checks the time.
MICHAEL
Oh, shit. I'm late!
Michael closes his laptop, stuffs it into a backpack - and it should be clear that fitting the laptop into the pack is a TIGHT FIT - and leaves the lab.
INT. HALLWAY - DAY
We see Michael walking down the hallway. His walk is a little unsteady. Other people pass him in the hallway walking in the opposite direction and give him a wide berth. Michael makes his way to the front door and goes outside.
SCENE: LUNCH
EXT. PARK - DAY
[At this point, I wanted to get more of the story out and so abandoned script formatting in favor of freeform writing.]
(In this scene, Michael goes to a restaurant and meets up with Kevin again. Kevin sees him first and tries to hide, but when Michael spots him, he brightens and fakes being happy to see Michael. They chat. Michael starts to munch on Kevin's lunch. Are you hungry, Michael? Should I get you a menu? Michael says no. He's too distracted to even give the question enough thought to actually answer it. He's going on and on about the treatment and how he thinks he's getting better. We hear the chime coming from the backpack. Michael actually gives himself the test in the restaurant. Kevin is trying to keep others from noticing what he is doing. They get strange looks from other restaurant patrons. Michael actually pulls a microscope from his backpack, some slides, a needle, etc., and runs the test right at the table. As he's pulling out the microscope, the waitress comes over to offer him a menu, but she's completely put off by what he pulls out of his pack. Out comes his notebook and textbook. More and more stuff comes out, the sum of which would have been impossible to fit inside the small pack. He runs the test right there. We go through another hallucination sequence. When it's done, Michael wakes up at the table in the restaurant, with a dozen plates with scraps of food on them. Some food stains his lab coat which he has on again. He looks around and realizes he's alone. The bill is on the table, totaling $102.57. "Shame on you," he says to himself. He repacks his backpack and leaves the restaurant quickly.
He runs to the marijuana dispensary to get more medical supplies.
He runs back to the lab and gives himself a huge injection, passes out for a long time (essentially hibernating, burning off all the food he ate), wakes up and feels fine.
[Time's up! One hour of writing time has elapsed.]
Looking back on it, I can say it's not horrible, but it's not good, either. While the hallucination scenes might be fun to film, it's certainly no winning script. But it's something. I'll have to do this again some time.
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