Story Telling Unit: The Meeting - Final Idea!!

Hi all,
I had a long think today about my idea for the meeting, and here it is now:

Working title

Pitch: A guy is in the army. He is injured by an IED. He is now confined to a wheelchair. Is it the end? Or just the beginning?

Synopsis

The idea I have is of a guy (Dan, 19) who is in the army and is currently serving on the frontline in Afghanistan. However, one day his life will be changed forever: he is hit by an IED (Improvised explosive device). He suffers serious injuries to his legs and is destined to spend the rest of his life confined to a wheelchair after having both legs amputated. Obviously this has a serious psychological effect on him, and he is unable to see how he can possibly continue to live a relatively normal life after he has been the victim of such a terrible event. However, once he returns home from this ordeal, and is continuing to wonder how on earth he can ever be “normal” again, he discovers a group for injured ex-army servicemen. He decides to go along to one of the meetings and see what the group is like. He meets another guy (Tony, 30) who was in a similar scenario to him ten years ago, and has been confined to a wheelchair ever since. However, he has managed to use artificial legs as a means of getting around at home to maintain his independence. Dan asks Tony a few questions to find out exactly how to go about getting the independence that comes with false limbs. He is truly inspired by Tony because despite what has happened to him, he is determined to live his life as normally as possible. He openly accepts that he is at a slight disadvantage to most people, but he will not let that stop him living his life. Dan is in total admiration of this outlook, and after months of feeling down and depressed after his incident, he decides to pick up the pieces and make some enquires about false limbs. Once he has made the enquires, he is very pleased that he did, as he was unaware of how many different options were available. He decides to go for a pair of artificial legs and after having them a while he is amazed how much independence he is able to maintain. Having gained this new found independence, he goes to see Tony and thanks him for his help and advice on the situation and Tony was only too pleased to help. Dan uses the independence to live a normal life and ends up getting a successful, well paid job in a big company. So despite this massive upheaval in his life, he has managed to resume a normal life and is now happy and confident again.

Genre

Action, drama

Theme

Recovery, overcoming a huge upheaval/tragedy in life.

Characters

Dan (19),  6ft1”, blonde hair, bright green eyes, stocky and muscular, an army serviceman who is injured whilst in active service, and now in a wheelchair. His main hobbies before his injury included working on his car and playing rugby.

Tony (30), 6ft3’, dark brown hair, blue eyes, slim, another army serviceman who was injured in service, and is also now in a wheelchair. His hobbies included playing football, and going to watch formula 1 racing.

Obviously this is all a little bit rough round the edges at present, and I think it needs a bit of refining. However, I feel it is an excellent basis from which to start.

Scott

Story Telling Unit: Pitch for The Meeting

Hi all,Here is my pitch for The Meeting:
A guy is in the Army. He is injured by an IED. He is now confined to a wheelchair. Is it the end? Or just the beginning?

The synopsis will be up as soon as I've written it. I've been struggling to think of ideas all over the weekend, and this is the first believable one I've had, so I'm sticking with it.
I'll write again soon with the synopsis for the idea.

Scott

Story Telling Unit: Idea that we had to come up with in pairs today - Necrophilia - 9.2.12

Nekrofilija

Genre
Horror/Thriller/Necrophilia

Idea

One evening, in his lounge, he is admiring the many photographs he has of a lady who he has had an unhealthy fixation with for years. After this, he spots her leaving her house, and quickly persues her out of sight. He finally gathers together what remains of his self confidence, and approaches her out of public view. After the briefest of exchanges, he receives an instant dismissal, and in a rage, he grabs her, she loses her balance, falls to the floor, lands awkwardly, and cracks her skull on the pavement, killing her instantly. By this stage, his instincts take over, and because of his mental instability, he treats this situation as their final goodbye and because of this, decides to make it memorable for him with an unforgettable act of passion and love. This becomes the start of a sick, twisted, and deadly addiction. 

Character
Male in his thirties goes by the name of Vladimir, loner, no friends, down on his luck, unemployed, parents died when he was young, he has a brother and sister who both live and work abroad and never contact him. He is tall thin and wiry, and distinctly dishevelled, which makes him incredibly unattractive to women. Never had a relationship, still a virgin, grew up in a rough area, bullied at school, severely lacking in self confidence and social skills. Resorts to stalking desirable women, on one occasion he takes it too far, the lady ends up suffering a fatal blow to the head, and he decides, because he is a virgin, he will turn to necrophilia for the first pleasurable experience in his miserable existence.

Theme

Deals with loneliness, desperation, seeking acceptance in mainstream society, how quickly an unhealthy addiction develops, necrophilia, bloke who is at the lowest point in his life, and in his desperate state, he stoops to an even lower low point.

Setting
Dark, secluded village in Northern Russia, in Vladimir’s flat, complete with photographs of the object of his desire, pinned up on the wall, and many letters stating his feelings for her that he has never had the courage to send. The blinds in the flat are always ajar, so that Vladimir is always able to catch a glimpse of her. The film is set in the mid 1990s. The flat is located in an area well known for it’s distinct lack of anything unusual happening – UNTIL NOW!!

By Scott Fisher and Sam Ellis

Story Telling Unit: Spaced - The Synopsis

After a chance meeting in the local café, homeless twenty somethings Tim (an aspiring comic book artist) and Daisy (aspiring to full time journalism), strike up an immediate friendship that looks set to become a long term relationship. After this initial meeting, they establish a plot which will enable them to convince the owner of a nearby apartment to let them move in. As the advert states “professional couple only” they must first come up with a legitimate image for themselves to fool the apartment owner. Once they have their stories established, they go to meet the owner of the apartment. On arrival, they are greeted by Marcia, a fifty something drinker and heavy smoker, who proceeds to show them round the apartment, before conducting a short interview to determine that Tim and Daisy are a suitable couple to be living in the apartment she is renting. Despite her age, Marcia appears to believe she is younger than her years, by dressing in a manner more befitting to someone of Tim and Daisy’s ages, rather than her own. After we are introduced to Marcia, we see Tim and Daisy unpacking their belongings and then we are introduced to Brian, who appears to be a tortured soul with a distinctly unique outlook on life when compared to Tim and Daisy. Once we have been introduced to Brian, we learn that he is an artist who specialises in anger and fear, amongst other things. In the midst of other events in the evening, we are reintroduced to Marcia, who proceeds to uncover Tim and Daisy’s relationship history over a glass of wine and countless cigarettes. After Marcia has gone to bed, Tim and Daisy decide that it is time for them to go to bed also. Spaced is filmed in a unique style that is unlikely to be seen in any other sit-com of the era; of particular note is the way in which the audience are shown what Tim and Daisy are thinking, with a verbal insight into their minds eye. Spaced is different to `’mainstream” sit-coms in that it shows a huge variety of characters and backgrounds. Tim and Daisy are the homeless pair, thrown together by circumstance, Mike is Tim’s best friend, obsessed with warfare and military procedures, Marcia is the landlady who fails to realize that she is not, in fact, in her twenties any more, Brian is the tortured soul who perceives life in a way that no one can quite make sense of, and then there is Colin the dog, who frequently leaves the house only to be found by Mike later on in the episode. As a series, Spaced takes place over two seasons with 14 half-hour episodes, 7 per season, in order to give a thorough and detailed look into each of the characters lives, and also to discover any quirks or unusual elements they may have about them. Spaced is utterly unique in it’s construction, characters, and subject matters. It’s like nothing else you’ve ever seen before.

Story Telling Unit: Spaced Pitch Redraft

In our lecture on Monday 6th January, Simon advised us that we should redraft our pitch for Spaced, along with a synopsis for it, which I am currently working on. Here is the redraft of the pitch:

Spaced is a quirky sit-com which focuses on the lives of 5 twenty-somethings living in an urban area, and dealing with real life issues.

I will also be posting up my synopsis for Spaced on completion of it.

Scott