'The Meeting' ContinContin

Right heres the rest of my ideas. Please comment on what you like, dislike or would change. Thank you!

Love story

For this story I thought of how my partner and I got together and thought I could use it as a starting point. A guy (Tim) is waiting at a bus stop from meeting his girlfriend (Kirsty) when he sees a girl (Holly) that he knows has recently moved to the same town as him. He sees that she has a lot of shopping and wants to talk to her, so he walks up and asks if she knows what time the bus is. (To make my story easier to follow the audience will hear what he is thinking and what she is too) she answers in which he replies (in his head) how wrong she is, but says thank you and they start talking. On the bus she is knows her stop is coming up and asks him for the time secretly hoping he doesn’t have a watch and gets his phone out instead so she can get his number. RESULT! He gets he phone out and they exchange numbers. Time passes and you see shots of Tim with his girlfriend (Kirsty) bored and unhappy but the shots of him and Holly messing up and having fun. The next scene is Holly gets a phone call from her sister saying that she met Tim on the bus and found out that he split up with his girlfriend and wanted to know what Holly was doing that night. Although Holly was going to a party she makes an excuse to not go, gets a bus home and they hang out. Faster paced shots are shown again of the two getting close are shown to past time and they get so close to the point of nearly kissing but one pulls away. The final shot would be of Holly answering the door to Tim and after a meal they get close and he kisses her. The lights fade out and the audience is left to imagine what happens next.

Drug dealer meeting

This could be the day in the life of a drug dealer as there would be multiple meetings in various places. There would be shots of the drug dealer getting up, checking voicemails to see what drugs need to be delivered and the typical stereotypes that follow. I haven’t thought to much about what would be in this story yet so I don’t know what the ending would be yet.

The Chase

Elliot is a 15 year old boy hanging out with friends when he gets a text message from his mum asking where he is, how long his will be as it is getting late and if he needed a lift home. He replies that he is ok and would be ten minutes. Elliot then leaves his friends and begins to walk home. On the way home he passes two boys dressed in trackie suits with their hoods covering their faces. As he passes he can see that they are intoxicated with alcohol and they start shouting at him. Elliot walks past not making any eye contact and not reacting to the shouting. As he is walking down the road he senses someone behind him and turn to see the yobs following. Scared Elliot makes a run for in and the chase is on. Elliot cannot out run them and is kicked to the ground. The boys start to beat Elliot up grabbing his phone and wallet. A passerby sees the incident and shouts at the boys in which they run away. The passerby goes to Elliot who has not moved from the ground yet to see if he is ok.

There are a few ways to end this story:

1.       Elliot gets up and the passerby tells him that they’ll walk him home

2.       Elliot lays unconscious as the passerby is calling 999

3.       The yobs come back with more people

Flick book

I wanted an original idea and one was that my film was made like a flick book but I think the time and detail it would take to do this would be too much but I thought I would write my idea anyway. Another idea I had was to show thoughts through flick book animation too.

'The Meeting' continued

Not all my story ideas are up yet but I'll put up the ones that i havewritten in more detail. Please comment on what you think and what could work better...

Cheating partner

A couple have been happily together for a few of years but over the last three months suspicion occurs when the boy becomes very secretive. When he is purchasing coffees he leaves his mobile on the table and a text comes through. The girl can’t take it any longer and looks at the message to find it says ‘Last night was amazing! I can’t wait to see you later ;) Jay xxx’. Shocked by what the girl has read she deletes the message puts the phone back on the table and puts a fake smile on her face as the guy comes back over and hands her coffee over. After a while another text message comes through which he smiles and replies too. The guy begins to gather his stuff together saying he has to leave in which the girl asks why? He says it lads night out playing pool and having a couple of drinks at the rabbit and cabbage. The girl lets the guy go but later that evening in the flat she is waiting for him to leave so she can follow him as she does not trust him at all. Time passes and the girl thinks she must be paranoid and read the text wrong but then the guy leaves the flat walking the opposite way to where the pub he said he was going was.  Walking behind at a distance she suddenly stops as he meets a girl in dim street lighting. After a short chat the guy starts making out with the girl and things get pretty heated. The girl is heartbroken and confused in what to do next, decides to film a bit as proof so when she confronts him he can’t deny it. She then tries to call him as she hopes deep down he’ll come to his senses and stop what he is doing. He looks at the phone ringing shows the mystery girl and laughs. Now filled with hate and revenge the girl heads home trying to decide what to do next. Should she confront him? Should she get the girl’s number of his phone and confront her? Should she show her anger and revenge by inviting another male to the flat for him to find? The girl is overwhelmed with emotions but which will control her and take over her body?

The curse of the tribal clan

A group of friends plan a weekend in some woods which are meant to have a curse of an ancient tribal clan to prove it is just a myth. One is a descendant of the clan and is very superstitious about the curse being true. The group meet at the edge of the woods and go down together to find a place to set up camp. After a few drinks by the campfire the group decide it would be fun to play a game. Man hunt is chosen and the group separate. The superstitious one becomes overwhelmed with paranoia and the alcohol and darkness is fuelling it more, to the extent that he begins to think the others are going to kill him. He blacks out...a news report is then played of 5 students have been found murdered and one has been left in a coma in the woods. Is this the curse of the tribal clan or did the superstitious one paranoia overcome him.

More will be up tomorrow!

Storytelling - Prewriting

On Monday we were learning about the pre-writing stages of storytelling. There are four key steps to follow when coming up with an idea before writing a script. They are the following:

1.       The idea

Having a strong idea is important as without it your story can’t even begin. Lynda La Plante who is a well-known writer/ producer once said:

“What’s the point in writing a beautifully structured script with all the right technical points in it if the writer has nothing to say?”

2.       The story

When writing about the story you should write about the series of events in chronological order to form a screenplay. You can then start writing the main plots to your story.

3.       The theme

When writing the theme you are not writing what happens in your story but your writing what it is really, the emotional meanings behind your story.    

4.       The character

In this bit you can write about the characters not just slim, tall, blonde hair, blue eyes but you can write who they are and their backgrounds like where there from and what beliefs they have. You can also put if a character has any flaws that can twist into the story later on. What are the characters goals and what could they risk to get it.

Our task was to then get in to pairs (which I was in a three due to an odd number in the group) and select a story from a newspaper making it into a ten minute story – this was to see how well we understood the above and to show us how easy the pre-writing stage was. We chose a story from The Sun about a husband who killed his wife and two children before killing himself as you can see below:

   “ESCAPE” – THE PRE-WRITING STAGE

Genre: Social realist drama.

The Idea/story: Escape is about domestic violence within a nuclear family set up. Aram is a young father on benefits, who is addicted to cannabis, consumed by paranoia, possessiveness and violent outbursts. His family suffers at the brunt of his split personality and his frustration at his loss of masculinity. Aram’s wife Joy, works hard to bring in food for her young family, and is desperate to change the life she is destined to have.  Yet, Joy out of fear, stands by and helplessly lets her husband beat her daily and mentally abuse their children, will she ever escape?

The Plot:  We enter the family’s life at breaking point.

Main Plot points:

1.       Opening scene, Aram is on the couch, all day smoking cannabis and watching daytime television. He is uninterested by his 2 and 4 year old sons, who are left to their own devices, with dirty clothes, raiding the kitchen for any scraps that they can find.

2.       Joy arrives home from work at the local Tescos, ten minutes later than normal, due to an unexpected delay. Aram, with irrational jealousy verbally attacks Joy. The situation escalates, and the audience is left watching the reaction of the children in the kitchen as they listen to the familiar sound of their mother being violently attacked, pleading for him to stop.

3.       Later we see, Joy, tenderly tucking her children into the cramped and cold beds, as she fights to hold back her tears.

4.       The next morning Joy awakes, and the full extent of the attack is shown on her swollen, bruised and battered body, including a black eye. Which she desperately tries to mask with make-up, before leaving the house.

5.       Whilst at work, Joy is confronted by her manager, who calls her into the office. The manager unsympathetically, explains to Joy that the unexplained bruises, that have appeared constantly since her employment three years ago, are not the kind of image that she wants portrayed to her customers any longer. If it continues then her contract will be terminated.

6.       Joy is in turmoil trying to muster up the courage to escape her violent life, not only for her, but also for the sake of her young children.

7.        Still undecided, Joy arrives home to the usual scene of Aram lying on the couch with a spliff in hand. She finds both children hysterical with cigarette burns all over their body. Her mind is finally made up. 

8.       Joy agonizingly waits until Aram is again unconscious for the night on the couch. She frantically collects her and her children’s necessities. Gently waking them, taking the youngest in her arms and the eldest by the hand she attempts her escape.

9.       Stepping through the front door her efforts are all in vain, as Aram suddenly grabs the eldest child pulling him back into the house.

10.    Joy and her children are tied to the kitchen chairs, as we see Aram’s descent into complete madness. The monster douses his family in petrol, as the Zippo lighter falls to floor, the front door closes, as the audience is left to imagine the horrific scene that follows. Has Joy finally escaped?

THEME:

1.       Loss of masculinity in an economy that is not longer dependent on manufacturing.

2.       Family and Relationships

3.       Lack of self-belief.

4.       Gender roles.

5.       Drugs

6.       Domestic Violence/child abuse

CHARACTERS:

ARAM:

1.       Is 23, unemployed former factory worker for Rover.

2.       Nobody, stoner, with working class family upbringing.

3.       Strong masculine values that he cannot meet due to him not being able to provide for his family, this brings immense frustration.

4.       Male dominant- only expresses his emotions through violence.

5.       Sever drug dependence, that only amplifies his paranoia, violent behavior and depression due to lack of male role and respect from peers.

6.       Aram is of average build,tall, strong and dominant. Poor personal hygiene, scruffy, dazed and confused.

7.       He only feels strong, when he exposes others weaknesses.

8.       He also lacks self worth and feels he has lost all control of his life. The only thing he can control is his weaker family.

JOY:

1.       21, employed Tesco’s worker.

2.       Quiet, shy, repressed and keeps herself to herself.

3.       Good at covering up her abusive life and has become submissive due to this.

4.       Joy was raised in an abusive household, in the same estate and doesn’t know any different.

5.       Joy became a mother at a very young age; she never enjoyed her childhood and never fulfilled her aspirations of getting out of the council estate.

6.       Emotionally scarred, trapped and extremely vulnerable

7.       She lacks the self-respect and courage to change the pattern in her life.

8.       Her appearance amplifies her situation; she is thin, weak, exhausted and immensely fragile.

9.       She takes on all the roles of a modern woman, juggling caring for her children, making sure her chores are carried out and working full time to support the whole family, including Aram’s drug habit.

SETTING:

1.       North of England

2.       Grotty council estate

3.       Cramped, dingy and dirty flat

4.       Present day

5.       Tesco’s supermarket

Grange Hill vs. Skins (not literally)

Right I need to do some updates as it has been a while. Last week we watched the first episode of Grange Hill and the first of Skins. This was so we could see how the audience and television has changed. I’ll give you a little information now about the starting of broadcasting and what I have learnt. Television started broadcasting in the UK in 1936 where the only broadcaster was the BBC transmitting a few hours a week. The BBC was the only channel that was broadcast for a number of years but television was stopped throughout the 2^nd world war. In 1954 ITV started to broadcast as a direct competition to the BBC and to give the viewers more choice as it was the first time in 18 years that the audience could choose what they wanted to watch. In 1964 BBC2 was broadcast and in the 1980’s channel 4 was brought to the airwaves and video recorders were produced. As you can see in the 50 years since television started broadcasting so much has already changed as viewer’s choice became important. In the 1990’s ‘the skies open’ as the ‘Old Independent Broadcasting Authority’ was replaced by the ‘Independent Television Commission’ otherwise known as ‘Ofcom’ – this was so independent channels had more of a chance to broadcast the shows. Other shows like channel 5 which would not have been able to broadcast on television before ‘Ofcom’ were put on air followed by satellite broadcasters. Viewer’s choice was focused on even more when Sky and digital came about. Even to this present day television is still changing as digital broadcasting began in 2002, with free view and the switchover being completed in 2012. Sky plus has also changed the way the audience can view television as it not only stores countless numbers of channel but sky plus is also a digital recorder. This gives the audience more choice as they can watch what they want when they want. The internet effects the way the audience chooses how to watch programmes as with websites such as ‘youtube’ and ‘vimeo’ it expands the time a view can watch a programme or film even more.

From watching Grange Hill and Skins you can see not only how much television and broadcasting has changed but you can see how the audience changes what gets broadcast. Grange Hill first broadcast in 1978 and was run for 30 years making it the longest children’s series to run. Phil Redmond was the creator of Grange Hill and also went on to making Brookside and Hollyoaks. It had a young target audience of 12-18 year olds and its most talked about storyline was when a character starts drug taking. Skins started broadcasting in 2007 aiming at a target audience of 15-18 year olds and have so far aired four complete seasons. Skins and Grange Hill‘s target audience are similar but when they were broadcast was swapped around, the audience of today would be bored and uninterested in Grange Hill but the audience of the past would be shocked at what is viewed today. Grange Hill showed education for what it was and nothing more as the audience could relate to it and feel like they were there. Although Skins show education in an unrealistic way and heighten the situations as this is what the audience of today want to see. The audience of today don’t want to watch something that shows normal life, they want it to be more and heighten or exaggerated. Grange Hill lasted 30 years but Skins won’t – this is because with Grange Hill there was little or no competition and with Skins there is so much competition it is being produced until viewers no longer as interested. Skins change their characters every two years to keep it fresh and different which also means you don’t have to watch the first season to understand what is going on.

I enjoyed watching the two shows as i could really see how the audience has changed and the viewers are now in control of what programmes they want to watch, when they want to watch it (e.g. internet, TV, sky plus etc) and where they watch a programme.

The Meeting

I've been trying to think of some ideas for 'the meeting' but been having trouble. I have been able to come up with ideas involving some form of meeting but I can't seem to link it to a new equilibrium or think of a resolution. Another problem I have been having is setting realistic guidelines, as I keep thinking up ideas that are impossible for me to do. Below are my ideas and tomorrow I'm going to write up detailed descriptions of each idea but if you have an ideas or comments free free to write away.    

SPACED Synopsis

Now after we read out our pitch for SPACED we were thrown into the deep end and a heads up for you. I sunk! We were asked to remember on our first day meeting everyone what we said our favorite TV show was at the moment was, and then we were told to make a pitch for it in ten minutes, we were then asked to read it out for the rest of the group to guess what it was. Well good luck and lets see if you can get it:

A comedy about a boy who moves from grammar school to public making friends with three misfit school boys. (19 words)

Next we were taught about the key factors to a synopsis and how to sell your story. A synopsis is basically your idea fitting your story arc onto one page. Although you are writing your story from A to B you shouldn't give your main plots away, as you can hook your listener in by putting a cliff hanger at the end. An example of this is boy meets girl, they split up, its on and off but you don't say wether they get back together or not - bad example but its all I can come up with at the moment.

Key factors to think about when writing a synopsis are the following, story arc (beginning, middle and end of story), main characters, style/genre and settings. We were then asked to write a 350-500 word synopsis for SPACED in our own time and put it on our blog. So here is my synopsis for SPACED:

SPACED is a comedy drama that has a multi-strand storyline based around six characters. The two main characters are a boy and a girl called Tim and Daisy. Tim is in his late twenties and an aspiring artist although recently dumped and a slight stoner, his childlike behaviour makes him loveable. Daisy who is also in her twenties and very unpredictable can go from one extreme to the other. She is very quirky and bubbly but can suddenly get extremely emotional. Daisy also has a side to her where she can be a fantasist but overall she has very likeable characteristics shown through her crazy ways.

Tim and Daisy meet by coincidence when both looking for an apartment to live in ending up lying about being in a relationship to get a place together. This is how the landlady Marsha and neighbour in the apartment below Brian. Marsha like most other characters is a dreamer but is an older character out of the group. She is in the present but always thinking about the ‘what ifs’ of the past. Marsha is alcohol dependant and self obsessed but never seems to be any wiser with age. Brian also in his twenties is the guy your not too sure about that lives next door. He is an aspiring artist in the form of anger and pain. His weird but serious attitude changes with his split personality.

SPACED is post modern and its style is fast paced. It can also switch from reality to animation when telling the story, an example of this is: Tim and Daisy are trying to decide what to do on a Friday night. Daisy’s idea is shown through a selection of photographs that would show snippets of the night, whereas Tim’s night is shown through animation drawings, which can relate to the characters personality. Pop culture references will be placed through the episodes to make it seem realistic to the year the drama is made. Not only will pop culture references make the drama seem realistic but the audience will also be able to relate to the characters.

SPACED will experiment with a non-linear structure, for example showing a clip of near the end at the beginning (non-linear doesn’t follow the a,b,c…z storyline structure but the audience of the but the audience of today will be able to follow this with no confusion). With the cinematography, shots will be quick, jumpy and shot at a fast pace with unusual angles  – this is because the target audience is young and will keep up with the story having no confusions.

The main settings for SPACED will be placed in their shabby flat where they live but local buildings will be used in the urban surroundings. With their quirky personalities, funny situations and crazy ways, SPACED is not to be missed. (470 words)

  

SPACED

It's Monday morning are first lecture at university and what do we have to do? Watched two episodes of a comedy drama called 'SPACED'. I can't complain about that! We were then asked to write a pitch for the drama, which would have been a first for many. For me I have already done pitch's from when i was studying Broadcast Media at college. Word of warning though this does not mean what you are going to read is going to be good. Unfortunately it is not one of my strong points, but you only get better if you practice.


When writing a pitch you have to be able to select they best parts of your story and squeeze it into 25 words to sell your work - this could be anything from genre, style, problems, setting, character/s etc.

I feel I have done enough rambling now. Out of the selection of pitch's I came up with the following is the one I feel was the best:

A comedy drama based on a group of flat mates who are dreamers in the present day where a series of twisted events take place. (25 words)