Submissions to the Ergodic Film Project
FIRST SCENE -
Opening: OVERHEAD SYMMETRIC SHOT: we see a boy’s hand going into a bowl full of crystal little spheres and moving his fingers through the bowl with a sense of pleasure. In a different shot (close up) we se the boy’s face.
FULL SHOT: We see and follow the boy whose hand was in the bowl through a hallway until he enters another room, he keeps going and we stop, sitting next to a table is his father, reading the newspaper. The boy approaches his dad and gets from him some news pages. After this, the boy walks back to where he came from and sits to read.
BIG CLOSE UP: We discover that what he had been given is the comic strip section as he starts to read one (voice off) and we follow the cartoon’s frames as he speaks. – The comic narrates the events that took place during a child’s holidays, that is encouraged by his mother to find a rewardable hobby.-LONG SHOT: Our character suddenly closes the booklet (without having finished his lecture) and runs to his bedroom, where he looks around for something that could work as source of a hobby. After some seconds where he does not know what to do, he goes to his neighbor’s house and asks if the younger child is at home. -————-SCENE 2
LONG SHOT: We see a soccer field were a training session is being held. FULL SHOT: The kids enter the place and sit in the bleachers, in the background are two young adults talking. – MEDIUM CLOSE UP: Both children are talking about soccer Angel, the kid next door does nearly all of the speaking until he stands up and says: Hold on, I’ve gotta pee. And leaves.
Our main character stays alone sitting and starts to overhear the adults’ conversation about films.
We slowly advance towards them, this is what they say: (While we are listening to these men we can also appreciate our main character moving closer to listen with detail.)
Oh, I was watching a Russian film the other day and god, it was heavy stuff, as heavy as a cow. Actually most russian films are the same, as heavy as a cow! (Looks at the kid) Hey kid, I guess you don’t know how heavy a cow is right? (“Interrupting himself”) Oh, what am I talking about? You have barely seen one; well, lifting a cow is about the same as lifting 20 playstations at the same time!
BIG CLOSE UP on the kid’s face, who turns his head away and thinks for a moment without answering to the man or saying anything as his friend comes back from the restroom complaining about it saying: God, how am I supposed to play soccer again after using a toilet like that one? I don’t know what I’m still doing here. – Then he keeps talking about his soccer matches.
SCENE 4
Axel, our main character is immensely intrigued by what he heard in the soccer field. He looks for help among his friends with the playstation issue, but only manages to get 2 consoles and not 20, as the man said would reproduce a cow’s weight. (This after really enduring and commiting to accomplish this)
SCENE 5
In a black screen we read: Two weeks later.
Next thing we see is our kid playing with his toys like any other kid would do, there is no sign of him still looking for cows or consoles. MEDIUM CLOSE UP we see that the place where he used to store the playstations is now empty.
FULL SHOT: He is still playing when he is called by his father and goes running to get on the truck, we don’t know where they are going.
EXTREME WIDE SHOT: we see a rural area, with no more than 5 houses in a few miles.
VERY WIDE SHOT: The SUV is moving through a dirt road across the screen.
WIDE SHOT: In what seems to be a farm, the SUV approaches us.
CUT-IN: Inside the truck, Axel is playing with some hotwheels. We see his hands.
CLOSE UP: He is looking downwards, to his own hands.
WIDE SHOT: In a single take we see everyone getting off the automobile and saying hello to our kid’s grandmother. When they all get in the house, Axel stays astonished and walks away from the house. We follow him in a TRAVELLING when at the same time we get further from him and let a group of cows enter the frame. (We are about 60ft away from our subject, which are the boy and the cows). Without cutting the take we approach our subject as the boy seems to want to touch a cow. When we are about 40ft away, some images that represent russian cinema appear cutting the take, but after less than a second disappearing. This happens several times until we are very close and the screen goes all black. (For these images I’ve thought about the Mosfilm introduction that is in several Tarkovsky and Eisenstein films, and some stills from some important films)
CUT-IN: We see the ground, from about 1 or 2 ft high, in the soil are buried coins, a syringe and other things. We move keeping our angle, the boy’s hand, then we move backwards and see his body lying on the ground. (In a totally different place than where he touched, or attempted to touch the cow)
WIDE SHOT: A dog is looking at him.
CLOSE UP: He opens his eyes and looks at the sky as he says: This is so quiet, it’s the quiettest place in Earth.
We fade to black.
Let me know what you think! Or any suggestions you have. (:
Dandara – Submitted
Hal2000 -
Nick Block -
Odilonvert – Submitted
PolarisDiB -
Ryan Estabrooks -
Santropez – Submitted
The Gamgee -
Tremolo -
Remember everyone, this thread is for your definitive pitch (or one of them, assuming you’re going to create multiple segments). It’s just a pitch, so you can obviously make as many changes as you like during the scriptwriting process. The pitch should essentially represent your final product, however.
I have a pitch. Bear with me, because I never work this way with my films (I just start filming, I never write scripts) so this is a first for me. The idea I’m presenting is an outline, to be fleshed out IN PROCESS. This is an idea inspired by a short I did called Personal Landscape: http://mubi.com/garage/projects/9/films/2379
You only see the hands of the person writing and holding others’ writing when that person is reading. I think this would be a really fun script for a group to do, because everyone could contribute to the content.
Love Letters
While searching papers in a room, Person A finds an anonymous love letter from Person B to Person C.
Person A decides to get in on the game and write an anonymous love letter to Person B.
After a period of intense correspondence (specific sentences would be filmed not entire letters, in the interest of time and audience interest) where each person is “searching out” the right responses from the other person, and which is about to lead to a person to person meeting, Person A gets a letter from the family of Person B that Person B is deceased.
Later the same day, Person A gets an anonymous love letter from Person D….
All the “persons” in the film use the equivalent of online names, where sex is not able to be determined. Though this idea focuses on handwriting rather than typing, because handwriting is more individual and interesting to read as it’s being done visually (to me anyway), the idea is to reflect the anonymity, ambiguity, and committmentlessness (if that is even a word) of relationships formed on the internet.
This idea might also function as a bridge between segments, if edited down to size in a clever way.
I think I will probably just submit my script, but I would be willing to look at suggestions as to how to make it work with the project. Did someone mention that the actual films that would be shot would be made in one week? If that is the case, I’m not quite sure if my script would be able to be filmed that way, but I will post it and you can let me know what you think. Looking forward to your responses.
There will probably be some kind of shooting deadline, but one week would be a bit short. I think 10-14 days would be the minimum.
Thanks for the response Anonymouse. I took a look at my script last night and after thinking about it today and talking about it with a friend, I think it needs a lot of work. When I get to the next stage of my idea, I’ll try and get it up on the Forum/Garage. @Anonymouse If I need an extension on the pitch/script, how long will you extend the deadline? I know I mentioned just above that I would probably submit the scrip rather than the pitch itself, but I may change my mind and put a pitch in instead. Still, I may add the script with it or decide to go back on what I said in my previous post and just put the script onto the Forum/Garage.
It’s perfectly acceptable to only submit a script, but you run the risk of it being rejected or having to make difficult revisions in order to make it work with the other movies (this is an “ergodic” project after all, so plot elements will need to concord between segments. The essential idea is that everyone submits a pitch, then we decide how they will be “linked” by selecting “key” films and then working them in to each other). Extensions are not a problem, you can take pretty much as long as you need but the longer you wait, the fewer options you likely will have for working the movie in with the other segments (once the other segments are made, because we can’t revise them, we’ll need to get pretty creative to work in new segments). I’m estimating the entire project will be done at some moment in the next three months (sometime in March or April) and so it’s not a huge deal if we need to extend to deadline for pitches or even a second time for scripts/ shot lists, but we have to draw a line somewhere. Supposing you get your pitch/ script in really late, it’s no big deal, but we may have to vote on your proposal individually (and not collectively) so I think we can pretty much guarantee that, in any case, your proposal won’t be made a “key” film. That’s not saying much, but the “key” films need to be pretty creative and easy to adapt, so the largest selection is best.
As for whether or not you want to submit a pitch, it’s really up to you. The entire project won’t fall through if you don’t, but it complicates things a bit. We’re going to vote to approve the pitches and then work out the connections between their plot structures before hard scripts are submitted, so you may or may not be making more work for yourself. Remember, a “pitch” is just a very general depiction of what you’re planning on doing, I guarantee they won’t end up being exactly as described here. The scripts/ shot lists however should be pretty representative.
We will probably receive around eight entries (unless a few film makers choose to create two segments) so we likely will have two “key” films.
Here’s the latest tally:
Dandara – Submitted
Hal2000 – Pending
Odilonvert – Submitted
PolarisDiB – Pending
Ryan Estabrooks -
Santropez – Submitted
The Gamgee -
Tremolo -
…and a new member (whose name, incidentally, means “robot kid” in Japanese and who will be making an animated segment):
Roboko -
@Anonymouse — kudos for keeping a tight reign on time, in other words letting everyone know that the line will need to be drawn somewhere. Things fall apart when no lines are drawn. With your kind of focus, this project WILL be completed and screened. :)
Bump.
Woops, looks like I posted this on the wrong thread.
Gritty, black and white segment. Very noir-ish feel to it. Silent. Husband and wife, both looking
extremely unhappy, sitting on a couch. He doesn’t notice her; she notices he doesn’t notice her.
She’s bored with everything, her life. She doesn’t even pay attention to any of the things in her
house. As she’s scrubbing dishes, she cracks a nice looking wine glass out of frustration. She
looks over at her husband, who doesn’t even bat an eye. All this time, there is a person in a
cloaked figure watching her through the windows. A person with a trench coat, face wrapped in
bandages, and a hat of some sort. The mystery person finds a way to creep in the house. Again,
husband doesn’t notice a thing. While the wife is about to change in the mirror, she sees the
cloaked figure appear behind her. She freezes at first, frightened. After a bit though, she smiles
for the first time. She wants this. The cloaked figure kills her. Mystery person drags her into the
bathroom, husband still not seeing any of it. Pulls her in the bathtub and starts rinsing her,
particularly her face.
The cloaked figure starts taking off the trench coat. Once the trench coat comes off, it reveals a
woman’s body. Dirty and tattered under garments are seen. She takes off the hat and reveals
long, feminine type hair. But the bandages remain on the face. She crouches down to the wife
and pulls out a long knife. She starts cutting her face. The segment then cuts back to the wife’s
room; the new woman walks in. Same tattered undergarments, but now with the wife’s face.
When she opens the closet, she is amazed and filled with wonder by simply looking at all this
clothing she’s never had access to. She dresses in and out of clothes like a little kid trying on
grown up clothes. She walks around the room and touches everything with her dirty fingers, all
with a wide smile. She walks around the house, taking it all in. She goes into the kitchen and is
amazed at all of the drinks, food, and wine glasses. She finally sits down next to the husband
who still hasn’t noticed anything about her. Smiling wide, she’s fascinated with this new life
she’s slipped into.
I picture this one being set to a very moody, dark score
Here’s the latest tally:
Dandara – Submitted
Hal2000 – Pending
Odilonvert – Submitted
PolarisDiB – Pending
Ryan Estabrooks – Submitted
Santropez – Submitted
The Gamgee -
Tremolo -
Roboko -
@Ryan Estabrooks: sounds interesting. When I was reading it, I was almost expecting the person in the trench coat (who is undressing) to be revealed as the woman s/he just killed (funny twist and a good opportunity for some clever camera work). This could work really well with what PolarisDiB was thinking on the other thread:
“…imagine a letter from a serial killer arriving at a police station, but getting picked up by Daniel. This links their two stories together, but even more fun, if up to that point the audience has sort of assumed that Nick’s character Daniel is Roboko’s story’s serial killer, the transfer of that letter being delivered by the one and stolen by the other indicates that they are different characters, and makes the audience assume that Daniel will then track down the serial killer. However, Daniel misinterprets the information on the letter and searches out someone else, who could be a character from another storyline…”
Please remember everyone the tentative deadline for pitch submissions is Tuesday 18 January, 2011 at 12:01 AM GMT (7:01PM EST)!
Voila! Here is my pitch:
SCENE 1 – A Public Park
A little boy is playing in the park when he sees a girl off in the distance. She looks up at him, then her mother calls and she walks away, dropping her doll. The boy runs after her but she is already gone. He picks up the doll and notices a book underneath it – all the pages are blank.
SCENE 2 – Brian’s Office
A man (BRIAN) wakes up – he has fallens asleep on his desk. His cell phone is vibrating. We see pictures of him with a woman – wedding photos – and of them with a little girl, the same girl from Scene 1. There are books, notes, and a typewriter, we understand he is a writer. He answers the phone and it is his agent telling him that his the publishers like his book and are seriously considering publishing it. Overjoyed, he calls his wife and they make dinner arrangements to celebrate.
SCENE 3 – A Diner (This could be understood as a dream)
Brian is sitting alone in a small diner. He is slowly sipping from a mug. The woman who was his wife in the photos walks in, but she looks very different. She sits down at the table next to his and orders something. She turns to Brian, and strikes up some small talk. They do not know each other. He tells her that the publishers have hired someone else to re-write the ending to his book. He says it will change everything and ruin his work, he feels like he has lost. She asks if he has a family and he says his daughter died three years ago and his wife left him. Ever since then he has had a dream where he is chasing after his daughter but cannot reach her. He feels that without her he cannot create anymore.
SCENE 4 – Brian’s House
Brian wakes up laying on top of his bed. He is dressed so he must have just dozed off. His wife comes in and announces that everyone is here and he needs to get up. There is a small party with some close friends to congratulate Brian’s success. Somebody asks him where he came up with all his ideas, and he says his inspiration came from his little girl, whom he is dedicating the book to after the deal is finalized. He picks her up and gives her a kiss.
After the party is over, he gets another call from his agent. She tells him that the publishers are having second thoughts about the ending of his book, claiming that it feels superficial. They wonder if the character could possibly end up having success – the story feels more like a tragedy. She tells him he has three days to come up with an alternate ending or they will cancel the deal.
SCENE 5 – ?
At this point, I can’t get a clear handle on how it ends, so I’m going to have to explain it in a different way. Basically the story is that of a writer who has either success, or failure, depending on which sequences you chose to be reality. A way you can look at it is that the “other” sequences could be his personification of the book he is writing. (ie he writes his dreams or his fears)
For example, if you choose to follow the story that he has success, then his book was about someone who loses everything. If you choose to follow the story where he fails, then his book was about someone who gets everything he doesn’t have.
Brian’s daughter represents ideas or inspiration, as well as family and love. He either has her, or has lost her – DEATH and/or REBIRTH as well as SEARCHING.
I hope I explained it well enough. I spent two days banging my head against the table to get everything in an order that makes sense. I’ve also left it fairly open so we can change it without me feeling like my story is getting torn apart, but that may have made it seem vague. I hope that isn’t the case.
_TheGamgee :)
I think you definately have something going there, TheGamgee. You may also consider “garbling” the end of your story given the “end” of your writer’s story is itself the object in question. They managed to pull it off in Evangelion:
Here’s the latest tally:
Dandara – Submitted
Odilonvert – Submitted
PolarisDiB – Pending
Ryan Estabrooks – Submitted
Santropez – Submitted
The Gamgee – Submitted
Remember that submissions will be closed today (January 17th) at 7:01 PM EST (12.01 AM GMT, January 18th).
Nearly done
Submissions to this round of the Ergodic Film Project are now officially closed. If we get more interest or some people wish to create a second segment, we’ll hold another round of submissions at a later date. If you have a pitch and want to get in on this round of segment creation, please send it to me by private message. Voting for the approval of pitches and the key segments will only be held on the following submissions (exclusing PolarisDiB’s which is still pending). As it is, here’s the definitive tally (in alphabetical order):
1. Dandara – Submitted
2. Odilonvert – Submitted
3. PolarisDiB – Pending
4. Ryan Estabrooks – Submitted
5. Santropez – Submitted
6. The Gamgee – Submitted
7. Tremolo – Submitted
8. Roboko – Submitted
We’ve recieved eight entries including that of PolarisDiB which is in fact still pending and will thus need to be voted on individually, meaning that we will be voting for two key segments and the remaining six ideas will need to be adapted to work into the two key segments. Voting will thus be for two segments in order of preference. You cannot vote for your own segment.
A simultaneous vote will be held on the approval of each pitch. In other words, there are two propositions for which you are voting.
All the entries are posted here, so please read each of them before voting! Voting is open to anyone from the public who has read each entry and who knows how this project works.
Voting will be held immediately and will last for one week (7 full days) running from the present date (January 18th, 00.01 Z) until January 24th, 00.01 Z). In other words, voting will close January 23rd at 7.01 PM EST! My vote will only be cast in the event of a tie and will always be for and never against the proposition.
Please cast your votes only in this thread!
Your votes should look like this:
Proposition 1 (Segment Approval):
1. Dandara’s pitch – Yes/ No
2. Odilonvert’s pitch – Yes/ No
3. Ryan Estabrooks’ pitch – Yes/ No
4. Santropez’ pitch – Yes/ No
5. The Gamgee’s pitch – Yes/ No
6. Roboo’s pitch – Yes/ No
7. Tremolo’s pitch- Yes/ No
Proposition 2 (Establishment of “Key Segments”):
Preference 1: X
Preference 2: X
After the vote, all participants with approved segment pitches will be asked to submit a script or a shot list. If a pitch is not approved, it will need to be re-looked before continuing to the scriptwriting process and re-submitted to an approval vote. If your pitch has been voted to be a “key” segment, you may begin the scriptwriting process immediately. If however your pitch has not been selected to be a key segment, you will need to adapt your pitch to one or the other key segment (please, no more than three segments to each key segment!) and you will need to re-submit the revised pitch for an (expodited) approval vote before continuing into the scriptwriting process. Once your script is approved, you’re free to make your segment!
If you do not understand something posted above, please send me a private message or post on my wall and I will get back to you within 24 hours.
Just a note: Tremolo and Roboko will be submitting their pitches a hair late, so please wait for those two submissions to be posted here before voting. They should apparently be posted within a few hours I believe, otherwise commence voting!
Sorry it’s late!
Notes:
The story will be over a period of 9 days, representing the 9 spheres of heaven
All animation is to illustrate the killer’s vision/ideas. There will not be very much of it as there are only three of us doing the animation. It will be animation mixed with camera footage, like in ‘son of rambow’.
Each circle/location has a ‘guardian’ character, a lollipop lady, a homeless person for a tunnel, a cafe owner, a dj etc
To make sure this is not similar to sev7n, more focus will be on locations, random selection of victims who do not have to commit the sin, not seven sins but endless amount of rewards punishments and concepts, and a jack the ripper flavour
The key scenes:
Sequence of “Dante” getting ready for school/work, monotonous, grey, stifling/claustrophobic camera work, equally dull lesson and walking through corridors sequence. A shot of three girls in highly exaggerated “mandem” outfits (tightly gelled back hair, extremely high quifs, large hoop earrings, claw-like fake nails, puffer jackets and dolly shoes, staring vacantly out at space or at their phones chewing gum like cows (reference). School/workplace represents limbo, where the lost souls of the mandem culture ridden youth reside. Animated maggots in the school dinners, a punishment of the uncommitted in the poem.
Dante will go to the regular meeting with three friends at a cafe/kebab/chip shop, “Beatrice” should be there. She isn’t. Representing gluttony, close up shots of people noisily tearing at food, heavy clatter of cutlery on plates, close ups of jaws chewing, in quick succession. Here the group come to eat and eventually talk about finding beatrice who hasn’t been responding since yesterday
Beatrice is seen taped to a chair and gagged in a room full of items depicting things from the 9 spheres of heaven (astronomy map, physics books, aristotle, posters of the milky way galaxy, a vase of roses etc). The killer, seen only from the back and neck down, presses a play button and beatrice is seen struggling, knowing what’s coming next.
Dante gets a tweet/message/text/email, telling him to go to eping forest. The message is from someone called “God”. Dante and “Virgil” (a sidekick type character representing the guiding poet virgil in the poem) go. As they walk on a crooked path (symbolising losing the ‘right’ path in the poem) we see they are being followed by the killer again. Dante breaks off a branch, animated wisp and a faint cry (not heard by Dante and Virgil as it is all in the head of the killer). Eventually the killer knocks them unconcious.
They wake up on a ferry on the river Thames (representing the river Styx) the next day. Both are confused and shaken, they call the other two of the group and say they think they know what happened to Beatrice.
Back in Beatrice’s room. We now see the killer fully for the first time. Killer starts a monologue speech to include all the ‘bolgias’ of fraud. We learn that he is not deeply religious or out to do God’s work, but this is all merely for entertainment. As he describes punishments and quotes from the poem it is said with irony and an amused smile, at one point he barks, with a red face and a string of spit on his mouth that he did it “because it was fun!”, chortles, then goes to press play again. End of ‘search’.
The next section, the death, the killer leads the group to various locations which refer to levels in the poem, whoever the killer judges to be the least competent in solving the puzzle of the hint to the next location, he kills in an inventive way. Locations will include a local park of mine, a subway, an old whitechapel street and any others that I can think of that would be both evocative of a level and easy to design a puzzle for.
Rebirth, last scene, they’ve finally gone through all of the killer’s ‘hell’, two left, Dante and Virgil, they go to take the tube train in the dead of night that will lead them to Heaven and therefore Beatrice. Virgil is the first to step onto the train, too late Dante realises that “virgil” represents virgil from the poem, who cannot enter heaven because he represents non religious philosophy and concepts, the doors shut, Dante bangs fists and kicks the door screaming, Virgil slowly falls to the floor sobbing, the train start moving, Dante follows the train still shouting, we see it go into the dark tunnel and that’s the end.
Further notes:
To reference Polaris, the youths will use the wikipedia entry for guidance
To reference the playstation story there will be a scene of a character either playing playstation or talking about selling it on ebay. I also have an old black and white photo of cows which I can put somewhere in a scene.
The music played by the serial killer in the Beatrice scenes will be, crudely put, happy sounding to create a juxtaposition of the situation and the music
There are a few more scenes I have in mind, I haven’t included them in here because they are not integral to the storyline and can easily be cut or they are half baked.
Scene 1 – A king awakens from a fragmented nightmare. He, escorted by two of his men, charges into his daughter’s room only to see she is missing. He orders one of his men to send a message to the kingdom that any man who finds his daughter shall have the daughter’s hand in marriage.
Scene 2 – A delightfully charming, yet poor, young man hears of this news and sets out on his adventure to find the King’s daughter. He travels horseless as his older brother has taken the family’s only horse to embark upon the same search.
Scene 3 – The young man follows a trail within a forest that is not seen on his map. He hears rustling within the forest and tries to find what is causing the noise. He finds his brother, now horseless, tied to a tree with his mouth covered by cloth and an apple. The young man takes the cover from his mouth and asks him how he got into this predicament. The older brother bribes the young man to untie him with a secret on how to find the King’s daughter. The young man agrees, but is fooled by the older brother. The older brother then ties the young man to the tree, mocking the young man for being so gullible and goes on his way to find the King’s daughter.
Scene 4 – The older brother is nearing the lair where the King’s daughter is being kept. He is fighting off hordes of men protecting the lair. He defeats the last man and runs into the lair. He runs down halls and halls until he sees the Princess. Right before the older brother is greeted with a kiss he is awaken by the feeling of rope around his arms. It was only a dream. After only ten minutes of running, the young man had found his brother asleep under a tree. Getting the revenge he deserves he ties his brother back up the way he found him only an hour ago
Scene 5 – It is night. The young man sets up camp and retires hoping that tomorrow will be his last day on this adventure. The young man awakens and begins his search. He walks for hours until he sees a house hidden in the trees. He edges toward and sees coming out from the other side of the woods a strange man. The young man yells out to the strange man who then precedes to run hoping to reach the house before the young man. The young man follows. The strange man enters the house followed by the young man only seconds later. The young man catches the strange man off guard and the two begin to fight. They bring the fighting throughout the whole house until they stumble into the doorway of a room. They continue fighting until the Princess commands them to stop. The two men look up in shock. The princess is sitting at a table along with another man. The two men precede to ask who this other man is and why they have not left this house in the middle of nowhere. The princess explains to the men how she left at her will and was not taken contrary to what the King says. She continues to say that the King never understood her love for this man she is with, and kindly asks the two men to leave and not mention any of this to anyone who asks. They reluctantly agree and head on their way out. As they head back they see the older brother running towards the house. The older brother stops when he sees the other two walking back towards the path. He notices that the strange man is the one who tied him to the tree the first time and begins to get angry. The two men then explain to the older brother that there is no use for the fighting or for the older brother to go any further on his adventure because the princess has already fallen in love.
That is the basic pitch. Some scenes are subject to change, and some scenes will be further explained once I begin on the script. I pictured this as a more playful segment as opposed to majority of the ones presented so far. Hope everyone enjoyed this pitch!
I’m assuming that everyone is actually capable of creating what they’ve posted above, this is definately not a theoretical experiment and you will actually need to make it.
In any case, we have our last two entries and so you may all begin voting.
What exciting times!
You can be reassured that I created my pitch with the idea in mind that I can easily film it. I’m a total minimalist, can’t pretend to be other than that.
I made my pitch more fantastical than it most likely will be, but I’m still going to add as much fantasy to it as I possibly can.
My biggest catch will be actors and locations, but I’ve faked locations before, and I’ve got friends who can act well enough.
Rest assured I wrote the pitch with the limitations of my resources in mind, and I made it flexible enough so that parts can be omitted if any problems arise.
Alright just so everyone is aware, you can vote now…
…like this:
Proposition 1 (Segment Approval):
1. Dandara’s pitch – Yes/ No
2. Odilonvert’s pitch – Yes/ No
3. Ryan Estabrooks’ pitch – Yes/ No
4. Santropez’ pitch – Yes/ No
5. The Gamgee’s pitch – Yes/ No
6. Roboo’s pitch – Yes/ No
7. Tremolo’s pitch- Yes/ No
Proposition 2 (Establishment of “Key Segments”):
First choice: X
Second choice: X
Yay! Onward!
There is no minimum vote, we’ll go by simple majority this time around. Supposing no one votes, which is about the tally for the last 27 hours, that will be considered a tie. In other words, all votes pass and the two key segments will be selected by order of submission.
I promise to vote. I want to read everything carefully before I decide.
BTW, do we post our votes here, or send them to you?
For the purpose of maximum transparency to the public, you should post.
If anyone wants a secret ballot, send me your vote(s) by private message and they will be counted anonymously. You are not required to post them publicly and your ballot will remain private should you choose to submit your vote via private message. I won’t be keeping a tally of who votes, only the numbers.
So far the vote is:
Proposition 1 (Segment Approval):
1. Dandara’s pitch – 1 Yes/ 0 No
2. Odilonvert’s pitch – 1 Yes/ 0 No
3. Ryan Estabrooks’ pitch – 1 Yes/ 0 No
4. Santropez’ pitch – 1 Yes/ 0 No
5. The Gamgee’s pitch – 1 Yes/ 0 No
6. Roboo’s pitch – 1 Yes/ 0 No
7. Tremolo’s pitch- 1 Yes/ 0 No
Proposition 2 (Establishment of “Key Segments”):
First choice: Dandara 1
Second choice: Santropez 1
In other words, Dandara will be making the first film in act 1 and Santropez will be making the first film in act 2 supposing the vote carries as is.
Thanks go to PolarisDiB for the graphic.
Anonymouse
This thread is for all your final submissions (pitch and script). Voting on them will take place here. The first thread (Idea for a Collaborative Forum Film Project) should be left to general communications and questions about our ergodic structure and our theme, the second thread (Film Ideas and Themes for the Collaborative Forum Film Project) will be for panning out pitch and script ideas that need developing before you post the final version here.
I’m just reposting this from the other thread, but here is Dandara’s (very interesting) movie pitch:
“MISSING (a short movie pitch)
1970’s. B&W images. Detail of a silver cross pending from a woman’s necklace, against her tanned skin. She holds a school notebook tight to her brest. She walks along a stone wall, topped by an iron fence, expressing anguish and anxiety. Across the fence, the grave-yard of Saint John The Baptist cemetery, in Rio, with large crosses and religious sculptures adorning the marble tombs.
Dream lile sequence. The woman on a bed, in an all white room. She can’t fall asleep. She looks to someone beside her with doubt and despair.
The woman checks a huge record book searching for the location of a specific grave. She walks through the cemetery alleys, stopping to watch the graves of Carmen Miranda and Antonio Carlos Jobim. She continues her search. She walks and walks… trapped in a labyrinth.
Dream sequence. The woman’s companion on bed is a ragged man’s army jacket. She caress it as if caressing a beloved one. The jacket is stained and has a bullet hole in the heart.
She keeps on searching. Now the urban cemetery changed into a grassy small town grave-yard, with many little white crosses signing the tombs of fallen soldiers. She finds a tomb, covered by dust and ivy branches. She cleans it, looking for the image that identifies whose rests lay in there. The old picture on it is hardly visible. She opens her notebook, filled with photos and notes about herself and a man, as in a sort of analogic Facebook. She takes one head shot off and compares with the image on the tomb. It’s not him!
Dream sequence. The woman receives a package, which she in her arms as if it was an injured person. She opens the package to find the army jacket. She notices the hole and the stain. Scene turns COLORFUL and the stain is as red as fresh blood. She embraces the jacket tightly.
The woman drags the army jacket through a bare land, pulling it “by the hand”, as if it was a body too heavy for her to carry alone. She digs a hole, so deep, that she disappears inside of it, and we can only see the dirty that comes out. She carefully places the man’s jacket onto the grave’s bottom. She puts her own necklace on top of it and begins putting the dirty back into the grave. She places a small white cross onto the tomb, opens her notebook and chooses a “thumbnail” to identify it. She attaches the chosen picture to the white cross.
Contemporary sequence. The woman with white hair coming out of cemetery Saint John The Baptist. She’s well-groomed and neatly dressed. She walks outside the wall, in the opposite direction of her opening sequence’s movement. She’s no longer in pain. She crosses a busy street. As she disappears in the crowd, subtitles dedicate the movie:
TO THE 82 POLITICAL PRISONERS OF THE BRAZILIAN MILITARY DICTATORSHIP (1964-1986) WHOSE BODIES ARE STILL MISSING.
There goes my pitch. I’m sorry if it looks too large, but I did my best to communicate my idea in the simplest way possible. I’ll be away until the 21st of January, running family errands in the country. Hope to be back on time for voting. Best!"
Based on the last vote which I am assuming can be understood as a tacit form of consent for participation in this project, this is how things break down for the submission of a film pitch (in alphabetical order). If we get them all in before the deadline of 18 January, 2011, we can move onto the next stage more quickly. It’s alright if you need more than two weeks time, the most important thing is a great proposal. Once they’ve all been submitted, we’ll hold a vote on whether or not each inividual pitch should be send to the scriptwriting phase (you don’t have to write a script if you don’t want to, but a shot list would be great at least) and which one or two films will act as “keys” for the others. In the scriptwriting phase, the films not chosen to be keys will need to be adapted in order to intertwine with plot elements from the “key” film. If you’re not sure what this should look like, just let me know and I’ll do my best to explain. In any case, here’s the latest tally:
Dandara – Submitted
Hal2000 -
Nick Block -
Odilonvert -
PolarisDiB -
Ryan Estabrooks -
Santropez –
The Gamgee –
Tremolo -
Just so we’re all aware, films do not have to made in English, but should be subbed (if you need a grammar check, I can do that for you). Most contributors are in the US but I know Santropez is in Mexico, Dandara in Brazil and PolarisDiB in UAE. It would actually be better I think if we had some films in Spanish, Portugese and Arabic (or at least partially). We could also provide subs in a number of languages for the videos, I can personally provide French subs and we could probably get Spanish etc. if anyone is willing to volunteer.
As for music, it’s great if you can get your own, but also consider that Ryan Estabrooks has kindly proposed his services for this project.
While I’m at it, I should also thank Odilonvert for writing up an entry for the Production Notes section here in Garage that should be up some time this weekend.
We have also opened a production notes section in Garage, so everyone go check it out! (Do it now!)