NARRATIVE DRAMAS
Exchange student legal drama. A girl from one of the few wealthy families in a third world country goes to the US as a foreign exchange student and, while she's there, the third world county has a revolution, and her family is killed, and she will be killed if she's sent back—but she’s required to go back at the end of the her exchange, for the government says so. She could apply for asylum, but her exchange family endeavors instead to adopt her. It's a legal dilemma. (08/28/2013)
A vaudeville troupe goes through a few cities, with their most recent addition: an undercover Pinkerton agent working on a case to stop an assassin who plans on murdering "someone important." They travel city to city, showcasing marginal talent with some mediocre performers who have hidden agendas and secret lives of their own... Takes place around the year 1900. (08/29/2013)
A new president (republican) comes into office and says that billions and billions of dollars are spent taking care of illegal immigrants, so he authorizes the Alien Ejection Act: anyone proven to be an illegal immigrant will be forcibly kicked out of the country, immediately, even if they have kids here (“anchor babies”) whom they can opt to take with or leave here in an orphanage. "We have been tending to liars and criminals, cheats and beggars, for too long. It's about time we right this wrong and start towards healing our nation, and its rightful, true people." A bunch of volunteers join a bounty hunting force to sweep the nation for illegal immigrants, to arrest and deport them; this film follows a small rag tag group of illegal alien hunters. (08/27/2013)
Note: Holy motherfucking shit—little did I know my idea for a minorly-dystopian near-future with fascist elements would literally become reality not even half a decade after I had this stupid fucking idea. Holy shit. What a fucking hell-hole America is becoming…“Neighborhoods” - A group of friends in South Boston start doing small robberies together. They get some notice from the Irish Mafia, who are interested in contracting-out roles for some of their heists (cut the profits 50-50) so they take the offer. After accidentally crossing turf lines, their association with the Irish triggers a domino cascade of disagreements that entangles all of Boston’s ethnic criminal outfits into a complex turf war—the Irish of South Boston, Blacks of the Southern Boroughs, Chinese of the Chinatown Enclave, Russians of Fenway/Brighton, Italians of the North End & Charlestown, and Hispanics of East Boston. See The Boondock Saints, The Town, The Departed, The Friends of Eddie Coyle, and Black Mass for Boston-local inspiration. (05/15/2015)
Elusive Sleeper Cell Terrorists: a secret terrorist organization in the USA rises up in synchronicity and assaults the nation on multiple fronts. (Perhaps 10:20 am on June 6th?)
Note: Literally no idea why that date/time were chosen, by Former Me, but I find it interesting enough that it’s six months off from an actual concerted [although far from strategic] attempt to overthrow the government that happened last year.They aim to overwhelm the emergency response services, induce mass panic, and create chaos—doing so through bombings, anthrax, hijackings, and EMPs.
Bombings:
a bomb in the pulpit on the stage of a college graduation, and other bombs in the planters lining the student section on the floor—taking out the next generation of minds.
bombs smuggled into Disney World via strollers, cameras, and water bottles, placed along the parade route—eliminating public belief of places of safety and comfort.
briefcase bombs placed throughout the pit in Wall Street—instilling fear and wounding the economy.
bombs underneath overpasses and elevated highways that will remove sections of important roads—disallowing public access to interurban travel.
bombs within subway trains that will incapacitate tunnels—disallowing public access to intraurban travel.
Anthrax:
anthrax spread through the vents of a public library—punishing public access to knowledge.
anthrax spread through the vents of an elementary school—taking out the next-next generation.
anthrax spread through the vents of a city hall—taking out prominent leaders.
Hijackings:
planes leaving numerous airports around the same time, commandeered and circled back to the airport they came from, where they'll crash into the main terminal buildings—disallowing public access to air travel.
major radio stations are commandeered to broadcast the same message at the same time—instilling fear and initiating attacks.
EMPs:
shut down electricity in hospitals, ceasing all equipment operations—a mass-murder emphasizing weaknesses in reliance on technology.
shut down air traffic controlling towers—emphasizing weaknesses in reliance on technology. (05/13/2014)
Two bands of thieves unintentionally attempt to rob the same bank at the same time. One group, hardened criminals who met in prison, sneak-in through the back with tactical precision, while the other group, desperate ruffians who grew-up together, burst-in through the front. There’s immediately a loud standoff with confused yelling and ordering each other to leave—all while the patrons and employees cower—until a foolishly-pulled trigger (or the daring of a guard or teller) alert the police and get them surrounded. After squabbling and scheming to throw the other group under the bus, the two bands of thieves resign to working together to figure a way out—with their lives and the cash. - Tonally, a dramedy, so think a mixture of Snatch and Panic Room; see also, Inside Man, The Town, and The Place Beyond the Pines. (08/28/2013)
Note: See also-also Den of Thieves, which is, like, the best heist film of the past decade. (Presuming you don’t include Baby Driver, which is more of a criminal romcom musical thriller.)Ex-con, freshly released in 2010, moves to North Dakota in order to find work, where the fracking companies care little for your past, only caring that you have hands and a pulse. He starts making great money, sucking sludge out of the Parshall Oil Field; he spends it on the vices offered in his boomtown—gambling, booze, women, drugs—and forms relationships with other workers—some friends, some enemies. Maybe he gets in a fight that goes sour, or he gets caught breaking-into a trailer, or something, and all this prosperity and promise gets taken away from him as he returns to prison? (05/13/2014)
A true story. I’m working at Planet Fitness and it’s a wintry December day; the day is progressing excruciatingly slowly, with few visitors, until some Lady—wearing an outfit of shimmering silver fabric—comes in and asks me where she can get coffee nearby, if there's a McDonalds. I tell her where the nearest McDonald’s and Starbucks are; she takes the liberty of now telling me her life story, beginning with her most recent excursion: she’s returning from Albany, NY, where she purchased “RFID shield bags” and clothes made of the same material, to keep the Mass. State Police from spying on her. Halfway through her spiel, some Middle Eastern guy—short, no shoes—comes running in, out of breath (like, legit SPRINTING, hurried, panting, desperate), and through broken English says, "Terrorist! Terrorist!" The Lady and I are like, "…What?" "Terrorist at the hospital," he points to the Market Basket, and I say, "The…grocery store?" "The hospital, they're pouring chemicals in the air vents to make you [unintelligible]; the hospital behind the Shaw's." "Uhh… You mean, the Market Basket?" "Call 911!" he groans, hoarse. The Lady suggests to him that he does it, turning my desk phone around: "Here’s the phone, if you'd like to call." He types 9-9-1, and gets no answer (presumably) then says “Number I do not recognize” then says I should call, but I don't. We stare at each other, in silence; he's still hurried. The Lady looks down and, as I had when I watched him run in, realizes he's not wearing shoes. He grumbles and clenches, frazzled; it seems maybe he's on drugs. Then he fucking bolts out of the lobby and runs further down the plaza, gone. The Lady then turns to me and says, “Do you get a lot of crazy people coming in here?” “Without shoes? No.“ “Yeah, I was gonna say, where were his shoes?” and then she resumes telling me her life story about her ex-husband the Mass. State Police Colonel, his crony friend who got fired from the force for doing meth, a Boston real estate developer and pedophile, a corrupt judge, her own genius loser brother, and others—and so, yeah, like I said, usually the crazy people who come into Planet Fitness are wearing shoes. (01/02/2018)
Note: I’m aware this isn’t a full movie idea; I linked a Google Docs document that’s 36 pages long inside the Word document, when I moved much of the “research” she recommended me to, as well as some of her more in-depth stories that I transcribed while directly in front of her; she actually encouraged this, because “I’m a writer” and “I could do something impactful with it”. Some of the horrifying, unbelievable things she said were true, and others were uncomfortably easy to believe, while a great amount of it seemed like the ravings of a paranoid loon. Nonetheless, I’ll transfer the research I accumulated into its own blog post and link it here.
GENRE FILMS
Adaptation of The True Confessions of Charlotte Doyle by Avi (Edward Irving Wortis). Include those delicious sea shanties, like "Roll the Old Chariot". (04/12/2016)
Note: Still interested in writing this script, should any studio rep happen upon this post. I think it would make for a great kids’ adventure drama during the Age of Sail which, as a kid, I was interested in, so I imagine others are, too.Gumby (Ryan) wants me to write a serious, dark, gritty, live-action reimagining of Mermaid Man and Barnacle Boy, a la the DC Universe superheroes. (08/27/2013)
Note: ( ¬‿¬)“The Commune” - A few thousand people live in a compound that is surrounded by barbed wire and fortifications. They live a bland life, with shabby handmade jumpsuits and poor living conditions. A preteen boy has always wondered why they must live like this and who is keeping them prisoner. He can see a city skyline on the horizon, and wonders how much better life is over there, but none of the adults will talk to him about what that city is or what it’s like, and they insist they aren’t prisoners or under duress—but that’s exactly what prisoners would say! (The scenery directly around the commune is flat and mostly barren.) He wants to escape, and to save his people—to rescue them from their supposed overlord oppressors—so he slowly plans an escape... Somehow, he ends up taking-down a whole wall. The other citizens, and the leaders and his family especially, are frightened and ask why he would do such a thing. He says he's helping them to freedom! They say the walls weren't keeping them in, they were keeping everyone else out; they were never prisoners, they were protecting themselves. The boy questions it, but by dusk a rebel army storms across the barren expanse, coming at them; some people flee, but many hold their ground and prepare for a battle. The boy flees, and heads towards the skyline. He walks throughout the night, until dawn’s break, but when the sun rises on the cityscape, he sees that the city is a wasteland—a hollow shell of a city; the remains of a society. (This is a post-apocalyptic world. This city was wiped out, and so were the others; the land was ruined. The survivors built what they could out in the open, with whatever materials remained, for protection from other bands of survivors. - Based on a dream I had.) (08/28/2013)
A radio DJ mingles with his crew and plays tunes according to the schedule, until missiles rain down outside the building, and a guerrilla army rises-up to take the city. After shock wears off, the DJ turns to his mic to inform the public on what's happening and to stay calm, but shit gets worse: the guerrillas try to take the station. Some enter the studio and lock the door behind them. The tables turn, eventually, as the crew fights back; they take the guerrillas hostage and question them, on the air; the DJ instructs the citizenry to resist. The film ends somehow. (The entire film takes place inside the studio: no out-the-window shots, as there are no windows in the studio; there is a TV where they watch a live, continuous update on the news outside, up until the TV station is violently taken over. (Based on a dream I had.) (08/29/2013)
A boy and a girl who go to school together can turn into living, man-like trees, and control plants as such. They do so to keep balance in nature or whatever. There are some ants, too. Anyways... It begins with the boy passing the girl’s grandpa’s farm while riding his bike during a storm; he sees the grandpa fall, in the slick mud on a hill, and he rushes over to help him. Neither the girl nor boy have friends, because they're weird, because she pals around with plants (that's a secret though) and he's awkward, so the grandpa tells him to hang around the farm and help maybe get to know her, and he then he drops a seed (suddenly in his unfurled hand) into the boy's palm and the seed absorbs into him, now having the same powers as the girl. (The grandpa had the powers, too, but he transferred them to the boy.) The grandpa then expires, and the boy has his gift now. Later he visits the farm and helps the girl with the crops; they can turn into manifestations of trees that resemble people, and they practice that and their other gifts, like talking to plants (who respond with chemicals that they can translate). On the farm is a kinda-small tree that the boy can't talk to; he asks the girl why he can't and she says that her grandpa said it wasn't growing right. Grandpa's ghost comes to visit and tells them that he's doing good; the girl asks if he's seen grandma and he says that he hasn't yet, but he's working on it. The grandpa tells the boy in private that he should get to know the girl a little better, and date her, and marry her; the boy is thrown off by the bluntness, but he decides to give it a go, given how much the grandpa has given him and been right so far. He awkwardly goes about trying to woo the girl, who is blind to his come-ons. Grandpa visits sometimes and checks around how the farm is doing, and checks that one tree. The boy and girl turn into the small, man-like trees to avoid a businessman who keeps coming over to ask if he can buy the farm to turn it into a neighborhood; he keeps saying "it's what your grandfather would have wanted" to which they reply "uh, no??!" and ghost of grandpa ain't having that, so he materializes in the passenger seat before he drives away and says "I'm not selling my farm, idiot." and the man runs away. The girl and boy are hitting it off but the girl finds out that the boy only started dating her because her grandpa told her to. She can't talk to grandpa about it because his materializing takes a lot out of him, so he has to wait a while, having just materialized for the businessman. The boy tries to explain on his own but doesn't know what to say; the girl leaves and a storm blows in, similar but worse than the one before. The girl gets caught (but isn't old as fuck so she won't die) and becomes a tree to avoid getting blown away, but it's still frighteningly windy. The boy comes to her and saves her by becoming a tree with her, and they together form one big tree, whose great roots keep it from getting ripped away. Grandpa comes by later and is like "that's how I met your grandma," because that's the tree version of being soulmates and doin’ the nasty: merging as trees. Then grandpa remembers ‘grandma’ and runs over to that smaller tree, which had fallen over in the storm. He yells at them with sad anger to lift it up and replant it, and they comply; grandpa explains that the tree is grandma, and he is working on leaving the afterlife to do what grandma did and become a true tree, where they feel like they belong; grandma is currently alone as a tree, and they can't sell the farm because she's here. Grandpa also states that he wanted them to get together because he could tell they were soulmates and didn't want the girl to end up like grandma—alone in the afterlife... so far. The tree ends up unharmed. The girl and boy go back to dating. Grandpa merges with grandma forever, and make a giant oak. (The redwood forests are where the first of their kind died. Mention that in grandpa's spiel). And that's it, or something. And there were ants at one point but I can’t remember fully. (Based on a dream I had.) (08/28/2013)
Original documents created on the dates parenthesized following each item.