DVXuser.com Feature Film - Writers wanted

chapelgrovefilms said:
We may not be betting the farm, but we're investing a good chunk of the next 2 years or so of our lives. We want the best possible shot at a success here, don't we?

If we can come up with a great story, a great script, that's also creative and different -- but something we all get EXCITED about -- then I'm all for it. But I wouldn't denegrate the idea of sticking to the tried and true formulas either.
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Really? Once I get a script for my part (if it goes that far and I get to direct a portion) I'll be done filming in a few weeks or so. We're talking about 15 to 20 minutes here.

Yes, there will be much more time involved with scouting locations, casting, SFX, editing, etc...

But I personally will not be spending anywhere close to two years on a project with so many people involved. Especially when each Director is just controlling 15 minutes of it.

Just my 2 cents.

Mike
 
Well, I was thinking of the storyline where a virus is being transmitted via VoIP phones, and a bunch of 'net addicts are seeing the people around them slowing changing -- in the vein of Invasion of the Body Snatchers. The 'net addicts are immune because they rarely use the 'land line' telephones. That's where I was going with that analogy.

As for the time commitment.....

It's true that not every person will be involved in every phase of the project. Scriptwriting will take a considerable length of time, as will breakdown and budgeting. Then comes the fun of digging up investors.

Casting needs to be done a little differently. Each unit director/producer conducts the casting at their level, but final casting decisions would (in my opinion) need to be cleared by the main producer, for the sake of uniformity and making sure we have the best people for the roles.

Each unit producer can hire their own director, but it would be best to consult with the main producer on that as well. Each director can put together their own crew. Each unit producer, along with his/her director, sound person and lighting person, will need to do location scouting. The proper paperwork for each location needs to be obtained in advance -- no 'guerrilla' shooting.

Equipment needs to be rented. Food/craft service arranged. All the multitude of things that go into preparing for a shoot. And scheduling, of course.

Then the actual shooting itself.

Hopefully once the footage gets to editing there will be no problems, but if there are then pickups and ADR may be required.

Editing, sound editing, titles, then off to the composer.

Lots and lots of paperwork too! :)

There WILL be people involved in this production who will invest the better part of two years, I suspect, it getting it to market. Not everyone, of course.
 
I think almost everyone likes the idea of them being connected somehow and chapelgrove suggested earlier that people would be affected at different times regarding proximity to the fallen meteor.

You could use that, say it falls in the barren woods of Maine. You pick it up with the virus sweeping/or popping up in first NY, then NC, Texas and then Cali.

If you wanted to connect the people, they could be on some sort of network or related in some form. Each person's reaction would develop differently for several reasons.
As it gradually sweeps across the land, people know more and more about what is going to happen to them.
Also if you wanted to connect it more, maybe clues/knowledge is passed along on the effect, how to avoid, how to handle, a possible cure. This would build as it hit each location and build to whatever climax that was decided upon.

Maybe one last hope from all the gathered knowledge when it reaches LA and then it works or doesn't work.
In the case of the ending that Michael suggested (which I like), it would work, but then alas it is all for naught.
 
Also I think you can get people to care about and invest in characters in 15-20 minutes, heck I read scripts in scriptfest that got me to care about characters in 7-10 pages.
 
conlanforever said:
Also I think you can get people to care about and invest in characters in 15-20 minutes, heck I read scripts in scriptfest that got me to care about characters in 7-10 pages.
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Yes you can, if they spend a solid 15-20 minutes with just those characters.

But if they spend a few minutes with these guys, then jump over for a few minutes with group #2, then jump to a few minutes with group #3, then group #4, then back again to group #1 (10 or 15 minutes later) -- and this happens several times -- then I think they're not really going to get rooted enough in any of them to an extent needed to be emotionally invested.

Maybe that's just me. I'm not saying it can't be done -- just that it's a lot harder than doing a traditional leads/supporting group dynamic.
 
Nothing in this thread seems very original, just rehash of existing stuff. There have been quite a few "plagues from outer space" films, the Andromeda Strain was just remade with a decent budget in fact.

If you want this film to really shine you need to start with a relatively original premise. M. Knight's next film seems to be an end of the world piece where everyone goes mute, lays down, and dies. Simple, cheap, and scary as hell if its handled correctly.

You can remove something that is needed for life, like fresh water: A scientist working on a chemical version of cold fusion creates a chemical that separates oxygen from hydrogen in a water molecule. He thinks he's solved the world's energy problem, but the chemical gets out into the environment (oops).

The high salt content of the oceans keep them stable, but the few survivors are those who successfully fight for what little fresh water is left. Barometric pressure goes up, crops and livestock wither and die. The end of the film can follow the last protagonist as he/she does something really dreadful, then the next day clouds form and it starts to rain. Or he/she finds some small store of water and manages to drown in it. Or a parent with a feverish, unconscious daughter at death's door gives her the last of the water but it goes down her windpipe and kills her. News reports of hiker's dying while trying to reach snow on mountains. Images of Mt. Kilimanjaro with the snow CGI'ed off. Etc, etc, etc.

You can have a CGI artist blow up a few large municipal water tanks, having them in the background of a few subsequent scenes would be a good idea. (Have the tanks deform to a round sphere and burst from the top, then show the gasses escaping like heat distortion). You could also tell the story "out of time", to set up a mystery and reveal it as the act 2/3 plot point. Burst tanks in the background would be good for that. Lead the audience to assume its terrorism until the chemical cause is revealed.

You wouldn't want to shoot anywhere that is 'green'; creative writing in concert with location scouting would be a must.

You have to think through all the details to make an exceptional story. For example: the last segments of the H2O holocaust the sky could turn a 'darkish' red (a mid day sun/sky with a sunset color), due to the liberated Oxygen and Hydrogen in the atmosphere molecules scattering the shorter solar wavelengths. If you went that route the blue skys could come back and bring the rain at the end of the film (after everything is dead). The last image could be a sprout springing up from the ground next to a dead roach (not even the roaches make it through this one).

Or maybe the water simply does not return. The last image could be an old dried out newspaper in the desert with the scientist's picture and headline "Free Energy!!!".

Bob
 
Bob has some good thoughts here. The virus / zombie thing is really played out. Environmental disaster has been harvested to a lesser extent. Heh... harvested.

:)

I think we should see our protagonist lying dead or dying on hard cracked earth / the bottom of barren water tank - a cockroach in a like state is in the foreground. The protag almost seems to be watching the roach from where she died.

Then the first drops of water fall from above. The sound of thunder is in the distance. One hits the roach, which begins to twitch, rights itself and crawls out of frame. Another drop hits the protagonist's face and rolls down to her nose - like a teardrop.

FIN
 
I agree David, it would be hard to get an audience invested with characters that they spend only 15-20 minutes with after you've spread it throughout the length of a movie. Like you, I'm just saying its possible, but a challenge.

Bob, that sounds like a really good idea.
 
Yeah, intriguing pitch Bob! Not a bad idea...

Like you said, cool concept but could be really sold with the right VFX shots.

Cool ending potentials as well! Liked Erik's idea of the drops of rain starting to fall and the roach flips over and scurries off...

Good stuff! :)
 
I like Bob's idea!

I'd also toyed once with an end of the world story were a new type of nuclear device is detonated in the Middle East, and it sets the Earth's atmosphere on fire. As the fire spreads uncontrolled, doom is certain because it's going to engulf the whole planet. CNN is tracking it, so people can actually 'see' it coming for them, but there's nothing they can do to stop it.

But Bob's idea is great. I have to admit, I have mixed feelings about a defeatist scenario -- one where nothing anybody can do will change what's going to happen. I prefer giving people a fighting chance to survive. But still, there's certainly drama there.
 
chapelgrovefilms said:
I have to admit, I have mixed feelings about a defeatist scenario -- one where nothing anybody can do will change what's going to happen. I prefer giving people a fighting chance to survive. But still, there's certainly drama there.
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I'm with you there, but the way to handle it is to make the audience believe that the water will return. A film must have ups and downs, every time a untainted water source is found is a joyous 'up', but when it runs out or is misused is a 'down'. Movies that start with an 'up' (free energy) are supposed to end with a 'down' (zenocide) and vice-versa. The last scene could dolly out to outer space where you see the excess hydrogen and oxygen actually being blown off the earth and into space.

You want catastrophe? I give you catastrophe!

Also, I'm sick of the roach surviving, the roach must die. (Stupid Hollywood conventions...)

Bob
 
Ooooooohhhh!!!!

The human body is like 98% water, what happens if you drink the tainted water before the molecules begin to split???? You'd be reduced to minerals from the inside out!!!

Also, as a technical detail it might actually quit raining if the barometric pressure got high enough. Frail people (old folks, babies) might get nosebleeds, earbleeds, etc...

Oooooooohhhh... This could get ugly.....

Bob
 
Also I think you can get people to care about and invest in characters in 15-20 minutes, heck I read scripts in scriptfest that got me to care about characters in 7-10 pages.
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Guys, who says you only will spend 15 minutes with each character? Or, put another way -- it doesn't have to be done all in contiguous chunks. Interweaving stories could be spread throughout the 90 minutes. And if you're really, really crafty, and the master director over the project scripts it properly, you could definitely have the characters cross paths even though in real life they never do. An over-the-shoulder conversation, etc... just don't show 'em both in a master, or use a body double... all sorts of ways to approach it.

Now, the real trick would be to find quadruplet actors who have all moved to different cities, and have them each play the lead... heh.
 
The interweaving stories was exactly the problem, in my view.

Okay, say we're doing an 80 minute feature. Say we've got 4 stories going on in 4 different corners of the world, each with its own set of leads and supportings.

If each story gets equal time, then that's 20 minutes per story.

If you tell each story one at a time, then you get to spend 20 mins with the characters and you can develop a deep emotional connection to them.

But it you interweave the stories, as Babel tried to do, then you're going to get a few minutes here, a few minutes there, jumping around between 4 sets of people whose only connection to each other is one overall common circumstance. You never spend enough time with one group of people to allow that deep emotional connection to take root. So the end result is you really don't care deeply about what happens to any of them.

At least, that was my reaction to Babel and similar stories. And that's my concern here. Maybe it can be done, but it will be harder. And since this is already a challenging project, it doesn't seem wise to make it even more challenging.

But again -- and I can't stress this too much -- that's just me. And my taste in movies runs to those with a linear storyline and a singular main cast. I did enjoy Creepshow back in the day, but that was a collection of linear stories with no attempt at interweaving.

An interwoven set of stories might very well find a good audience, and it's certainly a way to go. It's just not my personal preference, that's all.
 
I am waaay too tired and waaay too drunk to read these last posts.* I posted in the original thread that what we need before any of this can work is someone to take charge. I have asked Dustin to come up with a way of choosing someone who can then tell everyone what we are doing and when to do it. Otherwise this is just a place for a bunch of filmmakers to shoot the reeze about ideas and personal tastes as far as making a film go.

Until we have that leader, we need to compile our writing team. This needs to happen before we have a story too, I think. If you are interested PM me or post here and I will make a list of interested candidates. Then we will talk story and get it down and written. I think this is the only part I am actually in charge of, so DO WHAT I SAY! :evil: Just kidding. :grin: But seriously, I think that's the only way this bird's getting off the ground.






*Just joking. Although I am tired.
 
Barry is on it...

First location is the Protagonist, starts and ends in the first location.

Second location could be a flashback location with the protagonist as a child being taught lessons that help extend his/her survival.

Third location could follow the romantic interest as he/she "goes home to Texas" when the crisis breaks out. Cost to relocate one actor or be damn clever with shooting.

Fourth location could cover the scientist / lab / accident

etc...

Just shooting in different cities / environments will give the feeling of a bigger production than it really is.

Also, features are 90 minutes minimum. Not 80, not 88, 90.



I think that all this pontificating has grown beyond the original post's intent...

Bob
 
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