Volunteer(Idea for Short).

S

santosh2

New member
Hi Everyone,

Here's an idea I have for a short film.

Title: Volunteer.
Genre: Drama.
Synopsis: Raj, a self centered young Asian man volunteers to help in an old folks’ home. He doesn’t do it out of kindness but he’s struggling to find work and thinks volunteering will look good on his CV. He is asked to care for Peter, a WWII veteran who can no longer walk without assistance and whose eyesight is fading. Peter resents other peoples’ help and isn’t too keen on Raj. Peter often bemoans the fact that the only volunteering people did when he was young was to fight for king and country.

Peter’s prized possessions are his toy soldiers which he keeps strategically positioned on a table. Nobody is allowed to touch them, so when Peter relays stories of his wartime experiences, Raj imagines the pieces coming to life to reenact Peter’s heroic battles.

Eventually Raj begins to grow on Peter as he becomes more knowledgeable about the war and respectful of its veterans. Peter had assumed that much of today’s youth new nothing about it. As Peter’s health deteriorates, Raj endeavors to contact his family but is told that Peter has no family left. As Peter lays dying, Raj sits by his side and tells him that he will volunteer again, this time because he wants to.
 
That sounds pretty good, except that something doesnt ring exactly right with the reason Raj is volunteering. Because it would look good on his CV wouldnt seem like enough to keep him there if he didnt want to be. What kind of work is he looking for that unwilling volunteerism would be worth going through?

It might be more believable to me if it was court mandated community service. About thirty years ago, I knew someone who got in trouble with the law and his choices were to go to jail or go into the service...jail for a little while or the service for years. He opted for going into the service. I could see a similar situation having more of a hook (even if it IS a tired one) than rooting for the guy who wants to add something to his resume to get a job. What is the conflict in your story?
 
Very good idea. Heartfelt and emotional.

I agree with thartley though. Sew up that hole and you got a real solid story with lots of potential.
 
I like the idea but I would consider a few things.

1. Raj has to have a reason to want to join up, thats easy, get Peter to explain how he worked with an indian regiment, then on one occasion have him regress and talk to Raj like he was an old comrade but an indian comrade, that would give Raj a much better insight into Peter's mind.

2. I would bin the idea of having the toy soldiers animated, it belongs in something else, if you wanted to use the toys soldiers then have Peter refer to each of them as an old friend who dies, that would give it a more personal aspect.

3. Finally when Peter dies, have a heart felt emotional end, where he gets Raj to promoise that he will join up and serve something greater than just himself.

It has a great story potential, it also conveys a strong message about the current climate, especially with the operations in Iraq and Afganistan, to that end I would consider Raj as Mohammed, a muslim agreeing would be a very strong message.

Gaz
 
Another angle to consider: Raj's idea of 'volunteering' is helping people out, e.g. here at the old folks' home, but Peter's idea of 'volunteering' is military service. To many people, those two types of 'volunteering' are diametrically opposed, constructive vs. destructive - I think that would be an interesting conflict to bring out, with Raj looking down on Peter's 'right-wing warmongering' and Peter looking down on Raj's 'soft lefty peacenik' attitudes. This would work dramatically even if Raj is a genuinely enthusuastic volunteer. The two of them would both dislike each other's politics, but the story's journey would be them both coming to realise that each other is right too. (E.g as the ending, Raj might volunteer as a medic in a current war zone, he hasn't abandoned his ideals but now is less anti-military?)

I'd like to see a stronger link between the two, e.g. use the fact that Raj is Asian (maybe he has ancestors who dies on both sides during WW2, maybe his family are refugees from a current military conflict)

Having the toy soldiers 'come to life' could look cute, but could be very distracting if it's just a visual effect (and could be very difficult and expensive to do) - although I personally love animation, I'd drop the idea UNLESS it will help your story dramatically
 
Rather than a conversation at the end where Raj tells Peter he's going to volunteer, wouldn't it be more powerful if, after Peter dies, we just SEE Raj going to sign up? I think the audience would get the message.

I agree this would be more powerful if Raj were forced to volunteer initially, via a court order of community service or something. And he should resent it just as much as Peter resents the intrusion. That way it means something at the end when Raj decides to volunteer of his own free will.

One other idea......what if at the end it's not service work Raj is volunteering for? What if, instead, he's decided to enlist in the military?
 
I really like this idea. Unlike the others, I think the reason for signing up rings true. "Court mandated" is such a mainstream hollywood way of forcing a story that always feels fake. Like it belongs in the next Adam Sandler movie. (Uh oh! Adam Sandler offended a group of Chinese people so he's "court mandated" to go and live in China for a month! har har har!)

I love the idea of the soldiers coming to life. My only concern is the budgetary constraints of a film such as this. Could it be done? I also like the suggestion of someone above - about how he's assigned a name to each one. And maybe during the course of the short, when the main character keeps coming back, one less soldier is there (implying, of course, another death). And we do this until they're all gone. And then, of course, the old man dies. If you really wanted to take a chance, there could be a ghost angle here. Like the old man isn't really there. Just riffing here. Well aware that that could be the stupidest idea ever.

The only thing that needs to be worked out is the ending. I was thinking him volunteering for the service was going to be your ending originally. But if you used that, you would have to set him up as very anti-war. So that he had an arc and it actually *meant* something when he chose to sign up for the military. I don't know though. It seems a little much. Ultimately, you have to decide what your main character wants and what you're really trying to say with the movie. Then you'll know which direction the main character needs to go in the end.

Oh, and you could do something with this old man being a soldier in world war 2. and the main character being japanese. another point of conflict.
 
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I agree that Raj should be anti-war in the beginning, but maybe not rabidly so. His position isn't really strongly held, it just seems to be the thing to do among his age group. Peer pressure more than anything else, maybe. If he actually WERE rabidly anti-war, then I'd have a hard time believing his position would change so drastically in so short a time.

The toy soldiers coming to life could be done creatively -- maybe just shadows on the wall accompanied by appropriate sound effects and voices.

I can see that court mandated service might be cliche, but it doesn't seem strong enough that he's just choosing to do it to help him get into college. I guess it could be viable if handled well, though. If he's doing it by choice, then it's not logical that he would have a very strong aversion to working with old people.

If you've got time, then play him up as simply a selfish kid who's been told by parents or a school counselor that he NEEDS to do some sort of volunteer work to help with his college application. Maybe the college he wants to go to is well known as a 'party school', which reinforces his selfish nature. He chooses working with old people because he figures it will be easy. Then his whole attitude changes as a result of spending time with Peter.
 
If I may offer another perspective, from reading a lot of what has followed in an effort to make it a bit more 'dramatic' in a sense, it has started to lose the very real feel of the original story. Raj feels like he is simply apathetic, like a lot of younger people today - he isn't really all that bothered. He doesn't need to be anti-war, or anti-community service or anything else. He just doesn't care, and he's only there because his parents have told him it will maybe help him get a job - and having been in that position myself, the prospect of working for free for the sake of getting a job at Homebase or Tescos is hardly incentive to do it. But some parents can just be domineering. If it opened with a blazing row with his parents and Raj being a bit stroppy over going for his first day, that might help some.

As far as soldiers coming to life, a better option may be literal flashbacks - probably cheaper than using effects to make the toy soldiers move, and would perhaps convey more in the way of story - even if it's just the briefest of flashes, a few seconds, with the older gentleman moving the soldiers to represent the real people we only see the briefest of glimpses of. Having a photo in the background might also help the link.

As for what he volunteers for at the end, I think that depends on how the story goes. Does Raj become more respectful of his community, or of his country, or both? I wouldn't say volunteering for military service is necessarily the natural conclusion - my natural conclusion would have been that he instead becomes a full-on part-time carer instead of a soldier...
 
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