✩so many thoughts

 

Hi again blog :)

So, as I said in my last post, I'm starting to work on my next big project, aka the A-Level Portfolio project!

In this project, I can decide to create either two movie trailers, a piece of a documentary, a music video, or a short film. If you remember from last year, I mentioned that my brother had taken this course before, so I'm familiar with the project and its process. He made a short film (which I acted in B)) and I can still remember his experience making the film. Also, I always have a ton of story ideas, so coming up with a short film idea shouldn't be too hard.

You would think.

Since August of 2021, I've had two major ideas for a short film. I'm gonna talk about my different ideas in this post to share my complicated process of coming up with a story/idea for this project.

IDEA 1:

So this concept was based on a story I read about a boy who was a superhero. The story's chapters read like episodes of a children's cartoon (like The Amazing World of Gumball), where each chapter features the same cast, but with different, unrelated events. As the story progressed, the chapters got more and more outlandish, including the main character's best friend making a hideout in an oven and another character putting spaghetti in literally every single meal he made. Right before the end, the universe began to unravel to the point where the universe literally fell apart around the main character. Afterward, the story completely switched settings, from the fantasy cartoon world to a domestic home in the middle of a war. The city then becomes the target of a largescale fire and all of the characters tragically die </3, revealing how the fantasy world was the boy's limbo where he waited until he accepted he and all the other characters had died before he could finally pass on.

I hope I explained that well lol. It's a super neat concept and my small summary can't do the story the justice it deserves. This story had such an impact on me and my friends, two of them sobbed while reading it and I too, sobbed. I even have a picture of me crying over it on my phone lmao. 

Though as good as it is, the story is a fanfiction so I'm too embarrassed to link it to my blog, sorry team.

Moving on, I thought a cool idea would be to take from this concept of the fantasy world that was covering up for some sort of traumatic event. I wanted to have the main character in some sort of video game world where the main character's friend is an NPC in the game whos trying to get the main character to wake up from the game because in real life, the main character is in a coma. In my head, the fantasy world would have a lot of bright colors and graphics on screen; however, I realized my skill set (especially in the editing field) wouldn't live up to my expectations of the final product, so I decided to scrap it.

I do think if I took the effort to flesh out this concept, I could create something within my skill set that still looks cool, so I haven't entirely abandoned this idea.

This is the closest thing I could find to what I had in mind, primarily because this image has the GAME OVER text on the screen. I really wanted to put health and objectives in as graphics on the screen as well, among other graphics.

IDEA 2:

Ok explaining this idea is going to be much tougher than Idea 1 but I'll do my best! 

This idea stemmed primarily from this story (yes it's is also a fanfiction and no I don't want to talk about it) that showed 10 characters living in essentially a large apartment together after all 10 characters (stay with me now) each won the Hunger Games. They all have their own trauma responses to being thrust into a completely new life of unfathomable luxury where they must constantly play a character often associated with their gruesome actions during the Games. The government watches their every move to ensure they stay in line while simultaneously requiring them to constantly create content to release to the citizens of their world. I really enjoyed this story in how it tackles themes of grief and stagnancy, along with unstable family dynamics, especially in the different characters' reactions to their situation and how that affects their relationships with the other people they're forced to live with. 

In this story, I saw five main types of characters that really stuck with me: 1) the unsatisfactory "parental" figure, 2) the angry one, 3) the resigned one, 4) the young one who learns how awful of a situation they're in and looses their childlike wonder, and 5) the silent one. 

Because of my fierce adoration for this universe and concept, I was dead set on following through with this idea since about October. I even had a really productive conversation with one of my friends who I planned on having play the young character about my idea and the themes it addressed, along with other pieces of media with the same concept, like Omori.

I had also come up with two ideas for scenes. One scene would have all the characters sitting together eating dinner (like a family) until two of them (parental figure and resigned one) get into a heated conversation until the resigned one leaves the table. The angry one would then yell at the parent until both of them left as well, leaving only the young one and the silent one. After a moment, the silent one would leave too, so just the young one would be left at the dinner table.

Something like this except, you know, sad.

The other scene would follow the dinner one (idk if immediately or not) where the resigned one would be playing a guitar in their room and one by one, the other four characters would join the resigned one in their room, leaving them to exist together in silent solidarity as the guitar filled the air. I would've wanted either "Since I Saw Vienna" by Wilbur Soot, "Here Comes the Sun" by The Beatles, or "Yesterday" by The Beatles to be the song played in this scene (or at some point in the film).

I've literally thought about this idea so often, I have four voice memos talking about it.

In case you wanted proof of how much I've thought about this. I would put them on here for everyone's listening enjoyment but they're so long and I ramble so much I don't think they're cohesive at all </3.

And yet, once it began time to actually come up with a plot and how the film would actually play out, I realized there were many issues with my idea.

1. Five characters are so many and I do not want to work with that many actors. I could combine the silent one and the resigned one but 4 is still a lot. 
2. I'd have to create four fully fleshed-out characters with distinct personalities and reactions because of trauma which is, so hard, especially in a limited time frame.
3. Dialogue. Imagine having to write all that hefty dialogue from four very specific characters who are going through a lot, especially to try and convey such a serious topic. 
4. What would the plot be????? Like I have no idea what would happen aside from the two scenes I listed above except that it would probably focus on the young one. But what would the young one be doing? Head empty I have no idea.

There was so much I needed to think about and work through, and I realized that once again, I had come up with an idea outside of my skill range and I wouldn't be satisfied with the final product. Not to mention, the subject matter would be quite the challenge to accurately convey. Ultimately, as much as I love this idea and story, I'm scrapping it. At least for now.

Also, as much as I'd love to link this story to my blog simply because it means so much to me, I can't because the story was deleted :,(. Ngl I was so upset about it, I still am tbh I miss it so badly.

Somehow, that's not all though! I have a few other concepts for a short film that I pondered over:

• Something about soulmates? I really like soulmate alternate universes but I'm not sure how I would translate that into a short film; it might be too short to have someone find their soulmate by the end of the film so I'm not sure how to continue from there...
• I have a color-changing light bulb in my room, so maybe something where someone is forced to do something every time the light changes? Pretty dystopian, the concept would be similar to that of this video by YouTuber Jschlatt (warning for cursing and some relatively loud audio), I just can't think of a story using this idea. Not totally scrapped though, I still want to use the light.
• Short films to me are always associated with really deep stories that make you think about the world, so I thought it could be neat to try and make a comedic short film, though I'm completely lost as to how to go about that. Plus, my humor is so hit or miss, like it has a very specific target audience. Which is fine, I'm just not super driven to research how I could achieve a comedic short film.

With all these ideas out of the way, today I was hit with a wave of inspiration that originated from (you'll never guess!!!) a fanfiction, and I'll talk about it in my next post because I'm thinking this one might be a keeper (don't take my word on it I'm a Libra and I've never made a decision in my life).

👋👋👋Bye for now!

Song for 2/10

"Under Your Skin" by Jukebox the Ghost