Tuesday 30 September 2008

The new script

For a while, i was seriously thinking about doing my CityA idea as a script, right up to the first Scriptwriting tutorial i attended last last week. However, during a blustery walk back to my uni house, i came up with a much better idea! Well, on the walk i came up with the title for the script, which i think is probably just as important. And it's name?

Cruel Britannia.

Immediately, a million thoughts of homeless people wearing medals popped into my head, a tirade of angst in modern life.

Since then, i've gone through various ideas that i'd like to now share with you.

The original idea was based around one character and his struggle to get over a break up with someone who he deemed to be the perfect girl. Basically, we'd follow him round and some kind of story would happen. I didn't give too much thought to this idea, as it was a bit too simple for a long script. Also, it's a similar premise to a lot of things that i've written in the past, and i want this to be a definate step above what i have produced so far.

My next idea was to keep the main, morally dubious character, but link him to a parallel world where his actions affect others. This idea i liked, but i couldn't think of any ingenous way to link his actions without it being obvious or tenuous. I also figured he could have secret powers to use at his discretion, but then i realised that i'd wholeheartedly stolen the idea from Phonogram: Rue Britannia, a Graphic novel by quality journalist Kieron Gillen. As it happens, i've pretty much stolen the title of that graphic novel too, but i don't think that matters too much, as it's such a cool title.

So anyway, my idea that i think I may have settled on is as so; A bit like love actually, but better, with more misery and less Ben Elton. What that entails is a collection of characters, all with their lives entwined and affecting one another, setting a palette of what it is to be young in modern times- a script about being lost and alone. I've yet to work out all the characters, but there's going to be a lot going on. My reasoning for doing a script in this style is that i'm not convinced that i'd be able to hold a single story for an entire script- my writing style is often fairly whimsical and light- so by having lots of stories intertwined, there's scope to do lots of smaller stories that eventually build up to create an entirity. It's like when you're always told that things are easier when they're broken up into sections; that's the idea here. The mixture of long scripts and my short attention span isn't a prize winning one, so i'm hoping this will work to my advantages.

I may still change parts of the idea, and i'm still open to using magical elements if i think it will work, but hopefully this is the starting point for a wonderful script!

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