Procrastination and moving onto the "Next thing" have always been a real problem for me. I have ideas thick and fast and always seem to be juggling a few at a time.
I'm supposed to be writing a script for my MA. The one I pitched to my tutors was the horror/western BLOODRUSH. I haven't even looked at this one since I pitched it to them. Instead I've tinkered with an older idea, a stoner alien invasion movie. Not so much a comedy as a movie with a few wisecracking characters. This is the one with the alien masturbation. Then I started a new movie. 5 girls and 1 guy in a log cabin. Sounds like a fun way to spend a week. Then I had to go and throw in a murderous BIGFOOT.
The whole alien masturbation thing works. That whole chunk works. The only trouble is it's all superfluous, it has no story function. What was useful was that in writing those scenes I felt like I got t0 know those characters. Seeing them walk around and do their thing really helped me get a feel for them. Maybe it's something I should do for all of my characters in every film. I should write a scene just so I can get to know them. Hell the scene could even be used to audition actors if it ever gets made (I can dream).
So it works, what's the problem? Cut the scene out of the movie and we're missing a few laughs and not much else. Maybe their entertainment value would be reason enough to keep them in. Maybe. What would be better is if the scenes performed some function other than giving the audience a laugh. Maybe later on in the movie some ball bearings are required. Presto, my alien gets his schlong out and fires a few cum pellets. Suddenly a scene of gratuitous alien self love becomes a plant for later on. Sadly I can think of no apocalypse scenario that would require the use of ball bearings.
As for Bigfoot. Do you know how few movies there are about Bigfoot? I suppose it's because we all think of HARRY AND THE HENDERSONS when we think of Bigfoot (Sasquatch and Yeti however - they sound foreign and therefore must be evil). I remember one that scared me as a child. Terrified me. An American family staying in some sort of cabin in the woods (actually looked a lot like a Butlins chalet). Not much happened that I remember except a teenage boy getting thrown through a door. SNOWBEAST scared me when I was younger too. I watched that again a few months ago and quite enjoyed it, at least I did until the other half pointed out to me that I was copying at lot of the sound effects and music out loud.
So I'm wondering what tone I should take for the movie. Should I try and be serious (which to me means boring) or go all out CABIN FEVER on this? I have 5 girls and 1 guy. I can get at least 2 sex scenes out of that. Boy girl and girl girl, maybe even a girl boy girl. Maybe more. I could have the girl the guy did it with killed and have him move on. When faced with death at the hands of a psychotic mythical simian offshoot I think all bets are off. I've got to be honest, I enjoy the all out approach more. I like sex and violence and sarcastic characters. You're supposed to write the kind of movies you want to see, movies with your own voice but I honestly think I'm too obnoxious for a modern cinema audience.
OK I'm being needlessly harsh on myself. I'm just playing.
I have "trapped" on my old computer I can no longer turn on a few films that are totally different to the kind of thing I do now. A story about a family who come together over a life (baby) and a death. A family with a secret of sexual abuse. It's about how the oldest son is frightened by the prospect of becoming a father who willingly to becomes that father to his own siblings when his mother dies and he discovers why his older sister left home like she did and what has been happening with his younger sisters. No giant robots in that one.
Another is a road movie. A mismatched couple. He's a criminal, she's a rich (ish) policeman's daughter. She picks up a stray kitten and then soon picks up a young prostitute deciding to mother them both. The road trip (I believe it had something to do with a drug deal) goes bad, the kitten dies because they leave it in the boot and forget about it and eventually so does the young girl. The kitten was like a symbol for the girl. Once the kitten dies those paying attention will soon see that she's not far behind. So we at least have a schoolgirl in that one, but she's not an assassin or a mutant killing ninja.
The last was about a guy who constantly makes the wrong decision. As he gets poorer and poorer he spirals further and further into the criminal world. Eventually he runs away with the money, thinks he's found peace but soon he loses both that and his lady in one spectacular swoop. His last act is to call the people he stole the money from and let them know where he's going to be. They come. They kill him. So it was a kind of suicide.
At the time I was really into Larry Clark and I thought these dreary depressing movies were the only ones likely to get made in Britain. It seems all the arts council is interested in is reminding us how grey and shit life is. Now I'm all about entertainment. I like indy films, I like to think of myself as quirky, left of centre and part of the counter culture but dammit I went to be making JERRY BRUCKHEIMER movies! I want to write movies that defy the recession with the amount of stops I've pulled out.
I'm going to have a Japanese schoolgirl drive a real car through a real building with real explosions going off whilst chased by giant aliens. As the camera passes the building I want to see boobs in at least one of the windows. The car will emerge through the other side and crash into some evil ninjas, slicing them up with it's razor blade bumper, blood and body parts flying everywhere. The car will then transform itself (via seamless cgi) into an armoured battle suit for my schoolgirl who will battle with, hell, anything!
For the moment though its back to Bigfoot hiding in the forest. With the "the less you see, the more scary it is approach". It's all going to be mood, suggestion and aftermath. I better get writing.
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