From Script to Screen OGR Part 2 by Francis on Scribd
I am yet to finish my script, I still just can't figure out how I can construct the escape of the birds well enough. I have little to no ideas about how they could escape in an entertaining way.From Script to Screen OGR Part 2 by Francis on Scribd
I am yet to finish my script, I still just can't figure out how I can construct the escape of the birds well enough. I have little to no ideas about how they could escape in an entertaining way.
OGR 09/02/2018
ReplyDeleteHey Francis... Hmm isn't this your problem to solve? Isn't this the difficult bit? The 3rd Act? Do you think you should have committed to drawing a storyboard for a film without an ending? This is probably why we suggested you work out your step-outline before you do anything else to ensure you're not giving time to a story that doesn't work yet...
Maybe some things at the front have to change to give you the ending; so the birds are dead, so it's not as if they can escape to the outside of the shop because they're dead, so their goal is to get out of the shop because they've been denied their afterlife. Imagine the shop is a kind of purgatory and because they are stuffed, they're trapped in this half-place. So the goal is to escape to 'cross-over' and continue their 'after-lives' in freedom. So, as they're all dead, they get this one chance - on Halloween? - to cross-over, but of course they're trapped in the shop. This is their goal and they have a time limit in order to achieve it. Meanwhile, the shop-keeper wants to throw them away, which would mean they never get the chance to cross.
You have to ask yourself why they never got out before on a previous Halloween, and that's because maybe there's a grille on the window to protect the valuables in the shop window. That's why they haven't got out before. You could structure it so the birds have had multiple Halloweens to figure out their plan - so you could have references like 'But we tried that last Halloween etc'. Something about this Halloween has to be different - and that difference is the shopkeeper is preparing to ditch the birds to make room for something else. Maybe it's as simple as this; the shopkeeper has a key to the grille on the window. The grille is electronic - controlled by a button that is inside a box that is locked. The shopkeeper lives in the back of the shop - and he sleeps with the key on him at all times. The birds have to get the key without waking him, to open the box to reveal the button, which opens the grille, so they can smash the shop window and escape into the night (and into the afterlife). The parcel is used at the beginning because this is how we know the shopkeeper is going to chuck out the birds - perhaps the parcel is branded with the words 'Henry's Incinerators' etc so we know the fate of the birds right way. I think maybe you may need the Owl to be part of the good guys, or things could get too complex. Indeed, the owl could be used - being the wise one - to explain the scenario itself. Imagine you have another stuffed bird - a new one - and this is this bird's first Halloween so doesn't know anything about the previous escape attempts, and doesn't know anything about what's at stake. The Owl could be used to explain what's happening, thus telling the audience too and setting up the plot.
What's interesting here is how dialogue driven your story is - in this instance, I think you need it because your characters are enlivened in this way. Lots of quick-fire banter (that's already a nice element of your script).
ReplyDeleteSo - it could be set-up as quickly as this:
We see the shop-keeper put a heavy box against the door - we see it's headed for the incinerators. We're shown the shop-keeper lowering the outside grille on the window, locking the button box and putting the key on his belt. He leaves - the lights go out; a calendar tells us it's Halloween; suddenly, the box shakes, a bunch of ragged birds pour out - a small bird says 'What's happening? What's going on?' 'He's ditching the taxidermy' replies another bird. 'He's replacing us with cuckoo clocks!' and so it begins and then the owl tells us what's at stake, what they have to do - by the end of Act 1, you could have set things up so they have to get the key - Act 2 is getting the key of the sleeping shop-keeper - Act 3 is getting out...
It occurs to me that maybe you can still have a villain - the shopkeeper's cat? I don't want to make your life any more busy, but if you did have a villain as an obstacle, I think your Act 2/3 could come together quite fast - because it could go all a bit more Coyote and Roadrunner...
So my instincts are you don't have a clear ending because the initial set-up wasn't quite giving you enough. I'm not suggesting I've solved it here, but I do think you need to be prepared to revisit your set-up accordingly.