Brainstorm Sessions – Script Idea

Tackling the construction of my world in the best way that I can, I am going to reference the lists that we made together as a class to help flesh out the world that exists in a short film titled ‘Induction‘. This idea is a far cry from the initial idea that I had about the guard who gets knocked out in a spy/espionage type animation. The reason for me switching up ideas so late in the process is because of the feedback received from Stayci stating that I was way to narrative heavy, to the point where it begins to drive everything which wasn’t the purpose of the exercise. So now I am constructing a story that can only materialise once the world has been established.

Cultures – Main character will be Caucasian male. Very minimal cultural influence although interior design of the room will have Western influence.
Setting – A singular, square bedroom with one door and two windows, one of the walls is lined with 5 built-in closets, one of which is locked, another wall has the windows, another wall has the door and a desk and the last wall has a queen sized bed up against it. The 5th cabinet door unlocks periodically and that leads straight into a bathroom. The bathroom is clean and modern looking with black tiled floors. In the bathroom is a cabinet sink with a mirror on the wall, above the mirror is a frosted window that does not open. Next to the cabinet is a toilet and further along to the right is a glass-cubicled shower. This room is situated on the second storey in a 3-storey house, located in West Melbourne, surrounded by industrial buildings and a train line.
Boundaries (which relates to setting and character backstories) – The door to the room is locked. The boundaries are quite explicit in that whoever is within this room will not be able to get out. The door appears to be a white wooden but it’s actually metallic and super reinforced. The window is also impenetrable while appearing to be looking out, the glass is one-way and nobody on the street can see your pleas for help. Anger and rage does not help. You are only given attention when you are calm and relaxed.
Character backstory – Karl is a 21 year old who has dropped out of university due to his impatient, irreverent and cynical attitude. He has been in and out of jobs because of his volatile personality. Desperate for money, Karl takes the shortcut of applying to a super shady advert for a highly established and well regarded company that has a successful, IKEA-like furniture store.
Rules (internal logic) – You cannot get out of the room, you are locked in. The door to the cabinet unlocks three times a day, morning (8:30am), noon(12:30pm) and night (8:30pm) and the door only opens to the bathroom. Once entering the bathroom a countdown timer set for 45 minutes begins to tick over. If you’re in the bathroom when the timer expires the door locks and will not unlock again until the next scheduled door unlock. All the main fixtures of the rooms (door, window, shower, mirror, walls) are indestructible. You can break the objects on the tables all you want but they will be replaced the next morning. Every night at 3am a sleeping gas is dispensed into the room so if you’re awake past that time, you won’t be very soon. Meals are presented with you 3 times a day, breakfast (9:30am), lunch (12:00pm) and dinner (8:00pm). Dishes are removed overnight. Basically the room is reset over night. Meals are distributed out of a secret chute in the closet. The meals will not be delivered as long as the cabinet door is open. Calm behaviour seems to be the key to getting out of this place. A voice will speak to you and explain little pieces of your life if you remain calm for an extended period.
Genre (which affects the way you present the world and also the rules of it) – Thriller.
Social constructs – There aren’t many social constructs in this world as there are minimal characters in this. There is a small degree of hierarchy with Karl and the man on the speaker, with the man on the speaker clearly being the one in control.
Political structures – Not too applicable at this point.
Incentive – To get out of the room and find out why you are there. Isolation is a lonely existence and getting out will surely get you back to the real world.
Pressure/outside forces – Nothing is coming to save Karl, nobody knows that he is in this dilemma. The urgency comes from within Karl himself to find a way out of this place.
Scope of characters – Very minimal. Karl, man on the speaker and the assumed grunts who clean the room every night.
Problems – Karl is stuck in this world. His current existence is literally how constricting the world he is currently in is. There is more world out there but he is legitimately confined to this one.
Tone – Isolated, quiet, frantic, desperate, solemn, ominous. Quite a wide spectrum that dances between manic and mundane. Some emotions that I feel naturally come from being locked in a room.
Weather/climate – Internal, untouched from the elements, internal air conditioning keeps the room at a constant comfortable 23 degrees at all times.
environmental conditions – Steady, consistent, safe from the elements, isolated.
Colour/costume – Diffused lighting, basic, cream walls, black curtains, brown wooden floors, black and white bathroom.
Sounds – Diegetic, the sounds of the street outside, the sounds of the nearby train. The countdown clock.

As I went through each point, the world began to not expand outwards but it became denser. The rules became more and more clear cut. This was a decision I had to make early on because it was so easy to make things bigger to fit more things in but in reality the nature of this world is that it is cripplingly contained but it has all the necessities for a human being to live inside of. Flickers of story began to flow through my mind the further I got along which was a great sign! Rather than my first idea, crafting a world that fits this story, I found that making a rich and dense world gave me so many more naturally occurring ideas on story and plot.

In my presentation I hope to prompt heaps of questions from those who hear it. I want there to be a lot of mystery surrounding this room and the situation. I specifically want to use a second-hand perspective in my pitch and hopefully give the audience a clear vision of what I’m seeing.