Bird's Eye View Video Outline

From an email sent to my buddy Malcolm, who will be playing Luke in the video

Please offer any all criticism and additions/subtractions/opinions

I really want this to be good. Water outline coming next

Overall story of the project- Luke has decided to forsake that which other hold valuable and travel into the wilderness. Inspired by "Into the Wild," Luke is attempting to obtain a better Bird's Eye View of the world, to find what is most important, and necessary, for true success and happiness. 

Of course, Luke's first thought is to escape civilization, to regress to a simpler way of life. The problem with this is that the world is so overdeveloped, that he has to keep going further and further into the woods to find less and less signs of cilivilization. Whether it's old roads, airplanes, candy wrappers, power lines, etc. each example of society drives him further into the woods, until he has gone so far into the woods that Luke comes back out the other side, right into San Francisco. It is here that Luke has come full circle, and has a new appreciation for modern life, steel, and knows that to be human is to constantly strive for better, to create, to build. It can be done with respect for the past, for nature, for our history.

We fear change, but it is important, and integral, to our evolution to keep growing better, more efficient.

2, 3, 4

CUT TO:

-Back of Luke's head, bobbing slowly in the pool, almost to the beat, staring at house. 

(I liked your idea of the album cover homage a lot, and I thought a great way to take it a step further would be to show the "back cover" of the album, i.e. what is going on in the other direction- in this case, what is George looking at. Hopefully we can find a handful more album covers that we can flip like this.)

Head slowly submerges

Cut to

-Luke's eyes just before they go underwater, bubbles, and then stillness, until, facing away from camera, Luke emerges from the pool fully clothed and heads off into the woods. (Shot to be filmed in reverse, with fully clothed Luke walking backwards and dipping into the pool.)

Cut to

-Woods shots: at first excited about the journey, then growing more and more frustrated by lack of untouched nature. 

-Shot of Luke on old abandoned roads, grass growing up through concrete.

-Luke watching a plane fly overhead

Cut to

-Luke emerging from Marin Headlands to see the Golden Gate Bridge, truly admiring it's beauty, while struggling to understand where the rest of the woods are. The naked earth is no more.

Cut to

-HOOK: Luke partying out of the sunroof of the car, flying across the bridge

Cut to - VERSE 2

.....to be continued

Other shots-

Balloon shots on beach, marina

Luke walking down Lombard, jump cuts to speed up travel

It's not a porno, but it's good

I highly highly recommend Freebie and the Bean.

Fast paced, really funny, great action, and two great actors at the helm looking like they're having a lot of fun. The feel of the movie is so unique, it still feels fresh after 40 years.

About Preparing for a reality

To lighten the mood of the earlier post, here's a great example of trying to figure out what the reality of your movie is going to be, what the rules are

Cage Did Serious Research For Alcoholic Role

Nicolas Cage has revealed that the best research he's ever done for a part involved getting very drunk in Ireland. Cage went to Dublin for a two-week drinking binge for his role in Leaving Las Vegas (1995). The actor who played a Irish alcoholic in the movie, drank a 'ferocious' amount of Guinness and got a pal to videotape him under the influence so he could study the footage later. The star who won an Oscar in 1996 for his part in the movie, admitted that it was being away from home that gave him his drinking freedom. He says, "That's the beauty of staying in a hotel; you can drink and drink until you fall over, and no one need see you. I must admit, it was one of the most enjoyable pieces of research I've ever had to do for a part."

Reality and Rules

A quote from Todd Phillips about the Hangover, taken way out of context


"I'd love to say the movie is very real-feeling, and everything in the movie is real, and I love comedies that are real"


It's incredibly important to create a reality in any story. Like you mentioned about Dumb and Dumber deleted scenes, they felt off because they ruined the truth and reality of the character. He wasn't playing by his own rules any more, and it didn't work.

Think about in your own daily life, what rules you follow, how you talk. I got in some trouble today for making a comment about Pakistanis, but within my set of rules, and reality, the comment was okay. That's why some comedians are so successful. They have a different set of boundaries, but they absolutely have boundaries, and a reality that they exist in, where certain jokes work, and others don't.

It's what makes collaborating with others so difficult and so rewarding- we have difficulty following someone else's reality and rules, but at the same time we can create a mutual set that governs the ideas of both of us. The same way that a solo album sounds different from a band's album, so does branding allow for something to be a part of one group and not the other.

I think about BRM- the site had certain rules. While we maybe outright said them, we all felt at times that things that were contributed by ourselves and others were maybe pushing the limits, or even totally out of bounds. A lot of times we need to see that to understand what it looks like. To quote poorly the Supreme Court, "I know porn when I see it."

So for a movie to be successful, engaging, etc., at it's very core, it has to depict a real world. It shouldn't be the world that the viewer lives in, it shouldn't be the world that the writer lives in (because that's too easy) but it needs to have a reality, and a set of rules.

If two guys are going to drive across the country, they need to have a way of paying for it. It allows for the audience to reflect upon themselves, and ask, "could I do something like this?" It's a huge part about why Batman and Iron Man are so successful, and mostly likely why they changed the new Spiderman to have him build his webshooters. It creates something that is much more accessible.

Reading this again, it all seems pretty common sense, but sometimes it's good to write it out loud. I'm amazed by how much stuff I learned in college was right on the surface- anyone could grab it, the professor just did it a little better than the next guy.


At the end of One Way Ticket, the movie fails if we have not created a reality where the psychiatrist kills herself.

In Annisquam 2, ghost pirate zombies will not work unless they come from a real place, and have rules that they too have to obey - this leads to the whole outbreak debate, and the fast/slow zombie stuff, and you realize how important these little things are before you can progress with the story. This is also why the Avengers movie has had about a 5 hour prologue when you combine all the other Marvel movies that have come before it- they have spent an incredible amount of time/money/effort to create a world where all of these mutations and superheroes, gods and humans and monsters, can coexist. I don't have high hopes for The Avengers, but it is damn impressive that it's being made.

The end - I am currently considering taking a job that may make me hate things that I used to love, and I wanted to think about anything else for a moment - the end

Water

Final shot should be Sammy attempting to walk on the water himself and splashing in "say to you right noooooooooowwwwww"/splash

Maybe concept is seeing so much about Vegas, and then all he wants to do in Vegas is all the stuff he's seen in movies - reenact famous shots/moments instead of discover Vegas for himself

First verse should be Young Sammy, first hook is grown up Sammy

Definitely need some shots on the airplane of sammy watching vegas movies on his ipad, view of the strip as hes flying in

Fear and Loathing in Las Vegas
Casino
The Hangover
Leaving Las Vegas
Rain Man
Ocean's 11/13
Swingers
Go
Very Bad Things
What happens in Vegas (one of us will have to take the bullet and watch this for research purposes- maybe Kayla?)
Godfather Part 2
21
Showgirls
Bugsy
Austin Powers
Honeymoon in Vegas
Honey I Blew up the Kid (kid plays the Hard Rock Guitar)
Con Air (plane smashes the Hard Rock Guitar, but misses the Kid)

And I think the third Resident Evil had some vegas stuff in it


More to be continued with on

While I sit here twisting my moustache...

I've been reading a lot of articles about

-the difficulty in growing up.

http://news.yahoo.com/retreat-aims-young-mens-failure-launch-183924168.html


-and the "worthlessness" of higher education

http://techcrunch.com/2011/11/12/10-things-entrepreneurs-dont-learn-in-college/


Real talk stuff. There are definitely a lot of people out there who are just as scared shitless about the world as I am. And I think that's okay.

Payback is a biiiiitch

HPV story

HPV, not just for boys anymore. Looks like the deadliest dick just became the deadliest box. I knew that little loophole was too good to be true. You know what really sucks though? Only the guys nice enough to orally please their lady get punished. Guys who just ram it in there have all the luck.