Lesson 4

[Claudia OBrien]

Subject Line: Claudia O’Brien’s Subtext Plot

My vision: To become the best screenwriter I can be, and to find success in the industry.

What I learned from doing this assignment is again, doing this analysis up front will allow for more depth in the screenplay and for a better first draft. I’m already thinking about how I need to go back to my earlier screenplays, using this process to elevate them.

My overall concept: Grace, a nurse in the WWII Women’s Army Corps battles racism, sexism and incompetence as she tries to save the life of a badly injured Tuskegee airman.

My subtext plot is someone hides who they are. Grace’s fellow nurse and best friend, Ann Wahl, is a closet lesbian and secretly in love with Grace. Ann subtly pushes Grace to think for herself and to dare to defy conventions. She succeeds, helping Grace to develop the inner strength to pursue a socially unacceptable love affair – with Booker, a Black man.

A secondary subtext plot will be competitive agendas. Grace and Ann’s (male, misogynistic) commanding officer does not believe that women are competent to provide medical care, nor that scarce medical resources should be used to save the lives of Black soldiers. He seeks to undermine their work to prove his point of view, while Grace and Ann struggle to push back without technically being insubordinate.

[Tony Scott]

Tony J. Scott Transformational Journey

My true vision as a writer is to fall in love with writing and stay motivated to write from the love of writing and not as a chore and then hoping others will love my creations and become well known as a top writer in the screenplay community.

In order to give the story depth and help make the main character relatable to the audience he/she has to go through natural occurrences to create layers.

LOGLINE: A young black woman suffering from a blood disorder time travels to Savannah Georgia 1863 to discover a cure and save her life.

· GENRE: DRAMA SCYFY HORROR

· TITLE: TWO YEARS PAST FREEDOM

· HIGH CONCEPT: A young black woman must time travel to kill her pure blood vampire ancestor before someone else does or she’ll spend the rest of her life as a vampire.

· STORY HOOK: On Najah Blackman’s 21^st birthday she’s given an ancient family heirloom causing her to time travel to a slave plantation in Savannah 1863 to devise a plan to kill her vampire ancestor or live her life as a vampire in the future and altering history forever.

SUBTEXTS PLOTS:

· Someone hides who they are: Najah Blackman time travels to a slave plantation and has to pretend she is a bonded slave from Texas. She has to also hide the fact that she more than anything wants to kill her vampire ancestor and hope it will prevent her from turning into a vampire when she returns to the future.

· Competitive Agendas: In order to successfully end the ancient vampire curse she’s facing, Najah must kill her great ancestor-grandfather before the vampire hunters are successful killing him. CPT: Stanley is in command of a special vampire hunter squad posing as North freedom fighters and emancipation proclamators.

[Ron Johnson]

Ron’s Plot Subtext.

My Vision: I want a space that is dedicated to writing, so I can have an entire wall for notecard storyboarding. I want my projects to advance in competitions and then be requested by the studios. I want to see those projects in festivals, in theaters, on streaming platforms. I want writing and producing to be my full time job.

What I learned doing this assignment is that knowing my subtext before hand will save me time and headaches in future drafts and allow me to finish my script in a much quicker and efficient time frame.

After Eddie kills a drug dealer in self defense, a dirty cop forces Eddie to take the confidential informants place to make up for lost revenue. Eddie does as he’s told and pulls in a thread that leads to corruption at the highest levels.

I’m using two subtext plots, Layering and Fish out of water.

Subtext:

Shock of having to replace the lost cocaine any means aka robbery

dealing with the guilt of having killed someone.

fear of selling drugs and not knowing the lingo, the craft

Can he do undercover work without training?

Afraid of his past, father was murdered

Fear of the justice system.

• This reply was modified 1 year, 9 months ago by  Ron Johnson.

[Mahee Sanapareddy]

Mahee’s Transformational Journey

My Vision – I want to be a great writer who is well-respected and recognized in the industry, with successful books published and blockbuster movies produced. I want to create a successful movie franchise that audiences all over the world will love, rave about, look forward to, and continue to enjoy many years from now.

What I learned from doing this assignment is to use subtext plots to create the story beneath the surface.

Concept – When a prominent black historian studying an ancient tribe is brutally murdered, his son must embark on an interdimensional journey to find the assassin.

My main choice of subtext plot is Layering.

Trevon Campbell loves his father but disagrees with his old-school philosophy. He is greatly influenced by the actions of his father’s nemesis, Reverend Duvernay, a local hegemon and a power-grabber whose main intention is to climb the political ladder. When Trevon finds his father brutally murdered, he comes to learn that the assassin is not of this world. To find the assassin, he must embark on an interdimensional journey with the help of Sean Madden, a reluctant interdimensional traveler, who has his own apprehension about the mission. When the journey takes them to an alien world, Trevon is shocked to learn that the same story is playing itself out there, the climax of which could cause serious repercussions back in his own world.

[Will Jennings]

Will Jennings: Subtext Plot

My Vision: I will write movies that are extremely funny and entertaining that bring a sense of satisfaction and fulfillment to a world starving for true enjoyment.

What I learned from doing this assignment is a lot is going on under the surface. The audience will love their very superior position.

Concept: Two young princesses come from a Fairy Tale World to try and make Earth a better place. Whatever they envision on their cell phones and tablets, comes to life.

Superior Position: Both the audience and the twins know they are from Fairyland since they are shown being transported through a wormhole from the control room that doubles as a jumbotron so the inhabitants can watch the girls’ escapades on Earth.

The Fish Out of Water: Two royal princesses are commanded by their mother the Queen to go to Earth to try and help junior high kids that run the scope from painfully shy to horribly arrogant. The mother was worried the daughters would end up like Julia Roberts in Mirror Mirror.

[Maureen Tilyou]

Maureen’s Subtext Plots.

MY VISION: By nurturing fun and curiosity in the writing process, I will do my very best to create a successful writing career full of love, full of awe, full of productivity, and full of joy!

What I learned doing this assignment is that a lot of the choices for Subtext Plots seemed relevant to my story, so I had to really think about which two had the most apparent potential to create subtext throughout the story.

Concept: When a psychologically damaged genius invents a new mode of hacking & stumbles upon a plot to trick the nations of the world into giving up their sovereignty, he pushes himself to embark on the impossible– to somehow warn a world where no one can be trusted, while an omnipresent network of AI hunts him down.

I’m choosing ‘Layering’ and ‘Fish out of Water’ as my Subtext Plots,

I chose ‘Layering’ because it allows for the opportunity to have subtext meaning revealed later in the script, and that fits the type of story. Since this is a story involving a Secret Plot with hidden elements and alliances to be revealed later in the script, a Layering Subtext Plot will help me develop that underbelly and hopefully intrigue the audience with hints that will only be fully realized toward the end.

I am choosing ‘Fish Out of Water’ because Daniel is and has always been an outsider who people have reactions to that they tend to hide. He is a genius with psychological issues that make people uncomfortable. Some people think he’s dangerous, but when he is brought in, they have to work with him because it is clear that his contribution is enormous. There is also a layer of subterfuge here that will be covered up by the ‘Fish Out of Water’ reactions, until it becomes clear (Layering) that it was something other than what it appeared.

• This reply was modified 1 year, 9 months ago by  Maureen Tilyou.

[Tully Archer]

Tully’s Subtext Plot(s)

PRIMARY: Competitive Agendas

SECONDARY: Fish Out Of Water

COMPETITIVE AGENDAS:

Kavish’s goal is to proceed along the traditional prescribed marriage and children path. Lacey’s goal is to break up with him and escape this town and her family and live a crazy made-up-as-she-goes life. Meanwhile what Kavish REALLY wants is to be a stay-at-home dad, not the traditional provider role. And what Lacey REALLY wants it to keep her (best friend and) fiance Kavish in her life and have that freedom – she just doesn’t think she can have both.

FISH OUT OF WATER:

Neither of them have ever lived in a haunted house before. They don’t know what it’s like. They have to learn the ghost’s patterns, and navigate them. They also have to re-figure their worldviews, and they wind up exploring other elements of the supernatural during the task of helping the ghost.

[Natasha Paris]

I am a uniquely amazing, inspiring, prolific, and successful writer/director whose name alone sales. I have a huge following because I help change the world for the better.

Missing in Costa Rica

Genre: Thriller

Based on a true story, a sister retraces the steps of her missing sister in a foreign country.

Scheme and Investigation: One sister Mia schemed her disappearance while the other sister, Victoria, tries to find her and find clues. Mia has planned her ways of trying to find her and has clean her path.

The Fish Out of Water: Victoria fins herself in a world she doesn’t know how to maneuver. When her father and husband go to Costa Rica, they also find themselves as fish out of water.

[Anna Burroughs-Merrill]

Subject Line: Anna’s Subtext Plot

My personal vision: to get my writing mojo back.

What I learned from doing this assignment: this was rather fun. A long time brainstorming, and then had to pick our short tidbits for the assignment.

Title: La Sirène (The Mermaid)

Genre: Thriller

Concept: A Coast Guard maverick suspects that his wheel-chair-bound oceanography professor, who holds the fate of his career in her hands, is involved in a series of terrorist attacks against poachers by killer dolphins.

Subtext Plot: Someone hides who they are

Secondary subtext plots (fish out of water; scheme and investigation)

How this subtext will play out:

On the Surface: Jacob must learn to coordinate his crew to perform near-shore environmental protection and public safety duties as an officer, all while solving a series of eco-terrorist attacks against boats using “killer dolphins”.

Beneath The Surface: Jacob is dealing with what appears to be a cover up when his environmental professor turns out to have experience training dolphins, but the powers that be tell him to butt out. What is Lorelei hiding?

(….maybe FLIPPERS…?)