[Anne]

Anne’s Arctic Animals Horror Situation Track
What I learned doing this assignment is: Act 1 was relatively easy and heavily pulled from denial and/or trying to solve it. Act 2 and 3 were more difficult as a clear vision of the entire storyline had not yet emerged when I did the prior plot exercise. Not sure what reaction a victim can have to torture if they are unable to hide/fight back/escape.
ACT 1 – Set-up
– Atmosphere of Evil established: A 20’s female frantically runs from something or someone across an Arctic expanse. She reaches a cliff edge, stops, turns and faces her pursuer, then turns back and jumps off the cliff into the freezing water below.
o Horror Situation: Pursued in a dangerous area
o Reaction – Escape: Choosing death over being caught
– Connect with the Characters: Modern day. Protagonist college undergrad science student Molly goes to an intro planning meeting of the annual summer arctic study science team. Team members are introduced; Molly is the junior member and only woman.
o Horror Situation: Isolated situation described & risks hinted at
o Reaction – Denial: Molly ignores risks
– Warning: Woman science department admin tells Molly that the sole women members of the last two years’ teams died – one committed suicide and the other had an accident.
o Horror Situation: History of death – predecessors died
o Reaction – Denial: Molly proceeds despite new info that increases the risks
– Denial of Horror: Naïve and friendly with three of the male team members, Molly needs this summer work for the money and her resume for grad school.
o Horror Situation: Predators recognize Molly’s desperation & target her as their prey
o Reaction – Denial: Desperate and trusting of friends, Molly accepts the known risks
– Safety Taken Away: On the boat to the isolated arctic island, entering zone of no cell coverage. Team leader has only satellite phone. Team leader and his minions make Molly uncomfortable.
o Horror Situation: Geographic and communication isolation
o Reaction – Denial: Molly senses trap/danger but too late to turn back
– Monster: They land and set up camp. Molly overhears the slave role the team leader has planned for her. No other team members, even her friends, object. The boat leaves.
o Horror Situation: Molly lured into their trap, her tormenters reveal their plans.
o Reaction – Try to Solve it: As the dangers become apparent, Molly tries to defuse, stop, or escape the situation.
ACT 2 – The Point of No Return
– Isolated/Trapped/Abducted: Subordination of Molly by the team leader and his minions turns to enslavement Molly. She is threatened then punished when she doesn’t follow their orders.
o Horror Situation: Molly is surveilled 24/7; Her fear feeds her predators’ violence.
o Reaction- Hide: Molly tries to hide & mask her fear.
o Horror Situation: Molly is forced into servitude and to perform demeaning acts.
o Reaction – Try to Solve it: Molly tries arguments, then deal making, finally pleading with her tormenters
o Horror Situation: Molly is punished.
o Reaction – Try to Solve it: Molly goes to friends on team for help.
– One Killed: One friend betrays Molly. In a ceremony, the team formally converts her from a person to their property, cages her, and forces betrayer to brand her. Molly strikes back and injures one tormenter which only escalates the tormenters’ violence against her. She is one against many. She finds a note left by her dead predecessor detailing the cruelty the team inflicted was driving her to commit suicide and detailing possible options for survival.
o Horror Situation: Betrayed by friend; caged & made property; branded by friend.
o Reaction – Fight Back:
o Horror Situation: Branding; torture.
o Reaction – Fight – Molly strikes back and injures one tormenter.
o Horror Situation: Dead predecessor’s note informs Molly of extent of horrors to come
o Reaction – Try to Solve it: Molly’s focus shifts to planning for survival and escape.
– MIDPOINT – The Monster is worse than we thought: Torture increases. Rapes begin. Molly begs for help from the two remaining team member friends. One refuses. The other friend helps her but is killed in an “accident” by the team leader, with Molly set-up to be blamed for his death. No friends left, Molly escapes the camp and hides in a cave.
o Horror Situation: Rape.
o Reaction – Escape: Molly plans escape with help from friend.
o Horror Situation: Only friend killed; Molly blamed for death.
o Reaction – Escape/Hide: First escape – Molly hides in cave.
– Full Pursuit by the Killer: The team sends a 2 man patrol (betrayer/brander and another minion) to find Molly & bring her back for punishment. Molly kills her betrayer/brander. Minion flees and reports death to team. Molly attempts to communicate with the outside world.
o Horror situation: Patrol hunts Molly for capture.
o Reaction – Fight Back: Molly kills her betrayer/brander.
o Horror situation: Molly’s attempt to communicate/be rescued is thwarted by storm.
o Horror situation: Arctic storm; freezing temps.
o Reaction – Survival: Storm obscures Molly’s hideout but she is not prepared for its effects.
o Horror Situation: While in the cave, Molly discovers she is pregnant by rape.
o Reaction – Denial followed by Fight back: Molly is stunned at first but vows to survive at any cost.
– Terrorized: The team is united in its blame of and rage towards Molly. The team holds a ritual like planning meeting. They plan to drive her out via starvation and mental torture (loud music at night) and then kill her for revenge and to protect themselves.
o Horror Situation: Starvation; Sleep deprivation.
o Reaction – Fight back: Molly fights off rats, steals food, disables loud speaker.
ACT 3 – Full out Horror
– Fight to the Death: Once the storm lifts, Molly lays traps for the team. The team pursues a full-out hunt for her. Molly kills several, and traps the leader, but she is injured. Only the last former friend who previously refused to help her remains.
o Horror Situation: Molly is hunted – this time to be killed.
o Reaction – Fight back: Molly sets traps.
– Hysteria: Molly is injured, broken down. She doesn’t know if she can continue.
o Horror Situation: Injury weakens Molly’s defenses and prevents her from rescue attempts.
o Reaction – Try to Solve it: Molly treats her own injury and tries to compensate for it.
– Thrilling escape from Death: Last remaining friend appears willing to help Molly. They repair the radio and issue an SOS.
o Horror Situation: Molly can’t survive by herself, but the only option is her former on-off friend.
o Reaction- Denial & Try to Solve it: Molly takes a chance and makes a pact with former friend whereby both survive and blame the others.
– Death returns to take one more: Team leader, thought to be dead, escapes his trap and tries to kill Molly again. They fight with last remaining friend looking on. Molly shoves team leader over cliff. Last friend tries to make excuses for inaction. She asks for his help before pushing him off the same cliff as in the intro.
o Horror Situation: Team leader escapes and returns to kill Molly. Last friend oscillates on who to help.
o Reaction – Fight: Molly kills team leader by pushing him over the cliff. She takes revenge on false friend – pushing him over cliff as well.
– Resolution: Pregnant Molly is lone survivor.

[Anne]

Anne’s Arctic Animals Horror Plot
What I learned doing this assignment is: From the Purge example, the hunters and the hunted can change roles. “Good” characters can be revealed as “evil”.
ACT 1 – Set-up
– Atmosphere of Evil established: A 20’s female frantically runs from something or someone across an Arctic expanse. She reaches a cliff edge, stops, turns and faces her pursuer, then turns back and jumps off the cliff into the freezing water below.
– Connect with the Characters: Modern day. Protagonist college undergrad science student Molly goes to an intro planning meeting of the annual summer arctic study science team. Team members are introduced; Molly is the junior member and only woman.
– Warning: Woman science department admin tells Molly that the sole women members of the last two years’ teams died – one committed suicide and the other had an accident.
– Denial of Horror: Naïve and friendly with three of the male team members, Molly needs this summer work for the money and her resume for grad school.
– Safety Taken Away: On the boat to the isolated arctic island, entering zone of no cell coverage. Team leader has only satellite phone. Team leader and his minions make Molly uncomfortable.
– Monster: They land and set up camp. Molly overhears the slave role the team leader has planned for her. No other team members, even her friends, object.
ACT 2 – The Point of No Return
– Isolated/Trapped/Abducted: The evil acts of the team leader and his minions towards Molly increase to rape. She is threatened then punished when she doesn’t give in. She finds a note left by her predecessor last year detailing the cruelty the team inflicted.
– One Killed: Molly begs for help from her team member friends. One refuses. One tries to help her but when discovered is killed in an “accident.” The third says he will help in secret but has to appear to stay united with the team leader and his minions.
MIDPOINT – The Monster is worse than we thought
– Full Pursuit by the Killer: One month in, Molly is pregnant by one of the team. The team plans to kill her to protect themselves. Molly escapes the camp and hides in a remote area.
– Terrorized: The team hunts Molly.
ACT 3 – Full out Horror
– Fight to the Death: Molly lays traps for the hunters. She succeeds in killing several, including the team leader.
– Hysteria: Molly is injured, broken down. She doesn’t know if she can continue.
– Thrilling escape from Death: Last remaining friend appears willing to help Molly.
– Death returns to take one more: Team leader, thought to be dead, returns and tries to kill both. Last remaining friend turns on Molly. She pushes him off the same cliff as in the intro.
– Resolution: Pregnant Molly is lone survivor.

[Anne]

ANDE’s TERRIFYING MONSTER

From this assignment, I learned to reconsider making my monster unseen, at least at first and at least in part. My initial concept is to have the individually nice normal seeming guys that make up the rest of the scientific team) de-evolve into a single-minded dog-pack stalker/slaver group (“Monster Group”).

Terror: The Monster Group starts the terror in small ways – restricting protagonist to subservient roles & excluding her from the team. Their demeaning actions progress to essentially enslaving the protagonist including sexual slavery and threats of death or forced “suicide” to cover-up their actions.

Mystery: See above. Why is the Monster Group violent towards the protagonist. How can she survive? Can she divide the group into smaller more manageable parts?
Fear Provoking Appearance: At first, the Monster Group exhibit their normal nice guy appearances. But as the script progresses, they de-evolve into almost caricature neanderthal types (unkempt beards, sticks in their hair, mud used as “war paint”, wearing fewer clothes, etc.). At the very end, the few remaining, might “clean up” again to show that evil can lurk beneath a normal surface.

Rules:
– The Monster Group individuals are kings of their summer island kingdom. Their rules override societal norms.
– The Monster Group individuals are united – their consistent testimonies will over-ride inconsistent allegations of the protagonist. They will win a he said/she said battle.
– The Monster Group has professional power over the protagonist. They can ruin her career plans and reputation.
– They are many; she is alone.
– They prepared; she was unprepared.
– She is a plaything, a disposable amusement to the Monster Group. Her life, sanity, and career are at stake.

Mythology: Drop hints as to why these seemingly normal individual nice guys, when combined into a group and isolated, could behave as monsters.

• This reply was modified 1 year, 1 month ago by  Anne.

[Anne]

Title: LATE NIGHT WITH THE DEVIL; Concept: On Halloween 1977, a live tv talk, desperate for ratings, features a paranormal line-up that goes horribly wrong.
Terrorize the Characters: Relentless pressure on the tv talk host for ratings at any price; Death of the first guest; demon emergence from a young girl guest
Isolation: a film set during live taping
Death: The talk show host’s wife in flashback, several guests during the live taping
Monster/Villain: Demon that takes the form of a young girl
High Tension: Will real paranormal actions occur on live tv – what will the demon do/say?
Departure from Reality: Levitation, talk show guests dying on live tv
Moral Statement: Is success worth the cost?
***
MY CONCEPT: Adult Lord of the Flies where a group of male scientists turn on their sole female teammate during a summer field project on an isolated arctic island.
Terrorize the Character: Girl geologist is first enslaved, and then hunted down, by her scientific team mates
Isolation: Arctic island (no cell phones)
Death: Girl geologist kills her attackers, one by one, to save herself
Monster Villain: “Dog Pack” of male scientists – as a group, they do worse things than they would individually do
High Tension: Will they get to her before she can strike back
Departure from Reality: Girl geologist as McIver type – are her defensive/offensive actions believable
Moral statement: Can group dynamics/dog pack mentality make a non-killer into a killer?
AnDe

[Anne]

Greetings! My name is Anne Denise, but I go by AnDe. I’ve completed two screenplays, and have several more still “in progress” all in the horror/thriller/suspense genre exploring underlying feminist/social themes. In addition to improving my screenplays (current and future), I am thinking about converting one or more into book form and think this class will be helpful in “fleshing them out” for books. Unusual fact: I’m a recovering geophysicist who previously worked on projects from above the Canadian arctic circle to the extreme tip of South America.

[Anne]

What I (Anne Denise / AnDe) learned during this assignment is: Lose perfection as the goal; strip the screenplay down to its essence.

SUBJECT: FINAL EMERGENCE PROJECT PITCH

A. Genre = Horror

B. Title = Final Emergence

C. High Concept = Desperate aging actress Lauren commits to do whatever it whatever it takes to reclaim the physique and success of her younger self and resurrect her career – including tapeworms and other experimental treatments at a Mexican clinic located in an isolated butterfly preserve.

D. Main Conflict = To survive the clinic’s potentially fatal program, Lauren must overcome dangerous risks imposed by the clinic’s director.

E. Transformational Journey = Lauren evolves, mentally and physically, to meet head-on each increased risk until finally achieving her goals requires a life or death struggle with the clinic’s director.

F. Opposition = The clinic’s promise of a medically supervised accelerated weight loss transformation program masks the director’s true purpose of radical experimentation in search of a cure for other diseases.

[Anne]

1. Anne Denise Weber (“AnDe”)

2. One script completed, recognized as a finalist in competitions; several scripts still in draft.

3. Each script reflects a part of my life experience and I commit to doing the hard work to make each one the best it can be.

4. A life-long horror fan, the grit of that genre’s “final girl” trope inspired me to take risks. Using my life experience navigating those risks, I aim to refresh & rejuvenate the horror genre. My thriller/horror stories with universal feminist & social themes originate from my work as a geologist and attorney in a dangerous male-dominated field from the Arctic Circle to the tip of South America.

[Anne]

Anne Weber

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