Jean Knowlton
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Abandoning my first idea, since it’s more a spiritually-based screenplay than action adventure. Here’s my new project
OUTLINE:
Title: Taking Out the Trash
Act 1: The Unraveling
Opening Scene:
• Video Montage: Clips of Trump, Vance, Musk, Abbott, DeSantis, Alito, Kavanaugh, and Thomas being arrested by the F.B.I. The video shows jubilant reactions from the public and employees.
• NEWSCASTER (BLAKE SIMONS): Announces the arrests and the charges of treason, fraud, and election interference. Mentions the involvement of Jack Smith and the F.B.I. in uncovering the plot.
Inciting Incident:
• Blake Simons rushes to the newsroom, where he discusses the shocking news with Laura Kline. They speculate on the potential fallout and the possibility of martial law being declared.
Setting the Stakes:
• The newsroom is abuzz with activity as they try to get more information from White House sources. The tension is palpable as they anticipate violent protests from Trump supporters.
Act 2: The Investigation
Building the Tension:
• Paul, a journalist in Russia, reports on Putin’s explosive reaction to the news. The Department of State arranges for journalists to leave Russia, but Paul is reluctant to go. Laura convinces him to leave for his safety.
• The International Court charges Putin with war crimes, espionage, and the murder of Navalny. This adds an international dimension to the unfolding drama.
Midpoint:
• A whistleblower reveals that Trump had Ivana killed because her NDA was expiring and she planned to write a book. An editor has her first draft, which details Trump’s threats and the suspicious circumstances of her death. In the book, Ivana reveals the location of a secret camera that captured what happened the day she died.
Crisis:
• The newsroom receives a tip about the involvement of organized crime in the plot to take over the Republican party. The F.B.I. refers to this group as MAGA, adding another layer of complexity to the investigation.
Act 3: The Fallout
Climax:
• President Biden addresses the nation, declaring martial law to restore order and ensure the integrity of the election process. Violent protests erupt, but the F.B.I. and National Guard work to maintain control.
• The hand recounts of ballots in swing states reveal the extent of the cyber attacks and election interference. The arrested individuals face trial, and the evidence against them is overwhelming.
Resolution:
• Kamala Harris and Tim Walz are inaugurated as President and Vice President, respectively. The Democratic house and senate take office, and the nation begins to heal from the turmoil.
• Blake and Laura reflect on the events, acknowledging the importance of journalism in uncovering the truth and holding those in power accountable.
Key Characters:
• Blake Simons: A dedicated newscaster who breaks the story of the arrests and navigates the chaos that follows.
• Laura Kline: An experienced journalist who provides insight and guidance to Blake and the newsroom.
• Paul Marshall: A journalist in Russia who reports on Putin’s reaction and faces danger as he tries to leave the country.
• President Biden: The current president who declares martial law to restore order and ensure the integrity of the election process.
• Kamala Harris: The Vice President who is inaugurated as President after the arrests and recounts.
• Tim Walz: The new Vice President who takes office alongside Kamala Harris.
Themes:
• The importance of truth and accountability in journalism
• The resilience of democracy in the face of corruption and interference
• The power of unity and healing after a period of turmoil0 -
Lesson 6
Jean Action Structure
What I learned doing this assignment is: It’s hard for there to be any real action/adventure when everybody is healing immediately from any onslaught, so maybe this isn’t that genre exactly, but it’s helping me get a structure in place for the story I want to tell, at least.
Create the 3-Act structure for your story.
1. Look through your three tracks (Mission, Villain, and Action) and find the points that could work for this structure.
- Opening
Establish motivation by showing friendship of the heroine and her friend, have them discuss upcoming vacation to Hawaii and drop her off at the airport.
- Inciting Incident
The text from her usually skeptical, practical friend saying she is healed from polio and spontaneous healing is real. Then her attempts to call her back and being unable to reach her.
- First Turning Point at end of Act
1
She wants to investigate her friend’s claim and write a story but is being discouraged by her boss. She has vacation time, so takes it to pursue it on her own and find her friend.
- Mid-Point
Once on the island next to the one her friend went to and was cured, she finds her friend’s room has all of her things in it, but no one has seen her. She finds a native of that island who had been gone for several months being treated for MS and enlists his help as an interpreter. Also no one is being allowed onto the island, and he knows his way around it. The only way to have access to the island is to go out with a snorkeling tour group.
- Second Turning Point at end of
Act 2
Once she and her interpreter manage to get away from the tour group and get to her interpreter’s home, he is cured. They stay at his house which is more secluded and not a spot where the intruders to the island who are preventing people from coming onto the island and removing many of the islanders have spotted. It is camouflaged so only those who know it is there would access it.
- Crisis
She witnesses the healing of her interpreter, and she discovers certain ailments she had herself have disappeared, no more allergies and she can now see perfectly without glasses or contact lenses which she has worn since high school. She wants to leave the island to tell the story, but has to wait for another snorkeling tour group to join in order to leave. She has the schedule and knows when they will return. She manages to evade capture and leaves with the group, who are world travelers. She chats with them and tells them what happened to her on the island. They join her back at the other island for dinner and she finds many of them have noticed ailments have disappeared as well. They leave the next morning for various destinations. She learns that the people who arrived to take control of the other island claiming to be with federal law enforcement were traveling through a pharmaceutical company account and had no authorization to do what they were doing. She discovers through research who is behind it, and that he has a great deal of clout with governmental agencies who stand aside and let him do this. She reports it to the FBI, but decides she also wants to confront him directly in person via livestream. She makes an appointment to interview him. Flies to New York to his headquarters. In the meantime, she has blogged online about her discoveries on the island because her boss won’t print her story. The story and the virus are both spreading, so that is why the president of the pharmaceutical company granted her interview. She notices her blogs are being attacked by trolls claiming the virus is a hoax. It also says it’s very short-lived and those who stop taking their regular medications will become even sicker than they were before they caught it. She contacts a friend who runs a network of call centers and gets them to fight back against the trolls drowning them out online.
- Climax
She arrives at the pharmaceutical offices, and is taken aside before getting onto the elevator by someone who identifies himself as a scientist. He tells her that the people from the island are being held in the building and are being subjected to torment. He takes her to a communications booth that has video of all the rooms in the building and she sees her friend is in one of the cells watching television. She has been shown brutal footage of attempted torture, that backfires as the person immediately heals from whatever they throw at them. He lets her know the majority of the research scientists are not onboard with creating a vaccine against the healing virus because of the positive impact it’s been having on their own lives and the lives of those around them. He tells her they are going to release all the research subjects while she is in her interview with the president. He will send her a video of them leaving, heading to the airport on busses he has provided. She goes to the president’s office and begins the interview normally, getting background questions, giving them time to get everyone out safely and to the airport. When she gets the signal, she tells the president that his subjects have all been freed and are on planes to various destinations now. The FBI comes in and arrests him for kidnapping and torture.
- Resolution
2. Fill in any missing points and tell us the current version of your structure with a sentence or two for each point.
She and her friend are back in Hawaii on the island, enjoying the people there, and while there, the oldest woman on the island dies. So now they know while the virus prolongs life and makes it more vital and healthy, there is still death. The woman is 112, and the researches disclose that had she caught the virus in her 60s, she may have lived well into her 200s, which is the new norm. She reunites with her interpreter who was a relative of the woman who died. There is a celebration of her life and it includes visiting the monk seals who some believed gifted the islanders because of this woman’s work with them that prevented their extinction.
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What I learned from this assignment is: Turning what was going to be a fantasy story into an action/adventure makes it feel more exciting and compelling. It was an enjoyable fantasy, fun to think about, but this element of conflict makes it more interesting.
1. Fill in the blanks and see what shows up.
Concept:
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- Hero Morally Right: She wants to find her friend, learn the
truth, and write a story about it. Her motives are first to help her
friend if she’s in trouble, and also to follow the story and spread the
virus. - Villain Morally Wrong: He puts
money over the well being of humanity as a whole. He is fearful of losing
what he has and feels entitled to hurt people if that’s what it takes to
keep what is his. He’s a bully to people who work for him. He only really
cares about himself and being a Big Man. He’s used to being very powerful
because of all of the money and influence he has. - A. Unique Skill Set: She is
intelligent, a talented journalist, curious, a loyal friend, and she has
many contacts who are experts in their fields. She is able to get her
message across on the media to counteract all the disinformation being
spewed by the villain. Once she contracts the virus, she also has more
mental clarity, a deeper sense of calm. - B. Motivation: First to save her
friend, and second to write her story if it turns out there is one. - C. Secret or Wound: Mother died a
year ago of cancer. She was in her mid-50s. - A. Unbeatable: He has lots of power
and money, plenty of lackeys willing to do his bidding. He learns he can’t
physically harm them, but knows they love the island and value the monk
seals, so threatens to destroy the island and kill the seals. - B. Plan/Goal: Keep what he has
and get more of it. Kidnap people with the virus, threaten to destroy the
island and kill all the monk seals to convince them to stop spreading the
virus. - C. What they lose if Hero
survives: The truth could help dispel the propaganda he’s been spreading
that keeps people buying their medications. The virus would spread more
quickly if people stopped believing there was a downside to it or if
religions would stop claiming it came from the devil. Nobody would need
his pharmaceutical products. He would lose money, power and control. - A. Puts Hero in Action: Her
friend disappears, she can’t find her. She learns about the island and the
virus, contracts it herself and is going to tell the story. - B. Demands They Go Beyond Their
Best: Finds out the villain has her friend and many others from the
island. She is at risk of capture herself, but manages to get off the
island with a tour group filled with international travelers on a
snorkeling trip. They have been kept away from the inner area of the
village and its people. They catch the virus from her and go on their
travels all over the world, without the villain knowing about them. - C. Destroy the Villain: She
learns that people who have this virus are invulnerable and have increased
clarity and sense of well being. She writes her story, wires it to her
boss who doesn’t print it. The villain has gotten to him. She decides to
go over his head and wires it to the wire service that often carries their
stories and they print and broadcast it.
Hero
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Villain
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Impossible Mission
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2. Once you have filled in a quick answer to each, go back and extrapolate (If the villain seems unstoppable, then how might our heroine find ways to stop his plans to harm those who have the virus and to destroy the island?)
3. Tell us your improved answers. I gave my heroine another advantage in having many expert contacts in various fields and an ability to get her message across on the media to counteract the villain’s misinformation campaign. He needs to be stopped from gaining access to whatever weapon he plans to use to destroy the island. I also added that she comes to realize she is invulnerable physically, although could still be overpowered and imprisoned. She is willing to risk that in order to be able to confront him directly to save her friend. I added that the villain discovers he can’t physically harm those who have the virus but can control them by overpowering and imprisoning them. He is also harming them emotionally, threatening and planning to destroy the island, and especially the beloved monk seals, who were endangered but nurtured by islanders, and some believe to be the original source of the virus.
1. Jean Knowlton
2. I agree to the terms of the release form.
As a member of this group, I agree to the following:
1. That I will keep the processes, strategies, teleconferences, communications, lessons, and models of the class confidential, and that I will NOT share any of this program either privately, with a group, posting online, writing articles, through video or computer programming, or in any other way that would make those processes, teleconferences, communications, lessons, and models of the class available to anyone who is not a member of this class.
2. That each writer’s work here is copyrighted and that writer is the sole owner of that work. That includes this program which is copyrighted by Hal Croasmun. I acknowledge that submission of an idea to this group constitutes a claim of and the recognition of ownership of that idea.
I will keep the other writer’s ideas and writing confidential and will not share this information with anyone without the express written permission of the writer/owner. I will not market or even discuss this information with anyone outside this group.
3. I also understand that many stories and ideas are similar and/or have common themes and from time to time, two or more people can independently and simultaneously generate the same concept or movie idea.
4. If I have an idea that is the same as or very similar to another group member’s idea, I’ll immediately contact Hal and present proof that I had this idea prior to the beginning of the class. If Hal deems them to be the same idea or close enough to cause harm to either party, he’ll request both parties to present another concept for the class.
5. If you don’t present proof to Hal that you have the same idea as another person, you agree that all ideas presented to this group are the sole ownership of the person who presented them and you will not write or market another group member’s ideas.
6. Finally, I agree not to bring suit against anyone in this group for any reason, unless they use a substantial portion of my copyrighted work in a manner that is public and/or that prevents me from marketing my script by shopping it to production companies, agents, managers, actors, networks, studios or any other entertainment industry organizations or people.
1. Name Jean
2. I finished one script and have a bunch of started scripts.
3. I hope to start, write, finish, really finish a screenplay without getting sick of the whole thing. Not just endlessly revise and still not get it where I wanted it to be. Like, the one script I finished hit all the first-timer mistakes, a period piece about Lotta Crabtree, and by the time I finished, I realized she wasn’t nearly as interesting as Lola Montez, but she was more loveable. I did a lot of research in San Francisco, and probably picked up more information than could be used in a screenplay. She loved animals, and in her old age, she went around putting hats on horses left out in the sun in Boston. I loved that the gift she gave to San Francisco was a fountain intending to provide water to the public, horses and dogs. So I was fascinated by her, but my screenplay didn’t seem to do her justice.
4. I started writing at age 9, and was a big hit in the grade school classroom when I stuck to comedy. I hit my 20s as the civil rights movement was at its peak and I questioned everything, and basically still do now in my 70s.
And I’m ;posting my Lesson 5 here as a reply to your post because I could not post it as a reply to the original post either.
Jean Lesson 5 Action Track
What I learned from this assignment is: While there is the opportunity to pack some action into this story, the biggest obstacles will likely turn out to be more about the psychological gamesmanship of the villain to plant uncertainty where before the heroine felt confident, to create enough doubt and fear that people mistrust the virus and continue taking their meds, and to interfere with the peace and happiness of the island people, who also in the end will inevitably win, but will still suffer from the mental torment he inflicts upon them.
Create a rough draft of your Action Track.
1. Answer the Action Questions:
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naturally show up in this movie?
Some running and hiding, fighting, psychological attacks through disinformation, power games preventing the heroine from getting her message out, and trapping and preventing people from being where they want to be, doing what they want to do.
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work for this track?
Most of the action would be on the villain’s part, trapping people, trying to hurt them at first, even trying to kill them, but finding new ways to hurt them when one way doesn’t work. He uses money and power to control and manipulate people and get them to do the dirty work, not fully realizing he is making enemies of them as well.
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to a climax in the 3rd Act?
The villain knows about the virus before the heroine and has already taken steps to try to keep it from spreading. He already has a presence on the island. He goes from trying to contain the virus there, to taking islanders captive, to trying to destroy the island, perhaps blowing it up, only to have it immediately “heal” by having every single plant and blade of grass regenerate moments after the destruction, and perhaps going deep into the earth to heal the entire planet. Which could be the sequel, developers can’t clear spaces to build gigantic projects.
2. Select the types of action you’ll use. Probably all of those mentioned below, but also more mental suffering inflicted as well, gaslighting, misinformation, propaganda, etc.
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3. Sequence the action scenes to deliver your story. Give us your list of action scenes and the purpose of each scene.
First the heroine is in Chase/pursuit mode – looks for her friend, gets diverted on the island, discovers and catches virus, escapes/evades goons. Back to chase/pursuit, writing and research, trying to get her story out, and can’t put it in her own column, can’t get it on the wire services, every one of her usual avenues of publication are closed. She comes up with a way to get the story out there, then has to fight troll commentary trying to derail the truth. She finds out who has stopped her story from getting out, decides to take a camera crew to confront the villain in person pretending to be doing a biographical puff piece about him. Both the villain and the heroine know this is a fake story, but he plays up for her cameras, since they are broadcasting it over a live feed online. A scientist who has turned against the villain is passing her in the hall, pretends to trip and fall towards her and while he’s being helped up, he hands her a flash drive. She sees many disturbing things, including her friend being held in a lab unconscious while scientists are running tests on her, the interrogation and torture that turns out to bounce right off those with the virus as any injury inflicted upon them immediately heals. Her story on the villain goes viral with scenes woven in from the flash drive of what is happening at his facility. Meanwhile the story of the healing is spreading from many other sources, including the world traveling tourists she infected with the healing virus who have traveled all over and spread it to many countries, and they send celebratory videos to her of how it has been creating happiness.
I couldn’t post my assignment by replying to the post in general, so am replying to you. But well done, you!
Jean’s Villain Track
What I learned doing this assignment is when a villain has no morals or boundaries, it leaves the hero with fewer means of counter-attack.
1. Ask the Villain Track questions to discover your Villain’s plan, decisions, and actions.
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plan to accomplish an evil outcome or to annihilate the hero? The plan
could be pre-existing or created on the spot.
(1) The villain knows about the island, the healing virus before our hero does.
(2) He is holding islanders and the heroine’s friend hostage and having tests run on them to try to find a vaccine.
(3) In the meantime he is spreading misinformation everywhere news of the virus is starting to come out. So his first plan is to discourage people from learning about the virus and to find a vaccine to destroy the virus.
(4) His final most evil plan is to bomb the island out of existence and kill the monk seals.
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attack or destroy the hero?
(1) The villain already has the hero’s friend in his lab.
(2) He controls her boss at her news agency.
(3) Whatever she posts online, he has a room full of trolls commenting on them.
To sum it up, he can hold her friend hostage, he can prevent her from getting her message out.
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Villain have and how can they exploit that in this movie?
(1) The villain has power and money and doesn’t care about anybody. Nobody can hold his loved ones hostage because he doesn’t have any.
(2) He is not held back by morality, decency, or any inclination to make sacrifices in order to put the welfare of humanity above his own.
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for this Villain where they pay for what they’ve done?
The villain discovers everything he does has the opposite of his intended result and he is powerless.
I ran into some trouble posting assignments. I wasn’t able to upload the third one. Then one of my kitties died unexpectedly and I went into a funk, so now I still need to get back on the horse, I guess, and even if I can’t post them, do them until I’m caught up.