Post by scarecrow on Sept 14, 2006 16:06:35 GMT -5
This is an old idea of mine for a TV show that Eakyra got me interested in again. It's completely redone, though, so if you remember it from the old site this is something different entirely. I haven't finished the pilot yet, but I found myself so inspired that I had to write something. This is a threatrical teaser to wet your lips with until I have something substantial.
For Eakyra.
Sounds of a large vehicle are heard before the camera fades in on a shot straight down on a road. The yellow paint from the highway road zips by. The camera slowly tilts forward until we see the wheels of the vehicle making the noise.
Cut to a series of establishing shots: a series of green mountains, a close-up on a river, a car bumping along on a dirt road, some barefooted boys playing soccer. In all of the establishing shots it’s early evening, and there is evidence of a strong wind.
Cut to an old black man with unruly, graying hair, a lumpy face and narrow eyes (LENNOX) sitting on a weather-beaten stool in front of a rickety old two-room hut. The hut is obviously a store, judging from the spray painted sign ‘TIENDA GLADDEN’ and the grocery items on the shelves that can be seen from the display window LENNOX is sitting in front of. He lights a cigarette, and leans against the hut.
Cut to a right-side view of the hut, where we can see the hut is in front of a dirt road. There is a small house next to the store, bigger than the hut, and the yard is overcome with fauna. Taking up most of the shot is the school, a long, peeling blue building, and the flat expanse of grass in front of it, where some kids are playing soccer. LENNOX takes a puff, watching them.
Cut to the football game, where we see the kids having fun, yelling in Spanish and running around, kicking the ball. Again, we see that it is very windy from the way the kids’ clothes are waving around and the many leaves blowing past them.
Cut to an upfront view of the store. A plain, short Hispanic woman with a slight bronze and long hair (MARIELA) comes from the back room to the counter. She picks up something and comes out through the front door, and we see it’s another stool. She lays a hand on LENNOX’s shoulder and kisses it, and he looks at her and smiles. She goes over to his left and sits on her stool. He puts his hand around her shoulder, and she lays her head on him. They both watch the kids play ball. He takes another puff of his cigarette.
LENNOX: (looking around vaguely) Storm’s coming.
She makes a small noise of uncertainty, and turns slightly to look at him. She hasn’t heard him. He shakes his head at her unspoken request to repeat, and kisses her on her forehead. She turns back to the game, and he lays his head on top of hers.
Cut to a small, grassy burial ground. The graves are few and far between, mostly just plain-colored or unpainted rectangular blocks jutting from the grassy earth. We see a rear view of a short, plump, post middle-age woman in a long, brown dress (SYLVIA) is solemn as a girl in her late teens in a simple, short dress with slightly curly hair (KATIA) weeps openly beside her. They both stand in front of an open grave. What looks like a very homemade coffin lies in the grave. From the head of the grave, a person who must be a preacher says a sermon in Spanish. To the far left, a few young men stand, one of them with a shovel. The wind is a little stronger than before, and the preacher has a struggle keeping the page he’s reading put.
The preacher finishes his sermon/blessing and nods at the young men. Most of them move over to a metal frame, and place it on top of the grave.
Cut to the shirtless man with the shovel, and we see he is using the shovel to mix some cement manually. He fills a nearby bucket, and the camera pans back a little as it follows the young man who carries it over to the grave and pours it on top of the metal frame.
KATIA slightly breaks down upon seeing this last, and turns to cry on SYLVIA’s shoulder. Cut to KATIA’s back as we see SYLVIA’s head on KATIA’s shoulder, patting the sobbing girl softly, murmuring soothing, inaudible words. SYLVIA’s solemn face takes on a hint of worry from whatever it is she’s looking at over KATIA’s shoulder.
Cut to SYLVIA’s P.O.V., where we see a dirt road leading past a couple of village houses. The road forks off a little up ahead, where just by the fork a young, black guy with short, slick hair and a sharp black suit (STEVEN) can be made out. He watches for a second, and then goes slowly goes off on the left fork.
Cut back to the shot from KATIA’s back, where SYLVIA’s face contorts to an expression of misery. Hugging the crying KATIA tighter still, SYLVIA lets some silent tears fall from her eyes.
Back to the slow upward pan of the moving bus, where the camera almost gets to up to the windshield.
Cut to an unfocused shot of a branch of a tree, which shakes vigorously in the wind. The camera focuses on the background, the stretch of road behind it, where from afar we see a bus coming, as the bus comes closer, the focus switches from the background to the shuddering branch in the foreground as the bus whizzes past.
Cut to a low close-up of a pair of dusty old-shoes on a rocky dirt road moving forward briskly, a similar shot to the one of the bus. The camera pans up, rotating slightly to the left, to show a tall, slim, spiky haired Spanish guy in his early 20’s (ISRAEL). He looks a bit wary, wincing as he walks against the hard wind. The camera pulls back a little and stays put as he moves forward until we have a shot of him from behind, and we can see to his left the same boys playing football that LENNOX and MARIELA were watching.
Cut to a shot of TIENDA GLADDEN from a northeastern bearing, where ISRAEL enters the shot from a curve beside the neighbors, the school and the field in front of it directly behind him as he smiles, walking up to the store. MARIELA stands up and goes inside to the counter, and ISRAEL walks up to the store.
Cut to a front shot of TIENDA GLADDEN as LENNOX smiles at ISRAEL, who enters the shot from the left.
LENNOX: (amiably, offering a handshake) Israel.
ISRAEL: (taking the shake) Evening, sir. (to MARIELA in Spanish) A coke.
ISRAEL sits on MARIELA’s vacated stool beside LENNOX as MARIELA goes to the back room for the soda.
ISRAEL: How are you doing these days, Mr. Gladden?
LENNOX: Boy, well, I’m right here, can’t complain.
ISRAEL: Same old, huh?
LENNOX: Yeah. Yeah. Same old.
A beat passes, and the men sit in silence for a while, looking at the offscreen football game. You can hear the kids yelling, and the dull roar of the wind, and MARIELA opening the glass bottle offscreen.
LENNOX: You heard about Alejandro?
ISRAEL: Yeah, I did. Poor man. (a beat) He’s being buried today?
LENNOX just nods, and MARIELA brings ISRAEL his coke. He takes a sip of it, and MARIELA goes back into the back room.
Cut to the football game, where the ball is passed and somebody takes a shot. The goalkeeper blocks the shot, and kicks the ball back out into the field.
ISRAEL: Have the police found out who did him in?
Cut back to TIENDA GLADDEN.
LENNOX shakes his head for a while.
LENNOX: (meaningfully) I doubt they ever will.
ISRAEL: The bastard.
ISRAEL looks at him for a second, then looks at the ground, and then back at the game, taking another sip of his coke.
LENNOX: The girl’s taking it pretty hard.
ISRAEL: (sadly, softly) Yeah, I know. I really do. (another sip) I hear there isn’t gonna be a service. Is it true?
LENNOX: I hear Sylvia didn’t want to. They just carried him over to the graveyard, and Father Cayetano is blessing him at the burial site.
ISRAEL: (surprised) You mean they’re already burying him?
LENNOX nods, and ISRAEL swears.
ISRAEL: If I’d known I would have gone. Why didn’t she have a service?
LENNOX looks back at ISRAEL, taking his time before answering.
LENNOX: I think she didn’t want some people there.
Understanding comes to ISRAEL’s face, and he finishes his soda. LENNOX’s cigarette is blown out of his hand as he raises it to his mouth, and the camera cuts to a shot from his side at a view of the cigarette rolling on the road.
Cut back to the slow upward pan of the bus.
ISRAEL: Quite a wind we’re having today. Just came from nowhere.
A beat passes as the camera keeps panning, and we can now see from the windshield down, the bus whining as it speeds down the road.
LENNOX: It’s trouble. Definitely it’s bringing trouble, mark my words. Some might say it’s an ill wind.
We see the last few inches of the top of the bus now, the words “James Bus Line” emblazoned over the windshield. You can just make out the driver and some passengers through the slightly-tinted windshield.
ISRAEL: (tentatively, meaningfully) Would you?
LENNOX: (meaningfully) Hell yes.
Cut to a series of shots that we can tell are from inside the bus from the sound: some feet on a floor, the driver’s hands slowly turning the wheel, a little girl lying asleep on a seat, some bags on the luggage rack, etc. It then cuts to a close-up on one of the wheels as it shifts off the gravel and onto a bridge, and it then cuts to a close up of a book being held open in someone’s lap. The camera pans up on a young, solemn guy in his mid-to-late teens with short, brown hair (DAMIAN) who looks from the book to out the window on the second bump. He looks forward, slightly anxious, then turns back to his book for a second, before slamming it closed and looking forward again. His breaths, though silent, become quicker, his expression worried and pondering.
DAMIAN: Stop the bus. (louder) Stop the bus!
Cut to a rearview mirror, where we see DAMIAN making his way up the aisle. Cut to a shot of the driver looking in the rearview, and a guy sitting beside him on the hood of the engine, possibly the conductor. They look at each other, and the conductor shrugs. The driver sighs.
Cut to a low exterior shot of the bus, as it pulls over. The sound of someone getting off is heard, and we see some shoes from under the bus, loose stones crunching underfoot. Cut to a wider shot as the bus goes offscreen, and DAMIAN is left standing on a hill in the shot watching it pull away. He shoves the book in his pocket and slowly starts walking up, still looking anxious. He stops at a sign almost at the top of the hill that says “Boonsville, Pop. 1,089”.
Cut to a series of shots demonstrating the increased force of the wind: the clothes being blown off a woman’s clothesline as she scrambles to pick them in, two little kids stretching their arms out as their shirts flutter about them, etc., MARIELA wincing as she closes a window to stop the leaves from blowing in.
Cut back to the sign, where we see DAMIAN taking controlled but labored breaths in front of what appears to be a boundary line on the road beside the sign.
Cut back to series of shots, the tempo of the cuts increasing slightly: the zinc of someone’s home rattling noisily, the branch of a coconut tree crashing to the ground as the tree wafts, etc.
Back to the sign, where the camera starts panning down to DAMIAN’s feet.
Back to the shots, tempo again increasing: a dog running into it’s house for shelter, the grass waving like a beach of green, etc., the kids playing football oohing and ahhing and wowing as the football is pelted back at them when it’s kicked into the air.
Back to the pan of DAMIAN, where we see his foot directly in front of the boundary line into Boonsville.
Back to the shots, shifting rapidly: a wind chime almost at 90 degrees tingling like mad, an open door slamming repeatedly, etc., the burial site where SYLVIA and KATIA shelter themselves as the workers put the last batch of cement on the grave.
Back to DAMIAN’s feet, and then to DAMIAN’s face, the wind positively booming in the background, whipping everything madly. DAMIAN takes a deep breath, his face contorted in worry. Back to his feet, where he lifts his right foot to take a step over the line. The foot crosses in slow motion.
Back to series of shots, these last few the most urgent yet, ending with the last two shots of a house window, where STEVEN looks outside at something in the distance, and of an overhead of the burial site, where KATIA puts a wooden cross into the wet cement on top of the grave.
Back to DAMIAN, where with a grimace he thrusts himself into Boonsville. The moment he does, and with a sound like a flame being blown out the wind just dies suddenly.
A series of establishing shots again, this time very with a very slow tempo between shifts, and showing the sudden death of the wind: the amazement of the kids playing football as the leaves stop flying about, the wind chime jangles softly now, the dog peeks out of its house, the woman picking in her clothes looks around puzzled, KATIA and SYLVIA look up at the sky as the men building the grave talk in hurried whispers, STEVEN moving from the window and letting the curtain down, LENNOX and ISRAEL looking around and then at each other meaningfully.
Back to DAMIAN, who’s huffing and puffing like he’s come a long way, looking puzzled and anxious himself. Cut to a back shot of him on top of the hill, looking at a hill with a house on top far off at the back of the village below him. He sighs deeply, and starts walking down the hill towards the village. Fade out.
For Eakyra.
The House on Ginjam Hill
Episode 1.00 – Theatrical Teaser (An Ill Wind)
Episode 1.00 – Theatrical Teaser (An Ill Wind)
Sounds of a large vehicle are heard before the camera fades in on a shot straight down on a road. The yellow paint from the highway road zips by. The camera slowly tilts forward until we see the wheels of the vehicle making the noise.
Cut to a series of establishing shots: a series of green mountains, a close-up on a river, a car bumping along on a dirt road, some barefooted boys playing soccer. In all of the establishing shots it’s early evening, and there is evidence of a strong wind.
Cut to an old black man with unruly, graying hair, a lumpy face and narrow eyes (LENNOX) sitting on a weather-beaten stool in front of a rickety old two-room hut. The hut is obviously a store, judging from the spray painted sign ‘TIENDA GLADDEN’ and the grocery items on the shelves that can be seen from the display window LENNOX is sitting in front of. He lights a cigarette, and leans against the hut.
Cut to a right-side view of the hut, where we can see the hut is in front of a dirt road. There is a small house next to the store, bigger than the hut, and the yard is overcome with fauna. Taking up most of the shot is the school, a long, peeling blue building, and the flat expanse of grass in front of it, where some kids are playing soccer. LENNOX takes a puff, watching them.
Cut to the football game, where we see the kids having fun, yelling in Spanish and running around, kicking the ball. Again, we see that it is very windy from the way the kids’ clothes are waving around and the many leaves blowing past them.
Cut to an upfront view of the store. A plain, short Hispanic woman with a slight bronze and long hair (MARIELA) comes from the back room to the counter. She picks up something and comes out through the front door, and we see it’s another stool. She lays a hand on LENNOX’s shoulder and kisses it, and he looks at her and smiles. She goes over to his left and sits on her stool. He puts his hand around her shoulder, and she lays her head on him. They both watch the kids play ball. He takes another puff of his cigarette.
LENNOX: (looking around vaguely) Storm’s coming.
She makes a small noise of uncertainty, and turns slightly to look at him. She hasn’t heard him. He shakes his head at her unspoken request to repeat, and kisses her on her forehead. She turns back to the game, and he lays his head on top of hers.
Cut to a small, grassy burial ground. The graves are few and far between, mostly just plain-colored or unpainted rectangular blocks jutting from the grassy earth. We see a rear view of a short, plump, post middle-age woman in a long, brown dress (SYLVIA) is solemn as a girl in her late teens in a simple, short dress with slightly curly hair (KATIA) weeps openly beside her. They both stand in front of an open grave. What looks like a very homemade coffin lies in the grave. From the head of the grave, a person who must be a preacher says a sermon in Spanish. To the far left, a few young men stand, one of them with a shovel. The wind is a little stronger than before, and the preacher has a struggle keeping the page he’s reading put.
The preacher finishes his sermon/blessing and nods at the young men. Most of them move over to a metal frame, and place it on top of the grave.
Cut to the shirtless man with the shovel, and we see he is using the shovel to mix some cement manually. He fills a nearby bucket, and the camera pans back a little as it follows the young man who carries it over to the grave and pours it on top of the metal frame.
KATIA slightly breaks down upon seeing this last, and turns to cry on SYLVIA’s shoulder. Cut to KATIA’s back as we see SYLVIA’s head on KATIA’s shoulder, patting the sobbing girl softly, murmuring soothing, inaudible words. SYLVIA’s solemn face takes on a hint of worry from whatever it is she’s looking at over KATIA’s shoulder.
Cut to SYLVIA’s P.O.V., where we see a dirt road leading past a couple of village houses. The road forks off a little up ahead, where just by the fork a young, black guy with short, slick hair and a sharp black suit (STEVEN) can be made out. He watches for a second, and then goes slowly goes off on the left fork.
Cut back to the shot from KATIA’s back, where SYLVIA’s face contorts to an expression of misery. Hugging the crying KATIA tighter still, SYLVIA lets some silent tears fall from her eyes.
Back to the slow upward pan of the moving bus, where the camera almost gets to up to the windshield.
Cut to an unfocused shot of a branch of a tree, which shakes vigorously in the wind. The camera focuses on the background, the stretch of road behind it, where from afar we see a bus coming, as the bus comes closer, the focus switches from the background to the shuddering branch in the foreground as the bus whizzes past.
Cut to a low close-up of a pair of dusty old-shoes on a rocky dirt road moving forward briskly, a similar shot to the one of the bus. The camera pans up, rotating slightly to the left, to show a tall, slim, spiky haired Spanish guy in his early 20’s (ISRAEL). He looks a bit wary, wincing as he walks against the hard wind. The camera pulls back a little and stays put as he moves forward until we have a shot of him from behind, and we can see to his left the same boys playing football that LENNOX and MARIELA were watching.
Cut to a shot of TIENDA GLADDEN from a northeastern bearing, where ISRAEL enters the shot from a curve beside the neighbors, the school and the field in front of it directly behind him as he smiles, walking up to the store. MARIELA stands up and goes inside to the counter, and ISRAEL walks up to the store.
Cut to a front shot of TIENDA GLADDEN as LENNOX smiles at ISRAEL, who enters the shot from the left.
LENNOX: (amiably, offering a handshake) Israel.
ISRAEL: (taking the shake) Evening, sir. (to MARIELA in Spanish) A coke.
ISRAEL sits on MARIELA’s vacated stool beside LENNOX as MARIELA goes to the back room for the soda.
ISRAEL: How are you doing these days, Mr. Gladden?
LENNOX: Boy, well, I’m right here, can’t complain.
ISRAEL: Same old, huh?
LENNOX: Yeah. Yeah. Same old.
A beat passes, and the men sit in silence for a while, looking at the offscreen football game. You can hear the kids yelling, and the dull roar of the wind, and MARIELA opening the glass bottle offscreen.
LENNOX: You heard about Alejandro?
ISRAEL: Yeah, I did. Poor man. (a beat) He’s being buried today?
LENNOX just nods, and MARIELA brings ISRAEL his coke. He takes a sip of it, and MARIELA goes back into the back room.
Cut to the football game, where the ball is passed and somebody takes a shot. The goalkeeper blocks the shot, and kicks the ball back out into the field.
ISRAEL: Have the police found out who did him in?
Cut back to TIENDA GLADDEN.
LENNOX shakes his head for a while.
LENNOX: (meaningfully) I doubt they ever will.
ISRAEL: The bastard.
ISRAEL looks at him for a second, then looks at the ground, and then back at the game, taking another sip of his coke.
LENNOX: The girl’s taking it pretty hard.
ISRAEL: (sadly, softly) Yeah, I know. I really do. (another sip) I hear there isn’t gonna be a service. Is it true?
LENNOX: I hear Sylvia didn’t want to. They just carried him over to the graveyard, and Father Cayetano is blessing him at the burial site.
ISRAEL: (surprised) You mean they’re already burying him?
LENNOX nods, and ISRAEL swears.
ISRAEL: If I’d known I would have gone. Why didn’t she have a service?
LENNOX looks back at ISRAEL, taking his time before answering.
LENNOX: I think she didn’t want some people there.
Understanding comes to ISRAEL’s face, and he finishes his soda. LENNOX’s cigarette is blown out of his hand as he raises it to his mouth, and the camera cuts to a shot from his side at a view of the cigarette rolling on the road.
Cut back to the slow upward pan of the bus.
ISRAEL: Quite a wind we’re having today. Just came from nowhere.
A beat passes as the camera keeps panning, and we can now see from the windshield down, the bus whining as it speeds down the road.
LENNOX: It’s trouble. Definitely it’s bringing trouble, mark my words. Some might say it’s an ill wind.
We see the last few inches of the top of the bus now, the words “James Bus Line” emblazoned over the windshield. You can just make out the driver and some passengers through the slightly-tinted windshield.
ISRAEL: (tentatively, meaningfully) Would you?
LENNOX: (meaningfully) Hell yes.
Cut to a series of shots that we can tell are from inside the bus from the sound: some feet on a floor, the driver’s hands slowly turning the wheel, a little girl lying asleep on a seat, some bags on the luggage rack, etc. It then cuts to a close-up on one of the wheels as it shifts off the gravel and onto a bridge, and it then cuts to a close up of a book being held open in someone’s lap. The camera pans up on a young, solemn guy in his mid-to-late teens with short, brown hair (DAMIAN) who looks from the book to out the window on the second bump. He looks forward, slightly anxious, then turns back to his book for a second, before slamming it closed and looking forward again. His breaths, though silent, become quicker, his expression worried and pondering.
DAMIAN: Stop the bus. (louder) Stop the bus!
Cut to a rearview mirror, where we see DAMIAN making his way up the aisle. Cut to a shot of the driver looking in the rearview, and a guy sitting beside him on the hood of the engine, possibly the conductor. They look at each other, and the conductor shrugs. The driver sighs.
Cut to a low exterior shot of the bus, as it pulls over. The sound of someone getting off is heard, and we see some shoes from under the bus, loose stones crunching underfoot. Cut to a wider shot as the bus goes offscreen, and DAMIAN is left standing on a hill in the shot watching it pull away. He shoves the book in his pocket and slowly starts walking up, still looking anxious. He stops at a sign almost at the top of the hill that says “Boonsville, Pop. 1,089”.
Cut to a series of shots demonstrating the increased force of the wind: the clothes being blown off a woman’s clothesline as she scrambles to pick them in, two little kids stretching their arms out as their shirts flutter about them, etc., MARIELA wincing as she closes a window to stop the leaves from blowing in.
Cut back to the sign, where we see DAMIAN taking controlled but labored breaths in front of what appears to be a boundary line on the road beside the sign.
Cut back to series of shots, the tempo of the cuts increasing slightly: the zinc of someone’s home rattling noisily, the branch of a coconut tree crashing to the ground as the tree wafts, etc.
Back to the sign, where the camera starts panning down to DAMIAN’s feet.
Back to the shots, tempo again increasing: a dog running into it’s house for shelter, the grass waving like a beach of green, etc., the kids playing football oohing and ahhing and wowing as the football is pelted back at them when it’s kicked into the air.
Back to the pan of DAMIAN, where we see his foot directly in front of the boundary line into Boonsville.
Back to the shots, shifting rapidly: a wind chime almost at 90 degrees tingling like mad, an open door slamming repeatedly, etc., the burial site where SYLVIA and KATIA shelter themselves as the workers put the last batch of cement on the grave.
Back to DAMIAN’s feet, and then to DAMIAN’s face, the wind positively booming in the background, whipping everything madly. DAMIAN takes a deep breath, his face contorted in worry. Back to his feet, where he lifts his right foot to take a step over the line. The foot crosses in slow motion.
Back to series of shots, these last few the most urgent yet, ending with the last two shots of a house window, where STEVEN looks outside at something in the distance, and of an overhead of the burial site, where KATIA puts a wooden cross into the wet cement on top of the grave.
Back to DAMIAN, where with a grimace he thrusts himself into Boonsville. The moment he does, and with a sound like a flame being blown out the wind just dies suddenly.
A series of establishing shots again, this time very with a very slow tempo between shifts, and showing the sudden death of the wind: the amazement of the kids playing football as the leaves stop flying about, the wind chime jangles softly now, the dog peeks out of its house, the woman picking in her clothes looks around puzzled, KATIA and SYLVIA look up at the sky as the men building the grave talk in hurried whispers, STEVEN moving from the window and letting the curtain down, LENNOX and ISRAEL looking around and then at each other meaningfully.
Back to DAMIAN, who’s huffing and puffing like he’s come a long way, looking puzzled and anxious himself. Cut to a back shot of him on top of the hill, looking at a hill with a house on top far off at the back of the village below him. He sighs deeply, and starts walking down the hill towards the village. Fade out.
