Last night, after taking my computer apart and resigning myself to buying a new one, I went out and outlined the first three scenes and the trailer in the park. I figure we could do the trailer first, to give everyone practice, and to build an audience.
Characters so far*General Hice/Hyce - white hair, going bald, always wears a cap. Was a real tough fighter in his day, he didn't start as a desk jockey. Tells it like it is with few words.
*Scarsdale - Delta Operator
*Bayone - Delta Operator
*Brooklyn - Delta Operator
*Bean - Delta Operator
*Pony - Delta Operator/Leader
*Marcus Illa - anti-communist guerilla warlord who is target of US mission
*Saham - joins Illa's army after his family is blown up in air strike
*Unnamed Radio Host - warns people about the real reason for going to war has nothing to do with Illa
*Unnamed Trendy - appears in Internet video to drum up popular support of US war against Illa.
Scene index with rough timeJoy Ride (5 min) - what we've been working on so far
Back at Base - someone tells Pony the General wants to see him (2 min)
General's Office (5 min)
This should be between 12-15 minutes, introduce the problem, introduce at least indirectly at least 8/9 characters, and it shouldn't be too impossible even though it includes some pretty cool stuff.
TrailerBold words are text that appears on screen. The trailer should be about 1:30. I can't make a prototype version for a while so I don't know how exactly it should fit together, but here is a pretty good outline. The trailer is meant to be a little misleading because we don't want to give everything away, which is why scenes are put out of order and out of context. I was thinking somewhere, either toward the beginning or the end, there could be music. The first 50 seconds or so of
Rooster doesn't have any lyrics. We can put it in right after the first bold text and have it run in the background and then we can do a fade out at the end or something to stretch it out to the full trailer time. Or someone can chop parts from out of the song and arrange them however sounds best.
*Helicopter flying toward city
A war no one understood*"Trendy" (blond guy with wispy beard dressed in pastels) looking at camera "He is the worst of the worst" > Red and black high contrast images pop one next to the other "Adolf Hitler, Bin Laden, and Marcus Illa."> People in desert looking poor> Back to Trendy "we can get him."
*Fat radio guy at mic, real angry, red face, shaking his open hands around mike "This is so (beat) EVIL!!!"
A country on fire*Pony in driver's seat turning the wheel hard in slow motion with dust throwing up all around (from opening scene)
*Bradley coming around corner of city street
Where the only way out is farther in*Guy on top of different Humvee with
M240 shouting indistinctly
*RPG flying through the air
And the world comes apart around them*Helicopter spinning, going down
*Humvee explodes - flips in air (in reverse, so animate it forward and then play it in reverse so it looks odd and disturbing)
Everything can change (don't really like this line but I couldn't think of anything better)
*Someone (doesn't matter who because trailers always lie) looking up in pain, shirt torn, in a chair with arms tied behind back in a dank room
In A Heartbeat*Debris falling (from General's office scene)
Story backgroundD-Boys Pony, Bean, Scarsdale, Bayone, and Brooklyn are driving around the desert in a beat up US Army surplus Jeep that should have been trashed a decade ago, if not more. You'd never guess that they were the toughest bunch of SOBs you ever saw, and that's how they like it. Each of their names are special, the place of some significant event from tehir pasts, except Brooklyn - he was just from Brooklyn. He was the newest and they always gave him shit when they weren't on assignments. Their leader - the ranking officer, though they pay no mind to rank - was Stone Pony, after the club, but they always just shortened it to Pony and would have a good laugh about it. He never went anywhere without his signature mirrored aviator shades that matched his hair, which had just enough grey to make him look distinguished and worldly like George Cloony only tough. He was their driver, taking them on a tour of this rat trap country they had been stuck in for the past 6 weeks doing nothing. Then there was Bean. He liked to watch old cowboy movies and make fun of the way the characters acted and was generally the joker of the group. He could also speak 9 languages - a handy skill when you find yourself in the asshole of the world.
Wisteria (we can change it) was the kind of place you avoided if you could. 15 years of civil war following the fall of the communist regime set up during the Cold WAr and 2 million dead Wisterians later and you got yourself a real hot bed of anarchy if ever there was one.
They'd been doing nothing 'cept killing rats and getting on their helicopters, flying over the only city worth mentioning (Laria), and coming back to base. 6 weeks of boredom, 6 weeks without action, 6 weeks without women. Sure, there were women at the base, support staff and such, but they were strictly off limits and it just frustrated the hell out of everyone. Delta are the best of the best. They want to fight, that's what they signed up for. Army keeps them chained up like a dangerous dog, which is what they are, and rarely lets them out to have fun. Here they thought they were finally gonna' go on a real mission when politics got in the way and the Pentagon keeps dancing around the issue.
Marcus Illa was a Western trained and educated guerilla mastermind who had staged successful attacks on the old communist government with CIA approval in the old days. He was a brutal, bloodthirsty psychopath but he got the Reds running scared with 150 days of terror in the 80s that likely did more harm than good. Ever since the old government collapsed and a new regime took power the CIA dropped Illa like a stone and he's held a grudge ever since. The current President Amer Balam decided to entertain the idea of Chinese control over vital resources Illa has gotten back to his old tricks, for, as much as he hates the US he hates communists even more. America double crossed him, but communists wanted to destroy his peoples' way of life.
Illa leades an army som say is 30,000 strong called the Wisterian People's Front, the "IPW" ( we don't need to know how their language works, just make some stuff up). His chief rival is top general and strongman Desmond Rull. The US wants to put Rull in power to snub the Chinese but can't do it without getting rid of Illa first.
Scene in General's officeoffice is very spartan - a desk, lots of maps, and not a lot of light. the walls are green.
Pony comes in after his joy ride.Pony (P): What's the deal this time?
General (G): CNN, you seen it? (it doesn't have to be CNN)
P: (laughs) Do I look like I watch CNN?
G: One of those journalists found some goddamn balls to do some real reporting.
P: Yeah? (Standing with arms folded, not really paying attention)
G: Someone dropped
JDAM on an apartment block the IPW was using to house munitions. There were also noncoms (non-combatants, yes I know, some military use noncom to mean non-commissioned officer and others use NCO) there:
While the general is saying this we cut to a small bedroom. A mother is holding a baby. Her older son is around. Really poor quality, colours washed out like 1990s TV news footage. In slow motion the room explodes. Sound is very low, muffled. The General talks real matter of fact over scene of room filling with debris and smoke. People inside are thrown up, startled. There is no time to be scared. The room fills with the fireball of the explosion and speeds up to normal speed120 dead, 1600 wounded.
Smoke starts to clear. Mostly debris and blood droplets and body parts raining down normal speed or maybe slowed a little. Then we cut to the General talking in his office with Pony.Now the press is chewing my ass out.
P: Fuck the press.
G: We need something better, softer.
P: Is that so?
G: We need this guy Illa dead. Are your boys up to it?
P: No jerking us around this time?
G: This is the real deal. (Looks at him real intensely)
P: (nods) Alright.
by Shoprocks » March 29th, 2012, 3:51 pm 
