Sunday, November 1, 2009

Movies I Dreamt Up

My dreams take all forms. (Again, I must remind you that by "dreams" I do not mean aspirations. I only use that word when referring to the stuff my brain conjures up when I'm asleep.) When I'm not dreaming painful scenarios that drag my emotions over past failures, I often dream up movie ideas. My brain will make up some weird scenario, and then at some point in mid-dream I realize it's a movie, and as I'm dreaming, I'll form it into a better movie. It's kind of awesome really. I've also come up with songs in my sleep that I was able to remember the next morning. I've never been able to write a song in waking life.

Anyway, here are a few recent movies I dreamt up:

1. "Back to High School"

Glib version of the explanation: Like that Drew Barrymore movie, except better.

It's sorta kinda a lot like that Drew Barrymore movie where a grown-up goes back to high school as an undercover reporter, except a little different. So it starts with our heroine, who we'll call Emily (just to pick a random name), going through high school. This will be a pretty quick introductory segment, in which we run through all the typical characters and themes of all "high school sucks" movies -- there are the popular, rich, mean girls tormenting Emily, there's the charming, cute jock who doesn't have any interest in her, there's the nerd boy who pays attention to her but turns out to be a sex-obsessed jerk, and it's all generally a miserable experience.

All the above is stuffed in one day in which Emily is tired of blending into the woodwork and decides to break out of her shell by wearing these wacky socks that her mother gave her, and that she loves. But instead of getting her noticed in a good way, she gets ridiculed mercilessly. For the rest of high school, she's derisively known as "Socks" Macarthur. (Her last name's Macarthur. That's what my dream told me, so it must be a portentous sign from God.)

So anyway, Emily goes to college, and has a blast. Now she breaks out the wacky socks and everyone loves them. She again becomes known as "Socks," but this time it's a fun nickname. Now instead of wallowing in a crippling fear of people, she relishes their company.

While in college, she becomes fascinated with computers, and creates a few iPhone apps (or something like that -- something in science or technology) that she's then able to market and make a mint off of. After she graduates, she's pretty well set for a while. She's immensely happy.
But she keeps having dreams about how awful high school was. She meets with a therapist, who tells her that there's not much she can do about that one -- there's no aversion therapy for high school. At this point, Socks has become a bit of a perfectionist, obsessed with having a perfect life and no fears or scars. So she says, heck, that's exactly what I'm going to do.

So she goes ... back to high school! (OK, I realize this is a bit cheesy. But it could be fun. And the movie's kinda meant for kids.) She creates a fake identity for herself and enrolls in a different high school. (Maybe some comedy can be mined from having her college buddies pose as her parents. Socks is young-looking, and maybe she gets some bald dude with a beard from college to pose as her dad. Probably shouldn't make her boyfriend do it. That's too icky.)

In high school, she meets exactly the same archetypes as she knew in her high school. At first, she's a bit cowed, but then gathers herself, and acts very confident. She wears her crazy socks all the time. Of course, she gets made of, but she is able to shoot back now, and she becomes pretty popular, one of those rare popular kids who is friends with everyone. This time she actually gets to know all these archetypical characters -- jocks, sex-obsessed nerds, popular girls, etc. Her motives are kinda evil, to befriend them and then find a way to give them a good comeuppance, or at least get them to change from being so terrible to each other. But the more she gets to know them, the more she sees that they're packed with insecurities too, and are just better at hiding them. The popular girl, it turns out, had to fend off sexual advances from a teacher. The nerd has an oppressive family. Et cetera. She ends up being a genuine friend to them, helping them with their problems, but then when they start ganging up on a wallflower girl that reminds her of herself, she can't help herself. She ends up taking revenge on them, and of course it turns out horribly, making things much worse. She tries to atone for what she did, but by then someone discovers her fraud, and she's kicked out. Then everyone feels they've been defrauded and she's demonized and shunned.

She gets a criminal conviction but no jail time (she never did anything icky with any of the high school kids, always telling them she had a boyfriend from another school, which she actually does, and maybe her real boyfriend comes and meets them, and they're just awed by him), and returns to adult life. But maybe eventually, something makes the kids come see her at her cool apartment and there's some sort of tearful admittance that they have changed for the better because of her. So there's sort of a happy ending, somehow. Maybe in the end she becomes a school psychologist. I haven't worked out all the details.

2. "Wall Street Hustlers"

Glib version of the explanation: Chris Rock version of "Wall Street"

OK, I can't really describe this one and not look like an asshole, since I'm a white man. I'll just sound like I'm trying to put on a minstrel show or in some other way be insulting to African-Americans. So I'll resolve this problem by acting all black and shit.

Yo, bitch, what up? Mothafuckin' E to the D here to kick the ballistics on the ultimate balla comedy in the hizzay!!! Peep this .... oh Jesus, I am a horrible human being. I apologize with all my soul to everyone who is African-American, has ever met anyone African-American, or has ever heard of African-Americans. I'm so sorry.

But not sorry enough to not try again. OK, so there's this ghetto businessman who is ruling many of the illicit trades in the neighborhood. Let's call him Joe (just to pick a random name). He's cornered the market on marijuana. But he doesn't sell coke or crack or anything else, because he feels that those destroy the community, and a destroyed community is a dangerous one, and thus bad for business. Marijuana, he says half-jokingly, helps the community, making everyone relax. That's good business. He puts everything in terms of whether it's good or bad for business. He's a charmer, genuinely likable and not smarmy or evil, but he's also a ruthless capitalist, doing whatever it takes to maintain his monopoly. He is an extremely wise businessman, but a mostly amoral one. In a very charming way.

In the beginning he is challenged by an upstart who barges into his office and is shocked by un-fancy it is. Joe lets loose one of his many maxims, something about never looking like you have money. He wears very simple clothes that make him go mostly unnoticed. But he's rolling in money. The pictures on his wall are of Donald Trump, Michael Milken, Ken Lay -- his heroes.

So anyway, this upstart makes bold pronouncements about taking him over, and Joe flashes a genuine smile and says "Well, I welcome the competition! Competition is what makes the system great!" He then asks the upstart about his business plan. Of course, the upstart doesn't really have one. What areas are you going to go into? No idea, but he just spews more bluster instead of answering. How do you intend to get loyalty from the dealers and suppliers? No idea. Joe reveals that he gets their loyalty by always giving them a solid cut and treating them fairly. He even provides health insurance and a 401(k) (which would be a bit of a laugh line). When things get out of hand, which the inevitably do, he has an enforcement team, led by Big Mike, a man who then appears from the shadows and is very large and intimidating. So anyway, the opening scene is mainly meant to establish that Joe is an expert businessman and to set up how he does his thing.

Eventually the upstart goes away, and Joe's smile drops. He's tired of this shit. He wants to move to the next level, to go legit, maybe run some restaurants or other businesses so he can deal with professionals instead of blowhards. People like Trump, or Ken Lay.

Soon after he meets up with old friend from the neighborhood, Chris. Chris was a mathematical genius who got out of the ghetto on a scholarship and ended up working for a major bank. Recently, however, when the financial mess hit, Chris was fired, digraced, and came back to the ghetto.

Despite Chris' fall, Joe is inspired by his rise. Banking! There are no banks in their neighborhood. People go miles out of their way for a bank or just stash their money in mattresses, which often get stolen. Joe, with Chris' help, opens up a bank. It's a different kind of bank, with intense security. Maybe the upstart, who of course never did anything, comes in and tries to rob the place. He pulls out a gun on the teller, and the teller pulls out her own. As does everyone else in the bank. (OK, now you see where the offensiveness comes in. I've been telling it as straightforward as possible, avoiding the jokes, which are often about applying the ghetto world to the "straight" world, but it's hard to do that without playing on stereotypes of ghettos that I'm really not allowed to play on, as a white man. But you get the idea. A black screenwriter could do better on this.)

So anwyay, the bank is a success, and Joe and Chris quickly start opening other franchises. They start to gain some press. Reporters start asking uncomfortable questions about where Joe got all his money to begin with. Chris buts in and starts talking about credit default swaps and derivitatives and such, and that placates everyone. Afterwards, Joe says "What was all that? I don't know what any of that means." and Chris says,"Neither do I. Neither do they. Doesn't matter. It's all a hustle." You get the idea.

So quickly Joe and Chris start building a financial empire, getting into investment banking and all sorts of things. Then maybe they meet the real tycoons, and Joe is of course enthralled. But when he sees what they do, he gradually becomes more and more horrified. They talk casually of laying off thousands just to boost the stock price a bit so that they can then sell their own stashes for a profit. Or they talk of investments like buying up rivers from indigenous South American populations so they an use them for a new type of bottled water. Joe discovers his conscience, and threatens to expose all of their awful deals. The tycoons laugh and tell them that these deals are all well-known, and nobody cares.

Then the tycoons, just to be safe, expose Joe as getting his start in marijuana sales, and Joe is arrested and his businesses destroyed. Maybe at the trial he makes an impassioned speech, asking which is worse -- selling a mostly harmless drug in order to make a system of banks that help the community, or using your riches to destroy communities and people for the sake of gaining slightly more riches. He becomes a folk hero, taking every interview he can get and talking about this stuff. And then there's some happy ending. I don't know what.

So maybe these movies are a bit preachy. I'm so political these days that it would be hard for them not to be. But both would be comedies, with all this stuff underneath it all. What do you think? Neither would be great art, but they could be fun.

6 comments:

Amy Mancini said...

I've always been a sucker for back to high school movies. Or movie, since I've only seen that Drew Barrymore one. There really should be a time machine involved, though, so that Socks can go back and mess with her actual peers. That's what I think about when I imagine going back to high school. I want my real classmates to get their comeuppance, not some half-a-generation-younger facsimile of them. But time machine movies are tricky. Probably the biggest star you could manage for a time machine movie would be Rick Moranis and that would be a real box office embarrassment.

Hopefully you wouldn't lose your audience at the teller-pulling-a-gun scene in the other movie. 'Cause everyone knows that if you try to stop a bank (or Best Buy) robbery, you are summarily dismissed.

That said, I have never dreamt a movie. Next, see if you can dream up a syfy thriller.

emily said...

Hey! My name is Emily! And my mom gave my wacky pink socks in high school with a Boynton cat on it that said "Hang in there!"! That's where the similarities end, because I was really popular and no one made fun of me.

emily said...

Hmm... I see we have a new poster with some really good points.

Chris E. Keedei said...

Emily's referring to an anyonymous poster who posted "miley cyrus nude" three times with links each time to his site, presumably. I deleted it. Though I am kinda flattered that someone apparently thinks we could be a good source of inbound links (it's a serach engine marketing thing to make your site do better), it's just icky.

pettigrj said...

First off, how come you wind up convicting all your dream-movie protagonists? Your subconscious seems to have a strictly enforced penal code.

Secondly, how come Emily gets to be the ugly-duckling-into-a-swan-slash-caterpillar-into-a-butterfly character, while I have to be the ghetto druglord? I know it turns out he has a heart of gold, but still - if I ever amass an empire, I want it built purely on licitness.

Other than that, good movie ideas. Kind of a Clueless meets Transformers meets Casino meets Juno aesthetic. I like it. Why don't you try to write one of them up as a screenplay?

And remember to always hold on to your dreams, kids, especially when they contain detailed plot summaries for Hollywood-appropriate movies.

Chris E. Keedei said...

Meh, I'm never going to actually write any of them. Too much work. I'd rather wait for someone to steal my ideas and make a movie out of it so I can then sue them and get a huge settlement.