Ready for my close up

So, I thought at one point that I'd like to make movies, and I guess I kinda still do.

I had applied to the grad school I attended with the plan to go in as a theater major (I was pretty confident that I could get into that program) but then make some connections and switch over to the film school after the first year or so. But, I chickened out.

It was back before computers could do a lot of the heavy lifting in film. They were still working with actual 'film'. It was intimidating. Film making then to now is kind of like what typesetting is to word processing. Heck, they didn't even have mice on the PCs in the computer lab when I was there. I had to sneak into the journalism dept to use a Mac to type my papers.

I've had this idea for some little short films that I could maybe do. Ten short pieces (three minutes or under) that all connect in the end into a single narrative. I thought I might take some of my November blog-a-thon to get them out of my head and, you know, post them here.

Now you have to keep in mind that my greatest artistic aspiration follows the path of surealism. I'm a big fan. When I was a kid the 60s psychedelica had filtered down into children's programing, so I guess I kind of imprinted on that sort of Yellow Submarine world view.

When I was in a scene design course in college I did a set design assignment for the play "Glass Menagerie" by Tennessee Williams. It's a play in a realistic style, but I couldn't leave it alone. If you know that play you remember that the girl main character is so intimidated by her secretarial course that she throws up in class and never goes back, lying to her mother so she thinks she's still going. So I externalized that fear by making her practice typewriter in the corner of their shabby little apartment a giant man eating thing with big sharp teeth biting through the edge of the stage.

When I got through explaining the rest of the strangeness in that design, I looked up and the class was just staring at me. I was in a theater class and I was the weirdo----in a theater class.

So anyway, here's episode one as I imagine it:

Fade up on boy blinking awake on couch. He sits up listening. He can hear a hissing. He gets up and leaves the room.

He enters the kitchen and steps in a puddle. Looking over to the sink he sees that the water was left running over a sink full of dirty dishes and has run over and down the cabinets and onto the floor. He notices that the water is making the hissing noise and so goes over and shuts it off.

As soon as he does the hissing seems to be coming from the other room. He turns and walks toward it.

In the other room, a living room, he walks over to a big green lazy boy that is empty. Beside it is an ash tray on a stand with a smoldering cigar. He looks over toward the t.v. It is turned on but is only showing static, which is making the hissing noise. He goes over and turns it off.

The moment it's off, there is a knock at the door that makes him jump. He goes over and opens it and there is a little blond girl looking at him. He opens the storm door and suddenly she is down on the lawn. She giggles and runs away.

The boy doesn't know why, but he follows.

He chases her down the block and through the neighbor hood, and is finally lead down an abandoned railroad track. He stops as she is so far ahead now that it doesn't seem she can be caught. As he shades his eyes to stare after her and catch his breath, she seems to disappear.

Then suddenly, she steps out of the trees to his left. He has no idea how she got from one place to another so quickly, but before he can think much about it she giggles and runs into the forest and he is chasing her again.

As he is chasing her he doesn't notice that he runs by a tree holding a cigar.

Finally the forest ends and he runs out into a clearing, where he stops short. There in the clearing is his father's green lazy boy. He knows what he must do.

He begins to gather brush and branches and pile them around the chair. When there is a healthy stack around the chair he tosses down the still burning cigar and the whole thing bursts into flame.

As he watches it burning a small hand takes his. He looks over and the little girl is standing beside him.

They both turn and watch the flames rise into the sky.

Fade to black.

Ok, so it's like only the first episode. They'll be others and it'll kind of play together. It'll make sense later. Well, kinda. It'll still be wierd. You know, like I said, surrealism and stuff.

What?

Why are you looking at me like that?