My story for FMP
‘Strangers And A Chain.’
A Man. In love with a Woman. But he is unable to tell her he is in love with her because he is too shy to talk to her. So instead, he watches her. He devises a plan to give her a magical Chain, which will place her under a spell, first making her fall asleep, so that when she eventually wakes, his face will be the first that she sees and she will then realise that loves the Man. He plucks up the courage to give her the Chain, and the spell works, and the two are madly in love with one another.
They are happy together and things are good, as the Woman continues to wear the Chain, as the Man informs her never to take it off. Trusting him, the Woman is overcome with happiness as she has found love herself, and the Man is almost in disbelief, as he can’t believe he is finally with the Woman he has loved for so long.
Now that he is actually with the Woman however, slowly the Man begins to profusely apologise for all of his insecurities and faults. He is also secretly worried that the Woman will realise that the Chain is magical and that she is under a spell, and that she may still take it off, and inadvertently break the spell. As a result of the Man voicing his worry about the Chain so much though, the Woman begins to develop suspicions about the object. Eventually, her curiosity gets the better of her and she removes the Chain, breaking the spell. The Woman is angry that the Man has deceived her and she leaves him. The Man is upset that everything has fallen apart.
The Man continues to be upset that he is no longer with his love, but he feels even worse for having lied to the Woman. He is unable to get her out of his head, and he realises that he loves her more now, than before when he was watching her and when she was under the spell.
On her own, the Woman ponders all of the events with the Man and the Chain. She realises that her love for the Man wasn’t as a result of the Chain, and it was in fact genuine. She decides to rush and find the Man and to tell him that she loves him and that she wants to be with him. Simultaneously, the Man realises that he has to see the Woman, to tell her that he is sorry and that he loves her. The pair find each other and share their love for one another. The film ends with the reunited couple once again happy, and completely in love.
As a genre, at heart, the film is primarily a love story, although it will include traits of fantasy. I intend for the film to be fifteen minutes in length, without any credits. In terms of an audience, I think the film is aimed towards those that can appreciate a more artistic form of cinema. This is due to particular elements that I wish to include in the film, for example, the film will be a silent one. Titles on screen will depict the characters thoughts and feelings to the audience. The film will be black and white. I have decided this as I feel it will accompany the silence of the film naturally, giving it that classic look and feel of films from the past. Another vital point to mention is that the film will be stop motion, but not a typical stop motion animation, as it will in fact be live action, with actors. The content of the story then, interestingly enough, was inspired by a number of different pieces of music, most of which referred to the characters in their songs as either strange or weird. From this, I created the idea to show my two leading characters with cardboard boxes for heads, which I do think will visually stand out especially in black and white. In terms of location, I plan to shoot the film in one large room, similar to that of a theatre.
"Do, or do not. There is no try." 