Thursday, January 8, 2009

Pieces of Time

As some of you know I am trying to write a feature-length screenplay in about 3 weeks. I have a title, synopsis and characters done, as well as a treatment. Right now I am working on the long outline. Here is some info about my story.


PIECES OF TIME
A busy music industry executive in Los Angeles never seems to have enough time. He finds a magical pocket watch at an antique store that gives him thirteen hours instead of twelve. The antique store owner tells him about more watches that have more hours, these watches are scattered throughout the world. They begin a journey to find more magical watches but are constantly followed by an evil collector that is bent on stopping them.

Characters:
Jim Sherman
(Jeremy Piven)
A very busy and very important executive at a recording company. He has his entire life scheduled and timed. He never takes time to deviate from his schedule, not even for his family and friends.
After he discovers the watch he is able to have extra time with his two daughters and his wife Lynn, but he soon starts to become obsessed with finding more watches.

Harlan Macavoy
(Morgan Freeman)
Owner of the antique shop where Jim finds the watch. Ever since he found the 14-hour watch in a foxhole during the Vietnam war he has been searching the world to know if there are any other watches. He has found several clues as to where the other watches are and has even discovered more watches. He had put
away the thought of finding any more until Jim happened upon the 13-hour watch in his store. With Jim's encouragement, he takes up the search again.


Lynn Sherman
(Jennifer Connelly)
Jim's wife Lynn is very sweet and understanding, but this watch obsession is just too much. She affords Jim the opportunity to search a little bit for the watches and work on his hobby (even if she doesn't understand it). She also likes how he suddenly is able to have more time for her and the kids. When Jim's obsession for finding more watches overtakes his entire life and threatens his job she draws the line and pleads with him to give up the search.



Sir Walter Connegan
(Christopher Lee)
Our villain of the story, Sir Connegan has also been seeking the watches. His entire family down to his great, great, great, great grandfather has been seeking the watches. Sir Connegan is very rich and powerful and has many resources that Jim and Harlan don't have. He also has a great deal of artifacts and clues about the watches that they don't have. In the late 70's Harlan had been working with Sir Connegan to find the watches, but after a bitter fued over the 18-hour watch, Harlan broke up the friendship.


FYI: Don't even think about stealing my ideas, I know how to copyright and register with the WGA and I have a paper trail of all my ideas. Just be cool, keep your hands off.

Tuesday, January 6, 2009

Work Work Script Work

Still looking for a job. Nothing exciting to report yet.
I have been working on a few projects though. Various scripts and treatments in different levels of development.

I rally all writers to work with me to finish a script in the next three weeks. If you are interested in trying this with me, I will send you a three-week script writing course that I have found. It has helped me flesh out an idea and get it ready. I am just now finishing day 7 of my process. I plan on finishing an outline for my script tomorrow.

It's a really great way to express yourself and get your ideas out there. Also, it helps in getting your creativeness out so you can grow and learn.

If anyone has a feature script or a really good short that they want me to read or give thoughts/feedback on let me know!

Good luck!

Monday, January 5, 2009

Music

I've got to be honest folks. I am not a big fan of Portishead's new album. (I know, shock! amazement! horror!)
It is a good album, not a great album. I might be missing something within the greater picture, and I'm glad they're back after so long. But I can't say I like the new direction. (I guess that's what I get for being a die-hard 90's Portishead fan).
I was still excited about getting the new album, and I am listening to it again as I type. So I will not not recommend it, just slightly less recommend it.

Also in the world of music is some new stuff:
MGMT
"Electric Feel"
http://court13.com/electricfeel.mov

"Time to Pretend"
http://www.court13.com/TimeToPretend_480.mov

Asteroids Galaxy Tour
"Around the Bend"
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=TGjl6ITkFqI

Michael Franti and Spearhead
"Say Hey"
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=eoaTl7IcFs8

Ezra Furman and the Harpoons
"Take Off Your Sunglasses"
http://www.myspace.com/ezrafurman

Eagles of Death Metal
"Wanna Be In LA"
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=CN7aAYS7FuU
(alternate version) http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=lWF3Jt16Ciw

Friday, January 2, 2009

CLOSAT # 6

C- A filthy invalid who is homeless but also a hopeless romantic
L- The hydraulic chair at a hair salon
O- A slightly damaged and mostly used gift card to Pier One Imports
S- Searching for hours for an open restaurant on a major holiday and finding nothing
A- Furiously pulling out a ripped and bent piece of mail from a tiny mailbox
T- We can try our utmost to keep ourselves free of doing wrong, but when the temptation is much more visceral and attainable than any other reward, we tend to choose the wrong and then try and recover by justifying our actions, which doesn't really make us feel better about our decisions, it just numbs us from feeling good about ourselves

Wednesday, December 31, 2008

Loud Crowd

While listening to an Indy Rock station here in LA, I discovered a new social gaming site online that plays wicked tunes and is fun to play. I'm pretty obsessed with it right now. It's called Loud Crowd and it is in it's beta testing phase.

It was created by a new company called Conduit Labs: "Conduit was founded by a combination of web entrepreneurs and social gaming pioneers; leaders in the development of Rock Band, Lord of the Rings Online, Guitar Hero, Asheron’s Call and Ambient Devices."

Basically, you create an avatar and a profile, then go into a chat-room style place and pick someone to dance with (you can dance with yourself, but that's pretty lame).

You start dancing in a DDR for your fingers - style format. The more you get asked to dance, the more points you get. You also get points for dancing. If you get enough points you get cool stuff like a new wardrobe, music requests and other things.Anyway - I can invite people to play, but only every now and then. Let me know if you want an invite and I'll see what I can do.