Working through the drafts of the script for the documentary interview element of the installation I have realised that it is too long. There is simply too much in there and it is to the detriment of the drama and confrontation (chess game if you like) that I am trying to establish between myself the interviewer and Ben Wright. I did a lot of research and found a lot of the facts, stories, politics and science about global warming really interesting and think the audience will too, so I do want to keep the best of it in the piece. However within the documentary interview script hey end up being too fact, preachy, statistics at times and boring and I feel they will lack some of the drama they are designed to have and possible lose the audience.
Deciding to pursue the idea of stripping out some of the facts, exposition science and arguments as they do not sit well in the piece though is one thing but what to lose and how to re-purpose this into another way to the audience is a different story. It MUST fit in with the narrative of the story and installation. They MUST also be personal, short, visually interesting, communicate the message effectivelyI considered many options and also want this content to feel different from the other elements I will be using. I have outlined what I was considering and my feelings on all of these below.
1: Animated Virals.
I have tried some of these and they are time consuming.they can work though but also unless using real characters can not have the emotional connection with the audience. they are immediate and often funny but lack a little in depth and emotion..
2: Kinetic Typography
This works with some of the more basic messages but as well as being hugely time consuming lack a little of the emotional appeal of a real figure telling the audience the facts.
3: Vlogs.
Really interesting way of doing it and can be simply filmed and break the fourths wall having that direct to audience feel. Great for listing ideas and thoughts quickly.
4: Keep them in the documentary interview still.
Not really an option this as it would make the documentary far too long and too hard to shoot. the idea is to strip them out and even after thinking about possible ways to include it feel this is the wrong option.
So weighing up all of these and doing a little development on how they could work I have decided to do short Vlogs (Video Blogs). These will be used as new additions to the installation and work with the other video elements. These will be sold as Ben putting them up on his Blog and also online youtube etc to get his message out to his audience and hope that they go viral. It will basically be him selling his cause and possibly the organisations manifesto directly to the audience breaking the fourth wall. Stylistically these can be pretty interestingly filmed. As there will be a few very short vlogs I think I can be playful within the context of the story narrative too as early on I want to create a sense of enigma. I aim to keep the audience guessing as to if the returned figure claiming to be Ben Wright is actually him or not. So the first couple I think can be shot hiding much of Ben away to keep them guessing. Back lit, low key lighting, focus pulls
As a refresher of what the documentary shoot has to do and the role it performs in the whole piece and how the Vlogs and manifesto and issues that Ben will be campaigning on through them will slot together. This needs a to have a good narrative structure so I have really plotted this out and researched around academics and experts in the field and applied their ideas and theories.
ACT ONE
1: TV News Piece (3-4 mins)
The role this fake TV local news section will serve is a good set up for the video content that I am assembling. In about 3 minutes it does a really good catch up of the story so far, gets out of the way lots of exposition and back story and also has the sense of enigma I am after. I may also use a little bit of Vlog within the news piece to establish it and to illustrate the fact that Ben MAY be back!
This all happens in the first act of a screenplay generally the first quarter. Within the structure of the whole piece this is what narrative academics Todorov calls the equilibrium and Labov orientation. Screenwriting guru Syd Field calls them the set-up. They are pretty much all the same thing though. Field also talks of a plot point which spins the action off in another direction and this also occurs in this as it is the fact that Ben MAY be back!
ACT TWO
In the pieces that follow we now need to try and create some drama for the audience. The character whose journey we follow is Ben Wright and even though he is not playing out all of the drama in these his story and character arc is what takes the audience through the installation. Drama comes from conflict and for Ben this is in the form of not being acknowledged, conflict with governments and the fossil fuel companies, his past having faked his own death and run away. There are also the larger less personal and overriding conflict against the climate change issue he is fighting and creating awareness and change.
The elements 2-3 below will incorporate all of these in them and generally it is regarded as act 2 in the three act structure. Field called this middle section of a screenplay the confrontations, Todorov problems/enigmas and Labov complications and once again they are really saying the same thing. We need conflict to generate interest and hurdles to jump over and hoops for our hero to jump through to create drama.
2: VLOG (1-2 mins)
This will be the introduction into some of the issues that Ben wants to raise. We will have set up the Vlog in the TV news piece and what it is so we can get straight to business here. Ben will protest against apathy, fossil fuel spin, governments being bought and use this as a real call to arms. As of yet the enigma will still be there as to if it is actually ben or not.
3: Documentary Interview (9-10 mins)
This will be the audience finally getting to see ben in the flesh. The piece will be a sit down interview with a film-maker (myself) which he has been led to believe will act as a platform for his cause. However the film-maker whilst interested in the issue is really after the big expose and stories behind Joes murder, Bens faked suicide, and all of the conspiracy theories and dirt that surround this story. A game of cat and mouse ensues as I try to get him onto this topic and he dodges the issue before finally exploding at the end. The end of this piece of content will be what Syd Field calls the second plot and Labov the climax. This is where something happens that moves us towards act three and a conclusion.
ACT THREE
4: VLOG (1-2 mins)
This will be the final act and what Field and Labov both call the resolution and Todorov the new equilibrium. It is not really a happy ending and itself has a sense of enigma as it is basically Ben's war cry for action "by any means necessary" to fight global warming. He will set out his manifesto for change and motivate the public behind the cause. He will also make threat to the fossil fuel companies and governments making them very aware that he is about to go public with the incriminating evidence he has on them.
This takes us to a climactic ending. In the bigger picture if this was a 120 minute screenplay all of the above would be the first act.
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