2. The Plot
This is an idea of what my future media thriller noir
film may be about.
The idea captures many elements of film noir, as while
it is set in a present time, the main action would
happen at night in dark places, a detective is shown to
be one of the main characters, and this film falls into
one of the sub categories of film noir.
This being amnesia noir, a type of film where an event
happens at the start of the film, the main protagonist
becomes a sufferer of amnesia, usually from some sort
of injury to the head, and spends the rest of the film
trying to piece together what happened, the audience
discovering things with the main protagonist.
3. Characters
Jason Smith – Main Protagonist
Officer Jackson – Detective
Paula Grayson – Character with Knife.
Richard Hunt – Victim
4. Exposition
The first shot would be a fade in to find 3 people in a room, one dead, one with a
knife in the hand, Paula Grayson, the other the main protagonist, Jason Smith.
The protagonist becomes very worried and runs out of the house into the distant
forest, police sirens in the background. He is struggling to take in what has just
happened so is unable to focus properly, and as he is running through the forest,
he trips up, falls into a ditch, knocks his head and is rendered unconscious.
The scene then shifts to Jackson, who has been called onto the scene to
investigate what has happened, seeing the woman who was inside the house with
the knife, and taking him into custody.
The next day, the protagonist wakes up and has forgotten everything about who
he is and what happened the previous night. Two officers walk by and work out
that he may know something about the events of last night, and so take him to
the police station.
5. Development
The scene shifts to Jackson having an interrogation with Grayson about what
did happen last night, but Grayson is just as shocked about the whole ordeal
as Jason currently is.
This means that Jackson is unable to get much information currently out of
Grayson. This is when the corruptness of Jackson shows for the first time.
After telling the other police officers to leave the interrogation room, Jackson
turns the camera off and begins to attack Grayson to try and gain information
through this method instead.
Grayson, now screaming in pain, pleads Jackson to stop, and then utters the
words ‘Knife… Resist… Confused… Ran…’ Before falling unconscious. Jackson
brings the officers in and claims that Grayson passed out from the ordeal of
the whole situation. These words by themselves gave no lead to Jackson, so
he decided that he would interrogate the latest suspect found, Jason.
6. While waiting in the interrogation room, Jason has begun to have flashbacks of
what happened the night before. These include an argument between him, a
woman and a man, unknown to Jason, then another flashback showing this
unknown man dead on the floor.
These images are enough to tell him why he has been brought to the police
station and actually begin to scare him. Thoughts like ‘What if it’s me?’ ‘What
if I’m a killer?’ begin to go through his head. At this point, Jackson walks in to
begin the interrogation. Jason is filled in on the information of what the police
know so far:
The name of the victim – Richard Hunt
The Suspects – Jason Smith, Paula Grayson
What was seen – A man running (Jason) out of a house in fear. A woman standing
inside the house, paralysed in fear (Paula) and a dead body (Richard)
Known Weapon of choice – Kitchen Knife
Time of murder: 11:47pm
Location of murder – 25 Kings road
Motive: Unknown
7. After hearing the name ‘Richard Hunt’, Jason has a sudden flashback and
remembers Richard as a good friend of his. the name also creates another
flashback of the events of that night. It is a flashback of Grayson and
Jackson fighting over the knife with Richard already dead on the floor with
Grayson shouting the words ‘No No NO!’
This shakes Jason to his very core as it strengthens the possibility that he
may be the killer. Jackson then asks Jason if the words ‘Knife’, ‘Resist’,
‘Confused’ or ‘Ran’ mean anything to him. When Jackson sees Jason react
to the words ‘Knife’ and ‘Resist’, Jackson begins to press harder with
questions about what the words mean.
8. Jason tells what he’s seen his head, but Jackson begins to
gain frustration with the fact that Jason is unable to say much
due to ,what Jackson believes an ‘excuse’, his currently
fragmented memory.
Jackson almost has the idea of beating the unknown
information out of Jason, but prevents himself from doing so
when he realises that if Jason does have a fragmented
memory, then it will take more time to work out any
information and he will not get any further by violence, and
so chooses to let Jason go. Grayson is also let go once he
regains consciousness.
9. Complication
After being told the address and information of the murder, Jason decides
that, in order to regain his memory, he needs to take a trip to the place where
the murder happened. Jackson, however, has returned already to investigate
the house further to see if anything has been missed.
What Jackson discovers on closer inspection of the body is that the face and
chest area had been bruised slightly, indicating that there had been a fight of
some sort before the killing happened, meaning that there was a motive of
some sort.
Debris has also been scattered around the kitchen, where the event had
taken place, but these were not used as weapons as no identifiable
fingerprints were found by forensic experts. However, the three fingerprints
of Grayson, Jason and Hunt were found on the kitchen knife, which almost
definitely links both Grayson and Jason to the murder.
10. Jason is then found outside by Jackson struggling to get inside due to the
police creating a border around the house and the police not letting him
in. Jackson decided it would be a good idea for Jason to come back to
where the murder happened and look around to see if this jogs Jason’s
memory in any way. It does.
After seeing the knife, another flashback begins to happen. One flashback
of Jason holding the knife with Grayson running straight at him and Hunt
rushing to defend Jason, the other flashback of Hunt falling slowly to the
floor, blood gushing from his stomach looking directly at Jason.
11. These flashbacks pieced together with the others are enough to convince
Jason of what he did. How he killed Hunt. How he was the murderer. How
Grayson had taken the knife from him and Jason had tried to hold onto it. The
next flashback to be shown was Grayson taking the knife from Jason, for
Jason to then run from the house, into the forest, and then to fall into the
ditch.
After believing his memory had finally been given the whole story of past
events, his first instinct is to push Jackson out of the way and run out of the
house as quickly as possible. He is only just able to escape. Jason needs to
figure out what to do next, he is a murderer, the police will be on his trail.
12. Climax part 1
It’s been 2 days since Jason escaped from Jackson and discovered that he was
a killer, and now Jason is running out of places to go. He decides to do
something that could either help or end in disaster. He heads towards
Grayson’s house.
This could easily be something to regret. He knocks on Grayson’s door to find
an unwelcoming Grayson at the door. The first thing for him to say to Jason is
‘What ELSE do you want?’ This confuses Jason slightly as he walks inside.
After sitting in silence in the house, Grayson finally says ‘I’m surprised you
had the balls to come see me. After what you did, the only thing that really
shocks me is that you didn’t keep your distance.’ Jason asks what Grayson
means.
‘Don’t play jokes with me, just leave before I decide to run you through just
like I did Hunt.’ Before Jason has a chance to react to what has just been said,
the final part of the memory becomes clear to Jason.
13. The full memory
‘What did you just say to me Jason? What did YOU just say to ME?’ Grayson shouts. ‘You
heard me Grayson, you’re nothing but a lying thief, you’ve been stealing for too long and
these petty thefts need to end now! You hear me? Now!’ Jason says.
Without warning, Grayson picks up a kitchen knife from the side and runs straight at Jason.
At the last moment, Richard rushes to defend Jason, has Grayson run straight into him and
take a bruise to the head from Grayson, and ends up taking the knife to the stomach. Jason
can’t believe what he sees as he watches Hunt try to pull the blade of the knife out.
But Grayson instead yanks it out, causing Hunt’s lifeless corpse to collapse onto the floor.
Jason, in shock and not thinking straight, takes the small window of opportunity to try and
wrestle the knife off of Grayson. Unfortunately this fails and Grayson manages to push him
back. The two of them are left standing over the body of Richard Hunt, one with knife in
hand, the other in complete fear.
The only possible choice for Jason was to run. And so he did. He ran out into the forest, and
Jason tripped up, smashed his head and fell into a ditch. The next morning, he woke up with
amnesia.
14. Climax part 2
‘I change my mind, I might just kill you now, a lot easier for me. You’re
being considered the murderer after all. Why else would you run away
from that house? Only a guilty man would run with such speed.
I’ll just tell them the murderer wanted to tie loose ends and tried to
attack me? I’ll tell them he managed to get me in the leg but I put a
knife straight through your chest and ended it right there!’ Grayson
runs straight at Jason with the knife.
Jason has no choice but to stand there and watch as his fate rushes
towards him, only to be prevented as Jackson smashes the door down
and puts a bullet straight into Grayson’s head. ‘I heard everything I
needed outside, you’re safe and innocent, I’ll see to that. Now go
home, get some rest.’
15. Resolution
1 week later, Hunt’s funeral is held and Jason attends to say his final
goodbyes to the friend that had saved his life. ‘I never wanted any of
this for you. You didn’t deserve it. You were a true hero Hunt. I’ll miss
you.’
With that, and his memory restored now and in working order, Jason
simply walked away, hoping to put the misery he’d been through
behind him and hoping he’ll be able to forget it all.
Jackson was fired from his job as a detective for killing a man, even if it
was to save a life. His actions in the interrogation room were also
discovered meaning that he has been charged for assault and may well
end up in jail in the near future.
