Short film idea - Opinions / help needed!

[conormossie]

Hello you wonderful Mac people,

My name's Conor, long time reader, first time poster.

I was just wondering if I could run by the synopsis of the script I'm currently writing. I feel like it's lacking something somewhere, like a clever twist or turn or potentially a different ending altogether.

'Folie' is about a journey into one man's psyche in a tale of twists and turns.
Max (20) is with his friend Josh (20) in the forest when an argument leads to Max pushing Josh over, hitting his head on a sharp edge of a rock and subsequently dying on the ground. Max freaks out and can't believe what he's done and after freaking out over what's happened, he leaves the body and goes home in an attempt to hide from what's happened.

The next day he is plagued with the vivid flashbacks to the incident happening. He tries to call Josh's phone but when he calls he hears the response "This number has not been recognised". Scared and confused he decides to return to the scene of the incident to discover Josh's body not there and the blood from the rock gone.
He starts to question his own sanity, whether he has made this up. Did this even happen? Is Josh even real? Could've have been that kind of person to make up something like this.

He calls up his recent ex-girlfriend and asks about his friend Josh and if she knows where he is. She declines even knowing he had a friend called Josh.

With all this new information in his head now, he starts to really question everything that happened, whether his really is losing it or not. So he decides to bring someone else to where it happened. Someone he's sure is real and alive to the very same spot in the forest to confront the issue head on. He manages to re-create the event identically to the event that happened the day before, and he ends up killing someone he knows is real.



It's the ending I'm really struggling to conclude cleverly, and for it to not be left unanswered or over the top.
Any positive or constructive criticism is very much welcome, and I hope you have a few suggestions!

Thanks in advance!
Conor

 

[WRP]

Have him find out that the person he killed was really named Josh but from a young age went by his middle name.

 

[montgomeryr]

Film ending

I like your idea. I'd like to see it end at the real person's death. If you could really build up to that showing the guy just going out of his mind trying to figure out what happened and just screws things up by really killing someone.
You could show him about to explode after that.
Good luck

 

[Boe11]

Hey, Conor.

I like your idea, should be a cool film.

Short films make it tricky to build up to a climax that feels like a real ending. I'm working on one myself and can't seem to make the ending feel right. That all sounded oddly sexual but you know what I mean.

Some ideas. Whether or not you want to get into layering and the polarizing "OMG HE WAS ASLEEP?!" ending but...

Throughout the story, Max becomes increasingly twitchy and out of touch. You can reflect this descent with your camera work and editing as well (camera angles, vertigo shots).

He returns to the forrest.
His real friend dies during the reenactment.
Max is barely conscious and pretty much nonplussed at this point.
He wanders over to a nearby (insert something he can kill himself with - cliff?) At the moment of truth when the consternation is more than he can bear, and he kills himself, he wakes up.

Now, he could either wake up at the beginning, before Josh died, or he could wake up in the forrest, only to discover that Josh is still dead, he passed out from shock and everything that happened in the story after the initial accident was a torrential dream.

End with a slow zoom out (or even better, UP) while he sits on the ground weeping or mumbling troubled nonsense incoherently. "no...noooo. NOOOO!" etc.

Whatever you decide to do, post it here once you finish it!

Good luck, dude.

 

[conormossie]

Really appreciate the feedback guys!

Got some good things to work with now, I'll let you know how it all goes, and hopefully in the not too distant future link the finished video!

If you / anyone can think of anything, please feel free to share.

Thanks again!

 

[arjen92]

Max has been dead all the time! That should be original, just like "The sixth sense". Oh wait...

But perhaps you could do something with it, that he actually killed himself, but he can't face that and imagines he killed someone else instead of himself.

 

[conormossie]

Thanks a lot guys! Some really brilliant ideas!
I went down a more supernatural route in the end, but.... you'll have to wait and see the finished product to see what happens

I really appreciate all the input and suggestions, so really, thank you all so much.