My film is no longer a horror-comedy.

During the week I began to read through How to Write a Movie in 21 Days: The Inner Movie Method (King, 1988) and, whilst a lot of is useful for personal writing, because I’m only writing the outline of a feature for this project not much of it applied to me apart from an overwhelming sense of letting the story change naturally. I began to think about the sheer contrast of the slapstick, dialogue-fuelled comedy of Shane Black’s Kiss Kiss Bang Bang/The Nice Guys (Black, 2005, 2016) I wanted to emulate and the serial-killer horror I wished to play it against. I found myself wondering whether or not I was simply incorporating the horror genre because of my personal love of it. It seemed to take away a layer of reality within the film so I thought it would be best to change it to something more realistic but equally fun to play with. Instead of them witnessing a murder by a serial killer, instead Jacob and Michael witness a mafia killing by another idiotic duo, who are almost just as idiotic as those two:

Angelos Mulby (Late 30s) – A bald, stocky man with an intimidating presence but a surprisingly endearing outlook on life. Despite his exterior his biggest passion is poetry and he often dreams of becoming an unironic restaurant critic who specialises in Italian cuisine. Takes his role in the family business seriously. His goal is to find the witnesses to his job at the start of the film and silence them to keep the family out of trouble.

Anton Mulby (Late 20s) – A thinner, more nasal man with slicked back hair, obviously takes great pride in his appearance. More eccentric and immature than Angelos, settles into panic when talking about the witnesses throughout the film. He wants to be taken seriously by the rest of the family and his goal is to one day run the family business.

The idea came from a mixture of sources. One of my favourite films, In Bruges (McDonagh, 2008) again features a similar tone I wish to capture within my film, the dark comedy that’s superbly undercut by witty dialogue between characters throughout, even with the antagonist Harry (played by Ralph Fiennes), the dialogue is identical to that of the two protagonists. Everybody within the film appears to be in the same boat and I love that sense of dramatic irony in the idea that there are no clear antagonists within the film, there are just people with different agendas and different jobs. With that in mind two idiots being part of a larger crime syndicate family, terrified of their family being brought into the light by two accidental witnesses gives me a lot to work with in terms of character interactions. They desperately won’t want to be caught and that will drive them to find the two protagonists in the film.

To keep the comedic sensibilities I gave Angelos a small backstory that would be used as a recurring joke, as his italian connections due to being involved with the mafia could lead to his passion for italian cuisine being seen as a joke. Both Mulby’s were heavily inspire my my potentially first associations with mob members…those seen on The Simpsons (Fox, 1989-). In particular the characters ‘Fat Tony’ and ‘Louie’ (one of his men). I had both of these characters’ appearances in mind when crafting the two, which probably heavily influences how they act.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Bibliography:

King, V. (1988) How to Write a Movie in 21 Days: The Inner Movie Method. USA: Quill Publishing.

Black, S. (2005) Kiss Kiss Bang Bang. [DVD]. Warner Bros. Pictures.

Black, S. (2016) The Nice Guys. [DVD]. Warner Bros. Pictures.

McDonagh, M. (2008) In Bruges [DVD]. Universal Studios.

The Simpsons (1989-) [DVD]. 20th Century Fox.