Whilst going over the happenings of the film’s second act it recently occurred to me that the majority of what I’ve been brainstorming won’t be able to fit within my outline, mostly because it doesn’t advance the plot. It’s quite difficult to communicate the comedy of a script or a film idea through the use of an outline alone so maybe I’ll need to have snippets of dialogue included within mine, much like the one for The People vs. Larry Flynt (Forman, 1996). Nevertheless I feel like it’s important to continue brainstorming such ideas as it helps me form the world in which the film is set. Because even though the film takes place in a small rural town in Kent (making it a very British film), aspects of the plot such as the mafia characters are so exaggerated that I need to find a way to make them feel as home within the atmosphere I want for the film.

One of the ideas I had for the film’s second half included Jacob trying to dispose of all the knives and potential weapons within the house, but not knowing what to do with them after gathering them up. I began to imagine small snippets of conversation between Michael and Jacob in the situations, to get a feel for their characters:

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INT. Kitchen – Day.

Jacob comes rushing in, opens up various drawers and begins emptying their contents of knives and various sharp objects.

Michael: What are you doing?

Jacob holds up a spork and stares at it for a little while before putting it back.

Michael: Jacob!

Jacob: Look! I’m safety-guarding this house, alright?

He drops another knife into a black bag.

Michael: Safety guarding?

Jacob: Yes, when those two guys find us, and they will find us, we don’t need them thinking to themselves *He grabs a large bread knife* ‘ooh, this looks sharp, I bet this’ll hurt a lot more when I’m gutting these two idiots, I’m so glad this was here, or else-‘

Michael: ‘-or else I would have just shot them dead’…they had guns.

Jacob: Yeah, but you saw the way they tortured that guy. And this house has millions of potential torture weapons just waiting to be played with!

Jacob pulls out an apple corer and presents it to Michael.

Michael:…what.

Jacob: …heart plunger.

Michael: Apple corer.

Jacob: But in the right hands a heart plunger!

Michael: You can’t kill someone with an apple corer!

Jacob: I bet you can! Enough pressure, pushed into the chest *he begins to vividly act out the violence – sound effects and all* crack through a few ribs, pierce the heart, blade gets caught. Then all you gotta do it yank it back out when you’re done and bam…fresh heart to munch on.

Michael: Since when are the guys cannibals?!

Jacob: I don’t know what they do in their spare time do I?! How are you so sure that they’re not?

–

I then had the idea of Jacob initially trying to take out the black bags of knives to put in the wheeley bins outside, only for them to split and empty out onto the pavement in public – prompting more suspicion and gasps from the Preils. One of the knives would also fall and embed itself in Jacob’s foot, causing him great pain and would provide the start of a small montage sequence for comedy purposes.

 

After several failed attempts at getting rid of the knives and weapons eventually he would find dumping them in the small fish pond at the bottom of the garden, where he assumed they sink to the bottom. This would then lead to a visual joke in the form of multiple dead flailing fish with cutlery sticking in them rising to the water’s surface.

Small jokes I’ve been brainstorming like this aren’t useful when it comes to the film’s outline, but help me get more and more of an understanding of what I’d want the film to present itself as and be.

I think next though I need to develop the Mulby characters a bit more.

 

 

Bibliography:

Forman, M. (dir.) The People vs. Larry Flynt. [Download]. Columbia Pictures.