I really hate having depressing/scary dreams that turn an entire day into some introspective crap trip. It has killed my karma all day, or something.
While I’m on this crap trip, I’ll mention something I’ve been avoiding; I didn’t make it into the quarter-finals of that screenplay contest I entered. I wasn’t expecting to win, but when I got the letter I was still disappointed. I really don’t know why. Well, maybe I do. That contest would have cemented nearly all of my dreams all at once, I would have been set. $30,000 for school *and* recognition of my writing on a grand scale. On such a scale where I could turn my one writing project into a movie, which is really where I want to see this story go. Then that would be it, no more screenplays, I’d be done with movies. But this story, the one I wrote the screenplay of, is so important to me. Maybe because it’s about me in a very roundabout way, so it’s therapy. I want to see all the pain I went through with the Toe to come to some ultimate good. And I want that good to be arty.
I suppose this won’t make much sense if you don’t know what the screenplay’s about. I haven’t talked about it much because I don’t want anyone to steal the idea. But here it is in a nutshell; a woman is committed to a mental institution because she disappears and stuff. (I’m trying hard not to give too much away.) The movie’s about several patients, basically Post Traumatic Stress Disorder from five perspectives. Originally I thought it would only be three perspectives, but the more I think about it, it’s five. Anyway, the whole thing came from something a therapist told me a long time ago. I had to be evaluated for the court case for the toe lawsuit, and he diagnosed me with PTSD and said I was trying too hard to be perfect. He said I needed to let that all go and finally let out all of the pain I went through with the toe. He suggested writing, and that’s really what got me interested in writing in the first place.
But I didn’t think of that screenplay until three years later. It was a dream, sort of. I was in the shower, getting ready for bed, when a whole picture came to mind. This image of a woman, bruised, battered, thrown against a white wall. That was all it was at first, until I started trying to make up a story to fill in the gaps in the picture. It developed into a loose plot line. I knew who she was, who she was married to, but not what happened to her. By that point, though, I was tired and went to sleep.
I had a dream that night. I was standing in a room, looking at myself in a mirror. I was dressed in a black and white ball gown. Someone knocked at the door; I recognized his face somewhat. He told me it was time to go and we went to a big theatre. Everything was there, the cliche Hollywood premiere. I remember I didn’t quite like it and I felt uncomfortable in the dress. But I walked down the red carpeted aisle and stepped into the theatre, being led along by this somewhat familiar man in an impressive black tuxedo.
We sat down inside and a film started. Everything was there – the plot, the stylistic effects, the beautiful French countryside, a large white mansion… and the insane people. The plot unfolded, the audience reacted in all the right ways. I even woke up in tears once because of one of the scenes. But, I fell back asleep and found myself in the same dream, right where I left off. The film kept going and when I finally woke up, I knew I had been hit with my perfect outlet. The only thing my subconscious left out were character names and a few various things.
That happened two years ago, and the more I’ve thought about it since then the more I’ve come to realize that each and every perspective that I’ve researched for this book/screenplay is, in a strange sense, a part of myself. One character, for example, refuses to speak to anyone except for one patient in particular. That’s simply an exaggeration of how I felt the year after my first operations. I didn’t like to talk about what had happened, I ignored it. The characters may be in different situations, their problems may be exaggerated, but the core of their personality is a facet of myself at various times throughout the Toe Years.
Writing it and researching it has proven to be far better therapy than any psychologist could have offered, I think. But I wanted the final closure process to be making the film, showing the world what I saw, what I felt, vicariously. Why? Because PTSD, like most emotional problems, is often met with misunderstanding and fear. Even by those close to you, at times. I wanted this to be my mark on the world. My next PotterWar.
I don’t mean that I think that will never happen just because I didn’t win that fellowship. I’m just saying it would have been the perfect way to accomplish it. I could have paid for college, I could have gotten it going, and I just might have gotten the cast I want – the film in my dream was entirely cast, right down to supporting characters. For example, I thought the head psychiatrist was supposed to be Liam Neeson. I was a bit worried about this, but thought hey, I probably won’t get any of these people anyway, so why not go with it. But, I knew something wasn’t right. A year later my brother got a small job with Atom Films; as payment he got a DVD of foreign short films. There was one film in particular, Kleingeld, that when I watched it felt like Fate slapped me in the face. The main actor in that film looked *exactly* like the man in my dream, and yet I had never seen him before in my life. His name is Frank Lienert-Mondanelli and I can’t seem to find any further information on him. But I know he’s perfect.
The rest of the cast is a bit out there. I have no clue where my brain pulled them from. Gary Oldman, Ralph Fiennes, Nicolas Cage (he’s the one that really confuses me, considering who he’s playing), the list just gets weirder. But they were perfect. It was Gary Oldman’s scene that made me wake up; his character’s final break-down.
Perhaps the rejection letter was just a twinge of fear finally being realized. I think I’m afraid all of these beautiful images of what this film could be will only remain in my mind and never make it to the screen. Most of you know how I feel about the film industry, you know I’m not one to seek after fame and fortune by being the next It Girl. I just want this project in particular because I know it could be truly beautiful.
But I’m afraid it will never happen. And maybe that’s why I was disappointed with the rejection letter. Like I said, I wasn’t really expecting to win. After all, it was my first attempt at screenwriting, it only took me ten days to write it, and it is quite an odd thing to read as a screenplay. It needs two other elements – visuals and music – to truly convey all of its message. And maybe that will be its downfall, the very thing that I think could make it outstanding.
Whoa, that got philosophical. I told you my karma was way out of whack ever since I had that freaky dream last night. I’m not getting into that one, it didn’t have any chance of becoming a story. It was just downright scary.
I think I need to go listen to some seriously happy music for a while. Get all these thoughts of screenwriting out of my head. Somebody email me, I want happy thoughts.