Here are the latest notes from our group tutorial.
This information was in response to our story idea
(HERE)
•It's the buckaroo idea, just chucking things on something before it goes 'crash'
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•Duck and Cover theme
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•Hasn't got the ending yet
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•The splat thing is not necessarily the ending, you need to find an ending for this.
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•Has to have a message about the 50s
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•Intelligent parody of the 50s and nuclear threat and fear, is embedded in the guy the narrator is inter acing with
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•Like a goofy cartoon where they're putting things on him
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•It's an escalation plot so something has to happen at the end which is bigger than this splat which also points back to the war like was it pointless for people to even fear in the first place
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•Fido - Set in 50s, an alternate universe where theres been a disease and this has created a zombie race, but they realise by using electronic collars they could control the zombies so everyone has got a pet zombie and the keep them around the house doing the gardening. Like a warped Edward Scissorhands.
The Point is that you need to play with the idea of fear and perfection and how people try to control it. By using gadgets to control the fear, in a way the zombies in that was a point at the 50s with fear and threat and control of threat.
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•The outcome - none of these devices do anything, we know this. You need to show the pointlessness.
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•The naïvety of knowledge
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•By thinking having these gadgets these things won't happen to you, they WILL happen to you, what can you do to make that message sink home
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•You're missing another thread
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•A lot of cause but no reaction
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•The cause is that he's getting things, from this narrator, PING
The reaction is - he gets injured
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•So by the end of it he's in the wheelchair, wheeling along. Because every time he's been given something he's actually caused him to be hurt
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•So the more he tries to protect himself, the more hurt he becomes, so it's the opposite, and that's a message for the 1950s, that you're worrying about something that you probably shouldn't worry about because you can't stop it anyway. But in worrying about it you cause yourself more pain anyway than just living your life.
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•Like a classic goofy cartoon, but layer it with 50s knowledge
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•The question is who's the guy?
He's gonna be average Joe Blow, in a goofy cartoon he's goofy, goofy is goofy.
You've got to figure out what character he is - dressed in a raincoat and a hat type of average man in the street?
Is he particularly dumb and clumsy?
All American? American Dad from American Dad?
An old man? War veteran, remembers the war, doing his bit but doing it wrong.
Young and stupid? He's the guy that didn't get to go to war, because he was a bit of an idiot, or just too young? Cross-eyed, slumped down?
Salesman has come to the door and said YOU NEED THIS SIR! He's inheriting things because he's too stupid to say no. Make him the unwilling victim, could get him some sympathy with the audience, Pushy salesman.
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•Goofy Cartoons, Daffy Duck cartoon where he's a pushy salesman?
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•Metaphor for salesman, might not be a salesman, but somebody very pushy putting him through these things
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•Another way to look at it- this is a volunteer, so he's walked into this thing as a volunteer, "Thankyou for volunteering to be our 'blah blah blah"
and then he's injured by the end of it so he's wheeling off with his $10
Or the knowledge that this is a public safety demonstration and he is the actor who is suffering it, by the end he's walking off and nobody is any the wiser, nobody has learnt anything other than not to trust the video
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•Look at what we have and play with scenarios, the answers are embedded within the narrative already
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•It's a metaphorical death, he doesn't die but he gets injured where he's supposed to be learning how to protect himself
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•What technology??
Tin foil tent?
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•Be really ludicrous with these bits of technology to make the comedy work
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•Fine Line - To broad, too extreme and it's not funny
The rule in comedy, take a serious person and put them in a silly situation or take a silly person and put them in a serious situation you can invert that premise.
Monty Python = Serious people in silly situations
Mr Bean = Silly person in serious situations
For example, take tin foil hat, the way it's spoken about is very serious, his reaction is very serious but in contrast he has the hat on to one side but with a dead serious face on looking at the camera, that works because it's ludicrous but he's taking it seriously
Alternatively he could have a suit that could work but he can't get it on, now he's made a mockery of what is serious
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•Three things in comedy gags, establish, commit, then punchline (reinterpretation of gag)
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•Eddie Izzard = Establish, confirm, confirm, confirm, confirm, reinterpret
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•Steve Martin = went out of his way to not tell the punchlines, made up a thing, people went 'HUH?' then moved onto the next one, makes people laugh, they haven't got a clue why they're laughing because they're so confused by then they're laughing at everything, so lops off the punchline deliberately
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•For our project it's about set-up, establish in the voice, confirm in the image, maybe re-interpret a bit
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•Find voiceover artists, need somebody to read the script in an american voice, professional
