My story needs to include a restaurant, a camera and a liontamer.
The idea is of a young lion, recently captured for a circus. The liontamer spends all day using his whip and trying to break the lion's spirit. So far we have a baddy, represented by the tamer and the symbol of courage - the brave lion.
At the end of the day the liontamer is too tired to double-check the lock of the lion's cage and a storm starts pouring down. He goes at the restaurant across the street for his dinner. In the restaurant all of the clowns, trapeze-artists and jugglers are having a meal after the circus finally closed for the day. Everyone is at awe at the majestic liontamer and he sits on the best table, right in the center.
Suddenly people start looking around for the source of a loud noise, realizing that the lion is halfway through escaping his cage.
The liontamer jumps off his seat and opens the door with his trusty whip in hand. The crowd of performers quickly reaches for their phone cameras and anxiously start recording the occurings.
The liontamer stretches his whip in anger but the already free lion bites the end and pulls it off his hands.
The whip is broken in half and with a swift jump, the lion hops on the nearby stone fence. He gives one last look to his tamer, his face lit by a sudden lighting.
Your story idea has fired off some ideas in my brain, Vlad. The idea of shifting the emphasis onto the lion is interesting, and the idea of the lion tamer being the villain is interesting too. Funny thing is, even after our chat about camera phones, I keep being pulled back to the camera being more 'victorian' and traditional, because it seems to fit with the idea of the old-fashioned lion-tamer.
ReplyDeleteAnyway - these are my thoughts; what if the 'restaurant' was a 'wild animals' restaurant' - i.e. that the lion-tamer himself ends up as a 'dinner' surrounded by the circus animals he's always mistreated? What if the camera is used by the lion-tamer to promote his fame and fortune - i.e. he mistreats the animals, scares them into behaving in certain ways, and then has portraits taken of him which suggest the lion-tamer is courageous and brave.
I can imagine a structure when we're looking at all these old sepia portraits of the 'great lion-tamer', in which he appears to be very brave with his fearsome lion, and then the story reveals how the pictures were set-up (i,e, that the lion tamer mistreated the lion and forced him to behave - by starving him or similar)... then in the third act reveal, we see a new photo, and this is an image of all the circus animals gathering around their lunch... or something like that; there's something glimmering about the idea of the lion tamer being a shit, the sympathetic character being the lion, the restaurant 'not' being a conventional restaurant, the camera/photos being used as a storytelling device:
http://weheartvintage.co/wp-content/uploads/2013/10/Vintage_circus_lion_tamer.jpg
http://cloud.lomography.com/576/610/2f/caa485336e183965e11bbd78ce362c5c5b7d5f.jpg
https://s-media-cache-ak0.pinimg.com/236x/23/af/dc/23afdc3e13fdfe6b4745a6b21920fd61.jpg
http://static.flickr.com/240/456906146_bb06fe2b43.jpg
Ok, Phil bare with me...
ReplyDeleteI was thinking about your suggestion and it sort of evolved into something a bit more "me".
What if a camera records the performance of the liontamer and the lion and they are really serious and vicious but at the end of the show, when the curtains come down what they really are, are two really close friends. Without the spotlight and the expectations of what the viewers think is " normal" they can be themselves and maybe the story ends with the liontamer opening his packed lunch and sitting on the ground next to the lion, both of them eating as equals?
The story is clearly about the masks we need to wear in order to fit in our roles and i would reeeally like to work on it :)
The problem however is the lack of conflict and the happy-ending, being heartwarming, is not too exciting (even though i like these kind of endings much more)
Opinions will be greatly appreciated :)
I really like this idea, Vlad - it's sweet. I like sweet too, you know ;) There's not always a body in a chest after all! In terms of the restaurant however... hmmm. Could it be even kookier - female lion-tamer - male lion - eating together as old friends...
ReplyDeleteI did just have this related thought - make it a movie camera, make the restaurant one of those 'on film set' kind where the actors/technicians go an eat, and make the lion tamer the guy you 'wrangles' the lions on a film set - okay, still not quite right, but moving the action onto a movie lot does make sudden sense of all three of your components.
So how about going down the Disney road.
ReplyDeleteWhat if the sister of the female liontamer cursed her lover after an ongoing rivalry between the two, for his heart. He was turned into a lion and the only way for them to be together is to perform on stage?
Sort of like a modern day story about curses and witches but in contemporary setting?