Selfie Exile

Adam and Eve exile themselves from social media

Selfie Exile - image 1 - student project

Current update:

Open Letter to James Franco or his assistant:

Dear Mr. Franco,

You strike me as a person who might not have enough to do with themself. I am willing to take a chance on you. Please consider helping me to realise my film project by acting in one of the roles I have open. Adam may be the more suitable. In exchange it goes without saying that I will extol all the virtues of this class. The realization of my project with your help will prove indisputable the merits of its curriculem. I do hope that after reading my script you will strongly consider if not for me than for the future of collaborative education experiments and the public defense of selfies.

Yours in both show and tell,

Catherine Mouttet

Step 1: Selecting Your Text

I choose Wendell P. Bloyd from the Spoon River Anthologies.

Wendell P. Bloyd http://spoonriveranthology.net/spoon/river/view/Wendell_P_Bloyd

I wanted to take all of the spirited agression against the hypocrisy that Wendell expresses in this poem and translate his Adam and Eve reference into a contemporary argument.

The Adam and Eve characters take on aspects of Wendell's need to confront and combat. They also out wit mechnisms by creating their own form of eviction. Wendell's missconduct and imprisonment reflects his attempt to get kicked out of the society. In this manor his predicament reflects his biblical reference. He seems to be laughing at hypocrisy as much as he's offended and striking out against it. I wanted to create a representation that is very true to that spirit without being a literal retelling of Wendell's story.

Step 2: Drafting Your Screenplay

Final Draft:

https://drive.google.com/file/d/0B88Ssuw4mffhMHJVVFFadU05Ukk/edit?usp=sharing

2nd Draft:

https://drive.google.com/file/d/0B88Ssuw4mffhYXNIQzJwUEI5eEE/edit?usp=sharing

Step 3: Writing Your Logline

Adam and Eve exile themselves from social media

Inspiration

I took visual inspiration from the Standard Hotel on West 13th Street in New York where the conversation is set.

Selfie Exile - image 2 - student project

My hope is to have the hotel room set the mood of a projected reality as the internal spaces of the rooms are highly visable from the outside this seems very symbolic of the nature of the self projected which is visualized in the opening scene.

Images of the rooms and the hotel can be seen here:

http://www.pinterest.com/hijinxdesign/the-standard-13/

Selfie Exile - image 3 - student project

Selfie Exile - image 4 - student project

Another inspiration point is the combative romantic chemistry in films like this:

His Girl Friday.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=vkYT2_GoV20

It Happened One NIght

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ALmnUBqbhuo

Star Wars- Princess Leia and Han Solo

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Ry2-p0SGyKY

Dialog writers that inspire me range from Dorothy Parker to Oscar Wilde to Ken Kesey. I'm also very interested in interactions that seem natural and spontaneous. Scripting that walks the line between clever structure and opportunity for improvision is exciting to me.

Cast

Eve- Elizabeth Grant

Adam- James Franco

About me

I'm a fulltime art director and first time screenwriter who often posts on Instagram.

http://instagram.com/catherinemouttet

Thanks to everyone on Skillshare for the exchange and fellowship in this very unusual writing experiment. Crowdsourcing education and collective creativity for that matter is a promising and maverick space. I hope that whatever we have done here blossoms and defines us and our mediums in new and unprecidented ways. I am very excited to be a part of that.

In my script there is a phone number listed for Adam. I put this in there from my fellow script writers. It's Charles Bukowski's phone number from this poem

http://www.mitcharf.com/mitcharf/art/poems/462-0614.html

As we are all calling for answers in shaping our work it seemed appropriate.

Next steps

I'm planning to have this shot by the end of Summer. By my estimate we should shoot 3-4 hours of early evening to night footage and it should take 1-2 days to edit. Any suggestions or advisement is very welcome.

hijinxdesign@gmail.com

Thank you,

Catherine

Catherine Mouttet

1st time screenwriter

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