On The Brink

Notes for a Movie Script

Notes for a Movie Script

Fade in the sound of the Rock ‘n’ Roll Boogie

With its skipping uppity beat blaring from unseen speakers.

Fade up the picture of a small, cozy town:

A Main Street lined with historic buildings along a cobblestone road.

A dress shop here, a classic diner there.

Cut to the school,

Whip pan past the student-made posters through the open windows .

Enter the doors of a sweltering gymnasium,

An early May evening in Mississippi.

Picture an old-fashioned sock hop

Where shiny black oxford shoes dance with white bobby socks tucked into red saddle heels.

Catch the polka dots on poodle skirts and tiny buttons on white cashmere sweaters.

Focus on nervous laughs of first dates.

Capture the frizzy permed hair that contrasts the slicked back fresh haircuts moving about the room.

And don’t edit out the sweaty acne-prone skin that represents youth.

Switch the key light onto the “bad boys” wearing leather jackets

Who stomp in dripping with teen angst that match their chunky black motorcycle boots.

Let the Chantilly Lace record skip

Close up on the awkward boys standing like wallflowers

As they race to flip it, just to have

Something that would make them feel “normal” amongst their peers;

Something that filled the time before they get picked up at 8

In Dad’s 1947 Nash Ambassador, where they would be

In the solace of something familiar at a less than glamorous age.

Sidle the camera to the tired teachers,

Who are bored of standing at the front of a classroom

Full of rows of children looking forward to life beyond a hard wooden desk.

Take a master shot of the students

So that teachers can flashback to when they acted like wild animals in a zoo.

Smiling at their own high school memories as they stand beside red punch

And counting down the hours until they are no longer stuck chaperoning,

They wish to live carefree again.

Follow the smiling young blonde girl and dark haired boy,

Who comfortably danced together at the beginning.

Hand in hand, they feel free from the scrutinizing eyes of their parents from another generation

Who just don’t know what it’s like to be young.

Pull back and take a long shot as they exit the sweltering gym

And head towards the small diner a block away

To coat their thirsty, dry throats with a cold root beer float.

Pan out of the scene of the young couple

Sitting across from each other in a cushiony red booth at a sticky white table

Chatting and laughing, feeling liberated and experienced.

Creating stories they’ll tell their children and grandchildren years down the line.

Let the audience see an honest scene.

Let it seem real.

Let it be genuine.