HDC Idol II 2011-2012

[Fearonsarms]

http://www.horror.com/forum/showthre...t=58379&page=4

[ChronoGrl]

Originally Posted by ferretchucker

I can't wait for my first challenge!

Ditto!



AND I CAN'T WAIT TO SKIN THE FERRET ALIVE MWAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAH

[hammerfan]

Originally Posted by Fearonsarms

http://www.horror.com/forum/showthre...t=58379&page=4

"not sure" doesn't translate to no, I wont' be participating.

[Doc Faustus]

Question: Should I post my grade and comments publicly or just PM them to you?

[The Villain]

I hope this slow start doesnt translate as lack of interest. I'm really excited for my challenge!

[neverending]

Originally Posted by Doc Faustus

Question: Should I post my grade and comments publicly or just PM them to you?

He said to PM them to him.

[_____V_____]

Thank you, Your Honors.

I have received the grades from all 3 Judges, and so it's time to see them.

Here we go...

[_____V_____]

THE FIRST TEST OF HDC IDOL II - THE OGRES

Choosing from all the books of the genre you have read till now, pick a book and turn it into a suitable horror film with a working story outline. You are free to make necessary changes which might enhance the look of the film, and make it appeal to wider audiences worldwide.

Ogre Zombieness's entry -

Hiya. Here’s my entry. I chose the book Cell by Stephen King (partially because it was a good read. Partially because it was the closest book near my laptop at the time being)..

Enjoy!

A young man, Clayton Riddell, wakes up one morning late for his meeting with a company planning to publish a graphic novel he made. Before leaving his hotel, Clayton quickly calls his 13-year-old daughter, Jenny, and wishes her luck with her choir concert that she is to perform that evening.

Clayton reaches the publishing company and struggles to find his way to his meeting inside the building. A middle-aged man named Tom McCourt offers to help him. They enter the elevator, which loses power, and abruptly stops for a while. Outside they hear screaming and shouting.

The elevator restarts again and exits to the sound of disaster in the streets below, and rush to a window where a crowd have gathered and look upon as two large trucks collide into each other and a small van crashes into the lobby of a nearby store. A young girl named Alice Maxwell shrieks and darts to the stairs, fearing that her mother – an interior decorator who went down to their car to fetch some of her sketches for the employees lounge, might have been injured. Clayton and McCourt try to stop her, but end up following behind her.

Outside a better view of the chaos is shown – mad, animalistic people run around attacking pedestrians. McCourt, Alice and Clayton take cover from another wild car in a bookstore, where two men hide behind the front desk. One of them is injured with a heavily bleeding neck and the other is repeatedly trying to reach 911. Clayton and McCourt go down to try to calm the bleeding man.

The caller suddenly drops the phone and attacks the injured man – clawing and eventually cutting open his throat with rage. The man then attempts to attack McCourt, but Clayton narrowly defends him by strangling the madman with his belt. Clayton realizes that something happened to the phone lines and subsequently tosses his phone against the wall. Alice and McCourt do the same. Alice pleas them to go back and find her mother, but they decide against it, telling her that her mother would have already found safety or otherwise they wouldn’t have anything to find. Alice does not protest, and instead becomes very mute. She says the her mother would’ve gone back to their home in the North once she realized Alice wasn’t in the building, and coincidentally Clayton’s daughter is up North as well. The three decide to treck together.

The trio leaves the scene as large pieces of burning debry from a plane gone out of control starts to fall from the sky. They survive and reach McCourt’s suburban home as night falls, and decide to refresh for a few hours before trekking back to Maine. Clayton becomes increasingly stressed at the thought that Jenny – or her mother – might use their phones. He lies awake for the greatest part of the evening but is awoken by a sound coming from the living room. There, he finds that two altered beings have entered the home. He tries to make his way to upstairs where Alice and McCourt’s rooms were to be found, but is caught and attacked. The noise catches the attention of more altered beings around the home. Clayton finally manages to shake off the two already in the home, and wakes Alice and they retreat to McCourt’s room. The three jump from the window mere moments before a group of altered break the door down. McCourt then throws a lit match through the window, and the curtain catches fire and soon the entire house is ablaze.

They find a deserted school, where each of them fall unconcious and have a vision of a man (called ‘The Raggedy Man’), who commands them (who are now ‘Flock-killers’ after burning an entire flock’s equvilent in their home) to travel north to Kashwak. They regain reality, and upon realizing that each of them experienced the same dream, they decide to obey the demand and steal the school bus.

On a highway, a group of normal humans intercept them and try to break into the bus. McCourt is barely able to flank around the group, and the three are forced to leave the bus and run when a moltov cocktail sets fire to the back seats.

They arrive in Kent Pond, where Clayton’s home is in a state of disarray. He finds a note from Jenny, stating that after Shanon (Clayton’s wife) became turned into a ‘Phoner’, she was forced to kill her and ‘heard a voice’ telling her to go to a place called Kashwak.Clayton goes outside to the backyard and sits alone for a while to mourn the loss of his wife.

A man named Ray, a neighbor of Clayton, runs to him and hands Clayton a cell phone and a set of keys. He quickly tells Clayton to use the phone ‘when the time is right’, and then slits his throat with a knife before Clayton could answer his question.

Alice walks in on the scene and when she sees Ray’s body and Clayton holding the phone, believes he became mad and in a split second breaks down. McCourt tries to calm her down but she picks up Ray’s knife and starts to try to stab them. Clayton is forced to wrestle the knife from her and accidentally stabs her through the chest. She dies in his arms.

Clayton, guiltful of the incident but still intent on finding his daughter, buries Alice and Ray before leaving with McCourt to get to Kashwak.They reach the town in the Ray’s car. It is filled with Phoners all around – each of them aggressive but not attacking.

Clayton then experiences another vision while driving (causing them to crash in a lamppost) in which he’s locked inside a stadium with The Raggedy Man. The Raggedy Man congratulates Clayton on getting as far as he has, and invites him to either join ‘The New World Flock’ or be killed. Clayton tries to bargain with The Raggedy Man, exchanging his life for his daughter’s freedom, but wakes up abruptly.

Sees that McCourt has been dragged out of the shattered car window. McCourt is then mauled violently to death before the car by a group of Phoners. The hundreds of phoners then movie into the shadows, until only 11 remain around the car. The one closest is The Raggedy Man – who looks exactly as he did in the visions. Clayton climbs out of the car with Ray’s phone, hopeless and broken, and answers a sudden incoming call (planning to become one of them in a form of suicide).

The car then implodes and Clayton is sent flying through the air. The Raggedy Man is killed instantly when a metal shard slices through his skull, and as he falls down, dead, the hive mind that connected all the altered. All around in mere moments, the phoners turn from rabid to aimless and distant creatures. Clayton looks up at the sky and thanks Ray for his ingenious plan, and passes out.

A year later, Clayton is on a small plane with his daughter in his arms. By the way she lies and stares into the distance, she’s revealed to have turned into a phoner. The plane is shown flying over Paris, where a cure to the virus has apparently been developed.

Clayton pulls out a cell phone to look at pictures of her, him and Shanon and the happiness they experienced before the world changed. The battery dies and the phone screen fades to black, before the rest of the scene fades to black in the same way, ending the film and leaving Jenny’s fate ambiguous.

Judge #1's verdict -

I give Zombieness a C-.

Not enough detail and very disjointed. I was left with a myriad of questions. The part where Ray hands Clayton a cell phone and tells him to use it when the time is right, then slices his throat.....he says Ray slices his throat before Clayton can answer his question. I didn't see where Ray asked him a question.

Judge #2's verdict -

The story is exciting with well motivated characters. It would make a good screen adaptation. Nothing too deep, just a solid horror action film. No mention is made of the last clause in the assignment: You are free to make necessary changes which might enhance the look of the film, and make it appeal to wider audiences worldwide.

GRADE: C

Judge #3's verdict -

There was talk of adapting Cell into a movie and in all honesty, I think any King text has a more than solid chance of getting adapted into a film. If you had picked a piece of short fiction or a novella instead of a big, popular doorstop of a novel, I would have thought the choice was more inspired. I don't feel like a lot of creativity and thought went into this. Whether you're dealing with publishers, studio readers or any creative professional, remember that surprise is imperative. Consider yourself fortunate that your other teammates submitted nothing.

D

Overall Grade - C-

[_____V_____]

Ogre Roshiq's entry -

THE GREEN FEATHER


Based on Robert McCammon's Boy's Life

McCammom's Boy's Life offers many things. It is, in part, a mystery, but there are also enough dark moments in the story to consider it a horror story as well. But more than that it is a magical and very beautiful universal tale about being a boy and growing up in our very common word surrounding of good & evil.

The year is 1964. On a cold spring morning before the sun, 12-year-old Cory Mackenson is accompanying his father on his milk delivery route. It's on this route that Cory begins to come of age, as he and his dad witness a shocking accident that at first starts sinking with a menacing mystery. Corey and his father are just rounding a bend in the road when a brown car veers in front of them and drops down into the lake. There is a man behind the wheel, and Saxon's Lake is bottomless, so without any hesitation Cory's father makes a desperate attempt to save the driver, but instead comes face-to-face with a vision that will haunt and torment him: a dead man handcuffed to the steering wheel, naked and savagely beaten, a copper wire knotted around his neck. The lake's depths claim the car and the corpse, but the murderer's work is unfinished as, from that moment, both Cory and his father begin searching for the truth.
Zephyr is a sleepy, comfortable small town of Alabama. It’s a peaceful, idyllic place where Cory lives with his parents and pals around with his best friends - Davy Ray Callan, Johnny Wilson, and Ben Sears. It's 1964 and life is perfect for the boys. But now, the murder of an unknown man who lies in the dark lake, his tortured soul crying out for justice causes Cory's life to explode into deepening puzzles.
Tom Mackenson has seen dead bodies before, but never anything like this and the memory of what he has seen haunts him from that moment on and the dead man invades Tom's dreams calling for him to "Come join me down in the dark." One of the hardest things for Tom to deal with is the fact that the killer must surely be a local person, because only a local would know that the lake was so deep. In fact, if Tom and Corey hadn't witnessed the car going into the lake, no one would ever have known anything about the murder. Another thing that haunts Tom is the sad fact that nobody knows even seems to know the identity of the dead man. Their world no longer seems so innocent: a vicious killer hides among apparently friendly neighbors.

While his father is risking his life in the lake, Cory glances over towards the woods and sees someone standing there watching and wearing a long, dark coat. Cory looks away for a moment and when he looks back the figure has gone. Cory does not tell anyone about what he has seen, but later, while his father is talking to the sheriff, he walks over to where he thought the figure had been standing, but can see no signs of anyone ever being there. When he gets home though, he finds something stuck to the bottom of his shoe. It is a single, green feather...which later leads him deeper into the mystery.

Over the following months, both Cory and his father struggle to understand how life has now changed. Cory tries to understand his father's struggles and the struggle between good and evil that he has been forced to realize is taking place in his quiet little town. His father struggles with the sudden, harsh, realization that life isn't nearly as perfect or safe as he once believed it to be. It is now a darker world and a world of change. If and how they can accept that change is a large part of the story.

As days pass, Cory is faced with The Lady, an ancient, mystical woman who can talk to dead people, practices voodoo, and can bewitch the living, a violent clan of moonshiners, bullies, and the fact that a girl he calls "The Demon" has developed a crush on him and intends to make him miserable if he doesn't pay attention to her.

Boy's life is written in the first person and as the story is narrated to the reader by Cory; so there will be time to time monologue from his character in the film also...for example, after that mystical, magical things starts happening in Zephyr, Cory puts it:
"We had a dark queen who was one hundred and six years old. We had a gunfighter who saved the life of Wyatt Earp at the O.K. Corral. We had a monster in the river and a secret in the lake. We had a ghost that haunted the road behind the wheel of a black dragster with flames on the hood. We had a Gabriel and a Lucifer, and a rebel that rose from the dead. We had an alien invader, a boy with a perfect arm and we had a dinosaur loose on Merchants Street."

Other, equally unsettling transmogrification occur: a friend's father becomes a shambling bully under the influence of moonshine, decent men metamorphose into Klan bigots and "responsible" adults flee when faced with danger for the first time. With the aid of unexpected allies, Cory faces hair-raising dangers as he seeks to find the secret of the dead man in the lake.
His quest to understand the forces of good and evil at work in his hometown leads him through a maze of dangers and fascinations: the vicious Blaycock clan, who defend their nefarious backwoods trades with the barrels of their guns; a secret assembly of men united by racial hatred; a one-hundred-six-year-old black woman named the Lady who conjures snakes and hears voices of the dead; a reptilian thing that swims in the belly of a river; and a bicycle with a golden eye.

As Cory searches for a killer, he learns more about the meaning of both life and death. A single green feather leads him deeper into the mystery, and soon he realizes not only his life, but the sanity of his father may hang in the balance. Events such as Cory's dad seeing the dead body, Cory's dream while sleeping on Davy Ray's grave, and finding out who the real killer is all result of Cory's quest. When Cory's dad first saw the dead body in the car and looked into the face of murder, it rocks Cory's whole view of his hometown, and that everything is not as perfect as it seems. The next event, when Cory falls asleep on Davy Ray's grave and dreams of all the evils in the world, is when Cory fully reaches loss of innocence. He sees how evil the real world is, and how different it is from Zephyr. He knows that what happened with the dead man is not as bad as it gets, no matter how malicious it seemed at the time. The last event, when Cory discovers that the kindhearted veterinarian Dr. Lezander is the killer, is when Cory begins the next stage for quest, the seeking.

Cory's story with its pervading sense of childhood innocence tempered and compromised by experience is as such that it transcends the horror genre despite the understated supernatural elements. The story provides some intense action, a murder mystery, a horrifying and dramatic flood description. It portrays the excitement, despite the ignorance, of youth. It also included the most amazing description of the feeling of having a new bike and riding it.
This is a story of growing up during a time when the entire world seemed to be changing. It is the story of wisdom, courage, and truth--the kind of truth that everyone must eventually face. It is a story of life and of death. And most importantly, it is a story about the magic of childhood.
The story is set in the early 1960s and makes observations about changes that were happening in America at that time with particular emphasis on the Civil Rights Movement--several of the characters are even connected to the Ku Klux Klan. This is an affecting tale of a young man growing out of childhood in a troubled place and time and that offering is universal.

TBC...

[_____V_____]

Cast & Characters:

Cory Mackenson: Cory is the protagonist in the story. He has a small-boned frame, and is a skinny, gawky kid of average looks and height. Cory does not get noticed very often, so he stays quiet around people he does not know. Cory enjoys writing stories in his free time, making his stories on paper show life the way it should be, or the way he imagines it, he believes in magic and likes to read comics. He is a regular 12 year old. At the beginning when the man dies and finds a green feather, that's where his troubles begin.

Cast: Joel Courtney (Super 8)

Johnny Wilson: A soft-spoken, part native-American friend of Cory's who gets a severe concussion when fighting with the Branlin brothers, the local bullies. Johnny is a philosophical boy and has been a stoic his entire life from living with day to day mocking. Cory worries about him throughout the summer, but Johnny teaches Cory a lesson when, there is another confrontation with the Branlins. Johnny uses fighting skills and strength he had worked on all summer to defeat the Branlins. Cory realizes that it takes courage and hard work to earn peace.

Cast: Asa Butterfield (Nanny McPhee Returns, The Boy in the Striped Pajamas)

Tom Mackenson: Cory's father, a quiet and kindhearted man, who loses his job as a milkman and has to work at a super market. His one desire in life is peace, which he learns to fight for at Cory's suggestion.

Cast: Michael Biehn (Terminator, Aliens, Bereavement)

Davy Ray Callan: Cory's hot-headed, sarcastic friend who empathizes with a triceratop" that is caged and abused in a traveling circus. He frees the triceratops, wreaking minor havoc on the entire town of Zephyr. He dies towards the end of the story by shooting himself accidentally. The explanation he gives Cory is that he saw Snowdown, the local myth, which is a white stag no hunter can bag. Davy explains that when he saw Snowdown, he was so shocked he tripped and shot himself in the stomach.

Cast: Ryan Lee (Super 8)

Ben Sears: Cory's chubby, somewhat slow friend, who turns out to be braver than Cory thought. Cory realizes, during a sleepover, that Ben's father is a violent alcoholic, though Ben has never mentioned it.

Cast: Zach Mills (Super 8, Changelling, Mr. Magorium's Wonder Emporium)

Dr. Lezander: The local veterinarian who pretends to be a Dutch survivor of World War II. He is friendly and gives nicknames to the town's residents at weekly church services. His outward appearance hides sinister secrets. In the final chapter, it is revealed that his real name is Gunther Dahninaderke and he is actually a former Nazi, who was the doctor of Esterwegen concentration camp in World War II.

Cast: Michael Rooker (Henry: Portrait of a Serial Killer, Slither)

Rebel: Cory's dog that gets hit by a car, and dies, but Cory prays him back to life. Cory slowly realizes that he has to let Rebel die so he can be at peace, but not before spending some time with Dr. Lezander, and noticing some important things about him.

(No Casting given)

The Lady: The Lady is the undisputed leader of Bruton, and is well respected by everyone in Zephyr. She is 106 years old, and has lived to see many different things in her life. Her hair is whiter than fresh snow, and in contrast her wrinkled skin is as black as the night sky. She is small and frail with protruding bones, but commands attention with her stature and attitude. The most striking thing about the Lady's appearance is her intense green eyes. She is a very wise woman, and has answers to many people's questions. A special talent of hers is being able to see into the land of the dead, and talk to those on the other side. Some credit her with magic, but to her it is just a unique way of doing things.
White people tend to fear her, including Tom Mackenson. She is very in touch with the supernatural, such as Ol' Moses, the huge creature in the river, and spirits who are "on the other side of the river" (dead). She gives Cory Rocket, his bike, as thanks for saving a young boy from Ol' Moses during the flood.

Cast: Ruby Dee (American Gangster)

The Moon Man: The Lady's mysterious husband, known to all as the Moon Man, is black but has a very pale birthmark on his face and head that give him a very unusual appearance. He is generally a soft-spoken gentleman.

Cast: James Earl Jones

Dick Moultry: The town bigot, Moultry is an obese, cowardly, angry, self-centered KKK member. Ironically, he is caught under a bomb that is mysteriously "mistakenly" dropped in Zephyr on Christmas Eve, and which Cory attributes to the Lady's supernatural power. The bomb does not go off, but pins Moultry in his basement. He needs the help of Mr. Lightfoot, the local fix-it man who has a prodigious ability with all machines, to get out from under it. He refuses Mr. Lightfoot's help at first, on the grounds that Mr. Lightfoot is black. Being an unintelligent, rigid bigot, of course, Moultry learns nothing from the experience.

Cast: Giovanni Ribisi (Gone in 60 seconds)

Vernon Thaxter: The middle-aged son of the richest man in town, Vernon Thaxter refuses to wear clothes. He is crazy in some ways, yet makes predictions that are important to the solving of the murder. He is goodhearted in general, coercing even the most racist people in Zephyr to help build a dam in Bruton, the place where all the black citizens live, against a coming flood. He, like Cory, is a writer, but his writing disappointed his father, who in turn blamed Vernon for his mother's death (Vernon's father may be dead during the story, but Vernon keeps this a secret so no one will dare bother/insult him).

Cast: Ed Helms (The Hangover)

Mr. Hargison: The local mailman, who saves Cory and his friends during the first fight with the Branlins. He is friendly with Tom Mackenson until they discuss the matter of the KKK, which Hargison secretly belongs to.

Cast: Noah Emmerich (Truman show, Super 8)

The Demon: A girl in Cory's class who disgusts the other students with her nose-picking, etc., but wins their respect at the end when she glues Leatherlungs, their oppressive teacher, to her chair.
According to Cory..The Demon's name was Brenda Sutley. She was ten years old, and she had stringy red hair and a pallid face splashed with brown freckles. Her eyebrows were as thick as caterpillars, and the untidy arrangement of her features looked like somebody had tried to beat out a fire on her face with the flat side of a shovel.

Cast: Chloe Moretz (Let Me In, Kick-Ass)

Leatherlungs: One of Cory's teachers, who is considered to be half-crazy and a "burnout" by the other teachers. She bullies Cory, specifically for his trouble in math, and at one point he gets so angry that he hits her. At the end, she gets what she deserves when the Demon glues her (with very strong, homemade glue) to her chair.

Cast: Catherine Keener (40 year old virgin, Where the wild things are)

Mrs. Neville: Cory's teacher in the beginning of the book, who encourages him to enter a short-story contest. Cory resents her, simply because she is a teacher, but finds out later that she was dying of cancer at the end of the year. She passes away during the summer.

Cast: Vera Farmiga (The Orphan, The Departed, Source Code)

Reverend Blesset: A very right-wing Baptist preacher, who strongly opposes the Beach Boys and their music. He gives a sermon saying that their music is from the devil, and is trying to make children sexually crazed, immoral delinquents. He illustrates this point with an angry spider monkey, who he calls Lucifer, but this backfires when Lucifer escapes and proceeds to wreak havoc on the town.

Cast: Woody Harrelson (Zombieland, 2012, Defendor)

Screenplay & Directed by: Frank Darabont

------*****------

Judge #1's Verdict -

for roshiq's entry - I give him a B.

Very enjoyable story. I'm giving him a B because it didn't knock my socks off.

Judge #2's Verdict -

A very complete and well thought out proposal. The story is rife with dramatic situations and metaphors. I would caution about the use of a narrator, as that can sometimes lead to a reliance on telling things instead of showing, in what is primarily a visual medium. The setting in a small town in the 60s of America has great potential to allow comment on the situation today, with racism still very much alive today. Casting seems solid, but I'd like some explanation of why you chose Frank Darabont as director. No mention is made of the last clause in the assignment: You are free to make necessary changes which might enhance the look of the film, and make it appeal to wider audiences worldwide.

GRADE: B

Judge #3's verdict -

I love Boy's Life. It's a great book. Becoming a modern classic. But I've got a few problems with your choices. First of all, Boy's Life is loaded with plot. Very few books have so much meaningful content and do so much to build a big childhood world. So, I think Boy's Life would be better as a miniseries for tv. It's an inspired choice, but I don't want to see it done as one film, two films, or a very gimmicky three films even. The way it's told, it's way more conducive to five or six one hour episodes. Hurting the pacing or losing material doesn't do the text any favors. Second, your casting feels a little too on the nose. I would like to have seen some slightly more adventurous choices. Otherwise, an inspired choice and I'll be damned if you didn't work hard.

B

Overall Grade - B