Sick Dreams
My first short film will be made for my CALARTS portfolio and it is a dream come true
Be the first to read my script, Sick Dreams.
For California Institute of the Arts, I have to send them a comments page of films, books, plays, television shows, etc. that influenced me. I have to send them an outline of a film project I want to realize and I have to make a film.
Sick Dreams is my ambitious short film about a mid-twenties, early thirties, registered sex offender who kidnapped a young girl and held her in captivity. As she fights to stay alive, young Baby Anne Cassidy makes herself over and becomes the child he wants her to be. The disturbed couple fall in love. They blur their mental disturbances with carnal ecstasy.
The characters in this film are as follows:
Sick Dreams is my ambitious short film about a mid-twenties, early thirties, registered sex offender who kidnapped a young girl and held her in captivity. As she fights to stay alive, young Baby Anne Cassidy makes herself over and becomes the child he wants her to be. The disturbed couple fall in love. They blur their mental disturbances with carnal ecstasy.
The characters in this film are as follows:
Baby Anne Cassidy
Baby Anne Cassidy is Thomas Hudson's victim. She is being held ransom. She becomes aroused by her captor's magnetism. She develops Stockholm syndrome. She has a fugitive mentality. In love of the man who hasnt killed her yet, she becomes the object of his affection. She stars in his homemade pornographic videos where she portrays innocent children. She has an innocent, fragile adult child quality.
Thomas Hudson
Thomas Hudson has a history of mental disturbances. He's diagnosed with anxiety problems and is a registered sex offender. He lives alone preying on young women. He kidnaps and takes care of Anne Cassidy. He sees her as an immaculate creation, pristine and beautiful, untouched by the age of consent. His suppress rage for children is manifested when he uses Anne as his scapegoat. She becomes his Savior. He is morally depraved. He directs Anne in her pornographic videos. He's abusive. He's afraid her innocence will fade out, just like every child. He reverts Anne back into an objectified child.
"Peeping Tom" photo by James Hill
TREATMENT
The Man wanders inside Baby Anne's bedroom. The lovers' happily lie together and kiss. The lovers' caress each others' face. Thomas cusp Anne's face and tenderly kisses her pink cushion lips. Thomas lies on his belly. Anne sits on his back and straddles her legs on the bed. They coyily toy with each other and kiss.
The happy times come to an end. It was all a distant memory.
The happy times come to an end. It was all a distant memory.
A young, attractive girl sits on the kitchen counter eating a bowl of cereal. Her legs are spread. A man walks in with the mail and sees her seductively sitting on the counter. He quivers and schemes. He grabs his camera and begins taking photographs of the girl. The girl steps down from the counter and walks over to the sink and gargle the sink water. The young girl seductively poses on the floor. She is uncommonly innocent. Her master is aroused by the girl’s big brown eyes that seem to evoke demure childhood glee. Her rosy pink pout is adorable. The wanton man cherishes the stark photographs of the girl lying on the floor clutching her teddy bear in one hand and her underwear in the other hand.
The pedophile puts down his camera. He picks his video camera and records the garish young darling. She cutely poses in front of the Man. The Man cannot contain his stern demeanor. Her preciously provocative sexuality is making him uneasy. He begins to pull down his pants. He masturbates while recording the home video.
The pedophile and the girl kiss. He chases her to the girl’s bedroom. The bedroom is decorated with heavy influences of young little girl’s room. The pedophile throws the girl against the wall. He lies in the bed. He clutches the sheets and gnaws on his skin. The young girl crawls into the bathroom. She takes off her shirt and walks inside the dry bathtub. She silently cries to herself.
Inside the living room, the pedophile photographs the young girl. She provocatively models in front of the camera as she wears barely any clothing. The girl massages her owner’s shoulders. They kiss as she reaches over for the keys. The man takes her hands and throws on the floor. He grabs the video camera demands her to kneel on the floor facing the wall as if she was a little girl. The young girl is terrified. The Man sits back on his chair watches kiddy porn video he produce starring her. He gets aroused. The video is a creepy, puerile dollhouse set with the girl dressed up in a little girl’s dress. She is surrounded by porcelain dolls. She wears a pink dress. She crawls inside a cardboard box and pleasures herself. Surrounding the box is the sea of destroyed and desecrated Barbie dolls.
The Man giggles as the girl kneels against the wall. She continuingly begs for forgiveness. The Man takes her by the hair. She begins screaming.
The Man takes her to the bathroom and throws her inside the bathtub. He takes her a shower. He scrubs her dirty body. Images of them have sex races across their minds. The girl sinks inside the tub.
Outside the hotel room, the girl crawls on the floor in lingerie. Montages of the pedophile’s eyes are the only visible string in her memory.
The girl sits inside a dark closet. She hears the rambunctious screams getting louder. The zombie girl opens the door. The bedroom looks like an attraction at Disney World. The man envisions the girl as giant child-like marionettes on display. They speak to him. The man sees her and interrogates her. The story comes full circle from the beginning. He asks her why she ran away from him. The young girl wears the same grey long-sleeve tee and low cut Care Bears underwear. The girl reprimands him and violently tells him she wants his old life back. He has kept her and she stayed because she developed Stockholm syndrome. She tells him she’s grateful she’s still alive but this is not the life she wants. She becomes aggressive, womanly, stripping her performance as a doleful child. She rapidly screams with vengeful tears and she pounds her chest at him. She demands to be released from his imprisonment. The man cries out at her and tells her she is the object of his affection. He is enchanted by her, obsessed with her beauty. She tells him she does not love him and she never did. The man envisions the marionettes crawling towards him with their thin strings attached. The girl screams at him. She’s abrasive and fiery. The man holds up the gun and radically pulls the trigger. He shoots her in the chest. She falls on top of the heap of dolls.
The Man runs inside his bathroom, desperately sobbing. His inspiration is dead. He looks inside the mirror. He takes of his clothes. He grabs the rope from his medicine counter. He walks inside the shower and hangs himself.
Inside the bedroom, the cops and paramedics find her corpse. The cops see the sex tapes and disintegrated childhood icons. They bring in boxes of child pornography. The forensics covers her body with a white bed sheet. The police officers find hostage tapes of the Man touching her and locking her up in the bedroom if she disobeyed. The paramedics drag out the corpse of the Man. They cover his body with a white bed sheet.
On the television, a video of the Girl dressed in sexualized popular childhood icons is being shown. She looks like a desecrated mannequin. The Girl smiles at the camera when she playfully dances. The television set is turned off.
Sick Dreams is a disturbing portrayal of a doomed love set in the most dire situations. I will soon update this post photographs from this movie. Hopefully, you guys will enjoy this script as much as I enjoyed writing it.
Here are other ideas that I had for a short film. Maybe one day, I'll complete them:
To Love You, Caesar Augustus
At the funeral of Caesar August, four special women in his life remember the life of the Old Casanova.
Josephine was his wife. They met at a family picnic. He told her was going to war. Josephine was a rich girl. They secretly marry because she was pregnant. One morning he bags his belongings and leave her.
Housewife
He traveled and met Georgina Bayer, a journalist and novelist. They meet at a cafe. They dance. Georgina soon begins to write her magnum opus detailing her torrid romance with Caesar. Caesar tells her must explore the world.
Virgina Woolf
Checking out work at local theaters, he sees actress, Theresa Spencer, on stage. She recites a monologue from Gigi. Caesar gives her standing ovation. Theresa, at first, is abrasive with Caesar. She believes he is patronizing her. They strike up a conversation about politics. Caesar is impressed. He takes her to the lake, their spot. Theresa puts up a wall. She tells him she cannot be with him because it is harmful to her career. He leaves.
Joan Crawford
Caesar rents a hotel and meets Ava Ryan at a photo shoot. He directs her poses and they become one of her most famous shots. The have a torrid romance in the hotel. They barricade themselves in the hotel for two weeks straight.
Betty Brosmer
In the end, Caesar goes home to a pregnant Josephine, but every summer, he visits his three other girls. June is for Georgina. He dedicates July to Theresa. August is his month with Ava. He fathers their children and sends them trinkets.
In the end of his short life, the women meet for the first time at his funeral.
Sex Feet Under
Untitled Art-House Film
This is the story of my friend's hilarious life. Her escapades as a steampunk Queen to a bonafide academia starlet clash with her musical intusion, intrusive conscience, and inane friends and romances.
Glee
Lady GaGa "Bad Romance"
The Alpha Female
A young girl is sent to an all-girl boarding school. She has plans to take over the world one manipulation at a time. In the boarding school she feels the attraction with her teacher and blackmails him.
Siberia
Two women are sequestered inside a mental institution. As the murders that united them become infamous, they lay low in oblivion.
The Murders at Cielo Drive by Charles Manson and his family inspired me to write this hypothetical tale of two women from the opposite spectrums of the murders come together in grieve and trauma. The script is a retrospective look of who they were in the past and the people they've become. We see the motivations of the murders and the lives of the victims with an insider's look into the new lives of the survivors.
The Repugnant Charles Manson
The Angelic Sharon Tate
Every now and then I think about Sharon Tate, Paul Tate (Sharon and Roman Polanski's unborn son), Abigail Folger, Jay Sebring, Voytek Frykowski, Stephen Parent, and the LaBiancas. I hate the idea that their lives and legacy are marred with their deaths. Manson and his minion are repulsive figures in history and they should not be in the same sentence as these people. To take a life and steal their acclaim is the most offensive act against a man. You robbed them of their lives and killed a child's dreams before they even began. Innocence perished the day Sharon, Paul, Abigail, Jay, Votek, Stephen, and the LaBiancas.
Good Day Sharon
One day, these works will come alive or perish with me. Either way, my brain is collectively gathering exciting ideas to create. By December, I'll post my Calarts Portfolio. Hopefully, you'll enjoy the sneak peak.
