A Fresh Idea.

I’ve been watching a lot of movies lately, thanks to the existence of a video store, which is strategically located within a hundred metres radius from my apartment. I rented 5 dvds each week. After renting for a couple of week, I began to notice the type of movies that I tend to watch. To give you a picture, I will give some titles that I really enjoyed watching:

Almost Famous
Elizabethtown
Garden State
Eulogy
The Royal Tenenbaums
Rushmore
Orange County
The Good Girl
Punch-Drunk Love

Most of them are movies which deal with self-discovery, and dysfunctional families. They are basically off-beat drama movies, with a hint of comedy inside. Off-beat, please take a note, I come to a definition that an off beat movie is a movie that has somewhat slow pace, and frequently the scenes in the movie are bizarre and out of the ordinary. Well, like it or not, that’s my own definition.

Among those titles, I found that I really like Cameron Crowe’s film. I just think that he got this brilliant writing skill, and a good choice of soundtrack. His work on Almost Famous is just brilliant. A story about a young Rolling Stone reporter who gets involved in a rock band’s journey to stardom. On most of his films, Cameron Crowe often creates extraordinary characters, like Penny Lane from Almost famous. His characters drew my attention to the movie, and made the movie seemingly more colourful.

Also, on the movies that I mentioned above, they are often had a great soundtrack behind them. A great soundtrack is on of the key success to that kind of movies. I particularly like Zach Braff’s choices of songs on Garden State. He got a brilliant vision of choosing a soundtrack. Garden State soundtrack is loaded with great numbers of brilliant songs, which complement each other perfectly. I’m always a big fan of Braff’s works. He’s one of the most talented actors in hollywood right now.

So then I come to think, I’ve already found my favourite genre of film. I’ve had many references in that particular field of genre. Why not give a shot at writing a screenplay? So one day before going to bed, I got the idea of a film. This is a story of a man who is living in a big city, away from his family. He couldn’t stand his dad, which is close minded and hot headed. He chose to leave his family to pursue a writing career, in which he has not succeeded yet. Instead, he’s stuck in a minor local newspaper agency. One day his little sister called him from home, said that he needs to get home, because his Mom is getting relentless, sick, and have been calling his name frequently in her sleep. He reluctantly went back home to see his mom. On the way there, he encounters a hitchhiker. She's a free spirited, adventurous girl who is taking her time off from work to travel around the country. They immediately become friends and decided to travel together.

That's the main plot. I think it's pretty decent (at least that's what i think). And i also have a couple of thoughts regarding the cast and crew.Zach Braff is the actor that I have in mind to play the main character. But, I’m afraid that the character will be similar to Large in Garden State. So I changed my mind, and put Braff on the director’s chair. He would be an awesome choice to direct this movie. As for the main character, I would prefer Colin Hanks. I think he is a good actor, but he is rarely given a chance to show it. For the love interest, i would cast Zooey Deschanel. She would be perfect to play a free spirited girl who accompanied Colin Hanks in the main character. The parents will be portrayed by Brian Cox and Joan Allen. Two great character-actors. As for the sister, Kristen Bell from the tv show, Veronica Mars, will be a great choice.
So, there you go. A promising storyline, and a choice of cast and crews.
I will be posting the progress of it, when i have started the script.