Live Brief 2 - Short Film Idea

Developing short film ideas has always been a struggle for me, because I feel like i'm condensing and squeezing the entire plot of a feature into a few minutes, and details and scenes always seem to be left out and the story lacks because of it. I've started to take a new approach to short films, and that is thinking of stories as episodes. Television episodes can be 20-30 minutes and their stories are always quick and to the point, so now when ever I think of short films, I think of situations and circumstances that everyday characters can get into, like sitcom shows etc. My newest idea for a short film is quite dramatic and has the potential to be quite long, so I tried to apply the episode method and come up with the idea of shooting the end of what would be the script. To focus on the conclusion and finale of the story and use a cold open to throw the audience into this world and have them discover the story throughout.

The story centres around a young computer hacker, who has grown up poor and uses his skills to intercept large digital fund transactions from a large business. His plan is to take the money and give it to the poor, a Robin Hood type character. The film is going to cut in on a cold open that takes place after the hack and theft of the funds. It takes place in one location at a cafe/diner type restaurant and has the hacker and a high up executive at the company sat across from each other at a table. The story is going to be about the confrontation and the executive trying to get the money back, there will be smart and intelligent dialogue as they discuss whats happened and how its right or wrong, both growing up from different backgrounds, theres quite a friction between them. Once he realises the hacker won't give in, he has his friends brought in and used to intimidate him with the threat of torturing them. The hacker as the dilemma of sticking with his cause and doing what he believes to be the right thing, or saving his friends.

I want to be able to develop my writing of dialogue and thats why this idea will have plenty of back and forth between characters. It will always benefit whoever is on sound for the crew, as we've never really had a production that has had this much dialogue and that heavily relies on it. It will also be good for the director because the quality of the performances is what will carry and intrigue audiences throughout the story. I'm hoping to create a tense and intimidating tone like shows such as Breaking Bad and True Detective have been able to capture in their episodes.