I decided to re-write a script I have had out there for the last twelve months. I would like your feed back if you have a moment on the following: Title: THE TESLA PAPERS Genre: Suspense thriller Logline: When some old papers reveal the existence of an undisclosed Tesla device, the energy barons and their government puppets do all they can to possess them. Synopsis: The story begins with Grant Nolan, a Canadian Government employee and Army Reservist, witnessing a hit-and-run near an Irish pub in New York. Before he dies at Nolan’s feet, the victim insists Nolan takes his jacket. Later, in his hotel, Nolan finds a flash drive in the jacket and reads it. He discovers it contains details of an undisclosed device referred to as a Tesla-cell which, if produced, would devastate the economy of the world. The information on the flash drive also states that viable deposits of an essential mineral needed in the production of Tesla-cells are only found in Saskatchewan. As he reads, Nolan’s attention is drawn to the hotel TV where a CNN reporter states that three Irish thieves killed Eli Lippman the owner of a New York research laboratory while he slept two nights ago. They stole some cash and some sensitive information that the owner was researching at the time and which the US government would like to recover. Upon hearing this Grant realizes his life could be in danger and leaves New York for Vancouver where he confides in his superior, Fewster. Fewster in turn informs Canadian Prime Minister Carrington who then demands Nolan hand over the flash drive but Nolan, believing egotistical Carrington has his own agenda, memorizes some of Tesla’s equations, alters the flash drive, and disappears. Carrington, in cooperation with Western government secret agents, angrily pursues Nolan. While on the run, Nolan is befriended by wealthy recluse Spaulding who, unbeknown to Nolan, found the Tesla papers in one of his father’s old trunks and underwrote the initial research at the New York laboratory. Now he’s bent on getting the research back and befriends Nolan. Nolan falls for Spaulding’s charm and reveals the formula to him, believing Spaulding will develop it for the benefit of mankind; something Nolan desperately desires. Nolan then finds himself caught in Spaulding's matrix of lies, secret agendas and lust for power from which he and his new lover, Widow Deena Lippman, must escape.
Screenwriting : Script re-write feedback by Robert John Chapman
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When Nolan realizes he's got the cure for free energy, why doesn't he just publish the equations far and wide on Reddit, and send copies of the documents to leading physicists at the leading physics research labs, Elon Musk, and CERN?
Hi Shelly, did you ever see Three Days of the Condor? or Enemy of the State? There is no free media outlets. We only get to hear and see what is allowed.
Ah, but I didn't suggest going to the press, but to scientists and intellectuals and the viral storm that we've seen successful on Twitter, Reddit, and other sites where information spreads like wildfire (rightly or wrongly). Condor and State came out in 1975 and 1998, respectively. Twitter: 2006. Reddit: 2005. Facebook: 2004. Those two movies simply don't hold up with the new social technologies available. In 1998, Ferguson would have been a half-column, buried note. Today it's a viral phenomena. This kind of technology released to the wild public in 2015, you'd have a wild-west race to obtain patents, papers, and otherwise profit off of what would be a financial gold mine. With enough people evaluating the equations, saying "yes, this works", the public will demand application (not talking about picketing and protests but wallets). If the equations are simple enough, Kickstarters will spring up left and right to apply it. This is a viable, obvious, and possibly morally responsible outlet for Nolan to use from the get-go.
I really like the premise and I think there's a ton of opportunity for drama/action, but there's one thing that's really bugging me. I have trouble believing Nolan would trust Spaulding enough to tell him the equation. Nolan is on the run seemingly from the U.S. government and the Canadian government and his trust has already been betrayed once by his superior Fewster. It just seems unlikely to me that he would trust a complete stranger, no matter how charming of a recluse he appears to be. Perhaps if they had a relationship in the past (old friends, old acquaintances, friend of the family, old mentor, old teacher, etc) even if its thin it would ring truer than trusting a complete stranger. But, I'm only going off the synopsis...
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Hi Shelly, In the story, Nolan requires the use of high tech scientific equipment to prove the concepts works which limits him to government owned or controlled venues.
Hi Larry, The Bourne series was the best I have seen in 50 years. They were..."Man, this could happen to me", type productions. I have tried to emulate that with this one and its sequel. The story was originally more international than it is now and the body of the story was actually set in Australia. I have done away with that and now moved it to Canada to reduce locations and costs.
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Hi Daniel, Nolan is pushed into a corner by the government agencies and Spaulding provides a way of escape. Not only that, Spaulding controls a massive media network and provides Nolan the where with all to get his message out only to find Spaulding has an agenda for him to do so.
I think somewhere in there you've got the bones of a thriller, but I suspect you need to rethink "Tesla" as the name of your technology. The Tesla brand is reasonably well known in the US and Canada and anyone who follows the company even in a minor way will know that the stuff Tesla's batteries are made out of can be easily found in the Western US -- thus why Musk is building his so-called gigafactory in Nevada. I mention this because audiences will be puzzled about how Musk is making the guts of Teslas in Nevada when you're saying the required material for the "Tesla device" can only be found in central Canada. You don't want audiences asking Hitchcock's Refrigerator Question at the beginning of a film -- or script readers doing the same in the opening pages of the screenplay.
It is great input from you all, I appreciate it. In response to your concerns may I bring your attention to something that happens in the banking world that involves the leasing of petro-dollars from OPEC to prop up the IMF and WorldBank funding; not that it is generally referred to in public and hence it could be a world changer. It is explained in this scene from the script: INT. YAKIMA RESEARCH STATION / CONFERENCE ROOM - DAY Mary looks around a black oval table with LEADERS from several nations, including British Prime Minister Tynsdale, sitting in high-backed black swivel chairs. There are walnut and brass nameplates in front of each, and the usual country flags. Mary spins the locks on her brief case and SNAPS it open. MARY I'd like to apologize for calling you all here at such short notice. She makes eye contact with them each in turn. MARY (CONT'D) I won't take much of your time. (beat) In a few weeks Canadian Prime Minister Carrington will possess an energy formula which will eliminate the need for fossil fuels in less than ten years. There's general MURMURING among the leaders, except for Tynsdale. MARY (CONT'D) The developing world will be the first to collapse. They won't be able to convert their existing infrastructure to accommodate these Tesla-cells, as the inventor called them, unless the IMF and the World Bank underwrite the expenditure with trillions of petrodollars. (beat) Loan funds of the magnitude needed will not be available because the OPEC nations will demand full and immediate repatriation of all their petrodollars. AUSTRALIAN PRIMES MINISTER NIELSON, mid-50’s, is bumbling, balding, overweight and obviously not a fashion plate. NIELSON Can they do that? Mary glances at him. MARY As you know, we don't allow OPEC nations to receive immediate cash payment for their oil. We lease most of their petrodollars for thirty years at very low fixed interest rates so our prime banks can provide Bank Instruments worth billions of dollars to the highest bidders on the money market. Nielson leans forward. MARY (CONT'D) If those banking transactions were suddenly unsecured by this arrangement with the OPEC nations, it would bankrupt the IMF and the World Bank. Various expressions of surprise, doubt, and deep concern cross the others’ faces. MARY (CONT’D) Every banking institution that bids for petrodollar Bank Instruments would collapse and our first world nations would be involved whether we liked it or not. Nielson stands abruptly. NIELSON My god! This could start a world war! MARY Most likely.
Richard, Interesting take on the title. Most people I know who relate to Tesla remember that "all" of his technology that was known at the time of his death was confiscated by the FBI and other agencies and buried in warehouses somewhere. He was known to have destroyed inventions also because the world was not ready for them he claimed. Certainly there is the odd company here and there using the name, but from a non-American view point I was thinking the use of the name for a title would be more attractive to the potential viewer than distracting. I will give it some thought and see how others react. Thanks Bob
Thanks Larry. Appreciate your take on it. The good thing about the times we live in now is that the average Joe in the street is up with a lot of this and talks incessantly about it on social media in expectation of it coming to pass. When I was first exposed to the New World Order in 1974, you were run out of town if you mentioned it. Thanks to George Bush Snr and his declaration of the "New World Order" coming into being when he invaded Iraq in 1990 the NWO was an eye-opener to the average person and they soon began to take notice of what was happening around them. But most just don't know what is really going on behind the scenes, and those who do know don't get the air-time to tell it. Peter Sellers knew about it when he made the most boring movie ever made, "Being There" in which he portrays a puppet President coming out of obscurity to take the most powerful seat in the entire world. Such a plot has come to pass in President Obama taking office. In the last scene of Peter Seller's movie "Being There" he reveals that behind the entire plot to install a puppet President was the Illuminati...not bad for a 1978 production. Too bad most people were ignorant of their existence and intentions at the time. Seller's got it right and President Obama is a testimony to it. It would be good to tell my story some other way; maybe it will happen eventually. Thanks for your comments. Bob
Hi Peter, Have another look at "Being There" if you can get a copy. In the last scene you will see Peter Seller's walks across the water pond in front of the house of the wealthy man who put him in office. When he reaches the far shore of the pond you will see that they are entombing the wealthy man in a pyramid, which has an all-seeing eye symbol engraved on it. As for Russia and China both were sold out to the Illuminati a very long time ago. In 1985 I was on a field trip for the Chinese, who were interested in my background in fertilizer manufacture. I was taken to an old ammonia fertilizer plant. I asked them about its existence as I.C.I. licensed all the ammonia plants around the world. They said they knew that and that the old plant I was looking at was owned by I.C.I. and had been built in the early 50's. I asked them how could that be as they were communist and I.C.I. was British. They said, "Well, Shell Oil and I.C.I. were never kicked out of China and have been here all the time. As a matter of fact the US government lent us three trillion dollars to establish out chemical, fertilizer and petro-chemical industries years ago". The Rothschild and the Rockefellers have been involved with both these countries for an awfully long time also. War is not the plan for the future; rather it will be the consequence of the future. Economic collapse of the fiat money and the failure of food production with GMO crops etc, thanks to Monsanto, will take out most people in no time at all. The reason there is such freedom on social media today is because those involved know they have everything in place for a collapse of societies and a take over and are just waiting for the right moment to go at it. The only enemy they have is the man-in-the-street reacting as we see in Ferguson at present. And this also is no threat to them but a useful weapon they can use to create urban chaos, fear, etc. The UN has already had its laws regarding the limits of stored food legislated in nearly all governments around the world. The limit is seven days supply only per household. Any more than that and it can and will be confiscated....so much for the preppers surviving. There is much more to all this and you could make a hundred movies about it. It sure is an interesting time to be alive. Bob
Thanks Peter, call me when you land....there is more...