PHello, Internet.
So, way back in October we started a unit on horror. Things started off well – we went down to Seattle for a few days, where we visited the Museum of Pop Culture, as well as a very fun haunted house. Then, we started planning for our main project for this unit: a class wide horror movie.
We all pitched our best horror movie plots, and then our teachers selected a director, producers, and screenwriter for us, as well as assigning other, less major roles.
The plot we eventually settled on was this: two groups of students, one comprised of more popular, athletic students, and the other of more nerdy, outcast students, sneak into school on the same night to play grad pranks. While there, they start getting killed off one by one. Initially, they blame each other – however, it eventually turns out to be the school janitor, unhinged and angry about students sneaking into the school to make a mess. All but two students die, and those two survive only by breaking their stereotypes and working together.
From there, we wrote up a story treatment and began further developing the characters.
A group of friends have snuck into the school to pull some grad pranks. There’s four of them:Kirk, horror aficionado and known theatre geek, gleefully planning pranks that reference his favourite movies;Marcus, a techie with stage fright, working to make said pranks operate smoothly (and attempting to quell his fears); Barbara, a band geek suffering under high expectations from her parents and acting out for the first time in her life; and Lynda, an anxious loner that others are trying to befriend. Meanwhile, another group of friends is there on the same night also to pull grad prank. This group is a little different. It consists of amiable jock Chet, cheerleader Stacey, and their friends Cory and Bud, both known for partying. While there, the two groups realize that each other have snuck into the school, and start messing with each other, jump scaring each other and terrorizing each other with fake knives/blood/etc that they brought for their pranks. Midway through, Marcus wanders off from his friends and doesn’t come back. Eventually, they go to look for him and find him dead. They assume that the other group has gone too far, and killed him. Meanwhile, Stacy and Bud have also wandered off from their friends and turned up dead in the janitor’s closet, presumably having been making out. Their friends, unaware of Marcus’s death, also assume that the other group has gone too far. The two groups find each other, and are arguing. Lynda, anxious and on the verge of panicking, goes out for some air. Some time passes, and everyone else decides to go look around to see if she has left. They find her dead in the school, and realize that she must have been killed by someone not a part of either group, since they were all in the same room. Terrified, they go back into the room and lock the door. They decide that they aren’t safe and they need to move. The group looks for a way out of the school, and realize they are locked in. Kirk feels confident that he isn’t going to be killed, as his horror movie knowledge will keep him safe, until he makes a fatal mistake. He goes off by himself to find a way out and figures out who the killer is. With his new knowledge, he has to be killed and is murdered before he can warn the others. The remaining group members head toward sounds of screams, and find Kirk’s body. With little to no hope remaining, they head to the wood shop to try and find a tool to use to break out. In the wood shop, the teens find a tool they can use to break a lock, and all they have left to do is head to the door. They start to hear noises and the lights start to flicker. They know the killer is coming. Chet grabs a saw to try and defend himself as they see the shadow of the killer. He tells Barb and Cory to run and he will stay back and protect them. They start to leave, but Cory pauses. He admits his love for Chet, but knows he has no other choice and has to leave. Cory and Barb run away with tears streaming down Cory’s face as Chet is brutally murdered. The remaining two teens escape the school and head to safety, not knowing who the killer is. They are now good friends, who’s stereotypes have been broken down, leaving two natural humans. The janitor is revealed as the killer as he mops up the blood with a wink.
We had a couple of little snits in creating the original character summaries – we found it difficult to agree on small details like whether Bud was an acceptable name. However, we got through it without any major disagreements, so the script team (myself included) set about writing a first draft of the script.
We finished our draft without too much trouble, and a few weeks later, we opened the floor to the non-script writers for critique.
They had a lot of critique. So much, in fact, that we ended up having our entire script, two of our characters, and much of our storyline completely scrapped. We then rewrote the script based on the new story we were given: the day after pulling grad pranks, the students are made to stay after school and clean up their mess as punishment. Instead of cleaning, they decide to pull further pranks on each other, at which point the janitor becomes angry and starts killing them.
Once we’d written and edited our new script, we began preparing for the next stage of our project: filming. We cast actors for all the main characters – I played Lynda, am anxious emo girl who ends up getting pushed down a flight of stairs.
After our first few days of filming, it was clear that things were not going well. We were well behind schedule; we had, like in any project, unforeseen issues to contend with; and we were all incredibly stressed. So, we decided to make a few more changes.
First, we scrapped all the footage we had filmed so far. Second, we cut as much of the script as we could afford. Third, we made some personnel changes: namely, putting a lot of the class in different roles. For my own part, I maintained my role as an actor – but I also became the director.
We extended our timeline as much as we could, and we set off on our second attempt at filming. We made it through more of the movie this time – but still not all of it. When we hit our deadline for filming, we were still missing a few crucial scenes. So, we packed up our supplies, turned out the lights, and I headed home to wash the fake blood out of my hair. (I also showed up to a dinner with my extended family looking a little… mussy.)
After a two week break for Christmas, we were left with a lot of footage that we couldn’t turn into a movie. However, we still wanted to create something to show for our months of hard work. So, our editing team got to work making the footage into a trailer. While it wasn’t what we had originally intended to create, it was still a product showcasing all the time and energy we had put into the project.
So, here it is: the trailer for a movie we will never finish: Dirty Work.
After working on this project for the past few months, I think the thing I really learned was to just keep a positive face and try and find the good in the circumstances given to you. Historically, this is not something I’ve been great at. However, I love horror, and I really didn’t want to spend this whole project being grumpy or upset just because things weren’t going the way I wanted. So, whether it was volunteering to screen test our prop blood by having it poured onto me with a ladle, titling our movie after an old class inside joke, or drinking four cups of coffee onset, I found things to enjoy about our project. That being said, I’m happy that it’s finally done.
Toodles.