Script

This is the script for my team's crime documentary. 

Characters:

Victim - Thompson Devasya - CHRISTOPHER YONG (17/18)

Character Description

At school: quiet kid, prefers to spend time alone, awkward, introvert, doesn’t like participating in class and gets picked on for that, has friends but doesn’t really hang out with them 

At home: spends time in his room playing games, doesn’t leave his room unless it’s necessary, doesn’t really talk to his parents because they’re rarely home due to work, only comes out to go biking 

Stalker and kidnapper - JASMINE - HARPER (16) 

At school: very cheerful, participates a lot in class (sometimes too much), always volunteers to be the leader in groups, very likeable, friendly, pretty, popular, clumsy

At home: Always online so if anyone were to text her she would respond, when parents get home she always greets them, goes out a lot, always says yes to hangouts, she enjoys being in her house a lot (doing chores, texting other students, etc.)

General:

• Doesn’t open up to her friends, no one knows about her fully

• Too nice that it’s concerning

Police - JOCY

Conventions that we want to add:

• Radio chatter.

• Interview with police/ TV feed with footage of perpetrator(s).

• Photos of the victim (polaroid or printed??).

• Interview footage of the victim’s family or friends.

• Cool toned colour grading

Where did Christopher go?

Scene 1: [Rachelle draws storyboard)

At the start of the scene, there will be a black screen with text saying for example “On 19th July 2023, Christopher was finally found after going missing for 2 weeks. At the police station, he told the authorities everything that happened.”

Long shot of road, camera moves and follows Christopher going into the street of the house, track/truck camera movement of Christopher, camera stops as Christopher stops right in front of the house (the entire time this plays out, Christopher is voicing over this and reading his narrative) 

Narrative [use jocy’s microphone for thompson’s voiceover]: 

• “I’ve been living in this neighbourhood for most of my life, for the most part, it’s always been so peaceful and quiet.

• I would go around biking in front of my house, I always enjoyed feeling the wind against my face in the evening air.”

• Insert photographs of victim during childhood and neighbourhood [put grainy filter on pics]

Scene 2: [Jasmine draws storyboard)

Interview

Reporter: Hi, sorry to take up your time but are you Harper?

Harper: I’m sorry what’s this for?

Reporter: We’re with the news, we have permission to ask around the neighbourhood about the recent disappearance of Christopher Yong. We’ve been told by your schoolmates that you live in the same neighbourhood as Christopher?

Harper: Yeah, I do.

→ camera following Jasmine home, she goes into her house and unpacks (sits down/uses laptop) https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=CukIcWw8vnM 

• RECREATION using a different actress – options: Rachelle

• Harper drops bag → opens her laptop on table → types christopher on laptop

• Stable shots + neutral lighting

Voicing over this scene:

Reporter: What’s your routine like when you go home from school?

Harper: I don’t know, I guess I go to my room, get on my laptop and do my homework?

Reporter: Do you meet with him often at home or in your neighbourhood?

Harper: No, I’m pretty sure I live on a separate street from him.

Scene 3: [Jasmine draws storyboard)

• Fullscreen TV interview with an interviewer interviewing Harper about the situation/crime, the reporter asks her about how she lives in the same neighbourhood and what she feels and thinks abt the crime. 

• Questions asked during the interview (answers are semi-improvised to have a bit more realism)

J-cut back into interview

Reporter: How do you feel about the disappearance?

Harper: improvise

Reporter: Were you close with the victim?

Harper: improvise

Scene 4: [Rachelle draws storyboard)

• Interview heard from the tv

• Door opens and Harper walks out, hearing the interview (she’s clearly panicked and alarmed because she slipped and messed up on tv about the interview) on tv in her living room downstairs.

• RECREATION

Heard from the tv:

Reporter: Do you know anything about the disappearance?

Harper: improvise improvise improvise -- But i did see him a couple days ago so 

Reporter: Wait, a couple days ago? He disappeared a week ago. 

Harper: No, no yeah sorry weeks ago sorry I’m losing track of time, you know, with school and this whole crime.

Reporter: Right. You were saying?

Scene 5: 

[Rachelle draws storyboard)

scene 4 audio fades and turns into background noise - thompson voices over.

→ Christopher says sumn like “i didn’t think i’d end up here” and the camera blurs jasmine and focuses on the basement door downstairs

Overlapping interviews of other students talking and getting asked about Christopher

Cuts into one interview

• Music becomes unsettling and eerie (volume starts getting louder and louder)

• [Jasmine draws storyboard) Clips of pictures of the crime scenes, evidence and all flashes with camera clicking sounds rapidly.

Harper: I don’t know. Where did Christopher go?

Boom title card

Character Description

Christopher: 

At school: quiet kid, prefers to spend time alone, awkward, introvert, doesn’t like participating in class and gets picked on for that, has friends but doesn’t really hang out with them 

At home: spends time in his room playing games, doesn’t leave his room unless it’s necessary, doesn’t really talk to his parents because they’re rarely home due to work, only comes out to go biking 

Harper:

At school: very cheerful, participates a lot in class (sometimes too much), always volunteers to be the leader in groups, very likeable, friendly, pretty, popular, clumsy

At home: Always online so if anyone were to text her she would respond, when parents get home she always greets them, goes out a lot, always says yes to hangouts, she enjoys being in her house a lot (doing chores, texting other students, etc.)

General:

• Doesn’t open up to her friends, no one knows about her fully

• Too nice that it’s concerning

In the background audio, they could say something like this:

• “Harper has always been such a cheerful girl, she always makes people feel included! Everyone loved her.” 

• “I don’t know, she was always a little too much for me, i never liked having her around but she’s nice i guess. Too nice, sometimes.”

• “She’s always tripping on things and dropping things. I would have never expected her to do something so appalling, so well-planned, and thoroughly executed.”

Self-reflection

The process of making the script was quite confusing for me personally as each members had ideas of their own and were envisioning it differently. In addition to that we had ideas for each scene however it was difficult to put a flow into it. To me personally, I had trouble keeping up on what we wanted to go for as in the early stages, the script was really unclear and undeveloped where we had no explanation and it was just bullet points on roughly what will be going on for each scene. To solve my confusion, I had to ask and ask again my teammates about the camera movements, camera angles, and especially the edits that we were going to use as I was confused on what they were imagining for the visual effects.