Plot Ideas

I was thinking of the plot of "The Matrix", and how it uses very stereotypical thriller plot devices, such as the flawed hero and large amounts of mystery, when I thought that a really good idea (in my opinion) would be to lure the viewer into a perfectly ordinary world, and then twist the story completely, throwing off the watcher completely. So yes, exactly what the concept of the Matrix does to us, only instead of the rest of the film, I would focus it around another different idea. For example: A perfectly normal man finds out that nothing exists- everything is in his mind. Following ideas used in "The Truman Show" and "The Island", the man realises that once he knows this, he can shape the world in anyway he sees fit. The film could then take a "Eternal Sunshine of the Spotless Mind" style twist, revealing that everything he has seen is in his mind, and he has been trapped in a coma for years. Although the idea is one that follows thousands of basic ideas used in even more films, thinking about "The Matrix" really got me thinking. The films I've already mentioned are among my favourites, so I've decided to list any ideas I get for my thriller here, and eventually come back with my group, and select the ones we like the most, and create the intro to it.

1. A series of people live out their lives, not realising that whatever they are not looking at does not exist at all, questioning their very existance. The idea would be shown by having a perfectly ordinary story for the first 5 minutes, until the camera starts to slip around the character's fields of view, revealing discrete spots of complete black. At first these would be subtle, almost invisible to anybody not watching, slowly revealed throughout the film until this is revealed completely to the viewer. The ideas in the film would reflect this, the characters bringing up the topic, as well as others that fit in, such as one dimensional views people would show on different topics. Although the storyline needs a form, would be difficult to create and is very abstract, I like the idea for a film like this, and I'm sure I could figure something out that would make it a deep and interesting film to watch, like "Revolver", a film that questions the motives and ideas of the characters. A film like this would be easy to form around the thriller genre, and I hope to work more on this idea at some point.


2. Based on "Reservoir Dogs", but focusing more on the distrust and lust for money than the separate storylines and robbery. 6 Men have just escaped from robbing a Swiss bank, and when the 7th member of the team does not regroup, the criminals debate about whether he deliberately ditched them to tell the police where to find them or whether he was shot by the police upon escaping. The tension slowly climbs upwards when the separate characters realise that not only do they have either a rat or someone who murdered the 7th character in their mist, but with the 7th gone, they all get a higher share of the money. They begin to argue about who introduced the 7th to the group, and if they too, were in on the scheme, if there even was one. All the characters begin to distrust everybody in the room until a serious row breaks out, fights begin, and another member of the team is shot. The others are all far more focused on the money than the murder, until eventually, the separate characters all start to be murdered, run away, or die trying, until only 1 is left. Upon exiting the building, the man realises that he is surrounded by police, and realises that the 7th member was in fact a spy. He shoots the traitor, and is killed by the police. This story has a lot of potential, but I don't want it to be thought as of "that copy of "Reservoir Dogs"". The entire film must focus around the relationship between the characters, filled with awkward and tense moments, for example "Hey, guys, 1.2 mil divided by the 5 of us, that's 240 grand each!".
I really like the idea of showing the feelings the characters would show after hearing this, so distrustful and uncomfortable. This film would not easily take up 2 hours though, so it could be made into a short, depending on how long I can make the script.

3. A film based around the mindset of a murdering lunatic. Although I have no real plot as of yet, I would like to film something focusing on the crazy side of a person, showing what drives him to murder, and why. Such a film would involve a lot of tense moments, bordering on horror, but also leaves me free to experiment with different ways he could commit his murders. I really liked how "The Joker" was portrayed in "The Dark Knight", but i think we saw too much of "Batman, and, and not enough of "The Joker". Also influenced by Ichi the Killer, although even with that lunatic being far closer to my vision, I don't think he was shown enough. It would be a challenge to create this sort of character as a protagonist in a way that the viewer can not be put off, but if it were done well, I see no reason why this could not be possible, films nowadays often have a lot of unjustified murders performed by the protagonist. However, on my very limited budget, something with so much graphic detail would be hard to do, unless the killer was very subtle, but this goes against his character. Although I like the idea of playing with the mindset of the insane, I doubt this idea would work too well. I could use ideas from it for something else though.

4. The intro this thriller would be two men walking towards a spot where they will meet and exchange a briefcase. However, in the space of the 2-3 minutes, we hear both characters thoughts while they approach the destination. Although they both plan to double cross each other, a new twist is revealed when the complete unexpected happens, for example, one of the men gets shot by a sniper or the police arrive. I would have just 30-45 seconds of each person's thoughts and the remaining time on the climax.

5. Another simpler opening to a thriller, this one would be a chase scene between one man and a black van. The van would seem more dangerous, and is therefore shown as a "bad guy". The scene would end with a twist, the man being chased would appear to have escaped, but upon looking around at the end, it turns out he is surrounded. Although simple and generic, this idea would work, although would be near impossible to shoot as driving a car around the city to chase someone would be dangerous and illegal.

Although some of the ideas are pretty out there, but it really shows that thinking about one films can get me thinking about a lot of things.