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THE FIRST TEST OF HDC IDOL II - THE OGRES

Choosing from all the books of the genre you have read till now, pick a book and turn it into a suitable horror film with a working story outline. You are free to make necessary changes which might enhance the look of the film, and make it appeal to wider audiences worldwide.

Ogre Zombieness's entry -

Hiya. Here’s my entry. I chose the book Cell by Stephen King (partially because it was a good read. Partially because it was the closest book near my laptop at the time being)..

Enjoy!

A young man, Clayton Riddell, wakes up one morning late for his meeting with a company planning to publish a graphic novel he made. Before leaving his hotel, Clayton quickly calls his 13-year-old daughter, Jenny, and wishes her luck with her choir concert that she is to perform that evening.

Clayton reaches the publishing company and struggles to find his way to his meeting inside the building. A middle-aged man named Tom McCourt offers to help him. They enter the elevator, which loses power, and abruptly stops for a while. Outside they hear screaming and shouting.

The elevator restarts again and exits to the sound of disaster in the streets below, and rush to a window where a crowd have gathered and look upon as two large trucks collide into each other and a small van crashes into the lobby of a nearby store. A young girl named Alice Maxwell shrieks and darts to the stairs, fearing that her mother – an interior decorator who went down to their car to fetch some of her sketches for the employees lounge, might have been injured. Clayton and McCourt try to stop her, but end up following behind her.

Outside a better view of the chaos is shown – mad, animalistic people run around attacking pedestrians. McCourt, Alice and Clayton take cover from another wild car in a bookstore, where two men hide behind the front desk. One of them is injured with a heavily bleeding neck and the other is repeatedly trying to reach 911. Clayton and McCourt go down to try to calm the bleeding man.

The caller suddenly drops the phone and attacks the injured man – clawing and eventually cutting open his throat with rage. The man then attempts to attack McCourt, but Clayton narrowly defends him by strangling the madman with his belt. Clayton realizes that something happened to the phone lines and subsequently tosses his phone against the wall. Alice and McCourt do the same. Alice pleas them to go back and find her mother, but they decide against it, telling her that her mother would have already found safety or otherwise they wouldn’t have anything to find. Alice does not protest, and instead becomes very mute. She says the her mother would’ve gone back to their home in the North once she realized Alice wasn’t in the building, and coincidentally Clayton’s daughter is up North as well. The three decide to treck together.

The trio leaves the scene as large pieces of burning debry from a plane gone out of control starts to fall from the sky. They survive and reach McCourt’s suburban home as night falls, and decide to refresh for a few hours before trekking back to Maine. Clayton becomes increasingly stressed at the thought that Jenny – or her mother – might use their phones. He lies awake for the greatest part of the evening but is awoken by a sound coming from the living room. There, he finds that two altered beings have entered the home. He tries to make his way to upstairs where Alice and McCourt’s rooms were to be found, but is caught and attacked. The noise catches the attention of more altered beings around the home. Clayton finally manages to shake off the two already in the home, and wakes Alice and they retreat to McCourt’s room. The three jump from the window mere moments before a group of altered break the door down. McCourt then throws a lit match through the window, and the curtain catches fire and soon the entire house is ablaze.

They find a deserted school, where each of them fall unconcious and have a vision of a man (called ‘The Raggedy Man’), who commands them (who are now ‘Flock-killers’ after burning an entire flock’s equvilent in their home) to travel north to Kashwak. They regain reality, and upon realizing that each of them experienced the same dream, they decide to obey the demand and steal the school bus.

On a highway, a group of normal humans intercept them and try to break into the bus. McCourt is barely able to flank around the group, and the three are forced to leave the bus and run when a moltov cocktail sets fire to the back seats.

They arrive in Kent Pond, where Clayton’s home is in a state of disarray. He finds a note from Jenny, stating that after Shanon (Clayton’s wife) became turned into a ‘Phoner’, she was forced to kill her and ‘heard a voice’ telling her to go to a place called Kashwak.Clayton goes outside to the backyard and sits alone for a while to mourn the loss of his wife.

A man named Ray, a neighbor of Clayton, runs to him and hands Clayton a cell phone and a set of keys. He quickly tells Clayton to use the phone ‘when the time is right’, and then slits his throat with a knife before Clayton could answer his question.

Alice walks in on the scene and when she sees Ray’s body and Clayton holding the phone, believes he became mad and in a split second breaks down. McCourt tries to calm her down but she picks up Ray’s knife and starts to try to stab them. Clayton is forced to wrestle the knife from her and accidentally stabs her through the chest. She dies in his arms.

Clayton, guiltful of the incident but still intent on finding his daughter, buries Alice and Ray before leaving with McCourt to get to Kashwak.They reach the town in the Ray’s car. It is filled with Phoners all around – each of them aggressive but not attacking.

Clayton then experiences another vision while driving (causing them to crash in a lamppost) in which he’s locked inside a stadium with The Raggedy Man. The Raggedy Man congratulates Clayton on getting as far as he has, and invites him to either join ‘The New World Flock’ or be killed. Clayton tries to bargain with The Raggedy Man, exchanging his life for his daughter’s freedom, but wakes up abruptly.

Sees that McCourt has been dragged out of the shattered car window. McCourt is then mauled violently to death before the car by a group of Phoners. The hundreds of phoners then movie into the shadows, until only 11 remain around the car. The one closest is The Raggedy Man – who looks exactly as he did in the visions. Clayton climbs out of the car with Ray’s phone, hopeless and broken, and answers a sudden incoming call (planning to become one of them in a form of suicide).

The car then implodes and Clayton is sent flying through the air. The Raggedy Man is killed instantly when a metal shard slices through his skull, and as he falls down, dead, the hive mind that connected all the altered. All around in mere moments, the phoners turn from rabid to aimless and distant creatures. Clayton looks up at the sky and thanks Ray for his ingenious plan, and passes out.

A year later, Clayton is on a small plane with his daughter in his arms. By the way she lies and stares into the distance, she’s revealed to have turned into a phoner. The plane is shown flying over Paris, where a cure to the virus has apparently been developed.

Clayton pulls out a cell phone to look at pictures of her, him and Shanon and the happiness they experienced before the world changed. The battery dies and the phone screen fades to black, before the rest of the scene fades to black in the same way, ending the film and leaving Jenny’s fate ambiguous.

Judge #1's verdict -

I give Zombieness a C-.

Not enough detail and very disjointed. I was left with a myriad of questions. The part where Ray hands Clayton a cell phone and tells him to use it when the time is right, then slices his throat.....he says Ray slices his throat before Clayton can answer his question. I didn't see where Ray asked him a question.

Judge #2's verdict -

The story is exciting with well motivated characters. It would make a good screen adaptation. Nothing too deep, just a solid horror action film. No mention is made of the last clause in the assignment: You are free to make necessary changes which might enhance the look of the film, and make it appeal to wider audiences worldwide.

GRADE: C

Judge #3's verdict -

There was talk of adapting Cell into a movie and in all honesty, I think any King text has a more than solid chance of getting adapted into a film. If you had picked a piece of short fiction or a novella instead of a big, popular doorstop of a novel, I would have thought the choice was more inspired. I don't feel like a lot of creativity and thought went into this. Whether you're dealing with publishers, studio readers or any creative professional, remember that surprise is imperative. Consider yourself fortunate that your other teammates submitted nothing.

D

Overall Grade - C-