treatment

The Golden Rule

A twisted ordeal through the dark world of a counterfeit money business, where greed forces deception, emotional blackmail and where murder is key to keeping it all a secret.

Bella Paton

Email: ipaton@sthildas.qld.edu.au

Blog adress: http://ipatonftvnm.blogspot.com.au

INTRODUCTION

The following production is a design for a film noir exposing the corrupt world of underground fake money businesses. It focuses on Charlie, a police office who is keen on investigating this shady business. In a case of mistaken identity, Charlie finds herself working for the company and is blackmailed, by the sensual manager; Anna, into a downward spiral.

SYNPOSIS

Scene 1

Charlie, a 1950’s cop who, is writing information, about two suspicious men, in a notebook comes into view. A voice over reveals that Charlie believes one of the men (Carl) is working for an illegal money making business (Spin Straw Inc) and the other is a hit man hired by the company. Charlie gets out of the car to investigate. The camera pans to where Carl is telling the hit man to ‘hit’ a person who may know about the business. The two men then go their separate ways. Charlie then follows Carl knowing it will lead him to the location of the business. 

Scene 2

Once inside Spin Straw Inc Charlie is mistaken for a new employee. Charlie sees this as an advantage and decides to go undercover. Suddenly shots of the click of ‘The head of the company’ Veronica’s heels, money being printed, and Charlie's eyes looking around, play in a montage like way. Charlie is told to sit down and be quiet by an employee. Veronica gets angry at another employee who she doesn't believe is doing a good job. Suddenly Anna, the manager of the company, comes into view distracting Veronica and getting the worker out of trouble. Anna becomes immediately becomes suspicious of Charlie. 

Scene 3

Charlie, after leaving work, writes out information on the company in a notepad. A voice over reveals her experiences of that day. Anna comes into view, inside Charlie’s house. She has figured out who she is and where she lives. Charlie notices, upon entering her house, gun at the ready, that her door is already open. She enters and is shocked to see Anna standing at her pool table about to take a shot. Anna shows Charlie that she has found her police badge and knows everything. Anna tells Charlie she will not be ‘hit’ as long as she helps her blackmail Veronica so that Anna can take over the company. Charlie reluctantly agrees and pours two glasses of whisky. They clink glasses reluctantly and Anna hits a hole in one. 

Scene 4

This scene happens in a montage like way. Charlie and Anna begin to search for information about Veronica. They send each other coordinates, at work, of places to meet so they can exchange the information. Charlie comes into view staring at his police badge and notebook trying to decide where his loyalties lie. Anna comes into view staring at what she calls ‘The Death ring’. This is a ring she sends to people who are about to be ‘hit’ She gives a mans details to a hit man. A mans hand with the ring on it comes into view. A man watches this victim from far away. The gun comes into view and it shoots. The victim falls to the floor. Annas feet appear at the mans dead body and she pulls the ring off his finger. Comes into view in front of many documents and coordinates she has gathered about Charlie and Anna. Veronica has figured out what is going on and sends a coordinate to both Charlie and Anna for a place to meet. Anna recognises that it is not Charlie’s writing and realises that they have been found out. Charlie comes into view again in his house. He stares at a pile of money from the company and rips his notebook in half. His loyalty now belongs to Spin Straw Inc. 

Scene 5

Anna comes into view walking to Charlie’s desk. She warns Charlie that someone is trying to mess with them by sending them coordinates. She tell Charlie to be careful. Charlie reminds Anna that she expects a triple pay rise once Veronica is out of the way. Anna is silent and has other plans as she has no use for Charlie anymore.

Scene 6

Anna arrives at a dark alleyway, to find Veronica already waiting. Veronica is furious at Anna, and snatches away her gun. Veronica asks Anna what she is doing. Anna explains that she has always been loyal to her and to trust her. Veronica calms down and gives her back her gun. Charlie arrives soon after. When approaching the alleyway he is confused to see both Anna and Veronica and realises that Anna formed some sort of alliance with Veronica. Anna explains that she never intended to share the power of the company with Charlie. She asks her whats in her pocket and Charlie pulls out the ‘death ring’. Anna shoots her. Anna then whips around and points her gun at Veronica. Veronica is confused. Anna exclaims how much she loves power and pulls the trigger. Anna then steps over the bodies and walks into a phone booth calling another underground company to remove the bodies. 

Scene 7

Anna smiles innocently as she walks into the office the next day knowing she is in control. 

Film setting	Actual setting	Props	Character	Character description Personality	Actor	Original fairy tale
Charlie’s house	Libby’s house in Tedder Avenue	Pool table, whisky bottle, glasses, fake gun, pool sticks, pool balls, police badge, notebook	Charlie Stilts	A new police officer who works at Spin Straw inc undercover to investigate. She has good intentions but is overcome by black mail and the idea of wealth.	Nicole Hoskins	Rumplestiltskin
Spin Straw Inc	The top room in the borders area	Fake 100 dollar bills, old printers, scissors, desks, chairs, paper with coordinates, notebook	Anna	The manager of Spin Straw inc. She is extremely intelligent and thrives off power and blackmail to get what she wants.	Minnie Behn-Katz	The daughter
Ally way	An alleyway down in Tedder Avenue Main beach.	Car, gun, ring, Manilla folders	Veronica	The Boss of Spin Straw incorporated. She is extremely intelligent, nothing gets past her, although she often underestimates the intellegance of those around her.	Libby Gunther	The king
Charlies garage	Libby’s Garage in her house in Tedder Avenue	Car, notebook	Carl	A worker at the company	Chris Gunther	The father
			Employee 1	A worker at the company	Jenna Cross
			Employee 2	A worker at the company	Bronte Noden
			Hitman 1	A hitman at the company	Steph Grant
			Jonah Patterson	A victim who knew too much about the company	Bella Paton

Our group is using these resources to allow the audience to understand the relation to the genre of film noir and the 1950’s time-period. The characters in this film; the cop who goes undercover and is pulled into a bad situation, corrupt person in an authoritative position and femme fatale are all very relevant to film noir. *The film noir Genre is also accentuated in locations such as in the alleyway of Tedder avenue as it fits the idea of an urban Jungle and location where the underbelly of society would dwell. A busy industrial office in an urban jungle and Charlie’s expansive and expensive house also fit the idea of film noir. 

JUSTIFICATION

Time period

We chose to set this short film in the year of 1958 because authority in this time period was a lot less strict and people could get away with more crime. 

Characters

We chose a character of an undercover cop because that archetype is often a central character of a film noir. 

All film noir’s have a femme fatal which is why the characters of Anna and Veronica are part of this film. 

We decided to use a character like Veronica “A corrupt authority” as this is another archetype of a central character in the film noir.

These characters are diverse and intelligent make the story more complex. The characters are also more complicated and developed adding to the film noir style. 

Locations

See asterix (*) under table

Storyline

Our complex storyline fits well to the genre of film noir as it contains many twists in plot. One example of this is Charlie leaving her duties as a police officer. It contains double crossing (e.g. Charlie working undercover, at first, at Spinstraw inc and Anna leading Charlie to believe she will be safe but killing her in the end) another aspect of film noir. It also contains emotional blackmail. One example of this is Anna threatening Charlie with death if she does not do what she says. It contains deceit (When Anna leads both Veronica and Charlie to believe she is on their sides) and of course murder and jealously. Anna kills both Charlie and Veronica because of her power hungry nature. This complex plot definitely fits the genre of film noir.