Main idea - plot, story, narrative

I want my story to be about battling mental health struggles, such as depression, and most importantly, overcoming them. I want the whole film opening to have a sense of progression, which I plan to show by having the character physically move through a space.

There will be two main scenes:

• Cemetery

- the first scene will be filmed in a cemetery, a space which I will use as a metaphor for depression; the main character will just be walking among the graves, making their way to the entrance of the cemetery

• Forest road

- the second scene will be filmed on a forest road, the main character will be riding a motorcycle, as a metaphor of how much easier it gets to move away from mental health struggles once you're on the right path

Cemetery scene:

• for the entirety of this scene, the character will be walking; sometimes slowing down, but never standing still; at first they will be walking quite slowly, wandering pretty aimlessly, and as the scene goes on they will start walking faster, heading for the gate of the cemetery; this symbolises mental and emotional growth, as well as how much easier healing gets once you've actually started, how much faster and decided it becomes; at the end of the scene, the character will fully leave the cemetery, leaving depression behind

• shots with a lot of sky in them, for a hopeful feel

• many shots filmed with shallow depth of field, where either the character or the background is in focus, to show the separation between the character and the world around them

• the main character is always at the centre of the frame, on the horizontal axis, in order to make them the focus

• natural lighting, brightly lit shots, once again for a hopeful feel

• warm colours, soft contrast, to convey comfort and positiveness

• the character will be wearing darker clothes, so that they'll stand out in each shot against the grey and green background of the cemetery, and also as a visual representation that they are still struggling

• the scene will start off pretty quiet, with only diegetic sounds; partway through, a song will start playing, I was thinking about Tom Odell's 'Best Day of My Life', because I think the lyrics are quite fitting for my story; the song will carry on into the next scene

Forest road scene:

• the main character will be riding a motorcycle, on a forest road; I chose this particular vehicle as a metaphor for freedom, and as a way to visually portray movement and speed, away from the initial location, which was the cemetery, and mental health struggles; I picked a road through a forest as a means to represent that once you're on the right path of healing, the 'road' in front of you becomes clearer and clearer; whereas in the cemetery there were multiple paths and it wasn't clear where the character was headed, in the forest there is only one road, clearly defined, wide and straight

• ideally the road would be facing East, and the character would be riding towards a rising sun, quite literally heading towards something brighter

• vibrant colours, to show positiveness

• deep depth of field, the character and the background are in focus, to show that the character is a part of this world, instead of feeling isolated from it

• the song from the previous scene keeps on playing, and the scene ends with the lyric "Right now I'm just happy to be alive"

Throughout the whole opening, I want the editing style to be fairly slow paced, so that the viewer has time to take in the character and their surroundings, similar to the opening of 'Pride & Prejudice' (2005).

Right at the beginning, I want a few closer shots of the main character, to clearly establish them and what they look like, as well as some shots of the cemetery, to establish the location. From beginning to end, the camera will follow the character, literally tracking them or panning to keep them centered.

None of the frames in which the character is present will have the camera be static, because I want to include the viewer in that sort of 'movement' and 'progress' feeling that the character is experiencing. I'd like to keep the lighting natural, and bright, to make the setting of each shot feel real and familiar to what the viewer knows and is used to. If I can find some trees in the cemetery, I'd like to use their shade to represent that the character is still occasionally feeling negative things, conveyed through the shadows of the trees passing over them.

Especially in the cemetery scene, I'd like to have many closeups of the character and parts of them, and not really show them from head to toe, which will contrast with the second scene in the forest, where the character will be showed full body, giving the impression that they are now whole as a person. My aim is to make the whole opening feel very hopeful, and for it to act as a sort of flashforward, after which the rest of the movie will show the backstory of how the character got to that moment.

These are just some general ideas of what I want to include, and a few techniques I plan to use in order to convey the feelings and ideas I want the viewer to experience. I'm sure I'll change my mind about certain things, or come up with new ideas, because creative processes, like this one, are hardly ever linear, and honestly I enjoy going with the flow just as much as I like planning things ahead.