Senior Thesis Project Proposal

Working Project Title: Time and Space (working title)
Proposed Medium: Digital HD video
Genre: full-length fiction/drama
Stage of Development: planning/development

Describe project in one sentence: I will tell the story of two people looking to escape the lives they’ve come to live in pursuit of their dreams, and as they come closer to realizing their dreams their paths draw closer.

Describe project in 250 words or less:
I want to write/produce/direct/shoot/edit and release a fictional drama roughly 60-80 minutes in length. The story is that of two young adults, one male and one female protagonist who both share the same dream of escaping their hometowns and seeing the world. The female is a bubbly character that lives in her own world, her parents are deceased and she has been home-schooled by her aunt and uncle; she wishes to get out and see everything there is to see. The male character is a college graduate, but hasn’t moved on with his life and floats through life’s ups and downs with the idea that it’ll all be better as soon as he gets away from everything and everyone. As they begin to realize their dreams they begin to detach from their former lives, but they also begin to notice each other. Random encounters blossom interest but new relations mean another delay of the greater dream. What is most important in life and what is real?

Main goals to be achieved:
Make a movie that is emotionally powerful and expresses the beauty of life through balance of loss and despair, and hope and happiness. I want to grow as an artist and a professional as I plan, produce, and direct this work. I want to learn new things about filmmaking, continue to learn more about photography, and most of all just continue to learn in general.

Describe project in conceptual, theoretical, historical, and cultural terms:
I think the characters in this work really speak well to the youth of the modern time. Over the past century as extended travel has become more and more accessible, the hopes and dreams of traveling to distant lands and discovering new things have continued to spread through generations. This is something I think anyone can relate with, wanting to escape from the mundane to the unknown. This all as well as the film’s issue of balancing and individual’s dreams against the basic human desire of personal connections with others.

Discuss technical pursuits:
For this work I want to experiment a lot with different advanced techniques of shooting and editing; I want to illustrate dream-states and great imagination. I will also work more extensively with storyboarding and directing. And once completed, I will produce and (hopefully) sell DVDs of my work.

Who will be the project’s audience?
Aside from the KCAI audience, I want to submit the film to different film festivals in order to just get the movie out in the public and gain some recognition for myself. I think those who enjoy it most will be anyone who enjoys independent young movies, movies about life, things people can relate to.

What will be the appropriate venue for your work?
Theater, private and public screenings. DVD sales.

How will this work act as a vehicle to your artistic and professional growth?
As an artist and a professional, my dream is to go on to work in the field of nature and wildlife documentary filmmaking. This work will assist in basically getting me recognition in the industry, hopefully impress a lot of people with my cinematography and editing so that I can use those skills to move into the field I wish to be in. I do wish to continue making fictional independent films also, I enjoy them as well, but I’ll enjoy making them in between projects in the natural world.

What are your primary influences?
For this projects my main influences remain in East-Asian independent films, like those of Kiyoshi Kurosawa, Pen-Ek Retanaraung, Kim-ki Duk, Takeshi “Beat” Kitano, katsuhito Ishii, Wong Kar Wai as well as cinematographer Christopher Doyle. I also continue to be inspired by the works of Darren Aronofsky. I have also been very inspired by the natural world and nature photography. I have continued to read and research the Nationa Geographic Society and it’s contributing photographers and filmmakers.

ininiation

first official post. production book and script coming along slowly but surely. tough first week so far.
GOOD NEWS: should be getting Tokyo! in the mail today from Netflix, looking forward to finally seeing it. I think it will provide a lot of good ideas for the thesis-