Katie's WarWelcome to Katie's War. This was a very large cinematic planned early on and we got some of it finished, but never got it finished, so we're asking for your help.
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Grr...I really don't feel like writing this all up right now...but I'll at least try to get some of it (first few scenes), and we'll get the bids started on those.
Summary: The story is pretty much the flight of a young girl from a Viriginian town attacked by Indians during the French and Indian War period. She runs off to the prestigious members of the family for help, all the while worrying sick for her precious fiance. After discussions, the Governor hears word on an attack to be made on the Frence capital of Quebec, and decides that that is the only thing to stop the attacks on his towns, and decides to recruit and train members of the American Volunteers Force. This young girl's fiance decides to join and she comes with him, helping out the army. The story then takes you to a British training camp, where the soldiers will train, and then, the voyage to Quebec. From there, you meet the British Generals, and their forces when they combine with the American Volunteers. A feint attack will be made on French fortifications, and will be lost. Then, after a night getaway, they make it behind Quebec, and a battle will begin....
Characters:
Katie: Main character...fights, runs, goes to her grandpa...she does a lot of stuff (yes twoq, I'm listening to that "That straight up Outlaw Josey Wales" song and the other song, which I'm not sure I've sent you yet, but I'd like for you or somebody to upload those songs on to here...
Thomas Penn: Another main character...Katie's fiance, and will be followed throughout the story, like Katie.
Cpt. John McMurty: Katie's father, and head of the 21st Light Infantry...in control of Western Virginia Indian Guard (don't tell me that wasn't real...).
Gov. William Todd: Governor of Virginia and good friends with the McMurty family.
Gen. Wolfe: General of the British Army.
Brig. Gen. Monckton: Brigadier General of the British Army.
Brig. Gen. Townsend: Same as above.
Brig. Gen. Murray: Same as the last two above.
Gen. Montcalm: French general and military leader of Quebec and surrounding area.
And I probably forgot a couple, but oh well...I'll be willing to bet that I'm going to have to come in here and edit this anyways.
And so begins the story/script....
[Scene 1]
The movie opens up on the scene of a quiet British frontier town in Western Virginia. The text comes up and says: Adamsville, Virginia, May 12, 1759.
The scene starts zoomed off of a
little town with a couple of farms/mills on the outside. The camera rotates and zooms onto these mills until they are the main focus. You can still see the town on the right side, and on the left, starting just a couple inches away from the mills, begins and hill that slopes quickly, but does not go high at all, and sort of just plateaus, and it covered with pines and other foresty stuff.
The settlers are tending the farm (and maybe one working the mill like in that one shot that Shaw made). In the town, people (HC probably) are walking about and tending to their chores (it's up to you on how you want that to look). But in the scene, you
will see a couple of militiamen (the ones in the game and a couple of IGC Musketeers) lounging about (make them die, so they're laying down, or I don't care..just don't make them stand like they're expecting something).
There's a dirt road leading from a break in the hill into the town. After a few seconds of focusing on the mill, a wagon will come down this road. The camera won't move, though. As soon as the wagon gets into the town, Indians (Cherokee rifleman and Comance horse-thing (I forget the name) come flying down the hill. They were already there, but were concealed (hint hint, that means a lot of trees...and you really shouldn't even see the top of the hill...just the slope..kind of like the ambushes on RTW). Once the Indians make it to the bottom of the hill, they begin firing on the settlers (unit work trigger, so we don't get those ugly health bars...or whatever will work and not get those).
The settlers begin falling. A couple stand up and try to resist. One of them is Thomas Penn (IGC or HC char, if you can...something to make him distinguished throughout the movie). The fighting settlers try to fight, but start to fall quickly.
Just as there were only a couple of standing settlers left, those lounging soldiers have now heard the panic and are rushing out to the farm/mill to attack (not in lines...I want the militia/regular musketeers to get there and different times....the IGC_Musketeers will be in formation though. They put up a good volley, but start to fall.
As the IGC Musks. get there, Thomas Penn starts to run to the town. The camera still stays on the fight for a couple of seconds, where almost all of the British forces are down. Now, Penn should be almost off the screen, and the camera follows to watch him. The town should open up and touch the mills, to some extent. He runs down into part of the town and runs down a certain street (your choice...just don't make it the first street in the town), until he sees the character of Katie (Amelia Black in the game). The camera zooms in on these two. He speaks to her, and yes, there will be a lot of dialogue in this, but I'm not writing it right now, because I'm low on time, and I want to see the cine's first.
So they're talking, and after the dialogue has finished (which I will get to you tonight or tomorrow), Katie walks out of the town walls, and there you see that old dirt road. She takes a left once out of the walls (the camera will rest looking straight out the gate, so you won't be able to see where she goes after she takes a left), and after she has dissapeared for a few seconds, you see the HC Stagecoach/wagon go down the road. (in the dialogue, Penn is telling Katie to go to her father for help)
For the entire scene, it should be a cloudy looking day, maybe with a short rain shower here and there. Just sort of a rainy Sunday, if you will.
Thomas Penn will be played by the character of John Black.
[Scene 2]
Scene 2 begins with the camera zoomed out on a large busy city (that means many HC buildins and whatnot). The text comes on and says, "Yorktown, Virginia, May 14, 1759". The atmosphere is dark, like late afternoonish or early evening. You're under the impression that it's very cloudy and rain is falling steadily. You see some people walking in the streets, and an occasional stagecoach drive by, then disappear from sight.
Once the scene starts, the camera starts to zoom in slowly on a street. Once it is about halfway done zooming in, a wagon/stagecoach (the one that left during Scene 1 carrying Katie) you see coming down the street. The wagon/stagecoach should then stop at a large building with a man out front. By then, the camera should be just a bove the scene at regular pitch, or looking down kind of diagonally, not 90 degrees straight down.
I'm not sure if this is possible, but can you make a unit b e invisible then visible via triggers? If so, I want this to happen, and have Katie (IGC_Amelia) seem to come out of the stagecoach. If not, then it's okay, we'll just have the camera switch to a different scene. But I want the Old Coot (Cpt. John McMurtry) to be out on the stairway of the building. If you can make the unit visible, have her come out and make them talk (yes, there will be dialogue). If not, make a new shot, where the old coot and Amelia are on a city block (just open streets with large buildings all around, but on one side, there's the sea butted up against a wall (just make a little one, so it will look like a seawall, except you're going to be looking at it from the inside) talking in the rain (dark lighting...remember). In fact, I want that to be the scene. Just have the HC_Stagecoach pull up to the building where the old coot is waiting, then have the camera switch to a different spot in the town, where Amilia and the Old Coot will be talking.
Like I said, there will be large HC buildings all around, the sea on one side, with a low wall stopping it (like looking out towards the sea on the HC cities), and you'll see a few big roads leading down the large town. The area they are walking in is sort of like a plaza/park. It's an area filled with roads going around this little patch of ground with flowers and grass in it, and a bench in the middle (sort of like the...umm...HC German layout..there's a part like that, but I don't want that in the shot, because it just won't work (I've worked with it before--look in my shots). But you are welcome to use an HC layout, but only if it does the job for what I'm asking for.) You may see a butcher or a middleclass man walk down one of the roads leading to the park/plaza. But I want the two to be walking together in the middle of the street/block, and the camera will go around them in a full 360 degree angle, allowing you to view the sea and town.
Just think of a Massachusetts port town on a rainy day, and you are touring it, and there's a little park area where you see a view of the sea from. I don't know. Use your imagination, and yes, this is a lengthy dialogue section, but considering I suck at writing, you're going to have to give a little more time for me to get the dialogue...
[Scene 3]
Scene 3 takes place on a well-to-do Virginia plantation/building. The camera zooms in on Warwick and the Old Coot talking. The Old Coot is telling Warwick that they need an army to fight off the French and the Indians. (Dialogue is up to you).
The scene is like I said, a well-to-do Virginia plantation/building. The two are talking on the porch or in front of the building. It looks hot and sunny out. Maybe with some clouds rolling by (Dutch Skybox 1). There are fields behind the building; large big bushy fields. On the edge, you see a treeline and some trees, and behind that still, you see a church peak rising above the rest, with some tops of other buildings. In front of the house, there are several trees and a dirt road winding around the plantation. You see several wagons travelling the part of the road that leads to the town on the side of the house.
That's basically the scene. It just has quite a bit of dialogue, which I am going to let you guys do yourself, and see what we can get. I'm just telling you what the dialogue should be about.
[Scene 4]
Welcome to the Army Training Camp Scene. The scene begins in a rather forested area with a dirt road leading into this fort/camp with high wooden walls. The camera is a little below normal pitch (25 or 35 degrees..) and is zoomed out a little from it. You see a stagecoach driving on the road into the camp.
The camera zooms in and and lower (10-15 degrees), and follows along the road, just as the stagecoach went, and the gates open and close and you enter the camp. From there, you see Penn leaving the stagecoach and standing next to it talking to a Cooper character (General Townsend). And in the camp, you see soldiers running (make an obstacle course if possible), tents and campfires all around (much like Ben's Vallery Forge shot, just no snow - summer shot
), men target practicing, etc...
The song that twoq calls the "straight up Outlaw Josey Wales" song will be playing.
Basically, Gen. Townsend will be welcoming Penn and getting him upset. Penn will walk into a building, and come back out as an IGC_Musketeer (not sure if he'll keep that the rest of the movie, so we can identify him
), and you see that soldier start to train, etc.., and the camera zooms back out so you can view the river nearby, and that's the scene.
[Scene 5]
Scene 5 is probably the shortest scene of the movie. It takes place in the city area of where Katie and John McMurtry are talking in Scene 2, but 8 months later, in the spring of the next year (yes, I was a date and place to come on in the text), or something similar to what I described in Scene 2. For references on the surroundings, refer to the Scene 2 script. Basically, in this scene, General Townsend and Cpt. John McMurtry are talking and McMurtry tells Townsend that he has an army trained and believes he is ready for the battle. Townsend also says that including McMurtry's Division, he has 3 brigrades for the battle. The time is now to move. The scene ends with the two looking out on the sea (out over the sea wall thing I explained in Scene 2). The camera is behind them and just shows them looking out on a cloudy sea.
[Scene 6]
Scene 6 begins with the camera at a low pitch. It's dark, very dark, and heavy fog drenches the area. You can tell that you are looking onto a harbor of a large city at an angle. The text comes on and says, "Welcome to Boston, Massachusetts." Then, there are shouts from men (they're loading and disembarking a ship -use this to your imagination). You see a ship move out through the shroud, much like in the game's opening cinematic into the deep of the ocean. The camera never moves during this part. Once the ship disappears into the mist, the camera cuts to a new spot.
It is now day and you are at about normal pitch. There is a land on one side, and it's a long straight cliff that seperates land from ocean. Once again, the camera isn't perfectly parellel with the division of land and see, but slighly looking into the mainland. You see a fleet fly by, near the cliffs, following them. This shouldn't be a long camera position. We're just trying to get the feeling that the ships are moving.
The camera cuts again. Now, we're looking in from a bay onto the mainland. The bay is very gradual with the land, but in the middle, you can see a where a large river empty outs. The fleet is heading to this river.
The camera cuts again and shows the fleet down the river, well into it. There are forests all around and rolling hills and rather large ones behind them from the sides of the river. On a crest of a hill, next to the river (meaning on the cliff of part of the river), lies a French outpost.
The outpost opens fire on the ships and a couple of men run out from the outpost, shooting at the ships. The ships return fire, hitting a couple of the men, but leaving a couple as well (several shots). They also destroy the outpost. The remaining men shout out to the ships that there are many more outposts on the river ahead and they will never make it to Quebec. General Townsend shouts back from the ship and that have not even started to fight. The couple men then take off running into the distance.
the camera changes and zooms in to Townsend on his ship, speaking to one of his aids that he hopes England is doing the right thing (he's questioning himself...).
The camera zooms out and you see the ships start moving, with many twists and turns in the mighty river, with cliffs here and valley shores there. All potentially harboring French ambushers or outposts....
[/scene]
There is still a lot more to the story, and I have scenes 7 and 8 somewhere on my computer still, and I would like to be the story writer for this one.
Scenes 1 and 3 are finished right now. They can be seen here:
Scene 1 MovieScene 1 ZipScene 3 ZipThis is open to anyone. I still need to get a hold of Ben and see if I can get his Scene 4 stuff.
Hope I've got you interested.
Wow Custer. 
This is really intense. 
Like I say, wait till the actual battle scene...it's awesome. Especially with the music I have for it (ask twoq, he seems to really like it).
Ive got adamsville and the mills all done.... ive got the triggers done up to the point where john black (penn) runs into town... its looking pretty good IMO 
