More of that Movie Idea

Part I, II, III

It just occurred to me; the heroine is going to be assaulted by a team of cops, including the lead villain, and then the big baddie is going to depart, to bust other heads, and that's when she's going to continue fighting and that's when she's rescued by the mentor-figure.

I decided I'd have him say that one reason why he came to help her was because he admired that she continued fighting. Because (as it turns out) he is a fighter.

So, why not make explicit her reasons for continuing to struggle? So then I thought that while she's recovering from the initial beating, she replays in her head the way her parents were broken by unemployment and poverty and preyed-upon by religious hucksters. The way her boyfriend was gunned-down in the street by the cops. The way her brother came back from the military overseas mangled and betrayed. The way her boss exploited her at work. And to have all this fill her with rage and galvanize her to continue to struggle.

The rescue should be a confusing affair. Hand-held camera. But we see that in this noisy, semi-confined space, the rescuer employ sticks and knives to disable the cops by attacking the gaps in their riot gear, before taking the heroine by the hand and whisking her away.

He takes her to his home. He's a janitor. He was involved in "Justice for Janitors" in the 1990s. His wife works as a medical assistant. They have a few kids. Two will be devoted to their parents' ideals. The oldest will be consumed with video games and consumerism.

He tells her about, not a permanent political movement or secret society, but a tradition. Of human beings who recognize what "enough" is. People who believe that living in harmony with others and with the earth, is more important than having more than one needs. That is the statement of the official message of the film.

I'll have him take some liberties with history in describing the Great Sword Hunt in 16th Century Japan. After a period of social and political chaos in Japan, the warrior-farmer Hideyoshi managed to win the battle for supremacy against his main rivals and become ruler of Japan. Hideyoshi was afraid of continued social unrest, so he ordered the Great Sword Hunt, which took all the weapons away from the peasantry, putting them at the mercy of the Samurai, who despised peasants so much they would use their necks to test the sharpness of their swords.

To counter being deprived of weapons, some peasants developed the martial arts, using their bodies and objects around them as weapons. Some Samurai were fair to their peasants. There was no fighting. Some Samurai were rapacious and cruel. Sometimes there was fighting. Fists and feet were never enough against men armed with swords or spears, some on horseback, or teams of archers. Some peasant warriors were able to maintain their dignity and their lives. Many who fought were killed. Many were chased away and became bandits.

Here, he describes a story based on the histories written by Linebaugh and Rediker, such as The Many-Headed Hydra, about the continuous elite process to exploit people and the planet, and to oppress and even destroy those who resist them.

He points out that this is not a continuous line of elites. Throughout history, various gangs of greedy people contended with other gangs. Some rulers were overthrown and their entire families exterminated. Sometimes people from the bottom, greedy and ruthless, rose to the top of the game, and their descendants stayed at the top for centuries, even if only to regress to privileged obscurity.

In the same way, their movement of ordinary people is not some permanent secret society of rebels. Rebels would become bandits or pirates. Some would steal as much as they needed to survive and live independent lives. They would rob only from the rich. Some bandits and pirates became like their oppressors, greedy and cruel. Sometimes children of activists become corrupted by the society they live in and reject their parents' values and imitate and lust after the power and privileges of kings or nobles or, now, the super-wealthy. Sometimes, they just forget everything in the struggle for survival. But then they remember again, that they don't need riches and power to be full human beings.

That having been said, he and his wife are activists. They know about others, doing other things around the country and around the world. More than that, it seems possible that never before have the people of the world been easier to unite while the system has never been more vulnerable and the world has never been more threatened. The financial system is tottering. The economic system is buckling under its own contradictions. Global warming, mass-extinctions, other things are undermining the planet's ability to support sophisticated life.

So that's where he's going to ask her to join them. He's not aware that she's "The Chosen One" (although there is nothing tangible that does any choosing) and will become the "leader" of this movement.

Then the television set intrudes. Those three cops who were wounded when the mentor rescued her are being portrayed as victims of an unprovoked terrorist assault. They've managed to identify her from surveillance footage of the rally and they're now looking for her. The propagandist is leading the charge in demonizing this teenaged girl as a "child terrorist." A "black widow spider" with a poisoned mind.

The police sergeant/main bad guy is being interviewed about this cowardly, crazed attack upon his men, as well as on his "successful management" of the violent rally. The fair-wage demonstrators (who had toned-down their message and their tactics in a futile attempt to win the sympathy of the liberal betrayer politician) is being depicted as a bunch of losers who have been duped by violent enemies of the nation into attacking the police and rioting.

Anyway, it becomes clear that the heroine cannot go home. The police are looking for her. One of the mentor couple's kids delivers a USB stick to her parents and they open it up to find a recording from her saying that she's safe, she's happy, she's with people who can help her, but that she won't be able to see them for a while. She'll try to communicate with them once in a while. But not to tell the police at all about this recording.

The mentor takes her out of the city (I'm thinking Los Angeles at the moment) in his working van. They'll be going to a safe-house with friends of his outside of the state. Perhaps in the desert country in the South-West. Like Arizona or something. Perhaps they'll be First Nations or perhaps they'll be people who help Latin Americans crossing the border illegally looking for work.

That's my typing for today.