General Outline

Before beginning my screenplay and storyboard, I need a definitive outline of the plot and series of events.

Plot Diagram

I am going to be using the classic plot diagram to separate the parts of the story, rather than different acts. The opening, or exposition, will be the focus of my film opening and will end with the introduction of the conflict, just before the rising action.

Opening:

It begins with the main character, Alice, losing her high school sweetheart, Jacob, suddenly to a car crash. Alice is still in high school, a junior, struggling with typical high school problems like homework and tests, but the recent tragedy moves her to seek outside help. She begins by talking to her friends and family, until she decides to search the internet for advice.

Conflict:

During her search, she comes across an advertisement for a new app that allows her to "talk" to her late boyfriend. The app asks her to upload videos of him speaking, screenshots of their conversations, and to fill out a survey on his likes and dislikes. The app takes all of the information to create a computer-generated voice, meant to sound like those from the videos, down to the way he speaks. Alice is immediately relieved when she receives her first "phone call" from Jacob.

Rising Action:

Surprised by how realistic her "phone calls" with Jacob are, she becomes fascinated. The app's texting feature allows her to "speak" to him during school and at home discreetly. She begins to talk to him more and more, claiming it is like she is falling in love with him all over again. Stuck in the denial stage of grief too long, her family and friends begin to worry as time passes and confronts her. Alice takes it as they are not supportive, and falls deeper into the hole she made for herself.

Climax:

The turning point that precipitates Alice's downfall is when one night, she tells her pseudo-Jacob that she wants to see him and misses him. The app, working off the information from their previous messages, tells her to come to him. Alice's parents, the next morning, confront her once more and take her phone away, deleting the app from her phone. Alice begins to spiral out of control.

Falling Action:

After getting her phone taken away, Alice runs away and buys a cheaper smartphone and tries to replicate the Jacob she spoke to without the messages and videos she had on her previous phone. Alice's new Jacob is not the same, and she notices very quickly. She becomes very angry with the app and breaks her "new" phone. Alice returns home, begging for her old phone back; her parents refuse to return it.

Resolution:

After her parents resist giving her phone back, Alice threatens to kill herself and quickly takes a knife from the kitchen, putting it to her throat. Her parents try to calm her down, from a distance, standing their ground on not returning her phone. Alice, frustrated and hopeless, takes her own life to "be with" Jacob in the end.

I know the ending is very grim, but the impact of dystopian fiction is always exaggerated with an unhappy ending. With this story, I wanted to address phone addiction in my generation, as well as the dangers of certain artificial intelligence technology. To develop my main character, Alice, even further, I will research grief and addiction, specifically phone addiction.