Your Big Break

Thanks to Brendan Maclean for the music used in my pitch, “Long Black.”

INT. QUEENSTOWN AIRPORT / BAGGAGE CLAIM - DAY Sarah, prim, grim and dressed in a drab grey suit, waits for her bag at the conveyer. It cartwheels down the chute and she grabs it, lugs it toward the customs desk. Her phone rings and she pulls it out of her bag and flips it open.
INT. QUEENSTOWN AIRPORT / CUSTOMS DESK - DAY Sarah drags her bag toward the Customs Desk.

SARAH (on the phone): ...Okay, see you after the conference.
She hangs up as she arrives at the customs desk. The nice young Kiwi bloke at the desk smiles and comes around to help her put her heavy bag onto the X-ray machine. He’s very good-looking under his over-combed hair, over-starched shirt and over-polished glasses.
CUSTOMS OFFICER: Welcome to New Zealand.
Sarah barely notices him; she’s writing furious notes in her diary. The Customs Officer watches the screen as the bag rolls through and reacts with shock.
CUSTOMS OFFICER (CONT’D): Miss, did you pack this bag yourself?
Sarah looks up with total innocence.
SARAH: Yes, why?
CUSTOMS OFFICER: Er, may I have a look inside?
Sarah nods - what’s going on? He unzips the bag and a small girl in a cute red dress climbs out. Sarah and the Customs Officer both stare at her in disbelief.
SARAH: That’s not what I packed.
The girl grins at them both, jumps off the conveyor and makes for the door.
CUSTOMS OFFICER: I think you’d better go after her.
He quickly zips up Sarah’s bag and hands it to her; Sarah hesitates.
LITTLE GIRL: Sarah! Come on!
Sarah and the Customs guy share one last look before she follows the girl.

CUSTOMS OFFICER(feebly): Enjoy your stay in New Zealand.
The girl disappears out the door and Sarah follows.
EXT. QUEENSTOWN STREET - DAY The Little Girl skips along ahead of Sarah, who marches after her, business-like, trying to look dignified with her big empty suitcase and impractical heels. On both sides, the quaint architecture of the alpine village lends a whimsical backdrop to the strange pursuit.
SARAH: Wait, wait! Shouldn’t we be looking for your parents?
The Little Girl comes back and grabs Sarah’s hand, pulling her along.
LITTLE GIRL: There’s something I have to show you first. Come on!
EXT. AN ALPINE MEADOW - DAY The Little Girl skips along the grassy meadow with high mountain peaks on both sides. The landscape is a feast: something straight out of a fantasy. The Little Girl stops at waits for Sarah, who is trying to keep up while searching on her phone for a signal.
LITTLE GIRL (spreading her arms): Sarah, look!
Sarah glances up, takes in the landscape, returns her attention to her phone.
SARAH: At what?
The girl slumps in disappointment, looks around for inspiration, then runs off in a new direction.
SARAH (CONT’D): Hey, wait! Shouldn’t we be getting back?
The girl ignores her and runs on. Sarah trips and nearly loses her footing, just manages to keep upright. She sensibly decides to put her phone away, take off her shoes and leave the huge, useless bag behind. As her bare feet touch the grass, one-by-one, she stops still. The grass and mud ooze between her toes, and with them a kind of peace that envelops Sarah. She looks up again at the meadow and everything is suddenly brighter, more colourful. The little girl is running off in the distance; Sarah smiles at her and follows.
EXT. THE TOP OF A STEEP GRASSY SLOPE - DAY Sarah and the Little Girl stand at the top of the slope, staring at the magnificent view laid out before them. The Little Girl cups her hands around her mouth and lets out a long, whooping cry that echoes back to her. Sarah grins and does the same. They laugh as the echo returns. All around them, a magical wind rises, filling their senses. Sarah is shocked by the power of it; the Little Girl just smiles. The Little Girl suddenly gets serious.
LITTLE GIRL: There’s only one way down.
She points down the slope. Sarah looks worried.
SARAH: Really?
The girl nods, lays on her side, pushes off and rolls down the hill, giggling the whole way down. Sarah is about to follow on foot when she decides - what the heck, and lays down too. She pushes off and watches the world tumble over and over, laughing and whooping all the way to the bottom.
EXT. AN ALPINE LAKE SHORE - DAY With glinting snow-capped peaks on either side, Sarah and the Little Girl arrive at the edge of a deep blue lake. The Little Girl leads Sarah to a small shrub with a wilting kowhai flower hanging from it. She reaches out and cups the flower in her hand. When she releases it, the flower is restored to its full beauty. Sarah is just staring in disbelief; the Little Girl giggles at her reaction and runs down to the water’s edge. She dips her finger in the mud on the bank and paints a couple of stripes of ‘war paint’ on her cheeks, then runs over to Sarah and does the same. Once they’re ready for battle, the Little Girl taps Sarah on the shoulder.
LITTLE GIRL: You’re in!
She dashes off down the bank, and Sarah comes after her.
EXT. AN ALPINE LAKE SHORE - DAY Further along the lake, the land is rocky, and there are shrubs and trees to hide behind. Sarah pops her head up from behind a rock. As well as her mud-striped cheeks, she’s wearing a crown of vines and carrying a large stick. She sees the Little Girl up ahead, looking furtively about, and Sarah creeps up on her. She taps the Little Girl on the shoulder, and the Little Girl screams in fright, then Sarah screams in fright at her scream, and they both fall about laughing. They lie on the loamy ground for a moment before Sarah sits up suddenly.
SARAH: What’s your name, anyway?
The smile is wiped from the Little Girl’s face. She looks hurt.
LITTLE GIRL: Don’t you remember me?
SARAH: We’ve never met before.
LITTLE GIRL: I don’t mean meeting me, I mean being me.
Sarah can’t work it out for a moment, then the images come flooding -
BEGIN MONTAGE SEQUENCE:
EXT. A BEACH - DAY The Little Girl is building a masterpiece of a sand castle. As she lifts the bucket off the castle’s highest battlement - nearly as high as her - the sounds of galloping horses and a herald’s trumpet fill her ears.
EXT. THE EDGE OF A FOREST - DAY The Little Girl stands at the edge of the trees, staring into the dark woodland. A magical wind rises around her and she inhales lovingly. Among the trees, pinpoints of light appear, dancing through the air. The Girl smiles and goes toward them.
EXT. A BACK-YARD - DAY The garden is bordered by a line of thick, dark pine trees. The Little Girl is near the edge of the wood, playing hopscotch on a game she has drawn in the dirt. She tosses a stone onto the grid and it bounces into the forest. A moment later, the same stone bounces back out of the trees, landing on a square, and the Girl grins and hops toward it. Up at the house, Mum sticks her head out the window and calls-
MUM: Sarah! Dinner’s ready!
Sarah, the Little Girl, grins into the trees, tosses the rock back into the forest and runs up to the house. Her Mum meets her at the door, wraps her in a huge blanket and hugs her.
END MONTAGE SEQUENCE.
EXT. AN ALPINE LAKE SHORE - DAY Sarah returns to reality with the realization that the Little Girl is somehow herself. She turns to talk to her, but the Little Girl is gone. She sighs, stands and goes down to the bank of the lake to wash the mud from her face. As she leans over the water, the rippling reflection shows her two faces: her own and her inner-child’s. Sarah smiles.
EXT. AN ALPINE MEADOW - DUSK As the sun sinks in the West, Sarah returns to the spot where she left her bag and shoes. She picks them up, and hearing a shout in the distance, she looks up to see a man running along chasing a little boy. She grins and goes closer. The man is the straight-laced Customs Official we saw earlier. He grins shyly at Sarah, then frowns at the Little Boy.
CUSTOMS OFFICER: Look, we have to get back -
The Little Boy and Sarah share a grin. She takes his hand.
SARAH: First, there’s something we need to show you.
The Customs Officer looks bewildered as Sarah and the Little Boy skip off together. He pauses for a moment, smiles and follows them.
ROLL CREDITS.

NOTES:
Hi! Thanks for reading this far. I studied acting before graduating in 2007. By the end of the course, I was more interested in directing than performing, so I wrote and directed a few short films, some theatre, and this year, a low-budget feature film (unrealeased) called "Coffee." I love the way film can bring a bit of magic back into people's lives.

Practicalities:

Without being intimately familiar with the Queenstown area, it’s impossible to convey in the script my intention to double- or triple- up locations. For example, the first and final scenes in the wilderness take place in the same location; the scene of the Little Girl building a sand-castle can be easily shot on the same lake-shore where most of the action takes place. I’m confident we can reduce the nine onscreen locations down to a manageable three or four actual moves - and many of these would involve nothing more than walking down a hill. With such a small cast and a simple story, I envisage a tight crew.
To develop the magical theme without the use of CGI, I’ve created effects using lights, fans / wind and sound design - and a few simple cheats. There’s no CGI intended in this film, as per the rules, but I still plan to take the audience on an adventure through their imaginations!

Cheerio,
Denby.