Tuesday, November 22, 2016

No party before midnight [poem]

working along, working alone.
no rest for the wicked
not wanting or waiting to leave home
no celebration without sacrifice

no party before midnight
no winning the prize
no party before midnight
no truth through the lies

the day is gone before you
the day is given to the others
the night is left with little of you
nothing left to share with your brothers

no party before midnight
no winning the prize
no party before midnight
no truth through the lies

echoed concerns fading in the night
tired people with voices full of blisters
the curtain falls from the peaks at the top
we are left to tend to the wounds of our sisters

no party before midnight
no winning the prize
no party before midnight
no truth through the lies

Sunday, October 23, 2016

SpeedSquad - Movie Concept

SpeedSquad - Movie Concept

America has become a mess of talented criminal drivers that can allude law enforcement long enough to escape and are leaving a path of destruction behind.

After a high profile death in a high speed chase police officers are no longer allowed to give chase.

A special police unit is formed to stop the chaos being caused by speed on the roadways.
The team is formed from brains, speed, brawn and teamwork
  • GRIZ - a grizzly old police officer who has survived many high speed chases and seen too many good people and officers hurt or killed trying to put a speeder behind bars. (Played by James Edward Olmos) 
  • ON2 - a police officer turned mechanic and racer who rally races. (Played by Hayden Christensen) 
  • GEEK - computer genius who can interconnect everything. drives a 4x4 diesel truck outfitted with wireless internet (Played by Matt Doran) 
  • BUZ - a former apache pilot who can fly a helicopter anywhere. 
  • MAPPER - a middle age female cop who worked her way up through the ranks to a desk job so she could go home to her family for supper every day comes home on the bus to find that a speeding criminal high on drugs has killed her husband and two kids in a car accident. she agrees to join the squad. she is a GIS/MIS expert and can get the maps and the data to help in ways that the police never thought possible. predicting the route of a speeder becomes a valuable tool and using computers to manipulate makes their power even more powerful. (Played by Annette Benning) 
  • TARGET - a weapons expert who believes that creativity can beat the criminal mind who relies on best practices. (Played by Michael Dorn)
 - criminals using gps drop spots and the squad uses geocaching experts to help understand and track. using a local geocaching unit to understand.
- mini quadrotor ai with ipad video display
antgonist - in addition to all of the small criminals, and people who don't see themselves as criminals speeding, the squad has found that a drug lord is using speed junkies to deliver and distract
----
Timeline
----
Act 1
  1. Opening scene - High Speed Chase At night - Aerial support too late, black and whites sloppy.
  2. Criminal gets away, property damage and private injuries reviewed
  3. Media coverage of disastrous chase with no results
  4. Police chief at mayors office getting chewed out.
  5. High speed chase #2
  6. Aerial support but lots of damage, one death and criminals abandon car after successfully eluding patrol cars and despite aerial surveillance
  7. Governor discovers that the person who died is a high profile lobbyist's niece tells mayor and chief of police to stop high speed chases for good.
  8. Chief of police and GRIZ [a grizzly old police officer who has survived many high speed chases and seen too many good people and officers hurt or killed trying to put a speeder behind bars.] having a beer talk about the old days when town was much smaller and high speed chase meant following them out of town hoping they had a smaller tank of gas.
  9. GRIZ talks of Smart Cop [MAPPER] who knows how to use maps well and her ideas to be more strategic about making the city “small” again but they cannot convince her to take on the more stressful position. This smart map cop happy in a quiet job making her family a priority
  10. MAPPER home with family eating, talking about work and having fun together.
Act 2
  1. Crime scene unfolding during morning rush hour
  2. Criminals high speed exit
  3. MAPPER family killed when drugged criminials sideswipe minivan and kill her husband and kids in a high speed escape without a chase.
  4. MAPPER finds GRIZ and agrees to work with GRIZ but she says they can’t do it alone and tells him of others she knows of that know how to work smarter to make a new way of stopping speeding criminals work
  5. MAPPER goes looking for her brother's old high school friend who became a chopper pilot in the military but is now a police pilot in a nearby city and bored. BUZ [a former military pilot who can fly a helicopter anywhere] agrees, his wife becomes gis cop friend and helps her deal with her loss.
  6. GRIZ finds a computer nerd who works in the police armory who he had hoped is the computer genius they need. GEEK [computer genius who can interconnect everything. Drives a big crew cab truck outfitted with wireless internet and a high tech office in the back seat ] is supposed to have no access to computers after he hacked into the governors home computer trying to get access to his internet activity. He got caught and was put on probation. He is not allowed to have access to a computer and had none at home or at work. GEEK turns him down as he prefers to stay out of the limelight. GRIZ catches him “using” while getting coordinates for Geocaching and recruits him as an option to turning him in.
  7. GRIZ and MAPPER discuss the rest of the team on a hot day over cold ice tea. GRIZ remembers a cop turned weapons expert in R&D who might like to try out his techniques in the field since the department had been neglecting his really cool ideas.
  8. GRIZ visits TARGET [a weapons expert who believes that creativity can beat the criminal mind]. TARGET isn't so cranked up about being the field because he has a new girl friend who has two kids and he really wants to be a normal family man. GRIZ convinces him his role will be low risk.
  9. MAPPER finds racing cop ON2 [a police officer turned mechanic and racer who rally races.] and he jumps at the chance to make a difference
  10. Team assembles in a suburban police garage and GRIZ throws out to the team the problem. MAPPER gets them brainstorming on a whiteboard how they can change the face of high speed chases and MAPPER and GEEK guy spend the evening writing it up for GRIZ to take forward.
Act 3
  1. GRIZ pitches the idea to the chief of police to have a trial of this new way of stopping high speed chases.
  2. Chief and governor have a huge argument about the situation and governor tells him yes but if it fails he takes all the heat and resigns. Chief wants the high speed mayhem to stop and agrees.
  3. Team assembles again and begins to prep their gear and their strategies.
  4. MAPPER and GEEK start to build their connections to everything traffic and make the mounds of data something they can work with to make split second decisions or to relay crucial information.
  5. Meanwhile GRIZ, ON2 and TARGET go to see what their options are vehicles and tools.
  6. TARGET asks about ON2
  7. BUZ heads to the airport to take a loaner chopper for a test drive and bring it for equipment fitting. BUZ finds old mentor runs the police airport garage now and has just taken delivery of a new chopper which he agrees needs some hours on it before he can turn it over to the regular pd pilots.
  8. BUZ is happy and goes off flying.
  9. After much planning, equipment prep and training they officially become an option as a unit for the chief of police to call upon and they wait on standby scanning the operational flow of police data keeping up with what is happening.
Act 4
  1. As MAPPER, GEEK and ON2 find themselves in the middle of a discussion on patterns they are seeing in the data and radio chatter a call comes in from the chiefs office. Jewelry store heist with cash and valuables taken from the high profile store who's owner is a big supporter of the governor. The team leaps into action.
  2. MAPPER and GEEk work out an optimum safe path through the city to rendezvous spot and begin manipulating traffic lights and dispatching black and whites to herd the getaway car.
  3. BUZ gets airborn and provides eyes in the sky from a safe distance while the getaway car begins to think they lost the cops and starts to drive normally.
  4. Meanwhile ON2 and TARGET in one car and GRIZ in another converge and corner the car as it pulls into a side street. they are pinned in with no get away and no one hurt.
  5. The chief hails it as a success
  6. Team celebrates
Act 5

  1. The whole team starts to discuss patterns again and another call comes in.
36   this time it is a chase that began as a routine traffic stop but after identifying a high profile offender with a warrant a gun battle ensued and an officer was killed whilst the bad guys drove off with a new car in chase as well as several others. the chase is already causing damage and the chief is on the verge of calling off the b/ws.
37   MAPPER and GEEK sets to finding the chase and BUZ gets airborne with TARGET using his new setup in the chopper which allows him to control some new weapons on the chopper and on the chase cars remotely.
38   GRIZ and ON2 are en route to intercept based on MAPPER projections meanwhile GEEk is clearing up the path to avoid more traffic confrontations.
39   with only one b/w left ON2 catches up (after scratching his car on a hydrant on route) and GRIZ not long after. the b/w has its tires blown out and GRIZ and ON2 proceed to encourage the car into defined patterns intent on ending the chase. just as ON2 has gotten them under control a grenade throws him off his game and its up to GRIZ to try
40   meanwhile BUZ has gotten approval to come in lower and TARGET has started to hit the car with rounds of paintball like objectives filled with fart gas and goop
41   Just when they think they are done 3 vehicles come up and knock GRIZ and ON2 off the road with ramming and shooting and they get a way leaving a path of destruction behind them all while news choppers filmed the lack of success and mocking their tactics on the evening news.

Act 6 - The bad guys are revealed

42   Drug lords office, bad guy leader explodes in anger that his drivers were almost caught and he had to risk sending in help.
43   Drug lord tells thugs to do more to make themselves invincible to being stopped.

Act 7 - One Chance
44   Chief and Griz meet and discuss how well it didn’t work in the end and how there is obviously an organization behind the rampage. Relay’s governors once chance to get this right
45   GRIZ comes back to team meeting. TARGET is ticked that they were mocking his weapons despite them doing their job and would have worked if the backup hadn’t shown up. Since when do criminals have backup?
46   More time spent enhancing equipment and getting ready.

Act 8
47   Night time. Alarm tripped off at currency house. 3 Modified performance cars seen leaving the scene in multiple directions, black and whites looking for them. Call comes to the team.
48   Everyone gets the txt to jump to action.
49   MAPPER jumps into action. GEEK, already on the road pulls over to do his work.
50   TARGET and BUZ head to the chopper.
51   GRIZ and ON2 head to compound for their cars.
52   B/W report finding one car from the robbery and then another, 3rd car still missing.
53   GEEK and MAPPER talk about how all 3 may have stolen goods or only one of them and its going to be tricky to provide support for all 3
54   GRIZ heads for one of the cars and b/w fall back.
55   ON2 find the other one
56   BUZZ meanwhile is trying to find the 3rd based on radio reports and MAPPER projecting where it might go.
57   GEEK is frantically changing lights to green and providing support
58   MAPPER is working to help everyone.
59   GRIZ begins to use counter measures built into his car to stop the speeder
60   ON2 deploys goop splatter to cars rear window and mirrors and goes dark in his car so speeder doesn’t know where he is until its too late and ON2 has blown their engine and forced them to stop with black and whites closing in.
61   EVIL DUDE is listening in on radio scannners, watching TV network coverage and getting stats from his cars and looses it. Gets into his own modified SUV that looks like it came from mad max and heads out tracking to the GPS coordinates of the car GRIZ is chasing.
62   Meanwhile BUZZ has found the 3rd car and given out the coordinates to ON2 who isn’t far from it. As ON2 confirms he is closing in BUZZ comes in closer and TARGET unleashes a variety of counter measures.
63   ON2 and TARGET and BUZZ holds them long enough for the black and whites to take them into custody.
64   Meanwhile shortly after GRIZ thinks he is going to take down the car he is chasing EVIL DUDE comes from the side and starts to hit him and pushes him off the road and the two of them get away.

Act 9 - Embarassment
65   Crew sitting around talking about the EVIL DUDE who came to help.
66   Team all gets a text of chase in progress. GRIZ gets a phone call. Situation is Coordinated strike with banks, jewerly, guns and a freight delivery of pharmacueticals all happening at the same time.
67   The team decides to go for the truck with the drugs
68   Meanwhile chases from the other robberies are wreaking havoc on the city.
69   team locates the semi and a crew of vehicles racing with it to provide support of the getaway.
70   We see that the truck is wired with explosives and he has been told to follow the lead car or die.
71   MAPPER suggests they must have a plan for how to lose them, its not easy for a truck to disappear. Support vehicles starts splitting off and getting away despite efforts.
72   Team agrees they need to stop the truck and as they do the last car gets away and the cab of the truck explodes and it comes to a cumpled halt. A news helicopter has captured the entire scene.

Act 10 - Plot to take the leader

73   Sitting having drinks they discuss how they need to find the brains behind the operation and take them down.
74   MAPPER shows up late. She reveals how she had traffic camera footage during the big getaways analyzed in hopes of finding a common location. She discovers a common rendezvous point on the edges of the city with no trace of where they go to next. Do they go back into the city from there or do they leave the city. They agree they need to build intelligence.
75   The next day they spend in the shop beefing up the gear and/or putting new tracking tools into place around the city to find the group behind the speed crimes.
Act 11 – Alarm Triggered
76   Alarm goes off at 3 am of excessive speed in a group of vehicles
77   The team gets into position and tries to track where they they will strike.
78   They hone in on a convergence of traffic and discover the trajectory leads to the police evidence facility.
79   They call the chief but he doesn’t believe them.
80   They head to the site to find they have quietly been taking out the guards and on duty cops and are readying to leave with a lot of drugs
81   The chase begins.
82   Several cars  and heavily armoured modified transport vehicles move out in formation. Clearly lots of training.
83   Mapper tracks the trajectory and sends cars ahead but these guys are prepared for it and have reroutes planned.
84   Chopper begins to come in so that mapper who is on board can take the trucks with tracking begins shot onto their roofs. The cars prove harder to hit.
85   Meanwhile we find that geek has been learning to drive his truck more aggressively. And target is in the back of the truck with some very cool weapons
86   Griz is in high speed chase slowly taking out the chase cars and giving instructions to the black and whites to support him.
87   On2 meanwhile is going head to head with the leader who was driving with him and the leader has his own tricked out defenses in his car.
88   Battle ends with everyone stopped but leader and on2 car destroyed. Geek picks him up and they all race to where mapper thinks he will go.
89   Show down happens between griz and badguy who it turns out they have clashed before and cars crash. Leader shoots griz in the leg and mapper shoots him.
Act 12 the end
90   They have an awards ceremony and are congratulated
91   Cut to bad guys 2nd in charge going to another city to regroup.

Copyright Dale Clark 2012, 2013, 2014, 2015, 2016 
;-)

Saturday, April 30, 2016

Got in a street fight - Film Short Concept


Scene captured in a news report detailing all of the steps including screen shots of stories, interviews with people on the street, interviews with experts on anonymity.

an anonymous author begins to publish short stories

these stories expose the problematic underpinnings of society including which companies, people and systems are at the heart of the problems

the stories begin to go viral

the stories begin to pin-point solutions such that the common man can take action, and they do.

the public is posting videos showing how they tested the ideas in the stories and proved it true

the author calls for the common people who do not want to take action to instead hold boycotts

Scene captured in boardroom with executives sitting around angrily discussing the impact and then they call someone on the speakerphone.

when the boycotts start to be super successful the elite are not amused and ask their friends in government to expose and shut down this trouble maker

Scene captured in an office at a law enforcement agency where the a manager hangs up the phone and has a conversation with someone about the case.

they cannot find the author due to the software being used. so they go to the web sites that host the stories and host, after host is requested to shutdown their site but they continue to pop up in new places until they finally get hosted by non compliant host and don’t get taken down.

the authorities decide to create a fake author to rise and take claim for the stories, hoping to draw the original author out.  They realize that they cannot use an actor as he may be recognized but instead they use an agent who they can put a disguise on.

Scene captured at a public building. We see plain clothed officers going in. We see the hacker seeing them going in and snapping a picture. We see the makup and disguise being applied. We see the hacker making the connection and flashing back to his incident to snap out of it and send a message to this friends. We switch to scenes of young men searching up information on the agent. frantically copying it and posting to paste bin as well as notifying the media who start to get it on their smart phones while they are at the press conference and actually ask him about it during their question period.

a federal agent is disguised and brought out as the author and begins to apologize for causing unrest and for “making up” the information and that it is not true.

but a hacker recognizes the agent in moments before appearing to speaking entering a building without a disguise.  it is an agent that once busted him as a teen for finding a sloppy atm setup.

the hacker then spreads the word with his hacker network and they coordinate one big release of the information revealing the fake within hours of the new conference where he brought out.

Scene at a family dinner table about the anonymous author and the amazing posts.
Dad makes statement about how this guy is a real leader for the country. Daughter takes exception to her Dad thinking its a guy.

throughout the story we have been following a family talking about the author’s posts at their dinner table and with their friends and the story seems to be implying that the husband is the one posting the information.

Scene takes place in agent’s office. Use whiteboard to visualize the data storage.

time between the posts starts to increase but the amount of information increases too as does the methods to take action.

the depth of the articles research catchs the attention of one computer scientist on the agents team.

then, the government decides that they need to increase the spying on regular citizens by scanning for keywords, blobs of encrypted data and building a massive data store that might find the research being done prior to the posting.

Scene takes place in a car en route to the suspects home and then at the door. Agents enter the home and they confirm its cooicdence.

first a false alarm to someone who coincidentally was writing a paper for school on the same issue.

Agent office.

and then it works, they are able to track an IP of someone who researched information on both the stories. they are 2 hours away from their location and decide not to involve local law enforcement other than at the scene.

but the computer science guy is asked to scan a document with comments that explains the elite plans to crush her in public as a fraud without ever showing her side of the story to squash the public ramblins when he knows she has been uncovering the truth. He hims and haws but in the end he decides that the public needs to know who she is and so he calls a friend who shares it with hackers, the media and social interest groups and they rally at a simple bungalow.

Author’s home outside

people start to arrive but stay back thinking that they have been duped until moments later the police and agents arrive.

Agent’s Office

He decides that she deserves a second chance and so he gets a message by calling his friend again to her to say that agents are coming and she needs to erase all her research and evidence that links her to the posts.

Author’s home inside

and she does, including the stories she is working on which copies to a USB stick and drops down a heat vent moments before the police break in and she is hauled away.

Author’s home outside

the police haul her out in cuffs and they pause outside the door when they encounter the mass of people and media.  She is caught for a moment in awe. The people around her are just regular people.   She shouts out ”I am nobody special, just a partner to my husband, a mom to my children and someone who gives a damn about how the world should work!”  she is lead away to a waiting unmarked agent car and you can see offices removing her computer equipment.

TV News item follow

In the weeks that followed the government was able to prove no charges against Christine, she was just an average person involved in her community and they could prove no intent of any kind other than to share ideas.

Christine was encouraged  to lay low and so her posts haven’t been back on the internet, but many other average every day people are sharing information and taking action and maybe things can change for the little guy.

Quote before credits:

Never doubt that a small group of thoughtful, committed citizens can change the world; indeed, it's the only thing that ever has.