Rose Red?
Something about roses, anyway. I still don't know what the main plot is. But, roses. Definitely roses. Probably a movie or short, since almost everything is visual. If it's a movie, I'd like to actually make it, maybe mid-February (since that's when roses'll be cheap! ^_^)
Image One: A hand, dropped limply to its owner's side (I don't know who yet), tightening on the still-thorny rose stem. As in, the stem cuts into their hand, and blood, and yeah. I'm thinking use a real stem for this (no real thorns, though!), since it'll be a close-up; the "thorns" will be covered by the person's hand during the entire shot, so that'll be okay. The presence of thorns above and below the hand will insinuate the presence of thorns in the palm, and I think a carefully placed mini-squeeze-tube thing of fake blood will work nicely. E.G. a superglue tube, emptied and replaced with a little bit of fake blood, palmed...? Should by all rights work.
Image Two: "He handed her twelve roses, eleven real and one fake. He said, "I'll love you until the last one dies." This one is more difficult to do video-wise. I'll have to actually have eleven real roses, which is gonna such. The one fake is pretty easy, though. I don't know how I'd work this in plot-wise, especially as I almost want to do this as a non-verbal film (not silent, per se - I definitely want music in there - just one without speech; I don't feel like doing voice-overs). I guess that would depend on how the storyline turned out.
Thought here. What if the twelve roses all come individually? I'd say one a month, but that would take WAAAY too long; I'm thinking one every few days, just somewhere along her path. At first, just random roses. She's confused, but picks them up anyway, thinking someone's dropped them. Then, about a week after the first, the roses start appearing in "her" areas - her locker (or office), on her car, in her purse. She's weirded out, but keeps the roses nonetheless. The sixth (seventh?) comes with a note. "I love you." It's unsigned. Flustered, she throws all of the roses into the compost pile, bound together with a (white?) ribbon. (I want to do something with that color, but I'm not sure what yet.) When she passes by the compost pile the next morning, the roses are gone. (I don't know if she notices or not - probably not.)
The next rose is a different color, either yellow or white (depending on their meanings; I'll have to go check that). It's bound in the same ribbon that she tied the others with, and also has a note, this time an apology. She throws the rose down and runs over it with her car as she leaves. A silent figure appears a moment later and scoops up the battered rose; he tosses the rose itself into a trash can, but only after carefully untying the ribbon. He also picks up one of the undamaged petals from the ground and places it between the pages of the book he is carrying.
There is a long pause, perhaps several months. Not sure how this is to be shown, but I'll work something out. Two more roses appear, and she hesitates, but takes them home and places them in a vase together. A few days later she is going on a trip out-of-town; she discards the roses, as they will die in her absence anyway. Again, the roses disappear from the compost pile.
In the middle of her trip she finds the rose twined in the fence, and immediately goes home. Her neighbor calls her over and tells her that they saw a man standing in front of her door for about an hour earlier that day, but that he had left without doing anything. Shaken, she thanks the neighbor and goes inside. Nothing is broken or out of place; her house has not been disturbed. That evening she goes out onto the back porch for some fresh air, but upon opening the door, she finds a bundle of roses resting on the porch railing. Some are old and dried; others are fresh; the central rose is blue, and clearly fake. The handwritten note says, "I'll love you until the last one dies."
...meh. I don't like the way that's turning out. It's all right, but there's not involvement of the characters, and it's far too close to "Letters." And besides, I want the stalker and the stalk-ee to end up together; some sort of relationship that stalker thinks will never work, that stalk-ee would never be a part of, but that stalk-ee ends up going with in the end. Gay? That could actually be interesting, times being what they are and all. Plus, if they're together then I can play on the "'til the last one dies" bit, by having stalk-ee burn the roses. And we all know I want to burn things. ^_^
Hmm. An interesting idea, at any rate. It'll be interesting to see how it turns out. But for now, sleep.
