A Carousel In Silhouette

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He'd never seen a movie like that before.
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Author's note: To the people who left comments asking me to write more: sorry for making you wait nearly eleven years. This story isn't really a sequel to Poker With The Teachers, although it does contain a couple of the same characters. It's just set in the same universe a few years after that story. It's a wee bit longer than my other stories, rather a lot longer than I had intended, and it takes a little while to wind up, so grab a coffee. Maybe a pot of coffee. On second thought, there's a couple places where - if I've done my job right - coffee would be coming out of your nose and spraying all over your keyboard. Ok, so, coffee at own risk.

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It was that camera. That was the trigger.

He got it for Christmas from his dad. It wasn't the best digital video camera on the market, or the newest model, or the best resolution, but Gary Sullivan loved that camera. He was 12 that year. He plugged it into his computer and put together a stop-motion video with his Lego set, and the whole video was all of fourteen seconds long. He was hooked. From the first time he saw his completed fourteen-second movie of a little yellow smiling man having a car accident, he knew that he wanted to make movies. He was one of the lucky ones who finds his ideal career while still a child.

And he was good at it. Really good. He spent the rest of sixth grade, every waking minute outside of school, filming everything. He'd see ants on the sidewalk, and he'd bring the camera in really close and zoom in as far as he could, following a constantly-changing group of ants as they moved a ... something. "What was that, a chunk of ... Holy crap, they've got a dead bee!"

He'd film for hours, and then watch and edit stuff together on his computer until his mom yelled at him to do his homework. After homework and supper were out of the way, back to filming or editing together video.

The years went by, and he studied everything he could online about making movies. Composition. Lighting. Editing. Practical effects. He watched videos of directors talking about their movies. He heard George Lucas talking about film school, and Steven Spielberg talking about film school, and Kevin Smith talking about dropping out of film school. Lots of Kevin Smith - does Silent Bob ever shut up?

And he kept making movies. Not crappy little YouTube videos, but movies, documentaries or fiction with plot and dialogue and characters. And over the years he picked up a bunch of free software for video and sound editing. He could do green screen chroma-key, and made a film about his friends being chased by dinosaurs and getting saved by a wizard. He even found software that let him change an actor's voice, and spent a weekend recording himself and playing it back as Darth Vader.

Sure, they were all short films, most in the two to three minute range. His friends and big brother Doug would find themselves frequently getting roped in to helping Gary by saying a few lines or building a set or donning a wig and facing away from the camera while another buddy said a few lines, fake Shemping.

His next door neighbour Sophie, whom Gary had known since they were five, would often write scripts for him. She had a knack for putting words to paper, and a sly wit. Her scripts would frequently require several takes of each scene, due to the actors (and director) breaking down laughing halfway through. Sometimes he thought she'd write the scripts just to mess with his buddies' heads by making them say things they'd never say in real life.

By the time Gary was eighteen and in twelfth grade, it was obvious to everyone who knew him that Gary was going to be a Hollywood director, and a great one at that. His little movies were getting longer and longer, a few of them had already had over a million hits on YouTube, and the quality was getting better and better.

------------------------

The movie was awful. Laughably awful. They were fourteen years old and in sex-ed class, watching a movie that was at least forty years out of date. Gary's buddy Alan looked at him from the next desk and said, "please, promise me you will never, ever make a movie this bad."

In the desk on the other side of Gary was Trevor Mitchell, another of his close friends. He laughed. "If Gary made a sex-ed movie it would have a hard-R rating."

------------------------

For some reason, that Thursday night four years later Gary was hearing Trevor's words in his head. Sex-ed movie, hard R rating. Sex-ed movie. Hard R rating. It was actually distracting. Gary figured watching some mindless Got Talent videos on YouTube would distract him from the distraction.

He watched one clip after another. Alice Fredenham. Landau Eugene Murphy junior. Darcy Oake, Paul Potts, Smoothini, on and on and on. His mind wandered as he watched an old clip from Britain's Got Talent, a bunch of dancers in silhouette. As they moved, they formed shapes with their shadows and told a story.

Bolt upright, Gary's eyes popped wide. Sex-ed movie. Hard R rating. Silhouette! I need a story.

Gary turned on his phone and called Sophie.

"Hey Spud."

"Hey Pickle. What's up?"

"Nothing. Supposed to be studying stupid math. You?"

"Chemistry. That bitch Wu gave us five pages of gravimetric stoichiometry."

"Sounds painful. Wanna take a break?"

"Hell yes. Tree Fort, five minutes."

"Ok." He hung up and opened his desk drawer, pulled out his baggie of weed and rolled a joint. A few minutes later he was climbing the tree in Sophie's back yard, pulling himself up into the treehouse her dad had made for her ten years earlier. She was already there waiting for him, smiling. The treehouse had been plenty big when they were eight years old, but now there was only room for the two of them to sit cross-legged beside the trap door with their knees touching and their backs to the walls. Even at only five foot nine, while sitting Gary's head nearly touched the ceiling. He sparked the joint and passed it to her. The only other lights were yellow streetlights poking through the cracks between the boards of the west wall, and some light from Sophie's house through the balcony door of the treehouse. They had both grown too big for the balcony door years ago.

He exhaled a cloud. "So, I'm working on this movie..."

She laughed and pushed up her glasses. "Lemme guess. You need a script."

"Yeah. I got this idea that'll blow your mind. I just need a story to go along with it."

She passed the joint back to him and exhaled. This tasted like the same stuff he brought over on her 18th birthday party, Kush. Nice.

They spent the next fifteen minutes passing the joint back and forth while Gary explained what he wanted to do: a sex-ed video that didn't suck, that was actually interesting and even hot, with the twist of doing the whole thing in silhouette.

Within about fifteen seconds Gary knew Sophie was on board. She was already googling story ideas on her phone and asking him questions. Her Google-Fu was strong; within five minutes she had found an old German play that they could adapt for Gary's movie. They talked about how they were going to adapt this century-old play to the 21st century and how it could be filmed.

"Ten scenes. Five actors, five actresses. You realize that this is going to end up being a feature-length movie, right Gary? You think you can finance that?"

"Well, the silhouette will make a lot of things cheap. Props, makeup, costumes, hair... only their shadows are important. I won't need to rent much equipment, mostly the screen and lights, and I'll need a studio... I think I need to see the script before I figure out the budget and logistics."

"Fair enough. Look, I gotta get back and finish that Chemistry homework." He gave her ass a smack as she started to climb down. "Asshole," she laughed, and then she was gone back into her house. He stayed in the treehouse for another five minutes, starting to see in his mind what the movie would look like, thinking about who to cast in each role. Then he went back down the tree, hopped the fence, and back into his house.

------------------------

Nearly a week went by. Typical stuff: school, hanging out with Alan and Trevor, filming some crows as they chased some gulls away from a dumpster. More school, filming some guys framing a house, some school, filming some rabbits, more school, editing a mini-documentary on crows. Wednesday night he was unwinding, playing Assassin's Creed for the nth time, and his phone rang: Sophie.

He answered. "Hey Spud."

"Hey Pickle. I have a script for you."

"Tree Fort. Ten minutes"

"Ok."

He pulled himself up the ladder into the treehouse before Sophie got there. Another five minutes went by. Ten. Fifteen. What the fuck is taking that girl so damn long? He pulled out his phone and called.

"Hey."

"Hmm?"

"You coming?"

"Al...most..."

"You ok? You sound... funny."

"Yes. Oh, yes."

What the fuck? "Umm... look, I'll wait another ten min- are you sure you're ok?"

"Ohhhh. Unnh. Yesssss..."

"Ok, this is fucking weird."

Silence.

"Spud? You there?" Just ragged breathing on the other end. "Sophie?"

"Oh! um... sorry Pickle, I'll be right out." Click.

A few minutes later Sophie was climbing the ladder.

"Jesus Christ, I thought you were having a fucking heart attack or something. What the fuck?"

Her face went nearly as red as her hair.

"I nearly started without you," he said as he sparked the joint. If anything, she got even redder.

"I have your script" she said as she took the joint and passed him a small binder. He gave her a grin and flipped it open. She watched him through her eyelashes over her glasses as he read, and they passed the joint back and forth. In her mind she could see what he was reading, synchronizing her version every time he turned a page. He chuckled at that part, good. Ah, that got a laugh.

And then Gary was quiet for quite a while. The only sounds inside the treehouse were the turning of pages and the consumption of the joint. And then the joint was gone and Gary was just reading and turning pages. She watched him shift a little uncomfortably. Her blush had gone down, she had regained her composure, and she could see he was starting to lose his.

"Holy shit." He was almost halfway into the script. He was expecting something with a lot of humour, and there were indeed some funny lines, but he wasn't expecting this. He shifted his leg a little, and moved the script into his lap to try to hide his growing erection. He looked up at Sophie. "This is the hottest ... wow, Spud, you've got a dirty mind." He grinned.

"Keep reading," she said, her voice low, nearly a whisper, "it gets - more."

His grin got broader, and he kept reading. Every scene was hotter than the last, and he was getting painfully hard. I can't believe this, he thought, this is just from a script! He was sure if he touched himself he'd explode. Scene seven, scene eight... he was squirming...oh wow scene nine is a mile-high club.. Halfway through scene nine he looked up at Sophie. "My God, Sophie, this is amazing. I think I need a cigarette."

She laughed. "I know, right? I started reading the translation of that play and just kind of... went with it, you know? I did have to change some things, of course, and Google Translate couldn't figure it all out, turns out there were some puns, and I had to look some things up online, but the basic theme is just so fucking hot... but I don't want to spoil the end for you. Keep reading."

He finished scene nine, and then scene ten was ... different. Whoa. Very different. So much for that erection.

"Wow, Spud, I knew you could write, but this... that last scene, that's a whole new level."

"I know, it's fucked up, right?"

"Yeah, but it totally ties the movie together and kicks ya in the gut. That last scene, it's - it's perfect."

She beamed. That was the scene she was worried about, but he got it.

"You know," he joked, "we could appeal to the LGBT crowd, cut one scene and make another scene girl-girl, bowchickawow..."

She grabbed the binder, bonked him on the head, and shook it for emphasis. "You. Will. Not. Cut. My. Script." She dropped it in his lap. The threat was unmistakable. Gary liked having his balls located right where they were. Convenient for scratching, there. He winked and stuck out his tongue.

------------------------

"... and that's what's so frustrating, Gary. We all know you're smart and talented. It's obvious. But to get to that next level you're going to need to go to film school, which means you're going to have to graduate high school first. And you're not going to do that if you don't apply yourself to your school work, in particular your math. You really do need to study and do the homework."

Julia Philips was exasperated. She just couldn't seem to connect with him. He kept staring off into space as she talked. "Yes, you've got an A in your Drama class and we know that you've been making a lot of short movies - that's what this is all about, it's affecting the rest of your school work. And math is so important, it will affect everything you do as a director, even whether your movies get made at all..."

Suddenly he was looking at the guidance counselor right in her eyes. "Well, maybe you could help me out with that."

Her left eyebrow arched, her head turned slightly to the right. "What?"

"I've been looking at your shadow."

"My shadow."

"Yes, look at it. No. Wait. Do you have a mirror?"

"A small one in my purse."

"Perfect." He gestured towards the purse. Her green eyes narrowed slightly, locked with his as she retrieved her purse. What the heck was he up to? She looked down inside and found her makeup, pulled out and unfolded the small mirror. Years of habit forced a microsecond glance of appraisal at her makeup and auburn hair before she looked back at him.

"Hold it out so you can kind of look in my direction and also see your shadow in the mirror."

She moved it around a little bit to achieve the desired effect. "OK, now what?"

"Now, keep watching your shadow in the mirror. This is an angle you don't often see of your own shadow. You can see the outline of your face, sideways."

"Yes, interesting. So how is this supposed to help you out?"

"Just humour me. Now, I want you to say the same thing, but this time watch your shadow in the mirror instead of looking directly at me."

"Uhh, yes, interesting, how is this supposed to help you?"

"Did you see the way your lips moved, your eyebrows, your chin - ok, not your lips, but your shadow's?"

"Yes...?"

"That's what I'm looking for. An expressive shadow. I want a shadow that can convey emotion."

"I'm not following this at all."

"It's for my next movie. This will be my foot in the door for film school. Yes, I've been listening to you, don't look so shocked. I've got a great concept for a film, something I've never seen done before."

"Tell me more."

"I need to do this cheap. Money is not an option because I have hardly any. What I do have is digital film equipment and a computer and some editing and chroma-key software and an idea."

She nodded her head. "So where do I fit in?"

"I'm getting to that. As I say, cheap. I can't afford much for sets or costumes or props. However, with a green back light and a translucent screen between the camera and the actors, their shadows are black and everything else is green. So I can use chroma-key to put anything at all as a background, but the actors and props are just silhouettes. With a little cardboard and some duct tape, a simple chair can appear to be an airplane seat or a throne or something else entirely."

"I think I'm starting to see where you're going with this. So if you want a scene on an airplane, you just have rows of cardboard-covered chairs casting shadows, actors sitting in them, and the interior of a plane added later with software."

"Right. And If I want a scene in a banker's office, I just put in a folding table and some chairs, apply cardboard and tape to make their shadows look fancy, and change the background image. I can use the same set and a few simple props over and over again and have tons of seemingly-different sets. I can do it cheap - all I need are the actresses and actors."

"I'm trying to picture how it will look - I can kind of see it."

"It will definitely be eye-catching. But that's not the best part. Suppose I need an actor to have a big nose. Professional, movie quality makeup costs time and money, but if we can only see the actor's shadow then a simple half-mask will do. Heck, taking the moustache off a set of Groucho nose glasses would do the trick."

"So you can go cheap on sets, wardrobe, props, and makeup, and compensate by having elaborate backgrounds."

"Yup. And those backgrounds can all be stock photos. I don't even need to move the camera; I can just leave it fixed focused on the centre of the screen, and do pan and zoom later in software. I can even re-use the same actors for multiple roles, just by changing the voice a little in software. If I need to re-shoot a scene with a different actor, then he can just wear the mask or wig or whatever and I can change the voice later."

"This does sound interesting, and it would probably be visually intriguing. I saw something a little like it in Fantasia. And it sounds like you've put a lot of thought into it. Re-using actors in multiple roles? Multiple sets? Just how long is this movie going to be?"

He scratched his head. "Well, I'm planning on seventy to eighty minutes."

"That's pretty ambitious."

"I don't think I can make it much shorter than seven minutes per scene."

"You have a story in mind, I presume? Something that will hold the audience's attention for an hour?"

"I do. Sophie's adapted an old German play for me, updating it to the twenty-first century, and the script is amazing. Like, really powerful and just - amazing. There are ten scenes, each with one actor and one actress, and each actor and actress plays in two adjacent scenes opposite a different actress or actor. So I need five actors, five actresses, and ten sets."

"So... you want me to act in your film."

"More to the point, I want your shadow to act in the film. Like I said, I've been sitting here watching your shadow this whole time. I've been watching a lot of shadows, lately."

"I'll have to think about it."

"I'd really like it if you'd be in the movie. Your lips are expressive in profile. You're slim enough that I can make you appear any age I need you to be. And you're just naturally animated when you talk, moving your arms and head around in ways that lead to interesting shadows, not standing rigid. You'd be great for my movie, perhaps in multiple roles."

She smiled inwardly at the "slim enough" comment. "Well, I don't know. I've toyed with the idea of being in a play or something like that in the past, but I'm really not the greatest at remembering lines."

He grinned. "That's another advantage of filming this way. There can be pages of the script all over the set, taped to objects so that they won't cast a shadow. The audience wouldn't know if you were reading something taped to the top of a table. And the script has some room for ad-libbing lines anyway. Just look at your shadow in that mirror and picture yourself on screen -- or rather, your shadow on screen -- it will be easy, and fun, and it would really help me out."

She started to see herself -- her shadow -- being the shadow of Julie Andrews in the Sound of Music. The hilllls are aliiiiive -- waitasecond.

"Just what is this movie about, exactly?"

He shifted in his seat a little bit, scratched his right ear. "It's a cautionary tale about the dangers of unprotected sex and the spread of STDs. The first character infects the second, the second the third and so on, until the last character gets with the first, giving them a slightly mutated form of the original STD. Round and round and round we go, ring around the rosie. I'm calling it The Carousel."

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