{1st Person POV}
It was currently Tuesday, June 12th, 2007. It's already been two days since the audition, and the signing up of the actors.
The only other step left in pre-production was finding a film crew and a cinematographer.
Which is what I was currently going to do. I was reading up on the lists of crew and cinematographers Uncle David sent me.
There were a lot of talented people, not gonna lie. However, most of them were too expensive for me. I wasn't in any way able to pay them with a budget of $1 million, so I was searching for cheaper options.
And one guy caught my eye. Benjamin Lucas.
Currently in his early 40s with quite a lot of experience in filming smaller and indie films, and he was working for cheap aswell.
The perfect person for the job.
I opened the messaging app, and texted my uncle.
[Can you give me Benjamin Lucas's contact info? I think he'll be great. Thanks :)]
After a few minutes, uncle replied.
[Sure. Here you go +1*********. And no problem, kid.]
I dialled the number, and waited for a few seconds before the call was picked up."Hello. Is this Benjamin Lucas?"
-Yes, it is Benjamin Lucas. How can I help you?-
"You see, I'm making a movie, and everything's finalized already. I just needed a cinematographer, so I called you up."
-That so? What's your name?-
"I'm Oliver Knight."
-I see. Well, Oliver, I'd need to meet you in-person at **** on Saturday. There we'll finalize the deal.
"Thank you." Was the last thing I said before the call was cut.
I fell back on my chair and stared at translucent screen floating in the air.
[Congratulations on finishing the pre-production stage for your first ever movie! Here are the rewards: 1,300 Entertainment Coins,
Wheel Spin: Screenplay]
There are rewards for this kinds stuff?
Nah, it's probably just because it's my first time doing this.
Yeah, that's probably it.
Anyways, I got 1,300 coins! Woohoo!
That would've been my reaction if there wasn't something far greater as a reward right there. I'm not that enthusiastic about the coins, at all.
What I am happy for though, is the wheel spin, which is for scripts. That seems incredibly convenient. Free scripts for doing the most basic thing? Heck yeah!
"Should I use it now? Hmm."
I need to get over the pros and cons of this.
Pros: 1) I can write the script right now and probably release the movie quickly in like March or April. This is assuming the movie is pretty small in scale, which I'm 99% sure it is because someone who just started wouldn't get stuff like Avatar or Titanic.
I can see if the movie I'll get is actually worth my time/a movie I'd want or do or not. If I get something like, say, Finding Nemo, I'm not going to make it no matter what because 1) I don't know how to do animation, and 2) I don't have the necessary means for it.
When I get richer, then yeah, sure, I'll buy an animation studio and get it to make Walt Disney Animation, Pixar and DreamWorks classics, but I can't do that now.
And now for the cons:
1) The surprise factor and the satisfaction of waiting for it will be gone.
That's it.
Now, if I was a sensible person I would do the spin right now, but I'm not sensible at all.
I'm kidding. Of course I'll spin it right now! I'd be able to plan the release the movie, write it's script and see if I actually want to do it or not far earlier. Plus, it's a free script.
I clicked on the 'Wheel Spin: Screenplay' option, which brought up a wheel with about 10 movies. It was quite diverse, actually.
There were the auteur movies, like The Departed and Taxi Driver. Then there was Deadpool for Comic book/Superhero movies, Up for animation, Day After Tomorrow for disaster movies, Peter Jackson's King Kong for CGI fest and monster movies, Alien for horror, Blade Runner for Sci-fi, The Hangover for comedy and Saving Private Ryan for war movies.
All in all, it was actually quite a good list with a diverse list of movies from different genres. None of the them were that expensive, excluding Day After Tomorrow and King Kong, of course. This did prove me wrong that there wouldn't be large scale movies, but oh well. You can't win everything, can you?
Really, I wouldn't mind doing any of these, well, except for Day After Tomorrow.
Clicking on the 'Spin' button, I patiently waited for the wheel to stop spinning.
30 seconds passed, it was still spinning.
1 minute passed, it was still spinning. I was getting super anxious and kept staring at the system. It felt as if my heart was about to come out of my chest.
2 and a half minutes passed, it was still spinning.
"Uh, is this thing even going to stop?" I asked to no one.
As though the system heard my question, the wheel started spinning more slowly, and slowly, till it completely stooped spinning.
I was a little surprised at what I got, but it was a great choice.
What was it? The winner of 2007's Best Picture. Yes that's write, it was-
[Congratulations! You've won the screenplay for 'The Departed' as a reward for the Wheel Spin: Screenplay!]