Now is the season when many great #Screenplays are dropping all over the web, including recently #BAFTA longlisted The Substance. Seeing scenes omitted and added suggests that #filmmakers and #screenwriters interested in seeing what writing gave rise to the film are trusted with a ‘real’ preproduction screenplay - not polished for awards voters. The imaginative formatting is controversial but adds flair because of its evocative visuals and twisty structure. Poetic imagery, rhyming of colours, props and body parts are all dazzling. Every word has a purpose, building tension and meaning: the daring abstractions and stylisation consistently let the writer voice her ideas on aging, society, doubt and addiction.
We will be drawing on beat sheets in the next 100 Pages in 10 Weeks workshop, so I want to understand the compelling story structure better by experimenting
with a ‘reverse engineered’ beat sheet to identify the beats, where the action changes direction. SPOILER ALERT – watch the movie first, otherwise it’s not so much fun for you.
1.A syringe needle injected into an uncooked flat lying egg produces a second rounder, shinier, fleshier egg.
2.ELIZABETH’s Hollywood Walk of Fame star gets built, soiled with fast food, then restored by a street cleaning machine.
3.Elizabeth (50) leads an aerobics class filmed in TV studio; her wide smile fades instantly after finishing.
4. Avoiding the shut ladies’ room, in the men’s Elizabeth overhears network director HARVEY wanting a new, hot girl. Harvey fires Elizabeth: “RENEW or disappear.” Elizabeth’s manager CRAIG also fires her. In the car, she gets distracted by her show’s poster being replaced, leading her to crash.
5. In the hospital, a nurse with piercing eyes connects her to The Substance.
6.Leaving the hospital, she runs into FRED from 10th grade, who finds her still the most beautiful girl in the whole wide world and wants to meet.
7. At home, Elizabeth watches The Substance promo on a USB: It promises to enable a “better version of herself”, to be released through an injection.
8.The condition is she needs to go back into her old self every other week to recharge.
9.Elizabeth trashes the USB and a newspaper with casting call looking for Elizabeth’s replacement.
10. Elizabeth’s studio ‘goodbye’ roses wilt, she smashes a snowglobe with her figurine into a poster of her, trashes roses.
11. Elizabeth picks up USB, orders The Substance, injects herself with Activator.
12. Her pupils divide into two, a bulge grows, under her skin another body appears.
13. Elizabeth’s body lies lifeless, in the mirror she sees her new self: SUE, 30 years younger. Sue saws up the hole in Elizabeth’s body from which she emerged, injects it with Yellow Food solution, and herself with Stabilizer.
14. Sue picks up the newspaper with casting call, competes and Harvey hires the new her. He accepts the condition that Sue needs every other week off.
15. Sue fires Elizabeth’s housekeeper and changes her gold wardrobe to pink. She timely connects as ordered through injection, switching back to Elizabeth’s body.
16. Elizabeth wakes up in her painful old body, Sue’s lifeless body beside her. Picks up The Substance refill kit, crosses out days in calendar.
17. Sue rehearses workout with dancers, and at home builds secret room to hide Elizabeth’s body. Outside, a poster announces her new show. Harvey and the crew love her act. Craig wants to be her manager, but Sue chooses a rival.
18. Sue, drunk, brings a biker home as Elizabeth’s body absorbs the last Yellow Food solution.
19. As she kisses the biker, Sue’s nose bleeds.
20. To buy time, she goes to inject herself with Elizabeth’s spinal fluid and feeds Elizabeth with her Stabilizer.
21. Returns to biker.
22. Elizabeth wakes up, her index finger is gnarled and swollen.
23. She complains to The Substance organisation, but they claim what has been used on one side is lost on the other side. There is no going back.
24. Picking up The Substance refill, Elizabeth talks to another client, who doubts if the old body still deserves to exist. He is unhappy about the superficiality of his new self.
25. Elizabeth arranges to meet Fred.
26. But repeatedly changing her appearance. She misses the date.
27. Sue feels a bulge under her skin first in the shower, then bigger and uglier when recording her show, messes it up.
28. Harvey calls Sue into his office, but only to praise her ratings and offer her the New Year’s Eve Show.
29. Sue injects more of Elizabeth’s spinal fluid, does cover of Vogue.
30. Elizabeth showers, her foot now looks old with hardened yellowed nails, varicose veins crisscross her leg, black eye from wrinkles.
31. Sue complains to The Substance organisation, but they respond that these are her decisions. The balance has to be respected.
32. Elizabeth considers leaving The Substance.
33. Elizabeth sees Sue slagging off her old show on TV, throws an egg onto screen, leaves flat a mess.
34. Sue uses up Elizabeth’s spinal fluid.
35. Outside, the poster advertises her New Year’s Eve show.
36. Sue complains to The Substance organisation, but the only way forward is to switch back to Elizabeth’s body.
37. Elizabeth now looks like Gollum, throws out Sue’s boyfriend.
38. Elizabeth terminates The Substance by injecting into Sue’s heart
39. Elizabeth immediately regrets it.
40. Elizabeth resuscitates Sue with the switching pipe.
41. Now both Elizabeth and Sue are alive.
42. They fight. Sue kills Elizabeth.
43. Sue goes to the studio for New Year’s Eve show.
44. In the studio, Sue loses her teeth and fingernails.
45. At home, Sue injects herself with leftover Activator, awakes with a monstrous face including some of Elizabeth’s features in the wrong places: MonstroElisaSue
46. MonstroElisaSue cuts the face out of a poster advertising her old show, glues it onto her face.
47. MonstroElisaSue goes on stage where the poster detaches, causing panic.
48. MonstroElisaSue’s hand detaches, spraying Harvey with blood
49. MonstroElisaSue flees, to collapse on the pavement on her Hollywood star.
50. MonstroElisaSue’s remains are mopped up by a street cleaning machine.
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