| Author | Message | ||
     Gary Fry (Gary_fry) Username: Gary_fry Registered: 03-2008 Posted From: 86.29.182.194 |
Each year, I attend the premiere of Alan Ayckbourn's latest play. This year the play was called SURPRISES and one of its themes was just that: without surprises, he seemed to be saying, life losing its vitality. The central scene involves a teenage girl getting a visit from her boyfriend from the future - now in his 60s. He has to visit to tell her something crucial that will keep them together, but his visit ends up ruining everything for her: she knows what will happen and what he will look like, etc. So my question: how important are surprises for you in life? This has made me think a lot about things, because I'm the kind of guy who likes control, who seeks to minimise the impact of unanticipated events. I would say I'm surprise-aversive. Then again, if I knew certain things, would I find the whole struggle less meaningful? Anyway, just thought it might generate some interesting discussion. | ||
| Ramsey Campbell (Ramsey) Username: Ramsey Registered: 03-2008 Posted From: 92.8.22.77 |
If it's a pleasant one it's fine by me. | ||
| Tony (Tony) Username: Tony Registered: 03-2008 Posted From: 86.152.62.175 |
I try and pave the way for them by behaving rashly. It's often hugely disastrous, but sometimes quite serendipitous. I like SOME surprises, put it that way. | ||
| Craig (Craig) Username: Craig Registered: 03-2008 Posted From: 99.126.164.88 |
I have a whole script concept, that's a sort of deadpan-serious take on what I've invented, called, "extreme surprise parties." Which I was surprised (ironically) to discover, doesn't actually exist yet—but don't you kind of think it does already, when you hear it? Like, somewhere on the internet? I mean, we all know the standard surprise parties... but I mean like surprising someone in a supermarket—turning an aisle with the shopping cart, and there's a whole gathering yelling, "Happy Anniversary!" Or perfectly executing a scary but innocuous car accident, that sends someone's SUV up into a park where everyone's there, yelling "Surprise!" Repelling down the side of a blank cliff face, coming into view of a remote cliff-side cave—and it's filled with friends and loved ones yelling "Happy Birthday!" and presenting a cake. My opening scene shows a cheesy night club with a magician's act. A woman sitting up front is having a birthday, and the magicians doing a trick for her—when suddenly, the club is invaded by masked armed robbers. They're terrorizing the place, knocking out the magician as they empty patrons' pockets; something goes awry, and the birthday girl's husband is shot through the head, but she sees the killer's face, as his mask is pulled off. They panic, the robbers, so they pull a hood over her head, and whisk her away... she's screaming in horror, as they threaten to "Fucking blow your head off, bitch" and such, transporting her through the city to their secret hide-out, a sinister warehouse... They pull her, whimpering panic-stricken, through the dark building, to a waiting chair. Then they pull of her mask—and sitting before her—is the magician. He puts something up in front of her face: "Was this your card?" She's confused for a moment... then the lights go on, and a huge gathering is there, shouting "SURPRISE!" Cake, streamers, happy friends and family (including her "dead" husband; it was all squib and sfx); she's laughing, and shaking her head: "Oh, you guys...." I sort of abandoned it when I realized, it was probably waaaaay too out there.  | ||
| Gary Fry (Gary_fry) Username: Gary_fry Registered: 03-2008 Posted From: 86.29.182.194 |
Ha! That would be class, Craig. | ||
| Tony (Tony) Username: Tony Registered: 03-2008 Posted From: 86.152.62.175 |
Craig - over here we had a series called 'Beadle's About' in which a much hated (albeit seemingly very nice and with a disability) man did such tricks on the general public. The show was patchy but often genius; in one episode he managed to convince a man he was a deity. The look on the man's face as he went from shock to acceptance to dismay when realising he'd been 'had' was astonishing and sad. The main interest of the show was seeing the transformations, the reactions. Awful things happened but the victims got over them surprisingly, even shockingly fast. Your story idea sounds great. It reminds me of That film The Game, although that fluffed it I think. | ||
| David_lees (David_lees) Username: David_lees Registered: 12-2011 Posted From: 92.22.21.241 |
There was an American show called Scare Tactics that sort of did that...it was like Beadle's About taken to horrific extremes. The ones I saw had faked malevolent hauntings and a guy seeing his friends executed by corrupt cops after being pulled over on a quiet country road. The one that really stands out in my memory was the episode where they convinced a budding actor that he'd been hired to do a prank TV show. He went into a barbers wearing a wig and halfway through the haircut blood started pouring out of the wig... ...except the barber then had a "heart attack" and the fake TV crew fled in their van, leaving the actor with a dead body, a girl pretending to be the barber's distraught daughter and an angry cop telling him he was getting done for manslaughter. I think it was his reaction at the end that made it so memorable, he kept veering between relief, humour and pure murderous rage. | ||
| Ramsey Campbell (Ramsey) Username: Ramsey Registered: 03-2008 Posted From: 92.8.21.60 |
There are clips of the show on YouTube. | ||
| David_lees (David_lees) Username: David_lees Registered: 12-2011 Posted From: 92.22.34.128 |
So there are...there seem to be more supernatural-based pranks than I remembered. Perhaps they realised early on that faking deaths wasn't all that funny. | ||
| Tony (Tony) Username: Tony Registered: 03-2008 Posted From: 81.147.55.79 |
I loved Satan's Baby, and Channeling the Dead. That poor guy. Bigfoot was great, too - why hasn't there been as scary a Bigfoot film as that? | ||
| Tony (Tony) Username: Tony Registered: 03-2008 Posted From: 81.147.55.79 |
And 'Human Auction' - there was one absolute chill in that, where the girl pushes the Chinese girl to the men, saying 'You go with them'. | ||
| Weber (Weber_gregston) Username: Weber_gregston Registered: 03-2008 Posted From: 109.150.19.23 |
www.youtube.com/watch?v=H_Dtsx-VGG0&feature=related I think this is one of the most brilliant I've seen. How to mess with people's heads!!! | ||
| Mick Curtis (Mick) Username: Mick Registered: 03-2008 Posted From: 86.178.159.240 |
Excellent! |