I had a screenplay idea for an independent art-house type film called The Birder. Liam Neeson, Chris Eccleston or somebody similar is a widowered man in a brown tweed jacket who lives in a high, narrow boathouse on a road between a lake and a wetlands, and who in finally deciding to box up his wife's things after several years, comes across her birdwatching book and takes up the hobby to assuage his persistent grief and lingering boredom. As he traverses the surrounding wets and wilds, he finds within the pencil jottings she left in the book's margins a map to her half of the life they shared - and perhaps, a way through grief, to some kind of acceptance of life’s impermanence and, paradoxically, its permanence.
Either that, or else maybe the hints he reads between the lines of her margin-scrawls lead him to the disturbing realization that her spirit may in fact have been reincarnated, in the form of the beautiful and enigmatic loon (Emma Watson, Emma Thompson or somebody similar named Emma) who guards the lake's tiny island.
Or both! There's room in the plot for both those threads. This is one of those pensive, thinky films with a lot of lingering shots of things reflected in water, and big zoom close-ups of the main character's face as he looks out across the emptiness, and seems to see something in it.
People would totally go see that. I can already envision the posters and taste the popcorn! Liam Neeson is...The Birder. Or maybe Chris Eccleston.
5 comments:
It seems as though there may have been whole gangs of pensive widowers in that film. Perhaps Liam was one of them! The film was awash with memorable stars playing unmemorable parts.
Technically the screenwriter doesn't get to specify who plays what part, but I assure you, Liam Neeson would be welcome in most roles I write. Whether playing a pensive widower or a squeaky-voiced, pigtailed buxom blonde, Liam Neeson provides a nice touch of much-needed class to any filmmaking enterprise!
In fact, I recently dedicated a 9-post series to his latest film, Taken.
WHAT ABOUT WHAT'S HIS NAME? Alan Rickman?
He's always getting the short end of the recognition stick!
Poor guy.
Some Call Him Snape. As if that's any better.
Post a Comment