2010 Charleston International Film Festival Screenplay Competition Finalists


Title: ABSENCE VERSUS THIN AIR
Writer:
Marco Rosales
Synopsis: In a not so distant future a Federal Agent will discover the remains of a classified project. He will exploit this information for his own benefit and will discover a dark secret that involves him, testing his own morality.

Title: ALL ABOUT EVIL
Writer: Brad Blake
Synopsis: Dark fairy tale black comedy of twin sisters separated at birth and their dramatic battles when the evil twin switches places, sending her good sister to certain doom. Good’s efforts to escape several seemingly impossible situations and regain her family culminate in a wild battle to the death. But who’s death?

Title: AMERICA’S NEXT
Writer: Jamie White
Synopsis: Downtown Eddie Brown was a rare gem in the 1980s, a black Hollywood super agent who commanded respect. Things have changed. One sunny day in Beverly Hills, he meets Shana Perrineau; and bam!!!

Title: AN ESOTERIC EVENING
Writers: Anna Ritter with Schuyler Halsey
Synopsis: On an eclectic evening, modern love is aided and confounded. Clara and Hunter spend a night searching for their dreams and in return find love.

Title: BAKKER’S DOZEN
Writer:
Daniel D. Molinoff
Synopsis: The Bakker’s Dozen are 12 world famous paintings to be inherited by an orphaned 12-year old boy and his 8-year old sister, if the children’s aunt & uncle don’t kill them first.

Title: CARLA
Writer: Christoph Schinko
Synopsis: A diverse love story about the introvert Josef, who falls in love with his next door neighbour Carla. They never even met in person, but he can hear her through his bedroom wall, and starts to imagine a relationship. It explores how different minds cope with loneliness and the irony of having somebody very close to you, but yet indefinitely far away.

Title: CONTINUUM
Writer: Drew C. Planton
Synopsis: In the search for his mother, Diego Vargas leaps through time and space, clashing with a vicious band of thieves, a mysterious government organization, and a psychologically unstable spy in order to uncover a wide conspiracy, exposing an imminent apocalypse that may be sealed by Fate.

Title: COUNTDOWN TO BLISS
Writer: Michael Jon Levin
Synopsis: A famous screen team fake romance and marriage to save their mega- pic, while real life takes them on totally divergent paths.

Title: CORPORATE POLICY
Writer: Robert Gately
Synopsis: Greedy executives of a large corporation implement an illegal downsizing process, and they would’ve gotten away with it, but they didn’t count on a desperate employee whose family loyalty proves much stronger than any of their corporate policies.

Title: DANIELLE’S BEACON
Writers: Patrick Scott and Michael Berlin
Synopsis: Marriage soon leads to baby carriage for most couples. Not for Brad and Gina. After years of failing to have children – adoption is the only option. This is a true story of love, trust, and the ability of the human spirit to endure. It ponders one question we all ask about family. Why do we love each other?

Title: DICTATOR FOR ‘LIFE’
Writer: Gregory L. Heitmann
Synopsis: Iraq War veteran, Sergeant Gordon Coopermann is haunted by the ghost of Saddam Hussein five years after Saddam's capture. Can Saddam reverse the curse placed on Gordon now that Gordon has left the Army?

Title: DINKY DAU
Writer: James Oliveros White
Synopsis: On the day of his wife’s funeral, the ghosts of his former squad visit Vietnam veteran Harrison Roosevelt. Their presence helps Harrison reconcile with his estranged son and daughter and face demons from his past.

Title: DOG DAYS (AND NIGHTS) i
Writer: Eric W. Carlson
Synopsis: A hot shot executive on the fast track to partner in a powerful lobbying firm learns he has inherited an animal rescue farm from a grandfather he never knew. Will he give up his lavish lifestyle and keep the farm? Or will he sell out to eager developers after he discovers his grandfather’s deceitful motives?

Title: ELLIOT
Writer:
Keva Keyes
Synopsis: “Elliot” is an inspirational coming-of-age drama that takes place over the patriotic summer of 1976. Set amongst the tranquil backdrop of Beaufort County, SC it follows 12-year-old Elliot as he overcomes adversity, comes to terms with his estranged father and trains to win the town’s 4th of July weightlifting competition. “Elliot” is a story about defying the odds.

Title: ESCAPING
Writer: Alex C. Pedersen
Synopsis: A young American bombardier is shot down into Nazi-occupied France and must persuade ordinary strangers to make extraordinary sacrifices before a Gestapo officer – bent on revenge – hunts him down. This would be the first film to dramatize the Europe escape lines established by a few courageous citizens of France, the Netherlands, Belgium, and Spain to help the only people helping their countries during the dark years before D-Day: young American and British bomber crews.

Title: ESPERANCIA
Writer:
John Edward Flynt
Synopsis: A wealthy and arrogant black shipping tycoon named Marten LeBron must forsake all his power, money and influence keeping a promise to the dying friend who saved his life years before when they were in the Navy together, but in the process he faces almost certain death after discovering that someone he cares about deeply is the kingpin of the murderous, multi-billion dollar human trafficking trade in the Caribbean and South Florida.

Title: FISHING SHACK, THE
Writers: James M. Kirtland and Joyce Simmons
Synopsis: A Creole family scattered by events is brought together by a feline
conspiracy and the family fishing shack.

Title: FOR LIFE
Writer: Steve Weissman
Synopsis: Edged on by his incestuous sister-in-law, the president of a leading euthanasia group faces-off with his estranged anti-euthanasia daughter over the fate of his aged mother.

Title: FORGOTTEN HEROES
Writer: Larry M. Hedaa
Synopsis: Two young men rejected for military service during WWII join the Merchant Marines and find danger on the high seas.

Title: FRIENDS AND ROMANS
Writer:
Gregg Greenberg
Synopsis: A pair of extras from classic mob movies attempt to prove they can really act by staging a production of Julius Caesar at a Staten Island theater.

Title: GRIEF FROM MADAME BUTTERFLY
Writer: Barry Leach
Synopsis: A student going to a med-school interview must safely escort an aging psychologically ill ex-opera diva from Wichita to San Francisco to gate-crash her ex-lover’s funeral. As they lurch from disaster to disaster, he begins to doubt he is cut out for patient care.

Title: HAFFERTY J
Writer: Sean Calder
Synopsis: HAFFERTY J is a psychological thriller set in the early 1960's. It's the story of a young schizophrenic, recently returned from Vietnam, and his experimental treatments with a newly discovered drug known as LSD conducted under the brilliant Pharmacist and UCLA Professor Frank Cohen.

Title: HALFWAY HOME
Writer: David J. Schroeder
Synopsis: A paralyzed young man's scholarship requires him to be a live-in supervisor in a halfway house for the mentally disabled. Through a series of comic and tragic adventures, they find emotional and spiritual healing as individuals and a family.

Title: HAT TRICK
Writer: Robert Gately
Synopsis: Three codgers pursue personal goals – one of which is retired cop’s dream of streaking naked down the football field during the Orange Bowl to atone for a fumble he made years ago in college.

Title: HEALTH INSURANCE
Writer: Mark Clausen
Synopsis: A man from a third world country finds the only way he can get the United States to stop the slaughter and starvation in his country is to kidnap the child of a senator and put him amongst these threatened children.

Title: HOOPS AND RACES
Writers: Marc J. Olson and Daryl M. Davidson
Synopsis: White pro basketball player Cris Coppola feels unappreciated, so he issues a challenge: The top five white players, he says, could beat the top five blacks. The game is on, and so is the hype, hoopla and hate.

Title: I’LL WEAR THE CROWN
Writers: Pete Brewton and Mark Brewton
Synopsis: After the Civil War came peace, but the struggle for freedom continued: Dan Stroman, a freed slave from Goose Creek, South Carolina, fights the rise of the Ku Klux Klan while Pres. Ulysses S. Grant grapples to hold together the victory he won at Appomattox.

Title: IN THAT PLACE
Writer: Shannon Laribo
Synopsis: Hindered by family conflicts, aspiring writer Carter Jones transitions into adulthood, learning from his best friend Joelle that life is not about defying those who hurt you, but about focusing on your dream.

Title: KEY BRIDGE
Writer: Joseph Gueron
Synopsis: This is the story of the seduction of a middle aged married woman by a young woman as an act of revenge, both finding at the end that to plan is to amuse the Gods.

Title: LIGHTIN’ IN A JAR
Writer: Kevin Cutts
Synopsis: Bill Hopewell's wife wants to finish her college degree; his daughter has won a violin scholarship. They will each have to travel from home to achieve their dreams. Bill feels left behind, literally and intellectually. What is he to do? What would any man do...Why, act like a fool and succeed in running his family off. He has a chance to win them back, but first he must learn that their dreams are not a threat to him.

Title: LIQUIDATORS, THE
Writer: Jim Amatulli
Synopsis: Brothers find documents proving the true provenance of a museum's Etruscan antiquities, putting them in jeopardy as the papers are being sought by criminal elements, unscrupulous people and the Italian art crime authorities.

Title: LITTLE DEATH, THE
Writers: Gary Hoover and Beth Hoover
Synopsis: A troubled contract killer forever changes the life of a young misanthrope.

Title: MARTIAL ARTISTE
Writers: Janice Kennedy and Susan diRende
Synopsis: Martial arts teacher Kate Long trades her black belt for a blonde wig, short skirt and high heels so she can hide in plain sight as a bumbling bimbo and solve the mystery of her friend Carl’s disappearance in a small Southern town.

Title: MOMENT, THE
Writer: Catherine Carter Babcock
Synopsis: Lucas Temple, a five-year-old genius and only child, can’t cope with the thought of sharing his parents with a new baby sister. Determined to maintain his number one status, he decides he must get rid of the baby.

Title: NEITHER CONFIRM NOR DENY
Writer: David L. Harvey
Synopsis: A young man goes from the fields of Indiana to become a player in one of America’s Greatest Naval Underwater Spy Missions.

Title: ONEIRONAUT
Writer: Alejandro Sesma
Synopsis: A narcoleptic man escapes the city when he gets involved in a robbery with the person he's secretly obsessed with. In the journey he will learn the difference between true love and obsession, before authority catches up with them, and his dreams manage to take over his waking life.

Title: PAYBACK INCORPORATED
Writer: Jim Monack
Synopsis: When vindictive men have a score to settle with old lovers, they call Sam Patterson…a professional heartbreaker. For a price, he’ll wine ‘em, dine ‘em and dump ‘em. He has only one rule for himself: Don’t Fall In Love.

Title: PRODIGAL SONS, THE
Writers: Andrew Lewis and Jennifer Lewis
Synopsis: A prodigal son returns home after squandering his inheritance. His prideful older brother is stunned when their father forgives him and celebrates his return. The older brother sets out to prove he is the better son by showing everyone he can make a big profit from his inheritance. But his ambition leads him to a proverbial pig pen all his own. And there he finds the truth of his father's love.

Title: RIPPLES
Writer: Mark Winzer
Synopsis: A corrupt Chicago businessman encounters an abducted teen in Brazil. Is it too late to save her life? Is it too late to save his soul?

Title: RUINS OF OZ, THE
Writers:
Nathan Carliner Goldman and Miriam Esther Goldman
Synopsis: When burned-out ruins appear in a Kansas cornfield, an archeology professor discovers that the Wicked Witch of the West has returned and threatens the Earth as well as Oz.

Title: SYCAMORE HILL
Writer: Ashley Patterson
Synopsis: After witnessing the murder of her parents, Aly Simmons, 14, is sent to Sycamore Hill, a boarding school for troubled teens. Here she is forced to make sense of her past in order to create a new future.

Title: TOTENGOLD
Writer: Rich Gordon
Synopsis: Looted Nazi gold disappears in a web of secrecy and is recovered sixty years later after a dangerous international pursuit.

Title: VIKING LOVE
Writer: Drew Larimore
Synopsis: Sally Isp is living a slightly different life than most other twenty-somethings: she still lives with her mother, sells Mary Kay and relishes all things Viking. After corresponding with a Scandinavian sea captain on a Nordic-themed dating website, "VikingLove.com" - Sally decides to do the unthinkable: go to New York to meet him. Convincing a total stranger to drive her there, wild adventures ensue as a cross-country trip in the name of love turns out to be an all-out unpredictable roller coaster.

Title: WINTER
Writer: James R. Peoples
Synopsis: Ten years ago 4 friends accidentally cause the death of an entire family. Now, after a frightening nightmare, the ghosts of the past have returned to haunt them
all one by one.
 

 
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