Assignment 1 - Story Breakdown "What if a man discovered that his father is actually his stepfather and that his mother was murdered?"

University Degree Linguistics, Classics and related subjects

Timothy Cowell

Assignment 1 - Story Breakdown

“What if a man discovered that his father is actually his stepfather and that his mother was murdered?”

“In order to understand our past we must face our inner demons.”

Character List:

Michael Foley (P.O.V.) Characterisation:

Occupation: A stockbroker through his fathers business; he is career minded and focuses on nothing else.

Physical appearance: Michael is a tall, dark and handsome type of person. He is always well dressed. He wears a smart black suit for his work.

Personality: Hard working, he doesn’t like getting close to anyone emotionally and suffers no fools. He doesn’t trust people very easily.

I.Q: High intelligence and well educated via a private college.

Style of speech: Talks assertively as if he knows he is always in the right.

Home: An apartment in the city; Stylish and grand.

Mannerisms: Tends to stutter when nervous.

Michael believes he has everything in life that he needs.
He believes that he has always been in control of his life and has been free from any emotional ties.

True Character:

Michael has a very sensitive side.
He deeply misses his dead mother.
He despises his father for not caring for him enough.
He is lonely and yearns emotional attachment.
He has a tendency to not be the authoritative person of action he longs to be.

David Foley (The Stepfather) Characterisation:

Occupation: Landowner; Stocks and shares.

Physical Appearance: He is 68, ageing and weak.

Personality: Un-sympathetic and distanced from much emotion. Accomplice to the murder.

I.Q.: Intelligent but had an average education.

Style of speech: Blunt and to the point

Home: Is seen only in hospital.

He believes that the wealth and career that he has provided Michael with compensates for the murder he has knowledge of.
He believes that his actions were done out of love.

True Character:

Insensitive towards Michael’s upbringing.
Holds terrible guilt for his actions in the past.

Ally Peterson (Friend & love interest) Characterisation:

Occupation: Hotel owner

Physical Appearance: Attractive, slim brunette. Casual clothing.

Personality: Friendly and inviting

Style of Speech: Calm and collected.

Home: Upstairs floor of hotel. Moderately attired.

She believes that the village in which she lives is unexciting and dull
Her only accomplishment in life was her work

True Character:

Desires companionship and feels inadequate without.
Brave and resilient and a quick thinker.

...

This is a preview of the whole essay

True Character:

Insensitive towards Michael’s upbringing.
Holds terrible guilt for his actions in the past.

Ally Peterson (Friend & love interest) Characterisation:

Occupation: Hotel owner

Physical Appearance: Attractive, slim brunette. Casual clothing.

Personality: Friendly and inviting

Style of Speech: Calm and collected.

Home: Upstairs floor of hotel. Moderately attired.

She believes that the village in which she lives is unexciting and dull
Her only accomplishment in life was her work

True Character:

Desires companionship and feels inadequate without.
Brave and resilient and a quick thinker.

Roderick Hayes (Old friend & Murderer) Characterisation:

Occupation: Farmer

Physical Appearance: A scruffy man, who always seems to walk with a slight hunch.

Personality: Friendly and informative

Style of Speech: Relaxed,

Home: Village farmhouse, large property.

True Character:

A jealousy fuelled man with a malicious desire for love.
Unable to come to terms with the birth of his illegitimate son.

ACT 1

A man is sitting behind a desk. He is smartly dressed and is engaged in a conversation with one of his work colleagues who’s lecturing him in a demeaning manner about not completing a task. The man at the desk is Michael Foley. Michael begrudgingly agrees to his colleague that he should work to a better standard.

(Inciting incident) During his potentially stressful day at work Michael receives a telephone call regarding his father whom is dying.

Michael leaves work and drives to the hospital.

(Call to Action) Michael’s father asks him to leave the city and return to his childhood village, but Michael declines and his father passes away. Michael collects his father’s belongings only to find a letter addressed to him from his father.

(Commitment to Action) The letter reveals that Michael’s mother did not die in an accident but was murdered and that the truth lies in his childhood village.

ACT 2 (PART 1)

Michael arrives at the village hotel and meets his father’s old friend, Roderick, for the first time in twenty years.

Michael is pleased to meet one of his father’s closest friends and they reminisce about his father and old times they used to share.

Roderick introduces Michael to the hotel owner, Ally Peterson.

Ally and Michael share an instant attraction but Michael is unwilling to ‘open up’ to a stranger.

Michael receives death threats from an anonymous caller (The caller is Roderick), so Ally invites Michael to be her guest in her home where they can both be safe.

MID POINT

From Ally’s kindness Michael begins to trust Ally and opens up by telling her his dilemma. During their stay together Michael confides in her the emotions he feels of his father’s passing and the loss of his mother as a child. A romance then ensues between Michael and Ally and they both decide to work together on solving Michael’s past. Michael’s trust in people has greatened due to the bond he has with Ally.

ACT2 PART 2

Michael appreciates his mother’s old countryside village and the peace that there once was there, compared to his hectic lifestyle in the city.

Roderick reminisces with Michael about his mother’s past and inadvertently lets out that he knew about the letter that Michael’s father wrote. Ally doesn’t trust Roderick and shows this to Michael.

Michael feels he should believe Roderick, as he was his father’s best friend. Michael asks Ally to leave as he feels she is clouding his judgement. She leaves but he takes the advice of Ally and probes Roderick for more answers.

The more Michael asks Roderick questions, the closer to the truth he gets and finally Roderick breaks.

(MOMENT OF TRUTH)

Roderick is revealed to be the murderer and Michael’s biological father. Roderick explains that due to the fact that Michael was born out of wedlock Roderick felt his mother to be dirty and to not deserve to live. So he drowned her. David Foley (Michael’s Stepfather), Roderick’s weaker sidekick, was to be his accomplice but he changed his mind and fled the village with the newborn baby (Michael).

Roderick then tells Michael that he shouldn’t have come back. In Shock of all of this, Michael starts to panic. Roderick attacks him and knocks him unconscious.

ACT 3

Michael awakens to find Roderick has long departed. Dumbfounded as to what has just happened, Michael decides to get back to the hotel and inform Ally of the situation.

Ally tends to Michael’s head wound and discusses the conversation that Michael and Roderick had. Michael tells Ally to stay there and gives her a kitchen knife for protection. He tells her to lock up and not to answer the door to anyone. Michael decides to drive out to the point where his mother’s body was found, on the banks of the river just outside the village. He wants to overcome the demons of his past once and for all.

Once there, strong emotions within Michael finally emerge and he vows to put an end to Roderick’s maliciousness. He calls the police in the hope of getting Roderick arrested and drives back to the village hotel.

On the way back he almost collides with an oncoming vehicle that was travelling erratically, but with his mind focussed on getting back to the hotel and Ally he continues on.

Michael arrives at the hotel to find that the front door is wide open. Inside, the place is a mess indicating a struggle has occurred. He finds a note attached to the nearby table. It is a message from Roderick stating that he would kill Ally in the same way his dirty mother died if he didn’t leave the village for good.

Michael realises now that the car he passed must have been Roderick with Ally and decides that there’s no time to wait for the police and so he goes to try and stop Roderick.

Racing back along the road his thoughts now are of his stepfather and how he understands that he was only trying to do what he thought was right. Michael feels he can now forgive his stepfather.

A passing police car sees Michael’s speed and turns to follow him.

Arriving at the spot his mother was found, Michael can see Roderick pulling Ally from his car and into the water, she appears to be unconscious.

Michael lunges at Roderick, who loses his grip on Ally and they all fall into the water. Ally, still unconscious disappears from the surface. Michael notices this but is forced under by Roderick who is now wielding a gun. Whilst under water Michael can barely make out Ally who is conscious now and handing Michael a knife.

Roderick notices the police arrive and seizes his moment to shoot Ally. Michael lunges up at Roderick with the knife in hand and in the struggle gunfire is heard.

Roderick’s still body now floats to the shore and there is a knife in his throat. He is dead. Michael is wounded in his shoulder by the miss-fire but is okay and has Ally pulling him to safety, whilst the police survey what occurred.

Resolution:

Michael feels that his troubles are finally over. He also feels that he had to overcome his own anxieties and the realisation of his emotional ties to arrive at this point. A point that ended in the same place that it started. He has found a true life-long companion in Ally, something he has always longed for. And he has put his past and the ghost of his mother and stepfather to rest.