​

​

EXT. MOTORWAY – NIGHT
An establishing long shot of the town skyline PANS DOWN to reveal luminescent automobiles darting down the motorway. Thick pendulous clouds lie low on the horizon.

 

EXT. ROAD - NIGHT
Torrential rain pounds the concrete – each drop, swollen and bulging, explode like artillery fire on a blood-soaked meadow of yesteryear. Car headlights approach us from a distance: It cautiously passes us by.

 

EXT. DUEL CARRIAGEWAY
A car comes to a halt in a snail-trail of traffic. We CUT TO a long shot of the congestion with a telephoto lens.

 

INT. CAR (STATIONARY) – NIGHT

A glum looking woman – around 30 years of age – is listening to the radio whilst the screeching window wipers attempt to clear the unrelenting torrent with little success.

A piece of music ends abruptly; it is replaced with the daily radio clown who’d be more suited to presenting a children's entertainment program than the melancholic drive home. DOROTHY flicks to the next preset station but to her dissatisfaction, yet another radio advertisement blurts out. She proceeds to skip through all the preset stations in quick succession, none of which are airing any music.

The flustered woman then takes out a CD from her sun-visor and inserts it into the player. A relaxing piece of classical music sucks the stress from Dorothy’s face, but the respite is short lived – the CD starts to skip. Dorothy turns off the player with a rapid precise finger-punch and wallows in the ambience of heavy pitter-patter and honking car horns.

​

​

 

EXT. CARRIAGEWAY – NIGHT
The traffic is now on the move.

 

EXT. ROADSIDE – NIGHT
Dorothy's car sails through a large puddle on the side of the road.

 

INT. CAR (MOVING) - NIGHT
Dorothy is startled by the ringing of a mobile phone that sits on the passenger seat. She glances over to see that the call is from THE BOSS. Dorothy activates the car indicator.

 

EXT. LAYBY – NIGHT
Dorothy’s car pulls into A dimly-lit layby.

 

INT. CAR (MOVING) - NIGHT
A sudden thump jolts Dorothy from her seat and the sound of hissing can be heard from the rear of the car.  Before going to investigate, and like a good little lap-dog, Dorothy attempts to carry out her main priority – calling back her boss. She picks up her mobile phone but the battery dies.

She takes her phone and plugs it into the 12v car charger, but this charger, like all good chargers, has an intermittent fault. Dorothy proceeds to fidget with the wire - connecting and disconnecting it - until eventually, she pulls the damn thing right out of its plastic housing in frustration.

 

EXT. ROADSIDE – NIGHT
Dorothy exits the vehicle and heads to the rear of the car. On the ground, in the vicinity, lies a large piece of mangled metal debris which has punctured the tyre. Dorothy kicks the tyre and heads towards the boot. She takes out an umbrella and erects it - but it would seem fate is not smiling kindly on this particular young woman, on this particular night; the umbrella opens up like a giant cyborg-spider that’s been in an explosive encounter with a time traveling T-800.

Dorothy, now stranded in a layby in the pissing-down rain, decides that she needs to take decisive action. She grabs her personal belongings, a newspaper for cover, and heads off in search of a phone.

 

EXT.  PUBLIC PATH – NIGHT
With the heaven’s still open, with her bag slung over her shoulder, and with a newspaper held above her head, Dorothy paces down a dark public sidewalk. Unfortunately for Dorothy, her night is about to get just that little bit worse - she steps in a deep, dark, muddy puddle. As she pulls her foot from the murky abyss, she see’s a light in the distance.

 

EXT. WVR GATES – NIGHT
As Dorothy nears the light, she pauses and gazes up to see the warm ambient glow of the Warrington & Vale Royal College. WE SEE A WIDE-ANGLE ESTABLISHING SHOT with a SLOW ZOOM towards the WVR sign.
Dorothy - cold, wet, and down-trodden – hasn’t passed an open building for the past half-mile and chances are, there’s a phone in the college. She enters the campus grounds through the gate.

 

EXT. WVR MAIN PATH – NIGHT
We see a low angle shot of Dorothy’s silhouette (FROM BEHIND AND DEAD-CENTRE OF THE PATH) approach the blinding college backdrop.

 

INT. WVR RECEPTION – NIGHT
We see Dorothy enter the college reception through the automatic sliding doors. The reception office is shut; the foyer is desolate, and it’s so quiet, you could hear a pin drop. Dorothy takes a look around and notices a phone on a table. We see Dorothy pick up the phone and make an SOS.

OMITTED. As Dorothy hangs up the phone, a security guard approaches, grabs his ID badge and holds it up. It is clearly known that he is asking her for identification. The pair talk but we do not hear their conversation – just an exasperated Dorothy explaining what happened with animated body language.

Now, under any normal circumstances, a stranger without campus identification would be escorted off the premises, but this security guard can clearly see that this vulnerable young woman looks like she’s been dragged through a hedge backwards, and tossing her off site could potentially thrust her into harms way, and thus, allows her to wait in the building until help arrives. He points her in the direction of the canteen.

 

INT. CANTEEN – NIGHT
Dorothy inserts a pound coin into the coffee machine (CLOSE-UP) and selects a drink. CLOSE-UP of the hot liquid streaming into a paper cup.

​

INT. COLLEGE FOYER – NIGHT
Dorothy takes a sip of her hot beverage and heads towards a comfortable chair in the foyer waiting area. On the chair lies a college prospectus. She picks up the prospectus and sits down. With nothing else better to do, Dorothy decides to have a browse through the pamphlet where one particular page arouses her attention – a page offering hairdressing courses.

As Dorothy sits silently lost in thought, flashing amber lights pierce through the window, abruptly breaking her daydream: Dorothy is thrust back to reality. She throws the prospectus into her bag and heads out of the automatic sliding doors towards the recovery truck.

FADE OUT

 

INT. COLLEGE FOYER – DAY
WE TRANSITION TO THE EXACT SAME SHOT WHERE WE FADED OUT IN THE PREVIOUS SCENE, and like a classic episode of Stars in Their Eyes, in walks Dorothy to the backdrop of silky blue skies and warm glowing rays of sunshine. Dorothy is now dressed in casual attire, has a coffee in hand, and a student lanyard around her neck.

 

QUE MONTAGE
We now see a montage of Dorothy cutting hair, reading books, writing, typing, and eating lunch in the canteen. The last scene ends with a slow FADE OUT and the next scene will open with a slow FADE IN to show the passing of time.

 

EXT. COLLEGE FOYER – DAY
FADE IN
Dorothy exits the college through the automatic sliding doors while looking down at a certificate. We see a CLOSE-UP of the certificate which shows a hairdressing qualification. Dorothy looks up, smiles and walks out of the college – again to the backdrop of blue skies and sunshine.

 

EXT. ROAD – DAY

The shots in the opening scenes are now repeated in the exact same way as before (CIRCULAR NARRATIVE), but rather than a car driving at night in the rain, we see a female rider cutting through traffic on a moped in weather that’s cracking flags.

 

EXT.  SHOP FRONT – DAY

We see an ESTABLISHING WIDE SHOT of the moped coming to a slow stop outside of a shop front. The sign above the pane glass window reads “DOROTHY’S”. The female moped rider dismounts from the moped and removes her helmet to reveal, Dorothy.

​

With the camera still in the WIDE ESTABLISHING SHOT, Dorothy enters the shop and we enter a SLOW ZOOM towards the pane glass window (POLARIZING FILTER TO NEGATE REFLECTION). Through the glass window, we see Dorothy summon an elderly woman to the styling station. The elderly woman takes a seat and we see Dorothy touching and combing her hair. 

​

FADE OUT 

​

​

FADE IN TITLE SCREEN WITH THE FOLLOWING QUOTES:

"On any given day you can massively change the direction of your life" - Jim Rohn 

​

“You are never too old to set another goal or to dream a new dream.” – C.S Lewis. 

​

FADE OUT.

​

​

QUE MONTAGE OF COLLEGE FACILITATES 

A fast DOLLY SHOT from the campus gates to the college entrance.
ESTABLISHING SHOT of the Academy – CUT TO a hairdressing classroom. We see a CLOSE-UP of a styling mannequin head in the foreground and the rest of the room OUT OF FOCUS.

ESTABLISHING SHOT of the Health and social care building – CUT TO hospital classroom. We see a CLOSE-UP of a medical mannequin reading a newspaper in a hospital bed.

ESTABLISHING SHOT of the LRC entrance – CUT TO LRC. We see a CLOSE-UP of a pile of books - the rest of the room OUT OF FOCUS.

ESTABLISHING SHOT of the construction building – CUT TO joinery classroom. We see a close-up of a saw and a nail wedged in a piece of wood - the rest of the room is OUT OF FOCUS. CUT TO engineering classroom. We see a CLOSE-UP of a spinning drill with the rest of the room OUT OF FOCUS.

ESTABLISHING SHOT of the sports building – CUT TO the gym. We see a CLOSE-UP of dumbbells and the rest of the room OUT OF FOCUS.

ESTABLISHING SHOT of the brickyard – CUT TO bricky workshop. We see a CLOSE-UP of a trowel on a brick and the rest of the room OUT OF FOCUS.

ESTABLISHING SHOT of the theatre entrance – CUT TO theatre. We see a Skeleton lay on a chaise longue and the rest of the room OUT OF FOCUS.

ESTABLISHING SHOT of the TV studio – CUT TO TV studio. We see a tripod and camera and the rest of the room OUT OF FOCUS.

ESTABLISHING SHOT of Buckleys restaurant – CUT TO kitchen. We see a cooking utensil in the foreground and the rest of the room OUT OF FOCUS.

FADE OUT

​

FADE IN. TITLE SCREEN WITH THE WVR LOGO. After a momentary delay, "Where your future matters" FADES IN, and after yet another momentary delay, the college URL FADES IN. 

​

 

(2022)