BRAINS

CHARACTERS.

ELLORA. High school junior. Intelligent dreamer who enjoys life. Best friends with Jovie.

JOVIE. High school junior. Curious thinker. Best friends with Ellora.

EXT. NEIGHBORHOOD STREET – DAY.

BLACKOUT. Fun song starts (“Pencil Full of Lead” by Paolo Nutini).

ELLORA, high school junior, strolls down the middle of her neighborhood street on a beautiful, sunny day. A fun song plays as she walks (seen from the back), nothing in her hands and nothing on her mind but nature and life. She looks up at the beautiful blue sky, happy and determined. It’s an amazing summer afternoon. Bright colors, vivid world.

EXT. JOVIE’S PORCH – DAY.

Ellora is at the door of her friend’s house, knocking. Her friend JOVIE answers and smiles. Ellora smiles back.

The two of them stroll down the street together, absent-mindedly skipping and kinda dancing and talking casually, still enjoying the nature. Fun song dies down as they talk.

ELLORA
I was reading a book today, and
there was a girl who saw all these
really cool clouds.

JOVIE
What kinda clouds? Cumulus?
Stratus?

ELLORA
Clouds with cool shapes. She even
saw one with a word spelled out.

JOVIE
What word? Cloud? Cool?

ELLORA
I don’t know. The book ended with
her seeing the word.

JOVIE
And it didn’t tell you what the
word was?

ELLORA
No.

JOVIE
Maybe it was “The End.” Two words.

ELLORA
Maybe. I wanna find one.

JOVIE
One of the words?

They pause.

ELLORA
I wanna find a cool cloud that
spells out a word. Any word.

JOVIE
(shrugging)
We have the whole summer.

The two look at each other and smile. The fun song picks back up as a cloud-searching montage begins.

EXT. CLOUD-SEARCHING MONTAGE – DAY & NIGHT.

The girls go on all kinds of adventures searching for clouds. One of them drives while the other sits in the passenger seat, sticking her head out the window to look up. They walk through all the streets of the neighborhood, constantly craning their necks to look up. They stand on top of hills, shielding their vision to squint up at a sunny sky. They lie in grass with sketchbooks. They sit with ice cream on a front porch, pointing up. They play basketball in the driveway, getting distracted by clouds as they go to shoot the ball. They ride bikes down a hill in the neighborhood, one hand on the bike and one holding a pair of binoculars. They stare into a telescope and look up at the sky to realize it’s nighttime and there are no clouds. No matter what they do or where they go, they can’t find any clouds with words.

EXT. FRONT YARD – DAY.

Fun song cuts out abruptly. The girls lean against a tree in ELLORA’S front yard, sipping lemonades.

ELLORA
Can’t believe we spent a whole day
searching yesterday and didn’t even
find a single one.

JOVIE
We got close with that dog one.

ELLORA
Yeah, but that was just a dog. Not the
word “dog.”

JOVIE
Yeah.

ELLORA
Maybe we should Google what time of
day clouds with words are most often
sighted.

INT. ELLORA’S HOUSE – DAY.

The girls are in Ellora’s house, unplugging her phone from the charging station. They stand with it, searching “When can we see cool clouds” on Google. It doesn’t give them a real answer.

The girls look at each other and frown. They try “cool clouds time” and “word clouds morning or night”, but no luck.

ELLORA
We need more in-depth research.

EXT. NEIGHBORHOOD – DAY.

Fun music starts again. The girls walk quickly to Jovie’s house.

INT. JOVIE’S HOUSE – DAY.

They unplug Jovie’s phone from the charging table. Both girls sit inside separately on their phones, researching and sharing input with each other. They make a Notes app page titled “Clouds: Coolness? Words?” and fill it with info.

EXT. JOVIE’S PORCH – NIGHT.

The girls say goodbye on Jovie’s porch, waving to each other.

ELLORA
I’ll do more research and keep you
posted.

JOVIE
Me too.

Ellora heads off down the street while on her phone, and Jovie heads back inside. Blackout.

INT. ELLORA’S ROOM – DAY.

The next morning, Ellora wakes up in her bed. Fun music is still going. Her head is not shown from the front yet. She gets up and goes downstairs, unplugging her phone from the charging table before sitting down to eat breakfast. She is on her phone while eating breakfast, her face still not shown.

EXT. NEIGHBORHOOD STREET – DAY.

The same shot from the beginning is shown; Ellora is walking down the street. Fun music is still going. This time, Ellora is on her phone. She doesn’t smile or dance or look up.

EXT. JOVIE’S PORCH – DAY.

The same shot of Ellora knocking on Jovie’s door is shown. When Jovie answers and smiles, she has distinctly dark bags under her eyes—they are very noticeable and almost surreal. Fun music cuts out abruptly when she is revealed.

Ellora smiles back and her face is shown for the first time; she has identical dark bags.

EXT. CLOUD-SEARCHING MONTAGE – DAY & NIGHT.

Fun music picks back up. The girls go on an identical cloud-searching montage to the one from before. This time, they are on their phones a lot of the time, or at least one of them is. They aren’t even researching or going on Notes app anymore; they are just on social media or texting.

EXT. JOVIE’S PORCH – NIGHT.

The girls stand on Jovie’s porch in the same positions they were in last night. They still have severe eye bags but happy smiles.

ELLORA
Sad there weren’t many clouds today.

JOVIE
Yeah, none really at all.

ELLORA
I’ll keep you posted if I see any
cool words.

JOVIE
Me too.

They wave goodbye. Ellora walks down the street, on her phone the whole way. Jovie goes back inside.

INT. ELLORA’S ROOM – NIGHT.

Ellora lies in her bed on her phone before she goes to bed. She plugs it in on the bedside table and lies down to sleep. Blackout.

INT. ELLORA’S ROOM – DAY.

Ellora wakes up and immediately gets on her phone. There is no fun music this time. Only her hand is shown. The world except for her and her phone is grayscale.

She eats breakfast while on her phone. Only her hand is shown.

EXT. NEIGHBORHOOD STREET – DAY.

The same shot from the beginning is shown where Ellora is walking down the street—same angle. Ellora is on her phone again. There is still no music. She doesn’t smile or dance or look up. Still, the world except for her and her phone is grayscale.

EXT. JOVIE’S PORCH – DAY.

The same shot of Ellora knocking on Jovie’s door is shown. When Jovie answers and smiles halfheartedly, she has the dark bags plus clothes that are strangely torn and tattered.

Ellora smiles back halfheartedly, and her full body is shown for the first time; she has identical dark bags and torn clothing.

EXT. CLOUD-SEARCHING MONTAGE – DAY & NIGHT.

The girls go on an identical cloud-searching montage to the one from before. This time, they are on their phones the entire time, and the entire world is grayscale. They barely look up from their phones. The montage is sped-up. Still no music.

EXT. JOVIE’S PORCH – NIGHT.

The girls stand on Jovie’s porch in the same positions they were in the last two nights. They still have severe eye bags, torn clothes, and half-hearted smiles. They wave at each other, and Ellora strolls down the street, buried in her phone. Jovie goes back inside.

INT. ELLORA’S ROOM – DAY.

Ellora wakes up and immediately reaches for her phone on her bedside table. Only her hand is shown. No music. Still, the world except for her and her phone is grayscale.

EXT. NEIGHBORHOOD STREET – DAY.

The same shot from the beginning is shown where Ellora is walking down the street. She is on her phone again. There is no fun music, she doesn’t smile or dance or look up, and she walks weirdly slow.

EXT. JOVIE’S PORCH – DAY.

The same shot of Ellora knocking on Jovie’s door is shown. When Jovie answers, she not only has dark bags and torn clothes but green-tinted skin and fully green hair. No smile today.

Ellora appears to be a zombie too. No smile.

EXT. CLOUD-SEARCHING MONTAGE – DAY.

The girls start their usual cloud-searching montage, but this time, they don’t get past the second stage of it.

INT. ELLORA’S LIVING ROOM – DAY.

They lie on Ellora’s couch in silence, scrolling on their phones. The entire world is grayscale but them.

EXT. JOVIE’S PORCH – NIGHT.

The girls stand on Jovie’s porch in the same positions they were in the last three nights. They are still zombie-like and blank-faced.

ELLORA
Try again tomorrow?

JOVIE
Sounds good.

ELLORA
I’ll keep you posted.

They give each other half-hearted waves, and Ellora makes her way down the street. Jovie goes back inside.

The shot of Ellora walking down the street towards her house is the same as the opening shot of her walking towards Jovie’s house, but Ellora is walking the opposite direction and is seen from the front now, fully zombie-like in appearance and buried in her phone.

View pans up from Ellora to reveal the sky behind her—the sky she has completely missed. A group of clouds reads, “BRAINS.”

Fun music starts again.

BLACKOUT.