It’s One Flew Over the Cuckoo’s Nest meets the Borrowers.

An open cereal box sideways on a table in a street. The street isn’t busy, and the first few people who walk past pay no attention to the box.

But slowly people begin to stop and look. Because something very interesting is happening inside the box – two tiny men are playing a very small gig.

But Luca isn’t exactly a willing vocalist – and is being kept in a straitjacket to try and make sure he plays ball. He bounces off the walls occasionally, and all the while Henry works his magic on the keyboards in the background.

Then someone stops. And can’t quite believe his eyes. Two tiny guys playing away. It’s not long before a crowd starts to gather

Huge eyes peer in through the box as Luca and Henry play. They do their best to ignore them, but as more and more people arrive Luca loses the will to perform. He sits down, and sings the song with his head cupped in his hands.

One of the crowd isn’t happy with Luca. He pulls out a pencil and prods him to get up. Luca gets to his feet again.

Quite a crowd has gathered now, all bent down trying to get a glimpse inside the box. Someone in the back is jumping up and down at the back trying to see.

Notes

This would be a shoot of two parts. The first part would be to shoot the crowd slowly assembling around the cereal box in the street – we should be able to achieve this relatively quickly – by blocking one fluid piece of action with either some actors, or friends of the band. This will then be filmed from several different angles. Most importantly we will get lots of different POV reactions of the audience direct to camera, which will be used in compositing later.

The second part would be to film the band in a blue screen studio. This is where the action inside the box would be filmed, along with the reverse shots of the band seeing the crowd peering in.

The box would be created using an animated backdrop created in 3D Studio Max. In doing this, we will be able to shoot the band from a series of different angles, and still maintain the illusion of Riton being inside the box. All compositing, including the band inside the box with the reactions of people outside will be done using After Effects.

The pencil prodding Luca would be timed to coincide with the stabs of the mini breakdown. I would like to hire a giant pencil from a props house in order to prod Luca.

As far as styling the band, I would like to put Luca in a straitjacket. I would like to put Henry in a white coat, and make the playing of the keyboards and computers almost as if he was monitoring Luca’s progress.

It is also an alternative to have a third party actor playing the part of the “Angerman”, and have Luca and Henry both observing from outside the box, but I think it would work far better with the vibe of the song if Luca was to be the man himself.

Inevitably with such a low budget, we would be shooting digitally – the blue screen studio would be shot on digibeta, and the street footage would be shot on mini DV. All editing would be done in Final Cut Pro, and all post and compositing would be done using After Effects. I would like to give the promo a slightly cold blueish grade (think of the promo for Basement Jaxx’ Where’s Your Head At).