by Evan Perez

4/30/2023 

English 110 

The City College of New York 

Professor Vicars

Evan’s Film Logline: “Scatterbrain”

(An early 90’s style Horror Film)

Cast:

• Starring Sam Neil as “Professor Dyer” 
• Alyss Sutherland as “Scatterbrain”
• Sigourney Weaver as “Martha”

(Inspired by “In the Mouth of Madness”, “The Babadook”, and “Evil Dead Franchise”)

Logline:

Suffering from a brain disorder caused by a traumatic loss, a disorganized math professor is taken hostage by a demonic entity and forced to commit acts of violence to prevent harm to his family. 

Beginning:

Taking place in a small town in the pacific northwest, we are introduce our protagonist’s story. While taking his niece (age 16) out for a birthday dinner, Professor Dyer (age 30) and Susan are caught in the crossfire of a robbery gone wrong, causing Susan to be fatally wounded. Throughout the next three years, Dyer is broken and suffering from the incident after being diagnosed with Obsessive Compulsive Disorder, trapping him in the obsessive fear of another tragic event occurring that will harm his family which causes him to compulsively harm himself.

Due to his condition, Dyer is debilitated and released from working as a math professor indefinitely. He is disorganized, can barely take care of his basic needs like a clean room and clean clothes, and isolates himself from other. One day, he lashes out at his therapist Martha, saying nothing works and that she hasn’t helped him get out of his condition. Later that sam evening, with the build-up in pressure of his damaged career and financial instability, Dyer’s OCD is intensified, and accidentally harms his son during an episode of paranoia and anxiety at a large family gathering, the gathering being an attempt to some light into Dyer’s life. Overwhelmed with guilt and the negative reaction of actions from his family, Dyer runs away into a forest where he becomes lost. Dyer’s pant leg is snagged by a pile of loose barbed write and in a vulnerable state of heightened paranoia and the crushing weight of sadness, the barbed wire seems to come alive and pull him into a deep hole covered by leaves and tree roots.

Painfully waking up hours later while being dragged on the floor by two large figures, Dyer is thrown into a prison cell. He looks around and notices hundreds of other cells, each with twisted and angry prisoners yelling at him. He is then confronted by a gruesome figure who calls herself “Scatterbrain”. A slim figure draped in deep, dark red silk and blind folded with tightly bound barbed wire, Scatterbrain is the demon of agony who feeds off of the torture of mortal souls. Etching a curse deep into Dyer’s forearm, she explains that Dyer is in her prison realm and must perform indefinite acts of violence onto others in the real world in order for Scatterbrain to feed off of people’s pain. Dyer’s resistance to her demands forces her to show him visions of the murder of his family on repeat, shocking Dyer and leaving him shaking, questioning if what he saw was real or not.

Scatterbrain explains that she cannot exit her prison realm herself and picks hosts from the real world who exhibit violent behaviors / associations to violence to help her feed. Most hosts are murderers/criminals, but Dyer is a special host as his inaction to save his niece indirectly caused her death so to the eyes of Scatterbrain, he is no better than they. Dyer’s vulnerable state allowed her to reach out and pull him into the prison realm. If Dyer does not meet her demands, his curse will break, but this means that Scatterbrain can enter the real world and murder his family for real. Conflicted with the circumstances, Dyer reluctantly leaves Scatterbrain’s realm and goes back into the real world. 

Rising Action:

Guided by the voice of Scatterbrain, Dyer unwillingly commits violent acts of murder, terrorizing the small town he lives in. Dyer questions his morality and identity, having out of body experiences, panic attacks, and experiencing indescribable shock. With every act, Scatterbrain’s hold onto Dyer becomes stronger, causing every consecutive murder to become more gruesome and traumatizing for Dyer. There are 4 main victims he kills in the story, each individual revealing some piece of Dyer’s personality and past that he is at conflict with. He questions what is real and what is not, wondering if he will ever be free.

However, Dyer notices something off about the town he is in, taking note of the lack of law enforcement and calmness of others around him despite his unforgivable actions. He begins to pick up on his surroundings and while recollecting himself at the edge of a dark blue lake, Dyer is confronted by a young lady with a bright red jacket. After speaking with the lady and sharing their shared, conflicted feelings of guilt, sorrow, and fear of the unknown, the lady leaves Dyer with the piece of advice: “If you want to be let go, you have to be willing to embrace uncertainty”, forming a parallel with Dyer’s current hostage situation and him letting go of the guilt of the incident that occurred with his niece years ago. Dyer is reminded that there is nothing he can do to change the past, and feels ready to start the uncertain process of self forgiveness. 

Climax:

For a moment, Scatterbrain feels her grip on Dyer loosening, causing her to jolt the same, painful visions of his family being murdered to remind him of her the power she has over him. She whispers to him that he must chase down and brutally kill the lady in the red jacket, to which Dyer responds with a no, expressing his retaliation against Scatterbrain, saying that he doesn’t need to kill innocent people anymore. Even then, he fears for what may or not happen. He runs back into the streets, looking for a possible way out. As he’s about to jump start a truck, Scatterbrain appears at the end of the main road with the towns people slowly creeping out of their homes, menacingly approaching Dyer with household weapons like knives,  hammers, and torches with even his past victims reanimated in the grotesque state they were left in from his acts of murder. With a tire iron from the truck, Dyer fights his way through the town, lashing out his pent up rage and agony from over the years. Brutally clearing out the horde of people, he rushes for Scatterbrain when his surroundings are suddenly deprived of all light, left in an infinite darkness. Suddenly, Scatterbrain appears and transforms into a writhing heap of barbed wire, entangling Dyer’s limbs and face. As he looks ahead of him, he sees a window with a clear view of his family at home, seeing them worry and cry over his lengthy disappearance. In a fit of panic and fear of Scatterbrain’s promise to harm his family due to his rebellion, he begins to flail and try to run to his family despite his flesh being torn and tightly strangled by the barbed wire. Taking several, heavy steps forward against the sharp wire, he takes a leap of faith and lets go of his fear, letting out a final cry of agony for his past mistakes. The wire slowly loosens and slithers back into the darkness, leaving Dyer to fall backwards into the dark. 

Falling Action/End

Waking up on the forest floor, Dyer jolts upright, checking if the damage he had caused to his body from the barbed wire was there. The only thing he finds is Scatterbrain’s curse faintly scarred to his forearm. He rushes through the forest, remarkably finding his path back home. As he steps onto the front porch and knocks frantically, he catches his reflection in the window which reveals a fully grown beard and baggy eyes. His family finds him at the door and Dyer embraces them, trembling at the sight of their safety. He learns he was absent from his household for five months, causing his family to think he may be dead or out of town for good. He sobs as he grieves for the time he lost with his family and for putting them in a state of fear and uncertainty. Confused, Dyer learns that the same people in his town that he had murdered were perfectly well and alive, as if the curse had never occurred in the first place.

Fast forward several months later, Professor Dyer is finishing a therapy session with his therapist Martha, thanking her for guiding him through his several months back home and for giving him the tools to help himself manage his OCD. Later, while working on a garden shed with his son, he finds a rusty pile of barbed wire on the forest floor. Frightened at first, he slowly grabs the pile of barbed wire, noticing that the barbs are too brittle to hurt him. He thinks back to what Scatterbrain had said about feeding off of the pain of others, confirming that he never actually murdered anyone, it was just his agony that she was feeding off of. Wanting to get rid of the barbed wire, he instead throws them back where they are, seeing that they pose no threat. 

The camera pans to Martha’s office, she’s sorting her notes on Dyer and as she locks them away in a special cabinet, she looks at the camera and smiles exactly like Scatterbrain, her eyes glowing yellow, Michael Jackon’s Thriller begins playing at 150% volume, roll credits.

The end