The Need to Know
script&novel

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Download script (US version)here

Download script (CDN version)here

Logline:
An adoptee ignites a volatile chain of events when his adoption search turns up an expatriated birth father embroiled in the grisly murders of two undercover agents in 1975.

Synopsis:
Its Christmas nineteen seventy-five and two agents have been executed. But where is the third undercover named Larry Hudd? He is on leave with his pregnant wife. And now they are running for their lives, escaping certain prosecution and cheating imminent death. But there is one sacrifice that has to be made. An adoption. To save their son they must surrender him.

And so thirty odd years later

Adoptee Michael Spencer opens his own search. It is a need to know that changes his life forever. The inquiry ignites a volatile chain of events, ensnarling Michaels life in the surreptitious operation that labeled his birth father a traitor. A man with a name that still trembles the corridors of power. Larry Hudd is far from forgotten.

The ripple begins and a dangerous game of espionage and murder bears down on Michael. To save his son, Larry risks everything. But during the race for justice and absolution a father finds his son. And a son finally understands the courage it took to endure the sacrifice.

A Shake in the Tree
script

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Download Jessica's scene here

Log line:
A palliative care nurse rediscovers herself through an unexpected friendship with a terminally ill patient.

Synopsis:
Candace Rothwell does not see the simple pleasures of her life anymore. Her marriage is collapsing, strained with the recent murder of her husbands partner and his obsession to solve the case. Nothing is what it was supposed to be and her expectations of a perfect home with their two young boys only pushes them further apart. Her career had filled the void her marriage couldnt, enjoying almost heroic notoriety on a palliative care ward. But even that respite is falling short of late. Until patient Mary Jo Grayson came into her life.

Mary Jo watched her perfect life ruptured pre-maturely when Meningitis ravaged her a quadriplegic. Her children could no longer hug her. Her husband couldnt hold her. Violent spasms robbed everything that truly mattered in her young life. Yet their family persevered in the face of the ultimate struggle to survive. But Mary knows they will eventually mourn. They are trapped with her.

A shake in the tree tells the story of these two women and a special friendship that let one except her fate and the other except her life. To never take for granted the day-to-day for it can be gone so suddenly. And every family has their shake in the tree. It is how we live through it that matters.

Obvious
novel

Download novel sample here

Logline:
A prominent New York forensic psychologist accused of murdering his fiancé struggles with amnesia and paralyzing anxiety while unsure of his own culpability.

Synopsis:
Desmond Bennett is in hell. Awoken from a coma to debilitating anxiety and relentless media persecution for the murder of his famous fiancé. He is a man convicted before he even sees a courtroom. And he cant remember. The night she was bludgeoned to death is scattered pieces, leaving Desmond wrestling with obvious guilt.

But did he do it?

Even he is not sure and the more Desmond remembers, the more truth eludes him. Panic attacks cripple him. The death of a former patient haunts him. The prison hospital holding him has secrets deep within its basement corridors that could hold the key. And while Desmond struggles to remember before the death penalty claims him, the last remnants of his life crumble around him. Friends and family turn foe. Then in the final moment comes absolution. It was something so obvious.

Strait & Narrow
script

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Logline:
One man coming out the closet and another going out of his mind are forced to embark on a madcap journey with nothing in common but divorce.

Synopsis:
Nobody has come out of the closet like Mitch Strait. On his nationally acclaimed radio call in show, he has shocked his audience, his friends and his family. And now he is getting divorced. Richard Narrow is finally making partner, lavished in his legal circle with a new office, new expense account, new fame, and new respect. And now he is getting divorced. Can any two men be more different and yet have something so much in common. Paired as Lawyer and client they set off across the country to fight Mitchs right to still have his son in his life.

But an airline strike forces a journey that will change their lives.

One outlandish fiasco after the other plagues them. With credit cards and accounts locked pending financial disclosers, robbed and forced to borrow an old truck with a stick shift neither can master and mob drugs hidden onboard, they make for home. It is a ludicrous sojourn with, fans, cops and the mob chasing, beating, and banging them. Through it all Mitch and Richard find what really matters, what really makes them the men they want to be and the best friends they become to get them there.

Brutal
script

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Logline:
The brutal murder of a young woman unravels a twenty-five year old orphans conflicted past and threatens to expose secrets he has spent his life hiding.

Synopsis:
Matt Harley is a dot com refugee, building the latest in GPS software for the city transit system when one a bus is discovered to be out of sync in the system. The city polarizes from the sadistic murder of a young girl strung to a crucifix in a horrendous sacrifice at an old parish, the very place she spent her orphaned youth. The case baffles forensic scientist Maxime Greene. And while Matt cleans the bus and patches the system to conceal his past, Maxime uncovers the clue that could expose the double life he has carefully hidden. A life that involves the dead girl burnt to a crucifix.

But another girl with a history at the old parish is murdered

As much as Maxime wants to ignore Matts involvement there is no refuting the evidence. And the more Maxime digs the deeper Matt disconnects, his behavior more and more bizarre, alienating those who care, those who could help. And when a third girl is found murdered the clues only point to Matt and forever change the outcome of their lives.

RITE of PASSAGE
A short film


Logline:

From one life to the next, rite of passage can be taken as easily as given.

Synopsis:

Passage is the story about a young girl who returns to the family cottage after sighting the Blues Man at the local drug store. She fears the worst. Meanwhile her Grandfather sits on the dock, his past life visiting him and the bride he desperately misses beyond him, beyond this life. His choice made Old Bill embarks on the last journey, hoping for passage to the woman he loves. But the choice is not his to make. Rite of Passage is given, not taken.

Download script here
Download storyboard 1 here
Download storyboard 2 here
Download storyboard 3 here
Download storyboard 4 here
Download storyboard 5 here
Download budget here

A HEAVY PRICE
a one hour documentary


Logline:

The only Canadian prisoner abroad who would've been a free man if not for opting into Canada's Transfer Treaty program. How much life does one man have to loose before we notice.

Synopsis:

Kevin Hiebert was twenty-five years old when he was arrested in Athens airport in 1999. The charge was trafficking after authorities found two kilos of cocaine concealed in the soles of his shoes. Six other mules from Winnipeg were apprehended in Amsterdam earlier that day. The Greek police knew Kevin was coming. This was a first time offence, usually carrying a three to five year penalty, but Kevin Hiebert was given a life sentence, with no chance of release for sixteen years, minutes after his parents were approached for an undisclosed sum to have him home in six months. Money they did not have. He has served nine years in Malandrino prison. He has seven more to go.

This documentary challenges the lack of initiative and response of the Canadian Government to bring Kevin home under auspices of the International Transfer of Offenders Act. With the six others all home within a year of their arrests, why is Kevin still locked up in a prison deep within the mountains of Greece, well past our own maximum penalty for his crime?

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