By Annie Baker

MY DELL SMARTBOOKTHE GIRL WHO COULD FLY

CLASS 3B: Mr Thwaites

THIS BOOK BELONGS TO ANNIE. DO NOT READ!!! (Especially not you Mary)

PLEASE CLICK ON THE IMAGES TO PLAY THE VIDEO

THE GIRL WHO COULD FLY

We follow a paper plane as it lands on a school desk, to reveal a school classroom

full of 9 year olds learning about the history of flight. Then images of the Wright

brothers and Amelia Earhart light up on the Dell Smartboard. The young minds

are attentive, really connected with the lesson.

Amongst the children gathered round, we discover one in particular. She is spell-

bound, her face lit up with excitement, her eyes large with wonder. This is Annie.

She has an arm in a sling or bandage wrapped around her wrist. Her glasses are

a bit wonky and bent as they sit on her nose. She turns and looks out of the win-

dow with steely determination in her eyes.

Evening in the kitchen at home, as the rays of evening sun shaft beautifully in

through the windows – Annie is in deep concentration, looking at her Dell com-

puter as she works. She is using black gaffer tape to stick cardboard to a thin

strip of wood. On the screen of the Dell is a picture of Leonardo DaVinci’s flying

machine.

In a wide shot we see her standing on the edge of the garden shed roof with

the cardboard attached to her arms like wings. She jumps off and falls into the

bushes.

A band aid is stuck to her forehead as she stares up at the night sky. We pull

back to reveal that she is sitting on a flat roof at the back of the house, staring

up at the stars.

Annie is standing on a wall holding an umbrella in each hand. She jumps off and

tumbles to the ground, the umbrellas folding up into a tangled mess.

In her bedroom, Annie is flying a model plane around. Suddenly she stops. The

camera continues to rotate around her, stopping on her face. She has an inspired

idea. She throws the model on the bed and rushes downstairs. In front of the Dell

computer she looks excited and energised, she is checking something on the Inter-

net.

We cut to see Annie raiding her piggy bank – smashing it to the ground. Her little

brother watches her, impressed.

In art class Annie is painting ferociously. To the bewilderment of her teacher she

is painting all her sheets of paper green. She has green paint everywhere.

She rides her bike back from school fast, her little legs pumping with green paper

fluttering out of her bag.

We see Annie’s feet carefully walking along the top of a wall at school. She stops

and points a small video camera down at her friends in the playground below her.

She shouts and waves at them and many of them wave back, looking up at her

with curiosity. Except Mary Addlington, who scorns and turns away.

Sitting on a friends shoulders, Annie shoots a close up shot of the surface of the

flat roof of the back of the canteen block and pans the camera up into the sky,

although there is clearly nothing there.

At home she is followed into the garage by her little brother. He looks confused.

The back wall is covered with Annie’s green paper. We see her stick the last few

bits with tape. A model of the Eiffel tower is hanging on fishing wire. In front of

the green is a camera on a small tripod. Annie turns it on, then rushes into shot.

We cut out of the garage to show that it is dusk outside. The camera floats up into the

air, turning towards the glow in the sky from the setting sun.

We cut to a shot looking out the classroom window the next morning, with the sun-

light flaring out the lens. Suddenly blinds are drawn down and the light extinguished.

We see Annie’s excited face in the darkness lit only by the glow of her Dell computer.

She presses a key and we cut out wide to show that we are in Annie’s classroom, with

the blinds down. Annie connects her computer to a desktop projector as the glow of

screen illuminates her.

The screen flickers, titles scroll ‘The girl who dreamed she could fly’. Then we see

Annie up there on the screen, her feet lifting off the canteen roof like Mary Poppins.

We see her floating up into the air, and see past her feet looking down at the children

in the playground below her all crowding round and waving up at her (except Mary

Addlington). We realise that the images that she has been filming previously are the

background plates for the film she has created for the class.

Finally we see her lift up and away into a beautiful sunset, past the Eiffel tower and

up into infinity.

We close on her little face glowing with satisfaction, the light from the screen moving

and changing over her face.

NOTES

This is a gorgeous little idea, full of charm and wit to warm our hearts. It is also

an idea that shows that determination and application will win through in the

end, with a little help from Dell.

TONE

The most important factor is to have the right tone. We will avoid overly cute sen-

timentality and pitch the tone at a more truthful charm.

I like the idea of Annie having a ‘nemesis’ in the playground, simply because it

might feel more truthful and therefore more emotional than her being univer-

sally liked. It also highlights her single mindedness; she is not worried about what

everyone thinks of her. She has her friends, but she does this for herself and her

own ambition, not to win people over.

The tone of the Michel Gondry film “Be Kind Rewind’ is a good reference. The

charm is in the simplicity of the techniques used to get a result. We have to be-

lieve that a 9 year old girl could achieve the end result for the film to feel effec-

tive and special.

LOCATION

As this tale is so charming, we should set the story in a more urban setting to

balance the tone.

Annie should not feel like an over privileged girl with endless funds and resourc-

es. The joy of this tale is that is that her dream is realized using her Dell comput-

er, a tool that is accessible to everyone. Even a 9 year old girl.

CASTING

Annie is obsessive and stubborn. She is cute because we see that she is differ-

ent and we care about her because we see that she does not obviously fit in to

the rest of the class. She is a bit of a tomboy, and a dreamer, lost in her own

thoughts. Most girls at this age are more interested in how they fit in within the

group of friends, for them being 9 years old is all about peer group pressure. An-

nie couldn’t care less. She is off in the clouds, soaring on the wings of her imagi-

nation. We can immediately see this and love her strong individual personality.

She is a classic cinematic hero.

I feel that the younger Annie is the better, because we will find her struggle more

charming and emotional. However we also clearly need to believe that she man-

aged to make a film on her laptop using green screen etc. Then 9 years old would

be about right, but if we find someone younger that we can believe in then great!

VOICE OVER

The voice over is the thread that pulls us through the visual narrative, allowing

the imagery to be playful and free rather than strictly linear. It is also some-

thing that will really affect the tone of the spot. It is important for the text to feel

un-orchestrated, natural and truthful, perhaps with ad lib and a child’s point of

view.

PHOTOGRAPHY

This spot should feel cinematic yet intimate and charming. We observe our hero

Annie with the cinematic language of a journey, and this is charmingly juxtaposed

with her childish home made film that is finally revealed.

FINAL THOUGHT

Her film is like a modern day Mary Poppins, all made possible with the help of

Annie’s Dell.

I want one!

Peter