Treatment

Title

As a pair, my partner and I have decided to call our British social realism film 'Maze'.

The title 'Maze' connotes Leah's current situation as it highlights her desperation to escape from her abusive boyfriend in an attempt to create a more positive future for her baby. However it seems there is no escape because she is working class, she is unable to afford to escape as she cannot travel far enough due to limited money. Its almost a never ending cycle where she always finds her way back to the start but never the end. This title connotes many themes including; isolation, aspiration/escape, poverty, class and violence (domestic).

The theme of isolation is connoted through the film title 'Maze' as a maze is a designated space with many paths. People must choose which path to take in order to get out of the maze, but because there are so many people are left feeling trapped and alone inside of this big maze and it usually takes a long time to get out and to stop feeling like this, therefore people can feel isolated within them, just like the main character - Leah. For, example we see the theme of isolation when Leah is walking after packing her bags and her neighbour is calling her, she can hear the neighbour but is blocking her out through the use of headphones, like she wants to be alone and feel isolated.

The themes of aspiration and escape pair together nicely and are also connoted through the films title 'Maze' because in our film Leah aspires to escape from her violent, abusive relationship with her boyfriend as she is expecting his baby and aspires to give her baby a better life away from all of this violence and abuse. However, in a Maze escape is very challenging and can leave one feeling very dazed, confused and you can end up back where you began, so these themes of aspiration and escape are connoted through the title as fulfilling your aspirations and escaping current situations can be very challenging, especially to characters with a weak disposition like Leah. The themes of aspiration and escape are demonstrated in our films content as the audience are lead to connote that Leah is pregnant and is aspiring for a better life for her child away from her violent father and is trying to escape the violent relationship for the child by packing her things and going to the train station.

The title 'Maze' connotes the theme included in our film of poverty because a maze is a restricted, reserved space of land and when you are poor you are also very restricted as to the things you can do and reserved in the sense that you are held back a lot as you cant afford to do all of the things that you may want to. Its like a never ending cycle as you have no money to become what you want to be to earn money and therefore you can't gain wealth. You are more or less destined to be poor. An example of where the theme of poverty is demonstrated is when Leah goes to the train station and counts all of her coins and still doesn't have enough money for the train fare.

The theme of class is also connoted through the title 'Maze' as the main working class character in our film has no money to break or be freed from this class and because they are limited by the amount of money they have, they cant be adventurous and try to do what they would like to do in life and therefore will not be able to raise their class status. This theme of class is shown through the mise-en-scene as we see that a location used is a flat in a council estate. This highlights that the main character Leah leads a working class background.

The title 'Maze' also connotes one of the themes included in our film; violence (domestic). The main character Leah is stuck in a violent relationship as her boyfriend regularly abuses her. Similarly, people can get stuck in Maze's. Therefore, the title 'Maze' connotes this violent relationship in which Leah is stuck in and finds herself going round in circles. This theme of violence is shown in the film as we see Leah with a black eye.

The title 'Maze' is conventional of the British social realism genre because it is simple as it is only one word but has many connotations in relation to the films content and themes. My partner and I gained inspiration for our film title by looking at many other British social realism film titles and discussing what the connotations of each title were in relation to the content and themes. For example, we looked at the film 'Submarine'. We came to the conclusion that the title suggests that the male main character is perhaps suffocating under water in a submarine and is also claustrophobic. This instantly establishes the themes isolation because he'd be all alone under water, with no one or nowhere to turn to. Another example of a British social realism film that inspired our title was 'Fish Tank'. This title connotes that the main character/s may have big dreams, ambitions and aspire to be something great in life but is limited as to what they can be as they can't escape the environment they've been raised in as a fish tank is very small and enclosed. The fish would represent the main character/s and the fish tank would represent then environment in which they've been raised, connoting the environment is of working class and they are trapped within it due to limited resources.  

Our film title 'Maze' will appeal to our target audience of 16-24 year olds as it is simple, unique and intriguing. This title has a deep meaning connoting the films content and themes as you really have to think about how a Maze could relate to a British social realism film. A maze is something to do for the thrill of an adventure and creates some confusion, therefore it will appeal to the youthful target audience (16-24 years old) as the younger generation like to explore new things and seek an adventure they will want to find out the relevance of this title to the films content as it will also have them confused. This title 'Maze', would appeal to our target audience as they may relate to the complexity of a Maze in the mundane of everyday life, as 16-24 year olds face many challenges. So, our target audience are offered many different pathways in life just like a maze would and therefore they may be confused about how we have used our title and our interpretation of a maze in relation to our films content.

Target audience

As the brief instructs us to create a British social realist film's opening sequence for an audience aged from 16 to 24 year old of preferably middle class because a working class audience would not want to watch situations that they go through on a daily basis, for example - poverty, violence, single parenthood, etc. We have constructed our film to suit and appeal to this audience. Our film appeals to both genders but more to females as our narrative is restricted and only shows the story of Leah - our main character. Therefore, females are more likely to personally identify with her and the situation she faces in her everyday life, for example, pregnancy. Our female audience will be interested in TV shows like 16 and pregnant, teen mums both exhibited on MTV and one born every minute. Both genders of our audience may be interested in soaps like Eastenders, Coronation Street, Hollyoaks, etc and the news. They will probably listen to UK grime, rap, hip-hop as the lyrics in these music genres tend to be very real and applicable to real life. They probably wouldn't be interested in reading texts like books, newspapers, etc, but they may enjoy reading gossip magazines. I have individually conducted some audience research and the following link will take you to a power-point named 'My Target Audience', this will inform you about who I believe will be a typical audience member within the target audience for my film and what their interests will be. (http://kalkidanbrook.blogspot.co.uk/2013/03/audience-research.html)

Our film 'Maze' will appeal to our target audience as we have used themes that were suggested to us in our audience research vox pop (which is below), for example our audience liked film themes such as violence. Therefore we constructed our films narrative around this theme and included some other themes that would appeal to our young target audience, such as; poverty, isolation, aspiration/escape, class etc. The way in which the characters in our film are represented will appeal to our target audience because the characters are people you would meet in everyday life as they don't live in Hollywood and lead a luxurious lifestyle instead they are normal British people who are able to act. It was evident that our target audience of 16-24 year olds liked the characters used in British social realist films as they were down to earth and their dispositions were very much like theirs and therefore they could identify with them on a more personal level. Our films narrative appeals to our target audience, as the controversial themes such as; domestic violence, pregnancy and others are relevant to the 16-24 year olds generation. As the themes in our film appeal to our target audience, the verisimilitude in our film will also be strengthened as the target audience will believe the troubles and situations that arise as they are realistic and the target audience may have witnessed them in reality or experienced them and therefore they will like our film as they can personally identify and maybe even relate to what happens.

Technology

In film there are three stages of production, including; Pre-production (research and planning), production (filming) and post-production (editing). In pre-production we have used 'Blogger' - a social networking site to present our research and planning to prove that we have done it and actually thought about the film we are going to produce. We have also used flip cameras and another social networking site 'YouTube' to create our vox pop to gather some audience research information. In Production we will use technology like video cameras and tripods in order to film our opening sequence to shoot many different shot types, movements and angles. Finally, in post-production we will use software such as 'Fireworks' to create our graphics, the internet to use websites like; 'DaFont' to get a nice unique font for our graphics. We will also use 'iMovie' to put together the shots in our opening sequence and add in transitions, etc.  

These types of technology will be suitable as they are crucial in the completion of our production as each piece of technology has a different function that will contribute to our final British social realist opening sequence.

The brief states that we have been 'approached by Film 4' and as they are a British independent production company who have limited budgets and therefore are restricted as to what technology they can afford and use. We are also restricted because as students we must use the technology our school provides us with which is limited as they cannot afford major pieces of equipment, for example, cranes.

Representation

The key characters in our film are Leah and Kevin. Leah is the main character whose life we see through the restricted narrative. Kevin is her abusive boyfriend who we see from time to time in Leah's strive to escape. We see less of him in the opening sequence and more in the rest of the film.

Due to the restricted narrative we have decided to use, Leah as the main character is the protagonist according to Propp's theory, so the audience are limited as to who they sympathize with, because as Leah is the main character they only see her life prospective and troubles, therefore they can only sympathize with her. In contrast to this Kevin is the antagonist as he is violent towards Leah and as the restrictive narrative focuses away from him the audience cannot see why he does this and therefore fail to understand his actions, so they are forced to dislike him.

We are not subverting any typical representations of any groups in society, however, we do challenge some. A typical representation of females ageing from 16-24 is that if they are involved in sexual intercourse and fall pregnant their immediate reaction is to abort it and society frowns upon it. However in our film, Leah challenges this typical representation as we see her trying to escape her violent relationship for her unborn baby's protection and in hope of creating a better life for it.

Narrative

Brief Summary:

For the protection of her unborn baby, Leah tries to escape the grips of her violent boyfriend.

Detailed summary of opening sequence:

We will start our sequence with a smash mouth opening in a non-linear format. It will begin with Leah packing up the few clothes she has in her backpack, as she is doing this she receives many texts from and unidentified male asking of her where about. She ignores these texts and calls and packs even faster. As she is leaving her room, a pregnancy test drops from her bag. As she leaves her flat she bumps into a neighbour who questions her about where she is off to with a bag like that. Leah takes out her earphones (sound bridge) hears her neighbour, looks back but ignores her and carries on walking increasing her pace. Neighbour shouts 'oi, Leah', with no reply from Leah she shouts again, 'well fuck you then'. (over the shoulder shot - deep and shallow focus). Jump cuts to her walking under a subway, towards the train station. Jump cut to arrival at station as Leah asks an assistant how much the fair is to Stratford. Assistant replies '£4.60', Leah says 'aright thanks'. She then goes to sit on a bench to count her coins to see if she has enough change for the fare when a male whispers in her ear, 'did you think you'd get far'.

Conventions

My partner and I decided to conform to the convention of a smash mouth opening as we were inspired by the one used in the film 'London to Brighton' and we felt this convention grabbed our attention as the audience and wanted to reproduce this feeling in our opening sequence as it raised a lot of enigma codes. We will use this convention of a smash mouth opening differently as we will have a linear narrative and the narrative information will be conveyed to the audience in a restricted way, showing only Leah's perspective. Where as in London to Brighton, a non-linear narrative was used and an omniscient narrative showing various perspectives from different characters.

Style and ideology

To create an effect for the audience we will use s range of shots to express the main characters lifestyle through a restricted narrative. The shots included in the expression are; establishing shots to emphasize the mise-en-scene, close-ups to show how Leah feels, mid-shots to highlight Leah's body language and long shots to show the audience what she is wearing connoting her social class and the themes of the theme. We will not really use extreme angles (high/low) as it is not really conventional of the British social realism genre as we want to portray Leah's situation as it is and not exaggerate to enhance the verisimilitude. We will use frequent camera movements like pans as a replacement for some cuts to the allow the audience to follow Leah to almost try to understand her situation better and be aware of her confused state of mind. We will compose each shot used in our film considering the 'rule of thirds' (golden rule) as it is very important in the British social realism genre. We will also consider the 180 degree rule as it is important for the audience as if it is followed if prevents confusion within the audience. Each shot will be carefully framed as we want to highlight Leah's situation and the mise-en-scene, so lots of attention will be paid to detail, this will also help to emphasize the themes of the film better.

To create an effect for the audience and to emphasize the British social realism genre my partner and I will use simple/minimal editing in post production to add to the verisimilitude of our film, meaning we will not use special effects/CGI as they are very infrequent in British social realism, we will not use transitions like; wipes, swirls as these are all very apparent and the aim in British social realism is to make the editing non visible. Instead of using edits (cuts/dissolves/fades...) we will use camera movements (pan/track...) as this is conventional of the British social realism genre. We will also use an audio overlap in order to allow a smooth flow of action so that the audience can follow the main character Leah. We will use jump cuts when Leah is packing to show how erratic she is being and how confused she is feeling, this will allow the audience to sympathize with her even more.

We will use her costume as a signifier for the audience to highlight her social class - working class. Her costume will be very basic as she will be dressed in plain jeans and a top. She will wear what she can afford. The props will more or less be what is based around her naturally including the pregnancy test which will be a visual signifier for the audience as they will be able to realise that she is unable to afford many luxuries like a phone, etc. The pregnancy test will be a signifier that she is pregnant, but as they will not be able to see the result of it, enigmas will be raised within the audience.

The brief specifically states that copyright music cannot be used. Taking this into account, my partner and I will use music that has been composed but relates to our main character - Leah's situation.

Institution

The brief stated that the we had been 'approached by Film 4 to make a new British Social Realist film' and that we had to 'protect Film 4's reputation as a leader in British cinema' and therefore the film 'must conform to the conventions of the Social Realist genre'. Taking the briefs instructions into account my partner and I knew that we'd have to create a film that gets the audience thinking a lot as they watch the film for information and as film 4 as an institution have a very active audience we'd have to produce something that maintained this audience's expectations. An example of a film produced by Film 4 is 'Looking for Eric', this helped to influence the kind of film my partner and I would create as it had a restricted narrative that solely focused on the main character 'Eric' and his troubles and failure in life. This film had an impact on the narrative we produced as our film also has a restricted narrative that highlights our main character - Leah's troubles in her everyday life.

As Film 4 are an independent company, they have very limited funds for the films they create. But because they are a vertically integrated production company they market films through the internet, social networks (YouTube, IMDB, etc.) and create word of mouth as these marketing strategies are much cheaper and affordable for Film 4. For example, the film 'Shame' produced by Film 4 was exhibited at several film festivals before its actual release date which was 3-4 months later. This was done in order to slowly build the campaign and create word of mouth for the film as Film 4 did not have enough money for big scale distribution. Knowing the techniques that Film 4 use to distribute their films, we realize that our film will be marketed in a simple but effective way through a range of methods, like; film festivals, trailers and more traditional marketing strategies such as; posters and bus stop ads.

As Film 4 are vertically integrated our film is most likely going to be exhibited through one of their own exhibitors, for example, Film 4 OD, Channel 4, Film 4, etc. These platforms are popular within British society and therefore will gain predominately the British audience's attention. As Film 4 films do not have great sellability as they don't appeal to kids

Project Log - Week 4

Lesson 1: This lesson was spent finishing off a task that was set last week - Sound Analysis Of an Opening Sequence. I had to pick a British Social Realist film and explain what the sounds connote about the characters, the narrative and what relevance/ how does it appeal to the British target audience. I chose to analyse Trainspotting because the sounds used were unique and gave many hints to the audience about the characters disposition and what the narrative may be about. For example, there is a voice over of Renton. He uses foul language, like 'fucxing', which connotes his character s being wild and rebellious. Furthermore, he talks in a strong northern British accent, therefore the audience can relate to him and understand him, since they too are British. Lastly, the voice over gives the audience the back story and makes them feel more comfortable with Renton. Also, they will take more of a liking in him and side with him, since he is given a lot of talking time, establishing his dominance in the film.

Task - Sound Analysis Of an Opening Sequence: Trainspotting

Lesson 2: The lesson focused around audience research for British Social Realism films. I was introduced to four ways in which you can collect your research.

Focus groups: This is a form of group interview, where pre- determined discussion points/topics are presented, along with stimulus e.g. Clips. From this you get peoples opinions and thoughts towards the points.



Audience feedback: Feedback given back from the audience. Its designed to gain further knowledge on the media text and what the target audience dislike/like about it. So, you can then later alter your media text to their specifications, because you are trying to impress and appeal to them.

Questionnaires: Pre-determined questions, designed to get a better understanding of what your target audience want.

Vox pops: This is a random way of collecting data. You go out on the streets and randomly ask questions. From this your more likely to get raw and truthful answers.

Next, I learnt there were different techniques you can use to get good answers. One is asking open questions, which means asking broader questions e.g. Why do you like this film?, from asking questions like this you gain longer responses. Another way is asking closed questions, which are designed to get specific answers e.g. do you like films?.

Now using what I have learnt, as a class we listed what things do we want to find out about our potential audience. This is what we came up with:

- What do British Social Realism films do they like?

- Why do they like the films they have chosen?(Use and gratification, conventions)

- What do they think of my ideas?

- What potential ideas do they have?

Me and my partner then was given the task to gain 
research of what our target audience of teenagers liked. We chose to do a vox pop because it allowed us to interact with out audience first hand and really understand what they liked and did not like. In order to collect our data, we thought of open questions that really filtered out our target audiences thoughts and opinions. Below is the questions we asked.

Q1) " British Social Realism are films that tend to highlight the negative everyday scenarios of working class Brits and they celebrate the failure of these people in the most explicit way possible. "

1a) Have you seen any films of this genre? 

1b) What do you like about these films?

1c) How do they appeal to you?

Q2)

2a) Which theme are you most interested in and why?

2b) Do any of these themes personally relate you?

Q3)

 

3a) Would you go and see this films, if so why?

3b) What interested you about it?

Q4)

4a) These our ideas for a British Social Realism films, we are going to produce:

- A boy has a disability of dyslexia. Living in poverty with no support or love, can he achieve his dreams of being an author?

- A girl moves from Jamaica to a white majority area. She's a talented runner that dreams to compete in big competitions but is held back by racism.

- A girl gets pregnant and wants to run away from her abusive boyfriend, in order to protect her baby.

4b) Which one do you prefer and why?

Q5) How would you improve the idea you chose?

I believe these questions will bring our target audiences opinions and help me and my partner manipulate our ideas to their demands and likes.

Task - Audience Research: Vox pop

Lesson 3: Today i started the lesson by understanding the brief and what it instructs me to do. When i am making my opening sequence, i have to make sure that it is two minutes, of the genre British Social Realism, must contain copyright free music, must appeal to 16-24. Moreover, the institution i am making my film for, is Film 4, therefore it must include unknown actors, contain subject matters that would occur in the real world and lastly, it should fulfil the ethos of Film 4, by celebrating the mundane mediocrity and failure of British society. I also learnt that British Social Realist films are very ambiguous and has an ending open to different interpretations. Moreover it became evident they produce high concept films. These are films that have a simple narrative, that can be described under 25 words. The image below is of an article published by BBC. It showed how the UK film council where awarding money to young scriptwriters that could pitch a horror or comedy film under 25 words or less.

Then we was given the task of producing our own high concept film narrative and pitch them to our teacher. Mine was "Tom is the odd one out. He has a dream but obstacles are in the way, in the form of his dysfunctional family". My teacher gave feedback on how I could improve my idea, she suggested I either expand on how the family are dysfunctional or either state what Tom aspires to be. Next I was introduced to my task - the Treatment. I learnt what my treatment should include. It should contain the following:

- Title: With explanations of connotations

- Identify T.A: With the appeal it will have and include primary, as well as secondary research.

- Technology: How will it be used and why that technology is suitable.

- Representation: Characters, stereotypes and ideologies.

- Narrative: Summary of opening sequence with conventions (Todorv's Theory)

- Conventions: How will they keep/subvert with explanations ( sound, credits, graphics etc)

- Style & Iconography: effects of camera work/editing, use of costume and props

- Institutions: Who would produce/distribute/exhibit this film? Why?. Also, How have you reflected film 4's ethos in your idea?

Task - Treatment 

Lesson 4: This lesson was spent going around the school and filming our vox pop for me and my partners audience research. Once this was done, it was uploaded onto iMovie, ready to edit for next lesson.

Task - Audience Research

What have you learnt about your target audience?

Doing the vox pop has really highlighted the lack of knowledge 16-24 year olds have of British Social Realism films. On a positive note, films that were high of gang culture were very popular, for example, 4321 and Kidulthood. However, they did not know it was a British Social Realism film and also they did not know of traditional films such as Trainspotting and Kes. In addition, I also learnt that my target audience of 16-24 want to see themes such as racism, teen pregnancy, drugs, escape/aspiration etc because they feel its a true representation of society and its very interesting to watch from a different perspective and get lost in the movie. It also became evident they wanted characters to be around their age, so its easy to relate, since that's why films like Adulthood which consisted of teenagers attracted them.

What have you learnt about the institutions in the production of social realist films?

I have learnt that social realist films are produced by independent companies such as Film 4. Due to being financially restricted and not having that big Hollywood budget it drives them to be very creative. So that's why they don't have the sellability factor of known actors and exotic locations. However the lack of sellability is counter balanced by their ethos of producing films that have meaning, by touching on controversial subject matters, for instance Four Lions deals with religion and terrorism. It makes the audience think and opens their eyes to the harsh truth of the world we live in.

How will this inform your production?

In my production I will live up to the brief expectations of being typical to social realism. I will do this by popular techniques such as a smash mouth opening. Moreover, I may use handheld shots to add to the dullness of the situation and I will use a variety of shots to express the setting and characters facial/body expressions in order to establish the themes I want to get across. For examples if I want to highlight poverty, I will use plenty of wide shots and establishing shots in order to shows the locations of council estates which the audience will associate with poverty. Lastly, I will try to inform the audiences feedback into my work, for instance they gave me feedback on my opening sequence idea and I will take that into consideration in order for it to appeal to them more.

Visual Style Of British Social Realism

Presentation1x from kalkidanbrook

Sound Analysis Of Trainspotting

Potential Narratives For My Opening Sequence

The first story is named DREAMS AND OBSTACLES.

It is set in an urban area - council estate in Marks Gate. A family lives in one of the flats called Longhayes Court. They are a dysfunctional family of two parents and two children. The father is names Jack. He domestically abuses his wife because when he was child he lived in a household, where his mother was abused, therefore abusing his wife is maladaptive behaviour. He gets very angry and jealous, so gives her no freedom and keeps her close to him at all times. The wife is names Jo. She has always been shy and can not stand up for herself. She loves Jack very much and wants to leave him but cannot for the childrens sake and their protection, just incase Jack starts abusing them. The first child is a teenager of the age 16. His is named Tom. He is very odd and different from the rest of his family (also isolates himself away from them a lot). He is very angry about the lifestyle and situation he lives in, therefore he challenges this anger into his artwork. No one knows of his amazing talents and he dreams to go to study art at university. The second child is a younger teenager of the age 13. Her name is Kelly. She does not care about anything and his corrupted. She smokes, sleeps around with different boys, drinks etc. She is the opposite of her brother and lives a nasty life.

The film is about Tom trying escape this world of poverty and violence, in order be educated and achieve his dream of being an artist. However, his family is a big obstacle to his life goals and he is scared to leave his mum with his abusive dad and leave his sister in the corrupted lifestyle she leads.

The second story is names SUMMER ESCAPE.

A girl named Alice lives the so called perfect lifestyle. She's rich and has everything at her fingertips. However, all this means nothing to her. So, one day she decides to run away. At the train station she, a girl her age bumps into her and notices she's running away. So she suggests that Alice comes with her. Her names Kelly and she takes Alice to her 'endz' ( where she lives). Its the opposite to Alices mansion, its a council estate. Its rough, messy, loud etc. Its a culture shock at first but soon enough Alice like it. Soon enough she slowly gets accepted by the crowd and has a great bunch of friends, who are trouble makers but nothing to serious. She starts to like a boy who is a leader of a dangerous gang. He takes advantage and abuses her but she stays put. After a while, he starts to change his ways and really like her back, once he hears she pregnant with his baby. His gang says he's getting too 'soft' and that they plan to kill him. So Skitz ( Alices lover) plans a runaway for him and his family. Just as they are about to get away, they get caught by the gang and kill Skitz.

This film is to reinforce that being rich does not mean you are living the best lifestyle. Alice is emotionally unhappy and wants to move away from her parents high expectations and them pushing her into things she does not want to do. By meeting Kelly and a new group of friends, she fins where she belongs. Moreover, she scores double points by finding her true love, but you can get everything you want and so Skitz dies. It just represents life and how its a rollercoaster.

My third story is called STRAIGHT DOWN.

A single parent has three children, who are all very young. They live in one bedroom flat. They receive no care and love from their mother and their father is unknown. They look out for each other and want to escape this horrid lifestyle because they are constantly hungry. The mother makes money for her drugs but not for her childrens health. She's constantly bringing men back home or not come home for days. One day the neighbour clocks a horrible smell and children crying. She knocks and knocks and the little girl answers. She's horrified at the state they are living in. She instantly calls social services, but mid way through her conversation, the mother comes back, and notices who's she's calling. She spends the days cleaning her flat as best as she can, in order to try and fool the social services. When they come, they are content nothings wrong and the neighbour is annoyed. She's old and has never had children of her own. One day when she's sure the mother is gone, she bribes the children to come out their flat and come to hers. Its here where she, baths, feeds and dresses them all.

This film is about escape and whether these children can push away from their disgusting lifestyle that's leading them to death. Also, the ultimate challenge is being able to part from their mother forever.

The fourth story is called TURNING POINT.

A black jamaican girl, moves to Britain. She moves to a white majority area. Here she experiences racism and bullying. She's very talented. She is a fast runner and is an amazing student. She aspires to run in the olympics and set an unbreakable record. So, her school athletic team wins in her area and so they go forward to compete, to represent London. She knows big names will be there, as well as scouts. She runs amazing at first that gets tripped and falls. Just as she thinks everything is over, she gets scouted by a coach (an retired olympian). He trains her and pushes her past her limits.

This story deals with aspirations and having the drive to leave behind a bad lifestyle, in order to achieve your dreams and become successful. Moreover, it deals with controversial topics, like rasicm and how hard it is to keep your head up.