My Hollywood System

Chapter 145:

Amy was surfing through her MeTube feed. She liked watching dance videos and random cat videos on the website, and she generally frequently fell into the rabbit hole of MeTube’s horrendous algorithm.

Apparently, MeTube had decided that she should watch a review video on some Hollywood movie, released by Dream Vision, called [1917].

She was too lazy to switch and find a different video. ‘Oh, what the hell, might as well watch it.’ She mused as the video started playing.

[1917 – review.

EGN.

The video showed various clips of two soldiers traversing and walking through various different scenes, like barracks, a broken home, a no man’s land etc.

“Set over less than twenty-four hours on the western front, the harrowing 1917 is both simple in its story and breathtaking in its execution. Intimate, yet epic. Director Lucas Amspoker has delivered a completely engrossing survival thriller, written by Will Evans, about two young British soldiers, Schofield and Blake, on a perilous mission behind enemy lines.”

The scene shifts, showing them standing at attention in front of a commanding officer.

“Your orders are to deliver a message calling off tomorrow morning’s attack. If you don’t we will lose 1600 men. Your brother among them.” Orders the officer.

The narrator again picks up, showing more short scenes from the movie “Neither soldier is written to be particularly exceptional, upon their introduction. They’re just two of the countless everyman troops in the First World War. It’s their ordinariness and almost anonymity that lends this duo immediate sympathy and relatability. These two could be anyone, but they’ve been tasked with doing something that seems extraordinary and heroic, but was a common feature of the horrific war.

The movie depicts the vicious cycle of a soldier that wants to rest but is ordered to perform a perilous task. The conceit of the movie 1917 is that it is presented to us with a single tracking shot. With fantastic cinematography from Dream Vision’s lead Cinematographer Jeffery Houlston, and Director Lucas Amspoker, the viewer really feels that they’re really there, with the soldiers on the frontlines.

The beautifully crafted movie is emotionally very heavy on the viewer, with one of the lead characters, Lance Corporal Blake, dying halfway into the movie, and the various cuts and bruises that the other lead character, Lance Corporal Schofield, which are later exposed to decayed corpses, rats and muddy bandages leading us to believe that he too would die off-screen, despite his desire as well as an aversion to returning home, to his wife and daughter.

Having no dialogues in large part of the film, the director, following Will Evans’s trend of using new actors, uses phenomenal and emotional acting, alongside both picturesque and grotesque scenery mixed into a symphony of emotions for the audience to enjoy. The new actors Elijah Thomas and Renly Warren’s performance is phenomenal to experience, with raw emotions laid out on the battlefield, clear for us all to see.

1917 firmly places what is human, in such a dehumanizing environment, by not glorifying the horrific war and accurately portraying the ground reality that soldiers had to face on a daily basis.

This is certainly one of the best films of 2012.”

The video ended with an infographic labeled “9.5/10 – Reviewed Amazing” as the screen faded out.]

Amy hadn’t realized that she had gotten so engrossed in the video that she had seemingly sat up on her bed, on which she was previously lying down while surfing the website on her laptop.

Her interest had been piqued, and she was very intrigued by going to watch the movie.

“Jake! Honey! Are you free tonight?” She shouted out into her home.

A muffled yell of “Yeah, why, do you need something?” came as her reply.

She smiled and immediately leaped off her bed and scrambled into the living room, where her husband was lazily reading the newspaper. He looked up at her questioningly, and she continued, “Well, I was thinking, why don’t we go out to the movies tonight? We can let the kids go to Charles’ place for a few hours.”

Her husband blinked and titled his head, folding the paper in his hands. “Yeah, sure. He’d get to be Uncle Charles to Mac for the night. A movie sounds fun. We could go out for dinner later too. Do you have a movie in mind?”

A dinner and movie date sounded fun to her, and her excitement was visible. “Yeah, I was surfing through MeTube, and came across the review of [1917]. It was rated 9.5/10, and I thought we could go watch it.”

Jake got up from the table and walked toward her. He said, “Okay, I will book our tickets for tonight and then book reservations at a good restaurant. How does CZN Buraq sound?”

She smiled, wrapping her arms around her husband, giving him a lingering kiss, and said, “That sounds wonderful; it’s a date then!”

Jake chuckled as he watched his wife run back into their bedroom to get dressed for their date later that night, his eyes lingering on her ass for a few seconds.

He shook his head and started surfing his phone to look for a nearby theatre and book the tickets for the night.

******

14th March 2012.

Buttoning up the last buttons of his dark greyish black Suit, Will looked into the mirror that was inside his walk-in closet. He was dressed in a single-breasted dark grey formal jacket with two buttons upfront. Underneath the jacket was a dark grey vest with simple light greyish-silver embroidery. It was adorned with a set of high-rise dark grey trousers. The look was completed with a thin dark greyish black tie, alongside black shoes, a black belt, and dark Jet Black Cufflinks.

It was a simple choice of style, modeled after the style of clothing that John Wick was known to wear most of the time.

Will finally finished dressing up and strapped on his Carl F. Bucherer Manero AutoDate, timepiece to his left hand, and walked out of the closet.

The first thing he did was head back to his bedroom, where June was lying down. He walked beside her and placed his hand on her forehead, and said, “The Yacht must’ve been really bad for you, especially the dives you took into the ocean. Your temperature isn’t showing any sign of coming down.”

She turned around when she felt his hand on her forehead and subconsciously smiled.

He looked into her eyes and said, “If you’d like, I can forego going to the Oscars tonight. I can make you some more soup, and we could watch something together.”

She shook her head, got into a seated position a little, and said, “No, I thought of sleeping the fever off anyway. The soup you made me was good. It helped a lot. Plus, I know that the Oscars will be important for you, so you go on without me this time.”

Will searched her eyes and sighed, “Alright, but give me a call if you need anything, and I will come straight back. Okay?”

She nodded and said, “Okay, remember to have fun.”

Will smiled as he bent down, kissed her forehead, and said, “I will, goodnight, love.” And walked out of the room, leaving a tired yet smiling June behind him.

***

Getting out of his metallic grey 1979 Ford Mustang, Will stepped out onto the red carpet at the Dolby Theatre, Los Angeles. A flurry of flashes indicated that cameras went off as the surrounding Paparazzi scrambled to take his photos. He handed the keys to his car to the valet at the, who was waiting by the beginning of the rolled-out carpet.

“It’s Will Evans! Hurry, take some good shots.”

“Is he with someone?”

“Where is June Roberts?”

“Sir! Do you think your movies will win any awards tonight?”

“What about your other movies?”

“Will 500 days of Summer win anything?”

Questions of all kinds were bombarded at him by the surrounding media, even though they couldn’t get past the barricade that separated the path to the entrance of the theatre.

Will quickly made his way down the red carpet, pausing only when he noticed the crew of Weekend Tribunal struggling to take a few pictures. Quickly giving them a chance to take some pictures, he made his way into the venue of the 2012 Oscars show.

He knew his movies would at least be nominated for a few awards, if nothing else. Taking his seat in the VIP section of the theatre, he watched as the event began.

He kept his alcohol consumption to a bare minimum, choosing to take a seat among familiar faces, with Jeffery and his team from Dream Vision rather than with someone else.

Natalie Bergmann had won the award for Best Actress in a romantic comedy. She gave a short speech crediting Will Evans for most of her success.

Ewan Rees won the best actor award for [Birdman], where he yet again awarded substantial credit to Will for coming up with the story and making it possible for him to work in it. Robert was nominated for the award as well, for his work in [A Bullet to Kill], but the award was eventually given to Ewan Reese.

Will just smiled and socialized with his colleagues throughout the event.

He stayed for the after-party for some time, as well, and just as he was about to leave, Amanda came up to him and said, “Will, the CEO of OP Studios wants to have a word with you. It sounded like it was urgent. Do you have time for him, or should I schedule a meeting later?”

He looked at his watch and sighed, “I will see what he needs. Where is he?”

“He is waiting by the bar. If you’d like, I can arrange a private room for you both to discuss whatever it is he needs.” Amanda offered.

Will nodded. “Alright, please arrange the room for us. I will wait for him there.”

…

//DreamNote//

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