Shiver by Maggie Stiefvater
The best way to expand the audience would be bringing
a common love story between a human and werewolf to life. I believe this story is best illustrated by
making this book into a movie. Before the movie is made though there will be four
contests. Each with an unimaginable reward.
The first contest would be held on Facebook under
the Shiver page. The goal will be for a fan to come up with
a place that would be the best place to film the movie. They will have to put
up a picture of that place on the page. Then they would need to explain how it
relates to the book and why the movie should be filmed there. The winner of
this contest will get to go on a vacation with their family to the place they
choose. The trip would be free to the winner and up to five family members.
The second contest would be to write a scene. The director
would choose one scene from the book and start it. He would put out the started
scene and let the fans finish it. The scene that the director chooses will be
the winner. The winner will get the chance to meet all the actors from the
movie and their whole family will receive free admission into the movie with
free drinks and popcorn.
The third contest would be for a fan to rewrite the
ending of one of the three books. Then the author, Maggie, would choose her
favorite ending for each book. The three winners will get to spend the day with
her and get writing tips from her.
The fourth contest would be based in high schools
across the country. For any student that completes reading the first book, they
will get a plastic mug that shows a wolf howling when it’s cold and will show
the human character when its warm. Any student that completes the second book
will get a t-shirt with their choice of design. When they complete the third
book, they will get their book signed by the author and also get a 50% discount
on their tickets for each of the three movies.
Now, for the movie here are two major ideas the
audience needs to know. One that the werewolves stay human all summer and wolves
all winter. It’s also said that sooner or later they will be only wolves, no
more and no less. The second idea is that Grace was attacked by wolves but
didn’t change into a wolf. Within the movie, there should be these four main
scenes.
One – Sam saving Grace.
Is how the book starts
out and would be a great way to grab the viewers’ attention. In this scene
Grace is a little kid who gets attacked by the wolves, who live in the woods
behind her house. Sam, being one of the wolves, he watched them attack her
until he couldn’t take it anymore and stopped them. “The pack fell back from
me, wary. They growled at me, no longer one of them, and they snarled over
their prey. I thought she was the most beautiful girl I’d ever seen, a tiny,
bloody angel in the snow, and they were going to destroy her. I saw it, I saw
her, in a way I’d never seen anything before. And I stopped it.” (Sam-5)
Two – Sam getting shot and
really meeting Grace.
Sam had been watching
Grace ever since he saved her. Years later, the pack did it again to a boy
named Jack. This attack triggered fear in the town which caused them to gather
a hunting party and go after the wolves. During the hunt, Grace makes up a
story about her friend being in the woods hoping to stop them from hitting
“her” wolf. This lie, however, didn’t work. She knew the instant he was shot
and went looking for him. He was on her back porch as a human lying against the
door bleeding from the shoulder. But she knew it was “her” wolf from his eyes.
Those yellow eyes. “My breath caught painfully in my throat as I moved still
closer, hesitant. His beautiful ruff was gone and he was naked, but I knew it
was my wolf even before he opened his eyes. His pale yellow eyes, so familiar,
flicked open at the sound of my approach, but he didn’t move. Red was smeared
from his ear to his desperately human shoulders – deadly war paint.” (Grace-60)
Three – Sam and Grace
going to the candy shop and running into Olivia.
Ever since the second
attack, Sam has been human and Jack is a newly born werewolf, who is looking
for a cure. As the summer is beginning to end, Sam is running out of time with
Grace and wishes to take her out on a real date. So, they leave town on an hour
drive to Sam’s favorite candy shop. Here, Sam gets Grace to really open up and
use her wolf nose to smell the food. In this scene, it’s an escape from their
reality and puts them into their own world together. “Peppermint swirled into
my nostrils, sharp as glass, then raspberry, almost too sweet, like too-ripe
fruit. Apple, crisp and pure. Nuts, buttery, warm, earthy, like Sam. The
subtle, mild scent of white chocolate. Oh, God, some sort of mocha, rich and
dark and sinful.” (Grace-280)
Four – Sam coming back in
the dead of winter, after the “cure.”
Grace thought a cure
would be to overheat the wolf by having an extremely high fever. For this cure, they decided to try injecting
bacterial meningitis, while he was a human, the only problem was he had already
shifted. They had to come up with a way to get Sam to shift back even though it
was supposed to be his last year as a human. “I settled on the floor and
whispered to Sam, ‘I want you to listen to me, if you can.’ I leaned the side
of my face against his ruff and remembered the way the yellow leaves, the color
of Sam’s eyes, flutter and twisted, crashed butterflies, on their way to the
ground…I remembered Sam.” (Grace-369) When
they do get him to shift; they were only able to inject half of the ‘cure’ into
blood stream. Once Jack died from the cure, Grace feared the same had happened
to Sam, since he was back in the woods with no help.
By making this book into a movie and holding these
contests, fans will have an opportunity to interact with the storyline more
directly. For the people who didn’t know about the book, they would get wind of
the contest and read the books to compete. The movie would help the fans of the
book to get to know the characters better and they would get a chance to help affect
how the story will play out.
For the movie itself, I think it should be set up in Montana in
the mountains, when it snowing.
The actor I would choose for Sam’s character would be Chace
Crawford.
For Grace, I would pick Emma Watson.
For Grace’s friends (Olivia
and Rachel) I would use…
And
for Jack and Isabel I would use…
Thorough post, Taylor! I really like the ways you found to engage readers in the film-making process, and I think the incentives for HS readers in contest four are creative and fun. The temperature-sensitive mug is perfect.
ReplyDeleteNice job of digging into the specific scenes you would use and offering your thoughts on location and casting.
I really like how you came up with an idea to have the fans help to make the movie. It would really help to promote the movie and get people more excited to see the movie when it comes out.
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