This is the only script idea that wasn't my own.
When I worked at the video store, some of the customers knew I was in film school. I can’t count how many times someone pitched me their idea for a movie. The reality is that I am so backed up with my own ideas, I don’t have time to write someone else’s. There was one exception.
A customer told me she had an idea based on a true story. She said the police turned her house into a crime scene overnight. Apparently, a woman walked into the police station and confessed to a murder she committed in that house ten years earlier and claimed there were still human remains buried in the basement.
The details of the murder were bizarre and took place on the Fourth of July. After the woman and her accomplice tried unsuccessfully to burn the victim’s body, they purchased an axe at a local hardware store to finish the job, then returned it for a refund.
Because the crime took place on the holiday, I named the script Dead on the Fourth of July. I changed the names and some of the events. I also focused the story on the video store customer’s family and how their lives were turned upside down when the police arrived.
I added some new twists and turns, but never got into it. I lost interest and never finished the script.
CLICK HERE to read this script excerpt.