Bringing A Painting to Life

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Logline:

A tiny creature in a modern slice of life inspired by Norman Rockwell’s 1949 painting, “road block” unites a diverse society.

Treatment:

A busy, bustling downtown area establishes the pace, as changing “don’t walk” signs and traffic signals are interlaced with hurried people and vehicles. Cut to two men of different ethnicities getting into a moving truck and driving away from a building.

A college student leaves his/her dorm room, slinging a backpack on his/her shoulder, and gets onto a bicycle wearing earphones as he/she rides away.

A policeman leaves the station.

A man is in an open area painting on a canvas. A woman poses, partially hidden by the canvas to suggest nudity.

An older man wearing a white collared shirt and tie, glasses, and a stern face grabs his briefcase and hurries out of a storefront office.

A young man closes an instrument case and picks it up wearily and walks away.

In a narrow alley, the truck heads toward the camera and obviously leaves little room to pass. The older man in shirt, tie, and glasses pulls into the alley and stops abruptly. After honking his horn several times, he gets out shouting. A little girl/boy and a dog enter the scene as the moving men open the truck doors to reason with the older man. The student on the bicycle rides up and startles the puppy as he/she stops to see why the alley is blocked.

Cut to the artist and his female subject, who hear the commotion and pause quizzically. He walks away from the canvas, brush and palette in hands and is seen stepping onto a balcony with the draped subject following timidly.
The young man with his instrument case walks tediously into the scene. He shifts the case to his opposite hand; he flexes and stretches the prior weight-bearing arm.

The man on the left side of the frame gets out of the truck to help the child collect the dog. The dog is not cooperating, and the student has dismounted the bicycle. The child is leaning against the wall on the right, and the entire cast is laughing at the moving man and dog’s antics at this point.

The policeman walks into the scene and sees the situation. He begins laughing, as does the stern older man. Fade into the Norman Rockwell painting, and fade out.