Earthquake
Partner: Colton Elzey
The
historical event we chose for our script was the Northridge, California
earthquake which occurred on January 17, 1994. We incorporated this week's
reading in trying to display how this historic event would affect individuals
on the family level. Just as the 1980 cultural conflict affected the girl and
her family in our reading of “The Veil,” we contemplated how an earthquake, and
potentially deadly situation, would affect individuals in a family. While “The
Veil” presented the relationship between the cultural conflict in a comical
view, from the child's perspective, we tried to explore the sentimental route
of the earthquake's effect on a dysfunctional family. We took advantage of the
opportunity to present a story based around the facts of when and where the
earthquake hit and what could happen. In this sense, we explored the dynamic
relationship between how our fictional characters acted—initially the classic
angry son who learns his responsibility in the family—with the fictional, but
common family situation, in the real environment that we placed them in. In
other words we tried to explore how the life-threatening situation of the
shattering earthquake would effect an already broken family.
The initial
idea for the historical script was a mom and son surviving the earthquake and
becoming closer because of it. In the collaboration process we created a script
that depicts a mother and son struggling to overcome the recent abandonment of
the father and husband. The earthquake comes to be a metaphor for how the
characters felt internally during their emotional struggle, and provides a
medium for them to symbolically let go of things out of their control. Once the
mother and son decide to move on and work together against the uncontrollable
situation they have been placed in, they become a stronger, slightly more
functional family unit.
A movie that
shares a similar theme of disaster bringing family together is the film Deep Impact produced in 1998. When news of a
meteor possibly crashing into Earth hits the inhabitants of our planet, we see
the "impact" it has on a father and daughter, as well as a newly
married husband and wife. Each character has their internal struggles that
shine through and must be resolved before their ultimate physical destruction
takes place.
The sources
we drew from for this assignment helped us gather the facts regarding the
earthquake. We learned the location, covering the San Fernando Valley community
of Northridge, and the time it hit, around 4:31 in the morning. The Los Angeles
Daily News was a close to home report on the event and the NBC timeline article
also gave us a detailed timeline of the events, such as the initial quake and
many of the devastating reports—including widespread fires and floods, some of
which we incorporated into our story. It was a devastating event, but like all
others had some positive repercussions: bringing families closer and reminding
people in general how important others in their lives truly are.
http://www.dailynews.com/general-news/20140111/northridge-earthquake-1994-disaster-still-fresh-in-los-angeles-minds-after-20-years
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