Logline: A man fondly reflects upon how he came to meet his jogging partner.
A man is jogging on the Golden Gate Bridge en route to his friend's house. He describes how there has been over 1,500 suicides on the Golden Gate Bridge since it's completion in 1937 in a nonchalant tone. As a matter of fact, he just heard on the news how another person had jumped off the bridge on the news this morning. He begins recalling the first time he met his jogging partner as well as the first time he ran on this bridge.
The Golden Gate Bridge is seen against a clear sky. The man is jogging on the bridge with a woman jogging in the distance, similar to how he was jogging before the flashback. He marvels at the architecture of the bridge and doesn't pay attention to where he is going. He clumsily knocks into her, making the woman drop the iPod that she was listening to. The man apologizes and picks up the iPod, noticing the song that she was listening to. The man and the woman start to jog with each other conversing as they are running the length of the Golden Gate Bridge. They talk about the beauty of the architecture of the bridge (because that's why he ran into her). She jokes about how if she had the choice to live her last moments on this bridge, she would. They finish running on the other side of the bridge and agree to meet the next day.
The man is again seen jogging on the GGB as he continues to recall how they became jogging partners.
From that first encounter, they would soon run on the bridge each day together, each day progressively going farther until they are seen to jog to the woman's house. These day-by-day sequences happens in a series of montages.
He arrives at her house and starts walking up apartment stairs.
On one particular day, the woman is staring over the railing into the bay. The man arrives for the daily jog and they begin their daily jog. However she is noticeably sick as they run farther and starts to cough up blood and shows other signs of severe illness. He suggests that she goes to see a doctor, but she dismisses him and says that she is okay. They argue and she finally promises to go to see a doctor.
He calls her the next day to check up on her.
He notices that the door to her house is unlocked.
However she says that the doctor said that she was very ill. She starts telling him about how ever since she was a child, she wanted to be in control of her life. She also talks a lot about how she doesn't like to have people worried about her and that having people worry is considered a burden to her.
The man notices medical things scattered around her house, suggesting that she has been sick for a long time.
She thanks him for being so concerned with her. She says how special running on the bridge each day is. She says how seeing the bridge brings her to peace. The man promises to come to visit her the next day. She hangs up, gets out of her bed and starts walking outside.
Her bed is empty.
The doctor is telling her that her sickness is terminal. She sobs uncontrollably. He tells her to run in order to extend her life a little longer. The man bumps into her while she is running.
He pulls out [the miniature GGB] that he was going to give her as a get-well gift and looks at it. Everything makes sense.
She is walking alone on the GGB around sunset. The bridge looks majestic and calming . . .
I thought this treatment was a bit confusing for outside readers because we have two chracters stories being intertwined within each other. Also the usage of suicides isnt a topic that should be explored because the negativity people get from it, so the ending should change a bit. The scene setting on the bridge is an exciting scenery because it is incorporated with professional films and its a tougher location to film at.
ReplyDeleteI agree with John, being an outside source that it is a bit confusing. Not only that but I'm a little confused about how the story shifts because i feel that having him find this ill person while running and then she kills herself is kinda awkward. It just seems like there's too many subjects because it's originally about him and then transitions to her and so it's kinda confusing. I think that exploring the idea of suicide may be ok though because while it is negative, it's new and a lot of people have been to apprehensive to explore a controversial topic like this in their film, and it builds up well when she says she would want to die on that bridge.
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