Synopsis/Details
Erotic, gothic horror. Set in Oxford and London. Early 2020, as the COVID-19 pandemic hits.
Beginning.
A spotlit pole in a narrow, dark practice gymnasium. A
mirrored wall behind it reflects the emptiness of the room in
front. Sasha SASSY Cohen, 29, spins around the pole with her
legs splayed, her long, curly dyed-red hair flashes wild.
Sassy’s facial features accentuate in the spotlight and
shadow, her expression defiant, stoic, as though she has
entered another realm through her dancing. Sassy continues to
pole dance in an elegant fashion. Sassy’s face is spotlit:
Black eyeliner, vivid vamp lipstick, her green eyes wide; a
black beauty spot drawn beside her mouth, hung open as though
about to scream. Music stops. The sound of clapping: A voice
in the dark emerges: “Do you often so flagrantly exhibit
yourself?” Sassy and the voice engage in some mild
flirtation. There is a familiarity between them; they know
each other already. The voice in the dark tells Sassy that he
only wants her to pole dance for him, naked.
Cut to: A video of one of Sassy’s pole performances. A
homemade, grainy video effect. On screen, Sassy sits on her
neatly-made bed. She speaks directly to the camera,
introduces herself as Sasha, “but you can call me Sassy”.
4.
She tells the audience that she is a pole-dancing English
teacher, quotes Proust: “Love is a striking example of how
little reality means to us”. Sassy tells the camera that she
leads a double life and that she is in love with her dancer
persona. She says that she grew up within the tradition of
the Kabbalah and that she takes aesthetic inspiration from
1940s and 1950s pin-up glamour, the Old Testament, and death.
Sassy says that she went to the University of Oxford, where
she lives, and that soon she will move to London. She draws
attention to the retractable pole in her room: “if you’re
lucky, later, you’ll get to see my pussy while I dance on
it”. The video pauses, rewinds before zipping away.
Zoom our to Sassy’s bedroom: Sassy reclines on the bed
opposite her laptop screen and portable webcam, wears PVC
boots. On Sassy’s laptop screen: An online platform is open,
a graphic indicates the word ‘CONVEX’ in the upper right hand
corner. Sassy uploads the video to the home screen, sets the
audience to public. The sound of a bell rings. Sassy calls,
off camera: “Okay, give me a moment!” Close-Up: Sassy’s
fingers unzip the boots, squeeze the PVC material slowly from
her legs.
In a student bedroom, Conor Lynch, 26, a young man with dark,
floppy hair and piercing blue eyes, stares at the camera,
engrossed in a computer screen. He clicks a computer mouse
furiously. The beeping of game noises. Graphics: A monster,
pink tentacles a-snare, faces a knight in silvery armour. The
monster advances, the knight raises a sword. The monster
snares, its mouth opens. The knight’s sword bursts into
flames. The knight aims fire-balls at the monster. In the
corner of the screen, a notification appears: “CONVEX -
SASSYLOVESYOU made a new post!” Sassy’s video from earlier
floods Conor’s computer screen. Sassy’s resounding words
repeat. The screen indicator arrow clicks on a box below the
video: ‘Message Sassy Now!’. On-screen, Conor types the
sentence: ‘Hi Sassy, I’m Conor. I’m your biggest fan. Where
in London are you moving to? I’m based in Dublin. I love the
way you dance...’.
In a dining room, ‘Flower Duet’ from Madam Butterfly plays.
The sound of the bell ringing echoes. A woman with frizz for
curls and large, round glasses wears a cardigan, tugs
wholeheartedly at a string-like wire hanging from the wall.
Leah Cohen, 64, sighs deeply, hangs the wire on a hook. In
the corner: A record player spins. A pile of logs by the
fireplace, with a stoke. The foot of a large, spiral
staircase. On the dinner table: A grand, brass menorah, a
bowl of various fruits, a jar of honey, two silver chalices
and a bottle of wine. Beside: A large, human skull. Leah
shuffles toward the oven in the accompanying open plan
kitchen, opens the oven door, brings out a large, roast
chicken on a tray. Sassy enters, stepping from the last step
of the spiral staircase.
5.
She has removed her makeup and wears pyjamas shrouded in a
dressing gown. Leah says, “To think my little girl is going
to lie an adult life!” She reminds Sassy to look after
Christie when they move in together. Leah carves the chicken,
they sit down to eat. Leah tells Sassy that she is teaching
in a seminar at the University of Oxford on mysticism in the
Torah. Sassy takes a box of matches, lights the menorah
candles in the centre of the table. In the darkness shrouding
the dining room, the candles glow, cat shadows across the
hollows of the skull centre piece. Leah gives the Bracha:
Jewish prayer before a meal: “Blessed are You, Lord our God,
King of the Universe, who creates the fruit of the tree.” As
they enjoy the last meal before Sassy moves out, Sassy says
that she is getting a ‘special’ ride to her new place, and
that Christie arranged it as a surprise. Leah asks Sassy how
long she has been with Christie. An awkward pause follows
before Sassy answers: “Three months.” She follows by saying
that this relationship feels right, and that Christie is
everything she could have dreamed of. Leah says that she has
not met Christie, or even seen a photo. Sassy describes him,
says that although she knows Leah is unsure, Christie makes
me feel like a Goddess, “in my experience, men don’t tend to
have that gift.” Leah asks how Christie has the money to
afford a special taxi for Sassy from Oxford to London. Sassy
responds that he owns a software company. Leah says: “I’m
glad something motivated you to find your own place. Even
though I’ll miss you”. She asks Sassy if she has heard about
the Coronavirus in the news. They agree that it’s unlikely to
affect the UK. A menorah candle drips, splashes wax onto an
eye socket of the skull.
Catalyst for Change.
The next day, Sassy rests, eyes closed, in the back of a hightech
electric car with pink seating. In her arms: A large
gathering of lavender, tied in a bunch. As the car moves,
scenes of Finsbury Park, North London flash by in grey-ness
and tall buildings. The taxi comes to a stop, jolts Sassy
awake. The car door swings open. Outside: A tall, Victorian
terraced house in Finsbury Park, North London. There’s a
gateway with a small garden out front; the pathway leads to a
red front door numbered 7. Close-Up: Underneath the number 7
and above the letterbox on the red door, a sign: ‘SEARLEAMATO
MANOR’. Sassy, surrounded by suitcases, rings the
doorbell.
In an attic, Christie Searle-Amato, 32, a handsome, darkfeatured
man, advances from the darkness. He watches a series
of CCTV screens from a desk in his shadowy attic studio. The
screens flicker, entice, twitch and dart between different
areas of the house: a modern kitchen with steel furnishings,
a conservatory overlooking a garden, entwined with growth; a
hallway in black and white, where Sassy steps. Christie
speaks into a microphone: “Sasha.
6.
Stop where you are.” He instructs Sassy to look down to the
floor and follow the sprinkles of Lavender. On the CCTV
screen, the trail of lavender has led Sassy to the kitchen
table, where a tall box of chocolates lies next to a set of
house keys. A bottle of expensive champagne has an object
around the neck: A studded collar with a chain attached.
Christie welcomes Sassy ‘home’ through the screens.
In the conservatory, Sassy, in glamorous black lingerie and a
silk gown, sits on the arm of a wicker arm chair, its fanlike
back to us, shielding the audience from any view of
Christie. Instead, his voice emerges, as cigarette smoke
wafts from behind the chair. Christie asks Sassy what she
thinks of his pad. Sassy responds: “Innovative.
Technological. Classic. Cultured. - Just like you.” She
elaborates: “Mum couldn’t believe it when I told her that I
was moving in somewhere without having seen it. But I like
the element of surprise.” Christie stubs his cigarette out
from a mechanical arm which emerges from the sofa. He says:
“I work from home, I do everything here. That’s why I’ve
spent so long making the place mine. All of these devices,
you see everywhere - they’re designed by me.” Christie tells
Sassy that he has another surprise for her and that he wants
to see her dance again. In the corner: Sassy spots a round
CCTV camera, tells Christie that she wants to see all of his
gadgets. Christie responds in kind.
Christie and Sassy walk through the hallway, stop at the base
of the tapering, metal-lined, futuristic-looking staircase.
Christie gesticulates with bravado, shows Sassy the device on
the stairwell: One of the metal railings of the staircase
folds. Mechanically, an ancient-style samurai sword
protrudes, swings down across the entrance to the staircase,
makes a barrier. The sword, rested across the staircase,
promptly sets itself on fire. Christie states that this
“keeps out anyone unwanted”.
In the bedroom upstairs, Sassy bounces on a large, heartshaped
bed enlaced with fairy lights; her wild hair flows,
painted toenails peep through fishnet tights. In the corner
of a large bedroom, with ceiling-high mirrored wardrobes,
Christie stands nearby the light switches, leans with pride
against the wall, watches Sassy and her reflection in the
mirror behind amorously. Christie instructs Sassy to breathe
the air, Sassy exclaims that it smells of lavender, her
favourite. Christie flips a switch. The lights dim. A disco
ball lowers from the ceiling, spatters revolving sparkles of
light everywhere. Six poles protrude from the ceiling and
floor, unite to form a cluster of silver, shimmering poledancing
poles in the bedroom. A pleased Sassy saunters from
the edge of the bed, sidles up to Christie, leans against
him, seductive. Sassy brings her mouth to his. She says: “You
haven’t seen my Convex channel.
7.
This room is now perfect for it!” Christie turns aggressive:
“I thought I made it clear that I only want you to dance for
me -”. Sassy says that she pole-dances for empowerment and
for herself. This leads to an argument between them. Sassy
says: “My Convex account is just a platform - one with which
to escape into my own fantasy world.” Christie’s fingers
click. Pore-like holes emerge in the walls, exude little
billows of lilac fog. Sassy’s eyes struggle to stay open, her
eyes roll back in her head. In keeping with Sassy’s sway,
Christie pushes Sassy backwards for her to fall back on to
the bed. Her eyes close; her head lulls to the side under the
increasing weight of the sleep-inducing fog. Christie
advances, a leering expression.
Inside Sassy’s dream, a vivid sunrise glares ominous oranges,
purples and reds in the otherwise wide, clear sky. A singular
crow flies. A strange, distorted, convex view of the
surroundings: a living nightmare. Under the glaring sun, a
field of tall lavender stretches as far as the eye can see.
On the horizon: A small, oddly-placed synagogue, rectangular
in shape with a tiered roof and open door. Leah stands in its
porch, strangely silent, a foreboding expression on her face.
Amid the tall lavender stalks, Sassy sits, faces the
direction of the synagogue and her Mother. In her dream, she
bears a scythe, stood strangely upright in the ground beside
her. Sassy shouts, toward her Mother: “There’s something
wrong, Mum. I’m not sure Christie is the person I thought he
was. You were right to be suspicious!” Sassy rises, grabs
hold of the scythe. Surrounded by tall lavender, with only a
glimpse of her Mother ahead, Sassy wields the scythe, begins
to slew the surrounding stalks and forge a path ahead. Sassy
slews through the lavender with brisk strides. She shouts to
her Mother that she is in danger. Christie’s voiceover
emerges, telling Sassy that he can see Sasha everywhere she
goes. Sassy stops slaying the lavender stalks, stands still
for a moment, turns toward the sky, points as though talking
to a person: “You bastard! Fuck you!” The vivid sky and
clouds merge into a formation: Christie’s face, contorted
into a wicked smile. Sassy hurriedly slays through the
lavender stalks; the synagogue appears closer, where Leah is.
Lavender continues to fall to the ground in Sassy’s path.
Sweating and scrabbling away from the foreboding sky, Sassy
falls in a clearing at the doorstep to the synagogue; the
scythe falls to one side. Sassy holds Leah, cries into her
shoulder. Leah remains eerily rigid, her eyes wide open. In
Sassy’s dream, Leah reminds her of warning against Christie.
Leah hisses: “Christie Searle-Amato. I want his head on a
platter. Fulfill my wish!” Christie’s looming face in the sky
shifts away: the day quickly becomes night. Above: a
peaceful, peculiarly large full moon.
8.
Climax.
Back in the bedroom, loud, reggae-metal plays. Disco light
spatters. The fog has cleared. Sassy opens her eyes. She
screams, but the sound is muffled: A muzzle has been placed
around her mouth. Her head leans against a pole. Sassy’s
wrists have been tied together, bound with red rope. Her neck
is encased with the collar, chained to one of the four
protruding poles from the bedroom floor. Sassy looks down at
her bare breasts: Her clothes have mysteriously been stripped
from her body. Sassy looks around the light-speckled, pink
and purple bedroom, frantic: Christie is nowhere in sight.
Through her muffled screams, Sassy struggles, pulls her neck
away, the chain goes taught. She cannot leave. The collar
tugs on her neck. Christie’s voice booms around the room, as
though coming from nowhere.
In the attic, the shadowy back of Christie’s head faces the
elaborate rubix cube of black and white screens. In the
centre: A screen of Sassy, tied to one of the poles in the
bedroom, as she struggles and screams through the muzzle:
naked. Christie says into the microphone, tells Sassy that
she looks sweet on camera and that he has hacked into her
Convex account to live-stream the footage. He instructs her
to dance for him. Sassy collapses, leans against the pole she
is tied to, cries.
Archival news footage appears. Graphic: A model of the Corona
virus hovers, grows and makes contorted shapes. In an
overcrowded UK supermarket, people hurriedly rush about; a
woman overloads her trolley with stacks of cheese and toilet
roll. A flurry of people walk the streets of urban China:
their faces covered in masks. Towering buildings with screens
blazoning in the background. Cut to: Footage of the Prime
Minister’s office. UK Prime Minister Boris Johnson faces the
screen, fingers wrung on a table. He wears a suit with a red
tie and a grave expression, his blond hair askew. He
announces UK lockdown as the solution to slow the spread of
the disease.
In Conor’s bedroom, moonlight glimmers from the window, casts
onto the screen of Conor’s phone on his bedside table. The
screen lights up with a notification: ‘SASSYLOVESYOU made a
new post!’ Conor, beneath a duvet on the bed, rolls over from
his lull of sleep. He picks up his phone from the bedside
table, spots the notification. On Conor’s phone screen: The
scene from the large bedroom in Searle-Amato Manor. A gagged,
naked Sassy struggles against the pull of her collar, tied to
one of four poles by a chain. Conor’s eyes widen in shock. He
starts to type into the message box: “Sassy? What’s going
on?” Sassy raises herself to meet the pole. A wincing, pained
expression on her face. Her hair is laden with sweat.
Struggling, she wraps her legs around the pole.
9.
With faltering lackluster, she swivels around it. Conor
types: “Do you need help? Call the police?”
Under lockdown, the world has turned black and white. In
Christie’s urban, metallic kitchen, the window overlooks the
intricate vines of the conservatory and to the view of the
garden outside. A tired, makeup-less Sassy sits on a kitchen
stool at the table, wears a dressing gown. She stirs her mug
of coffee with a spoon, despondent. Sassy tells Christie that
she had the most horrendous dreams last night. She recalls
the dream in the lavender field with her Mother. Sassy and
Christie discuss the new circumstances of the pandemic: “For
once - the world is on the same page. In the most horrible
possible way. Everything is just so - violently bleak.”
Christie tells Sassy: “There’s no one I would rather be
locked down with in a pandemic than you.” Sassy asks Christie
if he has seen her phone. Christie turns sinister, tells
Christie that she won’t be needing it. A confused Sassy
panics, protests that she needs her phone to call her Mother.
Christie says, “You enter my abode, you live by my rules. -
You’re mine now, you understand? Mine.” Christie clicks his
fingers. The kitchen begins to fill with lilac mist. Sassy,
struggling, begins to close her eyes, against resistance.
Close-Up: Christie’s knuckles are white with the strain of
dragging Sassy’s legs by the feet up the stairs. Sassy’s head
knocks softly against the carpet on each step, unconscious.
On a phone screen, Leah appears, the worry lines visible on
her forehead beneath her thick glasses. She is leaving a
video message for Sasha, protests that Sassy is not answering
her phone. She says: “I’m doing fine. I think lockdown will
suit me, as a matter of fact. Don’t worry about me. - Call me
back, when you can. I want to know all about your new life!”
Cut to black. An electronic voice, in the darkness: Conor,
telling Sassy that he can see her, and to wake up. Sassy
jolts awake. She struggles: This time, her neck is tied to
the bedstead via the collar and chain. Her mouth is free to
move. Sassy looks around: she appears to be alone. She asks
who’s there. The electronic voice comes from nowhere again:
“This is Conor. Your biggest fan on Convex. I’m here to
rescue you.” Conor tells Sassy that he has intercepted her
Convex to reach the audio in the cameras. Sassy asks: “If you
can do that, can you affect the other technology in the
house?” Conor responds that he can try. Sassy asks Conor to
access the CCTV cameras to see where Christie is.
In Conor’s bedroom, Conor watches the CCTV cameras on his
laptop screen. In one: Christie makes his first step on the
set of stairs in the hallway. Conor warns Sassy. Sassy
struggles against the bedstead, tries to release herself from
entrapment. In the hallway, Christie’s hand closes the
gateway to the stairs, flips the lock.
10.
Conor warns Sassy that he can see Christie on the stairs, and
that a button has appeared on his screen with options related
to the stairs. Sassy urges Conor to press it. Christie slowly
makes his way up the stairs. He carries a glass of gin and
tonic in his hand. Above: The samurai sword swiftly lowers
from the ceiling. Christie stares at it: frozen, aghast, his
mouth agape. The glass of gin and tonic smashes on the step.
The samurai sword sets aflame, lowers further, cuts Christie
at the neck. Close-Up: Christie’s bloodied, severed head
rolls down the steps, lands on the hallway floor. His
expression is frozen in ugly shock. Conor announces that
Christie is dead. Sassy crouches forward, kneels on the bed,
collapsed in relief. Her hands cradle her face as she begins
to sob.
In Leah’s dining room, ‘Flower Duet’ from Madam Butterfly
plays. Close-Up: The menorah candles are lit, casting shadows
against the skull on Leah’s dining room table. Leah repeats
the Bracha. Sassy, her hands unified and eyes closed in
prayer, sits opposite. She opens her eyes, begins to eat the
roast chicken dinner in front of her. Leah says, dryly: “When
most daughters bring their partners home, they don’t mean to
say it’s like this.” Sassy chuckles. Her head turns upwards.
On the wall: Christie’s head is fastened to a plaque on the
wall, taxidermy style. His expression is still frozen in ugly
shock. In his mouth: Stuffed, sprigs of lavender. Sassy says:
“I’m no ordinary girl”. The pair chuckle, continue to eat in
the candlelight.
