Pre-production: Treatment

It’s pitch black; 12:34 am. Sarah and Reed are inside their home; now just hers. The couple argue about an affair, one he has had with another woman for the past few months. Reed is kicked out with a box of his few possessions and forced to get in his car to leave his family, exchanging a barrage of insults as he strides off. He throws his box on the seat and sits silently for a few seconds before lashing out in anger, striking the wheel of the car and driving away and joining the main road, regaining composure.

Driving at high speed, Reed calls his wife, preparing himself for another round of verbal abuse. She picks up and they argue about her decision to stop him from seeing his son. Sarah demands that he never contact them again and immediately hangs up on him. He calls again but after letting it ring out it’s clear no ones picking up, causing a fit of rage from Reed .There’s a brief pause as he makes the decision on who to call, choosing to contact Kayla, the woman he had an affair with only to be interrupted by his son calling him. He immediately changes his attitude, shifting to something that would suggest to his son that nothing is wrong. Miles, a boy of 14, seems conflicted between worry and resentment, forming a fascination with his fathers departure as just another event rather than a life changing decision and therefore seems almost uninterested and slightly disgusted in his father, alienated by his actions. Reed does his best to deflect his sons curious questions and admits to making a mistake, giving him the belief that he can turn around and put everything right but stops when Miles mentions that an unnamed man is present at the house again. There’s a faint background noise of footsteps and his mothers voice which causes his son to hang up the phone before he says who the man is, leaving Reed shouting desperately at a now already blank screen in desperation and despair. He’s lost his son and his wife to someone else, he just doesn’t want to admit it.

Reed phones Kayla. After multiple buzzes from the phone as she seems to take an eternity to answer, the voice of Kayla can be heard echoing through the cars speakers. Reed is now desperate, Kayla is the last person he can turn to for both physical help in the hopes of staying over and mentally as he continues to lose those around him. It becomes clear however that his pleas are in vain as he learns that she never felt that connection with him as he did for her and that it was just a fling, nothing more. She hangs up. There’s a moment of calm as the world closes around him, to his left the turning he’s indicating for and to the right, a herd of oncoming cars. A moment of silence, nothing is happening, he looks to the side of him at the box of possessions,  nothing. As he glances at an approaching car, he leisurely begins to shift the steering wheel to his right and cutting to black just before the impact of a large car and the sound of a loud crash of metal on metal.