The Whole Zen Thing

Aided by a mysterious young monk, an entrepreneur facing roadblocks to his financial survival finds the way by re-living three of his past lives.

*An official selection in more than a dozen international film festivals.*

In the second half of the 15th Century the German-born Dutch artist Hans Memling painted in Bruges the now famous triptych titled ‘Last Judgement’, the donors of which were Italian aristocrat Angelo Tani and his wife Caterina. However, the painting was never to make it into the hands of its donors. Due to military hostilities between England and the Hanseatic League, the galley carrying the triptych to Florence was captured in 1473 by a caravel under Paul Benecke’s command and taken to Gdańsk (Danzig). The ship and all precious cargo were the property of the Florentine family of Medici and of their agent in Bruges, Tommaso Portinari. After the capture, there followed long, unending legal proceedings, in which almost all of Europe became involved, including the Burgundian ruler Charles the Bold; the Austrian Archduke Maximilian; Cosimo, Piero and Lorenzo Medici, and Pope Sixtus IV.

The action of this epic tale covers the period from 1444 to 1494. Its main characters, apart from the painting itself, are Elizabeth from Gdańsk and Hans Memling, the manipulated painter of the ‘Last Judgement’. The premise of the action is the attempt to repair the effects of the conflict and the manipulation that transpires between two Medici bankers fighting over the triptych. The real driving force of the action, however, is Elizabeth; a woman of light who intuits the changes that are to come. The events take place mainly in three European cities: Bruges, Florence and Gdańsk, the latter having belonged to the Polish-Lithuanian Commonwealth from 1454. In Florence, ruled by the Medici, the Renaissance is blooming, while in the other two cities the Middle Ages are slowly fading. European society is on the crest of the wave of the Reformation.

The Last Judgement’ tells the story of a judge who issues an unfair sentence and tries to correct his mistake many years later. The judge, however, is not a man of the law. He is a painter, an artist whose vision leads him to people the canvas of the ‘Last Judgement' with the faces of those he lives among. Through his desire to ‘bring justice to the visible world’ by means of his talent, he unknowingly causes harm to a righteous man. His condemnation robs the man of the rest of his life through the ever-present burden of shame and disgrace.

Universal themes concerning the judgement of others and the administering of justice and the mistakes, abuses, as well as the manipulations that arise from such actions, touch everyone on a daily basis. Why is it worth telling the story of a wandering judge, in a historical setting? Firstly, the story is fascinating, unusual, and at the same time it is based on facts; therefore, it is cognitively interesting. Secondly, the questions surrounding the judgement of others is still relevant and universal. The situation of the judge not even being a jurist but an artist makes us acutely aware that each of us takes on the role of a judge more often than we think. We judge and are judged in every way: at home, at work, in the street, in the shop and at play; in private and professional relationships; by relatives and by strangers. By judging others we hurt them; we ourselves feel wronged by someone else's judgement. How easily we administer our daily verdicts.

The first layer of ‘The Last Judgement’ will be primarily a psychological thriller about love, betrayal, crime and punishment. I believe that ‘The Last Judgement’ can have the power of ‘The Name of the Rose’, which for me is the model of a historical film - extremely intelligent, appealing and visually beautiful.

A group of small town kids are growing up too fast. When a beat-up one-eyed alley cat befriends and protects them, they learn about love, loyalty and how to play.

The Goblins and the Gravedigger is my retelling of Dickens’ first Christmas fairy tale—“The Story of the Goblins Who Stole a Sexton,” which appeared as chapter 29 in The Pickwick Papers. This short story (only eight pages in my copy of Pickwick) provided the framework, in 1843, for A Christmas Carol: both stories take place on Christmas Eve, both involve a sour, surly old man (Gabriel Grub, Ebenezer Scrooge), and both involve metaphysical intervention (goblins, ghosts). There are eight songs. It’s hard to get through December without Dickens, and here is a show that brings all the magic of A Christmas Carol without being A Christmas Carol.

A policewoman recovering from PTSD finds herself entangled in the case of a missing mentally ill girl, but to unearth the bizarre and twisted truth she must ultimately face her own demons…

Leaving a harsh life for the freedom of the rails, a young man learns the importance of survival, friendship, and love within an ever-changing world, especially when the Past catches up.

After years of abuse at the hands of her literary hero father, Quill grows up with a similar passion for the written word, though she writes exclusively on the dried skin of abusive men she has murdered.

* Winner of the Best Script award at the Los Angeles Cinema Festival of Hollywood. - Fall 2017
* Winner of Best Script Award at the New York Film Awards -November 2017
* Winner of Honorable Mention for Best Script at the Los Angeles Film Awards

Suzanne and her mother, Ann, have a tumultuous relationship. After Ann survives a ruptured brain aneurysm, the family waits months to understand the extend of the damage and how much of her was lost. Suzanne struggles to reconcile their bruised relationship, and leans on her girlfriend Michelle, and family, for support.    

A very meta, very Millennial, multiverse horror-comedy spoof on what it means to truly be living in the worst possible timeline. Inspired by the works of My Chemical Romance, Fleetwood Mac, and other current and former Warner Music Group recording artists.

In the future, all recorded music is lost after a magnetic surge wipes out the digital database that stores the songs. Re-recordings are organised, leading to conflict over which song will be chosen to represent each past musical artist. Two fanatical groups of Roxy Music fans go to war over the choice of song for their band, leading to a final showdown involving the original singer of Roxy Music, Bryan Ferry.

A psychiatrist with a shady past stand on the very edge of his self-destructive ‘visibility’, his own patient-scientist researches on a potion for ‘invisibility’ and a repentant criminal in hiding seeks his own ‘visibility’ amidst a twisted love affair. What possibly could redeem them – three books landing in their hands by chance or would they have to wait forever in ‘The Waiting Room’?

Prof COTARD DEATH in his mid-50’s and a scientist researching on invisibility meets with a life-threatening road accident when his car crashes with the bike of Dr VIV SHADOW, a psychiatrist in his mid-30’s. As police officers approach them on a bridge to help, both the bleeding and dying men while staring at each other look back into their past few years back. The story begins in flashback.

Viv is handsome, sharp and yet undisciplined, a heavy drinker and snorter, self-destructive, loves the edge but scared of the bottomless pit beyond the edge, explores the darker side of life (favorite color ‘Black’) and finds himself ‘invisible’ in the eyes of his beloved ‘Dr HELENA EROS’ (working in same hospital as Viv). Viv believes himself ‘invisible’ in American society also as he is an Englishman with a shady past with his own father dying drunk on American shores.

Dr Helena is a divorcee staying alone with her son TREVOR and cannot fully trust Viv. Viv believes that Trevor will accept him as a father but Helena says “Trevor will not accept you”. She also hates AMBROSE, her divorced husband who is aggressive and although poetic in his outlook has a criminal past being indirectly responsible for the death of Helena’s father for which he spent years in prison. Ambrose hates Viv’s intimacy with Helena but is repentant and wants to live with his family again.

Cotard, who is ‘uncomfortable with his surname Death’ and ridiculed by many for his research on ‘invisibility’ finds himself disoriented in a hospital after a drowning accident of a bus, where many people die. He is under care of Dr Helena and post discharge under Dr Viv since Prof Cotard suffers from strange delusions – his believing that he himself is dead while others are alive thus making himself ‘invisible’, his hallucinations of himself decaying like rotten flesh, his seeing everything in shades of white (his favorite color is ‘White’). An eccentric Cotard’s favorite book is ‘The Invisible Man by HG Wells’ and loves his wife MAYA and daughter HARMONIA with whom he interacts strangely.

The sessions between Viv and Cotard are intense. While Viv gets intrigued by Cotard’s eccentricity and self-delusions of Cotard’s death, he himself is fighting his own demons. Viv gets introduced to two books ‘The Invisible Man by HG Wells’ and ‘Invisible Man by Emerson’. The quest for the ‘Enso circle, a perfect circle’ aspired by Viv influences Cotard as well. Viv seems to hide something from Cotard as he always tells Helena that it is not time to tell the truth yet to Cotard. When Viv asks Cotard, “If you are dead, how could you be speaking with me?”, a cheeky Cotard replies “Maybe you are dead too!”. A confused Viv names this delusion of Cotard as ‘Cotard’s Delusion’!xxx

The relationship between Helena, Ambrose and Viv gets complicated while Ambrose enjoys the weekend custody of Trevor. Ambrose himself gets uncomfortable while seeing an eerie resemblance of his own life with the life of Griffin (the principal character of The Invisible Man) when narrating the story to Trevor from the book which Helena gifted Trevor. A lost but repentant Ambrose also reads ‘The Mysterious Stranger by Mark Twain’, his favorite book. There is also ‘an unknown location like a waiting room’ with ‘A MASTER’ answering questions of three mysterious visitors separately. The ambience of the ‘waiting room’ also changes from time to time depending upon the mental state, favorite colors and worldview of the three visitors. Aphorisms from three books influence Cotard, Viv and Ambrose through ‘The Master’ at various times throughout. Police investigation into the drowning incident continues. As Viv realizes that Cotard’s research is not all wrong, Cotard on the other hand becomes more and more bizarre – losing both ‘hope and reason’. A secretive Viv also appears to lose his sanity to the extent that it becomes difficult to discern the doctor from the patient.

Finally, Helena takes Trevor to a carnival downtown. Ambrose decides to go there secretly (as if ‘invisible’ like ‘a mysterious stranger’). Cotard claims before Viv that he regularly meets Maya and Harmonia in the carnival at ‘The Hall of Mirrors’ every year. A curious Viv also goes. This coincidence makes all the characters meet at ‘The Hall of Mirrors’. As all of them separately stare at their own selves in the mirror, they gradually come to terms with their own demons as the song plays in the carnival “Even the greatest stars discover themselves in the looking glass…”. The ambience in the ‘Waiting Room’ also slowly is returning to some balance. It then becomes known that it was Viv, a close friend of Ambrose who had ditched Ambrose in the past, got him arrested so that Viv could live with Helena.

Just outside the Hall of Mirrors, Viv tells Cotard much to the relief of Helena what appears to be the truth that Cotard’s family is dead in bus drowning while Cotard himself is alive. A skeptical and unredeemable Cotard swears and leaves saying “All of you are remnants of a dead man’s imagination”.

Suddenly police arrive searching someone in the crowd much to the discomfort of Ambrose. Trevor (who already has read the end of the story ‘The Invisible Man’) is narrating the end to Ambrose in-front of Viv and Helena. Emotional Trevor breaks down saying that Griffin in the story (read Ambrose), betrayed by his doctor friend in the story (read Dr Viv) is finally killed by a mob and Griffin’s dying words were “Mercy! Mercy! Mercy!”. Meanwhile, police arrive and arrest Ambrose on grounds that his ‘yellow Honda Civic car’ was identified by few survivors of the drowning incident as being responsible for the bus accident as the car was travelling erratically. A confused Ambrose is taken away with Helena saying “Some people do not change”. Trevor begs falling on the ground “Mercy! Mercy!”, while an emotionally charged Viv kneels down and embraces Trevor saying “All stories do not end the same way” and telling Helena, “You were right about Trevor”. This brings Helena, Trevor and Viv closer.

Viv Shadow bikes off speedily but strangely towards the police station after writing something in a paper that he tucks into his pocket. A crazily charged Cotard and emotionally charged Viv are both speeding. Helena along with Trevor are also rushing to the police station. Ambrose is being taken in a police vehicle.

This is where the crash happens between Viv and Cotard, where ‘they both lie bleeding staring with awe and shock at each other’.

The dying confession note (taken from Viv’s pocket) states that it was his own yellow Honda Civic car (similar to Ambrose) that was responsible for the drowning mishap and he had disposed that car buying a bike after the accident, which he is driving now. The note talks of how another Englishman is lost in American shores and how Trevor made him lose both his love for Helena and hatred for Ambrose. He dies with the words “Mercy! Mercy! Mercy” on his lips. Cotard also dies trying to draw a ‘perfect Enso circle’ watching the full moon.

The ‘Unknown location/Waiting Room’ is now changed again. Viv (now wearing complete ‘White instead of black’) and Cotard (now wearing complete ‘Black’ instead of white) appears to have found a balance as they catch hold of the ‘invisible Master’ and the ambience now changes to the ‘perfect Yin and Yang’, where black and white are in perfect balance. A confident Viv who knows that he is dead says “I was dead. I mean I am dead” to which Cotard replies “If you are dead, how could you be speaking with me?” to which a confused Viv replies “Maybe you are dead too!”. The Invisible Master ends saying that he himself is a ‘mysterious stranger’ and while everyone knows that they are going to die, nobody surely knows that they are dead.

xxx Cotard Delusion is actually a psychological disorder, described first by neurologist Jules Cotard in 1880 where the patient believes that he is dead and his body is decaying or does not exist.

A trauma surgeon who suffers from alexithymia struggles mentally with the loss of his wife. Unable to mourn her death due to his condition, Stanley decides to rebuild his wife from the flesh of his patients. This screenplay, labeled as a deranged love story, dives into the psyche of a suffering yet meticulous man.

In the future, all recorded music is lost after a magnetic surge wipes out the digital database that stores the songs. Re-recordings are organised, leading to conflict over which song will be chosen to represent each past musical artist. Two fanatical groups of Roxy Music fans go to war over the choice of song for their band, leading to a final showdown involving the original singer of Roxy Music, Bryan Ferry.

One cold morning at the Apachieland saloon two men walked in and sat at the end of the bar to my right. One was a big fellow with wavy hair down to his shoulders, mustached and bearded---he looked like he’d seen better days. The other man was smaller, also bearded and mustached, and wore a bandanna on his head. I asked the big fella, ”What’s your name?” “Frank Kawaloski,” he smiled. “Are you guys with the film crew?” They nodded. I looked them over and said, “I hear the director is a Little Cesar and when he says jump, you ask how high?” The smaller man asked, “Do you want a shot of brandy in your coffee?” “Yes,” I replied, as it was freezing in the saloon. Frank asked if I was afraid, and I said, “NO! That guy better not try pushing me or…” and I raised my little fist and shook it. Frank looked at the smaller man and said, “Do you see that SAM? You better behave, or this little girl will part your hair!” “Really? I’m Sam Peckinpah.” We stared at each other for a bit then I said, “Gotta Go”, finished my coffee, jumped off the barstool, and skedaddled. 

When the film crew started working in town, I was an extra. Every time I turned around, I caught him looking at me. Understand, although people said I looked like Doris Day, I didn’t think so. I always had a weight problem and I didn’t like myself. I didn’t understand what was happening, as all my emotions were going crazy. Why this man? Why did I have these strong feelings for this old grizzly guy? I felt like I’d been hit by a truck, my heart hammered, and my head hurt. I wanted to run but needed the money, so worked and tried to keep my distance. 

The following day, Sam worked the crew from 8 AM to 3 AM. There was always tension on the set, but that night electricity was in the dry cold desert air. Sam looked at me and said, ”You walk by with that cowboy over there and be happy and gay.” “No, I’m tired, find somebody else.” Lucian Ballard looked at me pleadingly. “Ok”, I said, and picked a cowboy from our street shows, walked past the camera, turned, looked into the camera, and said, “Ha. Ha, Ha,” and kept walking. Sam softly said, “Cut… you, my dear are a rotten, rotten, Rotten actress!” “Do it again, Goddammit!” The second time I did do it perfectly. 

The next morning up at the barn standing near a beautiful black horse, I looked down the street and watched Sam standing in the middle of the road giving orders to the crew. You’ve heard of road rage, well, I had horse rage. Before I knew it, I was up on that black horse leaning down his neck and said, “You see that man? He called me a rotten, rotten, rotten actress. Let’s kill ‘em.” I kicked that horse and we thundered down the road hell-bent for leather. Sam saw us coming, didn’t move a muscle, and just stood there. Luckily the horse was smarter than me, sidestepped at the last instant so that my leg hit Sam’s arm, and twisted him into the direction we were going. 

Pulling up the horse, I looked back and saw Sam standing there looking at me with a Mona Lisa smirk on his face. 

The story is emotional, funny, and sad… 

The film ends with a mini-documentary...

Broken and suspended policeman becomes a victim of his own madness and gradually finds out unpleasant truth about himself and his past. Betrayed by his own mind, he is subject to despair, and even when the last ray of hope goes out, he reveals a fact that has been kept secret from him for years.