TWO ROADS DEVELOPMENT
Developed with the assistance of the BFI
INFORMATION
THE PREMISE
Two Roads follows Ashwin (Ash, 37) and Charlotte (Charlie, 34) Dhumal, and their daughter Emma (4).
They flipped a coin to decide who paid the bill on their first date, and have never stopped flipping it.
They have outsourced their decision making to avoid conflict. And it’s worked. They’re doing fine. They live in Leamington Spa (a move they flipped over), near Ash’s parents. They have a nice house (which they flipped a coin over buying). Charlotte is moving quickly up the recruitment ladder. Ash has written two successful novels with a third, slowly but surely, in process.
Underneath a well-functioning facade, they have spent years avoiding important conversions, ignoring their differences, and failing to communicate effectively. The coin is a crutch that has created the illusion of a successful marriage.
These are two very different people. Ash is close to his parents; Charlotte doesn’t speak to her family. Ash has always been financially supported; Charlie is proudly self-made. Ash is thoughtful, considered, cerebral; Charlie decisive, action-orientated, ruthless. Ash is firmly left-wing, Charlie more centre-right.
None of these facts should necessarily prevent a happy marriage. In fact, if the two of them could learn to use their complementary skill sets, then they could be hugely successful in any scenario. But neither has taken that leap. They’ve both become complicit in their avoidance, of conflict, of their differences, of anything that might catalyse the end they both secretly fear is inevitable. They have both become reliant on the coin - whilst resenting the other for doing so.
We meet them one summer evening in a slightly dystopian near future. And when the government announces a mysterious crisis, and the creation of a number of Resettlement Zones to save just a proportion of the population, Ash and Charlotte are faced with the hardest decision of their lives. They are given just two tickets to the Zones. For their family of three. And they have only 12 hours to work out what to do.
They are intitially brought together in this moment of crisis - they must save their daughter, whatever happens. But will they be able to stay united as the night goes on? As things they have successfully ignored for years begin to bubble to the surface … As the world around them responds to an unprecedented emergency … This is a relationship stress test like no other. They begin to flip coins to make increasingly impossible decisions.
We follow Ash and Charlie as they try to negotiate this strange and lawless new world. Viewers will be able to decide the result of each coin flip as Ash and Charlie face more and more terrifying situations, and are pushed to the limits of their characters, and their partnership.
Will this reignite their love as they face the possibility of losing one another? Will they be driven to betray each other as the world closes in?
Our leads think there’s two roads - his or hers. We show that there are many.
OUR GUIDING PRINCIPALS
Two Roads is a film about communication, positionality, agency and responsibility. Two people who have muted their communication, suppressed their positionality and outsourced their choice - relinquishing their agency and diminishing their responsibility - are suddenly forced to make enormous decisions under unprecedented pressure. They find themselves in situations where communicating their wants, making decisions, and taking responsibility for their choices become unavoidable.
Our universe sets out to reward or punish our protagonists for their ‘good’ or ‘bad’ behaviour using these markers, as they are pulled closer together or driven further apart by the extremity of their situation.
If they overcome their reliance on the coin and take control of their decision-making, they’ll be rewarded. If they confront their positionality, recognising their differences and using them to work as a team. If they learn to communicate effectively, rather than avoiding difficult conversations. But if they fail to do these things, continue to rely on the coin, use their differences to weaken each other, or commit particularly heinous acts, the universe will often teach them a lesson.
This is not something a viewer will necessarily be aware of, but we believe that this guiding internal morality will ensure a thematic consistency across all different versions of the film.
In every version of the film:
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Ash and Charlie address what the coin means for their relationship, and for them as people. They confront what their use of the coin means.
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They’re forced to accept responsibility for their actions, or accept what their actions meant (rather than just blaming the coin).
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They confront their past - things they have avoided, what has been left unaddressed.
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Using the coin weighs on them - especially when they’re using it to do morally abhorrent things.
The above will happen more or less successfully depending on which version of the film the Dhumals find themselves in. Are they communicating well? Have they been brought together in a moment of jeopardy? Are they blaming each other for the night’s events? Either way, a happy ending requires the Dhumals to stop using the coin.
This concept is unique in that the format, themes, and narrative of the story are fundamentally interwoven. Our conceit (the coin) is derived from the very character traits it aims to expose and interrogate. The coin is meaningful to our characters. It will become meaningful to our viewers.
Our characters are complex and fallible. They will appear very relatable as the story begins. And as it takes them on its rollercoaster ride, they can, and will, become a number of different people. Their best selves, their worst selves. Their most instinctual and their most thoughtful. Their most noble and their most selfish. They will die and inspire others; they will survive against the odds to protect their families. They will stick to and completely abandon their principles. They will be civilians and soldiers. Murderers and saviours. Charlotte will become more like Ash, and Ash more like Charlotte.
This unique format will allow us to see the full potential of our characters - both those in the lead and supporting. Haven’t you ever wondered what you might be capable of, if the circumstances were right? Well, Two Roads lets us play out that curiosity. And discover each character's extremes. Everything they CAN become.
We’re interested in moral ambiguity, in grey areas. We want the audience see-sawing back and forth between who’s right, out of Ash and Charlotte – and who they’d follow, or be, in a crisis like this one. Often both characters are, to some extent, in the right, and this is why the decisions they make, and the viewers make, are hard.
THE FORMAT | Structure
Every storyline begins with Chapter One and is made up of 5 or 6 chapters that aim to challenge our characters more and more as the story develops. We want to take our viewers on a journey - from relatable if uncomfortable circumstances, to terrifying, devastating extremes.
Each chapter ends with a coin flip as the characters encounter a decision they are unable to make, at which point the audience can choose: heads or tails. One of two scenes will then unfold as a result of the decision made. Usually, Ash or Charlie will have ‘won’ the toss. As the story develops, though, so does our relationship to the coin. Each of our protagonists may flip a coin alone. Their bad habit may be passed on to another - a friend, a relative. Their daughter.
There are 32 possible endings to the Dhumals’ story - some joyous, some utterly tragic. Our guiding principles determine where an ending falls on this spectrum.
As we move through the film’s timeline, and each decision our central couple has to make, the stakes are raised for their relationship, and the safety of their family. The audience is asked to make more difficult and morally challenging decisions with each flip of the coin. Unlike many other interactive film experiences, our world is self-contained. The characters are aware that they are submitting to a ‘higher power’, and to random choice, and buy into the journey themselves.
Our guidelines for the intensity of these flips are roughly as follows:
1st flip: Intriguing but not too challenging.
2nd flip: A hard decision based on the developing world around our protagonists.
3rd flip: Mischievous, morally ‘off’ – persuading someone to do something bad, stealing something from someone, letting someone die who we don’t know (maybe they’re no good), lying to your family …
4th or 5th flip: Personally fucked up - killing someone; letting someone die selfishly or maliciously (perhaps someone close to you); betraying the person closest to you.
Some 5th flips: Abhorrent - disastrous for the country, for instance.
We are forcing Ash and Charlie, in every instance, into tighter and tighter corners, harder and harder decisions. But, if they’re imaginative, if they’re brave, if they’re selfless, there might be ways out of such predicaments …
We are not only asking our characters to interrogate their own agency - our viewers will have to do the same thing. Asked to take responsibility for these increasingly morally challenging decisions on our lead characters’ behalf, viewers will naturally think about and on behalf of our characters. They will take sides, and perhaps even confront their own positionality as the consequences of their decisions play out. Consequences that may not always be what the viewer, or the Dhumals, expect.
This structure will encourage many viewers to go back and investigate the roads not taken. To explore the ‘what ifs’ of the situations they have caused to unfold. Some will seek disaster, some a happy ending, some will want to solve the mystery of the night’s events.
And some will just want to watch a single great film.
Our explorations of the capacity for varying genres, characters, and thematic explorations via the different roads make Two Roads a unique, narrative driven, interactive experience.
There are elements of a propulsive thriller, survival horror or even a dark satire in some of the film. There is high drama, marital collapse, elements of an apocalypse or disaster movie. In our various strands, we lean on some of these more than others. This stylistic variety is key to the chaos within Two Roads, where shifts in an already off-kilter world reveals a world stranger and more disconcerting than perhaps first expected.
VIEWER ENGAGEMENT
We anticipate that most viewers will want to engage in the interactive element of the film. So we have developed the concept to make it as satisfying as possible for those that do want to go back and explore. We will encourage repeat engagement. But we also envisage that there will be the option for viewers to randomise the coin flips, for those who want to watch a single film without having to choose. We will also ensure that each individual film is equally compelling, satisfying, seamless and fulfilling as a stand-alone feature.
Two Roads is a unique experience straddling interactive entertainment and epic feature film.
We want each road to be a complex feature film, offering a variety of endings - some happy, some sad; some euphoric, some brutal; some blunt, some mysterious; some satirical, some melodramatic; some horrifying, some beautiful. And in getting to these endings, viewers will traverse a wide variety of genres. Will you watch a thriller, an action movie, a black comedy, domestic drama, folk horror… Anything is possible in this unique set of circumstances,
Each road ends at around 7am. We always have, if not a definite answer about our leads’ fate, a clear sense of it. And there is a Happiest Ending - noted in that particular chapter. Viewers will be encouraged to consider the ‘what ifs’ of each of their choices at the end of the film they have just watched - and helped create.
The more they watch, the more familiar they will become with the rules of the Two Roads Universe. The more they will be aware of the mysteries it hides within it. The more they might seek to solve those mysteries.
We expect that on average, viewers will engage with the material for the equivalent viewing time of a season of television.
BONUS CONTENT
The format of the show lends itself to the inclusion of bonus content that can be unlocked by our viewers. This might include:
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The ability to unlock the full story map once a certain percentage of the content has been viewed, so viewers are able to navigate around the various stories, and keep track of what they have viewed.
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Possible snapshots of each of the ‘roads not taken’ as the viewer makes their choice. A short montage of flashes of what ‘could have been’ will intrigue viewers. A similar snapshot at the end of each film - glimpses of what could have been in an alternate road.
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There is also the option for these flashes to happen during the series of ‘almost flips’, where our characters consider using the coin and think better of it. The expanse of possibility in these characters’ worlds will be ever-present in the minds of our viewers.
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We are interested in exploring whether there might be further unlockable content - the option to see inside a COBRA meeting, to enter someone else’s house, to further explore one of our subplots.
The world is so full of possibilities for material that could draw current viewers into more viewing hours, and exciting viewing experiences that might draw new viewers and/or subscribers in.
THE WORLD | The Government
The world of Two Roads is the near future. In sight of our present. It will feel familiar, but with subtle, dystopian shifts that make the events of the night possible. ID bracelets sit on the wrist of every citizen. The government is overbearing and manipulative - with increased surveillance - but also employs ‘survival of the fittest’ tactics - leaving its citizens to fight certain things out amongst themselves. They're hard on the rules, big on law and order, but very open to the market, to individual liberty.
Tickets to the Resettlement Zone are allocated based on who’s listed as in a residence on a census - rolling, to keep close tabs on the population. Tickets are placed on individual’s ID bracelets, but can be transferred to other citizens.
Regulations on industry are lax - the potential dire consequences of which will become apparent in some strands.
Relations with other countries have worsened - conspiracy theories are rife.
The military is more present, more powerful, and more self-contained.
All of these elements create the perfect pressure cooker for a very dangerous situation.
Individualism reigns, and there are those who will use this night to play out their desires. Purge-style.
It is this self interest, self preservation, that will be our characters’ undoing - can they resist it and fight together? Even fight for the greater good?
THE CRISIS
The Crisis is the catalyst for the night’s events. In our current version of this crisis, lax government regulations have led to a chemical leak into the water supply, which is spreading fast. The government is engaged in a cover up to hide their culpability, but in various roads, scientists will work out what has happened.
The chemical leak will cause symptoms that reduce a person’s capacity for rational thought (again, this ties in with our central conceit). Their body will degenerate, and they will die - often quickly.
This structure offers a number of layers that can impact the story - the risk of poisoning, the symptoms, the government response, citizens’ theories and response, the implications of a cover-up …
In this treatment, we have the crisis do what we want it to. We use it to cause hallucinations, to make people angry, to mysteriously strike people down. We’re using it to serve our story, and we’re using it to give as wide a range of exciting events as possible. We plan to workshop the specifics and logic in future stages.
In our writers room, we discovered that the emergency behind the government’s panic could effectively be a number of things. The symptoms will play a part in many roads, but, primarily, it is the response of the government and its citizens to the crisis that will be central to how the story unfolds.
At 7pm the Prime Minister appears, to address the nation. She announces that there’s a serious and fast-moving national emergency underway. There will be an immediate curfew, and what sounds concerningly like the introduction of immediate marshal law. Public transport is shut down. Britain’s borders are closed.
The details of what is happening are withheld by the government, so citizens are asked to trust in their leaders, whilst battling the inevitable suspicion as to what is going on. Our characters will be pitted against each other as they argue over who and what they can trust, what might be at the bottom of the night's events, and what the powers that be might be trying to achieve.
As the military steps in to fill a vacuum, tensions only increase, and individual responses to news of a developing crisis and information leaks are instrumental in how the world changes for our leads.
Viewers will only discover the full nature of the crisis by watching multiple roads. No details are ever confirmed earlier than the Chapter Fours, and usually much later. And, even then, viewers will only get a small piece of the puzzle each time. There will be strands where our leads stumble upon the cover-up; where they unwittingly help to discover the chemical leak; where they uncover a covert investigation being carried out by Ash’s school friend, Curtis; where they become victims. There will be strands where the crisis itself remains almost entirely a mystery. There will be strands where viewers are fed a red herring as to what the crisis might be.
THE RESETTLEMENT ZONES
The Resettlement Zones are a hurried plan devised by the government in response to a fast-moving emergency they are working to understand.
But it is clear from their ability to roll out the plan quickly that such a crisis is not entirely unforeseen.
At 8pm, an announcement states that the government has built a number of ‘Resettlement Zones’ in secret locations. There has been a lottery, based on census data and location, for who gets tickets for the Resettlement Zones. Tickets are issued from a government website, and downloaded onto ID bracelets. Ticket holders will be picked up from their homes at a specified ‘pick up time’, by the authorities, and taken to the transport to their specified Zone. If for whatever reason ticket holders do not want their spot in the Zone, they are free to transfer their tickets to another citizen. Only ticket holders can come to the Resettlement Zone, and this includes children. Citizens are advised to keep this scheme quiet, for their own safety and the safety of the nation.
The Resettlement Zones have been established in Wales - it is believed that the area is safe from the crisis (for now). Areas of towns and cities have been cordoned off, homes commandeered, and temporary settlements established at these sites. The military are in charge of transport to and management of the Zones. Rumours abound of differential treatment of citizens within the Zones - VIPs and government officials treated differently to normal citizens.
But the Resettlement Zones are, on face value, the obvious safe choice. If the government has chosen to set them up, they must be necessary, so it can be assumed that staying outside of the Zones will be the more dangerous option. At least for Charlie, it seems clear that the safest aim for the night should be to try and get all three of them to the Zone or, failing that, to choose who takes Emma.
But the events of the film will challenge this black-and-white narrative. As the Zones are essentially establishing a new society, there is a desire for effective rule over them, which can lead to dire consequences for our characters and those around them.
In some strands, our leads are privy to the corrupt, self-interested, right-wing leadership within the Zones and are faced with the choice of whether to comply or fight for the greater good. They will face the consequences of the fierce struggles for citizens to make it to the Zones, they will see the various different living conditions it offers to its citizens. Though perhaps safe from the unfolding crisis, the complexities of humanity and society’s response are still very present. Nothing is simple in this opportunistic new world.
LOCATIONS
We begin Two Roads in Ash and Charlie’s house. Much of the early action of the film will unfold here. Although, very early in the film, we will see small clues of the worlds we may later visit - flashes of our subsidiary characters’ lives as they experience the crisis.
Depending on which road you are watching, the film takes places across a series of key locations, as our characters are pushed to leave their house and enter the increasingly dangerous outside world. These locations will be visited at different times of the night in different versions of the film, and will therefore be seen in different states, presenting different levels of danger. A fully manned roadblock at 9pm may have lost its soldiers by 1am, as troops are pulled out or die. The Pick Up Point may be fully functioning on one visit, and completely destroyed in another.
Some of our key locations include:
Ash and Charlotte’s House: 3 bedroom. Semi-detached. Patio doors lead out to a garden. Neighbours to either side, and, after an alley-way between gardens, behind them too.
The Cul-de-sac: In the suburbs of Leamington Spa. Ash and Charlotte’s house is near the entrance to the cul-de-sac, and is one of the smaller houses. Nosy neighbour Penny’s house is the largest, and the furthest into the cul-de-sac.
The Local Area: There are a number of nearby housing estates, with households with starkly different levels of wealth. There’s a council estate. There’s an old mental asylum converted into swanky flats. There’s a corner shop. There’s a food van.
The Smiths’ House: Next door to the Dhumals. The Samaans, a refugee family reside here with the now elderly Smiths, staying in an extension that’s been built above the garage.
Anand and Vidya’s House: Ash’s parents live in a large, 5 bedroom house on the outskirts of Leamington Spa. Up a driveway, with fewer neighbours around. Fields behind them.
Darren’s Flat: A swanky bachelor pad in Leamington Spa. The Kings live in a neighbouring apartment.
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Airfield: The Pick Up Point where ticket holders from Ash and Charlotte’s area are loaded onto buses for the Resettlement Zones. There is a small ‘backstage’ area at the airfield, where the soldiers change into hazmat suits and take breaks. There is a thin chain link fence surrounding the airfield, to keep out intruders, along with soldiers guarding the perimeter.
Amy and Bill’s House: Charlie’s father and sister live in a council estate in Leamington Spa. 2 bedroom.
Curtis’s House: A 3 bedroom house not far from Charlotte and Ash’s, in a nearby community. Unglamorous, but becomes a hotbed of action when Curtis unwittingly puts his family in great danger.
Wildman Farm: A farm near Birmingham owned by Charlie’s ‘Uncle’ Jim. There are beautiful woods, and a lake. Charlotte came on some holidays here as a kid – which she hated at the time, but now she dreams about it. Jim is a bit of a prepper, and he has a bunker in the woods. It’s pretty small, but it’ll weather an emergency.
The Dhumals’ Holiday Cottage: A cottage in Portscatho, Cornwall, backing onto a beach. There’s a small motorboat, locked to a dock. Ash spent a lot of good holidays here in his childhood. During the crisis, a nationalist militia forms in the local area. They want to stop people crossing into the area. There’s a slight folk horror feel to them.
The Eden Project: A tourist destination in Cornwall. Two biomes contain a diverse array of plants.
Swansea Resettlement Zone: The Resettlement Zone that the Dhumals receive 2 tickets to. It’s based in and around Swansea, in South Wales. It accommodates five hundred thousand people. It’s strictly regimented, but there are comforts and leisure activities. Soldiers defend it, with the Head of the Army based there.
Central Wales: Relative wilderness, but rumoured to be the safest alternative to the Resettlement Zones.
A pair of Roadside Diners: One close to Wildman farm, one on the way to Cornwall. The latter holds fond holiday memories for the Dhumals.
TIMELINE
As we have developed this treatment, we have kept track of a key timeline of common events. This is just a sample of what will in time be a much more complex granular timeline map, with some timings consistent across all strands, and some interrupted by our leads. For example:
7pm: The Prime Minister’s announcement of the crisis.
8pm: The results of the lottery are published, and the tickets are released.
8.15pm: Anti-curfew protesters clash with soldiers on the streets of Leamington Spa. Our leads will only encounter this in some strands.
9pm: The government contacts ticket holders to notify them of the Pick Up Points they can flee to if their house is not safe.
10pm: Government document leaks showing that mass casualties are expected.
10.30pm: The Internet goes down, besides the ‘Government Gateway’. (The government has ordered Internet Service Providers to shut down their services.)
11pm: Gunshots in the near distance, as heard from Ash and Charlie’s house. They will not always be there at this point, but it will inform them of impending and growing danger outside.
11.30pm: A looter (20s) tries to break into Ash and Charlotte’s house. They will alternately be successful, decide against it, or be killed, depending on our leads’ actions.
A mob attacks a house near Charlotte’s family’s house. Our leads will only occasionally be witness to this.
11.45pm: An intruder goes to Curtis’s house. Our leads will interact with this intruder in a number of ways across various different threads. In some, they will do nothing about it.
12.20am: A group of young white men attack the Smith house.
1.30am: If Ash and Charlotte hide in their house and do not get involved with their neighbours’ plans, spiralling events lead to soldiers massacring their neighbours in the cul-de-sac.
By this time of night, the authorities are struggling, and pulling back (towards the Zones). Too many of them are dead, too many citizens are moving about, too many of their superiors have stopped getting in touch.
3.30am: A foreign power drops bombs on London and Birmingham.
5am: Charlotte and Ash’s pick up time.
7am: A young scientist at the Resettlement Zone realises what is causing the crisis. In some threads, the Dhumals will have facilitated this discovery happening earlier.
In many threads, the Pick up Point will be destroyed, either by protesters or earlier, as a knock on effect of Ash and Charlie’s actions. We are interested in exploring common events happening at different times dependent on our leads’ interventions - an exploration of ‘the butterfly effect’, and the potential, seemingly small consequences of our actions that can have big knock on effects elsewhere.
STILL TO DISCOVER | Our aims
The next stage in our development would be to script a pilot, and enter into a writers room, where we could fully address the details of our parallel roads.
This process would involve ironing out the intricacies of the granular timeline of the film - events that happen or don’t happen, dependent on the actions of our principal characters, and the knock on effects of those actions; as well as events outside of their control, consistent in every timeline, but experienced in different ways depending on our characters’ journeys.
We have gone some way to achieving this in the work we have done so far, but look forward to interrogating it further.
We are also aware of some areas that we would invite more brains, sometimes expert opinions, to develop and deepen our understanding of various elements of the story and how this might unfold, to name a few:
The world - we are in a slightly dystopian near future, and look forward to interrogating the details of this future - the government, military, lifestyle, and further embellishing the unique set of circumstances that allow this night to unfold.
The crisis - now that we know what narrative function we would like the effects of the crisis to serve, we want to interrogate further the intricacies of the chemical leak, symptoms and transmission, to achieve consistency across strands. We are open to switching up the details of the crisis itself as it is largely the response of our government and its citizens to this crisis that we are narratively interested in.
We would want to go back and plant seeds of the government cover up, for those that find that mystery particularly appealing. This is something we’d want to be intriguing, exciting, and ultimately feasible in our future world.
One of our storylines involves Central Wales being ‘safe’ for citizens - this is something that is useful, but something we need to interrogate further as we develop the details of the crisis.
Travel - the intersection of the curfew and our protagonists’ need to travel is something that needs further exploration - how is this travel possible, what obstacles might they face, how many others might be trying the same thing. How do the unfolding events of the night change people’s behaviour? What events will encourage people to stay in their homes or break curfew? What will increase or decrease military presence in their path? We want to take our leads to new locations, and explore the complexities of how this can or can’t happen in various scenarios.
We will also need to fully trial the timings involved in all of our travel - do we need to move any of our locations (ie the Resettlement Zone) to make our timelines possible and consistent with all the obstacles the characters are likely to encounter.
The “humankind” factor - we would like to further explore the capacity of humanity to respond differently to moments of crisis. We are confident that we have included a wide range of pressure points to increase the jeopardy our protagonists find themselves in, and the difficulty of the decisions our audiences have to make. We would like to explore opportunities to reflect more community-focussed responses, well documented in times of crises - restaurants giving away food for free, companies redirecting resources, and other charitable acts. As per Rutger Bergman’s take on the instincts of mankind, we can offer more hope amongst our human landscape!
All of these things contribute to a complex and developing world outside of our protagonists (what we call the granular timeline), which they will sometimes impact. This world will need to be consistent across strands, and we look forward to adding an extra layer of detail to this interrogation, to make sure that everything lines up and is watertight, as we expand our team.
THE CONTINUATION OF THE WORLD
Both the form and content of Two Roads lend themselves perfectly to possible sequels, prequels, or even parallel stories that similarly interweave form and narrative to explore a filmic world in a way never seen before.
Some of our ideas for such expansions include:
A coin flip by two politicians goes the other way, and this film’s crisis never happens. 5 years on, Ash and Charlotte are divorced, with new partners. They’re forced back together - and into flipping coins - by a new global catastrophe.
Two friends of Ash and Charlie’s decide to give coin flipping a go during the same crisis as in this film.
Years on, Emma has survived this catastrophe (leading on from her ending in the orphanage). Brought up flipping the coin in a dark, self interested world, she is ruthless. This world-view is challenged when a new crisis strikes …