Between the Lines

ONE LINER: The encounter between the best interviewer in the world and an actor addicted to questions leads to “Between the Lines”: an interview show that redefines fiction and reality showing how ridiculous people can be when something goes viral.

SYNOPSIS: Zuluaga is a famous actor addicted to answering questions. Pedraza is a film critic turned successful interviewer. The television event “Between the Lines” brings the two interview celebrities together, but fails when both keep silent out of mutual respect. The audience, outraged by the unfulfilled expectation, demands a second version. With the help of Aponte, a talented interview scriptwriter, “Between the Lines” becomes a media hit by offering increasingly absurd questions and answers that challenge the official story. “Between the Lines” turns the interview into the most important fiction genre of the 21st century. However, Zuluaga’s overweening ambition leads him to leave the team and launch his solo career. The actor opens a YouTube channel where he uploads self-interviewing videos. His solo project fails and, although Zuluaga attempts a comeback with Pedraza and Aponte, it is too late: the public is already immersed in the trend of self-interviewing, leaving “Between the lines” in the shadows.

TECHNICAL DETAILS

WRITER: Deivis Cortes
FORMAT: Feature Film
GENRE: Mockumentary
RUNNING TIME: 90 minutes
ORIGINAL LANGUAGE: English
COUNTRY: Colombia
SHOOTING FORMAT: 2.35 l 4k

WRITE STATEMENT

In the book Conversations with Al Pacino, the actor agrees to be interviewed by journalist Lawrence Grobel after having been reluctant to be interviewed for years. Pacino confesses that he felt so comfortable with the interview that he dreamed he retired from acting and devoted himself exclusively to giving interviews. This dreamlike fantasy is the main trigger for Between the Lines. It’s the kind of ironic jokes, “nonsense” that could never happen, exaggerations and absurd nonsense that tend to be my main creative and life drivers. Instead of thinking “it’s impossible for an actor to give up acting and give interviews”, I decided to build a plot and characters where that premise could comfortably inhabit.

Between the Lines posits a world where the interview was the center of everything; the questions and answers of a specialized interview ceased to be

the stuff of nerds, researchers and journalists to become a media spectacle that affects the whole world.

In an interview the interlocutor may hesitate, pause, make mistakes, but in the final text the mistakes are eliminated and the phraseology is corrected so that the reading experience is as clear and clean as possible. Annotations are also introduced to give the reader an idea of the body movements that take place during the dialogue. All of the above relates the written interview to theatrical writing and, therefore, to the possibility of falsifying reality by taking advantage of the reader’s trust in the text. Between the lines also meant exploring this correction/falsification to the absurd, creating interview texts where things happen that not only did not happen in the real world but could not happen in any possible world: a fiction posing as real (documentary) where falsification plays a central role.

This project uses comedy that moves away from physical jokes and common humor to bet on the absurd as an ally. Monty Python, Groucho Marx, Billy Wilder, Woody Allen and Larry David are clear influences, as well as the discomfort of The Office and Arrested Development. A person giving an interview is a sober and solemn situation. However, if that situation is filled with nonsensical speech it generates an effect of contrast, strangeness and bewilderment. What excites me most about making a mockumentary is to put people talking nonsense without flinching; flaunting a sober and solemn delivery. Between the lines is a machine for generating bewilderment.

Deivis Cortés.

WRITER’S BIOGRAPHY

Deivis Cortés (1986): Master in Creative Writing. Filmmaker and audiovisual critic. University professor. Writer. Comedian.

He has collaborated in the magazines Kinetoscopio, Arcadia, El Espectador, Rio Grande Review, among other publications. He has taught film at several universities in Bogota. In 2010 he won the Centro Cultural España Córdoba Award for Best Celumetraje with the short film “Trivia(l)”. Cast member of the web series “Con ánimo de ofender” (2018-2021).

Director of the web series “Clasificado” (2019) and Turisteandup (2021). Director of the podcast “Cinentender: comedians talking about cinema” (2020–2021) Member of the podcast “Podcastinando (2020) and Por La Ventana PODCAST (2023)

He was one of the scriptwriters of the animated series “La estación” (2023) Author of the short story book Interfaz (Editorial 531) and the novel Ojo Midas (Escarabajo Editorial) Creator and host of the podcast RAYONES DE CINE (2022-2024).

COMPANY’S
BIOGRAPHY

Red Collision, established in 2017 is an audiovisual production company with more than six years of experience that reshapes entertainment with original films, gripping genre series, and top-tier production services. In 2020 they produced their first feature film called UN TAL ALONSO QUIJANO, directed by LIBA STELLA GÓMEZ with the support of Dago García Producciones and Caracol Televisión; it was released in 2021 with a digital strategy, reaching more than 500,000 viewers.

It also has a portfolio of projects in development for sale. Its feature film “The Trail” is a crime thriller that won the FDC in the category of post production and will be released in 2024. Currently, 4 more projects are underway, 2 in post-production: “I call them souls” and “Enemy in the mirror” and 2 scheduled for filming in 2024, all slated for release between 2025 and 2026.

Red Collision introduced “Red Script Factory” in 2024, a dynamic writers’ room that is a hive of constant ideation, crafting captivating stories and epic scripts to revolutionize original content. With a portfolio of projects in development for sale they’re here to redefine storytelling excellence.

LOOK AND FEEL

CHARACTER PROFILE

His aversion to the media is based on the fact that he considers them banal and alien to the real acting profession. Trained in the theater, he takes his profession very seriously and assumes his work in film and television as necessary and nourishing evils. He is fond of Shakespeare, Harold Pinter and David Mamet’s plays. In his spare time he recites texts from Richard III so as not to lose touch with what he considers “true art”. The events of Between the Lines confront him with his own repressed banality: he loves to talk about himself and to answer questions, much more than he is willing to admit.

ZULUAGA

ZULUAGA: BALD, BEARDED AND ROBUST TALENTED, DISCIPLINED. AND EXTREMELY RESERVED ACTOR

CHARACTER PROFILE

Addicted to movies and audiovisual fiction in general. He feels that life is what happens between movies. Reading and writing about cinema is a way to keep movies alive, while it’s time to see the next release or to fill film gaps. Addicted to dates, names and data, he finds in film criticism a profession that allows him to live from his obsessions. He becomes an interviewer to learn more about films by going to the primary source: their creators. His association with Between the Lines forces him to work with an actor he considers mediocre, despite his international recognition. The pragmatism he learned in film journalism allows him to survive almost any experience.

PEDRAZA

SLIM AND INCISIVE LOOK. FIL CRITIC.

CHARACTER PROFILE

She is able to see connections between apparently unrelated facts. She considers creativity to be an unstoppable force that is alien to morals and scruples. From her point of view, lies are nothing more than fictions judged from a moral standpoint. Since she was a child she wanted to be a writer like Dorothy Parker or Alice Munro; however, her social class and the machismo of her environment condemned her to work to survive. Although she did not study for a university degree, she continued to write privately and the events of Between the Lines allowed her to channel her creativity into a massive product.