Sobriety Industry - Red Collision

LOGNILE

Lucho, an alcoholic, claims that it is possible to deceive abstinence tests with a pill created to sell sobriety for days.

SYNOPSIS

In a world where sobriety is a currency, Lucho, a recovering addict, suffers a relapse the day before reaching one year clean. Seconds after the relapse, he realizes his mistake: he has just thrown a year of sobriety in the trash. The next day, he attends the annual control therapy and lies to his therapist: he claims he is still sober.

The deception works until the therapist detects a suspicious facial tic. To be sure, they take a blood test on him. The test reveals that the patient used drugs in the last 24 hours. “You can lie to the app and deceive me, but you can’t lie to your blood.” This phrase resonates in his head for years until he meets Patricia, a doctor with whom they found their own company and launch “SOBER EXPRESS”, a revolutionary app that forgives relapses as long as the user consumes an encapsulated sobriety pill, an innovative low-cost pill that provides a day of sobriety to the consumer and allows them to pass drug tests. Their success provokes a lawsuit from rehabilitation foundations, triggering a fierce legal confrontation that reveals dark conspiracies in the rehabilitation industry, a hippocratic oath that only applies if there is money involved.

WRITER STATEMENT

Sobriety Industry is a fiction series conceived for 2 seasons, each season composed of 6 one-hour episodes. From an apparently absurd situation, the series aims to explore how behind the discourse of addiction lies an entire economic ecosystem based on false concern for improvement. In this story, LUCHO and his companions expose themselves to big fish who will do everything possible to recover their millions. The world as we know it has changed, but two things remain the same:

The little importance towards people’s recovery.

The only relevant thing is the money involved.

It is inspired by recent famous pharmaceutical drama stories such as The Dropout (2022), Dopesick (2021) and Painkiller (2022). Reassured of the potential of this genre, we feel that Sobriety Industry presents a different and novel premise that must be told, in which we use science fiction codes to expand our universe to an absurd world in which the well-being of humanity ceases to matter, and only appearances do, therefore displaying a reflection of the situations our society can probably reach.

DIRECTOR 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.

CHARACTER’S PROFILE

LUCHO (33):

Inspired by Steve Jobs, Lucho was attracted to technology and video games from a young age. Despite being self-taught and his disdain for academia, he yielded to family expectations and studied computer science and software

development. His encounter with marijuana during university provided him temporary relief from social anxiety, but he soon recognized his dependence and sought rehabilitation, investing his savings in the process despite the high cost. At the foundation, he met Dr. Bayona, who taught him how to play poker, which helped him face his addiction and refocus on his academic goals while being aware of the human mind’s capacity for “self-deception” and the idea of bluffing oneself, which Bayona repeatedly talked about.

After leaving rehab, Lucho is told about I’M SOBER mobile-app to track his sober days, which uses a reward system similar to a video game: it rewards him as he achieves milestones. Lucho relapses right before reaching one year due to the influence of his friend Brayan. He regrets this

mistake and, immersed in guilt, falsely reports on the mobile-app his one year of sobriety. He experiences an internal conflict between guilt over his relapse and the feeling of deserving a reward for his dedication. The next day, during therapy, Dr. Bayona discovers Lucho’s lie and sends him back to rehab.

CHARACTER’S PROFILE

DOCTOR BAYONA (47):

Bayona, a psychologist specialized in addictions, dedicates years of his life to rehabilitating addicts for many foundations. His poker skills give him the ability to detect lies in facial gestures, and with that influencing his master’s thesis on

self-deception. In his personal life, he maintains a stable marriage with Adriana, but his occasional encounters with Dr. Patricia Martínez awakens an intellectual and sexual connection that prompts him to improve professionally. Despite the moral conflict over his adultery, Bayona finds a way to redeem himself through his work and seeks happiness by providing wellbeing to his patients by unmasking self-deception.

After the second conference where he coincides with Patricia, he buys a second phone to stay in contact with her. He feels proud to turn on the phone once a month. He is addicted to collecting unanswered messages and missed calls from Patricia. When his wife reconnects with an old love, Bayona understands the importance of her value and decides to focus on his marriage. He locks the phone in a safe and dedicates himself completely to his

wife and patients, committed to not getting in touch with Patricia for a year. However, a patient’s relapse makes him question if he has the right to make mistakes as well.

CHARACTER’S PROFILE

PATRICIA MARTINEZ (38):

From a young age, Patricia was interested in the pharmaceutical industry. She found it incredible that human health could fit into “adult candies.” While other little girls played with dolls, Patricia played pharmacy: she would give candies to

everyone pretending to cure them of many diseases, from the common cold, to stomach cancer. But once a real stomach cancer took her grandmother’s life a terrifying truth was revealed to her: pills don’t cure everything.

As a teenager, she discovered ecstasy at electronic music parties, and then she understood that pills could also be addictive and dangerous. Several of her close friends become addicts, going back and forth between school classes and rehab facilities.

Patricia develops a great interest in health sciences. She studies medicine and specializes in pharmacy. Nonetheless, and despite being one of the top of the class, she developed a very critical stance towards the pharmaceutical industry and public health in general from a young age. Her grandmother’s costly treatments, the considerable amount she paid at university, and the exorbitant

fees her friends paid at rehab centers confirmed to her that health is only accessible to those who can afford it. The Hippocratic oath only applies if there is money involved. She frequently misses classes to attend health brigades in low-income neighborhoods and she doesn’t hesitate to sign medical prescriptions for low-income patients.

TONE

Following in the footsteps of series such as Silicon Valley (2014-2019), or Curb Your Enthusiasm (1999-2024), ENCAPSULATED SOBRIETY will appeal to cynicism as its general register and tone. Just as Silicon Valley ironically destroys with irony the culture of Silicon Valley startups, ENCAPSULATED SOBRIETY aims to do something similar with the pharmaceutical industry, app developers, and academic medical conferences.

Keeping in mind the influence of Aaron Sorkin in series like The Newsroom (2012-2014) or The West Wing (1999-2006), the goal is for the characters to fire at each other sharp dialogues like bullets. The intention is to emulate the epicness of the professional world featured in Sorkin’s series for the medical conference episode and the trial episode: work contexts where the characters speak to each other with intelligence, camaraderie and rather than just dialoguing, they “throw words at each other’s faces,” as Sorkin himself defines his dialogue style. Similarly, following Sorkin’s influence, the aim is for Lucho to have that tenacity and self-driving characteristic of the tech titan Steve Jobs.

Within that context, the epicness of the man (or woman) who invents something and changes the world is present in both Lucho and Patricia and is indebted to films such as The Social Network, the aforementioned Steve Jobs, and more recent examples like The Founder and Blackberry. The trial episode draws from the classic tradition of courtroom drama and the overall litigant heroism it aims to convey is indebted to Preminger’s Anatomy of a Murder, but specially to Frank Galvin interpreted by Paul Newman in The Verdict, that alcoholic, down-and-out lawyer who redeems himself by facing a corporate giant in court.