A Story Idea Each Day for a Month — Day 8

This is the 12th year in a row I’ve run this series in April. Why a story idea each day for the month? Several reasons which I’ll work my through during this series of posts. Here’s another one:

You always need more than one in your gun.

Want that explained? Go here to read a Business of Screenwriting post.

Today’s story idea: 3-Year-Old Boy Remembers His Past Life, Locates His Body & Identifies The Man Who Murdered Him.

This article, however, focuses on a different case. And it starts with a doctor named Eli Lasch, a prominent physician in Israel who served as a senior consultant in the coordination of health services in the Gaza Strip. He passed away in 2009, but before he did, he was investigating a supposed reincarnation case in which a three-year old boy claimed to have remembered a past life. In this life, he remembered being struck by a big blow to the head with an axe, and having a long, red birthmark on his head.

The present-day boy, whose name remained confidential throughout the entire study, also had a birthmark in the exact same spot, which is interesting because multiple studies, like the one published in Explore, point out how shared birthmarks are common to children who remember their past lives.

The group went through the village and at one point the boy pointed out this past life house. Curious bystanders gathered around and suddenly the boy walked up to a man and called him by name. The man acknowledged that the boy correctly named him and the boy then said:

“I used to be your neighbor. We had a fight and you killed me with an ax.”

Dr. Lasch then observed that this man’s face suddenly became white as a sheet. The 3-year-old than stated:

“I even know where he buried my body.”

The boy then led the group, which included the accused murderer, into fields that were located nearby. The boy stopped in front of a pile of stones and reported:

“He buried my body under these stones and the ax over there.”

Depending upon how one approached this story concept, The Sixth Sense could be a good reference: A child who has a supernatural capability.

That said, I don’t think a mere mystery story —finding the person who murdered the boy in a past life — can sustain a movie.

I do like the idea of an expert paired with a boy. Riffing off another movie association (The Exorcist), what if something about the boy’s past life ties into the expert? That may be tricky to pull off so it’s not complete coincidence: The expert just happens to intersect with a boy who just happens to have something to do with the expert’s life.

Suddenly, I remember something from my youth. When my family moved to Virginia Beach, Virginia, I heard about a local psychic named Edgar Cayce.

Edgar Cayce (18 March 1877–3 January 1945) was an American clairvoyant who claimed, uniquely, to channel his own higher self. Cayce’s channeling sessions happened in a trance state that he would induce with help from his friend Al Layne or his wife until later in life, when he became accustomed enough to do so on his own. During these sessions, Cayce would answer questions on subjects as varied as healing, reincarnation, dreams, the afterlife, past-life, nutrition, Atlantis and future events. As a devout Christian and Sunday school teacher, his channelling claims were a source of trouble for him because channelling was typically criticized by practitioners of his faith as being demonic. Cayce, in contrast, believed that it was his subconscious mind exploring the dream realm, where he believed minds were timelessly connected. Cayce founded a nonprofit organization, the Association for Research and Enlightenment, to store and facilitate the study of his channelings, as well as run a hospital. A biographer gave him the nickname The Sleeping Prophet. Some consider him the true founder and a principal source of the most characteristic beliefs of the New Age movement.

My father and uncle told me stories about attending his sessions. People whose readings Cayce did swore by his ability to see into their past. Plus, he was a big believer in reincarnation.

Circling back to our story, what if the boy is a phenomenon? There is a spiritual movement based upon his readings, a cult group of believers. The group has generated some bad press based upon some sketchy recent events. For example, what if the boy did a reading in which they predicted that the person in that session was going to commit suicide? The boy stated the exact time and place. Sure enough, the person did kill themselves, all just like the details in the prediction. A family sued the group, stating that the boy didn’t predict anything, rather planted a message in the mind of the victim to provoked their death.

So, bad press. How to turn that around? Invite a skeptical journalist to do an in-depth, inside story of the boy and his followers.

It occurs to me there are several possible story paths:

• The journalist is “seduced” (psychologically) by the boy and becomes a cult member.
• The boy convinces the journalist that he (the boy) is being held captive, so the journalist and the boy escape… a chase story.
• There are mysteries in the journalist’s past and the boy leads the journalist into an investigation of his past lives.

I’m not locking into a specific angle. This happens sometimes, actually oftentimes with working with story concepts. It’s rare that a story concept immediately conjures up a narrative.

Thus, I leave today’s story idea at this juncture. My 8th story idea this month. If you like it, do with it what you will. It’s YOURS. And it’s free!

Day 1
Day 2
Day 3
Day 4
Day 5
Day 6
Day 7

Each day in April, I invite you to join me in comments to do some brainstorming. Take each day’s story idea and see what it can become when we play around with it. These are valuable skills for a writer to develop.