What Are We Doing Here?
This collection of screenplays poems and just about everything in between was pieced together by author Franci Ferrari who has high hopes that this work will “[change] the way mankind views humanity.” This ultimate goal may be out of reach but the writings within—though odd—do bear some practicality and are often related through solid prose.
Taking the form of screenplays the majority of the works in the book present readers with everyday situations and average protagonists who often inadvertently ponder the theory of creation and struggle to answer the age-old question “What are we doing here?” Each new scene and new character teaches readers something about themselves and where they might have come from. The characters are relatable and unlike Ferrari’s unreachable goal for the book are never out of reach to the audience.
The second portion of the book is more confusing. The author struggles to relate complex points and ideologies to a reader who may be losing interest. She packs in many random ideas in the form of synopses of stories random poetic off-ramps and unclassifiable spouts of word-art like the following:
Level: Atomic - Sun—passion
Suppose
Intend
Possible
Maybe
Is
Level: Plane - Moon—cogniscense
Know
Think
Feel
Emote
Sense
No matter how “out there” the book may appear or how nonstandard the formatting of her screenplays may be Ferrari manages to keep readers involved with her scenes. Excluding the second portion of ramblings that take away from the ultimate oneness of the collection Ferrari demonstrates her inherent writing ability and manages to get some valid points across about the structure of society and government as well as mankind’s role in the larger scheme of things. Her ideas are interesting to say the least.
While there isn’t a large commercial market for such a work as this it may appeal to college students studying drama theatre film and English. The author might also pursue the sale of the screenplays to a production company in the hopes of producing a short film. With a little formatting help and an eye to the three-act structure commonly used in screenplay formatting this could certainly be a viable script.
Reviewed by
Liam Brennan
Disclosure: This article is not an endorsement, but a review. The publisher of this book provided free copies of the book and paid a small fee to have their book reviewed by a professional reviewer. Foreword Reviews and Clarion Reviews make no guarantee that the publisher will receive a positive review. Foreword Magazine, Inc. is disclosing this in accordance with the Federal Trade Commission’s 16 CFR, Part 255.
