If I were to make a movie based on a song.....

Music is a very visual thing for me. I know that doesn't make sense, but let me explain.

Like I stated in my previous post , when I hear music my brain instantly associates it with certain things. One of those things that happens is that any song that I hear brings a certain visual to mind. Be it something that I have experienced in the past, someone that I know or have met, a place where I have been or something completely fictional.....in any case I hear the song with my ears and mental eyes, if you will.

When I hear the song attached to this post, I get the same mental image every time. It is completely fictional and it plays out in my head as the ending to a sad love story. All in all, it's a pretty "cookie cutter" type of scene that has probably appeared in many a movie, or at least one episode of "Grey's Anatomy" (I don't watch that show, but I know a little about it, so I am assuming here). Here is how it goes.

[Note: I don't know the first thing about script writing. This is off the top of my head. I think you'll get the idea]

Cut to a man sitting on a chair in some unnamed airport terminal. He is sitting up, staring at nothing, blank look on his face. He has a faded baseball hat on, beaten up brown jacket , t-shirt, jeans, 5 o'clock shadow and is looking very tired.

Cue music.

The camera stays on the man who just sits there, not moving. Everything around him is moving in fast forward. People moving around, cars driving by through the window behind him. But he just sits there, staring.

The camera pans in, coming closer and closer to his face. As it approaches very close to his eyes, the image dissolves and reappears into what is probably his memory.

There he is, sitting at a table in some cafe with a beautiful brunette. They're laughing the kind of laugh that happens when you're getting to know someone and genuinely showing interest in what they have to say. It's obviously a first date. The image fades as the camera closes in on the woman placing her hand on the man's hand across the table.

The next "memory" shows the couple holding hands, strolling through the cobblestone streets of some foreign country, maybe Greece. The shot is from behind them, watching them as they walk away from the camera. The woman rests her head on the mans shoulder as they walk. Fade shot.

The camera fades back in, showing the rear of a moving truck. The man emerges from the truck carrying boxes, followed by the woman also carrying boxes. They both enter the front door of an apartment together. Apparently, they have decided to move in with each other. The shot moves to the interior of a loft apartment in some unknown city. The woman hangs pictures on the wall while the man is putting together some sort of entertainment center. She is wearing denim shorts, tank top and a white bandanna on her head. He is in cargo shorts and an old college t-shirt. They are drinking beer and taking their time getting settled. Both are smiling. The camera fades out as it focuses on a picture the woman is hanging. The picture is of the two of them, kissing on some park bench somewhere.

Abruptly, the camera cuts to the next scene. The man is sitting on the couch, elbows resting on his knees and his head in his hands. The woman is standing and the look on her face shows that she is less than happy. You can't hear it, but you see her mouthing words to him and they are not kind words. The look of shame in his eye is clear, what happened is unclear. She is far from happy with him, he knows this yet says nothing.

The camera does a pan to the right as the image blurs. As the camera re-focuses, it shows the man and woman sitting across from one another, staring at each other's faces but still saying nothing. Her eyes are red from crying. His eyes are hollow, and the circles around them are evident.

The camera fades out, then cuts to the next scene where the man is standing at the front door to his place. There is a bouquet of flowers in his right hand, and he is pulling a note off of the door with his left hand. Slowly, he lowers his right hand as he reads, eventually dropping the flowers to the ground.

Immediately, the scene changes to the man sprinting down a long, white and poorly lit corridor. People stop and stare as he runs as fast as possible, not caring who is in his way. He is on a mission and will stop at nothing until he gets wherever he is going.

The camera is now behind the man, who is staring up at an airport flight board. He is panning down the board, trying to find something. Abruptly, his head stops lowering and he darts to the right, back into a full out sprint. He doesn't have far to go, but obviously he does not have much time.

The camera follows him closely from behind, step for step with him. He starts to slow down as he nears a crowd of people checking in through security at some random terminal. He stops and looks around. The camera pans to various people going to various places. Business people, families leaving for vacation, etc. He is still looking. Finally, he stops looking and sets his gaze upon one line of people in particular. The camera moves from person to person, back of the line to the front. Then it stops and closes in on a woman who is proceeding through the security check. After a few moments, the camera pans backward until it is looking just over the shoulder of the man. As it stops, the woman turns around. It is his girlfriend. She looks over her shoulder and gives a little smile. The smile says "I'm sorry, but I have to". The man doesn't move.

The camera pans in close to the man until it is almost touching him, the screen goes black for a moment, then pans out from the man's face. Back to the original shot from the beginning of the scene. He is still just sitting there, in the terminal, staring straight ahead at nothing.

The screen goes black.

**

Okay, so, that was more detailed and longer to write out than I thought it would be. But you get the picture.

Not every song I hear brings about a visual as detailed as this, but it happens nonetheless. It's one of the things that I love about music. It can transport you to other places, other times. It can jog memories of forgotten things, make you feel like you did at that time and take you away from your current reality for a brief moment.

What's your visual?