my outline

Opening scene
Exterior, establishing shots of small town, happy upbeat music making town seem normal. Then establishing shots of scary mental institution on edge of town suggesting that it will be a main part of the movie later on.

Scene 1- classroom
Main character Jeff and his friend have been just given an assignment to present to the class on their towns history. Jeff and his friend decide that they are going to do it on the State Mental Hospital since it had been around since the founding of the town. They decide to meet after school to start their research

Scene 2- outside the 2 friends walking down the sidewalk home
They are discussing what they were going to do and say for the project. Jeff gets the idea to go over to the hospital and check it out first hand to make the presentation more interesting. Jeff’s friend is a little apprehensive at first because he has heard of all the folklore and rumors surrounding how spooky the place- things like how on a really quiet night, you can hear screams coming from there. Since it’s pretty early in the afternoon, they decide to just drop their stuff off and go straight there.

Scene 3-arriving at the hospital
Huge vertical tilt shots from the ground to the top of the castle like structure. They realize that this is the closest they have ever been to the hospital since they had always been instructed to stay away from this place. The hospital had been fenced off and the fences were electrified, there were armed guards everywhere and when they arrive at what appears to be the entrance. They try and ask a guard if they could maybe get a tour or gather some first hand info on one of the oldest structures of their town. The guard says it is a completely closed facility with no possibilities of letting anyone but authorized personnel and mentally disturbed people onto the grounds. They actually hear some screams there.

Scene 4- getting back home
After being completely rejected, Jeff and his friend are even more curious as to what goes on inside. They get on their computers and start googling everything they can on the mental hospital. They find the usual stuff regarding its history: it was built in 1893 and was originally the town hospital for about 50 years before it was replaced by a more modern hospital in the town over. It was abandoned and empty for 10 years before the state decided to reopen it as a mental institution. What they couldn’t figure out however, was why a mental institution would be so heavily guarded. It is getting late, they decide to call it a night and meet in the town library after school.

Scene 5-library
They meet at the library so that they could check out the public records and newspaper clippings. They found some strange information, for some reason after it was reopened as a mental hospital, its source of funding on record was extremely ambiguous. They look more and they see that it is federally funded which is very strange for a state mental hospital. At this point they are extremely confused and even more motivated to find out what is really going on inside. Jeff now wants to see what’s going on inside. He remembers that there were cameras installed everywhere and was wondering if he could access them remotely. First Jeff attempts to just go to the site and try logging in. He is extremely unsuccessful and after one too many failed attempts he is logged out of his own computer, they get scared and call it day for now.

Scene 6- home
By the time Jeff arrives at home there are two men in suits waiting in the living room. They are from the DHS and have noticed that Jeff has been snooping around the hospital and been in the library looking for information on the hospital. Jeff is ordered to stop at once because it is a matter of national security. After the agents leave, Jeff calls his friend and he too has had a similar experience.

Scene 7-