I wanted to do a story about death and the effects of death at one point in my life, as this is a huge issue for me. Many times when I was growing up I would look at photographs of close relatives who should have been alive no longer with me.
But because I am a spiritual person who has grown up around people who believe in the supernatural and ghosts and the afterlife, I felt I wanted to create a story based on that, and the response to grief in relation to the spiritual.
There is a band I'm currently listening to called 'The Irrepressibles', who mainly write songs around the subject of homosexuality, and the love between two men (one of their songs is called 'Two Men in Love'). But one song is quite powerful in how it encapsulates the feeling of loss, whether it be a break-up or death, the song is relevant to each. The song is 'In This Shirt', and it has been used for a number of Media projects, from feature films to Russian adverts (which I find fascinating giving the situation in Russia at the moment).
Here is the song, and it's best to try and listen to it all the way through.
But the idea I had was to use inspiration from films like 'P.S. I love you' and other films which have themes of loss, and also a story which involves homosexuality. There is no reason why my story couldn't be heterosexual, but I feel a need to make a story that will add to the ever-growing number of films and TV series which are solely about LGBT couples, and try to bring a sense of normalising them, as society changes, it's becoming clearer that people in that community are feeling much more comfortable, and it's only through music like The Irrepressibles and films which allow gay, lesbian, bisexual and transgender people to feel as though they are not outside the 'box'.
With an issue like grief, it's easy to make mistakes when researching how people deal with it, as there are many ways in which people deal or can't deal with the loss of a loved one.
One of the interesting things about grief in that it can sometimes lead to extraordinary things. I read a while ago about how an elderly man had 'died from a broken heart', which I thought was sad, yet also incredibly romantic. However, it is a scientific thing, as experts have discovered that people can physically died from the loss of another, as their health declines, their immune system weakens, and the heart fails to function properly. The grief leads to the person not caring about their own life, so failure to eat, drink, sleep, and live as they had when their loved one was alive, meant that they literally, couldn't go on living.
As this is a feeling I know about, and have relatives who have gone through partners who have died, I feel compelled that a story line like this is right for me. Many other films and TV series have covered this topic, but I wanted to commit to a subtle way of telling it. and through subliminal imagery, dialogue, and scenery, which would all lead to a spiritual climax, the story would be on a personal level.
One of the other things I will need to look into is the religious side to it, as there are different variations of the 'afterlife', and so researching into those will benefit the story, whether it will be a strong connection to religion or not will depend on the characters and their beliefs which I haven't yet built upon.
Links:
http://www.thegrievingheart.info/thoughtsofsuicideletter.html
http://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-2120137/Broken-heart-kill-Losing-loved-really-CAN-make-die-broken-heart.html
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