"The Voice? Good Voice?"
Same as yesterday, same as noon, same cafeteria.
Isabella showed up before Columbus yet again.
That golden-haired figure, like a big retriever wagging its tail, with that eager grin, tray in hand, plopped down "naturally." Columbus honestly felt… like laughing.
He crooked his finger.
Sure enough, just as he expected, Isabella fished a thick wad of A4 pages out from under her Hogwarts robe.
Truth be told, finishing a story in one night isn't even considered fast in Hollywood circles.
Because a "story" there is just an idea. No word count required. If someone's brain leaks ideas like a busted faucet, it's nothing to sketch a concept in an hour, find bugs in two, and draft an outline in three.
But filling in characters, pinning down conflicts, making all the side details line up and turning that outline into a full script? That's where the hours vanish. Even pros need at least three days. Newbies can spend a year tinkering and still not finish.
So, Isabella bringing a full story in under 24 hours—Columbus didn't find it weird.
At best, it just proved she was bursting with things to say.
But when he actually read what she wrote—
His eyes narrowed instantly.
"You wrote this?"
He lifted his head, astonished at the girl across from him.
"Yeah~" Isabella nodded. "Director, is something wrong?"
"Just tell me. I can take it."
She honestly thought her work wasn't very good—it was her first attempt, after all.
But her modesty just carved deeper furrows across Columbus's forehead.
"Wrong? …Your story isn't wrong at all."
"You moved the setting from the East Coast to the English countryside? Made the protagonist a girl who loves music but can't get proper education? Even the church choir tells her no? That's as grounded and conflict-laden as it gets."
"And you localized her family too? An older sister who loves art, dreams of Europe, but ends up frustrated? That's historically resonant."
"You kept the road-movie backbone of inner journey, but added the competitive edge of a commercial film? With The Voice structured across city, county, and national levels?"
"Oh, Isabella—this story is good. Really good."
"You seriously never studied screenwriting?"
To Columbus's eyes, Isabella's new draft screamed "Hollywood."
Because whether aiming for box office or Oscars, Hollywood loves sprinkling in "social issues." Usually they don't resolve them—just raising the question is enough to give a film that faux-depth of "edutainment."
And if you've raised a social problem, you've already created conflict. That automatically gives your story dramatic tension.
Like when Isabella folded in the church choir, Columbus's brain immediately started spinning dialogue:
Heroine wants to enter a singing contest? Skeptics say she's had no vocal training, don't waste your time. And by the way, so-and-so from the choir joined too—he's got talent and a teacher.
Boom—instant introduction of rivals and antagonists straight from the background. Clean and efficient.
Even the sister's longing for Vienna could be expanded: her failed dream could fuel her opposition to the heroine. "We don't have the resources. We can't beat people born higher than us. So why fight? Just lie down."
That weary resignation oozes from the page.
But when the sister eventually supports her sibling and gifts her a painting, that's rebirth. The younger sister's sunshine rekindles her hope.
That's exactly the "soul refinement" a road movie is supposed to explore—yet here it's organically fused into the main plot.
And that was just surprise number one.
Surprise number two: pacing.
The original script felt too flat. Road movies already risk sagging because they're "inner journeys."
But Isabella? She kept the A-to-B redemption skeleton, then broke it into three arcs:
From home in the countryside to the city contest.
From city contest to county contest.
From county to nationals.
Suddenly the rhythm is manageable, milestones clear.
Columbus's mind was instantly choreographing beats:– 8 minutes to show the loser family in their chaotic rural home. Dad, a motivational speaker? Fine, now he's unemployed.– The heroine bursts in like a sunbeam, declaring her dream of the contest. Cue objections.– By minute 16, the journey begins: countryside to city, even weaving in visuals of the Industrial Revolution for contrast.
Rustic vs. modern. Nostalgia vs. change. Generational clashes. Perfectly packaged into brisk scenes.
Hollywood insists on pacing because audiences fatigue fast. One shot lingers too long, people yawn. One storyline drags, people tune out. So projects are timed down to the minute to keep fresh info flowing.
For trained writers, that's craft. For untrained? Near impossible—unless they're freakishly gifted.
And Isabella, apparently, was pulling it off.
So Columbus leaned forward, dead serious: "Isabella, are you absolutely sure you wrote this? The three-stage Voice structure was your idea? Cutting the road trip with competition rounds—that was you?"
Of course it wasn't. She was plagiarizing her past life's memory of The Voice. Last night she thought: hey, singing competitions like that actually fit well in a road-movie structure. So she mashed them together.
Now, seeing Columbus's reaction, she was realizing it was more than "interesting."
"This is really good?" she asked.
"Absolutely."
Columbus nodded.
Her smile bloomed. "Director, I promise, the story's mine. But I admit I borrowed the contest structure—like, say, from Who Wants to Be a Millionaire?"
That famous British quiz show: 15 questions, a million pounds. With screening rounds before the stage. First random phone quiz, then in-person auditions, then finally the televised contest.
Was her Voice-style upgrade system lifted? Sure. But who cares?
Hollywood recycles structures constantly. There are only so many story frameworks audiences accept. What matters is how you adapt them.
Plain plagiarism is worthless—you'll never outshine the first mover. But blending leveling-up mechanics with a road trip? That took thought.
"Isabella, your story could break into four acts and thirteen sequences," Columbus said. "The kind of draft you could shoot tomorrow."
"Do you know the last person with no training who wrote with this kind of pacing?"
"Who?" she blinked.
He raised his brows. "James Cameron. His breakout was The Terminator. Most people think of the effects, but the real genius is rhythm. Without the pacing, even the scariest monster looks cheap."
The Terminator was basically horror, and horror is all about rhythm.
None of that mattered to Isabella. She only heard the praise. Her lips curved up like petals.
Sure, she'd borrowed. She'd patched things together. But at the end of the day, this story was hers. These characters were hers.
And that was enough.
What Columbus called "pacing" was just a happy accident for Isabella. But does that mean she hadn't spent time, effort, brainpower on the rest?
So, when effort gets rewarded, and your very first attempt earns you treatment on par with James Cameron driving an eighteen-wheeler…
"Director."
"Can I take your words to mean you think I'm the next James Cameron? Or at least that my story structure could reach the height of The Terminator?"
The girl tilted her head slightly.
That big dumb grin plastered across her face.
Basically: praise me, please.jpg
"…"
Columbus was speechless.
He really had just been marveling at her talent—but could she maybe not wag her tail before he'd even finished the sentence? That smug already?
Looking at her glowing with excitement and expectation, he truly wanted to knock some sense into her.
But a moment later, he let it go.
He set aside the script, poking at his lunch as he said, "I don't have time at noon to teach you how to expand your sections. So come find me after filming tonight. I can give you half an hour to an hour. Every day."
Columbus still treasured talent.
That decision made Isabella beam like the sun.
He didn't flatter her outright, but agreeing to teach her was praise enough. And more than that, it meant her new project might actually have a shot at success.
But at the same time, she had something else for him—
With a magician's flourish, she pulled another A4 sheet out of her Hogwarts robe.
"Director, I've got another idea. Want to see it?"
"You have another one?"
Columbus was floored. At this point he seriously wondered—was inspiration for Isabella like cabbage? Growing everywhere, dirt-cheap? Except no, cabbage is rare in Britain. Never mind.
Isabella ignored his disbelief and handed over the page.
This time, it was a song.
"'The Climb'?"
Yeah~~~
If the movie was about a music competition, and she'd already borrowed The Voice, of course Isabella wouldn't ignore the songs themselves. That's why she'd been so excited last night: she realized The Climb from her past life fit her story perfectly.
The Climb, sung by Miley Cyrus, is basically a motivational anthem: life's a hard climb, you'll face setbacks and confusion, but keep your head high and keep moving. Cheesy? Sure. But that didn't matter.
Placed in the story, sung through the heroine's perspective, it would make her look talented. And juxtaposed with the loser family clawing their way to success, it would crank up the film's emotional punch.
Isabella wanted this project to work, badly. Of course, she also admitted she had a selfish reason—she'd always loved music, though pure music careers rarely break through. This way was a roundabout return to her first passion. And hey, The Climb had gone six-times platinum.
"Okay, Isa, I'll admit it—you are very talented."
Columbus already knew she'd studied music for years. When she joined the production, David Heyman even got her a piano. She practiced often. So inspiration spilling out like this wasn't shocking.
But—
"Isa." Columbus folded the lyric sheet and handed it back.
"Mm?" She stuffed it back into her robe.
"Talent is dangerous. Because talented people get lost in praise too easily."
"Oh, Director, I get it~" Isabella waved her hand breezily. "I won't get cocky~"
All he was really saying was basically The Story of Song Zhongyong.
Chinese really is ridiculously concise!
Columbus was hoping Isabella wouldn't get arrogant and would keep pushing herself, and that was exactly how Isabella felt too. Her good ideas came from her past life's broader horizons. The song match came from memories. None of it was born purely from her. Standing on giants' shoulders, the only real victory was to do it well.
Right?
She figured she was self-aware enough.
But—
"Oh, Isa, did the director just say your script was good?"
Columbus had barely finished his lunch and walked off before Isabella was mobbed by her castmates.
She and Columbus had been discussing scripts openly in the cafeteria. Which, honestly, was about as subtle as plotting a bank heist through a megaphone. And everyone already knew she'd landed a new project after fame, though it supposedly didn't suit her.
"Did Chris say your story could actually be filmed?" Daniel asked curiously.
"Oh, Isa, don't you dare tell me the director thinks your script is usable!" Rupert wailed, almost on his knees. "Or my mum's going to tear me apart again tonight! Every time you do something amazing she says—'Compared to Isabella, you're not even as bright as a fish in the Thames.' And I just want to scream—'There aren't any fish in the Thames!'"
The cafeteria erupted in laughter.
The Thames had been declared biologically dead back in the 1950s, thanks to pollution. So being "less impressive than the fish in the Thames" was basically saying you were useless sludge.
"Isa, what kind of story is it? Can we see it?" Bonnie chimed in.
"Isa, you know we're close, right?" Tom coughed into his fist, eyebrows waggling. The meaning could not have been more obvious.
All those eager questions raining down on her made Isabella squirm—
She didn't want the compliments. She didn't want to be arrogant. So why were they all trying to force her into it?
Staying humble was impossible.
There are always scheming subjects who want to harm their emperor!
Well then—
The emperor is cold.
The emperor needs more robes!
tail wags