Mini-movie — chapter beat sheet, word budgets, re-hook rules
The parent's beats (a paying 3-4 min song or spoken drama) are the spine: same accuser, same explainer, same vindication. The mini-movie ADDS chapters 2 (public record + subplot), 4 (false solution) and 7 (proof over days), and stretches the payoff. That addition is the one variable.
Clock math. Spoken dialogue + narration runs ~3.2-3.5 wps effective including turn gaps (narration alone ≥3.4, dialogue overall ≥2.9 per vo_check). Budget:
| Runtime | Words | Pack lines (~7-8 words) | Chapters | H3 batches (~10 s) |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| 5:00 | 960-1,050 | ~130 | cold open + 6 + close | ~30 |
| 8:00 (default) | 1,550-1,680 | ~210 | cold open + 8 + close | ~48 |
| 10:00 | 1,920-2,100 | ~260 | cold open + 8-9 + close | ~60 |
| 12:00 | 2,300-2,520 | ~315 | cold open + 9 + close | ~72 |
Percentages are of runtime; a chapter = whole pack lines. Product first appears at ~58 %, like the songs (~60 %); early reveal is not this format's lever.
Chapters (8:00 default, ~1,555 words)
| # | Chapter | % | Clock @8:00 | Words | Speakers | Job | Line rules | Closes on (open loop) |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| 0 | Cold open | 0-3 | 0:00-0:15 | 45-50 | ACCUSER or MOM | Stop the scroll on HER | Line 1 ≤12 words: the accuser's verbatim VOC line in his voice, or her stake; in action; no backstory, no product; same sentence in title:/overlay: |
"How did it get this far?" |
| 1 | The charge | 3-12 | 0:15-0:58 | 140-150 | MOM, ACCUSER | She IS the alarm; he blames her at home | Counts + times from VOC; knock → light → blinds → blanket escalation; generic failed solutions (louder alarms, phone across the room, lights on), never brands, never bed shakers | His threat ("I'm bringing this to the mediator") |
| 2 | The record goes public | 12-24 | 0:58-1:55 | 185-195 | MOM, WITNESS | Blame costs her in front of someone new | ONE new room + person (mediator, attendance officer, family dinner, school social worker); concrete cost (letter, exhibit, referral). Subplot opens: one second front the mornings caused (her boss's warning, her kid going cold on her, her sister fighting the same mornings) | A deadline ("one more and it goes to court") |
| 3 | Then you do it | 24-35 | 1:55-2:48 | 165-175 | MOM ↔ ACCUSER, KID | Hand-over test; he fails | Turns ≤8 words; 2-3 failed mornings fast ("Monday. Late."); humour from his failure, never from mocking her; he stays reasonable and wrong | He blames a gadget, not the kid's sleep ("He needs a better alarm") |
| 4 | The false solution (mid-point) | 35-47 | 2:48-3:46 | 185-195 | MOM, ACCUSER, KID | The objection, lived | A generic SOUND fix by default (louder alarm clock, three phones, a speaker by the bed); a smartwatch buzz only if Ch6 answers it (see False-solution rules). It works 1-2 days, then fails on the worst possible morning; the stake PEAKS on her; her low point ("Maybe it is me.") alone and still | The turn comes from outside her (a call, a text, someone at the door) |
| 5 | The explainer | 47-58 | 3:46-4:38 | 165-175 | EXPLAINER, MOM | Root cause from a person in the story | Nurse / pediatrician / sleep tech / attendance officer, titled so EL says it ("Nurse Patel"); ≤4 explainer lines; Fish's line verbatim: sound doesn't reach a deep-sleeping brain; one line on why the false fix failed (same root cause); one picture (a brain asleep under the noise) | "Then what gets through?" |
| 6 | Discovery | 58-67 | 4:38-5:22 | 135-145 | MOM, EXPLAINER | Mechanism + product | FIRST band beat, she wears it first; the three ruled lines: touch gets through; silent to everyone else; keeps going until he turns it off; product named once; facts per product-truth.md only. Optional mid-roll CTA line (cell 3) | "Monday was the test." |
| 7 | Proof | 67-80 | 5:22-6:24 | 195-205 | MOM, KID, SUBPLOT | It holds over days | Day stamps ("Day two. Six forty. Already in the kitchen."); nobody at his door; subplot resolves on screen (boss sees her on time, kid laughs with her again, sister texts) | The meeting/hearing/dinner day arrives |
| 8 | Vindication | 80-95 | 6:24-7:36 | 225-235 | KID, ACCUSER, WITNESS, MOM | Long payoff on HER | Proof first, then the public moment: the kid says it was never her, arm held OUT toward them; the accuser concedes in his own voice; her one-line reaction; then 3-5 lines of her mornings back (coffee hot, nobody yelling) | — |
| 9 | Close / CTA | 95-100 | 7:36-8:00 | 60-75 | MOM | Offer | Close line (new, not the parent's); "Dawn Band"; "sixty nights to try it"; end card (optional, --end-card; off by default per Fish 10-06) carries name + offer |
— |
Scale by percentage for other lengths. At 5:00 merge chapters 2+3 and drop the subplot to two touches (open in 2, close in 7). At 10-12 min add ONE more escalation chapter between 2 and 3 (a second witness or the subplot's own crisis), never a second false solution.
Re-hook rules (every chapter start)
- Line 1 of every chapter: 5-12 words, NEW information, in action, pronoun-first, passes the said-out-loud test. It could open the ad on its own (these lines are the hook-variant pool).
- Types that work: stake escalator ("Then the second letter came."), day/time stamp ("Day four. Seven forty. Still asleep."), reversal ("It worked. For exactly two days."), the accuser's line in his voice, a witness's question she can't win ("Is this record accurate, ma'am?").
- Never: a recap ("So like I said…"), a chapter name read aloud, a question to the viewer, a teaser of the product.
- Every chapter ends on an open loop answered in the next chapter's first 3 lines. No chapter runs >90 s without a new stake or turn.
Subplot rules
- Exactly ONE subplot, caused by the mornings, landing on her (job warning, her kid's trust, a family member's judgement). Opened in Ch2, touched once in Ch4 (it gets worse), resolved in Ch7 before the main vindication.
- The subplot person gets ≤6 lines and their own visual identity (sheet), distinct from Mom if similar age.
False-solution rules (Ch4)
- Generic, no brand names, never bed shakers. Picture words: "alarm clock", "smartwatch", "phone" (never "band"/"wristband", see SKILL §7).
- It must fail for the SAME root cause the explainer names in Ch5 (sound doesn't reach a deep-sleeping brain), so the explainer pays off the objection instead of introducing a new idea. Default = a sound fix.
- A smartwatch/wrist-buzz false solution is the riskiest choice: a wrist buzz failing on screen undercuts "touch gets through" (survey 09-04: 51 % almost didn't buy over "will it wake them"). Use it only when Ch6 states the difference in product-truth terms (3x stronger than common smartwatch vibration; keeps getting stronger until he turns it off), and never show it buzzing for long while he sleeps.
- Product truth allows "3x stronger than common smartwatch vibration" (owner claim, unlocked 10-02) if the false fix was a smartwatch; it is said once, in Ch6, never as the headline.
Line rules (all chapters)
- One sentence per pack line, 5-12 words; dialogue turns ≤8 words; ≤18 words on any line (vo_check).
- Every line tagged
[SPK]; numbers spelled with spaces ("six forty"); titles written out. - Accuser reasonable and wrong; Mom never the butt of the joke; stakes from VOC/stake bank, caused by the mornings, on her; never the kid's future money.
- Every line filmable literally; a line that only works as a close-up of its speaker gets re-staged or rewritten.
Structure example (ILLUSTRATIVE — shows the shape only; not shipping copy; real lines come from VOC, the red-team and Fish's approval)
### Cold open (lines 1-4)
1. [DAD] "The judge is going to see every one of these."
2. [MOM] "He held up the attendance printout in the hallway."
### Ch1 — The charge (5-22)
5. [MOM] "Six fifteen is my first knock on Owen's door."
...
### Ch2 — The record goes public (23-48)
23. [MOM] "The mediator read the tardies out loud. All nineteen."
31. [MOM] "That same week my manager pulled me aside." ← subplot opens
...
### Ch4 — The false solution (72-97)
72. [MOM] "It worked. For exactly two days." ← re-hook (reversal)
80. [MOM] "Day three, all three alarms rang for twenty minutes."
81. [MOM] "Owen slept through every second of it."
...
### Ch5 — The explainer (98-120)
98. [NURSE] "He isn't ignoring it."
99. [NURSE] "Sound doesn't reach a deep-sleeping brain."
...
### Ch8 — Vindication (165-200)
170. [OWEN] "It was never her. It was this." ← staged from behind Owen, arm held out