Leukaemia An Original Story by Sammy Butler Written by Sammy Butler

Logline: An educational animation for Key Stage 3 children informing on how leukaemia develops in the body, how this effects the way it functions and how it is then treated. Premise: What happens to the body during leukaemia and how is it treated?

3 Act Structure: Act 1: The body of a young girl develops leukaemia. Act 2: The body is then infected with a virus. Due to the low amount of functioning white blood cells the body in unable to fight the infection and becomes ill. Act 3: The young girl is treated with chemotherapy which kills the cancerous cells.

Step Outline: Step 1: In a young childs bedroom theres a little girl playing on the rug next to her bed. Step 2: The camera is taken to inside her body, through the arm, into a micro world. Step 3: Blood Cells are seen flying through the bone marrow tunnels. Step 4: A stem cell expands and contracts then becomes a new, young white blood cell. Step 5: The wall of the bone marrow is seen covered in the stem cells, all making the different blood cells. Step 6: A young white blood cell then matures into a fully grown white blood cell. Step 7: Another stem cell is seen again in the process of making a new cell, however, the new cell that is released is a cancerous cell. Step 8: The cancer cell then divides making two cancer cells. Step 9: Now several of these cells are seen dividing. Step 10: The wall of stem cells is seen again but this time not in production. The stem cells are all deflated. Step 11: The cancer cells have divided rapidly producing many copies of itself. Step 12: The cancer cells then enter the blood stream. Step 13: A virus enters the body through a cut. Step 14: The cancer cells cant fight the infection Step 15: The virus begins to divide, spread and grow.

Step 16: The body becomes sick Step 17: The chemotherapy drug, plastic, is introduced into the bloodstream and spreads. Step 18: The drug attacks the cancer cells and kills them. Step 19: A stem cell is seen making a healthy white blood cell. Step 20: The wall of stem cells are making blood cells again. Step 21: The camera returns to the normal world where Sarah plays in her room still.

First Draft 04/05/12 Leukaemia FADE IN: SCENE 1 INT: SARAHS BEDROOM CAMERA: TRACKING The room is filled with toys and bears and other things that are nostalgic of childhood. A little girl, SARAH, of about 4 year of age, is sitting on a rug next to her bed play with a stuffed rabbit. VOICE-OVER: This is Sarah. While Sarah plays, her body is performing thousands of different processes. Each is complex and vital to keeping her alive. These processes are carried out and controlled by workers called cells. One of the most important cell groups are the blood cells. SCENE 2 INT: BONE MARROW CAMERA: FAST ZOOM INTO ARM The camera is transported from the bedroom to a micro world of the body; the camera travels through the skin layers, fat, muscle then bone into the bone marrow. It then moves through the tunnels of bone marrow passing the different blood cells. VOICE-OVER: Inside Sarahs bones, the bone marrow is making all the blood cells. The body needs to make billions of blood cells a day so the bone marrow has to work quickly and efficiently. A single stem cell is centre frame. It expands and contracts till the core of the cell becomes a young WHITE BLOOD CELL (WBC). It leaves the stem cells outer membrane and exits the screen. VOICE-OVER: All the different blood cells grow from stem cells. The wall of the bone marrow is covered in stem cells. They all expand and contract till a blood cell is released. A young WBC then centres in frame. It grows into a fully mature WBC and leaves the frame VOICE-OVER: The cells then mature in the marrow and are released into the bloodstream to take their part in the running of the body.

Another stem cell is working, making a new cell. The cell that comes out is a cancerous cell. VOICE-OVER: However, sometimes a defective white blood cell is created. The cell cannot perform its vital role efficiently so usually a signal would tell the cell to selfdestruct. The cancerous cell divides into two. More cancer cells divide into two. VOICE-OVER: This cell ignores the bodys instructions and begins a process called mitosis. It divides itself making an exact copy. Each new cell does the same, rapidly reproducing the same defective cell. This is called Leukaemia, cancer of the white blood cells. The stem cells on the wall have deflated. VOICE-OVER: Because the bone marrow becomes filled with the cancerous cells it thinks that it has created enough blood cells and production of new blood cells is halted. This means the body becomes low on its oxygen carriers and protectors. SCENE 3 INT: BLOOD VESSEL The different cells are seen flowing through the blood vessel including the cancerous cells. VOICE-OVER: The cancerous cells enter into the bloodstream and spread through the body. A tear in the side of a blood vessel lets VIRUS cells into the blood stream. A cancerous cell comes across a virus spore but, unable to fight it, it floats away. VOICE-OVER: Usually, when a virus or harmful bacteria enters the body the white blood cells are able to fight the foreign body before it can prosper but the cancerous white blood cells are immature and do not have the correct information on how to combat the infection. The virus begins to divide in to two and then one attaches itself to the wall of the blood vessel and grows. VOICE-OVER:

The foreign cells divide and spread through throughout the body; this makes the body weak and sick. SCENE 4 INT: BLOOD VESSEL A needle pierces through the wall of the blood vessel and releases the ANTINEOPLASTIC DRUG into the vessel. VOICE-OVER: To combat the cancer Sarah is treated with Chemotherapy. This means a drug called the antineoplastic drug is introduced into the bloodstream. This drug is toxic to rapidly reproducing cells. INT: BONE MARROW Several cancer cells are floating in the bone marrow when the drug cells attach themselves to the cancer cells. VOICE-OVER: The drug latches on to the cancerous cells and kills them. A stem cell produces a healthy, young WBC. Then the wall of stem cells is seen back in production, making healthy cells VOICE-OVER: The bone marrow then receives a signal to make more blood cells. The white blood cells can then mature and combat any infections and return the body to a fully functioning life machine. SCENE 5 INT: SARAHS BEDROOM CAMERA: ZOOMS OUT The camera then retreats back out of the arm and back into Sarahs bedroom where shes still playing peacefully with her toys. FADE OUT. THE END