Logline:
A band of teen musicians leave their small town in search of a bigger, grander life. They embark upon a wild journey where each experience is farther out on the edge until finally they come to a mythical land where music was born.
Synopsis:
NOCK (18), a teenage, hard rock “philosopher” living on the edge of the world (doorway to the interior country) has a life goal that just doesn’t fit his surroundings. In short, he wants to be a rock star, but aside from a growing talent for pissing people off, nothing in his life is taking off. His attitude and his guitar have earned him some respect, but taking it to the next level seems next to impossible.
Enter a town legend, in the form of a long sleek black town car that has been coming through town once a month for over thirty years. The town car pulls up at the local station, right across the street from the DVD, magazine, pawn shop, drug store where his friend SHANE (22) works, and coincidently where Nock spends most of his time, hanging out.
Nock finds out that this is the last time he’ll ever come through town. Nock tells the band, and they all have theories about what the man has been doing all these years. Especially interested is Shane’s girlfriend and singer in the band, GO GIRL (16). Go Girl has a beauty and mischief that battle each other for attention.
Nock wakes up to find that Shane sold his guitar to the man in the town car who was looking for a going away present, 3000 dollars. Nock believes that his identity lives in the six strings and after a tantrum, he packs up the band and follows the town car. However, after they get into an accident they meet JAX (25) and RUBBER BALL (27), two Inuits who perform for the band at their Community Center Theatre. After their performance, the band goes back to their van and continues their journey in search of Nock’s guitar.
Later, they find a cabin in the woods. The aging occupant, ARON (70s), is at first unseen and threatens the friends by firing a shotgun at the van in warning. In their panic to get away, Go Girl gets dealt a hard blow to the head and is knocked unconscious.
Go Girl slowly recovers under the constant vigil of Nock. Aron goes about his business the same as always, but tells the boys never to go into the back shed and they have to eat what he eats. His food is all Vegan whole grain, dairy free, soy fortified crap.
Later, Aron leaves to climb a nearby mountain. He makes this journey every year on his birthday. He tells the boys that a local legend states that when a man climbs it, he can leave anything behind at its peak. Shane likes that idea, he jokes that he wants to climb it and leave Nock behind. With Aron out of the house Nock and Shane search around and find a two-way radio with all of the knobs missing in a locked cabinet, leaving them unable to call for help.
Aron returns and tells them a story about how he used to be famous. Nock calls bullshit, but can’t deny that there is something in the old man’s eyes that keeps him listening to every word, hanging upon every gesture. Aron promises to tell Nock the secret behind becoming a star, if Nock agrees to leave and never come back. But at that moment, Go Girl appears, in a state of distress. She tells them that Shane has gone to climb the mountain. Nock realizes that the pain that they are going through is really the fact that they don’t need each other any more. It hurts to lose a childhood friend just because he grows up – he follows Shane.
On the mountain, Nock finds Shane just as the clouds clear, and they find themselves only steps away from the peak. While Shane is busy performing his own ritual (leaving his head shots at the top of the peak,) Nock investigates what Aron has left behind. The top of the mountain has a stack of old records, pictures, it looks like a shrine to the king- and Nock realizes that Aron is indeed Elvis Presley. Inside a worn old leather suitcase is a white leather jumpsuit, frill on the seams stand frozen rigid like overgrown Braille telling a story that Nock finally understands.
Finally, after Nock and Shane have “left a part of themselves at the mountain,” they can move ahead with their lives to make their dreams come true. After teaching them everything he knows, Aron also leaves the band with parting gifts, leaving Shane with a stack of checks, Go Girl with sheet music, and Nock with a photograph of Aron holding up the middle finger. However, Nock also gives Aron a present in return, his beloved guitar. Very shortly thereafter, Nock takes the stage in front of a screaming throng of people – fans who are drawn to him for reasons that even they probably couldn’t put into words. He performs a cover of Suspicious Minds, while Go Girl writes music and performs with Nock, along with Jax, and Rubber Ball. Meanwhile, Shane is seen in the crowd, and it becomes known that he became famous by being rich– his dream come true. Lastly, Aron stands at the top of the mountain retrieving all of his things. He finds the guitar that Nock left there for him, and he picks it
up and plays, getting back what he always wanted as well, music.
