HEART FORCE
Limited Series
This series is something entirely different - it's my entry into the emerging genre of 'lucid tales of love and discovery' where NCIS and DARK meet James Joyce and Don Genaro - where genre is an antique aphorism and the driving question for the project centers around which nervy director in 2023 is going to be adequately brave, talented and inspired to rise up and tackle this level of lucid-dream cinema.
In this six-part suspense series a renegade Berkeley scientist plunges into a transformative love affair with a mystery woman – who is fighting a secret biotech team plotting to manipulate the thoughts and moods of world leaders. With a unique plot flow that feels almost like a lucid dream becoming all too real, HEART FORCE combines a white-collar terrorist mind-manipulation scheme, a lurking edge of ancient Mayan shamanism, plus radical plunges into mature romance.
HEART FORCE packs a deep punch because it dares to grapple with themes usually dodged in mainstream cinema. For instance this film project was initially called THE JADE PHALLUS because there's a realistic phallus artifact driving the whole plot. We first encounter this carving (in reality currently on display in Guatemala City) when our female lead Mahalena cleverly steals it – and then teams with our male lead Jack to smuggle it back down to Guatemala ....
With just a touch of magical realism (similar to DARK and other recent productions) HEART FORCE intertwines tense action/suspense with an edge of bio-tech sci-fi banging heads with an ancient reemerging Mayan prophesy. There's definitely no gross violence or horror in this series, nor any fluffy fantasy – this lucid tale is a mature shit-kicker adventure that just happens to occasionally dig deep into core stuff, like how people can relate and strive for the higher good in an entirely new way - thus the insistent series motto: 'a la nueva!'.
INTELLIGENT HUNGRY VIEWERS
HEART FORCE is aimed at the fast-growing TV audience seeking sharp entertainment but also mature romance mixed with intelligent uplifting dialog. The series is bound to stoke controversy because it explores a new dramatic genre where science and spirit, personal awakening and global revolution combine into a high-order vision of our human potential.
The primary HEART FORCE audience will tend to be secular, open-minded, receptive and progressive – people hungry for inspiring adventures that also pack a meaningful real-life twist. This series doesn't preach any party line. Instead it exposes looming ethical, tech and action choices we all might soon face – and then lets the drama play out to a stunning climax.
Grounded in core human values that all cultures hold in common, HEART FORCE aims to present both sides of an imminent real-life mind-manipulation crisis – and provoke deep viewer discussions of humanity's emerging challenges.
A
A NEW HERO FOR THESE NEW TIMES
This fast-paced but also deeply-internal odyssey introduces an almost-mythic half-Mayan woman named Mahalena Bernhardt. She talks kinda funny because English is her fourth language. She's too smart for her own good, and lives and loves right on the psychic knife-edge of crazy – it'll take a truly great budding actor to master this role.
Mahee is right now fighting her twin brother Bernardo. They're both half Mayan and half European – and understandably half-crazy from this inherited split-personality stance. They have one foot in emerging biotech inventions in Silicon Valley and the other foot deep in the quicksand of their Mayan ancestors – and their intimate wombian conflict is headed for disaster.
Bernardo is the real genius and his malicious scheme to manipulate world leaders and pacify select populations is scientifically quite believable. Through illegal neuro-resonance tech (the origins of the TEN % MAX satellite technologies) Bernardo aims to subtly transform human attitudes and behavior. With Mahee's unique shamanic knowledge, she and her new lover Jack are the only players who can perhaps stop this pernicious take-over of our minds.
CINEMA AS LUCID DREAM
We all know how our dreams and daydreams flow with a particular mesmeric logic. Great movies often flow with that same interior pace and lucidity, where a subliminal sense of synchronistic coincidence drives the overt action. The cinematic trick is to generate that magical mystic flow while also sustaining a hot action plot. HEART FORCE does just that.
Mahee is definitely controversial because she insists on living in her own expanded sense of reality. She openly stands up for what she thinks is real at deeper levels - and coming from her mixed heritage of macho dominance and indigenous wisdom, in the midst of overt action-adventure she keeps dipping into more subtle intimate realms where lucid visions momentarily take over normal reality.
Regularly pushing Jack into unexpected, almost occult feelings and realizations, Mahee keeps shifting the plot in revelatory directions. The opposite of New Age fluff, this series forces our gutsy young male hero to break beyond his progressive but still quite-macho attitudes as he taps into Mahee's new approach to passion and personal power. Check out the High Heart Audiobook for more on this.
As our story flows from Silicon Valley all the way down to highland Guatemala, complex subplots involving confused Google execs and deviant CIA operatives, greedy Washington politicos and nasty Guatemalan police, force our heroes to lead dual lives – fighting against very real adversaries while also slipping into deep realms of mature sexual encounter. In the process they discover a unique male-female bond that might breathe new passion into our own relationships.
PUSHING EROTIC / MYSTIC LIMITS
HEART FORCE is a hot romance happening within an intense life-or-death adventure. Inspired by 'The Odyssey' by Homer, and also by James Joyce's novel 'Ulysses', from the very first scenes (where Mahalena steals a Mayan jade-phallus artifact) we know we're entering a bold tale of high adventure laced with mature sexual undertones.
Especially at sexual levels, Jack finds himself way over his head. The jade phallus is present in all six episodes, though not in any pornographic way. Instead, this blatant male emblem of dominance from the ancient Mayan past highlights core male/female themes of our series. And yes, it still carries a certain power to provoke not only controversy and outrage, but also insight ... and finally transformation.
Alongside primary male-female encounters, HEART FORCE also brings to light several rugged man-to-man encounters that Jack must deal with – first comes Mahalena's grandfather in San Diego, then her powerful father Michael, then a nasty male brujo named Alehandro – and finally Mahee's brother Bernardo. There's also the ancient wise Mayan bruja, Abierta, Mahee's grandmother – she's the real heart of the story. This is very much a family saga – and look out! Bernardo is quite willing to kill even his twin sister in order to achieve his supposedly benevolent goal.
NOTE: Although HEART FORCE will climax in highland Guatemala, this cable series is not intended as an exposé of how the indigenous populations of southern Mexico and highland Guatemala have been brutalized. HEART FORCE is a contemporary California drama. The story does explore many deep themes related to indigenous rights and shamanic powers, and we fully support the indigenous movement still happening down south. But that's another story.
