The Low T Rebellion
- Treatment
by Nick Sconce
Logline
Documentarians follow a middle-aged grunge metal band that confronts aging with original, comedic songs. After a disastrous tour, sponsored by an unscrupulous testosterone supplement company and plagued with toxic masculinity and violence, the band must chart a future though a shattered reputation and the specter of greed over principles.
Characters
Hannah, Tyler, and Samanatha, millennial documentarians, discover a band with roots in live karaoke where they allow the audience on stage and pretend they’re part of the band during Gen X class reunions. They embark on a documentary on THE LOW T REBELLION and chart the band’s success after landing a corporate sponsorship from BLITZKRIEG, a low testosterone supplement manufacturer.
Hannah is forthright and focused on production and capturing the untarnished story.
Tyler, while aloof, gets closer to the band members to get more insight into the project.
Provocative activist Samantha, believes it’s the filmmakers’ duty to rehabilitate the band from their sexist, chauvinist ways.
Lead singer, Adam, is the band’s founding member and very protective of the band’s trajectory, future success, and other members.
Bassist Randy, a bull-headed Texan and the band’s second member, is very loyal to Adam and supports most of his decisions.
Lead guitarist, Guilliam has adopted a fully realized but fake French persona to remain guarded, inaccessible, and judgmental.
Wisconsin-born drummer Douglas is committed to perfecting his craft and has a strong musical connection with Randy, but they disagree on most matters outside of writing and performing. Douglas has survived a financially debilitating bout with cancer and is protective of this part of his life. He does, however, allow band manager LYDIA into his personal life.
Lydia, the band’s first super-fan turned band manager, brings them the Blitzkrieg tour and commercial sponsorship. She has a past with both Adam and Douglas, but her relationship with Douglas blossomed into a full romantic time before it ended. After the disastrous Blitzkrieg tour, she wants to find a way to reconnect with Douglas.
Rhythm guitarist Richard struggles with brain trauma from a car accident. It’s difficult for him to speak so he remains quiet and uninvolved in the documentary.
Synopsis
At the Blitzkrieg tour’s opening night in Denver, Colorado, lead singer ADAM introduces a song with its new title and lyrics, “Takin’ Blitzkrieg.” RANDY on bass, GUILLIAM on lead guitar, RICHARD on rhythm guitar, and DOUGLAS on drums play the song. The audience enjoys the show.
Outside Larkspur, Colorado, in their tiny house parked next to Adam’s detached three-stall garage, HANNAH, TYLER, and SAMANTHA introduce their documentary and themselves. The tiny house sits across from The Low T Rebellion’s (Low T’s) C-Class RV for touring. Low T’s song, “Relationships” plays in the background as they discuss how Tyler’s sister attended her 20-year class reunion where a karaoke band played and allowed the attendees to come on stage and pretend to play the band’s instruments. In question is whether Tyler’s then newly divorced sister slept with one of the band members, which Tyler vehemently denies. But it’s sparked the idea of tracking down the band and deciding to follow their new, sponsored tour.
The documentarians then cut to The Low T Rebellion’s Blitzkrieg commercial where they play “Takin’ Blitzkrieg” to a larger audience while the filmmakers explain how they wanted to determine if glam rock and grunge era musicians still behaved the way they did in their time of heightened popularity. Hannah and Tyler admit the journey gets dark.
They then cut to a cryptic scene where a large Blitzkrieg poster gets trampled by retreating feet during a riot.
This moves to Hannah and Samantha meeting LYDIA at a rocker bar to get more footage from her on the band’s early years. Lydia’s guarded and not excited to be meeting with the filmmakers again, but she’s willing to sell them more footage.
The film slides to the first interview with Guilliam where he defines Gen X for the filmmakers, referring to a joke about rotting bananas believing they’re going to be made into banana bread. He tells them his motivation for creating music is he believes he has the cure for a certain, general malaise. Writing music is his gift to the world.
The filmmakers then interview Adam and Randy about the band’s origins. Singing changed lyrics to glam rock songs to calm his nerves, Adam expounds his idea of class reunion rock band karaoke and how the band grew from there. Hannah warns Adam that he’ll have to stop signing or they’ll blow their budget on costly song rights. Samantha throws digs at Adam and Randy about the song references not aging well and brimming with sexism.
They cut to Lydia’s footage of the first karaoke band performance as Randy narrates meeting Adam at his class reunion before telling them that Guilliam was the next member to join. Guilliam’s real name is Gil, and Randy explains his theories of why Guilliam adopts the fake French persona that he’s a cynical little bastard who can’t whoop anyone’s ass which is why he identifies as being French. The filmmakers overlay this with photos from Guilliam in his former bands, Teaser, It’s Not Gonna Suck Itself, and Now Show Us Yours, which tracks the progression of the aging glam rocker and his dated looks and outfits.
Randy and Adam then tell the story of meeting Douglas while the filmmakers overlay Douglas’s former bands, Master Debater, Metal Cock, and White Stain, also tracking his decent into middle-age.
In a shitty reenactment at Low T’s insistence, Adam, Randy, and Douglas play themselves at the moment Randy and Adam meet Douglas while Douglas is in the middle of a gruesome fight with a married man trying to hit on a woman at a bar.
Back at the interview with Adam and Randy, they admit they liked Douglas right away and saw him helping keep Guilliam’s lead guitarist ego in check.
This cuts to another shitty reenactment at Low T’s insistence, where Douglas shows up hours too early to audition for the band, much to Guilliam’s annoyance.
At the Adam and Randy interview, Hannah asks if Richard was the last to join the band. Randy doesn’t know who she’s talking about, not knowing their rhythm guitarist’s name. Embarrassed, Adam admits that he lets Richard stay in his garage because he would otherwise be homeless. He goes on to reveal to Randy he didn’t really schedule Richard’s audition. Instead, Richard just showed up one day with gear, Adam thinking he was there to deliver a new refrigerator. Hannah and Tyler don’t believe this story but become convinced when Adam and Randy beg for a scene retake where they cover up not knowing Richard or his circumstances, instead explaining that Richard has a personality disorder where he doesn’t even have a personality.
The filmmakers overlay this with photos of Richard’s former bands, Lies You Tell Me, then to footage of a younger Richard onstage getting his hair caught in a drill trying to play his guitar like Eddie Van Halen, another stage scene where Richard, with much shorter hair, accidentally gets set on fire from faulty pyrotechnics, then footage from a terrible car wreck where Richard barely survives, leading to scenes of Richard in physical rehabilitation, and speech therapy, all apparently unknown by his fellow Low T bandmates.
The filmmakers transition from the band intro to concert footage where Adam introduces their moody, foreboding instrumental song, “The Nutsack Reduction,” much to the audience’s laughter and entertainment. This bleeds into a new interview with Tyler asking Randy and Guilliam about the song’s genesis while it plays in the background. Offended as the suggestion that he’s needs that surgery, Guilliam denies taking part in creating the song. Randy gladly admits he wrote it based on his personal experience, equating it to breast-reduction surgery for women. He also makes fun of Guilliam’s apparently small scrotum.
They expand on male aging as the inspiration for most of their songs before Tyler ask them if they have any songs about fatherhood. They don’t, but they do have a number dedicated to being stepfathers, a ratty groove metal tune called “You’re Right, Andrew, I Don’t Love You!”
During the Blitzkrieg tour’s third show, the band performs the song, more to the enjoyment of the men in the audience than the women. To win back the women, the band then rolls into another of their groove metal songs, “Don’t Talk to You Mother Like That – Goddamit!” Both the men and women in the audience love the song. The men start moshing and body-slamming until their knees and hips hurt.
After the show, Tyler films a backstage argument where Douglas worries something doesn’t feel right. Their audience is changing. Randy reminds him he voted for the Blitzkrieg sponsorship and to quit his bitching. Douglas punches Randy, who then lunges into Douglas. Adam breaks up the brawl. Guilliam storms out.
In another backstage interview, Tyler and Samantha ask Adam and Douglas why the band focuses so much on male aging. Douglas becomes so poetic Adam jots down his funnier lines as potential lyrics before discussing how the band shares equal credit and rights on both the lyrics and music. They believe this avoids the financial conflict that has broken up so many other bands.
At the fourth Blitzkrieg show in Lincoln, Nebraska, the band plays “Instru-Mental Part 1”.
After the show, Low T parties with their fans. Adam making out with one woman, Guilliam and another man take turns making out with two other women. Richard gets cornered by a couple. Douglas and Lydia hang back with Randy.
Back to the Adam and Douglas interview about their creative process, Adam laments how their genre of music isn’t getting the radio play it once did, blaming radio station consolidation. Samantha asks if bands still make more money touring. Douglas jokes about how major bands, broken up for years, figure out a way to get along and get back on tour once they run out of money. Douglas then cracks a joke about a poutine shortage and how a woman who loves poutine can help a man get through the winter. Samantha tells him that comment is borderline body-shaming, and the interview descends into a debate on whether Low T objectifies women in their music like so many bands in their era have done. Adam and Douglas get defensive, taking the position that if there were more female-focused bands, they would objectify men to the same degree, referencing a Heart song as proof.
Later, as the filmmakers review dailies in their tiny house, Samantha argues with Hannah and Tyler, believing its their duty to rehabilitate Low T from their sexist, chauvinist habits. Hannah and Tyler are reluctant, thinking that it interferes with the true spirit of documentaries. Samantha presses on, telling them they should target Douglas and Randy as the softer, less sexually motivated band members.
At the fifth show in Wichita, Kansas, Low T plays their acoustic ballad about a man slipping and falling and begging his woman to help him back up, telling her to grab the pain meds and warning her how this will affect their favorite sexual positions. The audience’s women like the first half of the song. The men like the second half.
After the show, Adam, Richard, and Guilliam participate in an orgy with some of their married couple fans.
Back to the interview with Douglas and Adam, Tyler dives into Low T’s first musical inspirations and how these helped form the band’s sound. Adam and Douglas remember being obsessed with thrash metal then grunge and admit now the thematic fascination with mortality has evolved into trepidation around actual morbidity. They discuss how their sound has mellowed from that early aggression to be more cerebral grove metal with a dash of “coffee house poon hound.” Samantha jumps on this as another example of their sexism. Douglas reminds her that before she was even born, sensitive ponytail men would learn five chords just to fall in love with her mom’s mind if only for one night, hence the coffee house reference.
At their sixth show in Joplin, Missouri, Low T plays their acoustic grove song, “There’s No Such Thing as a Bad Boob, Baby.” The audience finds the song funny and entertaining.
The song bleeds into an after-show montage of Adam bringing a woman to his hotel room. Guilliam does the same thing while Douglas and Randy drink and watch a ball game at the hotel’s bar. A woman approaches Randy, buys him a drink, and Randy takes her to his hotel room, leaving Douglas behind, which doesn’t bother Douglas at all. Richard engages in a threesome with a married couple who’s impressed with his silent commitment to the task at hand.
Back at Adam’s garage, Randy and Douglas smoke a brisket outside, both brandishing bruises and busted noses from their earlier fight. Richard floats back and forth inside, starving for the brisket. As soon as Hannah makes eye contact with Richard, he vanishes.
Hannah questions Douglas and Randy about how they aren’t really getting along. They assure her they see eye-to-eye when they’re writing and performing their music, which is all that really matters to them. They feel deeply connected and admit the music-making is the most intimate of the collaborative art forms. Samantha builds on this, asking if they feel they remain connected where it matters. Randy and Douglas look at each other and agree.
At the seventh show in Little Rock, Arkansas, the band plays their edgy metal power anthem, “Cook Me Up Some More B12.”
The filmmakers insert some of Lydia’s personal footage with Doulgas in a hotel room after his fight with Randy, where Douglas holds an ice pack to his face and admits that Randy was right. They did agree to the Blitzkrieg tour.
Back to the interview with Douglas and Randy, Samantha asks them how they feel about being labeled just another dad band. Samantha shows them critical posts on social media before peppering them with questions about the band’s sexual activity on the tour. Doulgas and Randy admit that Adam, Guilliam, even Richard, partake heavily in sexual escapades but remain steadfast that while they don’t participate, they see nothing wrong with other members enjoying life on the road.
The filmmakers shift to an interview with Adam and Guilliam where they bring up their sexual habits again, then cut to footage of Adam and Guilliam arriving backstage after a show expecting a room full of eager fans and finding no one. Back in the interview, Adam owns being a male slut on the road, while Guilliam questions Samantha and Hannah on why they’re so concerned. Adam argues that sex becomes more transactional as people age and experience divorce or the untimely death of a husband. Samantha insists this is predatory. Guilliam explains that he once worked in a nursing home where the ratio of men to women is one to twenty and that three men went from room to room on Friday and Saturday nights to “service” the women. Samantha presses them on preying on vulnerabilities and asks them if women have ever gotten between band members in sordid love triangles. Alarmed, Adam mentions they were almost Yoko-ed by Lydia.
The filmmakers go back to their interview with Lydia where they purchase her additional footage. They then cut back and forth between that and an interview with Randy and Adam. Lydia feels she can’t really define her relationship with the band without looking bad.
Hannah and Samantha bring up Lydia to Adam and Randy, and Randy tells them Adam’s still under her spell, which he refers to as “magical pussy.” His implication is that Lydia’s lady parts are such that can cause men to have multiple pre-mature organisms in one setting. Samantha and Hannah are as mortified as Adam is. Randy riffs off a story about a family of girls with this affliction in his hometown, how his grandma warned him about it, and how Dolly Parton’s song, “Jolene” is a good example as no man in his right mind would leave Dolly for another woman without magical pussy being involved.
During Hannah’s and Samnatha’s continued interview with Lydia, Lydia admits to first having a relationship with Adam before making a stronger connection with Douglas.
Randy tells Hannah and Samantha he’s thankful that Douglas took Lydia off Adam’s hands, otherwise they would have had to turn Richard on her. Hannah flippantly asks if Richard a magical dick. Randy says they’ve heard rumors. Samantha asks why Lydia was such a threat, and Adam and Randy tell her Lydia didn’t like the band playing at local gay bars.
The filmmakers turn to Lydia’s footage of a Low T show at the Gay 90s Bar in Denver. After the show, a group of men help Douglas tear down his drum set while they discuss Douglas’s failed marriage and his massive debt. They are unaware Lydia is filming as she becomes more curious and sympathetic to Douglas’s situation.
This cuts to a shitty reenactment at Low T’s insistence, where Randy drinks at the Gay 90s bar and is first introduced to Blitzkrieg as another man explains what it does, how it’s like boner pills mixed with low grade speed, and how you can’t mix it with any other stimulant or it will cause a medical emergency for an erection. As a prank, the band then leaves Guilliam stranded, surrounded by gay men on the dance floor.
Back to Hannah’s and Samantha’s interview with Adam and Randy, Samantha asks them how many times they’ve pranked Guilliam this way. Adam answers three times before realizing the joke may be on them and that Guilliam might be bisexual, which doesn’t bother Adam or Randy other than wanting to make sure Guilliam’s being safe.
The filmmakers close out this segment with their interview with Lydia, where she alludes that there is more to Douglas’s story than she feels comfortable sharing and that she has hopes of rekindling her relationship with him.
At the their tiny house, the filmmakers review new footage from Lydia about and assault on a female concertgoer at a Low T show. Hannah catches Richard walking outside the house, and she rushes out to see him, her intrigue at him avoiding the documentary-making process growing. When she catches him, rather than speaking, he motions with his phone and sends her a text explaining he was on the lookout for mountain lions as the neighbors had alerted him. While she reads the text, Richard vanishes, leaving her to wonder more why he doesn’t ever talk.
In another shitty reenactment at Low T’s insistence, they play-act the scene where Lydia, badly played by another woman, brings the Blitzkrieg offer to them, detailing the offer to buy and retitle two songs, the commercial shoot, and the fully funded, sponsored tour. Randy questions what Lydia gets for making the deal. She’s upfront and honest, telling them she gets a percentage above the line, not a part of the cash offer to the band. Randy warns them about what’s he’s heard from the Gay 90s about the supplement, and they argue whether gay men can handle using it more than straight men. They then vote on whether to take the deal, Randy being the only “no” vote.
Lydia films the contract signing at the Blitzkrieg Corporate Office with their rep, BLAKE, offers the band free samples of the supplement. Adam takes a few packets, but Randy warns him off it, referencing his talk with the guys at the Gay 90s. Blake overhears and is excited to learn Low T plays shows in gay clubs as their actual sales in that market are three times higher than projected.
Outside the tour’s eighth show in Tulsa, Oklahoma, Lydia films concertgoers in line to get into the venue. The men are already aggressive with the women, pawing and grabbing them.
Inside, Lydia films the band before they take the stage. The venue seats three thousand and is one of the largest shows Low T has ever had. Adam is nervous about playing where Willie Nelson played the night before. Randy is stoked that the venue only sells Texas beer. He jokes with Douglas over the less manly Michelob Golden Light that Douglas prefers.
The venue manager, CHETT, asks to be let into their changing room. He informs them the venue asked Blitzkrieg to hire additional security as other venues have reported Low T shows are getting more aggressive, bordering on violent. Chett has to inform the band that Blitzkrieg didn’t hire anyone to work the venue despite assuring Chett they would. He goes to say them that if it gets too rowdy, he reserves the right to stop the show. Low T grows more frustrated.
Lydia films from the side of the stage aa the band opens with “Don’t Talk to You Mother Like That- Goddamit!” The men in the front rows are already assaulting women. Douglas questions if they should have opened with that song while Adam tells the audience to keep their hands off the women. Men in the audience yell back, and Randy threatens to beat the next man he sees grabbing a woman. Guilliam break into “Takin’ Blitzkrieg” to keep the show moving.
The filmmakers cut to Adam’s garage where Randy tells Tyler the rest of the band blamed the venue but that the next show on the Oklahoma/Texas border got much worse.
The day of the ninth show, the band has a conference call with Blake, telling him their concerns about how the men are behaving and that they suspect them all of taking too much Blitzkrieg supplement before the show even starts. Blake’s position is that is the entire idea behind the sponsorship, but the band convinces him to hire additional security for that night’s show.
Before the band can even finish their opener, “No Such Thing as a Bad Boob, Baby,” women are leaving the concert and dragging their dates with them.
Backstage after the show, the band is distraught over the violence and increasing safety concerns for their audiences. They also realize their party participants have vanished along with their crowds.
Back at Adam’s garage, Gilliam is working on a new song with Richard. He looks up and starts talking about the tour’s final shows with Hannah and Samantha. Richard wonders off. They discuss the sexist Blitzkrieg commercials leading up to Low T’s commercial: one being a middle-aged man encouraging InCels to find a job, move out of their parents’ house and start taking the supplement, the other depicting a man hunting, fishing, chopping wood, and baling hay before having sex all credit due to the supplement.
Samantha tells Guilliam how offensive the commercials are, and they debate whether male-fantasy is more explicit and more exploited than female fantasy, Guilliam feeling both are equally abused and abusive. Hannah asks him why he voted for the sponsorship, and he explains he doesn’t care what people do to their bodies but that the assaults on women in the concerts are unacceptable. He goes on to explain the new song he’s working on, called “Unman,” a song of healing Low T’s wounds and hopefully keep the band together.
At the tenth show in Fort Worth, Texas, Adam begins with a plea to the audience, stating that violence and aggression is not what Low T stands for. The crowd, now mainly men, ignores him. Even before the band can begin their opener, a woman is hoisted to crowd-surfing against her will. The men drop her then swarm around her, grabbing at her and tearing her clothes. Adam calls for the additional security to break up the attack, which they do. The security guards then escort the woman out of the concert hall. The band stomps off stage, refusing to play the show.
In Douglas’s hotel room after the show, Lydia films his fight with her, where he blames her for bringing them the Blitzkrieg deal, lamenting how he feels cursed for getting a brain tumor, the surgeries sending him into bankruptcy and divorce, and now his payment plan of playing with Low T is threatened. He tells her to get out of his band and his life.
Back at the garage, Hannah and Samantha interview Adam, now that the rest of the tour has been canceled. Adam struggles with his deep humiliation about how the band was seduced with Blitzkrieg’s too good to be true offer. He sees the error of their sexist, chauvinist ways leading to the deal and who they brough into their fanbase. He worries the band won’t be able to book even local gigs or stay together.
The filmmakers cut to Tyler and Samantha interviewing Randy, who tells them he was the only one who ever took Blitzkrieg to test it out. He shows them a huge pile of chopped-down trees, which is how he spent his increased energy and rage while on Blitzkrieg. This cuts to a previous scene of a riot breaking out and a Blitzkrieg poster being trampled. Then back to Randy as he admits Blitzkrieg might have been behind some of the behavior during the January 6 insurrection at the capitol, referring to the actual Nazi Blitzkrieg fueled by methamphetamines.
Outside the Blitzkrieg Corporate Offices, Lydia films the band leaving a conference room where they’ve agreed to severe their remaining contract with Blitzkrieg at no cost and hold-harmless for the band. Douglas sees Lydia and tries to apologize to her. She isn’t ready to work things out as he knows she wasn’t at fault for the deal now but still blamed her when they fought.
Back at the garage, Hannah and Samnatha interview Randy and Douglas, where they praise the guards for keeping the attacked woman from getting hurt worse. They then discuss their attempts at finding a new direction through writing new songs.
Later, Randy and Guilliam work on a new song, called “Instru-Mental Part 2,” and another new song emerges from this session.
In a different interview, Tyler shows Douglas the new footage they’ve acquired from Lydia, where Lydia admits to wanting to reconcile with Douglas. They discuss Randy’s theory about Lydia’s lady parts, which Douglas doesn’t believe in. But he does question if he’ll ever be able to open up to her emotionally as she deserves in a relationship.
At The Gay 90s Bar, the band showcases their new songs, deeply appreciative their fanbase there is forgiving. During the intermission, Adam and Randy get drinks at the bar with the bar manager, Gary, who tells them they should have asked him first before signing the deal with Blitzkrieg. Randy tells him about the guy who warned him against it, saying the guy had to fight off a case of exploding penis from too massive an erection. Gary pulls out a picture to confirm the guy’s identity with Randy, telling them he in fact died from bleeding out from an exploding penis. Randy and Adam hold back their grief and nausea before Gary tells them he’s kidding. Gary then imparts the wisdom that women want men to act their age and that women don’t want men acting like the assholes they were when they were younger. Adam and Randy heed this counsel before spotting Lydia walking into the bar.
When the band returns to the play their second set, Douglas sees Lydia in the crowd and quits playing to jump off the stage and give her a huge hug. She responds warmly, reassuringly. The band continues the song without Douglas giving them their moment.
Back at the filmmakers’ tiny house, Hannah, Tyler, and Samantha review an edit of the entire project, and Samantha insists the work turned out better with their reforming intervention from the band. They then discuss future projects and moving on.
During the closing credits, in a voiceover, Randy sees Tyler’s last name, asks him if a lady named Lindsey is his sister, then asks for her number as Randy’s lost it from the last time they were together.
After the credits, the filmmakers include a scene where Lydia, Samantha, and Hannah listen to the band’s new song, “Awaken,” and ask Lydia about the band auditioning new talent.
This cuts to Adam and Randy practicing with AMY and HEATHER of the newly formed band that jokes about female again, called Fuck All This Shit. They discuss changing some of Low T’s songs to be more a conversation between a man and a woman and then plan out new gigs where the two bands can play with each other and share lead billing.
Tyler then adds footage he’s secretly taken of Hannah cornering Richard, demanding an interview with him. Richard explains to her that it’s difficult for him to speak after his car accident. He also tells her he’s no longer living in Adam’s garage, buying a tiny house like the filmmakers’. Hannah agrees to have Richard show her his new place. She winds up spending the night and leaving the next morning in a walk of shame, all captured by Tyler and Samantha for the documentary, even though they swear they’ll erase the compromising footage.