SYNOPSIS (with spoilers)​​​​

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INTERNAL THREAT is inspired by my years of teaching teenagers how to respond to an active shooter. The script considers what might happen if a school shooter wore a disguise. Then afterwards pretended to be one of the evacuating victims.

 

The film opens on 17-year-old MARK watching a viral video of himself getting publicly humiliated by his longtime bully, TREY, the principal’s asshole son. Mark vows revenge on TREY and buys an AR-15 with the intent to scare him. 

 

As MARK shifts from victim to perpetrator, his best friend COREY pulls further and further away from MARK, reports him to the school, and even attempts to stop him—getting a bullet in the stomach for it.

 

Post-shooting, MARK frames COREY and melts into the crowd of evacuating students. COREY survives and ultimately plays a pivotal role in MARK’s arrest.

 

In the final frames, Mark watches a news story about his consecutive life sentences. From his prison cell, leaving the audience with a realistic and tragic sense of justice.