June Challenge. Part I - The Treatment

Title

Living with BURPS: The Teresa Dimpley Story

Format


A short mockumentary.


Filmed as a low-budget human-interest documentary, with occasional cuts to still images and text with solemn music.

Logline

Teresa Dimpley, a woman in her sixties lives with BURPS—Baffling Unstable Recurring Phobia Syndrome—an affliction so rare that fewer than fifty cases have been self-diagnosed worldwide. Through a series of interviews, family commentary, and a surprising number of squirrel-related anecdotes, Teresa Dimpley becomes the reluctant face of an unknown and widely misunderstood debilitating condition.

Overview

The film follows Teresa over a short period of time, capturing her attempts to navigate daily life while contending with a rotating door of irrational, unpredictable, and sometimes overlapping phobias. BURPS manifests in two primary categories: deep-rooted, lifelong fears (Teresa’s, in order—squirrels, quicksand and nuclear bombs) and an ever changing menu of spontaneous, short-term phobias that may last hours or just minutes (some of Teresa’s in no specific order—particular colours shapes or textures, falling trees, clouds, the sound of a phone ringing, a fear of falling down stairs).
Through interviews and “candid” moments, the documentary aims to provide an empathetic but comedic insight into Teresa’s condition, family dynamics, and the often absurd lengths to which she goes to manage her fears.

Characters

Teresa Dimpley — a woman in her sixties, she has been dealing with phobias her entire life. Her deepest fear of squirrels she attributes to being a baby left alone in a playpen on the front porch of her family’s home, where, she surmises, squirrels were climbing in and out of the playpen with her. She struggles to explain the condition and has difficulty answering the interviewer’s questions due to her frequent  distractions.

Interviewer — is never seen. He sits across from her, asking probing questions. He attempts to draw her out and help her maintain focus. Teresa often responds to his questions by looking past him and directly into the camera. 

Husband and son — never seen. They can be heard making comments in the next room, having conversations with one another and answering questions that Teresa is hesitant to answer.

Introduction

Using Ken Burns effect, somber music plays over footage of squirrels, clouds, trees and people hesitating at staircases. 

A voice-over (the interviewer) introduces the documentary and reads a mock psychological explanation of BURPS, including research by the only expert in the field, Dr. Gerta von Freudenkaputt, the renowned neurophobiologist and world's leading authority on Baffling Unstable Recurring Phobia Syndrome (BURPS). Born in Munich, Germany in 1938, her family moved to Canada before the outbreak of WWII. She points to this time period as the onset of her own phobias, especially her fear of talking to strangers. Dr. von Freudenkaputt has spent over 80 years (yes, she was 7 when she began) studying irrational fears, most of them her own. Her groundbreaking paper, "Nothing to Fear But Everything: A Comprehensive Theory of Fear-Based Fear in Patients with BURPS”, followed by "What Are You So Afraid Of? No. Seriously. What Are You So Afriad Of?” are both widely misunderstood but frequently cited. Known for her unorthodox methods—including diagnosing patients without actually meeting them—she is a self-proclaimed expert whose theories have united the psychiatric community—against her. She currently resides in Eldridgeville with an emotional support monkey. 

The interviewer then introduces Teresa as the subject of the mockumentary.   

(A general synopsis of the interview follows) 

Act I

Teresa, clearly anxious, wears three layers of sweaters—each added in response to a new fear. She explains how a red sweater triggered a phobia, followed by an equally terrifying green one, then a final blue layer to hide the rest. Once an article of clothing is on, she has a phobia about removing it. She looks directly into the camera and notes, with absolute seriousness, that she’s also wearing three pairs of socks.
The off-camera interviewer gently presses her on the sweaters, asking if she’s warm. Teresa, visibly sweating, denies it. Her son chimes in from the next room, confirming, “She’ll never admit it if she is.” When the interviewer offers to take the conversation outside, Teresa refuses—“I saw a squirrel earlier. Probably best if we stay indoors.”
His questions focus on Teresa’s specific phobias. She attempts to explain, often being distracted by her husband and son. She pauses frequently, looking directly into the camera while the interviewer waits for her answers. Her family clearly finds her issue frustrating and ridiculous. At one point, Teresa walks into the other room, unaware she is still mic’d she has a whispered, but audible, conversation with the men. She’s asking if she should open up about her fear of opening up. She returns,  unaware her conversation was overheard, saying she asked her husband to make tea. She has now developed a phobia to the jacket the interviewer is wearing and asks him to remove it or she will have to wrap a blanket around him to cover it. 

Act II

As the interview continues, Teresa is seen wearing oven mitts and drinking tea. She talks about her early experience with squirrels in her playpen and squirrel incidents she experienced with her husband who confirms the events. The first, as they sat in a park many years earlier. They heard a rustling sound approaching and Teresa jumped off the park bench. As she and her husband looked behind them, they saw a man walking past and the couple began laughing. The man, in an aggressive tone and seemingly ready for a fight, asked if they were laughing at him and her husband responded “She thought you were a squirrel.” In a second incident, they were walking in a residential neighbourhood in the city when they heard rustling in a tree. Just as they stopped and looked up, a squirrel dropped from the tree, landing, spread eagle, directly in front of Teresa. Had she been one step closer, it would have landed on her head. The shocked animal pulled itself together, stared at her momentarily, then ran off. She, on the other hand, has never recovered from the shock and points out that these incidents would put the fear of squirrels in St. Francis of Assisi himself.

Act III

As the somber music plays, Teresa is seen walking past the basement stairs, pausing then stepping away, indicating she’s afraid she may fall down them. When asked to explain this phobia her son is heard saying, “Oh no, she’s about to tell the subway station story.”  And as he predicts she shares her fifty year old story of breaking her ankle falling down the stairs at Main Street Subway Station as she ran to catch the incoming train. Looking into the camera, she smiles as she shares that, broken ankle aside, she caught the train. Wondering if all her fears are based on real life experiences, Teresa contemplates the question before admitting she’s never lived through a nuclear explosion but it’s still a phobia. 

Epilogue

The interview comes to a necessary conclusion due to time constraints and a sudden realization by the interviewer that he may be suffering from a mild case of BURPS himself.