With the blog, I mean. I updated once - see below - and for the next week, my blog was for no discernible reason completely invisible to the world. If I typed in the URL, I would get a white screen and a random error message for which the kind folks at Blogger had no answer whatsoever. Le sigh. Yet, here I stand, and here I shall write.
I leave for Columbus in 18 hours to begin production on Separation Anxiety. After running the gauntlet on Happily After, and after our 13-day stint on Glass City, for some reason I can't bring myself to be nervous about this. With minor exceptions, everything has gone so tremendously well that I worry we're missing something. Because it's either that, or we've come perilously close to perfecting this business of low-budget film production.
Everything feels so close, and yet so far. Tomorrow? Really? And in four weeks, we'll be done? Really? I want it all to be over so I can take that much-deserved break, but after this, there's the uncertainty of editing and, more importantly, distribution. Part of me is absolutely terrified, simply because of the subjective nature of the business, but the other side of me knows that these two films - Happily After and Separation Anxiety - are far and away the best films I've ever done. That has to count for something, somehow.
I need to go see a movie in the theater. I had the pleasure of seeing a preview screening of Where The Wild Things Are about a month ago, but that was the first film I had seen in two months. I didn't capitalize on the summer season like I had hoped, and I'm really eager for the awards season to start so I can make a point of checking out films on the art-house circuit. Regardless, I feel like either going to the movies is too expensive, or I don't have enough time, or I can't find the excitement in me for any of the dreck that's out right now. Who knows.
Something's coming, something good. If I can wait...
Monday, October 26, 2009
Thursday, October 22, 2009
Inauguration Day
I've spent a bit less than a month not updating my Xanga blog, and I realized early on in the process how much I missed it. Not the format, and not the community, but the simple act of recording my thoughts and sending them out into the ether. So, in the wake of finally and fully completing principal photography on Happily After, and as I stand on the precipice of producing Separation Anxiety, I decided it was time to start anew. A change of scenery, if you will.
We finished our pickups for Happily After at 6:30am on Wednesday, October 20, 2009. 21 days of shooting, spread across two months. I suppose it was rational to expect the longer schedule; between stunts, animal talent, and the sheer number of locations and scenes, there was no chance of this film following Glass City's insanely short timetable. Too many company moves, too many issues with actor availability, too many things all around. And then, of course, the fateful injury of our lead actress. God bless SAG's insurance package and a woman with the heart of a lion who doesn't know the meaning of "recovery time."
I've had trouble adequately describing my first experience as a director of a feature film. Certainly, I feel like I acquitted myself well, simply by virtue of finishing. I didn't make any enemies, I kept my set running smoothly, and I learned a great deal as the shoot progressed about building the structure of a scene from the ground up rather than starting from one department's needs. Call it the cinematographer in me to start with the visuals, but it's not the best strategy sometimes. And I would say I enjoyed it, as much as I would say the position didn't fit me as well as I thought it might.
I'm excited to see the finished product, though, even more so than I thought I'd be after wrapping. This is genuinely going to be a good, sometimes shocking movie, and I can't wait to hear people's marveled reactions at our budget, our shoot schedule, and our war stories. The film festival circuit will be exciting, indeed.
I haven't quite adjusted to the fact that we'll be shooting Separation Anxiety 11 days from now. That I'll be living in Ohio for a month. I won't say I'm worried, but I will say I'm absolutely dreading being away from my fiancee for a month; the longest amount of time I've been away from her since she moved to Chicago is two weeks. Brutal.
Did I mention, by the way, that I'm looking extremely forward to getting married? Part of what's been so difficult about the past six months, I think - beyond the insane schedule and the money woes - is the lack of any stability whatsoever. It stuns me more and more to think that I'm excited to find some sort of steady job and become a house cat of sorts with my wife. I've always been eager for that, but the rush of freelancing initially made me wonder if I could sustain it forever; having been through it for several years now, I know there's an end game in sight. It also helps tremendously that I'm madly in love and that Kathleen pretty much rocks my world. Has it truly been over four years already? Wow.
I'm exhausted. I can't wait for a vacation.
We finished our pickups for Happily After at 6:30am on Wednesday, October 20, 2009. 21 days of shooting, spread across two months. I suppose it was rational to expect the longer schedule; between stunts, animal talent, and the sheer number of locations and scenes, there was no chance of this film following Glass City's insanely short timetable. Too many company moves, too many issues with actor availability, too many things all around. And then, of course, the fateful injury of our lead actress. God bless SAG's insurance package and a woman with the heart of a lion who doesn't know the meaning of "recovery time."
I've had trouble adequately describing my first experience as a director of a feature film. Certainly, I feel like I acquitted myself well, simply by virtue of finishing. I didn't make any enemies, I kept my set running smoothly, and I learned a great deal as the shoot progressed about building the structure of a scene from the ground up rather than starting from one department's needs. Call it the cinematographer in me to start with the visuals, but it's not the best strategy sometimes. And I would say I enjoyed it, as much as I would say the position didn't fit me as well as I thought it might.
I'm excited to see the finished product, though, even more so than I thought I'd be after wrapping. This is genuinely going to be a good, sometimes shocking movie, and I can't wait to hear people's marveled reactions at our budget, our shoot schedule, and our war stories. The film festival circuit will be exciting, indeed.
I haven't quite adjusted to the fact that we'll be shooting Separation Anxiety 11 days from now. That I'll be living in Ohio for a month. I won't say I'm worried, but I will say I'm absolutely dreading being away from my fiancee for a month; the longest amount of time I've been away from her since she moved to Chicago is two weeks. Brutal.
Did I mention, by the way, that I'm looking extremely forward to getting married? Part of what's been so difficult about the past six months, I think - beyond the insane schedule and the money woes - is the lack of any stability whatsoever. It stuns me more and more to think that I'm excited to find some sort of steady job and become a house cat of sorts with my wife. I've always been eager for that, but the rush of freelancing initially made me wonder if I could sustain it forever; having been through it for several years now, I know there's an end game in sight. It also helps tremendously that I'm madly in love and that Kathleen pretty much rocks my world. Has it truly been over four years already? Wow.
I'm exhausted. I can't wait for a vacation.
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