2016

Two Drops From Dry

17/10/16 22:15 Filed in: Post Production | Financing | The Big Picture

In the inexorable rush of western civilization to dynamite itself, the United Kingdom voted out of EU membership today. The thing is, we actually financed “Clocking The T” from my international savings account in Britain.

*gulp*

How does a European political debacle have anything to do with a Los Angeles based micro-budget passion project? To make sense I need to back up a little.

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They Think We’re Making ‘Coven’

10/10/16 10:47 Filed in: Post Production

We went to a family reunion in South Dakota back in July and my sister-in-law and her husband asked how the movie was going. I said it was going well but that we’d had a lot of setbacks and we’re slogging through it. That’s when I noticed she was giving me That Look.

Glassy eyed.

Slight nod of the head.

A shadow of a smile.

Every facial tic and body posture that human beings have developed over two million years of genetic evolution to communicate, "You sad fuckin’ loser,” without actually saying it.

When I mentioned it to Erika she said, yeah, she’d gotten the same Look when asked about the movie from a co-worker the week before. I wondered aloud, “What’s up with that? ” And she leaned in and whispered, “They think we’re making 'Coven.'"

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Rings Of A Tree

05/10/16 08:19 Filed in: Post Production | The Big Picture

At the tail end of the summer of ’95 I went to a BBQ of a friend of a friend’s place in Burbank. There I met a crew member who’d worked in a key position on “The Usual Suspects, ” which had just come out in theaters six weeks earlier to much acclaim. Enthusiastically I asked what that experience had been like and they began to dump a bucket of vitriol all over the movie, and in particular, the director, Bryan Singer. They told me he was a clown, a fool, both clueless and nitpicking. He didn’t know how to run a set, direct actors, or how even pronounce ‘Keyser Sozes'’ name correctly. They said it was a miracle the film got made. There was more but it’s irrelevant. Because here’s the thing:

It’s obvious to anyone who saw “The Usual Suspects” that summer that Bryan Singer knew what he was doing.

In fact, anyone who has ever seen “The Usual Suspects” knows immediately that Bryan Singer is a world class director.

So… WTF, right?

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You Load Sixteen Tons, What Do You Get?

06/04/16 10:02 Filed in: Production | Post Production

It’s our anniversary, of a kind. Whether good or bad, I cannot tell you. In the Death March of micro-budgetland, it’s just another signpost you ignore, knowing full well you’re Not There yet.

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Twenty-First Century Mulligan

30/03/16 10:23 Filed in: Post Production

We've been looping the movie the last couple of weeks, with actors flying in and out of the edit bay as they're available—which is a toughie when we're all juggling day jobs and the leads have a fistful of sides. But it's getting done. And here's how we did it on the cheap…

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Tags: editing, how not to

Low Hanging Fruit

06/02/16 14:17 Filed in: Post Production

We watched the ‘first cut’ of CTT last night and it moved along a LOT better. It’s really the second cut, but nobody counts the assembly. We didn’t miss a single thing of the 21 min 30 sec we deleted. If anything, we saw more scenes and elements we can jettison. But it certainly flows much smoother. In fact, it cranks along nicely…

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Tags: editing