Ridiculous Ice Cream: August 2008

Friday, August 8, 2008

Next phase

Hi there,

Well, I'm back in town -- but my camera, alas, is not. I left it in Maine. Eek!

I have to start getting seriously down to business prepping my classes now anyway, so there wouldn't be much time for editing, but it is displeasurable not to have to occasional moment here and there to compare takes or down(up?)load, etc. Not to mention that I can't use the camera for anything else, either.

I have decided that I must duplicate all the tapes, regardless. So that will be my next task. It will take a while because it's near 29 hours of footage and I will not be able to do more than a few hours at a time, probably (have to borrow the equipment). But that's what I'll do -- I'll dupe it so that I can pass it along to someone else without giving up the originals. We really do want to see a finished piece!!

Do let me know you're out there!

Rachel

Some of the Cast and Crew

Marissa ..... Vitta "Christine" Quinn
Larry ..... R.J. Bain
Bill ..... Kevin L. Bright
Amy ..... Rachel Allyn (-Oppenheimer)
Sarah ..... Rachel Ellis Adams
Director of Photography, Greg "Filmduck" Dancer
Written, Directed and Occasionally Edited by Rachel Ellis Adams
Produced by Jack Martin
Invaluable Help from Cynthia Conti
Additional Labor and Support Provided by Many Other Wonderful People
Bill's Living & Dining Rooms and Amy's Bedroom, thanks to Jenny and Mark Friedman
Bill's kitchen, thanks to Cynthia and Henry Jenkins
Bill's Front Vestibule, thanks to Alejandro Reuss
Larry's Bedroom, Bathroom & Dining Room, thanks to Elizabeth "FrizB" Ellis
Larry's Piano Room, thanks to some friends of Cynthia, but honestly? I don't even know what town we were in.
Tire Swing, thanks to Herb & Mary Adams

Plot and Themes (No Big Spoilers)

(There are spoilers in my posts!)

Seeing and Believing is a "quirky drama" about five friends in their late twenties: Marissa, Bill, Sarah, Amy and Larry.

As the film opens, Marissa is just leaving a mental hospital (is that what we call them these days?), where she has been staying, following her attempt at suicide. Her best friend Bill takes her in and tries to help her re-adjust to her new life as best he can, though he does not feel especially confident that he is up to the task. He, a chef, invites over some friends for a casual dinner, two of whom he does not know very well, and one of these - Larry - turns out to be someone that Marissa played with one summer as a child.

Marissa and Larry, under the jealous eye of Larry's girlfriend Amy, proceed to spend some time together. Soon a conflict arises as they each start to remember "the game" they played that one summer. Larry insists it wasn't real, that they were pretending or imagining things, but Marissa suspects he is mistaken. The truth becomes undeniable before too long: as five-year-olds, they really had ESP. The next question is, what about now?

Marissa is a writer, who has always been highly intuitive and empathetic, even while no "ESP" abilities have ever been explicitly recognized or labeled as such. Larry is a frustrated pianist who has dutifully put together a conventional and orderly life, of which the conservative Amy is a chief signifier. Eventually, each comes to a moment of testing in which they have to choose “yes” or “no” to the question, Can you live with who you really are?

The two governing themes of the film are:

1) The authentic self – both the obstacles that block us from realizing it, and the tools that allow us to bring it forth

2) Loving – what it means and what it looks like, both on a personal level and on a larger, social level (and on a theological level, too, if you're inclined to look through that lens).

Ridiculous Ice Cream

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Friday, August 8, 2008

Next phase

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Some of the Cast and Crew