Tone (Scene 28 "attraction")

Tone is an interesting, tricky thing in filmmaking.

Because you shoot things out of order and over several days -- sometimes weeks -- and because we are, as human animals, prone to moods and "inner tones," if you will -- affected by the weather and how much sleep we've had and what we've eaten last and who we've spoken to about what -- keeping the tone trajectory going in a consistent way is a real challenge.  It's another thing that the director has to be really clear about -- really, specifically, explicit about, i.e., not just to intuit.  One cannot rely on one's "understanding" of the script or the characters in a general way.  One has to be concretely prepared each new shoot day to push aside the influences of the moment (the weather, the food, the latest conversation -- and those things as they influence the actors, as well).

I'm having a hard time editing Scene 28 (Bill and Marissa in the kitchen: "It's the reaction to the attraction that matters"), not just because the DP and I totally screwed up the eyelines, but especially because I failed to keep the tone on track.

There's a little footage between takes of me & the actors talking, and I wasn't struggling; I was satisfied, even quite pleased sometimes.  But having now edited scenes 1-27 and most of 29-37 into their narrative lines, I can see more clearly what 28 was supposed to be doing in the middle there than I did, that July.  Watching the footage now, I can see that on the shoot day, I had lost sight of the role of the scene in the overall arc of the final 90-minute narrative -- understandably, perhaps, given so many variables and my lack of experience, but maddeningly!

We had the kitchen location (Henry and Cynthia Jenkins' house) for a certain number of days; we had the actors for certain hours of those days - some actors at certain times, others at others, with a little overlapping where possible for group scenes.  Accordingly, as is common practice, we therefore shot all the kitchen stuff consecutively, lumping the scenes by actor availability, regardless of how they fell chronologically in the story (though I do try to shoot as close to story chronology as I can).   What's instructive to watch, from here in 2012, is that I was obviously going along with the flow that the actors were taking the scene, instead of guiding them back to the tone that the scene initially - and ultimately - called/s for.  In my appreciation for the honest emotion that was being communicated well, and in my desire to trust them and respect them as artists making choices, I actually let them down by not helping them find their way to what would ultimately have been "better" performances -- because different choices would have fit more smoothly into the flow of the scenes around that one.  I watch this footage now, see the genuine, decent "acting" going on, but am confounded about what takes to choose, because so few of them actually fit the movie _emotionally_.  "Where was the director???!!!" I cry at my computer screen. 

In this scene, the following exchange is written (about Marissa's ex and why they're not together anymore):


BILL
You're always blaming yourself.
He was probably an asshole.

MARISSA
I'm not saying he wasn't an asshole.
But I still freaked him out.  I kept
telling him the truth.

BILL
Oh.  I've told you about that.  It's bad
form.  Freaks people out.

MARISSA
Apparently.  Silly me.  And then, well,
the proof came when... [sic] He never
came to visit me in there.  He called
and left a message once.  Once.

BILL
Fuckin' loser. 

MARISSA
I know it's hard for people, but once?
It would kill you?  I mean, it would
kill you?


If the humor/levity in the tone of this exchange is lost, if earnestness becomes the "interpretation," then the moment becomes doleful -- and it's the start of the scene; doleful to start doesn't really give you anywhere to go.

"I kept telling him the truth" must be meant with a self-aware irony, i.e., said as a joke, not as a straight-forward confession -- even though (if not especially because) it is the truth ("kidding on the square," as my friend Pete Simmons would say).  Go on, try it both ways in your head....

See?  When said earnestly, it sounds self-important.  Then when Bill answers her, there's only so much he can do to lift the humor (let alone the pace) back up again because Bill's role is to be sympathetic.

The other thing I didn't do as director here, re: the actors, was help them the see which lines were the earnest lines that call for emotional investment, and which lines were basically just the route to those important lines, and therefore not requiring much "umph" themselves.  That is one of the tasks of the conversations that should go on between actor and director:  making sure the actor is clear about the arc of the scene and the emotions that the character is having in these moments.  When you have extended rehearsals, as in theater, you have more room to let the actors find the rhythms of the scene together over time, but in film, "we shoot in five." It occurs to me as I write this that maybe because of my background in theater, I was letting the actors feel it out, probe it themselves, at a pace I might use in a theatrical rehearsal... 

Hm.  Well, it didn't work in this case. 

So - as shot, Scene 28 is slow, earnest and at times ponderous (Bill espouses his theories on the nature of attraction while Marissa playfully [or not!] teases him and draws him out), when it should be quick-paced dialogue with flashes of insight and an obviously intimate connection between the friends.  The actors did a really nice job at playing the scene with attention to the content of each line, finding the ways the characters really cared deeply about what they were saying.  Unfortunately, thinking seriously and caring deeply make for  s p e a k i n g   s l o w l y, which is not appropriate to this moment in the 90-minute arc of the final film.  PLUS, because the screenwriter needed another re-write (ahem), the scene is an ASTONISHING NINE PAGES LONG.  Which, as you might gather from my capital letters, is too long. 

So what I will DO now, as editor, with this scene, is search through all the million takes (nine angles!! WTF?? Where was the director???)  (to be fair, it's partly nine angles because they walk around the room, which is also how we lost track of the eyelines - d'oh!) and pick out the little moments here and there, as found, of anything that looks like levity and friendly irony (that is, not sarcasm, which could screw with the fun that they're supposed to be having and threaten to make the discussion look adversarial in some way).  Then I will try to help the tone along by having a lot of cuts -- increasing the pace not only through the rapidity of the cuts, but also cutting out many of the one- and two-second pauses between the lines - which I might actually have wanted to have there, if the scene were supposed to be thoughtful and dramatic.

We'll be going for Tom Stoppard, not Tennessee Williams. 

And it will be hard because the actors are doing "Cat," for sure.

Argh.

Another Good Lesson for Next Time!!

End o' May

All right, well, here we are.

Basically I would like to accomplish in the next five weeks the same amount of editing that I accomplished in the last five months.

Hmmmm...

Five weeks from now is the end of June, at which time I am hoping to pass on the rough cut to someone more skilled, who may be able to clean up the sound, etc. etc. blah blah blah - I'm sure I've said that 100 times.  IF I am _not_ done by then (but  how could I not get done in five weeks what took me five months theretofore??), I do have some room to still get at least the rough cut done in time for the end of July, when I hope to have some kind of reunion and screening.  I need to look up what was our last day of shooting, because that might be a good anniversary date for a reunion -- and I think it was like the 7th of August, which would give me an additional week.  Ahem.

Alas, when I floated this reunion idea to the crew, both of our California people -- and they are not incidental (Marissa AND Larry) -- said they don't have the funds for a summer trip east this year.  SUCK!  Understandable.  I am excited, though, that most of us will be there!!  It will be so neat!  I have not yet been able to track down Greg Dancer, our DP, but, admittedly, I have not tried all avenues yet.  I expect to find him and hope that he will join us. 

More Good News:

A) I found Cynthia Conti!  Yay!  Hi, Cynthia!  Cynthia was involved from the beginning, helping with planning and doing just about anything she was asked, including second camera and sound recording.  She was one of our crew who had actually had some background in film production, so she was invaluable -- not least because her friends made up probably a third of our crew or more; that is, on any given day, there was a friend of Cynthia's there, doing something well needed.  Plus, it was a friend of Cynthia's that supplied the "piano room" location.  So we're happy to get her back into the fold.

B) I have enlisted Katelyn Whitehead, a former student of mine from UMN, to be the "Montage of Humanity" director & editor.  This is a montage of visions that Marissa has as her ESP is increasing in accessibility. I have yet to really know how long it should be, or exactly how it will fit into the final film, precisely, but with Katelyn's formidable smarts and creative instincts, it is sure to be NEAT, regardless.  Hi Katelyn! 

More mixed news:

So - One of the "little" scenes we never shot (I think there are three) was of Marissa waking up at dawn and looking at the clock, seeing her ponytail extension hanging there.  This was supposed to be a little bridge between the night before (first dinner) and the next morning when she and Larry run into each other on the beach.  The audience got to see that her long hair is fake, so that when she is short-haired on the beach, they don't think she cut all her hair off -- only to be confused when, a few hours later at meeting for worship, she has long hair again.  Hm. 

Well, I was in communication last week with Christine/Marissa, and she agreed to try to film herself in bed, waking up and looking off -- then I would shoot a shot of a ponytail (yet to be purchased) and intercut them.  Christine then very promptly did this (yay!) but unfortunately, though her camera claimed it was 16x9, it is _fake_ 16x9 -- 620x480 or something -- i.e., it's 16x9 including the black pillar-box bars on the sides!  Duh.  Plus, it doesn't seem to play at the right speed, though I might be able to fix this.  The issue is that she doesn't have or know anyone with an actual video camera (oh, how times have changed in ten years!), so she had to use her still cam.  Poop.  But I think I will keep the weird footage in there, anyway, because I think it will be better to have the scene than not have the scene, and it's only like two 15-second shots around the 5-second shot of the pony-tail or so.  So it's Really Cool!! that we now have this scene - new footage!! - but a bit of a bummer that it won't match.  The thing is, it's not like we're expecting a theatrical release anyway, so this is just one more *lesson* for us all (or me?) on our journey of learning about RIDICULOUS ICE CREAM.

Now -
Today I will clean up scene 30 (skipped 28 & 29 because I had some old 30 that was already done), and then go back to 28.  I am >>resisting<< the urge to re-cut the parts of 30 and 28 that I did YEARS AGO.  "Rough cut, rough cut, rough cut rough cut" I keep telling myself.  Right?????

I wish someone were actually reading this blog (besides Diane!  Who posted a comment last time!  Yayy!!!).  But oh well, whaddaya do?  As I head into the next five weeks, I think I will try to write more often, keeping all of you theoretical readers apprised of how ridiculous or not it is of me to try to get so much done in that amount of time.  If you ARE there, it would really help me to know it.  But I know you're not because I see how many pageviews I've had.

Sigh.

ONWARD!

Love,
Rachel

Days of Heaven It's Not

Well, Scene 21 is done!  CHECK

This is the scene we shot near Carson Beach at dawn -- where we put coffee in RJ's hair to make it look sweaty because he'd been jogging -- as I recall, he preferred coffee to the bay water as likely to be more sanitary.  :)

RJ/Larry is carrying a CD Walkman on his run.  How quaint.  And what a pain in the butt to have had to run with such a thing.

Marissa is wearing blue, which I think she shouldn't be, symbollically (it's an Amy color - oops), but it looks good in the dawn light.

Continuity nightmare # 29:  shooting at dawn's magic minute.  Some of the shots are really lovely.  Greg did a great job with the dawn light.  Unfortunately, the scene diagetically takes about 3-4 mins, but we shot it over about an hour, I think.  So the light, er, changes.  I remember trying to go fast, trying to keep it as close to the crack of dawn as we could -- but there's only so much you can do -- especially when it's July fifth and there are still July 4th drunken revelers on the pier (remember that?).  I've tried to fix some of the exposure with color correction -- I definitely helped it look less egregiously different, one shot to the next, but the sky is a tough one (especially given that Marissa's shirt is the same color).  I can hardly imagine what filming was like on Days of Heaven when they shot almost exclusively at "magic hour" (near sunset), so they had only like 20 minutes of actual filming time per shoot day.  Looks fantastic, though.  Gorgeous movie. 

"The kid with the veiny eyelids?"

Now to the kitchen...

Scene 18...

...is now done.  It's the one where Rachel EA couldn't ever hit her mark when hopping up onto the bed, and Rachel AO gets to do the clap-off/clap-on light in Jenny & Mark's bedroom -- with Cynthia's help at the actual non-diagetic light switch.  "Are you asking if we were naked?"

"Scene 19" was supposed to be a shot of Marissa in bed, waking up, her blond ponytail hair visible on a chair nearby -- but we never actually shot this because we never found a bedroom for her.  I'm hoping to eventually shoot a pony tail on a chair _without_ Marissa waking up - ?  I think?  We'll see. Anyone else want to shoot that for me?  Anyone got a blond ponytail??

"Scene 20" is just a transitional shot of Carson Beach at dawn.  I'm also not sure we got quite the right shot of this.  We got lots of Carson Beach at dawn, but somehow, in like 20 minutes of "dawn" we just never seemed to get a shot I like for the right duration of time.  Not sure I've looked at it all, though.  We'll find something to go in there.

Scene 21 is really the next one I'll do.  This is when Marissa is at the beach at dawn and imagines Larry there, and then he appears, jogging.  It has that weird - "Is it live or is it ESP" quality, like when Larry imagines Marissa in his piano room, not too long afterward (a scene I already cut together - hooray!). 

Then 22, which is where Bill and Marissa talk too long over the Sunday paper and OJ about how she talks funny (saying things like "ne'er do well") and then she says she's going to meeting, and he says he's been thinking of going with her one of these days, and then SHE says:  "I'll believe it when I see it."  (Hey!  That's the name of the movie!) 

When that scene's done, I'll hit a clump of scenes I've done already which will feel good, because it will feel like I get to skip ahead some.    

Slow and steady wins the race.  Let's hope it gets the movie done.

First Dinner Done! (although....)

Yayyyy!!!!

I can't tell you how happy this makes me!

Scenes 7-16 are now DONE -- or, you know, what passes for "done" around these parts.  Hoorayy!!!

Them were some challenges, I'll tell you.  So many angles of five people talking, so many takes of each angle -- plus the two cameras running simultaneously for some of the tableside takes.  Plus we were sweaty and occasionally wilty (because, as you will recall if either you were there or you read previous posts, it was like 1,005 degrees).

I ended up leaving in one take of Kevin with the sweat coming through the front of his shirt - tough.  Of all the continuity issues, this will be a small one.  I mean, _eating_, for heaven's sake, presented all kinds of hands-up/hands-down issues (some one's asparagus turns into a yellow pepper at some point), and the glasses magically refill themselves and drain again, etc....  A few spots on the front of a shirt aren't going to trouble me.

One thing that does trouble me a little is the sound of metal spoons clanking against the iced coffee glasses in the living-room recognition scene.  WHY did we keep the spoons in the glasses??  Did we do that for a reason?  Because we all did it, it looks like.  I had the foresight to use plastic plates for the dinner (although they don't pass for glass, as I was hoping they would), but not to take the spoons out?  A little clanking is festive, but man, with five hot people, the glasses go up and down to our mouths a LOT -- there was a lot of clanking.

Oh well -- I don't care!  The scenes are done! 

I am hoping I can get a sound person to clean up some of the sound.  I did what I could with levels, but there are all kinds of issues.  Thank heaven for ROOM TONE.

Now, the only stupid -  really stupid - thing is that, erm, uhh, well -- the exit scene, where everyone is in Alejandro/Bill's vestibule saying good night -- including a moment, according to my notes, of Kevin looking into the camera and saying, "Hey, what's up, dog?" -- is, ahem, lost.  It's on Tape 29, which was, shudder, yes, lost.  More on that when I get to the scene with Amy and Sarah walking home from grocery shopping.  Fortunately, there was nothing KEY on it -- it was largely what some people call "B roll" (insert shots, non-dialogue, etc.), plus the good-bye at the door -- and there is an SLP-VHS copy of it, which, if absolutely necessary, might be able to fill in a hole or two. 

But let's be happy about the first dinner sequence again!

"I DO know you!"
"What?"
"You're Larry!  Larry-with-the-plastic-dinosaur Larry!  It's me:  Missy!"
"Missy?
"Yeah - Missy!"
"Oh, God!  Missy with the jelly and butter sandwiches??"
"Yes!"
"Oh my God!!"

Yayyyyy!!!!!

Oh here's a good thing -- I managed to cut a minute and a half out of the recognition scene!  As written, it's nine minutes, which is wayyyyyy too long (the script generally is "bottom heavy"), and I got it down to seven and a half.  For one thing, I cut out all references to Sarah wearing a flannel nightgown, for those who may recall Sarah's dream, which is probably none of you. 

Got some GREAT stuff from the actors!

So pleased!!!

Thing I Thought I Knew... #47

Well, so, one of the things about this whole editing process is that -- just like with teaching -- I'm learning things that I thought I already knew.

Example:  the sound bridge.

Wow - are they great!  They are so useful!  And prevalent!

This is is when you have a shot of, say for example, Bill and Marissa, and Bill has just said what a great "dream analyzer" Marissa is, and then Amy, sitting across the room with Larry (not in this shot) says, "Larry's pretty amazing at dream analysis, too!" ("I don't know about 'amazing' says Larry, embarrassed).  If one wants to cut from the shot of Bill and Marissa to the shot of Amy and Larry -- and one does -- one will want to start Amy's line before the viewer actually sees her, while the viewer is still seeing Bill and Marissa.  The sound of Amy's voice acts as a "bridge," leading the viewer over the visual cut.  It aids continuity, or "flow," and can hide some visual sloppiness.

So, yeah, I knew that already.  I've explained it to my students a thousand times.

But MAN - it's true!

When I first cut a scene together, I just cut most of the lines cleanly, without overlapping, and then I go back onto the timeline and cut and shift and do some overlapping (bridging).  This takes me FOREVER because - as I may have mentioned once or twice - I am Not Really an Editor.  OMG is it a pain in the, er, neck.  But I do it because the difference between the staccato jumpiness of the first way and the relatively flowy smoothness (I say "relatively" because I'm not all that great at it, since, as possibly mentioned, I'm not actually an editor) of the second way is the difference between me thinking, Oh Hell This Movie Is SO Bad, I Can't Stand It I'm Going to Have to Kill Myself, and me thinking, Wow What a Cute Little Moment, We Had Such a Good Group and Maybe This Movie Is Decent After All and Everyone Will Just Love It!

BIG DIFFERENCE.

All thanks to the sound bridge.  Thank you, sound bridge.  Much obliged.