Why...

...won't you post comments?   

Why?

It's because you're not there, isn't it? 

Starting Week 2

All righty!

I have finished 40-44!!  Yayy!

Scene 40 is supposed to be flashes into the down-and-out guy's mind, and in truth it's not exactly "done," but I've got some thematic filler in there.  All three montages will just have to wait until January, I think.

Counting that filler as something though, I am now "one day" or 1.75 pages ahead of schedule.  This is a good thing, because tomorrow I start Scene A45 - "Frazzled" - the scene where Marissa is crying in the dark and Bill counsels her.  It's six pages long and will take me probably four days (possibly three if it goes well).   This scene was really tough -- and it's one of the hardest scenes for me to watch/engage with because I should have been a better director for it.  I mean, I should have been a better director ALL ROUND, but this scene is so vital to the film that I can get furious watching certain things fall through the cracks, etc.  I will try to stay calm, though, because I am on a mission!

I managed to stay relatively calm for both the "you're f*king nothing" scene and the "I'm a people person" scene, both of which featured professional actors outside our central cast of five regulars.  It is clear to me watching these scenes - which came out well enough in the end - that I was a little intimidated by their experience or something -- I did not give them enough input. :(  Still, it is neat to have the fresh faces and energies in the movie.

PLUS - our own Jack Martin has two lines in Scene 44 (in the park on Comm Ave).  He plays "Somebody."

SOMEBODY:  Excuse me--
LARRY:  It's 12:45.
SOMEBODY:  Thanks. 

So, Jack, you're Somebody now! 

I'll probably write mid-Frazzled once, and then when I have finished that scene!  Man, I'll tell you, that will feel like quite an accomplishment!  After that, it will be the "Second Dinner" sequence, which includes reading Marissa's prose (I have no idea how to handle that) and Larry & Marissa's "showdown" on the street.  THEN it will be the suicide sequence; THEN Bill comes out; THEN Amy sings.  Then the ENDING.  No flies on these scenes! 

So -- until mid-frazzle....

"You weren't supposed to DO that!"

Scene 31:  After their nice "get reacquainted" dinner, Marissa and Larry adjourn to the "piano room" where Marissa tries to get Larry to "try the game."

LARRY:  But it wasn't real.
MARISSA:  We thought it was real.
LARRY:   We were little.  Little kids think Santa Claus is real!
MARISSA:  That's because adults tell them he's real. 

Larry is unconvinced but Marissa is undeterred and proceeds to "read" the piano bench.

The whole first part is one long take.  The O/S shots we did to insert were over the 180 line so they were not usable at that point [SEE: handy "Glossary," tabbed above, if need be].  It feels a little slow, but it's also okay -- symbolically, it's unifying.  It works symbolically not to cut until Marissa announces her "discovery" that alienates Larry.  Then we "separate" them visually to match the emotional truth.

I decided to try a little 'Homocide: Life on the Street' technique there:  Fans of this bygone, "revolutionary" TV show will know that they regularly edited scenes with certain moments/dialogue repeated or with intentional jumps in smoothness (a character might be to the right of a desk, then suddenly "jump" to behind the desk through a discontinuous cut).  Since this is the moment that their world turns upside down -- an "inciting incident" in a way -- I chose to represent this by making the world seem disjointed and rocky -- to model visually the instability and "shocking" nature of the event.  I repeat a couple lines of dialogue and put in a couple jumps.

Now, we didn't shoot it with this idea in mind, and it could be that someone with more experience with this sort of editing could do a more effective job than I (for example - I'm wondering if I should put in a flash frame somewhere, but I'm not sure how) -- AND this is the Rough Cut, so I'm calling it "DONE."

This means that I have supposedly "edited" 9.5 pages in three days.  Being ahead is going to be key because I'm sure that I will lose some ground on some of the more cut-heavy scenes.  Gain ground where you can!

Today I will try to do Alan/Down-and-Out-Man's "You're f-ing nothing!" scene, but I'm realizing as I look at the script that I was going to have another montage there -- the "montage of pain" -- as Marissa notices him and experiences his loss and struggle, etc.  Dunno exactly what I'll do about that.  Might need to ask someone with liquor bottles in their house to shoot a couple images for me.  Could this be YOU, invisible reader??  I have a great website for transferring the video...

Two down

Okay!

We're off to a good start.  This is especially nice because I'm sure there will be some very aggravating moments, too. 

I did Scene 29 yesterday...

It was a rough shoot on the street (somewhere - don't remember where we were - Dorchester somewhere, I think) with passers by and trucks and people whistling -- plus it was a very bright day, so as we walked, we moved in and out of shadows.  Were we aware of this at the time?  Probably.  We got a Verizon employee to be an extra at his truck, but he kept looking at the actors walk by, which makes it look like he's looking at the camera, because of the angle of his glance.  Too bad.  Ridiculous ice cream. 

Then today's job was to figure out if I had a version of Scene 30 already done because this was the very first scene I ever did -- I was going to (in 2004, I believe) use it as the frame of a trailer.  I recall sitting in the Caribou Coffee on Hennepin and 22nd St showing the scene to Marty W. on his cool portable monitor.  "You guys were really serious, weren't you?" he said in a pleasantly surprised tone.  He agreed to edit our movie for free.  Yay!  A year or so later, he gave the tapes back, having not had time because real life took him over.  Boo! 

The problem today was that all I could ever find was a squeezed QT file on the finished scene that was also slightly pixelated, for some reason.  It was not usable.  But where were the original clips??  I searched for an hour or more (even got my old PowerBook G4 to come on - a tricky task - and in there was a folder called "Old iMac" -- found some S&B original budget sheets, etc -- but no video files) and was just about to give up, when I tried One Last Thing -- which worked!  Yay!

SO:  Scene 30, after minor tweaking, is DONE TOO.

Now the real work begins!  Or, er, begins again!

The Scene List

I gotta tell ya, after looking this over, and thinking about how long it took me to do things before, I am less confident that I am even remotely capable of doing all this in four weeks.  I'll do my best! 

Here's the list: