Flash

I met with Drew Anderson http://plastichut.com tonight about doing the animation sequence that reveals some of Joey's secrets in Made Crooked.
Whenever I tell someone about the attempt to shoot a good bit of a feature film in a weekend, people are both sceptical and willing to help. In those moments I want to assure them that it will be good. I refrain as best I can manage, for expectations are the death of creativity. That's my theory in not telling the actors what I'm up to. Saying we're doing a bunch of exercises and it doesn't matter how they turn out is much different than saying we're trying to make a feature film in a weekend, but it doesn't matter if it works. People have too much invested in the results that way.

neal

Up Until Now

Huge sigh of relief. Nobody is going to read this until after the fact as I'm not going to tell anybody about this blog. I've been containing this secret for weeks now about an upcoming project. As it is very exciting, keeping an online record of it seems important.
We're making a film that four of the six actors don't know is being filmed. Hence the title taken from the quote previosly posted
I'm not a Bible toter or quoter, but this is really resonating with me. Very cool to think none of us are broken but crooked. And that we can't fix ourselves. Maybe becuase we don't need to be fixed as much as straightened out a bit.

A month or so back I decided to put on an acting retreat through the acting studio of which I am owner and coach. At first it was going to be a getaway to do some intensive work as well as an opportunity for the actor-students to bond a bit. Only five students signed up. Odd number, so I knew I would be doing a scene. I thought I would assign scenes from an existing film that we would rehearse and shoot over the weekend. I invited a cinematographer that I had just met to come along. The Anniversary Party came to mind. I was about halfway through that script when I had the thought it would be amazing to come up with a story that could be contained by the actual events of the weekend. Seemed very ambitious, so I didn't give it much thought.
At least that was the plan. It went to work on me and within a day or two I had the crude beginnings of a story. I was excited, but a little scared to sit down and start writing. I thought perhaps I was giddy and drunk on the idea and that nothing would end up on the page. I did it anyway.
There was a story. Not a great story, but it was fun. I have seen a number of digital features recently that were medicre at best, yet they were generously received. It occured to me as I raked them over the coals critically that while I might have been 100% correct in my negative assessments, I wasn't having any fun. I decided to let myself off the hook and be as bad or worse as these other hacks.
Initaially I came up with some sort of two couples in the woods and some bank robbers looking for a hideout in the woods take them hostage. All sorts of deviance was pondered. That idea didn't last long. I was watching Six Feet Under one night. It was the David abduction episode. it made me sick. I yearned for a return to plain old character development. I got to thinking. Maybe the visitors were angels that came to help a crooked family get straight.
I wrote a treatment and an annotated outline. I got a second cameraman excited about the project. I decided to tell the strongest actor of the lot and to make him my on-screen ally as well.
I'll bring this up to date with some additional posts very soon.
I'm also going to invite Jordan, the Director of Photography to post.

Neal

Made Crooked

Consider the work of God;
who can make straight what he has made crooked?

Ecclesiastes 7:13 (RSV)