The Last Post

It seems a lifetime, rather than a half-year ago that I sat in the first MAF class. Our goal throughout the year was to make a short film, write an original script, and to keep a blog - for which this will be the last entry.


So what is a short film? Hurbis-Cherrier defines short films in Voice & Vision as being “thirty minutes or less...tight, simple and efficient...usually revolv[ing] around a single, simple idea, recognizable characters, and a sharp turning point to make one moment resonate.” For the module, our films were to be five to eight minutes long.


Early lectures involved learning the basics; loglines, outlines, shooting scripts and later in October, storyboards. Loglines are a one sentence summary of the film designed to intrigue the viewer. Outlines differ from the logline in that in an outline the full story is summarized, culminating with the ending; nothing is held back, whereas the log-line ends with an implicit question - what happens next?


I was already concerned even at this early stage-- I'm much less comfortable with new technology than younger students who have already worked with similar equipment, and the effort of mastering the technology and trying to learn the principles was considerable, given the other demands on our time. In future older (but inexperienced) students might be advised when they select the module that there is a range of specialist equipment to master, and that they should arrange extra tuition.

In late October, we scouted Bath for locations- filming was scheduled for the third week of November, and we made a trial film using the script of The Eager Student. Most of November’s posts were taken up with pre -and post- production; I only managed one during the actual weekend, on the second day. I also laid hold (via Megan) of a copy of one of the previous year’s entries, which showed me the level that we had to aim for.


By late November I had posted initial reflections on the first film, such as the desirability of casting Performing Arts students (rather than amateur actors) for their greater professionalism. We received feedback on our initial blog entries. I now realize that my earlier blogs were too short, lacked an upsum, and had few links to technical terms or sources of information. I did consider rewriting earlier posts to benefit from the feedback, but felt that that would distort the narrative of my progress. On a lighter note, I posted the behind-the-scenes footage from the set...



In the run up to Christmas we spent several weeks revisiting scriptwriting, which took me back into a comparative comfort zone. I exchanged lengthy correspondence with Mike Alexander, an American writer of science- fiction short stories, in which we discussed my adapting his short story “Ware of the Worlds” under a Creative Commons Licence as an entry for the second film. However, it quickly became clear that although Mike wanted a less student-y orientation for the second film, a screenplay that called for a post-apocalyptic Bath, a survivalist protagonist who drove a humvee and lived in an isolated log cabin wasn’t going to be viable without changes so drastic as to make it unrecognizable. Also in December we reviewed all seven different versions of Choices, which we renamed Doorways to differentiate it from the other versions




Over Christmas, we each had to think of ideas, so –on the principle expounded in the class on idea generation that only one idea in every three will go anywhere- when we reassembled in the New Year to swap ideas, I floated the post-apocalyptic storyline, and a rather silly idea of magic sweets that make people invisible as my disposable ideas. I also brought my one serious idea (which I finally wrote as my script), The Other Woman. This was the story of a wife leaping to conclusions when she sees her husband with another woman, with laughable results. It featured older characters, with may have deterred the other groups.


To choose our script for the second film, each of our team listed their three favourite films from those available; we ended up with five films, of which two were common to almost everyone. They were Silent Disco, and Heads or Tails. In the end, we probably played safe in choosing Heads or Tails, our concern with the other film beiing that we would be reliant on finding someone who knew sign language (I suspect that most of the groups who chose Silent Disco had someone in their group or knew someone who could sign). Daniel volunteered to adapt the script –we had decided to be much less reverential of the source material, after witnessing how freely other groups adapted the script for the first film. By the end of January we were ready to start working on it.

We had a slightly different team from Doorways; Daniel had replaced Teagan and Megan -who was very good with the camera, so Julia and I agreed to share the cameraman role. I pre -and post- produced with her assistance, while Jaeeun directed, and Baylea was sound person. Following a lecture on editing, we agreed that Daniel not attend shooting except in emergencies, to maintain a Walter Murch-inspired detachment between the process and the end footage.

We were determined to learn from our experiences on Doorways, and to start work as quickly as possible on finding locations, casting, and getting permissions from interested parties such as Bath Film Council and the University; up until about two weeks before filming –which was scheduled for the 26th and 27th of February—everything seemed to be in hand. With hindsight, we should have taken that as an omen....

One of the things that I learned from Doorways was to always have a Plan B. If the leading man is late for filming, revise the shooting schedule. If the preferred location is suddenly no longer available, have an alternative location. When we were working on Heads or Tails, we tried to cover every contingency; so for each part when we were auditioning, we had a back-up actor under consideration, we looked at fall-back sites, alternative music, even back-up crew. However, when our entire cast withdrew in the space of 24 hours because we were competing with a rival –and for our primarily 3rd year cast mandatory- production, we learned that there are some blows so catastrophic that no amount of Plan Bs, Cs -even Zs- will cover them; at such times it’s necessary to change the entire game plan.

We agreed with our lecturer that we would film on Friday and Monday, the 25th and 28th of February, with a smaller cast and the crew filling bit parts. Since both those days effectively fell during Reading Week, we would have an empty lecture room, so we agreed with Mike that we would film one scene on Monday the 21st, after the guest speaker he had booked. But because my request was unclear (learning; if you need access to facilities, be specific about what you want, and when you want it) we still had to finish the lecture scene the following Monday. Apart from that hiccough, the actual filming went remarkably smoothly, perhaps because we had all worked together before, and had confidence in each other. Unlike the filming of Doorways we made sure that we got plenty of spare footage, we finished within schedule, and almost everything seemed to be in focus. But the words “It’s a wrap!” still came as considerable relief....

I deliberately limited my involvement in the post-production phase to that of completing the production folder and the PASC document, although I was happy to offer opinions and/or suggestions to Jaeeun and Daniel, who did an excellent job in editing. Simple pragmatism dictated that risking precious time was an indulgence we could hardly afford, given that the film is worth almost a fifth of our entire marks for the year across all subjects. And Daniel and Jaeeun proved more than adept at editing (I’ve learned there is only so much than one person can do, and any team must use their strengths). Even as we shot the film I felt that we had much better performances from the actors to work with, and the music added to the sense of 'mood' that we were trying to create. Once again, this film was all about decision making, but this time the narrative arc -I felt- was much clearer.

When we came to preview the rough assemblies in early April, we were surprised at how difficult the audience found it to grasp points that were obvious to us, though. One key scene involved the toss of a coin and the protagonist’s call, and caused the audience serious problems understanding the film's outcome and theme.

Also, despite shooting plenty of footage we found that we’d failed to include any external shots of the Hobgoblin to create a scene break. To rectify the confusion I travelled into Bath and took some extra shots. Both points show how over-familiarity with the script can blind those involved to flaws that are obvious to outsiders.

It seems a lifetime ago that I sat in that first class. I’ve learned how crucial teamwork is to filming, that any group is only as good as its weakest member, to have back-up plans, and communication is vital (even things that are ‘common sense’ -such as listing everyone’s phone numbers listed- may not be obvious to everyone). I’ve also learned that at heart I’m less of a film-maker than a scriptwriter, and I’m less of a scriptwriter than a novelist. It’s been fascinating and while I’m never going to be the next Roman Polanski, I feel proud of our team and our achievement

Back to The Grind

As I've noted in my main blog, it's back to work this morning, starting with Making A Film

As I've noted in my main blog, it's back to work this morning, starting with -what else?- Making a Film.

I knew it had been a while, but it's actually been over three weeks since I posted a Film Mumbling Blog entry. Next week is the last one, and I'd hoped that by leaving it for a little while that I could show the final version of Heads or Tails, but alas, twas not to be. (I'm guessing Mike is still knee deep in evaluating and marking them).

One interesting thing that cropped up over the Easter holidays was the screening of the distinctly atypical Midsommer Murder story about the brides in the bath called 'Echoes of the Dead.' Written by Sapphire & Steel creator, and more lately Torchwood writer Peter J. Hammond, it had his usual macabre sense of humour, prefectly typified by musician Celia Sheen on the theremin, which plays the wierd theme.

What was unusual about the episode was the way the camera panned from scene to scene. I'm still trying to work out why they might have done that. I'm assuming that it was to build a sense of continuity, but the effect was to slow the pace of the story. Contrast that with the pace of say, Doctor Who, and the world seems to be splitting into two camps.

I fear that I'm in danger of becoming even more obsessive about watching tv programmes....

Preview Time

Last week we previewed all the films made by our Film group, with slightly surprising results.

This blog is running about a week behind, but if I hadn't mentioned it few of you would have realized. It's easy for filmmakers to forget that the audience aren't party to what they know. It can be used to one's advantage, but for most filmmakers at our level, it's as much a liability as an advantage.

This manifested itself last week when we attended a preview of all of the the films made by our Film group. The purpose of this was not to allow us to bask in glory (or more likely to cram our fists in our teeth with embarrassment) but to allow each group to watch the other's films. The results were surprising.

One of the other groups pointed out that they were unsure whether we were using the same location for two different scenes. We were, but realized that we needed to insert some sort of break scene to differentiate them (we had deleted an intervening scene).

A more serious concern was that the audience's understanding of one key scene was the opposite of what we were striving for. Some serious tweaking was needed, and that's now been done. But it really rammed home how easy it is to assume that audience are following the story ("but that's obvious!" is the usual reaction from those involved in the making of the film) and how dangerous that can be. It's easy to assume from familiarity that the story is transparent - so it's necessary to have strangers who don't have any preconceptions to watch a preliminary screening.

And that applies to blogs as well...

Quantum of Cobblers

If this blog is to be truly reflective, then as well as looking at where films work, it also needs to look at where they don't...and why.

It struck me after watching what could have been a good film almost ruined by editing, that if this blog is to be truly reflective, then as well as looking at where films work, it also needs to look at where they don't...and why.

We watched Quantum of Solace on Saturday night. After 20 minutes we were all but ready to give up, so bad was the editing. It starts with one of Bond film's trademark intro chase sequences --now almost as much of a cliche as the TARDIS scene in Doctor Who ("It's bigger on the inside than the outside!")-- during which Bond captures an enemy agent and brings him in for interrogation, at which point things start to go wrong, both for Bond and the viewer. Someone fires a shot, someone else crumples, and then someone runs off. At this point, Bond runs after them -- which is a slight improvement on what's gone before, since we can at least identify one of the protagonists. In the scenes that follow, the villain runs across lots of rooftops, and then goes underground.

It wasn't that the editing was technically poor...it was actually very good at conveying what I assume the editor was trying to do, to (presumably) be thrilling, and to replicate being on a roller-coaster. The problem is that thrills and effects are at a premium, whereas clarity seems to be optional. The editor seems to have forgotten what the point of his/her job is -- to be part of an overall process. Instead the editor has elevated his/her part of the process to dominate everything else. When the producer actually got the editor back under some sort of control, the film became a much better one, at least until the final sequence, which was almost as incomprehensible as went before. It may be that I'm doing the editor a disservice, that the responsibility rests with the producer and/or director who encouraged such incomprehensibility. Certainly neither Richard Pearson, who edited Iron Man 2, nor Matt Chesse, whose work includes Finding Neverland and The Kite Runner are dunces -- both have been Oscar nominated. Perhaps the problem is that the film was also turned into a video game, and they became preoccupied with replicating that feeling, because the film is like watching one looooong game. Which is a shame.

It seems that the Bond franchise has been becalmed by the financial climate, but I think that if Quantum of Solace had been a better film, more intent on storytelling than on effects, maybe the take would have been better.

I very much got that feeling in the preview of our films; watching two of them, I had no idea what was happening and why, because the editing process seemed to have become an end in itself. Hopefully the final post-preview work will take care of that.

Casting

Introducing the male and female leads of Heads or Tails:

I've just realized that I never made good my promise (or was that a threat?) to introduce the cast of Heads or Tails. To avoid overwhelming you with new faces and names, I've kept it to the male and female leads. However, I'm awaiting b & w shots from them, so for the moment it's text only -- but as soon as I can, I'll update the blog post to show pictures.

First off, Ben Fuzi plays Ben, the main protagonist's boyfriend. Ben played a solo choir boy in a promo for BBC's Last Choir Standing, and is also interested in producing and directing his own work.

Sophie Pearce plays Hannah, the main protagonist. Sophie has appeared in the Phoenix Theatre's productions of both Guys n Dolls and The Tempest, as well as the intriguingly titled Cinderella's Interstellar Adventure, and has also performed as part of the Edinburgh Fringe. What was very noticeable was how much more accomplished they were as third year actors, versus the first years that we cast in Doorways. It just goes to show how much actors can develop in just two years of regular performing. In fact, Sophie managed the remarkable achievement of appearing in 3 of the 4 films, including two filmed the same weekend -- just how she managed that is unclear.

Looking Back At Filming Heads or Tails

After a three week break, I finally have the right frame of mind to look back at Four Eyes' production of the short film Heads or Tails.



Gulp; it's another of those moments when as a blogger, one looks at the date of the last post and thinks "Three weeks! It can't be!"



But on the plus side, these blogs are meant to be reflective, and one can't reflect without perspective, and for that one needs distance. Even the week after we finished filming, when our lecturer Mike asked me how filming went, I struggled to give him a considered answer.



I think I can do that now.



Three weeks ago we were ready for the off. Just twelve hours away from starting. Kate gave me a lift into the uni on the Friday morning, which were spent anxiously pacing up and down. I got there good and early, as did Jaeeun, who was frantically finishing off the storyboard.



The others were delayed due to their bus not running, which upped the tension still further, but we finally reached our opening location, the SU shop. With hindsight, we should have done some unofficial filming the day before, since we were all so anxious that we seemed to develop an extra set of thumbs instead of fingers. However, we were equally paranoid about running the battery down, so had decided against it. The cramped nature of the shop meant that some of the scenes were tricky, and when we finished it was more with a feeling of relief than actual satisfaction, but off we went to Jaeeun's rooms to film the next scene.



It was only when we reached the Hobgoblin that I began to relax into the process and even enjoy it. Darren --the landlord-- was a revelation as the bar manager and really got into the part.



The cafe scenes on the Monday went well for the most part. In fact the only problematic session was the lecture scene that had to be finished off during our last session on the Monday. By this time energy levels were low, shots needed to be made from specific angles to hide the fact that we had lost the audience we'd had shots during the early (thereby raising potential continuity problems) and everyone was feeling a little tired and stressed.



It was only after some days after my conversation with Mike that I realized that it was this difficult last session that had so jaundiced my view of the whole experience. Most of the time filming went much more easily than it did for Doorways because we knew what we were doing, but ending on a low left a poor impression of the whole process. It shows how endings --even ones in real life-- can affect the impression of what's gone before.

The Waiting's Almost Over (I Hope...)

So it's almost here - assuming none of the nine various bodies that affect us don't throw one last tack in the way...



So it's almost here. My Making A Film e-mail folder has 305 RECEIVED messages alone. I've spent over 22 hours in the last week (and that doesn't include the sleepless nights where I've been trying to keep track of everything) working on this project. We've had shouting and breakdowns and Uni Departments clashing over timetables.

Tomorrow, all being well, we hope to start filming. That's assuming that any one of the nine bodies (yes, NINE -- Bath Film Council, Highways and Police; the management of the Hobgoblin pub; the management of Matty's Cafe; the landlords of Waterside Court; Bath Spa University Estates management; BSU Film Department; BSU Drama Department) that can throw a spanner in the works don't do so.

If you want to see what practical effect this is having, just take a look at my main blog.

Bring it on.

Meet the Team

The teams have assembled, the scripts have been chosen, and the cast are being auditioned today.

We've been given the scripts to choose from to make our second 8 minute feature. This is the important one, the one which will be marked (Choices, which became Doorways -- was made to teach us how to make films), and which is worth 55% of our marks.

The dates for filming are the last weekend in February and the first weekend in March. We've gone for the earlier dates, since several of us have commitments the following weekend, which makes the timing even tighter -- but this time we have an idea of what we're doing.

We chose a script called 'Heads or Tails,' which was written by Lucy Baker. We really liked 'The Good Listener,' but had reservations about the viability of finding actors who could sign and would commit - in the space of a week.

The team making it --Four Eyes Productions (we all wear glasses) is very similar to that which made Doorways.

The one addition is Daniel Dearing who is adapting the script, with input from all the team. Daniel will also be one of the editing team during post-production, and is finding us the music.

The other four of us are the same team that Doorways, less a couple of people who have joined other groups.

Baylea Hart is responsible for scouting locations and casting during pre-production and sound on set and co-production during post-production.

Baylea will be co-producing during post-production, so with me will have the job of gathering the reams of permissions, release form and various scripts (original, final and shooting) into some sort of order.

Julia Hien is also responsible for scouting locations and casting during pre-production. On set she will take over as producer, and be co-camera person.

She'll be one of the three-person editing team post-production.

Finally, Jaeeun Jung is a Korean student studying English Language and Literature.

Jaeeun is going to be storyboarding during pre-production, will take over as Director on-set, and will be one of the editing team during post-production.

Today we have auditions, so I'll be able to introduce the rest of the team next time.

Black Swan

Yesterday we went to see Black Swan. Like many of the audience, our reaction was ‘Huh?’



Yesterday we went to see Black Swan, about which I knew absolutely nothing except that Natalie Portman has been highly praised for her performance in it as a ballet dancer. I was expecting many things, but none of them included a lurch into slasher-movie territory with a host of loud bangs and sudden jump cuts; at the end our reaction of 'huh?' seemed to be typical of many of the audience.

For those unfamiliar with the story, Nina Sayers (Portman) is an ambitious ballet dancer living at home with her domineering if well-meaning mother, Erica (Barbara Hershey). Picked to play the combined roles of Black and White Swans in Swan Lake, a combination that is not only incredibly high-profile but artistically challenging, Nina begins to crumble under the pressure.

Erica notices deep scratches on Nina’s back. Nina continually picks at her nails until they bleed. Nina hears whispers and begins to hallucinate as she seems to be descending into full-blown psychosis.

If Nina is the white swan (impresario Thomas Leroy recognizes her near-frigid perfection for the role) her rival Lily is the definitive seductive black swan. Lily always has an explanation for her behaviour, and when she doesn’t, she apologizes – after the damage is done.

In many ways, the early minutes of Black Swan perfectly encapsulate the art of film-making as we’ve been taught it. Minimal dialogue, none of it on the nose, lots of telling details, such as Nina’s cloying bedroom stuffed full of little-girl toys – and later as she tries to embrace a more adult persona, cramming them down the garbage chute.

But; but. The problem with telling details is that they don’t work if the protagonist is unreliable. Is Lily really after Nina’s role, or is she just misunderstood, easy-going, going with the flow? Is Nina her mother’s near-prisoner, or is Erica simply trying to look after her daughter? Do Nina and Lily have a night of passionate lesbian sex, or is Nina simply fantasizing?

I suspect the answer to that question, and in many ways the whole film is implied in the scene where Nina opens her door the morning after, but it's done so quickly and at the time it's significance isn't clear, that I wished afterwards that I could have taken a rewind button into the cinema.

The other problem with Black Swan is that its makers seem to be scared that their audience will get bored, so we’re given lots of jump cuts (literally at one point) and loud noises to stop us drifting off to sleep – rather as if they’ve taken Sergei Eisenstein’s view of editing as a series of images in collision rather too literally.

The film doesn’t really seem to know whether it wants to be a psychological study, a thriller or even a slasher movie. And in the end, it falls down between the two (or three) stools.

The Art (or Science) of Editing

A showing of The Cutting Edge, a 2004 documentary celebrating the centenary of development of editing, with contributions from directors and editors.


This morning in MAF we watched a 90 minute-ish film called The Cutting Edge, a 2004 documentary about the history of editing, from its inception in 1903.







The film was fascinating, and showed how actor's performances are far more reliant (than many of them would like to believe) on what happens in the cutting room, than what happens on set. A good performance can be made into an Oscar-winning one by how editors cut the images.



And presumably a good one can be made to look awful....



If I have one criticism of the interviewees, it is that many of them need to get out of the cutting room occasionally to get some perspective. Walter Murch may be a brilliant editor - and I was impressed by his focusing on eyes in the eyes of actors in Cold Mountain - but some of his analogies were wildly exaggerated or downright bizarre.

I particularly liked Election director Alexander Payne's description of editors as being like 'a sneaky politician.'

I can relate to that...

Script Example -- The Usual Suspects

How to make a film, using the opening of The Usual Suspects, and how not to make one, using some extracts from student scripts.

One of the best Making A Film seminars yet saw us study the script and film of the opening few minutes of The Usual Suspects, one of my favourite films of all time.

TUS -as I'll call it from now on-- was made on a shoestring budget. Since Bryan Singer went on to direct big budget X-men and other big budget films, I assumed it was a major release. It just goes to show that big budgets do not necessarily make better films.





A script is available here; it's worth noting that if a script is very, very close to the finished film, the chances are that it's actually been written after the film was shot. In the case of the date on this script, it's actually about 12 - 18 months prior to release date, and the script is a little more bare bones -- Keyser Soze doesn't appear in the script version of the opening scene.



What's striking about the opening sequence is the music clearly identifies the film's genre (thriller), and the judicious use of sound with the striking match, the fizz of the petrol catching and the stream of urine as Keyser Soze puts out the fire.


The opening five minutes provide a textbook example of providing an arresting opening, while the next five are an equally model example of pipe-filling, to use an industry term for setting a scene. In this case it's through a montage of action scenes.


But to contrast all of this this, we also looked at examples of badly written scripts, from detailed lists of camera shots (scripts aren't there to tell the director which shots to make but to outline action and dialogue), scripts littered with typos, to those written in past tense.

A great morning which makes we want to get hold of TUS and watch it again, leavened only by sadness at the loss of Pete Postlethwaite, whom I met briefly in a pub outside Chichester in 2000. I can't claim anything profound was said, but he seemed a genuinely nice, down-to-earth guy.

Re-visiting The Comfort Zone

Back to uni yesterday, and straight into workshopping our scripts, which was both a pleasurable and unsettling experience. Pleasurable because I'm in the comfort zone. Unsettling, because...I'm in the comfort zone. And that's something I've never experienced before in MAF.

So yesterday it was back to Bath Spa for the start of a new term. And of course, since we start on a Monday at 9am that means...Making A Film! We briought along our draft scripts, which we'd worked on over the Christmas break, and workshopped them.

It was both a pleasurable and unsettling experience. Pleasurable because for the first time in Making A Film I was in familiar territory. Which was in itself such a rare experience as make it unsettling in itself. (Typical writer, you mutter. Never happy...)

But I'm under no illusion; although it was an entirely comfortable experience it doesn't mean my script is any better than anyone else's. It's just a case that I've made my mistakes already, and while watching the example films provided by John August may have helped me tighten it up, it's no better than say, the raw but more original scripts some of my classmates brought along.

But for the time being, I'm going to enjoy a week back in the comfort zone

The Point of Film

The novel version of The Bridges of Madison County carries the best description of the purpose of photography and cinematography that I've ever read. But ironically that very description led me to ponder a question I don't have an answer to.

I’ve never seen the film version of The Bridges of Madison County, but I’m reading the novel for Genre Fiction. This may seem off-topic, by the way, but bear with me...all will become clear.



There is one point in the novel when the protagonist, Kincaid, is talking about his profession, that of photo-journalism:

She’d noticed he’d said ‘making’ pictures. “You make pictures, not take them?”

“Yes. At least, that’s how I think of it. That’s the difference between Sunday snap shooters and someone who does it for a living. When I’m finished with that bridge we saw today, it won’t look quite like you expect. I’ll have made it into something of my own, by means of lens choice, or camera angle, or general composition, and most likely by some combination of all of those.”

That’s the best description of the purpose of being a cameraman that I’ve ever seen, be it a stills photographer or a film cameraman, or any other person who uses a lens.

Which brings me to my second point: I can’t see such a passage of dialogue ever making it into a film adaptation, unless it’s in some way core to the film’s purpose. It’s too ephemeral.

So what is the point of a film adaptation, except to provide a story? In which case, why not just write one’s own story? This is not a pointless musing – one possibility among my script ideas was an adaptation of a published short story.

Any suggestions? What does a film adaptation of a written work bring to the ‘table’ apart from obliterating any mental images the reader has? In which case, isn’t it a prop for the imaginatively deficient media consumer? Hardly a ringing endorsement for an art form, is it?