The Editor - Editing Story, Editing Character
December 21, 2008
Andrew Stanton, the director of the fantastic WALL•E, is interviewed by Jeff Goldsmith in the latest of the ever-fascinating podcast Creative Screenwriting and he makes a great point as he talks about the incredibly fast writing process on TOY STORY 2, in which he had three months to rewrite a script which had been written and re-written over three years:
“It taught me this huge lesson that most of your time spent, even if you think you’re dealing with plot, is about character.”
That’s a lesson that applies everywhere, if you ask me, not just to writing.
One of the great things about James Cameron’s action films, like the TERMINATOR series (especially the second one) and TRUE LIES, is the great attention he pays to the details of the characters in the film, over and above the detail he lavishes on the action sequences. In fact, if you look at the chase scene in the LA River from TERMINATOR 2, you’ll see that the action — as the Terminator chases after the T1000 robot who is trying to capture the boy — is based on us caring about the lead characters. The scenes that come immediately before and after the chase scene deal with the boy’s and the Terminator’s relationship, and use that to push the danger element. The audience feels something in the action sequences because they feel something for the people involved in them. Name the top five chase movies of all time and, chances are, they make you care about the people involved in the action and take great pains to do that.
It is true that an enormous amount of time needs to spent in the editing room on how our characters move from one space to another. In the first few cuts of HEATHERS, for instance, we realized that the film was quite involving but that the Veronica character committed these murders and suffered almost no regret or self-doubt about them. In the terms of the film, since the film was about her need to separate herself from the culture of popularity — she got away with them. And that made it harder for the audience to get our film in the way we wanted them to get it. We then spent the next bunch of cuts trying to make her more empathetic — by removing self-righteous speeches, accenting her self-doubts, and increasing the manipulative nature of the JD character. That caused us to rearrange scenes, eliminate others and drop some action that helped tie pieces together. Winona Ryder’s hair changed from wet to dry suddenly, her wardrobe bounced around — and it didn’t matter, ultimately, because the audience was following who she was. Not what she wore.
The lesson goes even deeper than that. Look at any film by a first-time feature director and you’ll notice that, except in extraordinary circumstances (such as Sam Mendes, or Orson Welles — and they both had incredible learning experiences in theater before venturing into films), the films pay great attention to the two or three lead characters as opposed to the rest of the people. It’s a learning curve thing, of course — the business of filmmaking is so hard that it’s a wonder that there’s footage shot at the end of every day, much less detailed wonderful footage. But it is the attention to the supporting characters that separates the truly successful films from the near-misses.
In John Patrick Shanley’s DOUBT, it is inevitable that the filmmakers need to focus intensely on the two leading characters — played by Meryl Streep and Philip Seymour Hoffman (there’s a great piece on Hoffman in this week’s New York Times Sunday Magazine, in which he talks about shaping character and the detail that is necessary to do that — you should go off and read it as soon as you finish this blog post). They are the two protagonists who bring the film’s underlying message/concerns to the surface — just how confident can we be about truth? It is desperately important that the audience understand Shanley’s reasons for making this film. And the two of them carry most of that weight. But it is in the performance of Viola Davis, as the mother of the first black student at this 1960’s Catholic school, that jumps the film above the near-miss category.
Davis’ character carries a message that is important to give contrast to the main story of the film — despite the knowledge that her son may have been abused by Hoffman’s priestly character — she tells Streep’s character (who is the head of the school) that she simply can’t afford to care about that; the positive aspects of her son’s presence in the school far outweigh the potential negatives. It is a shade of grey that Streep’s character cannot take in — her world is made up of stark contrasts — everything is black and white, without nuance.
Now, I’ve been in meetings where a scene like this would have been put on the potential chopping block. “It’s too long a scene,” someone would say. “It doesn’t directly affect the plot, let’s cut it,” another would chime in. “It’s a great scene,” a third would say condescendingly, “but the preview cards tell us that they need to focus at that point in the film.”
In other words, it doesn’t need to be in the film. Now, while I’d disagree with that, the difference between a movie that succeeds on many levels, and one that is so focussed that it ultimately falls apart, might be the attention to character detail that the scene with Davis provides. What the people making the comments in the preceding character never take into account is that the believability of our main character’s situation relies on, is the believability of the world around it. Davis’ character pushes the overall meaning of the film closer to clarity because it tests the audience’s assumption of what truth really means, and what it’s value is. If the struggle between Streep’s character’s truth and Hoffman’s is to feel real for us, it helps to have it be tested in other avenues than just the laser-beam focus of the Streep/Hoffman struggle.
In other words, sometimes it’s not about how the story progresses, but in who is helping us to get the story. Streep’s characterization is magnificently clarified by Viola Davis’ (in much the same way that the lead teacher in THE CLASS has his character more clearly defined in a scene with the parents of a student than in the more obvious scenes with his own students) and a well shaped movie needs those scenes as much as it needs the shoe leather of the plot.
Tags: Hollywood, Filmmaking, Television, Movie, Filmmaker
The Indie Film Producer - THE WEEK THAT WUZ - CHRISTMAS EDITION
December 19, 2008
Click headlines for articles…
More ‘GRRRREAT in ‘08′:
-Top Buzzwords 2008
-The year that broke the rules
Female fare, 3-D made box office gains
Despite the dismal state of the economy, domestic B.O. revenues are running even with last year’s record-breaking pace . Apparently the truism about the movie biz being recession-proof is holding, …
Tags: Television, Movie, Hollywood, Oscars, Movie Theatre
The Showrunner - Putting the Show back in the Bizzle
December 18, 2008
What I like about producing original content for the digital world is that if it doesn’t work out you get to throw up your hands and insist that your website/start-up/show was in Beta mode the whole time — and then, with one click of a mouse, poof, all is forgiven, …
Tags: Movie, Movie Blog, Filmmaker, Television, Actor
The Documentary Producer - How I shot myself in the foot… PAL!
December 18, 2008
So in an attempt to be all artsy fartsy, I screwed myself! Over the past few years I have been shooting a documentary on this great little HD camera and skillfully selected 1080i50 to shoot in. Now, don’t ask why, it goes back to my undergraduate days in Colorado. Days that tend to be a bit blurry due to circumstances of my control:).
ANYWAY, I am shooting away and loving the footage and the subject. I get into FCP and throw the baby on a timeline and edit away. FIRST mistake was editing the whole forty minute film on a 1080i60 timeline thinking the conversion would be just fine. After all, one doesn’t have to render that conversion on the time line anymore! Great! Right?! NO.
So, I get all the way done, do an huge render and another huge render to find out that the conversion is less than sufficiant. I know what you techie type are thinking at this moment and well, keep those thoughts to yourself, or don’t! I would love to hear your solution. But this is my journey and damnit it has become my mission to stop anyone else from having to go down the long and winding road I traveled.
Here is where my research journey begins. I hop on line hoping to find the quick fix and nothing. Or at least very little. Digging through the depths of Google I happened upon a great website, CreativeCow.com. You see, my first attempt was to do a direct conversion from my FCP timeline to compressor. 
After a million different tests on my own, I finally found this one guy on creativecow.com who had the answer. Thank you Mike Shea…
Export movie directly from fcp to compressor
Choose Advanced Format Conversion - dv ntsc
Go to the inspector window, and in the encoder pane, click on video settings and change scan mode to - Progressive ( this gets rid of motion artifacts) (I SKIPPED THIS STEP BECAUSE I SHOT IN 1080I50 WHICH IS INTERLACED)
Go to Frame Control Pane and set Frame controls to on. Using the Standard default settings will lead to fast processing time, changing settings to better or best will lead to a long, long wait (83 hrs for best setting on my macbook pro) *SEE BELOW FOR SETTING I USED
When the processing is complete, put your ntsc movie back in compressor, choose the 90 minute best quality dvd setting, change gop setting from 15 to 7 ( this stops any pulsing of image in certain shots) I also add a noise reduction filter and the sharpen edges filter ( I set it to about 20, as I found the ntsc conversion lead to a softening of image across the project)
END SCENE
After a nail biting 24 hours of rendering it came out spotless! I was so impressed and relieved. Too bad there was a glitch on my end that I didn’t see while previewing the film so I knew I was going to be up against it again.
In the process of doing research I came across another option… Nattress.com A ton of people thought this was the better option and was supposed to save me time. So in a huge time crunch to get my project off the computer for the film festivals I decided to give Nattress a run the second time around. Mistake? Maybe.
Graeme, the owner, was very helpful in the beginning as I bumbled my way through the program. Then my emails stopped being answered leaving me quite frustrated. Below is the process I used to get marginal results - there is still a ton of trailing on the image.
Make my 1080i50 a quicktime movie like you said.
Putting that clip into a 1080i60 timeline and placing my clip on it.
I put on the conversion filter and open the filter menu on the clip.
my settings are as follows 1920 x 1080
not nested
upper
upper
pal to ntsc
not anamorphic to letter
high quality is checked
not ntsc dv
not progressive output
de itnterlace normal
tolerance 10 (as it comes)
Anti alias 0 (as it comes)
motion blur 15 (last time it was 100)
pulldown offset o
put the clip in the source clip box
I then”render all” on the time line - It appears there is another way to do this from watching your video, but I can’t quite figure that way out.
that rendered clip i export as a quicktime movie
and place it in the compressor using dvd 90 best. and render.
END SCENE
Like I said, not great, but good enough for the time being. As I am going back to make one more adjustment to the film, I will use the compressor again as the results were really good. But the time was forever and it ties up my FCP while doing it.
So I leave you with this information and invite EVERYONE with any knowledge on this subject to speak up!
And in the future, shot NTSC for US distribution.
CHEERS!!!!
Tags: Television, Movie, Director, Actor, Film Blog
The Script Reader - Comfort Films
December 16, 2008
(last, phoned-in blog before vacation, guys!) This thing is gonna be short. I gotta go buy some presents for others and a new mac for myself. Because having this page load in less than 1 minute is my Christmas wish and I’m going to make sure it comes true.
But Holidays, the time of family foods …
Tags: Movie, Director, Film Blog, Movie, Filmmaking
The Storyboard Artist - A few STORYBOARD GIGS before Christmas
December 15, 2008
I’m going to try to actually get a blog in on time this week. Last week was quite congested and full, as I’ve been working on two gigs at once.
One spot is a promo for the Academy Awards. The other is a Walmart commercial. Both spots are being directed by friends of mine (or are also mutual friends), which usually works out fine as you know what the other needs ad thinks.
The Academy job has lots of filters to go through, with the Oscar folk, ABC and the production team. I get told what to draw and I do it. No creativity on my part, and it’s not needed as they have a clear vision of what they want.
The Walmart job will probably come out during Black History Month (February, people) as it shows a traveling exhibition of African American history (it’s in an 18 wheeler) and it will also show (without hitting you over the head) a few every day inventions by African Americans.
Otherwise, I’ve squeezed out a little writing time while also preparing for the Holidays. I managed to wear myself a little thin and my body paid the price. Headaches and much needed naps.
I still await news on a couple of features that I am in the running for. Tense times, as we all need a job. Even trough all this, I have good friends and colleagues like Jim Magdaleno and Darryl Henly who will put the word out for me if they can’t do a job. They are both quality artists and better friends.
Oh, really liked the X MEN ORIGINS:WOLVERINE trailer. I sooooooo hope this flick is good. Yea, it’s yet another super-hero film. I’m not bored with them yet. I used to know someone named Tiger Ouderkirk and I said “wow, that’s a unique nick-name to go by”. Ten years later, a kid named Eldrick “Tiger” Woods pops up and sets the world on fire.
Same nick-name, a million times the impact. It’s all how you do it. Let’s hope WOLVERINE is better than ELECTRA…
Tags: , Director, Movie, Movie Blog, Film Industry
The Standby Painter - House of Mirrors, Radio Hell…
December 15, 2008
The Long, Strange Road to Working with a Bunch of Vampires on the Set of TwilightPart IV: House of Mirrors, Radio Hell, and the Little Piece of Plywood That Could: Dancing at Twilight
No matter how many movies I have worked on, no matter how many sets where I have painted …
Tags: Television, Movie Blog, Oscars, Film Industry,
The Indie Film Producer - INDIE FILM CONVENTIONAL WISDOM Vol.1
December 15, 2008
The Business of Film. Running a Limited Liability Company (LLC), dealmaking, attaching talent, getting funding, foreign pre-sales, chain-of-title, etc, etc, on and on up to number 661 on the production checklist. I have a copy if you want it. All for the low, low recession-era price of $14.95. But wait, …
Tags: Television, Film Industry, Director, Film Blog, Movie Theatre
The Storyboard Artist - THE STORYBOARD ARTIST STRIKES BACK
December 13, 2008
I’m doing three commercials this week! A Mcdonald’s job, a promo for The Academy Awards, and a Panasonic gig. It’s been a good week. I missed getting a dance movie at SONY. I sent some killer samples, too. Their loss. I am still up for a couple of features. Totally, unrelated, my son Joshua got an excellent character report from one of his teachers, who feels Josh is very smart and well behaved. Always good for a parent to hear. Running to an Visual FX meeting after today’s gig. Trying to get phone time with a manager who actually liked one of my scripts and wants to discuss it. We will see. It’s been a busy week.
Tags: Filmmaker, Director, Movie, , Filmmaking
The Casting Director - Stuff & Taxes
December 12, 2008
This week I went to Chicago to see a friend of mine in the play “Ruined” at the Goodman Theater. Wow! What a great show, the acting was fantastic, especially my friend who was the lead, Saidah Ekulona. The show transfers to the Manhattan Theater Club in February and I highly recommend that if you are in NYC at the time, go see this. Congratulations to Saidah and the cast!
Back in LA, I am winding down for the holidays. I have been doing a lot of casting workshops and I am slowly getting closer to building a clientele of actors who come to me for audition coaching. I love working with actors, and as so much of what I do is finding talent, it is super-fulfilling to help an actor book a job and/or realize what it takes to be prepared for an audition. Also, in these times it doesn’t hurt to have additional income :0)
I have been contacted by Student Filmmaker Magazine for an interview on how I got to where I am, so look out for that to come out soon. When I think about how I got to where I am, the first thing I think about is that I am still trying to get there, because where I am is not where I want to be, not in a negative way, I just have so much more to do! So, maybe as my New Year’s resolution I should think of what my goals are, because I think it’s time to step up my game and visualize where I want to be – or maybe I have been living in L.A for too long and now officially sound like someone from Southern California!
I have met with a lot of producers and directors over the past few weeks and I have been reading a lot of scripts, so I expect the New Year to be busy. “After.Life” is all cast, and my assistant Mark was amazing. He took care of so many things and made my life easy. It is important to have an assitant like that because Mark allowed me to do what I am good at, finding talent. Thank you Mark!
As the year comes to a close it is also time for me to do my taxes. I hate this part of the year, it is so bittersweet. On one hand you have Christmas, family, presents and on the other hand I have a tax bill looming, getting my finances together and praying that I can file by April. Oh, the life of a freelancer!
Tags: Movie Theatre, , Movie Bloggers, Movie, Film Industry
