The Editor - When Do I Make A Cut?

The Production Manager - It’s not what you know….

The Production Manager - It’s not what you know….

Another week down and I’m still working on development. Made a couple of steps forward finally, by engaging an ex colleague in the treatment and teaser. In fact this guy was head of development so it’s a clear case of who you know….                                                                   

He feels as I do that this idea has some substance to it (I keep wanting to say that it has legs but as it involves an amputee, I just can’t dammit) but more importantly he can pave the way to a direct line to an appropriate network, which is really just awesome.

But, this is the Production Managers blog not the development producer’s blog so today I’m going to write a little about networking. There are two reasons that this has come up recently, for one I am heading back to London for a visit soon and am using the time to network my ass off, more about that later. More relevantly I, as someone who once offered employment, often get calls, emails and texts from people looking for work.

This ranges from a direct text message, such as the one I received today which read:

Hi, this is xxxxxx xxxxx I worked with you on [name of show] and I was wondering if you knew of anyone in need of a PA.

To a faux friend / networking acquaintance who gets in touch when they’re looking:

IM: Still not found any work, getting so bored L

To the spec email:

Hi,

Cold Calling gives me the chills but I thought I’d send you my resume because I’ve just graduated from film school and am pretty sure I should be working already. I’m ready to direct because I took Directing 101 but I’m also willing to take any role like Producer, Cinematographer or PA. Here’s a link to my website www.iwanttheworldandiwantitnow.com.

Call me!

Xxx xxxx

Now it’s true I never actually received one quite like the last one but I do get plenty that are just like that and the cold calling part IS from a real email. In that instance I did what I always do when I receive an unsolicited email that is neither directed towards me nor particularly relevant. I replied.

My reply usually goes along the lines of…

Dear X,

Can I offer you some advice? If you’re planning to send unsolicited emails to people who you hope will employ you, you should really take the time to address it directly to them rather than to send one email to everyone on your list. This makes you look very lazy and doesn’t feel very personal for the person receiving it.

Best of luck

The Production Manager

I also usually ask them where they got my details. This separates those who don’t know any better from those who couldn’t give a shit. Those who reply and reply specifically to me get their resume read. Those who don’t are on my blacklist. It’s as simple as that people.

I’m not a big fan of the fishing friendships but they are a necessary evil as you never know when you’ll need someone in a pinch.

My advice is: if you’re trying to keep your name out there, drop people you know a line every once in a while to see if there’s work available and maybe let the person know what you’ve been up to work wise.  I wouldn’t advise cold emailing or cold calling people unless a) you’re amazing at it and have a strong success rate or b) you know someone in common and refer to them in your communications.

However in these desperate times (yes I said it, there’s a cold wind blowing through the media employment world these day and there’s no point denying it), sometimes you need to network. Sometimes you may wish to contact people you think would love to employ you if only they knew who you were because you’ve exhausted every other avenue. There are ways to do that if you’re considered with what you say. Always be polite, be brief and explain how you come to be writing to them.

As an example, I recently made a very good contact on LinkedIn using the following:

Hi there X,

I apologize for sending you an unsolicited email, I notice through LinkedIn that we have a couple of people in common and as you’re Head of Production, I was hoping to be able to send you my resume as I have excellent skills in the following areas……

…Best regards

The Production Manager

This email alone very nearly got me a job (scheduling conflicts prevailed). But it goes to show that networking, done right, can have an impact while networking done badly can have an adverse affect.

 

Now onto networking in London; I’ll be off in a couple of weeks and I’ll do my best to report from there what the cold media front looks like and hopefully be able to send back some optimism for a brighter time ahead. I’ve been reaching out to people I have worked with in the past to set up informal chats usually over drinks, where I will discuss with them what kind of jobs they do over in the states in the hope to get some of that work brought locally. Hopefully when they are next shooting over in the US I’ll be able to handle their project locally and I’ll finally be in a position to start offering work again. So brush up on your networking skills and remember a little goes a long way

Tags: Movie, Movie Blog, Film Blog, Movie Bloggers, Hollywood

The Standby Painter - Movies About Animals: Not Just for Kids

Why is it that the humans involved in the story are always children?  Why does every animal movie have to be considered a children’s story, made for a child audience?  The only exceptions that come to mind are Day of the Dolphin (made many decades ago, and only adult because …

Tags: Film, , Movie, Movie Bloggers, Movie Blog

The Genre Director - Bicycles, Testicles, and French Nicole Kidman…

Bicycles, Testicles, and French Nicole Kidman…the rush of speed on the senses, the power of the pedal on the environment. Movie trivia from the genre trenches.

Is an homage a rip off or a celebration? I prefer to think of imitation as the sincerest form of flattery. All genre directors try their hand at a range of standard set piece sequences on widely differing budgets, with varying degrees of success. If the result is still engaging an audience on DVD and Cable channels 26 years later, that’s gratifying, but a genre director really gets his rocks off when one of HIS films gets imitated!

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Remember my Nicole Kidman starrer BMX BANDITS, in which I had a go at comedy bicycle chase scenes. (It did not hurt to have future Academy Award winner John Seale behind the camera either.)

As a warm-up, here’s a BMX BANDITS trivia collectible: Nicole’s first scene in the film is taken from a French language print.

It kinda plays better in French, don’t you think?  Did the actress in the Paris dubbing studio know she was French-voicing a future Academy Award-winning star? Did she do Nicole’s voice in other French releases? Did it grow into a good living? I wonder about things like that. How often does one of the invisibles of our celebrity obsessed trade become the recipient of windfall good fortune? Over to you, French Showbiz researchers.

OK. Now take a look at this. A 30 second Australian TV commercial for BMX BANDITS that played Christmas 1983. The film was such fun to make. Perhaps it shows.

Please note the 2 year old kid at the end. We’ll get back to him in a moment.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Now here’s a BMX KUNG FU sequence from LADY IS THE BOSS produced by Hong Kong’s Shaw Bros., directed by Chia-Liang Liu.

They even imitated the costume design. Good for them! I wish I had included a martial arts fight in my building site chase sequence.

Now, back to the kid in the picture, with that expression on his face of uninhibited joy as the bikes fly past him down the escalator… He actually said “BMX Wow!” when we shot it. (For the TV spot they dubbed in a girl‘s voice for clarity) Well, that’s my son Eric, and 26 years later his enthusiasm for bikes is unabated. Here he is, doing some flatland. His bike will ride into shot after 12 seconds. Click this pic:

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Eric has a license but does not want a car. He bikes to work, in order to reduce his carbon footprint. I am proud to have a son who follows through on his principles. It’s one thing to talk the talk, it’s another to pedal 9 miles each way and save on all that carbon monoxide. We should all seriously think about using bikes for our short range travel. Walking’s good too.

The Dutch city of Groningen sets a great example by creating a bike friendly environment. Their view is that cycling is the life blood of the city, and have prioritized urban planning accordingly. Look at the space saving in this bike parking lot.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Bicycles and pedestrians rule the medieval-era city hub, cruising along on car-free dedicated pathways and short cuts. People also commute on bikes in large numbers from suburban housing spread out around the city to downtown jobs, via a ring-and-spoke network of paths.  Population 185,000. A recent survey counted 150,000 bike trips per day.

Bicycling is also good for your health. For those in the LA area, I recommend WHEEL WORLD in Culver City as the best place for a reliable purchase. Ask for Eric.

My son introduced me to some real life footage of bike messengers racing through the streets of New York. Check out this video. The audio has been removed for copyright reasons, just jog forward to 50 seconds. I think it will pique your interest.

Those guys (and gals) have big brass balls.

If you are in the mood for more, this time with musical accompaniment, here’s one of Lucas Brunelle’s hair raising adventures in urban traffic across the world.

Now there’s a Stunt Rocker!

Guess what? There was even a bicycle film festival in San Francisco….

http://www.bicyclefilmfestival.com/

Tags: Movie Blog, Movie, , Hollywood, Actor

The Production Manager - You can’t teach an old dog new tricks…

When I first found out I was going to be ‘The Production Manager’ I was sat in a hotel room devising daily schedules for the Rachel Zoe Project’s Fashion week shoot wondering to myself how on earth I was going to find the time for these weekly postings amid the 6 days weeks and 18 hour days.                                      

 

Thanks to the economy and stubbornness on the part of the US TV industry to actual give a hard working all rounder a chance, this has not been a problem I’ve actually had to deal with. Aside from a few pesky weeks on an abysmal MTV reality show that I hope won’t see the light of day, work has been very, very sparing this year, leaving me lots of time to pass on pearls of wisdom.

It’s hard not to feel a little like an imposter writing as The Production Manager while I’m not really managing any productions officially. I am as I’ve mentioned previously working on some development for a reality show, advising small outfits on budgets and pre production and working on a few bits and pieces of my own but I’m not balls to the wall busy, which is a definite pre requisite for Production Managing.

What I am doing with my spare time is learning as much as I can about the creative side, developing, producing, writing so when I find a good production to work on I’m able to offer a lot more than creative number crunching. Every other person I meet is a videographer who writes, shoots and edits their own stuff on their little identi-kit Macintosh computers, loading them on youtube and becoming local legends. I have to admit, it’s making me feel a little inadequate.

The one thing I do have over those people is a relationship with the networks, an understanding of what goes into making a series or a one of special aired to an audience of millions (and occasionally to audiences of 5000, I’m sorry to report) and the knowledge of how to do it right.

I’m trying to put this knowledge to good use and have recently begun working on a film making workshop for kids in the local area. This week we worked out how to break down their movie trailer into segments so we could think about what scenes we could film and then we had the children storyboard their opening shot, we taught them about establishing shots and close ups.  I’d like to tell you it’s rewarding but mainly the kids are bored when they’re not being creative – how very ironic. But it’s nice to know that they are at least aware that there is a planning process involved with film making.

Now, if I only we could teach this to the film schoolers and other creative folk my life would be so much easier.

 

 

 

 

Tags: Movie Bloggers, Filmmaker, Film, Movie, Actor

The Standby Painter - The Other Side of the Dream

Joking or only half so, we often like to say we are “living the dream” in the film business. Dreaming is more than a metaphor in the Business, however, and the dream has at least two sides.

When I work as a standby painter or a scenic artist, by the time …

Tags: Filmmaking, Movie, Movie Bloggers, Television, Film

The Independent Filmmaker - Down time equals prep time

This week I realized that for the majority of my working life the economy has been good.  Ever since I had my first jobs in high school I never had trouble finding employment.  I’m sure lots of factors played in to that, but I don’t think I ever felt the effects of a bad economy.

Now I have friends who have been laid off, relatives that have been forced to retire early and colleagues who are struggling to find enough freelance work to keep the bills paid.

I’ve had a few conversations recently with friends in various professions about the economy, and what I’ve learned is that what happens in a slow economy is that there are just no scraps to be had.  No scraps for the little guy, the new guy or the guy wanting to make a change.  There just is no extra.  Everyone clamps down on risk and the big boys  scoop up all the work.  No one wants to take a chance on someone or something new.  Everyone becomes conservative.

I have seen this in large tv companies battling for small budget shows they might  previously not have bothered with, commercial directors working with smaller crews and less fancy gear, openings for new young talent becoming even more rare, budgets continuing to shrink.

But with all things, there is an upside.

A teacher I had at NYU said something that really stuck with me.  He said “In our industry, you may have a lot of down time between opportunities, those are the times to work harder, improve your skills and be prepared to make the most of the opportunities when they do come along.”

Now is the time to learn a new skill, make a new contact, strengthen an old one.  It’s the time to absorb the world, write a spec script, learn how our industry is changing, apply to labs and workshops, make a crappy low budget film just for the heck of it.  Now is the time to do whatever you can to make yourself a better filmmaker.

The work will come back and if we’re all smart we’ll have used this slow time to get ready to accept the opportunities that will come with it.

Tags: Movie Blog, , Hollywood, Film, Director

The Editor - More Film School Tips

A few months ago I wrote about a talk I gave at this year’s National Association of Broadcasters (NAB) conference which I called “15 Film School Tips in 20 Minutes.” During that posting I gave three of those tips:

• Use L-Cuts — as much as you can
• Cut on action
• Matching Action is Overrated

Last week Marcin asked if I’d post some more. And, while you won’t have the benefit (??) of watching me leap around on stage, giving examples to these tips, I thought that it wouldn’t hurt to give you three more of them.

Attract The Eye

Let me start out by stating the obvious: filmmaking is all about manipulting the audience. Now, that’s not a word that I’m afraid of. If we’re good filmmakers we all should have stories that we want to tell other people. When we show our audiences our finished films we want them to be affected by them. For better or worse. When I edited HEATHERS there were clearly people who were affected by the film — some of them hated it.  Of course, a lot of people also liked it, equally as passionately. And that’s why I loved working on that film — it affected people.

But you can’t affect people in a direction that you want, without manipulating them. So, alot of filmmaking is about trying to get the audience to see and feel what you want them to see and feel.

Much of that is about controlling their eye.

There are three main ways to control the audience’s eye and you’ll usually use them in some combination. [I know that I’ve oversimplifying here. If you want to go into more details about this, come and take a class with me. You’ll hear more than you probably want to know about all of this.] The first is by size. If you’ve got five people standing in a row and one is taller than the other, the audience’s eye is generally (all else being equal) going to go the taller one. The second is by color. If you’ve got five people standing in a row and four are wearing black and one is wearing white — well, the audience’s eye is (generally) going to go to the one wearing white. The third control method is action. If four of the people are standing and one is moving in some bigger way, the audience’s eye is almost always going to go to the character who is moving.

This last point is the most potent of them all, for editors. We use movement to distract the audience from seeing mismatches, we use it to attract the audience’s attention to an important plot point, and we certainly use it to keep energy moving at a cut.

So what do all three of these points have in common? They are all about creating change. And that leads to point number two

Change Things

What this means that is that, if you want to impress a point on the audience, you can best do it by changing something at that point. Cutting from a wide shot to a closer one emphasizes what is happening at that point. Adding a piece of music emphasizes what is happening at that point. Dropping out most of the sound emphasizes what is happening at that point (look at the Caravaggio interrogation scene in THE ENGLISH PATIENT for a great example).

Put another way, if every scene in your film is high energy then none are high energy. If every moment in a scene is frought with deep pensive thought, then none of them will feel deep and pensive to the audience. A movie like IN THE BEDROOM was, to me, made much less effective since the lead characterswere constantly undergoing heavy, meaningful moments.

This means  you want identify these individual scripted moments in a scene.  Oddly enough,  I’ve written an entire book to help you do exactly that. It’s called THE LEAN FORWARD MOMENT and it takes you through this process in every filmmaking craft, not just editing. And once you identify these moments, then you can decide what things to change around them. The Lean Forward Moments are always identified with important story points, and there’s at least one in every storytelling chunk/scene in your project. Finding them, and then using that knowlege to help to make the audience lean forward and pay added attention to what you’re saying, is what effective storytelling is all about.

Matching Sizes

A corollary to the previous point is that you shouldn’t change anything if you don’t want the audience to lean forward and pay added attention. Don’t begin music at Point A, if you want the audience to feel an important point later on down the line at Point B.

Since changing lens sizes is an effective way of creating a Lean Forward Moment (banging into a closeup when you’ve been working in medium shots is a sure attention-grabber) you will want to make sure that you don‘t change lens sizes unless you want to. What this means is that, in a dialogue scene between three people, you should make sure that you have matching medium shots on all three.  That way, when you cut from one character to another, you’re not emphasizing one of the characters more than another, and you’re not calling attention to the editing moments if you don’t want to.

That’s also why most narrative directors will cover all of their characters in matching sizes no matter what size shots you use. If you cover Character A in both a medium and a clean single shot, you will make sure that you cover Characters B and C in both sizes as well. If you don’t have time to shoot all six set-ups (plus a wide shot of all three) then you should lose pieces of coverage on the least important person in the scene, though even that is horribly risky. Sometimes cutting from a series of matching closeups to a medium carries as much impact as cutting from the medium to the closeup.

In other words, changing anything on screen is going to have an affect on the audience. It would be WAY better if that affect was something that helped push your story forward rather than a side effect of a random production decision you made in order to save time or money.

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So there you have it.  Three more handy-dandy tips from Film School.  All without the tuition fees.

 

Tags: Filmmaking, Television, Film Industry, Hollywood, Movie Bloggers

The Casting Director - I HEART ACTORS

If an actor comes in with the sides for an audition and the page numbers say 1 of 3, 2 of 3, etc… If they are missing page 3 of 3 why are they surprised that they don’t have all of the sides? How much hand holding do I have to do? A rhetorical question, because the truth is that Casting Directors have to be very specific in everything we do in order to get an actor to audition to the best of their ability. I make the script available to all, I make the sides available to all, actors can call me for information, I am available by email, I reschedule and reschedule and reschedule actors till I am blue in the face and then after the 5th reschedule and the actor comes in for the Director, they admit in the office to the Director that they haven’t read the script! I want to cry. WHY DID I KEEP RESCHEDULING YOU? I know you are busy people, but if you are meeting with a Director, please read the script. It makes a huge difference in the overall perception of how a Director places you in his/her mind. Also, if you read the script and don’t like it, please do not come in to the audition…PASS! It’s ok, I will find someone who does want to do it. My feeling will not get hurt.
I was watching a Casting Director being interviewed on a web-series about Casting Directors, and she was saying that the reason she loves casting is that she “loves actors.” I have heard this a lot from Casting Directors. I am now going to shock all of you; I don’t think you will ever hear me say, “The reason I am a Casting Director is because I love actors.” I love casting because I am passionate about finding the right actor for a role in a film for a Director/Writer who writes stories passionately. I admire actors, I wish I could be as creative and be as talented in what I do in my field as some of my favorite actors practice in the craft of acting, but to me, saying you love actors seems weird. I love the craft of acting and I respect actors who transcend themselves and make a performance so detailed and flawless that I am swept away into the story that I am watching or casting. To me, that is where the love is. I am not passionate about actors, I am passionate about good acting. It is what I teach, it is what I preach, and it is how I try to make the best cast come to a film. When I say to a director, “This actor is really good,” I mean it. I am not just saying it.

I love actors when I see how well they bring a film to life. I do use or bring in many of the same actors when I am casting a film, or try to, because I know that they will give 110% on set. I see as many actors as possible for a film. I have a policy of never shutting out an actor because their previous audition sucked. I give second, third, forth chances…but by the 5th time, not so much…Maybe I do “love” actors on some sub-conscious level. After all, I was one a long time ago. My love for actors is my respect for what an actor does, goes through and gives emotionally to a script and developing a character. But in a sense, everyone working on a low-budget film is doing the same thing an actor does. The DP, AD, PA’s are all spending crazy amounts of time on getting the vision of the director/writer on the screen to look the best it can look. We are all in it for the best intentions: to make a great film.

So, in the spirit of me maybe admitting to myself that I do love actors, I give you the website to a smart actor, one who knows how to market herself and an actor whose talent I respect. I have cast her once, I am sure I will cast her again soon… www.jamiesorrentini.com

I am still in Hawaii and casting is almost complete. I had dinner tonight with two of the cast members. It is an exciting time when you see your hard work come together…

Tags: Filmmaker, Director, Film Industry, Movie Theatre, Movie

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