Senseless
It has been 4 days since I have been to the gym but can't get myself to go there, especially when the back pain still persists and I might just have to get myself a massage or something soon..I watched half of 'Memories' yesterday as I started making small notes, to use while doing the audio commentary track, which I will be recording along with Lance next weekend. Benji is recording a seperate editor's commentary track back in USA and he will be sending it over once it is done. I might pull Rachel and Richard in to do a seperate audio commentary but I am not sure about it yet. All those audio commentary tracks will be going onto the NZ/Australia DVD, since Arkles Entertainment will be putting out the DVD which we give them {which is bloody fantastic..}
On a completely different note -the current government is being a complete idiot and has started pulling out valuable funding from PTE's {Private Training Institutes}. You can read one of the articles HERE. The problem is that there is no way that the government can decide which ones are low quality and poor courses, so even high capital courses like Film Schools will have funding pulled off from under their feet. I hope that they start making some sensible decisions soon otherwise they are gonna have one hellish year at elections, especially with National Party biting so hard at their heels.
An interesting page to check out if you want to know more about NZ Film is located here. It gives you a really good place to follow up links. I am sure you will enjoy it.
Anyway am off for now.
Amit
posted by Amit @ 6:55 PM
1 Comments:
Loved the movie… great look, great acting, great story.
Firstly I must commend you on the ambition of not making a talkie, but an action film. And I don’t mean to say that you just made an ACTION ala Stephen Segal. I mean ACTION most basic terms, as in something happens. You actually made a thriller. And it doesn’t hurt that it was at times thrilling. The first feature script that I finished (still the only one I finished) was all talk. When I was done it was like a ‘smarter’ Clerks. I am jealous.
To get back to what I said about Garden State… that feeling like a first movie… I didn’t get the same feeling from your film. I think that Zach Braff indulged himself in some ‘wouldn’t it be funny ifs’ and some ‘I’ll seem real deep ifs’. You made a story with depth that came out of a great story idea and great execution.
About the camera work (aka the look): I loved the handheld. It definitely lent urgency to action scenes and a casual feel to the relationship scenes. Also the short depth of field made everything seem very personal and almost claustrophobic. A great example of that in another movie is Changing Lanes with Sam Jackson and Ben Affleck. So many films use the camera blindly. The look was motivated. I shoot corporate video and the occasional side project and nothing impresses me more 'cinematically' than someone who knows when to move the camera and when not to. The same goes for lighting and sound, but I’m more tuned into camera.
I also loved the graphic feel of the wide shots. I get nervous about wide shots on miniDV cameras, but because you used shots (like at the beach) that were less about detail and more about bold images; the lack of pixels wasn’t an issue.
From what I can tell (maybe I’m wrong) your specialty is editing. I’m torn about what is good editing. Because there were flashes back and forth, tricks and clever story telling tools that I would praise the craft of editing except in those situations I would call that the art of good directing. The editor, which I see wasn’t you, did a great job because the scenes that weren’t supposed to be frenetic and mysterious were seamless. Good = you don’t see it. Thumbs up. A+. I’m more talking about the impressive ‘cuts’ that were more a decision to tell a story in a certain style. Good = Shot A juxtaposed with Shot X is better than A+B back to A…
I had a couple of concerns, questions and things I didn’t totally love. If you want to hear them I’d be happy to tell them to you. But they are minor things and I would have similar suggestions for any Hollywood or indie movie. And who am I? Nobody.
I lent the DVD to a friend who has the same camera. It was an attempt to kick him in the pants and say, look what we could do. I hope you don’t mind, I can charge him a rental rate and get you your royalty check.
Thank you for allowing me to see your film. It was great and I expect to see and hear more from you and about you.
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