What a turbulent week it has been - many things happening at the same time to the point where I was angry with myself for allowing myself to let one thing impact on another.
Last weekend was relaxing and a complete 180 to what this week has been. Mary and me canceled the trip to White Island at the last minute as the weather forecast said gale force winds and it was highly unlikely that the tour would have gone ahead plus it was bad weather on Friday as well - so driving down to Whakatane would have been one massive mission. So instead we made an impromptu program and went up north - not too north though. It was a lazy weekend exploring some wonderful countryside and the gorgeous beaches that NZ has to offer, eating lovely food and simply lazing about. It is much easier to just show the photos and show the beauty that the trip turned out to be.
The road trip
The 'crowded' path to the beach
Road to the Seas
Anchored boats at Leigh
The hideaway
PERFECT
Everyone is a traveler
Ready to fly
What do you mean this is the end of the beach?
A room with a view
The rain coming in
Everyone enjoying a Sunday lunch
The journey continues
This week started off with an unexpected system shock with a meeting between 2 of us producers for 'Nowhere to Love' and the legal firm representing the movie. We are trying to sort out the matter of rights and title to the movie, so that the work on the script can start again. The meeting went well but was a definite shock to me as I wasn't expecting quite a few things that came out of the meeting. So after having a think I have decided not to direct 'Nowhere to Love' - I will only be attached to the project as a producer - that is once the 'rights' thing gets cleared up. More on that once things are a bit more clear about the happenings with the movie.
The meeting put me in a frame of mind where I couldn't really work on editing 'Five' - which was the plan as I got 2 days off in a row from my work at TVNZ. Thank God for the acting class in the evening, which snapped me out of it. Tuesday was spent trimming the cut further with 'Five' and it is now down to 74 minutes minus the end credits - so the final duration will probably be around the 78 minute mark. Wednesday was my first solo shift in a new work area at TVNZ and it was exciting - so now I will be jumping between different areas, which is a great way to work.
Over the past couple of days I have spent about 2 hours a day working on the first rough colour grade on FIVE - so that when we submit it for consideration for the Auckland International Film Festival - it is not as rough and visually jarring. Benji has started doing the first audio clean-up pass, so that the audio levels are consistent and don't take away from viewing the rough cut. The deadline for getting the DVD screener in for the selection process is this coming Friday (I managed to get a few extra days for the project) and it will be long work days till that point. Once the screener goes in - we need to keep chugging away on sound and possibly start arranging for some ADR sessions before one of the talents leaves the country for her OE (Overseas Experience). Ilke Gers - a friend of one of the talents has come on board to design the poster for the movie and I am looking forward to how that's going to shape up - I am definitely excited about it. So yeah - there is a whole lot of 'Five' on my mind plus there is my usual freelance work occupying the rest of my time. Besides 'Five' - there is atleast one solid project on the horizon (no - I am not talking about 'Nowhere') and details about that will follow once work on that project kick starts.
It is that time of the year where one has to file their tax returns and this time around there is a new person (with the same accounting firm) handling the Unkreative Artists and my accounts. It was amusing trying to explain to them why we are spending so much money on making a movie but not seeing any income straight away. I told him that I am still working on the movie and that income from the movie won't accrue anytime soon since I have to finish editing it and sell it and then hopefully see some returns before the end of the next financial year - the voice on the other end said 'Oh!' as if they understood what I was saying but it was definitely more preplexed than before it asked the question. Keeping fingers crossed that we make some money on the movie this time. If we don't then the next movie will be truly 'zero budget'.
That's it from me for now.
Till later
Amit
[BTW - I just laid a complaint to the police because there was this car which followed me for 2 nights in a row now- it is too much of a coincidence, especially when this has happened when I return from my night shift at TVNZ at different points in time. It is a bit bizarre so thought I would mention it - nothing to worry about yet. It must be my vivid clarity of instincts but will get to know for sure if it happens again. How is that for topping off a crazy week? The car registration no. is WC 3149 incase you are wondering.]
Not that the blog is going to become a weekly kind of a thing but it just happens that I got drowned in sudden splurge of work - small things which needed to be sorted out straight away.
Weekend was a lazy one for the most part but had a lovely Sunday with Mary. We went to Muruwai beach and it turned out to be a beautiful day - not sunny and it didn't rain either. Oh and my usual way of making french toast received an upgrade with some fried banana and bacon and maple syrup (courtesy: Mary) ; and it was yummy. Muruwai beach was really busy for some reason - even though it was a Sunday. Oh well... here are some photos from the Muruwai trip -
Muruwai Beach (the far end - thats why there are less people)
A view of the beach from top of the hill
Mary is amused
"I will do anything for catching that one little fish"
The Gannet Colony - the trademark of Muruwai beach
A lady taking her baby for a stroll
"Give me the stick. I wanna fetch it."
Mary and me
I have just come back from the first class with Michael Saccente and the only way to describe it is that I am feeling very alive. It is a great bunch of people in the class - coming from different backgrounds and I am sure that it will turn out to be a really exciting 80 weeks. :-)
Earlier last week - I had a catch up meeting with Richard Collins over 'Nowhere' and trying to sort out how we move the project forward - including sorting out the rights to the script - which has become a little bit entangled because of the project has shaped up. Unkreative Artists started off the project and paid for the initial amount for the script - which meant that Unkreative Artists holds the rights. As the project gained a couple more producers and a new company - NTL Ltd., was formed for the purpose of the movie - the rights related to the script were never really sorted out and it was assumed that the rights would be transferred to NTL Ltd. Jordan - the script writer, luckily enough (for Unkreative Artists) did not sign the renegotiated contract because of delays on both sides in sorting out the renegotiated contract - which meant that I finally had the chance to sort this mess out, as Unkreative Artists is afterall a company. And to me it just didn't make sense that Unkreative Artists pays for a script which will be exploited by NTL Ltd. - so I got talking to Richard and we have already made progress over the course of action. Now it is just a matter of implementing the steps properly - in order to resolve the matter satisfactorily for the 3 parties involved in this. There were a couple of other matters and they too need sorting out. Once all those things are sorted then we will take the script back to the treatment stage and start working on it again. The other thing that I am going to do is take down the 'Nowhere to Love' website till the project regains momentum and gets back on its feet again - and then NTL Ltd. can pay for the website and design.
In the meantime I have started designing the website for 'Five' and I have finally settled on a design which I like - so now it is a matter of finishing it off and uploading it. And then there is the upcoming shoot this weekend - where we will be shooting the opening scene and a couple of pickup scenes to tie things up with the movie. It looks like the score for the movie will be delayed a bit but hopefully we will still hit the deadline for the Auckland international film festival.
On the movie front - managed to watch 'The White Masai' - which is very nicely done and is mesmerizing and beautiful; 'Hot Fuzz' - a movie which has you chuckling for its entire running length but still you need to be an action movie aficionado to laugh out loud. On the documentary front I watched 'Scorsese on Scorsese' which was enormously entertaining - the best bit was the American express credit card advertisement featuring Martin Scorsese. Check it out
The other documentary I was looking forward to was 'Behind the Scenes' of 'Children of Men' - I really wanted to know how they managed to pull off some of the incredible sequences. I was a bit disappointed that they still did not touch on how they managed to stage the single shot war sequence towards the end of the movie. The interesting bit was seeing how they managed to pull off the opening blast in the movie and also the car chase sequence where the camera is always inside the car following action inside and outside the car.
It is great that India is out of the cricket world cup. I think someone needs to drive some sense into the Indian masses that it is not the end of the world. Every country has it's sporting obsessions but I think Indians go a bit overboard with their obsession for the game. Let me correct myself - the Indian sub-continent takes the game a little too seriously. The keyword is that it is just a game - nothing more and nothing less. Personally, I think the cricket world cup should be stopped because of Bob Woolmer's murder but that's a fool's wish because there is so much money riding on the game that one person's death is not important in the overall scheme of things.
Today was the first proper day of editing where I got a proper 8 hour shift and it was good. I had been sneaking in about 3-4 hours of edit over the past couple of days so that the assembly would keep progressing nicely. At last count I have assembled about 38 minutes of the movie - which is not bad going considering that I have probably put in about 24-25 hours edit time into that. The real challenge in editing usually starts when the assembly is done and you start trying to get the pacing and rhythm right.
It is holiday season and most of the country is on a holiday break. I still find it amusing as to how almost the country comes to a stand still during this period. The shoppers don't mind it though since everyone is out shopping and this year there was a record spending spree leading up to Christmas where the total amount of transactions through credit cards and debit cards hit NZ$ 196 million in 1 day (on Friday)- which to me is absolutely insane as it does not include any cash or cheque transactions either. People find so much comfort in materialistic things when it is a feeling of goodwill and sharing that counts. Even if half the people did one good deed on that day the world would be a better place to live in.
On Christmas eve - i.e Sunday evening, I went and had dinner with friends at a Thai restaurant - the food was a bit expensive but really yummy. On Christmas evening I was invited to a lovely dinner with Lance and his family. The Christmas dinner was heaps of fun and was rounded up nicely by a table tennis tournament, card games and some lovely food.
I have been bad over the last week or so, in the sense that I haven't sent anyone any Christmas greetings or text messages or emails. I am so caught up with editing the movie that the dose of reality just jars me. So you can say that I have been really lucky that some people thought it worthwhile to drop me an email or a text wishing me the best for the holiday season but a couple of text messages have been really frustrating as well - they are from numbers I don't have on my cellphone. They obviously know me and have gone to the pain of wishing me but when I text them back wishing them the same and asking who they are, I don't receive any reply back. How annoying is that? I am not being an arrogant son of a bitch or anything, I genuinely want to know who it is because I don't have their number on my address book. We can make life so complicated sometimes.
I found out today that freelance work for me at TVNZ would start from the 3rd week of January, so now I have to really make my savings stretch that much more. On the other hand it is fantastic - as it gives me a good 3 week solid run at editing the movie and I can possibly get it to the half way through the rough cut stage by that point.
It has been a relaxing sunday - sort of - I got to doing something which is almost 5 months overdue - upload more of the pics from my trip to India. See the process is a tad hard for me as I have to short list the photos (don't want to upload a gizillion pics), which capture that location without repeating the moments. And after shortlisting I then have to change their image size and then upload them along with the description for each pic. So in short - it does take time.
I uploaded photos from the part where we were in Hyderabad - the capital of Andhra Pradesh. Most of the pics are from our trip to Golconda Fort. I was sick for most of the trip - I was down with heavy fever, so we did not go out as much as we would have liked to but it was still a memorable stop over. The photos also include the series of photos which made Lance into an 'international monument'. You can view the photos from Hyderabad HERE.
Since the winters are fast advancing - I thought I would take the opportunity to put up photos from the summer of 2006. I am sure if you read the blog regularly you would have seen the small pics - but HERE are bigger sized pics all in 1 place.
I also took the opportunity to watch a 1929 russian documentary/movie titled 'The Man with the Movie Camera' and it was an amazing experience. To me it is a true classic and it is visionary in all aspects. It is a marvel both from camera point of view as well as editing point of view. It is a must watch, if you can get your hands on the DVD.
The other movie I watched was ' Knots' - which was an ensemble comedy based in New York. It was quite funny despite some predictable themes. Most of the actors were on their mark but what did not work for the movie was the 'tv' feel - it never felt like a feature film per se but felt more like it could have been a pilot for a TV series or someting.
Now just about ready to hit the bed - time to prepare for a long week ahead. Ciao, Amit
It has been an incredibly productive saturday. Caught up with Jordan (the script writer for 'Nowhere to Love'), over the phone regarding the script - along with Richard. It is definitely an exciting phase of the storytelling process, especially when everyone is tuned into the story and working to make it even better than what it is right now. I still have to clean my room but the good thing is that I cleared up my study table, so I can actually sit and work without having to worry about other flatmates in the lounge. But it now means that all the stuff on the desk is now on the floor but that's a task for tomorrow.(:-)
I have uploaded the travel photos when Lance and me stopped over at Hong Kong - you can view them HERE. It truly was an amazing place and I think to enjoy it one needs atleast a week there to view all the major attractions without rushing through them.
I was in mood for some cooking - and I did not want to make the usual dishes, so I tried something new with no prior idea of what it will be. The dish turned out to be yummy and got a compliment from my flatmate who could smell the aroma, coming up the driveway. I think I will name the dish- Asian Delight chicken. Here is the recipe below if you wanna try it out.
Ingredients
500 gm diced (skinless) chicken
2 tablespoon extra virgin olive oil
2 teaspoon crushed garlic
2 teaspoon crushed coriander paste
1 teaspoon red chilli powder
1 teaspoon garam masala
2 teaspoons salt
1 tablespoon soya sauce
2 generous scoops of butter (normal one which we use on bread)
Preperation
Heat 2 table spoons of extra virgin olive oil in a non stick wok, on high.
Add 2 teaspoons of crushed garlic and stir till all of it is evenly spread out across the base and is slightly brownish in colour.
Add 1 teaspoon of red chilli powder and stir nicely into the oil and crushed garlic in the wok.
Add the diced chicken to the wok and stir nicely till it starts getting a little brown (after 4-5 minutes).
Add 2 teaspoons of crushed coriander paste and stir chicken well for another 3-4 minutes.
Add 1 teaspoon garam masala and 2 teaspoons of salt and stir chicken for another 4-5 minutes.
Keep cooking the chicken, stirring it occasionally. The chicken will leave water but keep cooking on high till the water dries out.
Add 1 tablespoon of soya sauce to the chicken and stir fry for another 2-3 minutes.
The chicken should now be dry and giving a nice aroma. Add 2 generous scoops of butter to the wok and stir fry the chicken till it is nicely fried in the butter. This should take another 2 minutes.
Remove from the wok and serve hot with rice.
[Tip - At any point if you think the chicken is getting stuck to the bottom reduce the heat to low for sometime while carrying on the cooking (I didn't have to do it).]
It is yummy and my flatmate and two of his mates who have come over for a BBQ can vouch for that because they were interested in knowing what I was cooking and really liked the taste of the finished product - when I got them to taste a little bit of it (I always tend to do it because you loose your sense of smell after a time while cooking). So I am happy that this time the cooking experiment worked.
Loads of paperwork to go through over the next couple of days, so I better get back into it. Till later, Amit
I have been a bad boy today..I was supposed to reply to my huge backload of emails but what do I do: I sleep - for most of the day. I have think I will start answering the mails straight away and maybe I will cover some ground.
I have uploaded some more photos from the trip to India- this time specifically the short trip through to Amaravati and Guntur. Amaravati is considered a holy place and four days after we went there - there was this massive buddhist event happening there: Kalchakra, so the security was no doubt really heavy and there were a lot of buddhist monks roaming around. After Amaravati - I somehow managed to convince everyone to do a brief stopover at Loyola Public School in Naalapadu (a township near Guntur}, since I wanted to check out the school which had a huge impact on my personality. So here are some pics from that day.
I found a place where they cook some nice won-tons which have meat filling in them.. The reason I liked those are because they tasted like Momos - one of my favorite dishes. Momos are a north east indian delicacy and here they are called Dumplings (I think) at the chinese restaurents. I should check out one of those soon and then make a comparision between them.
I sat down and started compressing and uploading photos from the trip to India...I know it has been long overdue and thought I should start off the process by doing the stuff in smaller batches, so it doesn't seem too much like a task. First batch of photos - from the trip to Vijayawada and Tukuluru. You can view the pics HERE.
The day of auditions was again interesting and I think I will start viewing the tapes and shortlisting soon. I am feeling tired - somehow the auditions are exciting and energy draining at the same time.
The road trip
The 'crowded' path to the beach
Road to the Seas
Anchored boats at Leigh
The hideaway
PERFECT
Everyone is a traveler
Ready to fly
What do you mean this is the end of the beach?
A room with a view
The rain coming in
Everyone enjoying a Sunday lunch
The journey continues
