2009 May « 12 Films. 12 Weeks. There are worse ways to spend a summer.

Shoot 1/12

May 31, 2009 at 12:22 am | Posted in Mike Lavoie | Leave a comment
Tags: beer, exhaustion, masochism, perpetual motion

There is a physical and spiritual exhaustion that comes at the end of a day of filming that is unlike anything else I’ve ever experienced. You rise early, you shower and shave, you rehearse, you shoot, you repeat takes, for every possible reason, you contend with egos and the elements and at the end of the day you hug everyone, have a beer and go to bed.

Tomorrow Keith and I start editing and figuring out our team for next weekend. Friday we post OLD LOVE. Saturday morning we shoot the next one, Saturday night we hug everyone, have a beer and go to bed. Sunday we edit and plan.

Round and round we go on the mad carousel that is 12in12.

Posted by Mike

P.S. James Creque says hi. He’s not blogging yet. YET!

Shooting on “Old Love” is wrapped!

May 30, 2009 at 11:30 pm | Posted in Keith Boynton | Leave a comment
Tags: perfectionism, team spirit, work ethic

Early on in discussing the 12in12 project, we agreed that we would do one- or two-day shoots, depending on the complexity of the script. “Old Love” is a pretty demanding script. It’s nine pages long (near the limit for this project), it’s tonally delicate, and it contains eleven distinct scenes. Our shot list included thirty-five separate shots. If ever there was a candidate for a two-day shoot, this was it.

For various reasons, we scheduled it as a one-day shoot. And with the grace of the gods, we got it done.

We started shooting just after 9:00 AM, and wrapped just after 10:00 PM. Early shots were plagued by inconsistent sunlight and relentlessly noisy traffic; once we moved indoors, we were hampered by our limited lighting equipment and our limited collective experience with lighting. Luckily, our team was tough, enthusiastic, and open to the unusual, so holding up a sheet over a window to block out light – or whatever absurd measure was necessary to get the shot – didn’t raise any objections. It’s a great feeling when a team comes together and takes a project on as its own.

As director, I made (of course) countless mistakes, and I think the biggest one was insisting on too many takes early on. It slowed down the process, and it forced us to rush to finish as the day wore on. I still believe that in order to do my job, I have to keep rolling until I see what I want, but I think I need to learn to recognize that moment sooner.

Live and learn. There are eleven more shoots to go. But first, it’s time to dive into editing those endless takes …

Posted by Keith

We Shoot in 2 Hours.

May 30, 2009 at 6:52 am | Posted in Keith Boynton | Leave a comment

Quarter to seven. At the moment, I’m the only one awake at 378 Bond. Robb and I stayed up till about 1:30 working on a shot list, which was pure cruelty on my part (he’d already had a long week), but it should pay off later on. Of course, all of the things that we should have done to prepare began occurring to me as soon as my head hit the pillow. In fact, it seemed like the magnitude of the whole project came home to me all at once, in its full mad urgency. I allowed myself a few moments of worry; then I breathed deeply and thought about stupid things until I fell asleep.

This really is a monumental task we’ve taken on. And we really are going to be scrambling to keep up with an ever-escalating workload. But we’re gluttons for punishment, and we have reserves of energy that even we do not suspect.

Bring it on.

Posted by Keith

We shoot in 12 hours!

May 29, 2009 at 10:36 pm | Posted in Mike Lavoie | 1 Comment
Tags: boobs, john ortiz, philip seymour hoffman, rehearsal

It’s funny, after doing the 24-hour film race, any amount of preparation feels like a lot. We are treading an interesting line here, we have some time, not nearly enough for a conventional shoot, but here it feels like just enough. We had a five-hour casting call but have done little actual casting. Keith, James and I have spent the past few weeks writing but we only have a few truly polished scripts, the rest are all drafts in varying degrees of disrepair. It will be fun to see how our pages of meandering Courier 12 evolve (or don’t) and which actors fill which roles.

We had our second and final rehearsal with Elia for “Old Love” tonight, on set in Brooklyn. With Keith and Robb circling us like velociraptors, figuring out the shots for tomorrow, Elia and I picked up the line or two we dropped the take before and kept working the scene. Elia and I actually worked together over a year ago in a scene in the LAB theater master class. We were mostly naked during the scene and in the final performance, which was attended by LAB directors Philip Seymour Hoffman and John Ortiz, my face accidentally ended up amidst her cleavage. I can only hope that our old rapport shows up on screen and that my face somehow gets in her boobs again.

By the end of day tomorrow, we should have some on-set photos and maybe even some video online!

Stay tuned!

Posted by Mike

Home Again, Home Again …

May 27, 2009 at 9:12 pm | Posted in Keith Boynton | Leave a comment
Tags: blogging, in-flight wifi, self-promotion, twitter power

Writing this on the flight back from California. I’ll be posting it in the air too, which blows my mind, though perhaps I should be used to the magic by now.

Last night, at dinner, I saw an eye-opening demonstration of Twitter’s speed and power. Historically, I’ve been afraid of technological progress, and deeply wary of self-promotion, but I’m trying to get past those hang-ups. They’re doing me more harm then good.

So I’m blogging. I’m tweeting. I’m sending out the occasional mass e-mail, and using my Facebook page to publicize what I’m working on. Some of it comes fairly naturally to me, and some of it doesn’t, but I’m going to keep at it. I’ve been coy and passive for long enough.

More to the point, LA is behind me. “Vacation” is a memory. It’s time to shoot/prep/shoot/prep/shoot/prep/shoot/and-so-on. It’s going to be a real crucible of a summer.

I’m looking forward to it.

Posted by Keith

An Ill-Timed Appeal, An Ill Team Congeals

May 27, 2009 at 12:32 am | Posted in Mike Lavoie | 1 Comment
Tags: law, miscariage of justice, moving on

I’m writing this on Amtrak train 137 headed to Washington, DC with my MacBook, one of the two suits I own, and a toothbrush. My elderly college next-door neighbor has been suing me and my old roommates for seven years and tomorrow is his final appeal (really long story). There are about 40 items that need doing in NYC before we start shooting Saturday morning, but most of that will to wait for the American Judicial system to have its way with me one more time.

Usually these annual trips to my old stomping grounds fill me with dread and a mixture of anxiety and fury that is hard to describe. It’s like being kicked in the balls by a twelve year old over and over and not being allowed to fight back. I used to wish it were the 1950’s, or better yet, the 1850’s; times when a neurotic old codger interfering with the life of strapping, hot-tempered young man like myself was really a very bad idea.

But this time I can’t seem to summon up the familiar hurricane of hatred for this man. I think my emotions are busy in other parts of my soul, working out a few clunky moments on “Old Love,” emailing Keith and Robb, reading new scripts, making sure the cast and crew are all on the same page, even Tweeting for lord’s sake. This trip is a complete waste of time, to be sure, but all the same, it’s never too bad to sit on a train for a few hours and watch the trees pass by.

Keith gets his vacation, I get mine.

So it seems one chapter of my life is set to close and a new chapter is prepped to begin. And it’s kicking off with a killer crew; from the “Queen Bee” team, we have Keith at the helm, Stey behind the D90, Creque and I in front, Art “Arturo” Chan assisting, and Brian Testa is back to make sure the sound is pure as a driven snow goose. And a couple new faces to boot, just to keep the rest of us on our toes.

It’s not going to be easy to stare evil personified in the eye tomorrow, but I have a fantastic and crazy project to hurry home for. I don’t have the time or energy to destroy the enemies of yesterday.

*****

Hours later, after some lo mein and a Blue Moon, I got this fortune in my fortune cookie: “A thrilling time is in your immediate future.” Indeed.

Posted by Mike

The Calm Before the Storm

May 26, 2009 at 2:33 pm | Posted in Keith Boynton | Leave a comment
Tags: california, Coen Brothers, Steven Soderbergh, vacation

Sitting in my hotel room overlooking the beach and the Santa Monica Pier, with a breeze blowing in from the balcony and the morning smog slowly fading to reveal a brilliant sun, it’s hard to believe that in a few days I’ll be on set in Brooklyn trying to film eight pages in twelve hours without compromising quality or going insane. I feel guilty for being out here; I feel like I should be back on the East Coast, putting out fires and rubbing Mike’s shoulders and tending to our growing forest of GoogleDocs spreadsheets. I’ve been doing my best to keep up with things over the Internet – which is indeed where most of our tasks are located – but the physical distance, and the lulling power of Southern California, seem to act as buffers between myself and productivity. I’d love to work, really I would; but the thing is, I’m in La-La-Land.

Of course, there’s something appropriate about spending a few days in Hollywood (where I was over the weekend) before plunging into a summer of optimistic amateur filmmaking. The stars on the boulevard! The history of American cinema around every corner! The knickknacks! The tourism! The great golden prostituted dream!

On the plane out here, I saw Steven Soderbergh. At breakfast this morning, Joel Coen walked by. Perhaps these are omens! Portents! Heavy-handed foreshadowings! Maybe the universe is not-so-subtly hinting that 12in12 will catapult me into the exalted ranks of “directors people recognize on sight.” (Or maybe it just means I’m in Los Angeles.)

soderbergh coen keith apple

Oh, and I also saw Marilyn Manson. Hopefully, that doesn’t portend anything.

Posted by Keith

Writing Shorts IS Hard

May 25, 2009 at 7:54 pm | Posted in Mike Lavoie | Leave a comment
Tags: david lynch, screenwriting, short films

This is pretty unusual for me, but I’m going to go ahead and agree with Keith. Like him, much of my academic success hinged on pure word count. Coupled with solid grammar, flawless spelling and the judicious use of a thesaurus, academia could not flunk me. No matter how many rhetorical cul-de-sacs I found myself stuck in, I could always depend on overwhelming the reader with an army of well-worded rhetorical cul-de-sacs thereafter. It’s impressive and frightening that if you sound like you know what you’re talking about, people think you know what you’re talking about. Or at least they’ll give you an “A” for the effort.

Mike ponders the crushing difficulty of writing shorts

My writing has always been like a David Lynch movie. You know you just saw a movie and it was pretty and interesting, but you can’t remember what exactly HAPPENED.

The short film format is challenging because it demands you get to the point, and quickly. And efficiently. And the point doesn’t even have to be a POINT. It can be a feeling or explosion or joke, but there’s gotta be something.

But I’m learning that the time and page limit (we’re shooting for 3-7 pages) can be strangely liberating. I don’t NEED to fluff. I don’t NEED to drone on and prop up any ridiculous straw man arguments. I can say what I want to say and be done with it. And for the first time in my life, I feel like I’m getting close to actually saying something with a creative work. And that too is pretty unusual for me.

This weekend, I completed a one-take screenplay and a silent film screenplay; both under five pages. That brings the total number of completed drafts to nine. We also have an additional 12 films labeled “in progress/concept.” Plus, I’m owed another six by Keith by the time he returns to NYC.

Since we’ve never done this before, and it looks like no one else has, it’s hard to know if we are on schedule, ahead of schedule, or hopelessly behind. It always feels like hopelessly behind, but let’s not forget: we made a film in 24-hours and worst case scenario, we could just do that every week. But I’m not sure that we’d end up with as much as we’re capable of and I feel like I’ve spent enough time writing filler.

Posted by Mike

Telling Excerpts from a Stressful Meeting

May 25, 2009 at 4:03 am | Posted in Keith Boynton | Leave a comment
Tags: despair, quips, stress

These are a little out of date, but they tickled me, so I thought I’d share them:

“Don’t think of it like work. Think of it as play that’s ABSOLUTELY NECESSARY.”
-Keith

“So much depends on the cooperation of artists …”
-Mike

Posted by Keith

“Queen Bee” Make Out Outtakes

May 24, 2009 at 9:09 pm | Posted in Mike Lavoie | Leave a comment
Tags: angela perri, Film Racing, filmmaking, hilarity, James Creque, james fauvell, making out, Mike Lavoie, outtakes, Queen Bee of Mushroomtown

The good folks at FilmRacing.com sent us a few questions for an article on “Queen Bee” and one of the things they were most curious about was the infamous James-on-James make out scene. We decided we’d throw together a few takes and let everyone relive the awkwardness and hilarity with us! Hopefully the next 13 weeks will bring as much joy and laughter to our lives as these next few minutes did.

Enjoy!

Posted with glee by Mike