This Savage Art

Whenever I hear of a filmmaker going through some horrendous experience with their film, whether it be at the hands of the money people or the weather or even because of their own inexperience, it weighs heavy on my heart. The current podcast of The Business talks about actor and filmmaker Adam Goldberg’s hell ride to get his film I Love Your Work to the screen. Likable guy, bad luck.

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Steven Boone over at Big Media Vandalism gives us some great insights into the savagely strange world of Sam Peckinpah’s film, Bring Me the Head of Alfredo Garcia. Relentless, gutsy and totally bizarre, Alfredo Garcia goes into some untested waters of the action genre. Oh, let’s face it, it’s a western…on peyote washed down with some tequila. So why are all you up-and-comers watching Scarface on a loop for all your cinematic inspiration? Read this instead.

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To say that shooting Full Metal Jacket was something like the experience of Vietnam itself is an understatement. While working tireless hours Matthew Modine happened to be documenting that experience and has transformed it into a scrapbook filled with gorgeous photographs and journal entries. Full Metal Jacket Diary is now available.

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In the recent issue of Filmmaker Magazine outspoken cinematographer/traveler Christopher Doyle checks in on politics, Asian Cinema, Marty and the shitpile that American filmmaking has become. Read the interview here.

Courtesy of Making the Movie

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For all the digital filmmakers out there and let’s face it, we will all be one day, I came across this great resource to keep you informed with new advancements in digital technology, production through post. If you will be in New York on November 13th you can come to their first east coast meeting. All info can be obtained from the Digital Cinema Society website. Make sure you check out the Tech Tips section.

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Mark Cuban and Todd Wagner’s company 2929 Entertainment spin off with Truly Indie to offer an alternative to the broken distribution model that has plagued so many independent filmmakers.

Truly Indie will enable theatrical distribution funded by filmmakers themselves, mainly through 2929′s Landmark Theaters, the country’s biggest arthouse theater circuit. Offering a twist on the service deal model, a filmmaker pays an up front fee that covers all distribution costs (marketing, advertising, and publicity). Securing a one-week run in at least five markets (or as many as twenty markets), the filmmaker keeps 100% of box office receipts and retains all rights to their film.

I have to say Wagner and Cuban are making some bold moves in the world of filmmaking and distribution. It’s a gamble and I’m a gambling man so I’m keeping my eye on how this all unfolds. Hollywood might want to also because if all of 2929′s new enterprises blow up they will be looking to xerox the blueprints.

Check here to read more.

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I haven’t been blogging all that much lately because I’ve been working on my new draft but I did want to add something to the blog that I thought would be helpful to myself and readers of this savage art… Whenever I come across some information in my travels whether it be by my own finding or someone else’s I will encapsulate it into a tip.

I found this helpful tip in Karl Iglesias’ column in this month’s Creative Screenwriting, volume 12,#5. The scope of the column covers how we all strive to create crisp, believable dialogue but can sometimes fall short of this task. In the pursuit of great dialogue one thing must be understood, the character wants something and is having a difficult time getting it. Words need to become action, after all that is what makes an effective screenplay.

Characters negotiate, exploit, coerce, inquire, seduce, irritate, provoke, impress, blackmail, warn or create a power struggle through forceful and confrontational dialogue rather than being sympathetic, aggreeable or conversational. This is what conflict is all about.

And, as we all know, story is about conflict so conflict, in one form of another, must be expressed in your dialogue. One way this can be achieved by having the character ask questions. Questions create a verbal jousting match. It can create a confrontational tone or a coercive one, that’s up to you depending on your characters motivation. Ask yourself what they want and what they are not getting when you start writing a scene and your dialogue will improve and flow greatly.

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This weekend was kinda shitty. Weather was miserable so I was destined to staying inside watching The Ballad of Cable Hogue. It is a real flawed gem from wildman director Sam Peckinpah. Let me just say this up front, I am a big admirer of his work. Peckinpah might be the most misunderstood genius in the world of cinema. The first time I saw this film was at Lincoln Center a few years back when they did a retrospective of his work including a new director’s cut print of The Wild Bunch. I was in heaven. On the schedule was this film. Forgotten and worn maybe like the man himself, I believe The Ballad of Cable Hogue was Peckinpah’s way of exposing how he felt about his own life in the film biz. It deals with an old coot in the west who is on the cusp of the industrial revolution in America. Always authentic, Peckinpah takes us through this heartfelt journey of American ingenuity from the lone loser’s point-of-view. He creates fortune from nothing and finds his life turned around only to be crushed by the inevitable, technology. As Cable Hogue, Jason Robards gives us insight into a man that just wants to be worth something in this world and in the end he is, to himself and the people around him. If you want to see how theme and character are skillfully intertwoven this would be a solid example along with most of Peckinpah’s better works.

Right now it’s only available on VHS and you might find some film techniques to be antiquated and some just plain laughable making Cable Hogue uneven but it still does not take away from it’s overall power. There have been rumors of Warner Brothers giving his catalog the serious treatment by way of a box set in the not to distant future. He will probably always be remembered as being responsible for creating the most violent films in Hollywood history but one thing you will always walk away with after seeing a Sam Peckinpah film, as Tom Petty says, even the losers get lucky some times.

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Ya got me Rob McKittrick but you don’t have my $10.50.

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My new adventure this week was jury duty. I postponed the last time around to do an editing gig so here I was spending two days in a holding pen waiting for my name to be called. Seems like the County of New York couldn’t get their shit together because Day One consisted of drinking coffee, reading Linda Seger’s book, Making A Good Script Great, being entertained by a great stand-up/jury clerk named Walter (thanks for making the time go a little quicker) and going over my outline for Where Are You Seventeen? I’ve been away from it for a while and now I’m ready to dive back in full force except after going over my outline I realized how disconnected I was from my own material. It kind of freaked me out because the last time around I was INTO the story. Creating an entirely new outline made sense and it worked except perusing it this time around made me see some holes, things were not coming together.

By Day Two I felt like I was getting closer to the original narrative thread I had but I have to say I was shook up by how lost I was. More coffee, more stand-up except not from Walter. A new clerk announced this morning that all the computers were down due to a water leak. After about two hours the repair wasn’t coming together like they expected so we all got dismissed. I’m off the hook for a couple of years and $80 bucks richer. Whooo hooo!!! Thanks County of New York.

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