Friday, October 17, 2008

More on making Evil League of Evil Applications

Morgue has blogged about the process of making The Embezzler, and I thought rather than leaving any more lengthy comments on his blog I might write a little about it here. Jon had written an excellent though slightly long script for a short film, and had arranged for several people to help out with the filming. The script had several scenes - an initial interview, a song, a heist and a final interview. None of the scenes was overly long, but it looked like it might run to 6 or 7 minutes rather than 3. Debbie was going to play one of the characters, which was very exciting, but it also meant that filming would have to be very quick so we could get back home in time for Dom's bedtime routine. As Morgue has said, people arrived at Jon's at 10am, read through the script, and started looking at ways to simplify it to get it down to 3 minutes. When Debbie, Dom and I arrived just after 11am this process was still underway, along with prop making. We chatted, checked out Jon's apartment with its awesome balcony, and looked for useful things to do. Green Felt The first useful thing we found to do was help construct Jon's costume. As we'd learned from making With Mighty Power, it's possible to make pretty cool superhero logos from sticky-backed, coloured felt. We'd bought 4 different colours when we did that film and had only used two, so we threw the leftovers into our bag o'stuff to take to Jon's. He'd been meaning to spraypaing $ signs onto his suit, but the silver hairspray he wanted to use wasn't thick enough on the day to effectively $ sign up his suit. While Dom crawled all over the place, played with Debbie, Morgue, Margie, Cecile and Ming, and generally got really excited about being in a new place with new people, I started cutting out green felt $ signs. I did them freehand, and they didn't turn out too hideous :-) After showing Jon the first one and getting approval I got some help from Ming and Cecile, who'd finished making the paper shield (which ended up being cut from the script). Script Doctoring Morgue and Margie were already deep in thought when we arrived, trying to come up with a way to stay true to Jon's vision but simplify things down to 3 minutes. It's not an easy thing to do, and Debbie and I started making suggestions to further complicate matters :-) As I said on Morgue's blog we were helped by two significant factors: 1. Jon's script was cool. We were just trying to simplify it. 2. Jon really owned the project - his character, his script, his apartment :-) We all knew our job was to make Jon happy, so that was going to be our ultimate measure of success. Going through the major beats of the script, trying to hone in on what was essential, and having some back and forth on how to get where we needed to go was an interesting process. Both Margie and Morgue then went away and wrote their own cut-down versions of the script, which I thought was an excellent idea. Having two takes on the idea was great. I went and got some Subway (a LOT of subway) for Debbie and me to eat. When Jon and Jarratt got back from their props run Morgue and Margie pitched their takes on the script, I mumbled a few comments, and Jon and Jarratt gave their feedback. There was some discussion around how to move into the final section, and then someone mentioned the idea of 'speak to my lawyer' being a phone call, and it all seemed to fall into place. Costuming, learning lines, ordering pizza and tidying up the apartment ensued. It was later in the day than I'd hoped, but momentum was building up. Jarratt started unloading camera gear, and Dom enthusiastically climbed over all the bags and cases. When filming started Dom was looking pretty wired, but was more than due for a nap, so I took him down to the car and grabbed the stroller, and he was asleep within 5 minutes of starting on our walk. I didn't want to stray too far as there were ominous clouds overhead, so I prowled about the neighbourhood sending encouraging text messages and pushing my own personal script agenda (getting Jon to say 'I'm getting in on an evil technicality' and do a little dance). When it started spitting I headed back to the car, and Dom woke up as I transferred him to the car seat. We went out and did a little shopping, then returned to base. I hung out with Morgue and had crawling races with Dom in the corridor, then caught up with the crew for an ETA on finishing Debbie's shots. They were close, so I took the wee one out for a bite to eat, then returned to pick up Debbie and head home. Dominic was really excited by the whole day, new people and places and his fun afternoon with his dad. We thought he'd probably snooze on the way home, but he was far too full of smiles and energy. He did eventually get to sleep when we got home, but he still gets really excited whenever he watches the Embezzler :-) Editing Jarratt both shot and edited the film, and was a fantastic person to work with. Debbie was impressed by his speed and the confidence he instilled in the team. When it came to editing, I naggingly suggested he make an itty-bitty version of the film (a compressed wee file) that he could send through for feedback. Using a cool website (yousendit.com) he sent through at least 4 versions of the film, from the second day rough cut (3 minutes 17 without song) to increasingly polished versions of the film. Morgue, Jon, Debbie and I all made suggestions, Debbie made the Lairs logo, and it really felt like a team effort (with Jarratt doing all the work, but being very open to suggestions). So, it was a very cool experience which Dom, Debbie and I all loved. Not something we could do often, but very satisfying. And I'm very proud of our little movie!





























5 comments:

Anonymous said...

Good post. I was also very happy to get to be in the film as I was kind of a last minute replacement for the part when the other person cast couldn't make it. Unexpected acting bonus!

I had a dream the other night that The Embezzler got onto the DVD! I was also a little bit disappointed in the dream as Dom's application didn't make it but another one with a baby did. (The baby vid from my dream was very lame - just a baby in a jolly jumper for the whole film with a bad voiceover and incoherent storyline).

However, I don't think I necessarily have prophetic dreams. Last night I dreamt I was in a LARP playing a human during an alien invasion. My brother-in-law was playing one of the human-hating aliens and was disturbing dressed like John Travolta from Battlefield Earth. However, it turned out that he had a real gun with live ammo and was enthusiactically yelling "die human rats" and shooting furiously. Those of us playing the humans were hiding in the bushes thinking that we had to tell him that he had a real gun and shouldn't be spraying bullets around but everyone was too scared to move closer for fear of being shot by him.

-Debz

Anonymous said...

Nice coverage!

Yeah, I was going back over old e-mails on it the other day, and found the one where you guys said you could do like 11am - 4pm or something. I'd totally forgotten that! So sorry if I kept you a little longer than you intended - I had totally forgotten any timeframes you had indicated.

I think it could have been me who mentioned "speak to my lawyer". Or not. So much was going on...

Matt said...

I think it was much better for us - and Jarratt as the editor - to stay a little longer on that day rather than have to come back down and do more filming the day before the competition closed :-)

Unknown said...

It's really great to hear all these updates etc, so much cool film stuff has been done this year. I really wish I could have been there and involved.

debbie said...

Having a good female singer could have been awesome for the ELE :-)

I'm pretty sure we'll be making more short films next year!